#I do love the idea of Edgar having not only a good support system as a single(?) parent -

[sysig]

Second request: baby todd and Jake fluff perhaps? 💖

Day 12 - Little hands, my one weakness

[uncloseted]

okay i absolutely LOVE the jobs redux thing you posted so what type of jobs do you think GEN 3 would have? ❤️

Thank you! I'm so glad you liked them. I could have sworn I did the same thing for Gen 3 somewhere but I can't find the post so maybe I just thought about it in my head?

I also want to preface this by saying that Gen 3 is also a little bit more complicated than the others in terms of guessing what their futures might look like because we don't get as good of an idea of what their plans for their futures are. In gens 1 and 2, we mostly know which A-levels the characters are taking, which universities they applied to and for what, and we get a general sense of where they think their lives are headed. But for gen 3, we don't get as much of that.

Mini: I think Mini would do well as the editor in chief of a high fashion magazine, since she's someone who's really interested in fashion and trends and who's good at managing other people.

Liv: I think Liv would do well as a teacher or a school counsellor or something like that. She mentions going to uni, but she doesn't say what she's going there to study, and the only subject we know she takes is English Literature. So maybe she studied Psychology at university and then became a school counsellor.

Franky: One of Franky's hobbies is making stop-motion animation videos, and I like the idea of her pursuing something like that professionally. So maybe she'd be a stop motion animator, or a CGI artist, or a miniature maker for film sets. Something that's creative and time intensive but relatively solitary.

Rich: Rich goes to Bradbury College to study English Literature and Philosophy. Since Bradbury is apparently a college of Cambridge University, that gives him a lot of options for his future. I think I like the idea of him becoming a novelist, the kind that writes literary fiction about grief and death that gets nominated for important awards. I think he would feel like that's something Grace would be proud of.

Alo: I like the idea of Alo being a stay at home dad. I think he would be really good at it if he could get to the point where he recognizes that he's an adult with responsibilities and that he can't just be having fun all the time.

Matty: I have no idea what I think Matty would be doing as an adult. He doesn't have a lot of stability in his life that would allow him to have a career, and he turns himself in for a drug possession charge that would presumably limit his career options. I kind of imagine he would be the type of guy who always has lots of odd jobs and maybe has a band that plays music that sounds like "everything Edgar Allen Poe would have listened to if the synthesizer was created before 1964."

Nick: Nick takes English Literature at school, and I think we can also assume he took something like Sports Science, Physical Education, or Physical Science. I think he would make a great coach for a college rugby team, and I think he'd like having the opportunity to be a support system to the guys on his team, the same way his coach was a support system for him.

[cartoonfangirl1218]

BTS Inspiration of Winner’s Curse

I know not many people read my descendants fic, but hey it’s my Bday tomorrow and I feel like revealing some of the inspiration for it. This world building was actually what inspired me to start writing it down. Originally it was going to be from the POV of a Vk, and explore all the dynamics of the “new” Isle under the Coven of 13, and get into the motivations of each but as you can see that did not happen. I was intrigued by the idea of exploring a “sidekick” trying to be the hero and all that. Other notes are

Circe was originally going to be the mother of Malik, after having a fling with Mozonroth when she got sent to the Isle. Decided it was too much drama and discarded that.

There was going to be more focus on the power struggles between the mercenaries, the Coven and the authority figures. Was going to reveal Uma and Freddie to be siblings. Ended up sidelining Freddie.

Gaston’s daughter, Cosette, was going to have a role, becoming closer with Gil.

Atlantis characters were going to be part of the main group. As well as Black Cauldron characters. Also discarded.

Was going to redeem Drizella because I heard the original plans for Cinderella III was going to be Drizella redemption but they changed so they could give more development to Anastasia. So I decided I was going to do it. Dizzy would have been given more of a role.

Hans was going to be revealed as the cruelest villain. (Yeah I was going to make him a twist villain again. Be glad I did not).

Nasira and Mozonroth were going to be lovers before I decided on mother and son.

Diego and Ivy De’Vil would have had more a role.

Hercules characters would have had more a role. Including the Muses.

Ben would have had more a role somehow.

And that‘s about it.

But some things I am proud of in Winner’s Curse. Passing the Bedchel test.

A POC majority cast (This was completely unintentional but now I see it and counting it out, there’s four Agrabians, two WOC, and three European. Though I’ll admit I have not given Harry, Calix and Gil as much spotlight as I should. So my bad. But does Greek count as a white Euro? Idk, point is, unintentional diversity. Woo)

There‘s only two romances. Both are interracial. Also unintentional. Uma and Harry are totally together. And Aziz and Lala’s burgeoning crushes that will not end in a kiss after the final battle because it’s not important. Oh well. Attempts to explore PTSD, abuse, sexual assault and poverty.

The emphasis on family and friendship between characters.

Exploring the negative side of Auradon including it’s classist system, the Magic Ban, and the Euro-countries getting more resources and riches compared to the likes of Kuzcotopia and Atlantis and Atlantica,

Psychological studies(ish) and more character exploration.

Jay faces his dad!

Hook siblings!

Getting to mention tie ins to the Aladdin animated series, Legend of Tarzan animated series, Hercules animated series, Ariel‘s Beginning and soon Disney fairies books. And adding those characters.

That I finished 20 chapters! This is my longest fic ever! And just ten more chapters to go! I’ll get there.

Coven of 13: Villains dedicated to using their old magic to take over Auradon and be restored to their glory days once more. However they all have conflicting wishes with what the final plan should be.

Maleficent: Since being “overthrown” as queen of the Isle. Maleficent had to settle herself with working with others until she can be mistress of all evil again. Is in a constant battle for dominance with Queen Nerissa, Ursula, Mozenrath and Jafar.

(Evil) Queen Grimhilde: Though she may be pre-occupied by her looks and seem to be passive, Grimhilde is secretly gunning for complete control of the Isle and Auradon when they invade. She feels there should be a new queen that doesn’t get into such petty tantrums as Maleficent. Queen Nerissa: Queen Nerissa is the unofficial leader of the coven since it was her idea but it is impossible to convince the others of that. She wishes to get her ultimate revenge on Giselle, Edgar and the rest of Auradon by becoming the tyrant.

Ursula: Ursula is smartly setting her sights on just ruling Atlantica. Unless she gets bored. Then she might expande her pool of options. She mainly just wants to stick it to King Triton and when it comes to execution time. She isn’t going to make the mistake of keeping his soul, she wants to destroy it. Mother of Uma.

Circe: Very bitter about ending up on the Isle even after Helen of Troy vouched for her to stay in Auradon. So to say that she wants to crush Adam to the bone is understatement. She wants him to grovel. And if she can find that one good man while she’s at it, that would be a plus. Mother of Calix.

Mother Gothel: Though she has an intense rivalry with Grimhilde since day one about hoarding the scarce beauty products available on the Isle, she is her closest supporter now when it comes to finding magic for revenge and curing wrinkly skin. She is the mother of Ginny who she doesn’t dote on nearly as much as she did with Rapunzel.

Yzma: She wants Kuzcotopia and she will do anything and everything to get it even if it means teaming up with a bunch of “old hags” (yes pot calling kettle). Still remains overdramatic and delusional. Has a semi-dependent abusive relationship with her children Zevon and Yzla.

Morgaine Le Fey: Morgaine Le Fey, like Grimhilde, is quiet when it comes to group work but she is always observing for everyone else’s weaknesses and flaws that she will undoubtedly exploit when she becomes Queen of Camelot. Mother of Morrían.

Nasira: Sister to Jafar and mother of Jade and Mozonroth. She isn't nearly as enthusiastic about ruling Agrabah as her brother and Mozonroth are but she is just in it to get revenge on the stinking alley rat, Aladdin.

Queen La: Without her staff, her kingdom or leopard-man army, La has resorted to her Atlantean priestess magic again in hopes of getting off the Isle and reclaiming her staff. Still delusional, still lustful and hates having to depend on the rest of these people. Mother of Ranavalalona.

Jafar: Wishes to rule Agrabah and execute the royal family that “mistreated’ and “disrespected” him so much. Is in a constant battle with Mozonroth on the fact that he is the best sorcerer and will be ruler of Agrabah when they take over. Mozonroth: Finds Jafar to be a blowhard and believes that since he already took over the Black Sands and overthrew his former mentor that he should be doing far better plots. But with the Isle’s Magic Ban, he has to go with what he has. Besides that he would like to give his half-brother, Aladdin, a taste of “brotherly love” when he puts him in a headlock to crack his skull. Father to Malik and Imran Abbas.

Dr. Facilier: Like Ursula, Dr. Facilier smartly works on the fringes, setting his sights small on the Bayou before ruling the rest of Auradon. Father of Freddie and Celia.

All-Powerful Quartet: Generally speaking, if any villain was going to be taking over Auradon, it would be these 4. But due to their all-powerful status, they’d rather not exert themselves to do such menial tasks when they have other things to do.

Mirage: Evil Incarnate. So she does get to go off-Isle to maintain some balance of good and evil in the universe but generally enjoys the place. There is just so much evil and chaos everywhere and she glories in it. Mother of Illusion and Chimera.

Chernabog: Since being put on the Isle, Chernabog remains asleep on the mountain, waiting for his day to rise again.

Horned King: Without his deathless army, the Horned King remains in his cave, slowly wasting away. Mainly convenes with Hades.

Hades: God of the Underworld. So yeah, he has a full time job to do.

Mercenaries: The muscle behind the Coven, these are people who can’t adjust to domestic life, more 20th century living and miss the thrill of a fight. They deal with the dirtier deeds of murder and treason. The big boss (literal mob boss) is Sykes who rents their services out.

Sykes: Mob boss. Basically owner of the unofficially named, “Mercenary for Hire.” He never gets his own hands dirty but he has plenty of people who will do it for him. He keeps his people in line with his files of blackmail he has stocked up.

Clayton: Desperately misses the thrill of the hunt and more modern conveniences like a well-polish gun with enough ammo to shoot all these thieves to hell. Has a coworkers- with-benefits relationship with Helga. Father of Clay.

Rourke: Since being screwed over by magic, Rourke has kept a very rigid condition that he will only deal with non-magical situations. Still maintains his treasure-seeking ways and often pilfers from Jafar’s shop.

Helga Sinclair: One of the most intimidating humans on the Isle and of the mercenaries in general. She is known for her efficiency in work, stoic demeanor and same condition to her jobs as Rourke, no magic.

Muviro: Finds mercenary life to be very suitable since being exiled from his tribe. He does it less so for the money but for the glory and bloodlust. Father of Renavalalona.

Lady Caine: Self-proclaimed, “Queen of Thieves” and pirate extradonier. She is Captain Hook’s only real competition on the piracy front leaving a lot of punch-punch kiss tension between them. Many suspect that she is CJ’s bio mom since they share the same manipulativeness, “devil may care” attitude and self-centeredness. However she has no time for any child-rearing, and leaves James to do whatever neglectful work.

Gaston: Another mercenary that does it for the glory rather than the money. He needs something to do since his hunting days are over. Unfortunately he has not won a lot of admirers on the Isle for his chauvinistic attitude (Bad move considering that many of the women have actual powers). Father of Gaston Jr. Gaston the Second, Gil, Gaston (IV) the Great and Cosette.

Shan Yu: Finds himself very low being part of a mercenary gang instead of invading foreign countries. But it does provide some thrill that he can work on his own and make his homicides as bloody as he wants them to be.

Sa’Luk: Former “King of the Thieves,” Sa’Luk uses his mercenary work to get rid of his excess energy and anger towards his enemies. He joins Rourke in pilfering from Jafar’s shops and has a penchant for shiny gold trinkets.

Lt. Col. Jean Staquait: Former French officer and best to hire when you need someone to torture prisoners.

Authority Figures: Villains who are used to have some amount of power in more domestic/civilian pursuits. Pretty much like big corporations that constantly drain the other villains of cash, small trinkets, food and whatever other valuables are on the Isle.

Queen Saleen: One of the most malevolent mermaid, well only mermaid on the Isle. She spends most of her time in the Isle’s waters, avoiding the annoying two legged people. She is often in some sort of feud with Ursula.

Lady Tremaine: Guardian to Anthony Tremaine. Lady is getting on with her years and remains more or less infirmed in her house with a dozen grandchildren. She runs her house with an iron fist and is the most vocal on the Isle in support of child labor. She misses her days of richness and convenes with other elder women about how low they have fallen.

Medusa: Just like she did before the Isle, Medusa owns a pawn shop that is on a constant losing streak to Jafar’s so she has opened a small casino next to it too. She rather delusionally considers herself to be an entrepreneur and tries to work with those higher up in the social ladder to get more money herself.

Cruella De’Vil: While she spends most of her time tending to her furs and car and drinking, when she is sober she tries her hand at fashion design as in the olden days. She works closely with Lady Tremaine and Medusa.

Prince Hans: More or less the least-adjusted to the Isle with his loss of kingdom, servants and anyone gullible enough to believe his lies or manipulations. He is in close cahoots with Mozenrath and bought Drizella as his mistress. Father to Lars, his only son and heir since Stalyan refuses to ruin her figure again.

Sheriff of Nottingham: Serves as the Isle’s one man police force and a sucky job at that as he lets his henchmen squad do most of the work while he serves as trial judge and executioner with the Queen of Hearts: She works a bit on the judicial system, mainly the one who suggests the executions. She can also be found bringing most of the cases to court against henchmen who have wronged her or disobeyed her Tea Shop’s rules.

Captain Hook: The sole owner and commander of the coasts of the Isle while Ursula controls its seas. He is still as obsessive as ever about Peter Pan, his hand and crocodiles and can be found frequenting bars and other brawling areas on the Isle where his hook serves as a nasty weapon. Father of Harriet, Harry and CJ.

Gov. Ratcliff: The only one on the Isle that deals with paperwork. Sort of a treasurer of sorts. Not so much in organizing it but guarding it with his life and spends his time staring longingly at the piles wishing it were genuine gold than copper coins. Claude Frollo: Father of Claudine. Maintains his strict preaching and inflaming others against sin and towards prejudice. But he also tends to lose his inhibitions more and is a regular at the brothels of the Isle late at night. No woman has replaced his lust for Esmeralda though. Claudette seems to becoming close to that though.

Stalyan: Hans’ wife and Lady Caine’s part-time lover which drives Prince Hans crazy. She has her eyes on one thing and one thing only, money and bad boys that make her look good. She has no real ambitions of her own and depends on her father, the Baron, to give her what she wants. Mother of Lars.

Regular Citizens: Citizens that hold no sort of power and are pretty much everyone’s punching bags.

Morgana: Morgana would have been put part of the coven, but her sister, Ursula forbade it. Besides everyone knows that Ursula is far more powerful and talented than her sister. Instead Morgana is blackballed from any real position of respect and takes care of Ursula’s restaurant when she is away.

Marina Del Ray: Since losing her job to Sebastian she has become the Madam of the Isle’s seaside brothels, using the money to spiffy up her gaudy wardrobe.

The Bimbettes: Claudette (red dress) used to be Gaston’s gf but left him after he tried to “throw away” their daughter, Cosette, to try for a boy. She has since then been seen with the likes of Prince Hans, Mozenrath and Frollo. Laurette (yellow dress), the mother of Gastons 1-3 is Gaston’s favorite. Paulette (green dress), Gaston’s official wife is more or less his servant/punching bag and mother to Gil.

Drizella Tremaine: Since she couldn’t be married to Prince Hans, she has settled for being his mistress whenever he and Stalyan have a fight. A thankless position since she regularly bends over (literally and metaphorically) to his will and gets discarded like trash every time.

Lefou and Smee: Live together and own a kinda profitable gun and fishing shack. By far the best parents on the Isle due to their goofy more sympathetic natures.

Jasper and Horace: Still devoted henchmen of Cruella, they serve as secretaries, gophers and all manner of assistance to her. Fathers to Jace and Harold.

Ivy De’Vil: Mother of Diego, is the brains behind Cruella’s beauty designs since she isn’t drunk all the time. Can be considered one of the better mothers on the Isle.

Animals: No explanation needed

Scar, Zira, Shere Khan, Sabor, Benzai, Ed and Shenzi, Tublat, Hista

Couples: Captain Hook and Lady Caine (fight-hate sex rivalry. Child- CJ)

Lady Caine and Stalyan (with-benefits)

Stalyan and Prince Hans (Married. Child- Lars)

Prince Hans and Drizella (affair, possibly Dizzy?)

Mozenrath and Hans (Hans swears it was an accident. Or he was too drunk. Or it was magic)

Lady Caine and Hans (Revenge against Stalyan)

Queen Grimhilde and Prince Hans (One night stand)

Ursula and Dr. Facilier (fling, potentially Freddie and Uma)

Frollo and Claudette (with-benefits)

Gaston and Laurette (Affair/borderline married. Children- Gaston Jr. Gaston the Second, Gaston (IV) the Great)

Gaston and Paulette (Married. Child- Gil)

Lefou and Paulette (Lefou deux, drunken night of pity sex because Gaston’s treatment of them)

Smee and Lefou (Couple. Adopted Sammy)

Ivy De’Vil and Frollo (One night stand. Child-Diego)

Mozonroth and Morgaine Le Fey (Fling)

Clayton and Helga Sinclair (co-workers with benefits)

Queen La and Muviro (Married and dumped. Children- Ranavalalona. Musala, Taytu Betuvira, and unnamed, deceased)

Queen La and Clayton (Fling- Leopold, deceased)

Queen La and Gaston (Fling. Children-Amina and Shaka, deceased)

Queen La and Rourke (Fling. Child- Euware, deceased)

Queen La and Mozonroth (Fling. Child-Sarounia, deceased)

Shan Yu and Sa’Luk (Once- There’s no straight men in the trenches)

[statticscribbles]

My Dearest, My Dead

Summary: Evelyn/Edgar, A look at what they want from The Farm

Evelyn writes; she keeps unsent letters and journals in the records rooms; with everyone’s files. Edgar says it’s her way of coping, the rest of The Farm just think they’re her records of everyone. She doesn’t think back to when she’d been told. She blocks out how she’d gone to Edgar sobbing, inconsolable with pain blurring her entire being. Edgar carefully took her in his arms and they spent days in bed. They didn’t have the Farm; they didn’t have their family to support them as they do now. Edgar talked to her softly, gently explaining how they can build a family, how they can create The Farm. How Evelyn will need to be the first to be harvested. He can’t take her pain of course, he reminds her; but she can help the cause. She agrees and when she wakes up it’s like nothing has changed; the memory of what happened buried under the stitches and bandages.

Edgar sits with her as she recovers, the stitches he gave her barely there, they dissolve within two weeks and she barely has anything more than a faint line on her side. She writes when he suggest it, a way to keep her feelings her own, but not let them fester inside her. He never asks her to read them, but when she wakes screaming and sobbing from nightmares she’ll read to him in her shaking voice until she calms enough to sleep.

In the places before Riverdale they do not dwell on those they had to leave. Evelyn does not write to them, she burns the records, she does what Edgar says. He promised her they’d have their family and as they move on from the last town they’ve taken from Evelyn can’t help but be relieved it’s one step closer. She does not have doubts she knows Edgar will succeed and they’ll have their family, have their farm and everything will go back to how it was. She wonders if they’ll move back to the first town they took from, she decides she’d prefer not to, she likes the idea of Riverdale, of it being their final home; where they started is where they end. She finds it poetic; Edgar agrees. Evelyn is far too excited to start their plan, Edgar reminds her they might still need to move, still need to leave. ——————————————————————————–

In the sister’s of quiet mercy, past the Gargoyle King’s chamber, beyond the tunnel that leads out; there’s a room locked from everyone’s eyes. The only two who have seen in are Evelyn and Edgar. Edgar told Alice it was the room where they’d ascend. It was a way to stave off her curiosity, to hush the reporter’s urge that still bubbled under her skin. Evelyn had caught her trying to sneak down; Alice was understandably confused when all Evelyn did was start sobbing; broken wails and injured animal sounds drowning out any of the farms regular noises; even the pipe system was drowned out under her crushed voice. Edgar was there in moments, snarling into Alice’s ear and telling her how Polly would be punished for her sneaking around, grip on her arm almost breaking it. Alice doesn’t understand where the viciousness comes from, how it vanishes the instant he moves from her to Evelyn; it’s not love she reasons, but something darker. The way Evelyn folds into him mumbling nonsense and dates long past has Alice wondering what exactly that room is meant for. She mentions it to Charles when she sees him next; he promises he’ll look into it.

Charles brings her half used information, snippets and pieces of the past members in the Farm, they all talk of similar doors, similar rooms, and how Evelyn always fell apart at the idea of others in the room The door was always locked, bolted and there was no window, no way to see what was inside. They’d spoken how no one entered and no one left. It was thought to be the records room; until the records room was mapped out. The room big enough to house two people, with bed on either side. Alice shot down that idea; Edgar and Evelyn already had their own room; they had no need for another one. —————————————————————–

Evelyn wakes to Edgar’s arms around her, she doesn’t move wondering if he’s awake as well. “Betty’s staying with us.” “That’s good.” “She’s smart, bound to figure out some part of what we’re doing.” “That’s bad.” Evelyn frowns her headache coming back as she remembers the nightmares she’d had; she can faintly remember Edgar sedating her but she’s not sure if it was last night or months ago. “I had to dear, you were going to start screaming, can’t worry anyone now can we.” Evelyn nods letting him kiss her forehead as he pets her hair. “We’re having another group today, would you like to join?” “Maybe; I know today is; tough for both of us.” He nods nudging her to lie back down so they face each other. She watches the way his eyes track her face, and as he brushes his thumb against the corner of her mouth she knows he’s not seeing her as she is now. She wonders which version of her he’ll see the most today. “We’ll be together; through all of it. Like always.” He speaks softly nodding to her, his hand running down her arm as he pulls her close.

She’s not aware she falls asleep again, just as she’s not aware she’s awake once more. She’s aware she’s sitting in a chair. She knows Edgar helped her, she can smell his soap on her skin and the shampoo he uses in his hair on her own damp locks. She turns her head to see not only her journal, but a new book and a fresh vase of flowers. She reaches for the flowers wincing when the IV tape tugs against her skin. She grabs the book easily enough and starts to read. She glances at the almost full bag, she knows she’ll have hours left.

She’s barely a third through when Polly walks in. She’s reading, thankful she decided to leave her daily journaling to before bed. “Oh sorry.” Polly’s about to back out of the room when Evelyn watches Juniper fussing in her arms. “Tilt her chin up.” Is all she says before she flicks another page in her book; Polly’s surprised when Juniper quiets. Alice asks to talk to her, and Evelyn declines. “Evelyn.” Alice starts and watches how she turns her head, regarding Alice nervously. Alice isn’t sure why she’d been so anxious recently but it seems like every sound had her on the knife’s edge of panic. In the group session earlier some sort of beeping alarm went off and Edgar had to sedate Evelyn. She looked terrified even when she was sleeping. Betty has theories about Evelyn’s guilt, about her knowledge of the organ farming but Alice knows she can’t share it with her daughter, she just hopes she’ll be able to get her and Juniper out before anything else happens. ————————————————————-

Evelyn knows she’s dreaming, she always knows when she’s dreaming after being sedated; everything is too dull or too vibrant. She can smell too much, everything is too crisp, too clear it makes her wan to close her eyes, to turn away; but she knows she can’t. She must look to understand. She watches her husband, her Edgar, always trying to do good, always trying to help people; why he’d become a trauma surgeon in the first place. She knew he was going to help thousands. She didn’t understand why she had to be one of the first. The car had swerved too far out, it had been dark and icy, it would have happened to anyone. She knows this is what the doctors tell everyone, that they never stood a chance in the tiny car against the truck, against the weather and the distance from the town, from the hospital. Edgar saves her, she knows he does, she can smell the soap and shampoo he uses, unchanging since they’d met in school. He knows it comforts her.

She lets the dream happen, she knows she can’t wake herself, she’s tried time and time again, she knows not when this will twist from dream to memory unsure if it already has. She follows the gurney; the ambulance no longer makes sound, she can’t hear the shouts, the screams from the doctors. She knows this is a memory with how everything seems to settle for a moment, the saturation dropping, the sound no longer fogged. Her vision no longer blurry. She sees her own face, blood covered and she can’t help but gag with her memory self and she tries to breathe, she looks up and it’s a dream once more, Edgar rushing over, his hands running up her arms promising her he’ll save her, the fact she can see him the giveaway it’s only a dream again. She knows she’s dreaming and she can feel herself crying already; she watches herself on the gurney, reaching to the other one, Edgar moves them both closer despite that they’re going to different operating rooms, despite that she knows Edgar can only save one. She wonders why he chose her. She can hear screaming from the other room, she knows she’s dreaming but she cant help the panic, the need stop the screaming, she shakes on the gurney, twisting and trying to shout, only managing to choke on her own blood as someone that’s not Edgar pricks her with a needle and a mask is placed over her mouth and nose.

She wakes shaking and gasping scrambling off the bed trying to pull herself free of wires and tubes and IV’s that are no longer there. She sobs, throwing herself from the bed and trying her best to stand and move towards the door. She’s sure she’s the source of the screams, the pained broken animal that bubbles from inside her chest. She can hear footsteps and collapses into the arms that open the door. “I’m sorry; I’m sorry, what about Elizabeth, you need to fix her, she knows; she knows, she knows! You left her; you left her!” She chokes on her own sorrow as Edgar’s arms hold her up. He kisses her forehead once more, not bringing her back to their room, but to the common room, he sits with her; both Cheryl and Polly appear instantly, worry on their faces. Fangs and Kevin bring her a blanket and she sits, confused and blinking in the sunlight filled room as they stay next to her. Cheryl smiles, running her hand up her arm in comfort. Polly braids her hair. Kevin and Fangs start talking about something they saw on TV, a distraction she thinks. Edgar sits next to her and she reaches out for him. “Elizabeth she-“ “It’s alright Evelyn, it’s alright.” He rubs circles on her back as she starts to cry again, confusion on her face. She watches Betty back out of the room, she watches the look her and Alice share before Alice smiles at Evelyn trying to be comforting. “It’s okay, it’s okay.” Everyone chorus’ Edgar’s voice, concern and confusion lacing their words. ——————————————————————————-

Evelyn doesn’t need to ask, she waits until its far past anyone being awake, Edgar rouses her she’s still confused about how she ended up asleep on the common room couch, her hair braided and one of Fang’s hoodies around her shoulders, but she lets Edgar wake her and walk with her. She knows he doesn’t need to support her but he does it anyways; the closer they draw to the room the more pronounced the limp she has gets; he can tell she’s nervous. The door opens with a hiss, it’s been sealed to prevent decay; she’s not sure how it works, only that it does. Edgar steps in first, letting the lights flicker on before Evelyn steps through. The door hisses closed behind them, sealing them in with the rest of room’s content.

“It’s beautiful, Evelyn runs her hands along the bed frame, the side table where Edgar’s notes and drawings sit is where she touches next; where he keeps most of his medical supplies from his days as a surgeon is the last she touches, always in the same pattern. Evelyn’s fingers tangle in a blanket, letting the soft fabric run through her fingers. They catch, as they always do on the bloodstains that haven’t been washed out. “What troubles you about today love?” “We’re home; we’re back we- We shouldn’t have come into her room without her.” Evelyn trembles and Edgar’s arms wrap around her. “Dear, she’s here remember? In the hospital, we just have to bring her home, once everyone agrees to ascend, we can bring her back. One human soul has to be given back if we give up hundreds. It would only be fair, of course.” His fingers undo the braids in her hair.

“Can we visit her?” Her voice is small and Edgar nods, they don’t need to sneak out, but still they do, taking the tunnel the sister’s had closed up. Moving past the hospital security is easy enough, and as they both stand outside the room, Evelyn starts to cry. Edgar wipes his own tears along with hers. They nudge the door open, the room exactly the same as it was two years ago. Everything the same, just as if they stepped out for only a moment. “Hey Elizabeth, how’re you doing sweetheart?” Edgar offers into the darkness, only the beeping of the machines answers him. Evelyn’s grip on his arm tightens, he knows this is too much for her, but he nudges both of them closer. He needs to see her face. “Please.” She whimpers and he nods, sighing as they step back towards the door, a step and a half and they’re back in the hallway. Edgar carries her back to the Farm, back to their room.

“You did so well this time, you got all they way into her room. I’m so proud of you.” “Shouldn’t have to be.” She mumbles upset at herself; Edgar shakes his head kissing her softly. “Remember what the doctor’s said, you can’t blame yourself for what’s happened to her, just like I can’t blame myself for not being able to help her. I saved my wife. I saved the love of my life. You’re safe, you’re alive because of me.” Evelyn nods swallowing. “You should have saved our daughter.” Edgar tenses. “I will. I’m going to bring her back; I’m going to wake her up. I swear.”

Evelyn wakes up alone, she’s told Edgar is performing pain removal on someone and she nods letting him have his peace, she’s seen his notes, his drawings and ideas, to create enough pain to draw his daughter’s soul back to the living; to give up the soul’s from the farm, to trade for hers. She’s fairly sure it won’t work, but she’s foolish enough to let Edgar’s hope and delusions infect her like the pain he inflicts on others. She wonder’s what is worse, living with her pain, or what he’d take away to free her from it.

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[emeraldtawny]

Ikerev Drug Dealer AU

Strap in folks, there’s a lot of explaining to do ^w^

Welcome to the city of Cradle, a bustling city with everything you could possibly need and want. With the majority of the city’s population being young adults, Cradle has earned a reputation as a “party city” and is a hotspot for clubs, concerts and crazy weekend getaways to get completely smashed and return home with a ruined liver and a shorter lifespan. However, the dark underbelly of the city stretches up to encroach on its lively surface...in the form of illegal dealings of performance-enhancers.

In this universe, Magic Crystals are an outlawed supplement. They aren’t fatally dangerous, but they’ve been outlawed for their uncanny ability to heighten senses and basically make you superhuman. The catch is that you only need to take it once and then the effects are permanent.

These things are hard to get and even more costly, but still, dealings are abundant in the city whilst authorities try their best to find the last major dealer at large yet anonymous: Harr Silver.

Magic Crystals affect everyone differently, so depending on your metabolism and the chemical balance in your body, you could absorb all of the Crystal’s effects into you or none at all. They’re put into classes based on how much Magic Crystal is absorbed into them and those who ingest Crystals are basically wanted criminals, both by police and other jealous non-absorbers. However, the one consistency is that when you first ingest Magic Crystals, your body essentially goes into stasis and you are incredibly malleable and practically useless while your brain tries to adjust to the new chemical balances.

The categorisation of Magic Crystal absorption:

0% - Incompatible, physically cannot absorb the Crystal’s effects no matter how potent the Crystal.

1-30% - around 50% of the population is estimated to be able to absorb this percentage of a Crystal’s substances. Slightly heightened hearing and sight and less fatigued muscles after exercise.

31-60% - Moderately heightened senses and increased spatial awareness. Reinforced muscles and strengthened bones making the person stronger and more flexible. Less susceptible to burnout unless completely stretching their limits.

61-85% - High increases in senses, spatial awareness and cognitive memory. Near superhuman strength and agility as well as near immune to sickness, but with a high cost of extreme fatigue and nausea when overworked.

86-100% - Pure Absorbers. Superhuman levels of spatial awareness, inhuman sense of hearing, sight and smell, photographic memory and the slightest chance of manipulating the potential energy of others around them (pushing them back without touching them, or nullifying their abilities). Huge recoil from overuse of powers with symptoms like severe nausea, hallucinations and coma.

Main Dealers

Harr Silver

“This was never my intention, but it seems this whole situation is now mine to regulate.”

Originally a humble self-taught biochemist and wildlife enthusiast. Stumbled upon potent Magic Crystals in the forest and decided to experiment on them to appease his curiosity. After many testings of creating a natural enhancer that would reduce muscle tension and fatigue - finally testing on himself when he was confident and absorbing 100% of the chemicals into his system - he started selling them as supplements through back-door sales. Initially tried to sell it legally through mainstream markets, but they all wrote it off as a cheap organic scam product. Stumped for ideas, he confided in his two friends, Lancelot and Sirius, on what to do. Little did he know how big things would get from there.

Sirius Oswald

“I hate that I’m a part of this, but there’s no way in hell I’m leaving you two to your own devices.”

Owner of the city’s largest flower shop and a long-time friend of Harr and Lancelot. Was approached by Harr about his new discovery for advice on how to bring it into the mainstream market, which he obliged. When the situation literally turned into a drug cartel, Sirius was the one to tell Harr to turn back, but it was too late. In order to help his friend, Sirius (begrudgingly) agrees to help him using his various connections throughout the city (to cover up/stop any trails police catch wind of) and his green thumb (his ability to identify and find the highest quality crystals to synthesise). Is repulsed by the thought of ever absorbing a Magic Crystal’s energy, but supports Harr’s and Lancelot’s decisions in doing it themselves.

Lancelot Kingsley

“You’re not thinking big enough. We could do so many things with what you’ve discovered.”

A dignified noble in the city and a polarising public figure because of it. The other friend Harr confided in about his discovery and, unlike Sirius, was almost excited about it. He was the reason these supplement Magic Crystals became the sought after product it is; after taking it himself (him absorbing around 90% into his body), he used his widespread connections to create other dealers throughout the city. The most notable places were the city’s largest nightclub and the organic medicine clinic. Despite both Harr’s and Sirius’ disapproval, Lancelot takes the responsibility for the seeds he planted and helps them both manage the Magic Crystals, himself quite intent on pushing for higher production and more exports. What does he have in mind?

Associates

Fenrir Godspeed

“Sure, I’ll help ya out. Welcome to the hell of illegal dealings, pleasure doin’ business with ya.”

Son to one of the major rich families in the city and the owner of the lucrative Cat’s Cradle nightclub, an establishment known for catchy tunes and shady dealings. Cocky yet grounded, his dealings of Magic Crystals are the best-kept secret in the city, the only source more reliable being Harr himself. Was approached by Lancelot - another rich kid he knew through their family’s connection - and agreed to help in exchange for his own high-quality crystals. Another who has taken Magic Crystals (around 60% absorption) and uses the abilities it gives him to conceal his illegal dealings. Never without his personal bodyguard Seth and loves the exposure the Crystal dealings give his nightclub, so is surprisingly cooperative with the whole operation.

Seth Hyde

“Me? I wouldn’t tell anyone about this. I’m more reliable than that, y’know~”

Fenrir’s bodyguard and co-host to the Cat’s Cradle nightclub. Mainly the entertainment organiser (a real singing and dancing star) and loves to confuse patrons by wearing his hair down to mislead them about his gender (also incredibly helpful for disguises). Knows of the dealings but is prohibited from knowing any top-secret details of the nightclub’s dealings...which is something he needs to know, especially considering he’s an undercover police agent searching for concrete evidence to out the entire Crystal operation. His communications with police are limited to reduce the risk of him being discovered, but relays information to another officer, Edgar, when he can.

Kyle Ash

“Look, I don’t really care about how you’re going about this. Just lemme test them for myself and I won’t tell a soul.”

Head researcher of the town’s organic medicine clinic. Was approached by Lancelot about being an additional dealer but was hesitant at first. Only agreed after talking with Harr directly and getting expressed permission to study the Crystals as long as he sold them as well. Not one for ethics so he saw no downside to this deal and happily sells Magic Crystals to customers whilst researching their effects in his own time. Is currently attempting to find an “antidote” to reverse-engineer the Crystal’s effects, at Harr’s request, so people who regretted their decisions could rectify themselves. Drinks the weekends away with his friend Oliver, though it’s more accurate to say that he’s being babysitted by him.

Edgar Bright

“No one here is truly innocent, myself included. But I can hold my tongue as long as you hold yours.”

A special agent in the Cradle police force. Despite being on the side that works to outlaw and contain Magic Crystals, he isn’t too bothered by them (especially considering he has taken one himself, absorbing approximately 30% into his system). He actually linked the mass exportation of Magic Crystals to Lancelot’s sudden increase in publicity. He confronts him about it but agrees to keep his silence in exchange for Lancelot using his ties to prevent the police force finding out Edgar has taken Crystals. Feeds intel to an investigator, Zero, “for fun”, but makes sure it’s just short of being enough. Receives information from Seth irregularly about the possible nightclub dealings, but doesn’t really bat an eye to it.

Innocents

Ray Blackwell

“Why me? I didn’t ask for this…”

A young man unwillingly dragged into the drug ring through unfortunate circumstances. A frequent visitor to the Cat’s Cradle nightclub, since he’s good friends with the young owner. Because of this, he gets swept up in rumours about him having power in the dealings the nightclub does. He gets dragged out into the alley and forced to ingest a Magic Crystal to make him weak and easy to deal with. However, he absorbs a lot of the Crystal (around 85%) and accidentally severely injures his attackers from an outburst of power. Currently wanted by police for his arrest. Luckily, Fenrir is keeping him safe whilst he tries to come to terms with these powers he doesn’t even want.

Loki Genetta

“I can help you - no, let me help you!”

A young college student before the whole ordeal happened. His friends got hold of Magic Crystals and they all decided to try them for fun. Whilst his friends absorbed close to nothing of the Crystal, his eyes started burning and he passed out from the pain in the alley. Doctors confirmed he absorbed approximately 90% of the Crystal. His parents, while telling him they wouldn't hold his young dumb mistake against him, made plans to turn him in to the police for their own safety as well as his own. Hearing this, Loki fled and lucked out by running into Harr by chance. Sympathising and feeling sorry for the boy, Harr promises to protect him himself, much to Lancelot’s dismay at being a babysitter. Loki learns Harr was the original procurer of the supplement and asks to help him for saving him from homelessness and jail. Harr refuses yet Loki still remains at his side, ready to help whenever he needs it.

Jonah Clemence

“How dare you sully my family name with such useless bile! You’ll pay for what you’ve done.”

The elder brother of the esteemed and powerful Clemence family. Completely uninvolved with any drug trading “nonsense” in order to keep his family’s image pristine. This changes, however, when rumours started by the Godspeed family start spreading about the Clemences doing Crystal dealings to elites behind closed doors. His parents are jailed for suspected drug dealing and he is now determined to clear their name and expose the true culprit who started these rumours about his family. By any means necessary.

Luka Clemence

“Just leave me out of this. It doesn’t concern me, anyway…”

The younger brother of the Clemence family. Knew of the rumours about his family before they did but kept his silence knowing they wouldn’t believe him. Annoyed by his brother’s two-facedness about the situation (only caring about the drug trading after it becomes a family matter). Distances himself from Jonah to hang out with Edgar and tries to pretend nothing is wrong. Carries a couple of Crystals on him in secret, in case of an emergency.

Anti-Crystal

Zero

“Think what you like, but I know who I am and I’m not a criminal!”

An independent investigator assigned with the Cradle police force who works alone in exposing the small branch dealers under Harr’s control (he suspects Kyle’s clinic but needs evidence). Gets leads and tip-offs from a certain esteemed police agent, Edgar, and is incredibly close to getting the intel he needs to break open the case, but every time he gets close he gets cut off. The reason he works alone is because no one wants to work with him. It’s forbidden to take Crystals in the police force and they assume he has taken it because of his physical prowess. Even if it’s his name, they call him Zero as a slur (in a mocking way that is obvious in them not believing his innocence) and they shun him despite him doing nothing wrong. This doesn’t deter him, however.

Blanc Lapin

“I must admit, I am in quite a difficult spot with this whole ordeal. Oh, dear..”

The only surviving heir of the Lapins, the most esteemed family in the city of Cradle and, therefore, has a lot of political power. Harbours a lot of media attention for allowing a drug cartel to break out in the city, but dismisses it politely. Behind closed doors, he works with Oliver to uncover the truth themselves, without police intervention or the possibility of fake information or double agents. Aware of Harr’s history with wildlife knowledge but refuses to make any moves publicly until he has concrete evidence (to limit the risk of his credibility falling).

Oliver Knight

“Can’t trust a single soul in this godforsaken city...drug addicts, the lot of them.”

A local activist against Magic Crystals who believes the whole thing is rigged and even the police can’t stop it with the “no doubt countless rats in every crevice”, to quote him directly. Works with his long-time friend Blanc to find out everything they can without alerting authorities or dealers alike. Drinks his stresses away with his drinking buddy Kyle (but has no idea of his connections to the dealings) but trusts him to chat with about the whole situation. He despises Magic Crystals with a passion...but, why?

Accompanying story posted here because this post is already long enough gkrjdfgbkrjdmfn

[unapologeticallyaisha-archive]

Lost and Found - part 6/6

David, Gwen, and Mr. and Mrs. Copperfield came up to the boys. “Why aren’t you at lunch?” Mrs. Copperfield asked.

“We’ve got your paperwork all filled out,” their father told them.

“Don’t worry, Edgar and Harrison will have a wonderful time at Camp Campbell!” said David.

“We hope so,” said Mrs. Copperfield.

“About our conversation last time …” said David. “You asked us if we knew what was … different about Harrison.”

The Copperfields nodded.

“To be honest, I don’t think we know much more about your son’s powers than we did at the start. What we do know is that he has been getting better through his own perseverance!”

“That’s good,” said Mr. Copperfield.

“We don’t have answers, Mr. and Mrs. Copperfield,” said Gwen. “But I can assure you that Harrison fits in well here.”

“We just wanted to help him,” said Mr. Copperfield. “I know we may have been putting a lot of pressure on you and come on too strongly -”

“Oh, no, you really didn’t -” David began.

“- We were just really worried about Harrison, and Edgar, and we just wanted to know whether or not, you know, you had any idea what was wrong with him -”

“What was wrong with him?” Edgar said loudly.

His parents flinched.

“I can’t believe you!” said Edgar.

“Edgar -” Harrison began.

“You never called me broken!” Edgar continued. “You can’t demonize it just because you can’t understand it! How’s that supposed to make him feel?”

David and Gwen were inching away, looking as if they thought they shouldn’t be there.

“You’ve always looked out for my needs, but what about Harrison’s needs?” Edgar cried.

There was a long pause.

“You’re right to make us feel ashamed, Edgar,” his father admitted. “We never paid Harrison the same amount of attention we paid to you. And we don’t want to be scared of him.”

Harrison hung his head.

“We knew even less about Harrison’s abilities than we did about your disability. We wanted to give him a support system, things to help him cope … but we still haven’t found any.”

“We were blessed with two very special boys with things that we never expected,” said Mrs. Copperfield. “All children come with problems and challenges. We were hoping that he could meet other kids with magic and learn from others like him. But that turned out not to be the case.”

Edgar immediately thought of Nerris.

“Camp Campbell is the one place where I’ve been comfortable using my powers,” said Harrison to his parents. “I hope you can stop being scared one day.”

To Harrison’s absolute surprise, Mrs. Copperfield knelt down and hugged Harrison. “We love you, and that will never change.”

Harrison hugged her back tightly.

“Edgar, is this why you want us to leave?” said Mr. Copperfield.

Edgar sighed. “I want you to get help for yourselves. You’ve always tried to help us, and I’m grateful for that. But you’ve done it at the cost of yourselves. When was the last time you two had alone time? You need to take a break.”

“But …”

“This is good for you!” Edgar insisted. “You don’t need to spend every second of your lives being parents! Enjoy yourselves!”

“What … what should we do?” said Mr. Copperfield.

“I’ve been going to therapy for years,” said Edgar, “and you know what I’ve realized? I’m not the only one in the family who has anxiety.”

His parents glanced at each other.

“Fear is something that takes time to heal,” said Edgar. “I’m not blaming for you for being afraid and I don’t expect you to recover immediately. But I will blame you for not trying to get better.” Can you do that? For yourselves? For all of us?”

“And you think this camp will be good for you?” said Mr. Copperfield for a beat.

Edgar was uncertain, but he answered, “If this camp was good for Harrison, it might be good for me, too.”

Mrs. Copperfield slowly nodded. “If either you or Harrison feel we’re doing something wrong, please tell us.”

 The Quartermaster served the Copperfields and David trays of meat, potatoes, and vegetables.

“Real human food!” Edgar cried, shoveling it into his mouth.

His parents evidently found the food mediocre, but they ate just enough to not let it go to waste.  

Mr. Copperfield set his fork and knife down. “Why don’t we play a board game? For old time’s sake?”

Soon the Copperfields were all engaged in a game of Monopoly, with the campers and counselors watching eagerly.

It didn’t take long for everyone to see that Edgar was winning. He made plans quietly, and collected his winnings calmly and smoothly. The rest of his family protested a little, but there was no hostility. They seemed to have accepted the fact that he would always beat them.

By the time Edgar’s victory came around, all of them were laughing and joking around. The Copperfields were a family once again.

[stattic-writes]

My Dearest, My Dead

https://statticscribbles.tumblr.com/post/639099629845233664/masterlist

Support My Writing?

[weston-hcs]

If you play Overwatch or any other MMO, what heroes do the boys play and what are their play styles?

Why yes, I do play Overwatch. If you want to hit me up for a game I’m on the European server and I can give out my tag in messages. Also wrote about play style that can be applied to other games as well.

Lawrence

He has absolutely no idea how to aim. Thank gosh he’s playing high damage characters so he can stick with a spray & pray tactic - just shoot at everything and hope for the best. Lawrence sometimes checks the stats to see how he’s doing in comparison to the team but he’d rather not take a glance at his accuracy. (It’s below 20%) But maybe… just maybe he can blame it on his non-existent lag.

Mains: Junkrat + Torbjorn

Clayton

He hates the game. He doesn’t even know why he’s playing it. It seemed cool at first with all the hype around it and people praising it for diversity. Now he’s just angry about never even ranking up in competitive matches. Maybe… he should be playing something other than snipers with his low kill rate.

Mains: Hanzo (Disgusting) + Ana

Herman

You’d expect this guy to be the tank anyways. Mostly because nobody actually wants to pick the tank character anyways so he’s just the filler. Maybe you can describe him as a flex player since he’s also not that bad at attack and defense characters either. He’s just terrible at support since he thinks he can take everyone on ‘if he plays things right’.

Mains: Winston + Reaper

Edward

This guy’s surprisingly skilled for someone who doesn’t play too often. He’s a flex player, able to go into any role with ease, saying “you just have to have a good aim” - it’s pretty infuriating for everyone else who has shitty internet. Midford’s just lucky he has a stable connection. Obviously he’s supporting London Spitfire because why wouldn’t you support your home team? For someone who says that they “aren’t too into the game”, it doesn’t seem right to claim that anyone who supports otherwise is “dead to him.”

Mains: Ana + Pharah

Edgar

Well, at least he gets a whole bunch of kills. Too bad it’s as the result of going straight into the enemy team and dying straight away. He’s a memer that’ll play supports for offensive but he can definitely play safe and carry the team to victory if he focused more. Though, he just really cares about having fun with this game and doesn’t care too much about the ranking system. (Edgar should be in gold but he’s… just too lazy.)

Mains: Reaper + Lucio

Joanne

He’s the most casual out of anyone here. Support is his preferred role, since he doesn’t have to do much work but he can hold a point as a tank as well. Joanne never speaks on team chat since he’d rather avoid the sound of his team shouting over one another for ten minutes. Instead, he’ll just stick to emoting a ‘hello’ to others in the spawn room and that’s about it.

Mains: Orisa + Zenyatta

Soma

He gets way too invested into the characters and lore. Obviously none of that matters in a FPS game like this, but it’s the thought behind everything that he loves the most. Soma loves looking at people’s interesting cosplays and fanart more than he actually plays the game - though, he doesn’t think that any of that is up his alley. Just leave him to play some good defence and he’ll be fine.

Mains: Symmetra + Mei

Gregory

Of course… he’s the support. He can’t be bothered to play “high skill” characters since he’s only playing for fun. Why bother playing if you’re going to go in and work like it’s school or something? He’s not too adamant on being a kill-hungry support but you’ll hear a shady laugh over the mic when he gets more than a double kill. 

Mains: Mercy + Moira

Cheslock

He’s good. Like, really good. Maybe it’s cause he’s poured his absolute heart and soul into this and is one of the few people who actually bought team skins - if you insult Seoul Dynasty in his presence he’ll be fuming - and he doesn’t regret it. He’s got a pretty even spread of time as different characters but he’s only here to troll others.

Mains: Doomfist + Roadhog

[dipulb3]

Analysis: A Appradab reporter went to two different QAnon events. Here's what he found

New Post has been published on https://appradab.com/analysis-a-appradab-reporter-went-to-two-different-qanon-events-heres-what-he-found-2/

Analysis: A Appradab reporter went to two different QAnon events. Here's what he found

One, in Los Angeles, was a march through Hollywood that portrayed itself as an anti-pedophilia protest. Its organizers were careful not to explicitly embrace the QAnon conspiracy theory even as they implicitly signaled they support it and repeated its disinformation — much like what President Donald Trump did during an NBC town hall last week.

The other event, “Q Con Live,” took place in a conference room at a resort in Scottsdale, Arizona. It was a meeting of some of QAnon’s most passionate peddlers — but it could have easily been mistaken for a grassroots meeting to help re-elect the President.

What both showed is that for many of its supporters QAnon is not just a set of conspiracy theories. For them, it’s a way to distract themselves from the failures of a President they see as the hero of a fight against an all-encompassing villainy, to elevate themselves by casting his critics and political opponents as those villains, and to not have to pay attention to all of the US’ very real problems, like Covid-19 and systemic racism.

“Pedophiles, you are on notice! – Q” one person’s sign at the event in Hollywood said. Along with other material, including a QAnon symbol, the sign featured a picture of Trump heroically pointing, with the words “And I mean you Hollywood” added underneath. And then there was a hashtag: #SaveTheChildren.

Save The Children is a respected humanitarian organization that has been around for more than 100 years.

You might have seen over the past few months friends or family on social media sharing posts with the hashtags#SaveTheChildren or #SaveOurChildren. If you have, it’s possible your loved ones have unwittingly shared QAnon disinformation.

QAnon followers have hijacked and bastardized the name “Save The Children” as a way to spread baseless conspiracy theories about prominent Democrats, including former Vice President Joe Biden.

Children need to be “saved,” Qanon followers believe, from a cabal of evil Democrats. It is essentially the same conspiracy theory that was pushed as part of “Pizzagate” in 2016 which falsely alleged a Washington DC pizza shop was at the center of a child sex trafficking ring.

Edgar Maddison Welch was sentenced to four years in prison in 2017 after he showed up to the pizzeria and fired three shots with an AR-15 rifle. He claimed he was attempting to find and rescue child sex slaves that he believed were being held at the restaurant.

After Welch found no evidence of child sex-trafficking at the restaurant, he surrendered.

The “Save The Children” charity has nothing to do with this. It has publicly sought to distance itself from all of it. Other child protection organizations have said these conspiracy theories are creating dangerous distractions from the real issue of child exploitation.

One hundred or so people gathered on Sunset Boulevard in Hollywood two Saturdays ago chanting “Save Our Children.”

Most people I spoke to there were ardent supporters of President Trump. Many carried pro-Trump signs and some wore Make America Great Again hats. When I told attendees I worked for Appradab, their response often included some variation on the Trump attack mantra “fake news.” Indeed, Appradab’s bureau in Los Angeles was a major stop on the march. The media writ large is a frequent target of these groups and their rallies because they think — falsely — that it is covering up for the people they have baselessly accused.

Outside Appradab, I spoke to the organizer of the event. An aspiring rapper who appears to have begun posting on Instagram about alleged crimes against children earlier this year, he told me all he was interested in was helping save kids and that he did not follow QAnon — despite his having shared a post specifically mentioning QAnon on his Instagram account the day before we met.

Several marchers asked me a very good question: “What’s wrong with wanting to save children?”

Of course, the answer is absolutely nothing. Child exploitation is real — though the reality of it is very different from the narrative promoted by QAnon — and abhorrent.

Also abhorrent, though, is how QAnon is exploiting people’s genuine concerns about the issue to peddle a false narrative. And it’s disturbing to watch as this conspiracy theory crowds out, for believers, the idea that anything else could possibly be as important as their fight against the non-existent cabal. People at the march told me that the “real” thing we should care about is fighting against the cabal — issues like racism and Covid-19 were, to them, either a distraction or at best a secondary concern.

A meeting in Arizona

At one point during Q Con Live on Saturday, a pair of presenters went on a long diatribe against people who wear masks to prevent the spread of Covid-19. It’s a way to control people, and a symbol of submission, they argued.

It was an example of how the community of QAnon believers has come to embrace many other seemingly unrelated conspiracy theories, and of how willing those believers are to see everything as a sinister move by the “cabal” that must be fought against — inventing an imaginary threat and ignoring the very real virus that has already killed more than 200,000 people in the US.

It also showed just how strong the pull of groupthink can be among the conspiracy theorists. As the presenters spoke, I looked around the room and noted that — as ​was often the case on Saturday — I was one of the only people in a room of roughly 100 who was wearing a mask. I felt eyes on me, realizing the same thing I had. And, against my better judgment, I briefly pulled my mask down hoping it would stop the people on stage from singling me out.

The mask wasn’t the only way I was different from most people at the conference. Journalists were allowed to attend, but not exactly encouraged — we could “purchase tickets and attend as individuals,” the conference’s website said, so long as we did not attempt to interview anyone.

Attendees might not have been wearing masks, but many were wearing both Trump and QAnon attire. Trump’s importance to them, and to the whole conspiracy theory, was clear.

When someone brought up how Trump had two days earlier, at an NBC town hall, refused to disavow QAnon it was cheered.

Speakers at the event, some of the conspiracy theories’ most ardent peddlers, referenced specific posts shared by the anonymous person or people behind QAnon as if they were scripture. Some told the audience that it was necessary to re-elect the President so the QAnon prediction of the arrest of people like Hillary Clinton could finally come to fruition.

QAnon had first falsely predicted Clinton’s imminent arrest in 2017, and some speakers hinted at growing impatience and even perhaps skepticism about QAnon’s claims and predictions.

Others, though, suggested it will all fall into place after Trump’s reelection. This part was less surprising to hear. It will be very hard for people who’ve convinced themselves that this is the most important fight of anyone’s life to realize it’s all been a lie. And besides, many of the speakers had Q merchandise and books to sell.

[rilenerocks]

The weather where I live has been hot and very dry. I keep my birdbath full and yesterday, I turned on the sprinkler as well. Lots of thirsty birds arrived within minutes to cool off and drink. This female cardinal has a nest with her partner somewhere in the tall shrubs behind her. Her color and markings are unusual so I always recognize her. I do a better job attending to my avian friends than I do for myself. I’m always sweaty and uncomfortable in the summer. Toward the end of April in many years past, I’d start complaining about the heat and Michael would say, “so long – see you in October.” I actually wasn’t quite that bad, but I’m not enamored of this annual muggy time. These days, though, I’m sending myself different messages. Right now, I’m hyper-aware of how lucky I am to be outside during these months, sticky and disgusting though I may be. My outdoor space liberates me from the claustrophobia being experienced by people who occupy small spaces in crowded cities. Icy winter will change how I manage virus time, when I’ll be on the inside, looking out. I’m consciously working on these messages to myself.  Unconsciously, too. Some of them are clear and easily explainable. I ponder over the others.

 What messages are poking out of my subconscious brain? I’ve been remembering lots of my dreams. I’m recording them so I won’t forget what’s being sorted through while I sleep. The Covid19 nightscape. Last night’s internal video made some sense to me. I dreamed that Michael and I were going to renew our marriage vows. It felt more like a first wedding for awhile because I was busily registering for gifts like dishes, silverware and serving trays. I was being really extravagant, selecting items made of gold and other fancy materials. I suddenly realized that was crazy as we already had everything we needed and I confessed that to Michael, who’d been assisting me from another room. Things moved from there to a conflict with some contractors who were working in my backyard. I’d been angry with them because they’d been doing a sloppy job. They were now being almost obsequious toward me, overly apologetic and fawning to please me. I realized that was because Michael was present, which felt like an admission of their intrinsic sexism toward me. I was relieved but also angry. I think some of this is connected to the basement cleaning project I did last week. I unearthed a set of china which belonged to either Michael’s grandmother or great grandmother. I’m not sure which. That kind of delicate fancy stuff didn’t fit with who we were or how we lived. I’d wrapped each individual piece in newspaper which was now falling apart and smelling strongly from dampness and mildew. The newspaper was dated 1983. Put away down there decades ago.  I just couldn’t throw away that table service for twelve. I hauled it all upstairs and spent hours washing each piece and peeling away the debris of all those years. Now it’s in my dining room cabinet until I figure out what to do with it. Somehow those dishes translated into me wanting to restart  my marriage and into thinking how much easier it is to have a partner sometimes than it is to be alone. Makes sense. Truthfully, I’d settle for a nice old-fashioned erotic dream.

That segues into another one of my dreams. Dream two consisted of me in an effort to relieve my frequent loneliness for physical contact, I found my way to a facility that catered to the common practices offered at a “house of ill repute.” What I was seeking however, was a person whose physique resembled Michael’s, and who would allow me to rest my head on his shoulder for just a few hours. A faceless person was found for with the right body type and for several nights, I got to go and rest, releasing the burdens of my day. Innocent though it was, I did this covertly as I knew this was not a socially acceptable thing.  However, someone found out and leaked the story to the local newspaper, where it became quite the sensation as both Michael and I were public officials well-known in our community. My pathetic behavior led to a city-wide sympathetic response which wound up generating a consensus that what I really needed was a cat.

I was presented with an orange long-haired feline who looked nothing like the collie-type dogs I’ve been surrounded by my entire adult life. I got the message about being lonely but haven’t figured out the cat thing. No offense intended to those devoted to their kitties, but for me at this point in time, I mostly think of them as bird assassins.

Another dream’s message was me evidently being kind to myself. I’m still a member of a cancer support group. Over the past three years, I’ve gotten half-way through the story of what it was like to live through the stunning orphan cancer process that consumed the last five years of my life with Michael. Writing about the experience has been much harder than I anticipated as the feelings it evokes are still sharp and painful. Part of me has been afraid to lose touch with the immediacy of what that day-to-day emotional balancing act feels like. When I read what patients and their families write in this online group, I’m reminded of the fragility of life and the struggles being faced by so many people. I don’t want to become numb to that, not just because what I read informs my own story, but because I feel a solidarity with those enjoined in their often lonely struggles. I see painful statements. The other night my brain spewed out a particularly sad confession written by a desolate stranger. It appeared as if it was written on a billboard.

‘‘I’m the husband of a cervical cancer survivor. I thought I could handle all the stress and be her rock but I crumbled like aluminum foil. It ruined our relationship and we’re separated. Has anyone else’s relationship suffered from this? I was the only one who knew her survival rate and it was not good at all. That’s ultimately what made me have a nervous breakdown.“

When I saw that sign in my dream, I was empathetic to that poor man but at the same time, I was gratified to know that I’d hung in with Michael through everything and had no regrets to haunt me. An important message indeed.

I’ve got more mysterious and obtuse dreams that I’ve recorded immediately upon waking in the morning. Enough of them for now. On the lighter side, I recently received another message from neither my conscious nor my subconscious self, but rather from Michael, the gift who keeps on giving, via one of his most loved colleagues.

Although there was a significant age gap between them, Michael and Dan were just in sync about most things, personally and professionally. When the time came for Michael to hastily leave teaching to begin systemic cancer treatment, he gave Dan his very cool red retro class stool which was shaped like the palm of a hand. The photo above looks most like it. During Michael’s years of therapy, the two of them stayed in contact, going out for beers and lunches during the good times. After Michael died, Dan had an elaborate tattoo which honored him for his personal favorites along with his mentoring talent as an educator. Dan and I have stayed in touch as he became a trusted friend.

Our local school district established a history scholarship in Michael’s name after his retirement. He was so honored and was deeply hopeful that it would be awarded long after he was gone. He lived long enough to give the first award himself. He hoped to make the initial seed money self-sustaining and I promised him I would see to his wishes. This year was the fourth time it was awarded. I knew Michael had lots of ideas about how to keep it going but so far, I’ve been able to raise enough funds for quite awhile. Last week, Dan contacted me and told me something I didn’t know. Michael had shared the idea of having an auction as a way to raise funds for the scholarship. Dan had forgotten about it until recently, when packing up to move to a new home. Then he found a box of odds and ends Michael had left with him for the sale, along with the red stool. He asked me what I wanted to do about them. I told him to keep the stool as a token of Michael’s affection. I wanted to see everything else. Oh my. What a bunch of great laughs from my ever-quirky and kitschy guy.

Look at this bizarre stuff. A Freud action figure. How about Annie Oakley or Edgar Allen Poe? Let’s not forget a flatulence machine, to be polite, which still works. My nine year old grandson is willing to pay almost anything for that. There’s a blanket with all the landmarks of our community and some academic treatises on the Viet Nam war. I haven’t had the time to give every item the attention it deserves, but I’ll get there. For the moment, this medium was the message. My funny inventive husband didn’t raise any money from his idiosyncratic collection but he raised my spirits. A little nudge to remind me to remember the good and to find a little humor in the midst of everything. I’m going to stay a receiver- message input from many sources is welcome here.

Messages The weather where I live has been hot and very dry. I keep my birdbath full and yesterday, I turned on the sprinkler as well.

[margothuxley]

What is my passion?  I’m not quite sure what it might be if it has a name, but I think my goal in life is to be someone who’s a voice for those who cannot themselves speak.  I see something that doesn’t sit well with my belief system and it’s not something I can let pass without my commenting on it.  If I agree with someone then I say something as well, unless that someone is vulnerable and so I silently agree and move on.  It’s been my experience that when I support someone or like someone’s work that that person becomes a focus or target for my deniers who are eager to put the kibosh on them.  So I need to pick and choose who and what I publicly support.  Those that I do publicly support aren’t all vulnerable to the naysayers of my life - many are organisations, bodies of authority, or people so high up that they already have built upa support system that I am a part of.

So what my passion is is to be a supporter of the people who are denied some basic right that they should have and they can’t due to the nature of their lives or some other thing that deniers or naysayers thing they are tainted with.

I support the military but I do not support the idea of a military that takes over the country and strictly polices all people with some very steep sort of ideal that denies the freedoms of the people they are supposed to help in their basic rights.  The military have a purpose and that is to assure that the rights of people are kept sacred and not to stand by at different posts in the cities disallowing or allowing people passage because of some other reason that is intrusive.

I do not approve of the use of authority such as the police to make people subliminally bow to some unseen force that makes people behave in a way that isn’t free.  Freedom then is a thing that the police need to be cognizant of and not make people feel as though they can’t move about freely.  The police state is not a natural and civilized state.  I do support the police in making sure that lawbreakers are made to face the law but this idea of putting together some sort of file on people who they might target is not good.  It reminds me of how J Edgar Hoover kept a file on everyone and operated ominously doing this and making a lot of people feel hunted even thought they had done nothing wrong in the eyes of God and all Heaven.

I’m a supporter of self-improvement and if one thinks they can be a better person so that they will find love then that’s a good thing.  To improve one’s self is a good thing - but not in the way that some people in Hollywood or wealthy people do it - seeking plastic surgery for example to look more alluring to some targeted set of approvers.  I mean, to give one’s self some sort of help to get well, to improve health, to improve the appearance so that they don’t get so frightful-looking to the public, to exercise as much as their age and level of income can provide.  To have a diet that’s not all over the place and giving them all sorts of heartburn or make them gouty.  To have a way of behaving towards their fellowmen and fellow-women so that they aren’t labeled as psychopaths or narcissists.

This society has excused a lot of behavior and it might be a reflection of how everyone’s just ‘let things slide’ and made everything too much of an isolationist attitude.  We can’t save the whole world, but we can’t just withdraw from society so much so that we’re being a selfish bunch of people only interested in our selves and what society can provide for our families and friends.  There has to be an open dialogue among people.  To disagree isn’t a bad thing, it is a way to seek other’s outlook on things and then to have a civil debate in the public square and not to hide one’s preferences so much so that it fosters a neo-nazi sort of mentality.  We have to be as polite to others and their own freedoms of experession.  

We have to assure that the press is free to operate and report of everything.  The press in some quarters have become too much a pet of some authorities and approval of stories has become the purview of these same authorities who might not even have beene elected to high office. To suppress the press is a big sin and everybody won’t be aware of what the world is going into.

To be secretive is a bad thing - and we don’t want to air our own scandals but if it affects the good of society then we must talk about it.  I don’t wish to tell people, for example, to divulge that their wives are having an affair or whatever but if people could be transparent enough about their own doings and not be overly conscious of what people think of them then that’s probably good enough.

What I mean to say is that those who run the world are responsible for the rights and freedoms of the people that have elected them to high office.

[wickedspideruk]

Super ContentCal Ifragilisticexpialidocious

ContentCal is much more than a social media scheduling tool. I will go as far as to say that it’s got it all.

Let me start by saying that I had tried many tools before finding and falling in love with ContentCal.  I was trying to remember how many apps I’d used the other day. Here are a few:

Hootsuite

Meet Edgar

Buffer

Social Oomph

Post Planner

TweetDeck

SmarterQueue

RecurPost

I know there are others but I can’t remember what they are called and I’m sure some don’t exist anymore too.

So you see when it comes to social media apps I’ve been around the block a bit.

No more!

Since I’ve found ContentCal I no longer have or need spreadsheets (numerous) or Word documents. Some of my spreadsheets were works of art in themselves. But keeping track of what I had or had not used was a nightmare. And I don’t have scraps of paper all over the place now either with bright ideas for blog posts either. And I’ve given away lots of  work notebooks as the chaos they caused me did not make me happy (p.s. disclosure – I’m not saying I’m a tidy person now

)

Let me explain why I’m using ContentCal:

Social Media Scheduling

The first thing a tool like ContentCal has to do is let you easily schedule content to go out to your audiences on Facebook (pages and groups), Twitter, LinkedIn (profiles & company pages), Instagram and other platforms. You can schedule for any date and time in the future; you can preconfigure a set time to post on set days or you can post at random times.

Posts can be added as “approved” and go out at the time you’ve chosen. If you work as part of a team, or with a VA perhaps, content can be set to need moderation before it is published. If you run a social media management company you can schedule posts and receive feedback from your clients before the content goes out.

Planning Channels

It is the ContentCal planning channels that have rescued me from spreadsheet paralysis. A planning channel is viewable on the calendar but the content is only there for you to plan ahead. So, I have a blog planning channel where I have the titles of my posts assigned to a specific date. If you are running email marketing campaigns you can have another channel for that. You can use a planning channel for anything – vlogs, podcasts, interviews etc….and see the plans for the week or the month all in one view.

Campaigns

Campaigns hold the essential information for each of your social media campaigns. As with the planning channels you can be flexible with how you use the campaign feature. You could have a campaign to fill the places at a workshop for instance. Or a themed campaigned like my Confessions of a Website Designer series or Tosca’s Wicked Words. 

For each campaign you set a start and end date and then write up the brief. The brief has anything in it that you want to remember about the campaign. For my email marketing campaign I have saved the links I will use to source reliable information. I also have a section in the brief to record metrics like how many subscribers I gain or lose in that period.

App

The app is what saves my house from bits of paper lying all over the place. When an idea pops into my head I add it straightway via the app. I don’t type up all the content of course – I just add enough text to remind me of the gist. Then when I’m at my computer I open ContentCal and write up the idea fully. Your bright ideas are never lost.

Integrations

ContentCal have started releasing some integrations that you setup using Zapier.  For example you can connect ContentCal to Google sheets which creates a copy of your post into a Google Sheet. Or you could create a Google Form and when someone fills in the form Zapier creates a post in ContentCal.  And an integration that I’ve not tried is between ContentCal and Pinterest.  Zapier is a great tool to connect all sorts of apps but you may need a bit of patience as sometimes getting two apps connected is a bit temperamental. But once your Zap is setup then  on the whole it’s smooth sailing.

Content Hub

The Content Hub is I think my favourite feature. This is where you put all your content, assign it to a category and use and reuse as appropriate. I create a post once and then if I want to use it again I can edit the content each time it gets published. The hub will let you know how often you’ve used a particular post. The hub is the place you keep your evergreen content.

Easy to Use

The user interface is perhaps the one reason that ContentCal tops the charts for me. It works for me visually. I get that the interface may not appeal to everyone. Much thought has gone into how the various features join together. As with anything new you need to give it time and use it regularly to see how it feels to you.

Customer Support

If I could give 5 stars for the level of support I would give 10. As I’m writing this I’m having 3 webchats with Ben. Here are the main reasons why this app beats the other social management systems I’ve tried before:

There is a bank of video tutorials to get you going at the start.

If they don’t have a video tutorial already to answer your particular query they will record one just for you – they have for me anyway.

They are very responsive to questions asked via their web chat facility.

If like me you are based in the UK it is a significant bonus to get help during our standard working hours rather than having to wait to get a response from someone across the globe.

Innovative

All I’m going to say here is that I look forward to reading their emails to see what new features have been added.

In summary, you can see that I really do think that ContentCal is supercalifragilisticexpialidocious.

If you would like a walkthrough of the app click this link to ContentCal and they will arrange that with you. Use “wicked spider” as the promotional code. You will receive $30 off your first bill if you decide to sign up with them.  If you just want to give the trial ago you can still use that promotional code.

p.s. Someone said to me the other day that they were apprehensive about putting all their content in someone else’s system and asked what would happen if they went bust or they lost all the content. That is a very good question and I can understand where it comes from. Firstly there is an option to export your content into a CSV file where you get the text content and a link to any images or videos you have uploaded. You could run the export on a monthly basis if you wanted to take a belts and braces approach. I have asked about the backup and restore policy at ContentCal just now via the webchat. When I get a reply I will update this post. I’m confident enough in their data recovery options to be using this app myself.

Some of the links in this post are affiliate links and if you go through them to make a purchase I will earn a commission. Keep in mind that I link to these companies and their products because of their quality and not because of the commission I receive from your purchases. I only recommend products and services that I have used myself. The decision is yours, and whether or not you decide to buy something is completely up to you

  The post Super ContentCal Ifragilisticexpialidocious appeared first on Wicked Spider.

from Wicked Spider https://wickedspider.com/super-contentcal-ifragilisticexpialidocious/

[shirleyjhust90]

Super ContentCal Ifragilisticexpialidocious

ContentCal is much more than a social media scheduling tool. I will go as far as to say that it’s got it all.

Let me start by saying that I had tried many tools before finding and falling in love with ContentCal.  I was trying to remember how many apps I’d used the other day. Here are a few:

Hootsuite

Meet Edgar

Buffer

Social Oomph

Post Planner

TweetDeck

SmarterQueue

RecurPost

I know there are others but I can’t remember what they are called and I’m sure some don’t exist anymore too.

So you see when it comes to social media apps I’ve been around the block a bit.

No more!

Since I’ve found ContentCal I no longer have or need spreadsheets (numerous) or Word documents. Some of my spreadsheets were works of art in themselves. But keeping track of what I had or had not used was a nightmare. And I don’t have scraps of paper all over the place now either with bright ideas for blog posts either. And I’ve given away lots of  work notebooks as the chaos they caused me did not make me happy (p.s. disclosure – I’m not saying I’m a tidy person now

)

Let me explain why I’m using ContentCal:

Social Media Scheduling

The first thing a tool like ContentCal has to do is let you easily schedule content to go out to your audiences on Facebook (pages and groups), Twitter, LinkedIn (profiles & company pages), Instagram and other platforms. You can schedule for any date and time in the future; you can preconfigure a set time to post on set days or you can post at random times.

Posts can be added as “approved” and go out at the time you’ve chosen. If you work as part of a team, or with a VA perhaps, content can be set to need moderation before it is published. If you run a social media management company you can schedule posts and receive feedback from your clients before the content goes out.

Planning Channels

It is the ContentCal planning channels that have rescued me from spreadsheet paralysis. A planning channel is viewable on the calendar but the content is only there for you to plan ahead. So, I have a blog planning channel where I have the titles of my posts assigned to a specific date. If you are running email marketing campaigns you can have another channel for that. You can use a planning channel for anything – vlogs, podcasts, interviews etc….and see the plans for the week or the month all in one view.

Campaigns

Campaigns hold the essential information for each of your social media campaigns. As with the planning channels you can be flexible with how you use the campaign feature. You could have a campaign to fill the places at a workshop for instance. Or a themed campaigned like my Confessions of a Website Designer series or Tosca’s Wicked Words. 

For each campaign you set a start and end date and then write up the brief. The brief has anything in it that you want to remember about the campaign. For my email marketing campaign I have saved the links I will use to source reliable information. I also have a section in the brief to record metrics like how many subscribers I gain or lose in that period.

App

The app is what saves my house from bits of paper lying all over the place. When an idea pops into my head I add it straightway via the app. I don’t type up all the content of course – I just add enough text to remind me of the gist. Then when I’m at my computer I open ContentCal and write up the idea fully. Your bright ideas are never lost.

Integrations

ContentCal have started releasing some integrations that you setup using Zapier.  For example you can connect ContentCal to Google sheets which creates a copy of your post into a Google Sheet. Or you could create a Google Form and when someone fills in the form Zapier creates a post in ContentCal.  And an integration that I’ve not tried is between ContentCal and Pinterest.  Zapier is a great tool to connect all sorts of apps but you may need a bit of patience as sometimes getting two apps connected is a bit temperamental. But once your Zap is setup then  on the whole it’s smooth sailing.

Content Hub

The Content Hub is I think my favourite feature. This is where you put all your content, assign it to a category and use and reuse as appropriate. I create a post once and then if I want to use it again I can edit the content each time it gets published. The hub will let you know how often you’ve used a particular post. The hub is the place you keep your evergreen content.

Easy to Use

The user interface is perhaps the one reason that ContentCal tops the charts for me. It works for me visually. I get that the interface may not appeal to everyone. Much thought has gone into how the various features join together. As with anything new you need to give it time and use it regularly to see how it feels to you.

Customer Support

If I could give 5 stars for the level of support I would give 10. As I’m writing this I’m having 3 webchats with Ben. Here are the main reasons why this app beats the other social management systems I’ve tried before:

There is a bank of video tutorials to get you going at the start.

If they don’t have a video tutorial already to answer your particular query they will record one just for you – they have for me anyway.

They are very responsive to questions asked via their web chat facility.

If like me you are based in the UK it is a significant bonus to get help during our standard working hours rather than having to wait to get a response from someone across the globe.

Innovative

All I’m going to say here is that I look forward to reading their emails to see what new features have been added.

In summary, you can see that I really do think that ContentCal is supercalifragilisticexpialidocious.

If you would like a walkthrough of the app click this link to ContentCal and they will arrange that with you. Use “wicked spider” as the promotional code. You will receive $30 off your first bill if you decide to sign up with them.  If you just want to give the trial ago you can still use that promotional code.

p.s. Someone said to me the other day that they were apprehensive about putting all their content in someone else’s system and asked what would happen if they went bust or they lost all the content. That is a very good question and I can understand where it comes from. Firstly there is an option to export your content into a CSV file where you get the text content and a link to any images or videos you have uploaded. You could run the export on a monthly basis if you wanted to take a belts and braces approach. I have asked about the backup and restore policy at ContentCal just now via the webchat. When I get a reply I will update this post. I’m confident enough in their data recovery options to be using this app myself.

Some of the links in this post are affiliate links and if you go through them to make a purchase I will earn a commission. Keep in mind that I link to these companies and their products because of their quality and not because of the commission I receive from your purchases. I only recommend products and services that I have used myself. The decision is yours, and whether or not you decide to buy something is completely up to you

 The post Super ContentCal Ifragilisticexpialidocious appeared first on Wicked Spider.

source https://wickedspider.com/super-contentcal-ifragilisticexpialidocious/ from Wicked Spider https://wickedspideruk.blogspot.com/2020/05/super-contentcal-ifragilisticexpialidoc.html

[susanbcnvs]

okay so!! drizzle here with my second child. susan is a completely new muse, and honestly i don’t know what i’m doing ( tho lbh, when do i ever? ), but i’ve written down some hcs that should hopefully make at least some sense and be somewhat helpful?? let’s just get into it. trigger warnings: death, mourning, super brief mentions of anxiety/ panic

SIMAY BARLAS? No, that’s actually SUSAN BONES from the GOLDEN TRIO ERA. You know, the child of HENRY BONES and SOPHIE BONES? About to begin SIXTH YEAR, this HUFFLEPUFF student is sided with THE ORDER OF THE PHOENIX. SHE identifies as CIS-FEMALE and is a HALFBLOOD who is known to be SENSITIVE, PERFECTIONISTIC, and CYNICAL but also COMPASSIONATE, INDEPENDENT, and HARD-WORKING.

so susan obviously comes from the prominent bones family, that has close ties to the ministry and have been very against blood supremacy for a long time now. her parents, grandparents, uncle edgar and his family were all murdered in the first wizarding world, so susan was raised by her remaining aunt amelia. since she was only one year old at the time her parents died, she has no memories of them, and only what amelia has told her. the first wizarding war obviously had a huge impact on her family, and unlike some children that grew up in peaceful ignorance of the devastating effects of the war and blood supremacy, she’s never not seen the effect it had and the terror it caused. still, she’s grateful for the life she’s been given. her aunt was amazing and worked hard to make susan’s childhood a good one. and it was, for the most part --- she knows she could be so much worse off, and she’s grateful that she had amelia and for everything she’s given her. still, sometimes it was difficult not to let grief and bitterness and cynicism seep in, on birthdays and death anniversaries and those moments she’d catch her aunt grieving in private 

when she came to hogwarts, she was quickly sorted into hufflepuff. she was briefly considered for slytherin ( not quite long enough to be considered a hatstall ) due to her ambition, resourcefulness and determination, but ultimately her hufflepuff traits won out and her admiration for their attitudes and beliefs. there hasn’t been a day where she’s thought she was sorted into the wrong house --- she’s a hufflepuff through and through, and although she only had her aunt growing up, she found another family in her hufflepuff classmates, one which she will always be grateful for

susan is very enduring and persevering tbh. in part i think it’s just how she was raised? i mean, amelia lost all her family except for susan, and suddenly she had this baby she had to raise --- she definitely had to adapt and persevere through it despite the losses and grief she felt. susan knows that life can be cruel, it can bring you down, it can try its hardest to break you, but she also knows that she has to find a way to adapt to it and keep going? susan doesn’t view breaking down or being overwhelmed by negative emotions as a weakness, and when life gets tough she won’t ignore them or pretend she doesn’t feel them. i mean, it’s not something she wants to display in public, but in private or around people she trusts she’s comfortable with falling apart if that makes any sense?? she would never want to go through life as an emotionless zombie just to stay ‘strong’, but she also won’t let her emotions bring her down or stop her from moving forward? we’re closing in on 2 a.m. over here so i am most likely not explaining this well at all lmao, but this gif from the bold type ( go watch it ) kind of sums up her general attitude and approach to the challenging parts of life:

fifth year was... not fun. still reeling from the loss of cedric, umbridge changing essentially everything they loved about the school, the fear of the approaching war, joining the d.a. in hopes of being able to protect herself and her loved ones  --- all things that contributed to it being a Stressful Year. not only that, but her best friend hannah abbott lost her mum and susan had to watch her spiral out of control with little to no idea of how she could help her through it. furthermore, the death eaters that murdered her uncle edgar and his family escaped from prison, and throughout the school year she was pestered with questions from other students about her family and how they were murdered, understandably causing her a lot of emotional distress. she tried to focus her attention on the d.a. and the rest of her classes that umbridge hadn’t changed too much, but at the end of the school year she was just relieved to go home tbh and attempt put that behind her

sorry to say susan, but it only gets worse after that. in july before the start of this school year, amelia was personally murdered by voldemort in their home. susan was at a friend’s house at the time --- she wouldn’t be alive now if she’d been home --- but she was the one to discover her. i’m not gonna go into any details because none of us need that, but it was clear amelia had put up one hell of a fight, and it was obviously a traumatising experience for susan

since amelia had been her last living relative, susan was now an orphan with no other relatives to turn to. thankfully enough, hannah’s family were willing to take her in so that she wouldn’t have to go to a children's home/ into foster care. can’t even begin to explain how relieved susan was about that tbh, it might have been too much for her to handle otherwise. she may not have any blood relatives left, but she still has a family that will support her and catch her when she falls, and that familiarity and knowledge really does so much in helping her feel less alone and not letting her somewhat cynical nature bring her down, and just mourn her aunt in peace?? 

legit where would susan be without hannah abbott?? she’s happy she never has to know the answer to that

really into things like scrapbooking, pottery, knitting, photography and other creative mediums?? just finds them to be a good way for her to relax and not think Too Much for a while, plus she gets something beautiful out of it at the end ( she is here for the #aesthetic ). she might not be excellent at all of it ( her knitting is definitely Questionable ) but she finds it therapeutic

usually makes yearly scrapbooks for the hufflepuffs that they can keep in the common room to look back on fond memories, and that new/ future students can look through and see how close-knit they are. sort of a way to show them that although they may be away from their parents and the home that they know, they have a family here too that will support them through their years here and be there whenever they need a friend?? 

definitely did a little scrapbook in honour of cedric that anyone who wanted to help out with could, so that future generations got an idea of what an incredible person he was, and that he’s not just a name that’s remembered

is probably working on a scrapbook rn about her family, partly as a way to help her process and deal with the fact that they’re all gone now, and partly just to make sure that they’re not just another couple of names on a list of the deceased either. i mean, the bones family is well known in the wizarding world, especially in connection to the ministry, so she knows they won’t ever really be forgotten, but amelia was more than just the head of the department of magical law enforcement, and susan wants to show that. like i said, it’s just a scrapbook for herself and not something she would actually share, but she just kind of wants to show who they were as people and how much they mattered, even if it’s just to herself?? and obviously she didn’t know her parents or grandparents or the other family members that died during the first war, but she’s trying her best to do them justice based on the memories amelia told her about growing up 

definitely that student with perfectly colour-coordinated notes, organised binders, meticulously planned study timetable, detailed essay plans etc. etc. and just really looks like she Knows what she’s doing even if she’s just screaming on the inside

if she had grown up in modern times, she would be like.... ridiculously devoted to the bullet journal system and just make it aesthetic af. tho i guess now that she’s in the future, she might get the chance to actually try it

not one to procrastinate; knows it won’t do her any good, and would rather dive right into a task so she can give it her all. which is a good thing, because if she did procrastinate, she would likely Die from stress ( she already sort of is ). she can be a bit of a perfectionist when it comes to her schoolwork ( putting it lightly tbh ). she’s been known to finish an essay ( which she edited several times to make it Good Enough ) in the evening and then the next day decide that it is not, in fact, good enough and quite literally burn it and start again

honestly i’m making myself stressed just thinking about it pls love yourself susan and don’t make life harder for yourself 

for someone who seems so organised and put together, she actually has no idea what she’s really doing --- the future after hogwarts is just a terrifyingly blank canvas to her right now. she feels an extreme pressure to live up to her surname, especially now that she’s the last survivor, because her family did so much good. they were some of the brightest wizards and witches of their age, especially her aunt amelia, and it was part of the reason why they were targeted. susan just wants to make them, and herself, proud. she wants to make a real difference in the world, but whether that means heading into the same career field as amelia or doing something different, she’s not sure of yet

that’s also part of the reason why she puts so much effort into her studies --- when she finally figures out what she wants to do, she doesn’t want to realize she can’t do it because she didn’t work hard enough in school or anything. she just wants to give herself as good chance as possible to succeed

so. it’s pretty clear that susan Cares about her academic life, but it doesn’t come close to how much she cares about her friends. she will drop everything for you, no questions asked. even if you wake her at three a.m. the night before a big exam, she’ll stay up with you for the rest of the night if that’s what you need, talking or playing games or drinking a comforting cup of cocoa --- whatever you need. she’ll panic about the consequences later, for sure, but she’ll be there when you need her. she only had her aunt growing up, but she views her friends at hogwarts ( especially the other hufflepuffs ) as family, and she’ll do anything for them. they don’t have to consider her family in return, but she’ll definitely try her hardest to be there for them as much as possible

really good at braiding hair?? usually wears her hair in a long braid down her back, and is always willing to braid others’ hair, especially the younger students. the big sister of hufflepuff tbh

is honestly just. Terrified by the war, by the death eaters, by voldemort. i mean, the wars have claimed her whole family --- there’s never really been a time where she didn’t understand how serious the war was, how devastating the impact of it could be. how frightening of a time it was. one thing that hits her particularly hard is the fact that her family were great wizards --- they were so talented, and they still ended up dead. if they couldn’t make it out alive, what chance would susan really stand if the death eaters decided they wanted to rid the world of the last surviving bones member? she’s just so scared

that being said, she isn't someone who would let her fear paralyse or stop her from doing what's right? she's still going to fight for her friends, for the justice of her family, for the targeted muggleborns and blood traitors. she'll do anything she can to help dumbledore's army, even if she's scared as hell the whole time

in terms of the time travel thing, susan is Stressed and Conflicted. amelia's death is still so recent, susan doesn't even know what would happen if she met her here --- whether she would appreciate getting a few more moments with her aunt or if it'd just make the grieving and eventual goodbye harder ( because susan wholeheartedly believe there has to be a way for them to revert everything back to normal ). there's also the chance that she could run into her parents, or the other family members she never got to know --- and although she's always wanted to get the chance to know them, now that it might actually be a reality, she doesn't know how to feel. of course, there's also the worry of how this could affect the war, and the world as a whole --- what would happen if there was no way to fix this?? basically, susan is conflicted af atm and she is Not here for this situation.

at long last i will Shut Up and leave you with her pinterest board

[dragonsongs-reprise]

The Anxious Yet Determined Author: A BSD Edgar Allan Poe Meta

Edgar Allen Poe, everyone’s favorite raccoon loving, relatable anxiety filled author! Despite being in only a handful of chapters, he still manages to be a popular character with a loving fanbase. But, why is that? Is it because of his wonderfully well done character design? His unique ability? The fact his social anxious self is relatable to many readers? Or is it just his raccoon? That’s what I hope to answer through this analysis of his character so far

(Note that this will only use info up to chapter 53 as chapter 54 hasn’t been translated yet at the time of writing this and the original source material will always win out over the anime in terms of information I use to analyze )

First off, before I start, I would like to state that any manga translations that I use throughout this analysis aren’t mine. All screencaps and translations I use belong to the wonderful and lovely people over at dazaiscans!

So, let’s start this off by talking about the fan favorite trope that people have decided to characterize Poe with within fanfics, rps, and such. The idea that Poe’s anxiety causes him to stutter constantly. No matter how cute this idea is, this doesn’t line up with what we’ve been presented in canon this far. We’ve been shown that Poe certainly has some kind of anxiety and that his speech seems more hushed and submissive in nature when he feels panicked, yet, a stutter has never been present as a part of his panicked speech.

Yet this screencap does tell us something about Poe’s anxiety and how he deals with being surprised/pushed aside. After Ranpo speaks of not caring about Poe’s reasons for setting up the deduction game despite the fact that Ranpo himself was the cause for Poe creating this game in the first place, he turns to Karl.

He tries to convince Ranpo to listen to his backstory with saying “But this match’s outcome involves our fate!”, yet that doesn’t work. So he doesn’t even attempt to speak to Ranpo about how he feels pushed aside before he can recompose himself. He turns over and mutters his feelings to Karl, as if Karl will reassure him. From this and how Poe explains that everyone basically abandoned him after losing to Ranpo in the investigation competition six years ago, we can infer that Karl has become Poe’s support system, someone that won’t leave him for his failures (cause pets can’t talk down to you or leave you in the way that other humans can). So when Poe becomes overwhelmed or even dejected, he turns to Karl as he’s had no people that he could turn to for the last six years. Talking to Karl seems to recompose Poe (he even gave Karl food just for listening to him) and allows him to continue his conversation with Ranpo without trouble.

Let’s move away from the man’s anxiety and towards his ambition along with the way he works towards the goals he has. While the man may have his moments of anxiety and insecurities resulting from said anxiety, he’s also quite the determined individual. Once he lost to Ranpo those six years ago, he wanted to get back at him. He NEEDS to get back at Ranpo and to regain what he lost then, he needs to prove that he can outsmart Ranpo.

To show that he’s better. Yet, the people who left him six years ago probably won’t care about his victory six years after the fact. Yet, Poe needs this. Not to prove himself to everyone else, he needs to prove that he’s capable to himself.

He doesn’t view this as fair, neither does he care about it being fair. Poe wants a victory over Ranpo, and he doesn’t care about the way he goes about getting said victory over the man that he sees as the man who ruined his life. The satisfaction of beating Ranpo in the way of deduction and proving his intellect is enough for him. No matter what shock or even disappointment he showed in Ranpo proclaiming that he didn’t remember him, it’s all in the past now. All that matters now is seeing Ranpo defeated by the novel of Poe’s design. Ranpo’s defeat will be Poe’s revenge against the one who caused his life to crumble away those six years ago.

Yet, as proven later on in both chapter 37 with Poe showing up to the Agency to show Ranpo his manuscript, at Ranpo’s request along with him agree to write the novel that Ranpo later used in chapter 49 to trap both him and Chuuya in, Poe doesn’t hate Ranpo. In fact he respects him

and from this screenshot, he even cares about Ranpo’s safety and even wonders what he’ll do if Ranpo was to die. Ranpo and him have a stable relationship that at least classifies them as good associates. His hatred for Ranpo only extend as far as to hate the man for his abilities and for seemingly forgetting him, not for the person he actually is.

So when Ranpo told him that he remembered his match against Poe and how Poe had actually made Ranpo work towards his victory, Poe softens towards him. Poe wanted revenge towards the man that ruined his life without effort, he who didn’t even care enough to remember who he is. Not revenge towards the man who remembered him and acknowledged Poe’s abilities. Thus, his relationship with Ranpo turned positive. This relationship is what’s truly making Poe stay as a character who’s able to impact the story as without Ranpo and him working out the kinks (not those types of kinks, you nasties) in their relationship, Poe would have no ties to Japan and would have absolutely no reason to stay and not go back to America.

So to anyone who read until the end, thank you so much! I hope that this short meta helped with trying to explain Poe’s character and perhaps the reasons why Poe has such a big fanbase for a character who has appeared very little within the series.

[singingpeople]

Paying the price

Chapter 15

@pathybo @jojuarez26 @tigpooh67 @beautifulramblingbrains @jaiboomer11 @lets-play-truth-or-dare @carefultheyspit @love17mwh

@iammarylastar @bookwarm85 @deepfrz 

Important: This chapter is wholly unedited, so it may be terrible spelling & sentence wording & all that stuff. But I´m writing from my brother´s PC because the ventilation system of my new one broke down today, making it sound as if he´ll explode anytime soon. I won´t have my brother´s PC very often because he needs it for writing his master thesis & when I have to send mine in (hopefully it´s a guarantee case) I have no idea when I will get it back. Still, I´ll try to make it work with the updates & all :) This chapter is really rough, but bare with me it will get better very soon, I promise! :) Thank you for reading & all the reviews, I´ll try to edit it tomorrow if my brother doesn’t need it! :)

Time is an abstract thing if you think about it. Sometimes it is as if no time at all passed while at other times, it just flies by you, blurring your memories until you don’t remember what day it is or what you did yesterday. For a minute you lose yourself, cease to exist while you feel like walking through honey, your limbs heavy while the world around you is spinning on and on. You are rooted to the spot while everything around you spirals out of control, being so stuck in your own universe that you´de indifferent to the happenings around you, only moments stand out, colorful specks in a world of full of grey.

Have you ever looked down at your own hand, moving your fingers, watching every single muscle contract while asking yourself if this is really your body if this is all you are. All you will ever be. Just a mass of skin and bones that is condemned to walk on this earth until you finally bite the dust.

Or do you ever feel like standing beside yourself, not being the person in control of your own body.  You watch them going through their daily chores like machines, your mind so far away from the empty shell that is considered being alive because it breathes, that only a flicker of pain can bring you back.

I ask myself if someone else ever felt the way I do now. If anyone in this damn city feels everything, every single emotion at once while feeling nothing at all. If their breathing becomes forced the moment they feel the panic rising in their chest until it overwhelms them, consuming them alive but still don´t show any signs of being nervous. If the people in their lives don´t notice it because those people have become so good at acting, always so collected, so calm as if nothing ever bothers them or if the humans that are supposed to support them just don´t care. Maybe they don´t realize they're the exact the opposite of calm and indifferent. They care, maybe too much and about everything. About how to overcome the struggle their facing, if they are worth loving or if they should stop trying at all because, in the end, their struggle will have been in vain. Like always.

Are there walking paradoxes like I am one, a person that is consumed by their fear while simultaneously feeling nothing at all, or am I just crazy?

All I know is, that I was lying in that bed for days, my hands at one point restricted, limiting my movements to the bare minimum, at another free again, giving me the chance to curl up, the fetus position acting as a shield against the world. There were people. Sitting on my bed, trying to talk to me or worse, touching me. I did my best to ignore them and their obnoxious babbling, but it followed me into my dreams, their voices echoing through the empty space that was my mind.

There were also needles piercing my skin, right after living through a very vivid memory that was playing in an endless loop, like a broken tape. Every time I felt myself coming out of what felt like cotton candy clouding my head and got more lively, something cool would touch the back of my hand and I was gone once again, drifting in and out of consciousness.

Funny, I always thought I knew what it felt like to stand beside myself, but in this state, it was so much worse. Every second seemed to last an eternity while hours flew by in a blink of the eye. I knew they had all been here, my mother, Tris, the twins and even Ivy and Avery. But despite Dante not once showing up, his voice telling me that everything would be okay followed me into these strange dreams, lightening the burden I carried with me for at least a little, just for a second making it easier to breathe.

I also knew, that dad always stayed outside the room, only getting a short briefing from the nurse before disappearing again. From one of these conversations that ended in a screaming fit of him, I concluded they had found traces of the fear serum in my bloodstream. Guess now I know where that vivid memory of hot burning iron marring my skin came from.

I came to the conclusion that they had planned this, Edgar had planned this. It was a simple concept, really. Something an erudite could think of. Their methods of calculated mental torturing had me thinking of the scruffy cat I found playing with a little bird when I was on my way home from school. She always gave it the chance to escape, drawing her claws back to created the illusion that the little sparrow was free to leave. The bird, scared as it was always hopped away, not realizing that his eagerness to get away and survive was exactly, what the cat wanted, what it craved. The prey running away from its predator was, what the cat considered fun, the chase what was so thrilling. To crush any hope it may have by capturing it over and over again until it got finally got boring. That was the moment the cat showed mercy and killed it with one bite, ending its agony. The final kill wasn't the satisfying part, it had been the chase, the diminishing of every ounce of hope it may have still had. That was, what got the cat off.

In the end, I would suffer the same fate like this bird. I just wished Edgar and his minions would get it over with and kill me before someone else dear to me would pay the price for being a part of my life. Like Dante almost had.

If he had died in that alleyway, right before my eyes, my life would have been over. Being the cause of one person's death was worse enough, but adding another life to that list would have effectively caused my own demise. My real breaking point, as if I wasn’t pathetic enough right now. It would have been easier than breaking a window in one of those countless crumbling skyscrapers in the heart of the city. Only one stone, for me one bullet to shatter the fragile resistance we still managed to muster.

Yeah, life is an abstract thing, not tangible for the human mind, while love, which is just hormones going crazy inside our heads creating hallucinations, isn’t something for everyone. It certainly isn’t for me. I either end up hurting the people dearest to me in the worst way possible or they die, maybe even both. It was simple as that. No, loving someone and being loved in return was never something that would be granted to me. And as long those around me were happy living their lives, I would go gladly through mine. Alone, until the bite of death would wipe my mortal existence from the face of the earth, until everything that remained was a faint echo of pain and the stardust I was created from restored to its original condition.

The week I spent in the infirmary was one big blur, partly through the meds I was given, partly by the daze that left my whole body numb and my mind fuzzy. In hindsight, everything seemed a little clearer, now that the sedatives didn´t turn my brain into useless mush, but I also knew what I had to do. I knew it from the moment the first gunshot rang through the air, almost killing the one person I wanted to stay out of the shitshow I call live. If being associated with me was a death sentence, I would reduce the number of people in my life to the bare minimum. And that meant only mom.

She had spent the whole time by my side head buried in countless files, only leaving when someone else would come to watch over me. Most of the time their voices faded into background noises while I stared at the white wallpaper, barely blinking. For days. Internalizing every swirl and bump into the wall, I tried to make it easier for them to leave. The moment they would realize I was already a dead man walking was be the moment, they would finally leave me be. Leave me to resign to my fate.

The last string in my heart was ripped apart when Tris thought it would be a good idea to bring Sam to my room. Something to cheer me up she said. Being convinced I couldn’t feel any longer, the sharp pain in my chest when I turned my back towards them, moving for the first time that day, was almost a pleasant sensation. Reminding me that I wasn’t dead yet.

Getting the hint, my aunt left again immediately, trying to explain Sam what was wrong with me when she asked, her voice as curious, as it was sad. Curled up under my blanket that mom specially brought from home I asked myself if she would remember me in the years to come. Maybe it would be better if she didn’t, you couldn't miss what you didn't know, right?   But still, I selfishly wished for it.

After six days that felt like six weeks, I was discharged and sent my way, with a bottle of pills I was supposed to take if I felt anxious or homicidal. Maybe if I sneaked some of them into dad´s food, just a pill or two he would let loose for a day. The thought of him running around in the compound like an amity on peace serum almost made me smile.  Almost.

The majority of the time home I spent in my old room, lying in my bed, staring at the wall. Instead of white, this one was a dark grey, almost black. The only burst of colors being the flames that symbolized everything I wasn’t. Our manifesto told us to fight our fears, no matter the cost of it. It certainly seemed as if I´d lost my sanity trying to do just that, my happiness long gone so it should count at least for something. Thinking of our manifest, I was sure that I would also always stand up for people, maybe even shout for them if I could. But I would never be free from my fears, from the demons that haunted me. They would always control my actions. How cowardly. And because my faction thought this cowardice was to blame for the world's injustice and that the bravery, I didn´t possess, is considered the most important virtue of them all, it is safe to say I have failed my faction before I was even a part of it. That sums my life up perfectly.

After three of four days of peaceful serenity, dad suddenly came storming into the room,  the door slamming against the door, declaring he had enough of it. His face contorted in anger, his eyes blazing fire like they always did before he ended the life of a poor soul. Not being able to help the small sliver of fear, I blinked, trying to scoop away from him, cowering away in the corner of my bed. But he wasn’t having any of it.

Grabbing my wrists, dad wasn´t faced at all by my resistance and dragged me to the bathroom, basically pulling me after him while I stemmed my feet into the floor with all my strength. But it just took him one powerful pull to make me stumble into him. Sensing his chance, dad threw me over his shoulder marching into the bathroom. When he turned on the water I knew exactly what he was planning and I tried my best to get him to put me down, hitting his back with my fists. And then he did.

Grabbing my waist, he heaved me from his shoulder before pushing me directly under the ice-cold water, not giving a damn that I was gasping for air, still dressed in leggings and a shirt or that I was basically freezing to death after only three seconds under the stream.

“You have ten minutes before I want you dressed, ready for training.” With that he was gone, the bathroom door of my en suite slamming shut behind him as I scrambled for the temperature regulator, turning the water scolding hot before peeling the heavy clothes off me.

Like dad demanded, I was done in under ten minutes but instead of waiting for him, I just stormed out of the apartment while he was busy doing something in his study. If he wants me gone, fine. I have no problem with leaving when I know I´m not wanted. But I won´t hang around him all day, listening to how a perfect dauntless would behave. Not today.

It was already evening, the whole day had passed in a blur while I sat hidden away in an alcove on one of the lower levels of the chasm. The way down there was reclusive, only known to a few and I was one of them. 

The sound of water crashing against rock always caused a strange sense of tranquility to wash over me, but with it came also the numbness, the little spark of anger and defiance from this morning gone as soon as it came.

How many days of training I had missed, including this one, I had no idea but I knew, dad would skin me alive as soon as he´d get his hands on me. So my hiding game had to be strong.

Lost in thought, I hadn’t realized how much my back and butt really hurt from sitting on cold, wet stone the whole day but standing up, I almost toppled over. In the last second before falling I managed to regain my balance, swaying on my wobbly feet. Not quite good so close to a hole filled with water that swallowed everyone and everything up, unless you were suicidal. And, I wasn’t yet at that point of my life.

After having scaled the steep pathway, I thought about where to go now. It must have been close to midnight, the white light being replaced by blue, solar powered ones. Going to the dorms, jut like going home wasn´t an option. But since sleep avoided me ever since leaving the infirmary and without the meds, I was content spending my night somewhere I could let my mind wander around, without having to worry about people seeing me.

Letting my feet carry me wherever they wanted, my mind was still reeling about everything and nothing at once. Stopping short, I found myself in front of the training room that whispered for me to step in. Opening the heavy steel doors I did just that. My feet dragging over the rubber floor I soon faced the door of the small chamber in the back. Slowly extending my hand, I pushed this one open too, the memories rushing into my head as soon as I smelled the familiar scent of leather mats, gunpowder and sweat overwhelming me to such an extent I had to support myself on the threshold.

Closing my eyes, I stumbled inside before sinking down on the mats, a few feet away from where Dante and I had first become one. Reliving all the passionate kisses and shared laughter while he sunk himself into me over and over again I found myself reminiscing the first happy memory since landing in the infirmary. The ache in my chest getting almost unbearable. Happiness to have been granted such a special moment in my life. Sadness because there wouldn´t be any more of them. No more stolen kisses or passionate nights, no more covert glances or breathless laughter.

Folding my hands, I pressed them against my chest, drawing in a shaky breath because right in that moment, I could almost see him looking down at me with these warm brown eyes. I could feel his hands traveling across my bare skin, igniting every nerve ending in my body. His smell had been manly, the scent of his sweat not overpowering despite him training the whole day. I could even fucking taste him, his lips moving against mine and I knew he must have been chewing a gum before we kissed, his breath all minty. All these sensations after weeks of numbness were just too much for me. Pressing my palms against my eyes, I rocked back and forth trying to get my composure back. But it was futile.

Slapping my hand against my forehead, I tried harder, almost desperately when suddenly the door to the little chamber was thrown open and he wasn’t any longer a figment of my imagination.

Letting himself fall to his knees beside me, Dante pulled my head up, his hands on either side of my cheeks. His gaze frantically flitting over my face, he let out a relieved breath the moment he realized I was fine, before pulling me into his chest. He laid his chin on my hair and I could feel him taking a deep breath, his arms pulling me even closer to him. “Thank fuck, Lexi! We have been searching for you the whole goddamn day. Your family is going nuts, especially your father.” Letting out an incredulous chuckle, I felt him press his face into my hair, exhaling deeply. “Fuck. I thought something happened to you. Don´t ever do this to me again!”

Having almost forgotten what I had promised myself, I melted into him for a second reveling in the tranquility his touch brought. But then I froze up, not believing I had thrown all my cautions into the wind like this. Like I wouldn’t be the cause of his doom. Instantly feeling something was wrong, Dante drew back a little, looking down at me with worried eyes that tore my soul apart. Not having it in me to withstand him even a second longer, I did was I was best in. I ran.

Pushing him away with all the force I could muster, I was out the door before he could even get up again. But as I sprinted towards the doors leading out of the training room as fast as I could, I realized the lack of sleep and most importantly food had drained my powers. How much exactly, I had to find out when Dante suddenly grabbed by my wrists only inches away from the door and whirled me around, slamming us against the wall beside it.

“Forget it. Not again.” Dante was hovering over me, his muscular body caging me against the wall like he had done so many times before, his breathing ragged. And for the first time, he looked almost angry, his eyes hard and I shrank back, the fury boiling under the surface such a foreign sensation coming from him. “Do you really think I would just let you run away again? Just look where it took us last time!”

Lowering my head in shame, I stared at our chests that were pressed against each other, both heaving heavily. Yes, it had been my fault. My fault he was shot, my fault for freaking out. My fault for making everything worse by mindlessly running after a bunch of guys, I knew wanted nothing more than to kill me.

“Hey.” Dante grabbed my chin, but I tried to push him away, not being able to deal with his proximity. To deal with him and everything he stood for. When my movements turned into real struggling, almost desperately trying to get away from him, Dante captured my hands, pressing them against the wall by my side, rendering me completely immobile. “Lexi, stop it.” When I didn’t, he grabbed both of my wrists in one hand, raising my head with his other. But I lowered my eyes, avoiding his questioning gaze. “Look, I´m sorry for not visiting you in the infirmary but your mother was always there, your brother had me handling the other dauntless-born 24/7 and when I finally had an hour off, I had to deal with the consequences of the patrol debacle. I really tried, though...”

Trailing off, Dante tilted his head, his lips barely brushing over my cheek. Despite wanting to revel in the feeling of his stubbly face against mine and melt into his embrace to forget everything around us once more, I turned my head. Away from his touch, from everything I ever craved. Freezing up, it took Dante a moment before he drew back and from the corner of my eye, I could see him muster me intently. But I stared straight ahead, matching the hurt that crossed his face with an indifferent expression, even though it send sharp jabs into my guts. “Lexi, what´s wrong?” No answer.

“Tell me, please...” After another minute without any reaction from me, Dante positioned his face right in front of mine, causing me to turn away again. He huffed incredulously and I heard it, despite it being so quiet. Not wanting to see the range of emotion my indifferent behavior caused, I closed my eyes willing him to just leave it be and leave me. But he didn’t. Slamming me against the wall once more, frustrated but still careful I wouldn’t get hurt, I cursed the loud, surprised breath that left my lips, not ever wanting him to think I was afraid of him. But I still felt him increasing the space between us so that our chests weren´t touching.

“I see that you obviously want nothing to do with me right now,  Lexi. And I understand it, I totally do. After all, it was my fault you were there, right? That you ended up in the infirmary.”

Biting my lips in despair, I shook my head. He didn’t understand it, none of it. Especially not, that it was for his own good. Me wanting to end whatever we have had nothing to do with him taking me there. the incident just showed me what I had to do. For him.

“Alright, just tell me one thing.” Letting out a breath, I despised the resigned tone in his voice. It was the way everyone spoke to me before giving up for good. “Did you ever have any feelings for me? No matter how little they were, was there something?”

Snapping my head up, my wide eyes met his hooded ones for the first time this evening. Dante´s face was guarded, his brow furrowed but his eyes gave away the vulnerability he felt.

Heart rate speeding up, my breathing quickening I felt my chest constricting, my throat closing in. I would have never assumed Dante would ask such a question in a moment like this. And right now, it was freaking me the hell out. But it was also the opportunity I had waited for, hoped for. To cut him off, to end what could have been the beginning of a perfect relationship. The start of a fairytale where the prince saves his princess and shields her from every harm that may come her way while looking ridiculously good doing it.

But I had never been a princess and in the end, he would just die in the process of trying to save me. If from myself or Edgar, I had no idea... Dante was so much more than a tragic love story gone wrong. He was an amazing human being and had the potential to be great, to achieve something. To become a high ranking member, having a loving wife and maybe even children. The image of a brown haired little boy with Dante´s eyes running around in the compound took my breath away, my heart fracturing as I pictured him kissing some dauntless female on his way to work, while I spent the rest of my life alone. He´d have the perfect family. And I wouldn’t be part of it.

So despite my heart screaming at me to not do it and the knowledge that this would be the one moment in my life, I would never forgive myself for, I shook my head no. Telling him that I didn’t have any feelings for him. Never had and never will.

“Alright.” Nodding his head, before shaking it, Dante stepped back, letting go of my hands while huffing. Immediately the cold started to settle into my whole being, only the spots where his skin had touched mine still burning like fire. The disappointment and hurt in his eyes were so all-consuming that I had to look away, threatened to be swallowed whole.

He took more steps back, seemingly wanting to get space between as while he ran his hands through his hair, jaw gritted. Every inch of space between us enlarged the hole in my chest and I balled my hands into fists, preventing myself from running forward and cling to him. When Dante finally spoke,  chuckling humorlessly as if he couldn’t believe I was such a bitch, his voice was croaky, sounding more than just pained. “Goodbye, Lexi.”

Without one last look, he was gone and I collapsed on the floor. Slinging my arms around myself, I hugged my knees to my chest rocking back and forth, gasping for breath as the hole in my chest seemed to double in size. He was gone, most likely for good, just like I wanted him. My plan had worked out perfectly. But for what price?

Why does doing the right thing hurt so fucking bad?

Sometimes you have to burn the bridges to prevent yourself from making the same mistake twice. And that what I was doing now.

Yesterday, the first day I had gone back to training and two days after Dante and I´s conversation, I almost lost my shit in front of the whole training room. Lyssa approached him, a sly smile on her lips claiming she needed extra training to keep up with the class. Dante hadn’t spared me one glance the whole day, not even uttering one word to me. Despite knowing it would be like this, it still hurt, especially when he told her it wasn’t a problem and smiled at her. A real, genuine smile. I tried to keep my face expressionless but it´s needless to say that my knuckles were almost black after training ended, the jealousy burning a hole through my whole body.

So here I was now, in the bar I first spotted him, trying to prevent myself from doing something utterly stupid by doing something equally stupid. Maybe it was even worse, at least for me. My mind was still reeling from everything that had happened the last few weeks, meeting someone, choosing dauntless, beginning a forbidden affair and ending it in less than a month. If someone ever said to me developing feelings for another person could happen so fast, I would have laughed outright into his face. But now I knew better and considering my stupid plan, I asked myself countless times if I was going nuts by really doing this.

I despised doing this, but I didn’t to pay Dante back, no not at all. But if he started to hate me it would be so much easier for the both of us. Not to mention that it would save him in the end. Because by not associating with me, the target on his back would be gone. And when they would finally get me, it would be so much easier on everyone surrounding me if they were able to tell themselves just how fucked up I really was and that they´re better off without me. Only the truth...

Ordering a shot from Sal who gave me a warm smile, I downed it, disgusted with the strong liquor and myself. But it certainly would take the edge off long enough.

I knew he was there, watching me. After all, I could feel his gaze on my back, causing shivers to erupt all over my body, especially when it started to trace the exposed skin on my neck, my whole body heating up under his scrutiny. Waiting on the barstool, I ordered myself another drink, so close to throwing it up when I suddenly, finally felt a pair of lips caressing my bare skin while two broad arms slung themselves around my waist. “Miss me?”

Turning around, I plastered a fake smile on my lips as I came face to face with a smug looking Freddy. He only pulled me closer to him, burying his face in my neck. Grimacing, I had to suppress the violent urge to push him away, only being able to control my face when I looked up to see two burning eyes watching me intently, condemning me into the depths of hell. Dante was standing on a higher floor of the bar, jaw clenched as he squeezed the neck of his beer bottle to death, while Freddy was peppering light kisses onto my skin. Hurriedly adverting my eyes, I forced my lips into what I hoped was a genuine smile, before I pushed Freddy back to give him a real kiss. He started to moan when his lips met mine, his hands immediately wandering to the small of my back while I was so repulsed by myself I had to keep the bile down, that was rising in my throat. Luckily, Freddy being the simple-minded guy he was, drew back fairly quick, his smile sickly smug while he pulled me from the chair and out of the club.

I knew that Dante had seen every second of this act and that I had succeeded in my mission. From now on, he would despite me with his whole being and I couldn't even be mad about it. When Freddy pulled me closer, slinging his arm around my waist I knew there was no going back to before this all happened. That small glimpse of joy I had been granted being the only happiness I would ever experience. And now knowing what it was like, letting go of it was even harder than it had been before. But I had made my choice.

The last bridge had been burned down.