#Rev Don Robins

[insidecroydon]

Croydon Airport was take-off point for a life of innovation

SUNDAY SUPPLEMENT: From being a pilot in World War I to working as a visionary minister caring for the vulnerable during the Great Depression, Don Robins had an inspiring career, writes DAVID MORGAN From Croydon to The Crypt: Don Robins was a man with a mission Croydon Airport in the 1920s was at the forefront of the world’s travel revolution. New aeroplanes, which were capable of flying greater…

[nanenna]

Title: The Parent Trap Fandoms: Batman (DC Comics) and Danny Phantom Ships: None AUs: Demon Twins Warnings: Character injury, discussions of death.

Summary: It was just an ordinary night on patrol until...

“We need an evac,” Dick said, cutting the chatter off, “bird down.”

“Spoiler, you’re the closest to the cave. Nightwing, who’s with you?” Barb asked, “And how bad is the injury?”

“Robin,” Dick replied with some confusion before adding on with confidence, “a leg injury, we’re pretty sure it’s broken.”

“Robin?” Tim couldn’t help blurting out, looking over at Damian next to him, perched on his bike in full Robin costume. “But here’s right here, with me.”

---

Damian had been acting strange for the week or so. Rather, Robin had been acting strange for the last week. Not many people actually lived full time in the manor anymore, but everyone agreed that during the day he was his usual self. During patrols, however, he was simply a little… off. Like tonight for instance: Batman was away from Gotham on official Justice League business and Nightwing had agreed to cover his usual patrol route; normally Robin would tag along with Nightwing, giving the excuse that he needed to make sure Dick did the route correctly while everyone knew the demon brat really just wanted to spend more time with his favorite brother. But tonight…

“I will be joining you on your case, Drake.”

“You will?” Tim asked skeptically. Dick had already suited up and left, yet instead of scrambling to go catch up here Damian was, already all suited up, demanding to join Tim of all people.

“You are doing a stake out for street racers, correct? What will you do when they inevitably split to lose you?”

He sadly had a point, having someone else there would help. “Are you going to stab me?”

Robin didn't say anything, simply stood there and stared Tim down.

After standing there for a full minute, Tim sighed and headed for the vehicle bay, Robin hot on his heels. Without another word they donned helmets and slung legs over their bikes. Weird, but not unheard of, just another thing that was a little off. Not that Tim was entirely unhappy, he wanted a chance to observe Damian’s behavior. Even if he thought Dick was more likely to get Damian to open up.

…

And Tim was bored. The first half of patrol was quiet and uneventful, the street racers hadn’t shown up at their usual time/place yet, and Damian hadn’t said a damn thing the whole night. It’d just been the two of them riding around, not finding anything that needed their attention, and just being… normal. At least the usual chatter from the others was there to keep him company.

“We need an evac,” Dick said, cutting the chatter off, “bird down.”

There was a moment of silence.

“Spoiler, you’re the closest to the cave. Nightwing, who’s with you?” Barb asked, “And how bad is the injury?”

“Robin,” Dick replied with some confusion before adding on with confidence, “a leg injury, we’re pretty sure it’s broken.”

“Robin?” Tim couldn’t help blurting out, looking over at Damian next to him, perched on his bike in full Robin costume. “But here’s right here, with me.” The shadows around them grew deeper, seemed to sharpen.

“What? No, I’m looking right at him.”

“Well so am I!” 

“I’ve got your cams up and… well shit,” Barb murmured.

“Oracle,” Damian? Robin? Some imposter? said into the quiet comms, a hand up to his helmet, “send me Nightwing’s location.”

“Robin,” Oracle started, only to be interrupted.

“We’re in sector 36,” Damian? Robin? Some imposter? replied, going so far as to give longitude and latitude coordinates and a description of the building roof they’re on.

“Copy that,” Damian? Robin? Some imposter? said before revving his bike’s engine and taking off.

Tim would never admit to nearly losing him due to sheer shock. Too busy screaming “What the fuck” in his own head to remember he needed to follow, but follow he did. This… this might explain Damian’s strange behavior over the past couple weeks. If there was an imposter running around with them, but they would have surely noticed, right?

“We can’t have everyone abandoning their patrols!” Barb said in clear frustration. Heard clearly because the chatter was still gone, nothing but dead silence. You would think everyone would be demanding answers, peppering the Robins with non-stop questions. Hell, Tim wanted to, but he was too busy keeping his bike under him as he chased after his Robin.

“Red Robin and I are on motorcycles,” Damian? Robin? Some imposter? told Barb, “which means we have the small vehicle first aid kits, including analgesics, splints, and extra bandages.”

“We could use the splints,” Dick said faintly.

“And doing first aid before evac arrives means less time faffing about once Spoiler arrives.”

Tim nearly crashed, barely righting his bike. To hear Damian’s voice say “faffing about” was just… weird. Does that mean Tim’s Robin was the imposter?

“You all are faffing about right now,” Damian? Robin? Some imposter? grumbled before hissing.

“Stay still,” Dick chided.

Okay, so maybe “faffing” was a phrase Damian had recently learned from a classmate or something, Tim sure didn’t know. And oh thank god, they must have arrived. Damian? Robin? Some imposter? was parked on the sidewalk, helmet already off and just pulling the field kit from the bike’s storage. He didn’t even spare Tim a glance, simply looked up at the very tall building, looked down at his grapple, shrugged, put the grapple away, and then lifted off the ground and into the air.

“Shit,” Tim said softly but with feeling.

“What?” Barb asked, clearly very tense.

“I think my Robin was the imposter, he just flew up the building. Like Kryptonian flew.” Is this Jon? Were he and Damian pulling a Bruce and Clark? Except it couldn’t be, Jon had started packing on muscles while Damian was still in the lanky growing-taller-before-filling-out stage.

“Really, akhi?” Damian? Robin? Some imposter? asked in exasperation.

“Hey, the jig is well and truly up at this point,” Damian? Robin? Some imposter? replied.

Okay, that was really weird to hear in Damian’s voice. And oh wait, maybe Tim should get up there too.

“Oh shit, there really is two of them!” Dick said in shock. “Uh… hello there… other Robin?”

“Hello Nightwing, I brought the kit. I…” Damian paused, then sighed into the comm, “akhi, what did you do?”

Damian tsked, “Nothing for you to worry about.”

“Your leg is broken!” Damian yelled.

“Did you see that with your x-ray vision?” Damian asked.

“Contrary to popular belief, I’m not Kryptonian,” Damian replied. “I don’t have x-ray vision.”

“Sure sound Kryptonian,��� Tim muttered under his breath. The Robin that flew had slipped into a faint Midwestern drawl that reminded him of Clark.

“Can you just give me the kit?” Dick asked both warily and wearily.

“Right, yes. Here.” 

Tim had made it onto the roof by that point, just in time to watch one of the Robins hand over the kit to Nightwing before kneeling next to the other Robin, who had his leg stretched out in front of him while he sat half propped up on his elbows. The laying down Robin (the real one? The one that hasn’t shown any meta powers yet, anyway. Is one of them the real Robin or were they both imposters?) let himself fall fully on his back and held a hand out. The meta(?) Robin kneeled next to him and took his hand. “You’re going to be okay.”

“I am more worried about you, you’re not used to this.”

“Yeah, normally I’m the only one getting hurt, and I usually don’t have bones when that happens.” Imposter Robin laughed at that.

“What the fuck?” Tim said under his breath, what does that mean?

“Focus,” Dick chided as Tim came to join him in tending to Damian’s(?) injury.

“Batcopter ETA five minutes,” Barb said. “Agent A has the medbay prepped.”

Imposter Robin flinched at that. Odd.

“Focus,” Dick hissed. “Save the mystery for after we get our downed bird home.”

Tim almost pointed out they couldn't be sure either Robin was even the real one, but a scathing look from Dick that burned even through the domino white outs had Tim snapping his mouth shut. Instead he nodded and set about helping Dick set and splint Robin's leg.

Steph arrived right on time, between Dick, imposter Robin, and Tim they got the real(?) Robin loaded onto the batcopter. Then the imposter pulled something from his costume and tossed it at Dick.

“Keys?” Dick asked.

“We gotta get Robin's bike back to the cave somehow.” He hopped into the batcopter and settled next to the injured Robin.

Dick held out the keys, “And as Robin shouldn’t-”

“No,” the imposter interrupted. “I’m not leaving him.”

Seems it was Tim’s turn to be the voice of reason. He put a hand on Dick’s shoulder, “Robin trusts him, we’ll meet them back at the cave in a minute.” If the injured Robin even was the real Damian, if the imposter didn’t use his unknown powers to escape, if any slew of unpredictable situations. Holy hell, Tim could see why Bruce was so paranoid about knowing everything about everyone. He’d be in the middle of three panic attacks and an existential crisis on top of a heart attack if he were here right now. But he wasn’t, thankfully. Instead Tim pulled Dick away from the batcopter so Steph could take back off and head to the cave.

Soon Dick and Tim were on their respective bikes, Nightwing looking ridiculous on Robin’s candy apple red paint job, and were zooming through the streets at a pace that was while fast still gave Tim time to actually think. He went back over everything the two Robins had said since Nightwing had called in for an evac. And then it hit him.

“Akhi.”

“What about it?” Dick asked.

“It’s what they called each other.”

“Brother,” Cass added in her soft voice.

“Right, in Arabic. They called each other brother. And recently Robin told us about his twin brother.”

“Are you telling us that Robin’s twin brother came back from the dead and decided to just… join us on patrol?” Dick asked in disbelief.

“He told us several weeks ago, and has been acting odd on patrol for nearly two weeks now. If when he told us was when he found out, or at least started planning this, then they had a few weeks for Robin to give his twin a crash course on us before pulling this stunt.”

There was muffled laughter in the comms, but Tim wasn’t sure who.

“But why?” Oracle asked.

“A prank?” Dick asked.

“A test of some kind,” Tim said in a monotone. There was a double tap on the comm, Cass’s form of nonverbal agreement.

“The batcopter has arrived back at the cave,” Oracle informed them. Everyone else grew quiet, waiting for whatever was about to happen to happen.

“... -nk went too far,” Damian (or his twin?) was saying into the comm.

“TT, it did not,” Damian replied.

“You couldn’t taste their emotions,” okay that was the twin, and what a weird way to phrase that, “they were really scared.”

“You like the taste of fear.”

Wow, Damian, really not helping with how creepy your long dead twin is being.

“Well yeah, obviously, it’s delicious. That doesn’t mean it’s okay to go around purposefully scaring your family.”

Fear is delicious?!

“What does it matter? As you said, ‘the jig is up’ and the prank is over. We will have to explain ourselves when the others arrive.”

“Others like me?” Steph asked cheerfully.

“Great, time for the great bat interrogation,” the twin said with exactly zero enthusiasm.

“Not until Master Damian has been seen to,” Alfred said. Tim could just see the raised eyebrow.

Tim tuned the rest out as those actually in the cave set about the logistics of getting Damian moved to the medbay.

“He can taste fear?” Tim asked incredulously.

“You know as much as the rest of us,” Dick said back.

“Does that make him an empath? He said he’s not Kryptonian, would that make his power suite closer to a Marian? Wait, neither Talia nor Bruce have the meta gene, how’d he even get powers?”

“Maybe he got them from the Lazarus Pits?”

There was a snort in the comms, “Then why didn’t I get powers?”

“Hood? What’re you doing on our comms?” Dick sounded far too delighted.

“I have an alert set up for whenever your chatter stops, it’s always a bad sign.”

“Fair enough, you heading to the cave to meet the demon brat’s long lost twin?”

There was a scoff from Jason, “Of course!”

“Everyone’s headed for the cave,” Oracle said with a tone of defeat.

“Stuck in ops?” Dick asked.

“Well someone has to keep an ear on things while the rest of you get to go have fun.”

“We’ll keep our comms on.”

“You don’t have a choice.”

Tim and Dick both laughed at that. Fortunately they arrived back at the cave at that point, quickly parking their bikes and all but running over to the medbay. Steph was standing just outside the door, clearly keeping an eye on things while Alfred and the twin fussed over Damian. Tim and Dick went to go join Steph at the door, none of them willing to risk Alfred’s wrath should they get in his way. Cass joined them shortly after, all four staring as Alfred finished up what he could do for Damian. The demon brat was laid out on a medical cot, his costume set to the side, down to just the thin layer worn under the armor, mask already removed.

“Leslie has been called, she’ll be here in the morning with the necessary supplies. I’m afraid you will have to remain here until then, Master Damian.”

Damian tsked, but otherwise said nothing.

“And now I do believe we are all owed an explanation.” Alfred turned ever so slightly as his attention turned to Damian’s twin.

Damian responded by struggling in his bed.

“What are you doing, akhi?” the twin asked, clearly exasperated.

“I will be sitting up for this,” Damian snarled.

Without a word Alfred handed Damian the bed’s controls, allowing him to slowly raise himself into a reclined sitting position. Alfred raised a brow as if to ask if that would do, Damian only glowered at the wall.

The twin started pulling his domino off. Damian tsked yet again and handed his twin a wipe to help pull the mask off. “Ancients,” the twin said, which Dick mouthed in confusion, “you lot sure do love your theming. And I thought the ghosts had it bad.”

“Ghosts?” Tim mouthed, exchanging quick, confused glances with Dick.

“So yeah, hi. I’m Danny, Damian’s long lost twin.” The twin, now known as Danny, said with a little wave after he got the domino off. And there was no denying that he was Damian’s twin, he had Damian’s face in every feature save his eyes. While Damian clearly had Talia’s eyes, Danny’s were all Bruce.

“Everyone, this is my brother, Danyal Al Ghul Wayne.”

“Legally not my name anymore.”

“Legally?” Tim asked.

“Yeah, I got adopted!” Danny grinned again, all sunshine and cheer that was so wrong when he had Damian’s face.

Tim snorted, Bruce’s kid had been adopted. Oh things just got complicated but the irony of Brucie being on the other end of a kid getting adopted was still a fun kind of irony. Or maybe Tim had gotten to the everything-is-hilarious stage of sleep depravation.

“So what is your legal name?” Dick asked.

“Um… I’m not sure I should tell you that.” Danny fidgeted nervously. “Not yet anyway. I mean, Bruce… uh… our father? Isn’t here and like… shouldn’t he be told? Too? Or first? Honestly I’d rather just be able to tell everyone at the same time rather than having to go over the whole thing every time someone new walks in the door.”

As if he had timed it to happen that way, Jason came roaring into the cave on his bike. There was a collective sigh as everyone crowding around the outside of the door knew they’d have to wait for Jason to get there before things could continue, even if he had been listening in along with Oracle on his way in.

Danny’s face lit up as Jason, still wearing his full Red Hood gear, came into view. He whooped and threw both hands in the air as he ran out the door, somehow not even touching any of the vigilantes crowded in the way.

Jason stopped dead, his own hands raised up halfway in front of him as if unsure what to do. Danny just slapped both of Jason’s with his own in a kind of low five, then bounced excitedly in place. “Undead solidarity, yeah!”

“Uh… what?” Jason’s modulated voice asked in its usual monotone.

“I’ve been dying to meet you!”

“Heh, have you? Were you dead set on meeting the best?”

Damian groaned, “Stop encouraging Danyal’s insipid sense of humor.”

“Yeah, you’re the best!” Danny continued as if Damian hadn’t said a thing, “My favorite new brother!”

Dick gasped and clutched his chest.

Jason pointed at him and laughed as he slung an arm over Danny’s shoulders. “I see you are a kid of taste. How do you feel about Jane Austen.”

Danny winced, “My dude, I’m a guy in high school.”

“And so was I once, but we can’t all have my impeccable taste.” He started walking Danny back over to the medbay. “Anyway, Bruce shouldn’t be back until tomorrow afternoon, we really going to wait that long for the whole story?”

Danny winced, then cursed quietly under his breath. “We’ll have to, something just came up.”

Everyone frowned at that, “What do you mean?” Damian asked.

“The real deal got into a fight and uh… they’re pretty strong. I think I’m gonna need to recombine.”

“What?” Jason said, it was hard to tell if the flatness was his own voice or the modulator.

“Oh uh… I’m a… what’s that word again… doppelganger! That’s it. The main body’s back home and,” he winced again, a bruise blooming across his cheek in real time. No, in double time, it was like watching a time lapse of a bruise blooming and slowly starting to heal. “Look, having my attention and powers split like this is normally fine, a good way to keep my powers in check for fighting normal humans actually. But uh… let’s see… I think I’m fighting Plasmius?”

“We don’t know who that is,” Damian said with a sigh. “He keeps saying names of people or things like I’ll know what it means.”

“It means I can’t afford to have my attention and powers split over two bodies, so I’m about to poof. Sorry. But I’ll be back tomorrow, summon me after school Dami?”

“Summon?” Everyone but the twins asked in confusion.

“Of course, Danyal. Good luck fighting your rogue.”

“I think the fruit loop counts as my arch nemesis, unfortunately. But I gotta sorta slide back, can’t have all of tonight’s memories and my half of the power hit me all at once. This might look a little freaky, but it’s normal and I’m fine I promise.”

Jason unslung his arm from Danny’s shoulder and took a step to the side. They all gawked as Danny closed his eyes and breathed out slowly, his breath frosting in what should be warm air. His face, the only part of him not covered by the Robin costume, started to go invisible at the same time his skin and hair started to gray. Then he was gone and the costume was left behind, slumping to the floor in a pile.

Everyone stood there for a moment, staring at the colorful pile of armor, then they all turned to look at Damian.

“TT, don’t ask me. I still don’t have a full list of everything he can do.”

---

Tim, along with everyone else, was at the manor the next afternoon. And he did mean everyone, even Kate, Harper, and Cullen were there. Hell, even Jason was there, on time no less. Damian had put “17:30 sharp” in the family (minus Bruce) chat and they knew he meant it. They were crowded into one of the larger sitting rooms, every chair filled save a chaise lounge that had been reserved for Damian. The boy of the hour arrived right on time, with five minutes leeway to set everything up.

“So tell me again who you want to introduce us to, chum?” Bruce asked as he followed behind Damian. Alfred brought up the rear, a plate of fresh cookies in hand.

“I haven't told you yet, Father. Have some patience, it will all make sense soon.” Damian settled on the lounge, setting his crutches to lean against it before pulling something out of his pocket. It was a small metal container, he popped it open and pulled out what appeared to be a bright green handkerchief. Very bright green, possible letting off light, neon toxic green. Duke made a soft surprised sound. Damian spread the cloth out on the coffee table in front of him and smoothed it out.

“Damian,” Bruce said carefully, “what is that?”

“A summoning circle, obviously.”

Wait, Danny was serious about being summoned?

“Can… can you even summon living people?” Dick leaned over from where he was perched on the couch’s arm to whisper to Cass, who was perched behind Tim on the couch’s back. Tim and Cass both shrugged.

“Damian, dealing with the occult is very dangerous.”

“It’s quite safe, Father.” Damian pointed down at the white markings on the handkerchief, “Since all the sigils are on here permanently there is no chance of making a mistake drawing them by hand. This group here is his name, this circle can summon one person and one person only. The rest of these are for protection. And this spot here,” Damian tapped on a small circle within the outer ring, “is to activate it. It does require a single drop of blood, it was the safest way to make the circle.”

“Blood?” Bruce asked flatly.

“It will make sense when I call him, do you trust me?”

“I’m not sure I trust whoever this “him” is,” Bruce grumbled.

“But do you trust me, Father?”

Bruce sighed, “You promise whoever this is means us no harm?”

“Of course, I promise.”

“I met the young man last night,” Alfred said as he placed the plate of cookies in the circle. “I found him to be polite and sincere.”

“So this is to do with whatever happened last night that I can’t get any of you to tell me about?”

“We want to explain it ourselves,” Damian said firmly. Then he pulled out a batarang and carefully poked a finger. “Blood of my blood, I call forth the spirit of my brother, Danyal.” He touched the drop of blood to the handkerchief, which lit up as the air around them shifted. 

A figure began floating up from the circle, glowing white hair that waved as if they were under water, ashen skin, glowing Lazarus green eyes, a wide smile filled with sharp fangs. This… this wasn’t Danny, was this? The figure seemed to be wearing some kind of black jumpsuit, white gloves picking up the plate of cookies as they passed through the plate. They had no legs, after the belt the body just continued in a long tapering tail that ended like whisps of smoke. They were glowing, they were slightly see through! What was going on?

This wasn’t the boy they’d met last night.

“Father, my brother. Danyal, our father.” Damian paused, then added on, “And the rest of our family.”

“Hi,” the figure chirped, then seemed to shrink into himself as he looked around. “I uh… prefer to be called Danny. The only people who full name me are usually trying to kill me. Or send me to detention.”

That was Damian’s, or rather Danny’s voice alright. Even still had the faint midwestern drawal.

“Why do you look so different?” Dick asked in shock.

“It’s… a long story. Which I’m supposed to tell everyone.” Danny shrunk further into himself, looking miserable. “Please stop being so scared.”

“They are simply adjusting to your unfamiliar form, they will get over it,” Damian said firmly, glaring at everyone in the room.

“It’s not just fear, Dami, they’re horrified.”

“Sit down, eat your cookies. Alfred worked hard on those.” Damian patted the empty space next to him on the chaise lounge. 

Danny turned and spun in place to sit down, looked down at where his tail was curled up under him, made a sour face, then the tail was suddenly replaced by a pair of legs tucked under him. He shoved a cookie into his mouth, now sporting normal teeth from what little Tim could see. “S’good,” Danny slurred, glancing over at Alfred who merely nodded his approval.

“Some time ago,” Damian started, as if that wasn’t the most vague way to start, “I summoned Danyal the first time. I am aware it was foolish, I will not hear about it.”

“I called him dumb already,” Danny added in. “I mean, I had to go find someone to explain how the circles work and what makes them safe or dangerous first, but yeah, I called him dumb. Then I had some friends help me make this,” Danny reached over and tapped the handkerchief, “then I went to three trusted uh… mentors? I guess I’d call them? And made sure with each of them this thing is legit before giving it to Dami.”

Bruce hadn’t moved, still standing in front of the coffee table, slack jawed, staring blankly down at Danny and Damian.

“Is he okay?” Danny stage whispered to Damian.

“Perhaps keeping it a surprise was not the optimal option.”

That seemed to snap Bruce out of it, “I think I need to sit down.”

Dick hopped up to guide Bruce to the nearest open seat, which happened to be the chaise lounge. Danny quickly flew up and moved to float cross legged in the air just on the other side of Damian, as if he were sitting in some invisible chair. He munched another cookie before offering the plate to Damian, who took a cookie for himself.

Once Bruce and Dick had settled back down, Damian decided to continue the story. “More recently I needed to do a covert investigation, but I couldn’t allow any of you know.”

“You what?” Bruce asked, clearly upset.

“I know, he still hasn’t even told me what it was. And I had to cover for him!” Danny sounded so offended.

“I had Danyal take my place in patrol while I was away.”

“When?” Bruce asked, voice dipping down as he leveled a steely glare at Damian.

“You never noticed, I think that speaks for itself. So as a test-”

Cass and Tim bumped fists.

“-Danyal has been joining us on patrols for the last twelve days.”

“Almost made it the full two weeks too,” Danny said airily. “That reminds me, you owe me fifty bucks.”

“What? No!” Damian shot back angrily. “They found out before the two weeks were up, clearly I won that bet and you owe me!”

“They didn’t figure it out, that part of the bet is a draw at best for you. No, the fifty is because you’re the reason they found out. It seems awfully suspicious you got into some kind of accident right before the deadline, how did you break your leg again?”

“I did not break my leg on purpose just to win a meaningless bet!”

“Okay, both of you need to calm down,” Bruce said, looking unsure if he needed to step between the two squabbling boys. “You… had a bet?”

“I bet fifty bucks I wouldn’t give myself away before the two weeks were up, Damian bet fifty bucks you’d figure me out before two weeks. And they didn’t figure it out.” Danny turned to glare at Damian as he said that last part.

“Fine,” Damian conceded with a pout. “I shall venmo you your winnings.”

The ghost floating in front of them has a venmo. The ghost floating in front of them has a use for US currency. What is going on? Is Tim hallucinating?

Damian’s pout deepened, “I am still disappointed in you all for not noticing a whole extra person joining our patrols.”

“In my defense, I don’t patrol with you guys,” Duke joked.

“In our defense, we were suspicious,” Tim added.

Bruce sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose, “Damian, we had no way of even expecting you to switch places with your long lost dead twin.” Bruce paused, then looked over at Danny. “How did you pull that off? No offense Danny, but you are very easy to tell apart right now.”

“Oh, that’s because I can do this.” A bright flash of light washed over Danny, changing him back to the boy Tim had met the night before, only wearing baggy casual clothes instead of brightly colored armor.

Duke yelped and covered his eyes, “A little more warning next time? Damn, that was bright!”

“Oops, sorry.”

“Oh thank god, I was so worried,” Steph murmured from next to Tim.

“Well that was flashy,” Dick said.

Bruce seemed broken again, staring at the now living, black haired, blue eyed boy sitting cross legged in the air next to Damian.

“Okay, so what the fuck was all that?” Jason asked, motioning to Danny. “Are you dead or aren’t you? Because you don’t look dead right now.”

“Neither do you,” Danny snarked back.

“I’m not dead though.”

“You sure?”

“Not anymore,” Jason said stubbornly.

“No one ever comes all the way back, not anyone who was dead dead.”

“Please stop,” Bruce begged. Dick whimpered in agreement.

Danny ducked into his shoulders again, grinning sheepishly. “Sorry.”

“Since it would be inconvenient for Robin to be missing at the same time I have a broken leg,” Damian said as a clear subject change, “and we have a perfect stand in who’s already proven himself in the field, Danyal has kindly offered to cover for me for the next few nights.”

“I managed to soup Plasmius last night, so that gives me two, three days max of not having to worry about his schemes. My friends can cover for me during the night so long as I’m still back home during the day. Unless a rabid ancient show up, anyway.”

“What does any of that even mean?” Tim begged.

“We could use some context,” Dick added.

“Right, I guess this is when the life story portion starts,” Danny said with a sigh.

“Perhaps you would prefer to talk over dinner?” Alfred asked from the room’s doorway.

“Dinner sounds great!” Danny cheered as he hopped to his feet, now firmly on the floor. “I’m not sure talking about dying and coming back is the best dinner conversation though,” Danny said absently as he and Bruce helped Damian to his feet.

“Alfred usually has a strict no work talk at the dinner table rule,” Tim teased.

“I think he can make an exception for someone’s life story,” Duke laughed. There were several murmurs of agreement.

“Alright, well I guess we can start with the first time I died,” Danny said as the group slowly filed out of the sitting room and towards the dining room.

[coolcoolcoolbutwtf]

When asked why he doesn't display the same level of power as he did against Trigon, Shego Danny says the more power he brings forth, the closer he gets to being dead. It's true from a certain point of view

Shego was't surprised at the teens dumbfounded expressions. It truly filled him with such glee as their faces twisted with the donning realisation.

Ever since it got out that ''Shego used to be a hero'' the comments about him " joining the good side again" had ramped up!

'"Oh Shego join us and use your powers for the good"' or a remixed version of "'you have such power but you use it for evil"'. Danny had heard it all and it got tiring fast.

So yes Shego would enjoy the horror stricken Faces of the kidi-heros. Because they would. Not. Shut. Up. About. It!

The older heroes had eventually slowed down but not these little twerps. Was it because he held back too much? Should he start hitting them harder so they learned to concentrate on the God damn fight in front of them!?

It had worked great for him so it must be an effective solution!

(He thought he heard a face slap suspiciously sounding like Jazz's echo in the back of his mind.) A quiet swish followed by humming started up, right on que!

"Well brats I gotta go my ride is here and I don't want any of your twerpyness getting on me!" The kids were hit with whiplash by shego's words still and slight guilt.

Aww look at the little baby Heros feeling guilty. Constantly having forced Shego into annoying situations and forcing him into using his powers. How cute they are thinking about what they did.

He still wouldn't forget it and he sure as hell doesn't forgive them but they really are just kids. Isn't it practically teenagers' job to be annoying to adults anyway? Ah to be young again. But speaking about annoying.

"Oi, Shego stop standing around and hop on already!" His boss's filtered voice cracked to life in his com and had him flipping backwards in a rather Nightwing-esk maneuver (not that Nightwing existed quite yet in this dimension) and gave the kiddos a final wave goodbye before jumping on the revving motorcycle his boss drove. Robin looked even more shocked as the bike shot off.

Danny sighed slightly, apparently his boss still loved a flashy exit! The red helm should really have tipped him off about his dramatic nature or the heads in the duffle bag thing a while back. Or maybe future, that was the thing with interdimensional hopping!

Now what he really wanted to know was how much Red hood was going to pay him in compensation for helping out. Because the annoyances Shego would get for "helping" were going to cost Red hood dearly. Mark his words.

"Oh stop being pissy Shego."

"Fuck off Hood you aren't the one that will have to deal with the hero's and their savior complex constantly now." The laugh Danny got in return just cemented his hatred for his boss. :D

Wip of Shego Danny fighting his boss before he became his boss:b Boss was still fresh free from the LOA.

[ymawgat]

saw batman today,

- very much felt like the director’s movie rather than a movie for the franchise or any one of the actors? lots of cinnamon-tography, lots of clever scenes and shots and weird colour arrangements. not necessarily a bad thing, just interesting that that’s what was prioritized?

- I had this idea going in that the movie was like, really out of step and counter to what a lot of (superhero) movies are nowadays? which I don’t think is untrue, but the movie definitely felt in step and consistent with the batman begins trilogy, and it very much fit into the “dark gritty batman movie” genre, even if it had a very different core message to other similar movies

- having said that there was a hell of a lot of like, delayed gratification sequences? like the bit at the end where bruce and selina are on their motorcycles and you know they’re gonna part ways and drive down different roads, but it takes like, a good 10 seconds to get to that moment. felt a lot more like an older (20th century?) movie than a 2020s superhero movie, which was nice to experience, at the very least.

- (although those slow 20th century movies didn’t have a 3 hour long runtime :/ but w/e)

- the batmobile scene felt a little out of place. you’ve got this incredibly masturbatary shot of the car’s engine and this rev-ing build up before the chase scene (where batman 100% kills people btw), but it’s in a movie that ends up with the message very counter to the whole hypermasculine “I am vengance my car go vroom vroom”?

- I guess the car scene was primarily aimed at people who’d come for the action rather than the character story, as something to hook them in and get them invested before you then say “this is what the consequences/weight of those violent action sequences are”, but I was already on the other side of that hump so ultimately that scene and the way it was framed didn’t really add that much?

- the Selina characterisation felt a little weird. batman stops her from killing the man who killed her mother and girlfriend(?) and she ends up just being kind of fine with that? and forgives him for stopping her from killing falconey? I didn’t feel like that sequence of decisions made sense really. It’s like after he got killed by the riddler her arc seemed to kind of just, end? and she had no lasting character strings other than that she was the love interest? idk

- i liked the riddles. it felt a lot more like a detective story than i remember any of the christopher nolon movies did. the fact there were kinda red herrings and that batman missed stuff was also really great

- i think at the pictures of people going in and out of the penguin club (like the dirt on mayor don?) where taken from the Riddler’s apartment?

- i had gotten spoiled on the ending being that batman chooses to be a symbol of hope instead of fear/vengeance, but i didn’t know how much the climax was a character beat rather than an action/combat beat? like the climax is about that moment of realisation and the act of saving people more than defeating the villain. using his baterang/knife weapon to cut the dangerous electrical cord rather than to beat someone... just like, yeah. that’s good.

- the fact that batman was so much of a civilian rescuer at the end of the movie, and the fact that batman was so openly working working with the police (and that this was a point of conflict) was really refreshing, and it really does feel like a bridge between the dark and gritty nolon movies and the more comic book superhero batman (in which batman being a public hero who does search and rescue and publicly helps police is never questioned), or getting closer to it at least

- on that note i’d love to see a brigher sequel that included robin/dick grayson, like some people have suggested. I honestly feel like robin is the only natural progression a batterson sequel could take? seeing the riddler in a campy-er outfit would also be great.

- i need the riddler to have a redemption arc. let him be an autistic antihero. let him kill the joker. let him say riddle me this, please. please

[hookedonapirate]

Miss Fix-It

Summary: Miracle worker. Relationship Guru. Savior.

Those are just a few of her monikers, but most people have taken to call her Miss Fix-It. Helping broken-hearted women get back together with their former boyfriends is her specialty. How does she do it, you ask? Simple—she becomes his date from hell so he’ll realize what a catch he had before he let her go.

Emma Swan is an expert at fixing relationships, it’s just too bad she’ll never have one of her own.

Her particular set of talents is tested, however, when a cheating ex-girlfriend requests her services. Emma’s reluctant at first. It’s not an easy task to make someone seem like a catch when they’ve cheated, but the potential client is an emotional wreck desperate to get her former boyfriend back before he heads back to England. Besides, Emma Swan never backs down from a challenge. They don’t call her Miss Fix-It for nothing. She’ll find a way to make him wish he was back in his ex-girlfriend’s arms, no matter what it takes. If only she can squash the feelings she develops for him and stop breaking her rules.

Captain Swan AU with a side order of Snowing.

A/N: A big shout out to @ultraluckycatnd​​ for beta reading and to @onceuponaprincessworld​​ for letting me share my ideas with her!

Also available on: AO3 l FF.N

Catch up: Ch 1 Ch 2 Ch 3

Chapter 4

“Thanks for giving me this job at the last minute. I appreciate it.”

Robin flashes a warm smile. “No problem, lass. I needed the help and Dave told me you needed another job because you were behind on your bills. Besides, he owed me for hiring Regina.”

Emma hoists her head up, pausing from the cosmopolitan she’s making to turn around and raise her brows at her new boss. “Wait, back up. Regina works here, too?”

He nods, confusion clouding his features. “David didn’t tell you?”

“Um, no-oooo,” she fumes, not particularly happy about the thought of working with her. Had she known, she would’ve never accepted the job here. She would’ve figured out another way to run into Killian. One that didn’t involve having to put up with the Evil Queen.

“She got fired from her previous job. My guess is because she was too controlling, even toward her superiors, and no one else wanted to hire her.” 

Emma makes a pained gasp in fake astonishment. “Regina was too controlling? I’m shocked!” Emma remarks theatrically in a breathy tone. Finishing the cocktail, she adds a freshly sliced lime garnish and serves a woman at the bar her drink. 

Robin follows behind to continue their conversation. “Anyway, she was staying home all the time and constantly knocking on Mary Margaret’s and David’s door to complain about all the noise they were supposedly making.”

Emma grabs a fresh terry cloth hand towel and wipes down the counter after two patrons leave their seats. She looks up and scans the bar crowd, anxiously waiting for a particular patron to show up. Disappointment flares in her gut when she doesn’t spot him. She’s fine, though, really. “But she did that before.”

“Not as often, believe it or not. You should’ve seen David and Mary Margaret a few weeks ago. They. Were. Livid.” He chuckles. “Regina stormed over to their apartment, pounding on the door while they were engaged in...” He clears his throat and continues, “well, let’s just say they were making tacos.”

Emma snorts. She’s well aware of what making tacos means for Mary Margaret and David. She’s accidentally interrupted them a few times while they were making tacos.

“They were desperate and needed a break, so David begged me to hire her.”

“Wow, they must’ve been desperate. They come here for drinks all the time,” she points out.

“Which is why I schedule her day shifts on the weekends. She’s gone for most of the day, and when Dave and Mary Margaret want to come here, she’s already gone home. And they aren’t home to make a noise while she’s trying to sleep, and she’s not here to spit in their drinks. It’s really a win/win situation.”

“Not for me,” Emma groans. 

“At least your shifts will only overlap with hers for a few hours during the after-work rush on the days you’re both scheduled. She’ll be too busy to give you a hard time.”

“I highly doubt that. She’ll yell at me for getting in her way.”

“Probably,” Robin agrees. “You can’t let her get to you, though.”

“Ha! Easier said than done.”

He dons a slight smile. “I know, believe me. I have to work with her a lot more than you do.”

“Oh, lucky you. How’s that going? Do you want to fire her yet?” she asks hopefully. “Or use her head as a dartboard?”

He chuckles and shakes his head. “She’s actually not as bad as everyone makes her out to be. She and I get along for the most part. Sometimes she gets in one of her moods though, and I have to hide in my office to avoid her.”

Emma throws the towel over her shoulder and turns around, placing her hand on her hip. “Regina actually found someone who gets along with her, other than her sister? That has to qualify for a good samaritan award,” she smirks. “How do you do it, anyway?” she asks curiously, cocking her head to the side.

He shrugs. “Regina’s kind of like a Shelby Cobra. She’s high maintenance, temperamental, unpredictable, not easy to drive, often gives you a headache and requires a lot of attention. But at the end of the day, she just wants to be loved and cared for.”

Emma sighs and shakes her head. “Why do men like to compare women to cars?” She narrows her eyes at him. “Why are you—my boss—comparing women to cars to me—one of your employees?”

“Oh, come on, it’s not like we’re strangers. How many times have I given you free drinks?”

“So what, that makes it okay?” She rolls her eyes. “No wonder your wife left you.”

Robin gasps dramatically, placing his hand on his heart, and the look he gives reminds her of a wounded animal. “You go straight for the jugular, don’t you? I guess I won’t have to worry about you not being able to handle yourself with the rowdy male patrons.”

“Damn right you don’t. If there’s anything I’m good at, it’s putting men in their place. It's one of my specialties.”

“I don’t doubt that,” he chuckles. “No wonder you’re single,” he teases.

“Haha, you’re hilarious,” she says sarcastically. “For your information, I choose to be single.”

“Uh-huh, that’s what all single people say.”

“Well, I guess it takes one to know one,” she retorts.

He responds with a caustic smirk.

Tossing the towel on the counter, she scans the bar once more before walking away while excusing herself to use the ladies’ room. Heading down the small corridor to the restroom, she pulls out her phone and sends a text. As much as she enjoys her banter with Robin, she needs to save the rest of her sassy energy for someone else. 

Emma: What’s the ETA?

Slipping her phone into her back pocket, she enters the restroom, using one of the available stalls. Her back pocket buzzes when she’s washing her hands at the sink. She dries them off and steps outside the restroom to take the call, speaking quietly into the phone.

“Hey, what’s up?”

“He’s on his way,” David replies.

“It’s about time. What took so long? You said he’d be here at seven-thirty.” She checks her Fitbit for the time. “It’s almost nine.”

“Sorry, there was a bit of a delay. He stopped by Ruby’s to return a box of her stuff before I got home,” David sighs. “They ended up getting into an argument, which is both a good thing and a bad one. He’s even more revved up and ready to drink, but be prepared for him to be in a pisspoor mood.”

“Don’t worry, I can handle him,” she assures. “Do you think he’ll be pissed at you for standing him up?”

“I’ll just tell him I had to help Mary Margaret with a wedding planning emergency.” She can detect his smile over the phone. “Works like a charm every time. And as you know, there’s always at least one.”

“Oh, I know,” Emma laughs. “I’m the maid of honor, remember? I’m lucky to get a day off.” 

He chuckles. “Just remember, a little over one month from now, it’ll all be over with.”

“Ugh, I can’t wait.” Her best friends are wasting no time getting married, and because Mary Margaret has been dreaming about marrying her Prince Charming since she was five years old, she already booked the venue two years ago, right after she met David. So they’re trying to scramble everything together in three months. Emma sees this as a blessing in disguise because it will get her out of having to bring a date. Since Ruby hired her to spend time with Killian and she's spending the rest of her time helping Mary Margaret pull everything together for the wedding, she won’t have time to find a date, or at least that’s the excuse she plans on giving Bridezilla.

“By the way, I have a bone to pick with you.”

He pauses. “You’re about to yell at me for not telling you about Regina, aren’t you?”

“Um, yeah. What the hell? Why didn’t you tell me?”

“Because I knew you’d turn down the bartending job. But Robin promised not to schedule you together, very often at least. Besides, if you’re only there to get Ruby back with Killian, then why does it matter?”

She groans in frustration. “Are you kidding? Have you met her?!”

“I know, I know, but look at it this way, I’m pretty sure she likes Robin, so I think she’ll be in a much better mood at work,” he chuckles.

“So not funny.” She rolls her eyes.

“Sorry, Emma. You know I love you.”

“Love you too,” she mumbles bitterly under her breath.

“Well, I should let you go. Killian will be there any minute now.”

“Okay, talk to you later.”

“Good luck.”

“Thanks,” she says before hanging up. Something tells her she’ll need all the luck she can get.

She checks her text messages and sure enough, there’s a string of them from a freaked out Mary Margaret regarding the wedding invitations she ordered. Or rather, ones she didn’t order. This is the second time the invitations have been delayed, otherwise, they would’ve been sent out a month ago. Well, at least now David will have a valid excuse for standing up Killian. Mary Margaret clued her fiance in on the situation with Ruby and Killian, and because he has a similar stance as her about hope and love and second chances and blah blah blah, he offered to help. (The pair’s optimism is rather annoying. Endearing, but annoying.) Thus, Emma’s plan to get a job at the bar so she could talk to Killian without it seeming like she was just another woman at the bar trying to hit on him, was hatched. 

Finding nothing which requires her immediate attention, Emma looks up from her phone, tucking it into her back pocket. Instead of rounding the corner to head back to work though, she immediately halts in her tracks, all the air leaving her lungs when she sees him—the epitome of tall, dark and handsome—as he enters the bar. Her heart spikes, eyes widening as she watches him make his way across the room, his shoulders hanging low. His expression makes her heart hurt. He looks completely broken. Probably from the fight with Ruby. But the wreckage in his eyes takes nothing away from how attractive he is. 

God, he’s gorgeous. 

Emma’s suddenly very nervous and fidgety, tucking her hair behind her ear, smoothing her hands over the front of her slim jeans and ironing out the wrinkles in her red, button-down blouse. She unsnaps a couple buttons, exposing some cleavage, but then, twisting her lips with indecisiveness, she snaps the buttons into place.  

Oh, screw it. She unbuttons them again. She’s supposed to be his distraction. 

She returns behind the bar counter, keeping herself occupied to avoid the temptation of staring at the handsome man taking a seat at the bar. She takes some orders, trying to steady her hands as she’s making some cocktails. She sneaks a peek when she suspects it's safe to do so and catches him burying his face in his hands.

Poor guy.

Emma really wants to tell Ruby she can’t go through with this, even more so since she found out who her ex is. But that would mean breaking the contract. She empathizes with the guy, and knowing he’s the same man she’d fantasized about for two months makes it worse. Scratch that, knowing he’s a god in bed and how big his dick is makes it worse. Now, seeing him again after that time had passed only reminds her of how good-looking he is. Not that she forgot.

She’s not even sure she can go through with her grand plan. She wouldn’t wish that on anyone, let alone Killian. And she’s only ever talked to him for like two seconds. She’s so fucked.

Taking a deep breath while tucking some hair behind her ears again, she clears her throat and strides over to him, her heart thumping in her ear. She straightens her clothing once more before placing her hands on the counter directly in front of him. “Did you come here just to mope on my counter?” she teases, throwing on a cheeky smirk, thankful her voice didn’t give out on her. “Or did you come here to drink?”

“Listen, I've had a terrible day,” he mumbles into his palms, but she can detect that rich, British accent she remembers from two months ago, and shudders. 

She should’ve put the pieces together when Ruby had told her the ex was heading back to England, but maybe she just didn’t want to think about the possibility that this man was him. She didn’t want it to be true. 

He drags his hands down his face, still grumbling. “Actually, this entire week has been fucking he—” His silky, accented words hang in the air when he looks up, his eyes flickering with recognition when they connect with hers. She swears she can hear him suck in a breath as his mouth hangs open. He flicks his tongue along the inside his cheek as if to say, well, well, well if it isn't the bitch from the elevator. A variety of expressions fleet across his features—intrigue, surprise, perhaps a hint of attraction, or so she’s hoping. She has to tighten her hands around the edge of the counter to keep from falling, those stunning blue eyes knocking the wind out of her. And she’s definitely not imaging what else he could be flicking that sinful tongue at. She clenches her thighs to ease some of the tension she feels under his fascinated gaze. 

He wags a finger at her. “I remember you. You’re the woman who barrelled into me on the elevator.”

Ha, I knew it!

She glares at him hotly, placing a hand on her hip. “Yeah because you were blocking the entrance to said elevator.” 

He frowns. “Aye, to keep the doors open for you when I saw you coming. I was being a gentleman.”

She scoffs.

“And need I remind you, I picked up your phone and handed it to you?” he points out smugly.

“As you should've since you were the reason I dropped it in the first place.” She cocks her head, lifting a challenging brow.

He chuckles and shakes his head. “There’s no chance of me winning this, is there?”

Emma crosses her arms over her chest, a slight smirk tugging her lips. “Nope.”

“Well, the next time I see a gorgeous woman running toward the elevator, I’ll make sure to step off so the doors can close before she gets there. Even if it means she has to wait for it to return to her floor.” He shrugs and crosses his arms over the counter, leaning over it. “And if she’s on her phone and runs into the doors, well, that’s her fault. Is that what you’d rather have me do, love?”

The endearment sends goosebumps over her skin as she leans over the counter, their faces only inches away from each other. “Fine, you get a point for keeping the doors open. But not for picking up my phone.”

Amusement dances across his features as he cracks a smile. “I’ll take what I can get.”

A victory grin crosses her lips, her eyes hooked on his. For a moment, she just stares at him, raw, magnetic energy suffocating the surrounding air. 

A rowdy bunch enters the bar, along with their boisterous hooting and hollering and she remembers herself again and straightens, clutching at the edge of the counter. “So, whatcha drinking tonight?”

“What do you recommend for a man who just got his heart ripped out and torn to bits in a blender like a strawberry smoothie?” Despair etches his features again and her heart tightens, though she knows it’s not nearly as painful as what he’s feeling. She knows all too well what he’s going through.

“Ouch, I guess you weren't joking when you said you had a rough week.”

“Rough doesn’t begin to cover it,” he grumbles bitterly.

She purses her lips in thought, rubbing her chin as she decides what drink to suggest. “Something strong I take it?”

“Please.”

“Tequila Slammers usually work for me, but I might have something more up your alley. Can I see some identification?”

He cocks a brow. “Seriously? I come here all the time. Your boss is one of my best mates.”

She offers up an apologetic smile and a shrug. “Sorry, I’m required by law, and I don’t want to get fired on my first day. Besides, for someone who frequents this place a lot, you should already know the selection Robin keeps in stock.”

“I do, but since you’re new, I have to put your bartending skills and knowledge of alcohol to the test,” he says with a playful wink. 

“Ah, a challenge? I’m always up for a challenge.” Her lips curve into a dramatic smirk. “Still need to see some identification, though.”

He blows out an exasperated sigh, dragging his wallet from his leather jacket, pulling out his i.d. and handing it to her. She scans his date of birth, doing the math in her head and gives it back. He’s 28 and his birthday’s January 26th. Good to know.

“First day, huh?” he asks, slipping his i.d. into his wallet before returning the wallet into his pocket. “I wondered why I haven’t seen you here before.”

“Yeah, I needed a side job.”

“Oh yeah? What else do you do?”

Emma hesitates before answering. She doesn’t want to lie to him, but she has to focus on the goal because otherwise, she’ll end up on a slippery slope. “I own a small home improvement company.” It’s not a complete lie. Okay, it is, but she has the required education, and an updated Residential Builders license; she just hasn’t put either to much use since her grandparents passed away, which halted pretty much all of her plans and dimmed her ambitions to actually own and run her own home improvement company. But if she’s making Ruby look like a saint, she has to lie to Killian. And she really hates that. She hates this situation Ruby and Mary Margaret put her in; they sort of cornered Emma, wedging her in between a rock and a hard place. 

“Really?” he asks in surprise.

“What? You think because I’m a woman, I can’t get my hands dirty with good old-fashioned, hard work?” she asks defensively.

“I didn’t say that. I’m just surprised you have the time to own your own business and tend a bar.”

“I manage.” Emma shrugs. “Why don’t I get you that drink,” she says, desperate to change the subject. She places a glass tumbler on the bar top and spins around, dashing to a cabinet where she knows Robin stashes the good liquor. She can feel Killian’s eyes burning into her backside as she reaches up to grab a bottle of Bacardi Superior. 

When she turns around again to pour his glass, she catches him staring at her, confirming her suspicions. Her cheeks warm and she fights off a triumphant grin as his eyes drop to the drink she’s pouring him. 

“Very impressive,” he comments with genuine pride. “You could’ve gone for whiskey but instead, you chose my favorite brand of my favorite liquor. How did you know?”

She shrugs nonchalantly, sliding over the glass of rum to him. “Drowning your sorrows in rum is an excellent remedy for being cheated on.”

Devastation clouds his features again, and she immediately regrets her statement. It’s a sore topic. 

She shouldn’t have brought it up, especially since they’re technically still strangers; they haven’t officially exchanged names yet. But she can’t exactly tell him she obtained pertinent details from Ruby, (along with some extremely intimate and very unnecessary ones) like his affinity for rum, now can she? 

“But I never said I was cheated on. There are many other things that can lead to a broken heart.”

“True, but you’re kind of an open book, and I’m actually quite perceptive.” 

He takes a sip of his drink before setting down the glass, still clutching onto it, his eyes furrowing as he studies her for a moment. “You’re friends with Mary Margaret. And knowing her, or rather, what I’ve gathered about her, she can’t keep a secret to save her life. That’s not perception, darling, that’s listening to gossip.”

She wrinkles her brows. “How do you know I’m friends with her?”

“Because, when we ran into each other on the elevator, you mentioned that her neurotic behavior was the reason why you were on your phone. Ruby had often described Mary Margaret in a similar fashion. Plus, you showed me the text from an MM, so I put the pieces together.” He lifts his glass, pointing a finger at her and cocking his head from side to side as he adds very smugly, “That, my love, is what you call perception.”

Her mouth opens in protest, but anything she'd planned to say is immediately lost to the clever smirk he’s donning before he lifts his glass to those sensuous looking lips and takes a victory drink. She’d never wanted to smack a grin off someone’s face so badly in her life. She has to leave to help other customers, but it gives her time to calm down and think. She has to think of a way to respond to that, but she’s so flustered and infuriated at the same time, she can’t think straight. She’s only known him very briefly and already he’s managed to crawl his way under her skin, in more ways than one. 

After serving a few patrons, she returns to Killian, wiping down the bar counter. “So, what do you do for a living? Other than pester bartenders,” she slips in, taking a jab at him.

There he goes again, flicking his tongue along the inside of his cheek as he sets her with a sarcastic glare. Good God, that thing should be illegal. 

“I’m an architect. But I’m guessing you already know that too.”

Damn, this guy’s good.

“Maybe. But still, I wanted to be polite by asking you about yourself. Is that so bad?”

A deep chuckle rumbles from his throat, penetrating her ears so deliciously she can feel all the way in her toes. “You're a lot like Tequila. Sweet on the tongue but burns all the way down.”

She rolls her eyes in annoyance, but at least he didn't compare her to a car. “How do you know I'm sweet on the tongue?” she asks cheekily, placing a hand on her hip.

A ridiculously sultry grin crawls over his ridiculously handsome face, making the pulse of her heart stagger. “While I do imagine you would be sweet on the tongue,” he says, swiping his tongue across his lips, “I was referring to your act of chivalry followed up with an insult.”

She has to run away again and busy herself with tasks to recover from the comment and the way he casually licked his lips. 

“I work at Fisher’s,” he says when she hands a drink to the guy sitting next to him. 

She looks at him, arching a brow in curiosity. “What got you into architecture?”

“Well, I’ve always had a knack for drawing. I got my creativity from my mum, but unlike what you do, I enjoy working from scratch. Which is not to crap on your craft, love, we’re just different in that way. How did you get into home improvement?”

“My grandparents. They were house flippers, and I wanted to carry on the family business after they died.”

A doleful look clouds his features. “Sorry to hear, love.”

“Thanks,” she murmurs. “Continuing the business was the plan at least. But it reminded me too much of them, made me miss them more, you know? So I had to separate myself from it all and take some time to grieve. Then I ended up starting my own business.” That was also the plan, but it didn’t exactly happen that way.

“Well, I’m glad you were able to keep doing what you love,” he smiles optimistically.

“Yeah,” she breathes, guilt and regret coiled in the pit of her stomach.

He opens his mouth to say something, but the sound of his phone buzzing on the counter pulls him from his thoughts. He looks at the screen and sighs. “Of course,” he mutters to himself.

“What’s wrong?” she asks in concern, even though she knows who the text is from.

“I got a text from David. He invited me here tonight. Wanted to help make me feel better because of what happened with Ruby. I think he felt bad because Mary Margaret is friends with her.”

She nods in understanding, offering a slight smile. “Sounds like him.”

“Aye, except he canceled on me. Said he had to help Mary Margaret with some wedding invitation crisis.”

“Oh, I’m well aware of the crisis,” Emma laughs. “She’s been blowing up my phone since I’ve been at work.”

Killian sighs. “That's another one of my plans falling through.”

“Oh yeah? What were the other plans?”

He shakes his head. “I’ve taken up too much of your time already. I don’t want to burden you with my problems.”

Emma opens her mouth to tell him he’s not at all a burden, but Robin interrupts her attempt when he emerges from his office.

“Hey, there he is!” he greets cheerily, approaching the counter as he glances between Killian and Emma, sensing he’s interrupting something. “I see you’ve two been acquainted?”

“Aye,” Killian manages a slight smile. “I didn’t realize you hired a new bartender.”

“It happened quite fast after I found out she needed another job. How’s she treating you?”

“Like family,” he answers, his eyes locked with hers. “She even knew what kind of rum I prefer.”

“She’s good, isn’t she?” Robin boasts proudly with a grin. “She’s perceptive too.”

The look on Killian’s face is priceless and the smile overtaking her lips is so smug, even she’s feeling the urge to slap it off herself.

“Aye, she is,” Killian answers, donning a sarcastic smirk.

“You aren't bringing down my new help with sob stories about your ex, are you?” 

Killian’s brows furrow in mock offense. “No, of course not. I even dodged one of her questions to avoid that.”

Emma rolls her eyes. “Oh please, I’m used to hearing sob stories. This isn’t my first bartending job.” 

“I know. You can handle yourself, I’m not worried,” Robin smiles and walks away to make his rounds, greeting the regulars and welcoming the newcomers. He knows how to work a crowd—it’s one of the many reasons his bar does so well.

Emma reverts her attention to Killian and sees him draining his glass and setting it down curtly. “Can I get another one, love?” 

She nods and makes another glass for him, placing it in front of him. He’d taken his time with the first drink, but this one he downs in one impressive gulp before slamming it down on the bar top.

She arches a brow. “Easy there, tiger. You keep that up and you’re going to feel awful in the morning.”

“I’ll feel awful anyway,” he groans.

Emma purses her lips. “True, but I can think of a way that might make you feel better without the nasty hangover.”

Killian cocks a brow, intrigued. “And what’s that, darling?”

She smirks. “Just trust me. I get off soon. Meet me outside?”

Killian looks her over, a dubious look on his face. “Look, um…” Killian scratches behind his ear, pausing in hesitation for a second as his cheeks turn pink. “You seem really nice and all, and in other circumstances, I’d definitely take you up on the offer, but, I’m not really in the mood to—”

“To what? Have sex?” Emma laughs and shakes her head. “That’s not what I was offering, but it’s good to know I’d have a chance if you didn’t just go through an awful breakup. I do have to give you points for turning down sex so soon after your breakup. You just put Ross Geller to shame.”

Killian’s brows furrow in confusion. “I’m afraid I don’t follow the reference.”

She raises a brow. “You’ve never watched Friends?”

“Afraid not, love. I was more of a Seinfeld guy.”

Emma gasps. “That’s it. We can’t be friends anymore.”

Killian chuckles. “So we’re friends now?”

She shakes her head, but she’s smiling from ear to ear. “Not anymore.”

Killian pouts, and it’s just about the most adorable thing she’s ever witnessed before. Like more adorable than babies, kittens and puppies.

“Okay, fine, I suppose we can be friends.” She sticks out her hand. “I’m Emma.”

“I know, love; it says on your name tag,” he chuckles.

“And I already know yours is Killian from Mary Margaret and your i.d. but if we’re going to be friends, we have to be formally introduced, don’t you agree?”

He nods and slips his palm into hers. “I’m Killian. Nice to meet you, love.”

Oh god, his hand is so warm and feels like heaven in hers; her heart flutters as she manages a weak smile and shakes it. “Nice to meet you too, Killian.” 

[sussex-nature-lover]

Saturday 20th March 2021

Anniversary Week

As we started to hear about the global pandemic and to worry about how it was going to affect our daily lives, I had the idea to write a blog. Write about what you know I always hear and so my theme was what’s right on my doorstep. The very first entry I wrote, pre-Tumblr was on 20th March 2020 on Google sheets, but I soon decided I need to move to a different platform and so my first Tumblr Blog came about on 27th March 2020, which was a Friday.

Where has the time gone? We’ve missed all the birthdays, big anniversary, Mother’s Day (twice) and Father’s Day, Christmas with family and so on, so the big benefit of a nature blog is that rather than marking time by your own life events, the seasons are going to roll around come what may and that Spring is the period of hope and regeneration. We’re into Spring proper now as today’s the Vernal Equinox.

photo credit: Ms NW tE

Ms NW tE is definitely catching the gardening and nature bug and spent yesterday painting some pots. I’ve got my eye on that one in the middle, you can tell it’s my style as per these hiding behind Pedro.

My Mother’s Day Muscari are all flowering now

Finally, this morning I got up to some colour on my green sticks. Hoorah! Crow got up to a patient queue awaiting his breakfast café - all the girls (female Pheasants) were lined up in the shrubbery, anticipating a feast. They may have been having a long wait because I was awake at ten past four today, when Robin was singing. There wasn’t even the slightest sign of light either and I nodded off again.

photo credit: Ms NW tE

I also got this Parakeet picture sent from SE London, what a fantastic pose it is too.

The rose-ringed parakeet is sexually dimorphic. The adult male sports a red and black neck ring, and the hen and immature birds of both sexes either show no neck rings, or display shadow-like pale to dark grey neck rings. Both sexes have a distinctive green colour in the wild, and captive bred ringnecks have multiple colour mutations including blue, violet and yellow. Rose-ringed parakeets measure on average 40 cm (16 in) in length, including the tail feathers, a large portion of their total length. Their average single-wing length is about 15 to 17.5 cm (5.9 to 6.9 in). In the wild, this is a noisy species with an unmistakable squawking call.

Wikipedia

When you talk about noisy gardens and nuisance calls though, I think the Parakeet might be preferable to the Rooks’ and I can tell you they’re revving up big time now.

Rook (Dunnock behind)

GARDEN NOTES:

Yesterday I watched three Rabbits chasing each other around the bottom of the garden.  Last night I heard an Owl for the first time in a while and a few times today the Sparrow Hawk flew in and landed low in the shrubbery. One time the door was open and we both roared at the same time and off it went, but it’s been back since.

AROUND THE WORLD:

Volcano erupts in Iceland after tens of thousands of earthquakes and in Japan

An earthquake struck northern Japan generating a tsunami of one metre on Saturday.

The quake hit the coast of Miyagi Prefecture at 6.26pm (0926 GMT) and had a magnitude of 7.2 at a depth of 60km, the Japan Meteorological Agency said.

Tremors started just before 6:10 p.m and could be felt in Tokyo, about 400 km south of the epicentre.

The United States Geological Survey said the quake was centred 27 kilometres east of Ishinomaki at a depth of 60 kilometres, which is off the coast of the Miyagi prefecture - an area that was heavily damaged during the huge earthquake and tsunami of 2011.

The Standard

WHAT DID I LEARN TODAY?

I can’t quite believe this TV series with the gardener Monty Don, passed me by. It’s two years old and has 10 episodes visiting famous gardens all around the world - perfect for lockdown viewing.

Link at the BBC here.

Episode 9, which I haven’t seen yet, features Sissinghurst (National Trust) near to us.

Winter view from the top of the Tower at Sissinghurst. The famous White Garden is located between the two buildings, with the Orchard on our right

Spring at Sissinghurst

and if you can’t get the BBC i-player then episodes are on Daily Motion.

[hlupdate]

A hand­shake can quell polit­i­cal unrest and sti­fle impend­ing war. It can, with a bit of spit, val­i­date a gentleman’s agree­ment, end a years-long roman­tic rela­tion­ship or send a young heart rac­ing. But it all depends on the two par­ties involved.

Daisy, 21, felt a seis­mic jolt when Har­ry Styles, 25, wear­ing a striped jumper and rings on three of his five fin­gers, clutched her hand two days after this year’s Met Gala in New York, when she served him gela­to at the shop where she worked.

“He decid­ed on a small mint choco­late gela­to and I made his and the one for his friend and I said, ​‘Can I just say I absolute­ly loved your Met Gala look’ and he said ​‘Thank you very much! What’s your name?’ And I said, ​‘Daisy’ AND HE FUCK­ING EXTEND­ED HISHAND AND REACHED TO SHAKE MY HAND AND I ACTU­AL­LY FUCK­INGSHOOK HIS HAND WHAT THE FUCK,” she wrote on Insta­gram after The Shak­en­ing. ​“Like I didn’t even say any­thing to gas him up besides ​‘I loved your met gala look’ and his fine ass went and shook my hand! WHAT A BEAU­TI­FUL FUCK­ING HUMAN BEINGTHAT HE IS GOD BLESS HIM AND I HOPE HW [sic] LIVES FOREVER.”

For Har­ry Styles, a hand­shake can be a roman­tic ges­ture, con­jur­ing a potent rev­er­ence in its recip­i­ent, like the time he met Gucci’s cre­ative direc­tor Alessan­dro Michele. ​“He was as attrac­tive as James Dean and as per­sua­sive as Gre­ta Gar­bo. He was like a Luchi­no Vis­con­ti char­ac­ter, like an Apol­lo: at the same time sexy as a woman, as a kid, as a man,” Michele told me, has­ten­ing to add: ​“Of course, Har­ry is not aware of this.”

No, Styles has no idea the pow­er he wields. In per­son, he’s tow­er­ing, like some­one who is not that much taller but whose rep­u­ta­tion adds four inch­es. Styles has a seda­tive bari­tone, spo­ken in a rum­my north­ern Eng­lish accent, that tum­bles out so slow­ly you for­get the name of your first born, a swag­ger that has been nursed and per­fect­ed in myth­i­cal places with names like Pais­ley Park, or Abbey Road, or Grace­land. Makes com­plete sense that he would be up for the role of Elvis Pres­ley in Baz Luhrmann’s upcom­ing biopic. He was primed, nay, born to shake his hips, all but one but­ton on his shirt cling­ing for dear life around his tor­so. Then the part was award­ed to anoth­er actor, Austin Butler.

“[Elvis] was such an icon for me grow­ing up,” Styles tells me. ​“There was some­thing almost sacred about him, almost like I didn’t want to touch him. Then I end­ed up get­ting into [his life] a bit and I wasn’t dis­ap­point­ed,” he adds of his ini­tial research and prepa­ra­tions to play The King. He seems relaxed about los­ing the part to But­ler. ​“I feel like if I’m not the right per­son for the thing, then it’s best for both of us that I don’t do it, you know?”

Styles released his self-titled debut solo album in May 2017. The boy­band grad was clear­ly unin­ter­est­ed in hol­low­ing out the charts with more for­mu­la­ic meme pop. Instead, to the sur­prise of many, he dug his heels into retro-fetishist West Coast ​’70s rock. Some of the One Direc­tion fan-hordes might have been con­fused, but no mat­ter: Har­ry Styles sold one mil­lion copies.

Despite its com­mer­cial and crit­i­cal suc­cess, he didn’t tour the album right away. He want­ed to act in the Christo­pher Nolan film Dunkirk. To his cred­it, his por­tray­al of a British sol­dier cow­er­ing in a moored boat on the French beach­es as the Nazis advanced wasn’t skew­ered in the press like the movie debuts of, say, Madon­na or Justin Tim­ber­lake. Per­haps he was fol­low­ing advice giv­en by Elton John, who had urged him to diver­si­fy. ​“He was bril­liant in Dunkirk, which took a lot of peo­ple by sur­prise,” John writes in an email. ​“I love how he takes chances and risks.” Act­ing, unlike music, is a release for Styles; it’s the one time he can be not himself.

“Why do I want to act? It’s so dif­fer­ent to music for me,” he says, sud­den­ly ani­mat­ed. ​“They’re almost oppo­site for me. Music, you try and put so much of your­self into it; act­ing, you’re try­ing to total­ly dis­ap­pear in who­ev­er you’re being.”

Fol­low­ing the news that he missed out on Pres­ley, his name was float­ed for the role of Prince Eric in Disney’s live-action remake of The Lit­tle Mer­maid. How­ev­er, fans will have to wait a bit longer to see Styles on the big screen as that idea, too, has sunk. He won’t be The King or the Prince. ​“It was dis­cussed,” he acknow­ledges before swift­ly chang­ing the sub­ject. ​“I want to put music out and focus on that for a while. But every­one involved in it was amaz­ing, so I think it’s going to be great. I’ll enjoy watch­ing it, I’m sure.”

The new album is wrapped and the sin­gle is decid­ed upon. ​“It’s not like his last album,” his friend, rock ​‘n’ roll leg­end Ste­vie Nicks, told me recent­ly over the phone. ​“It’s not like any­thing One Direc­tion ever did. It’s pure Har­ry, as Har­ry would say. He’s made a very dif­fer­ent record and it’s spectacular.”

Beyond that, Styles is keep­ing his cards close to his chest as to his next musi­cal move. How­ev­er, the air is thick with rumours that his main wing­man for HS2 is Kid Har­poon, aka Tom Hull, who co-wrote debut album track Sweet Crea­ture. No less an author­i­ty than Liam Gal­lagher told us that both big band escapees were in the same stu­dio – RAK in north-west Lon­don – at the same time mak­ing their sec­ond solo albums. Styles played him a cou­ple of tracks, ​“and I tell you what, they’re good,” Gal­lagher enthused. ​“A bit like that Bon Iver. Is that his name?”

Har­ry Styles met Nicks at a Fleet­wood Mac con­cert in Los Ange­les in April 2015. Some­thing about him felt authen­tic to the leg­endary front­woman: ground­ed, like she’d known him for­ev­er, blessed with a win­ning moon­shot grin. A month lat­er, they met back­stage at anoth­er Mac gig, this time at the O2 in Lon­don. Styles brought a car­rot cake for Nicks’ birth­day, her name piped in icing on top. By her own admis­sion, Nicks doesn’t even cel­e­brate birth­days, so this was a sur­prise. ​“He was per­son­al­ly respon­si­ble for me actu­al­ly hav­ing to cel­e­brate my birth­day, which was very sweet,” she says.

Styles’ rela­tion­ship with Nicks is hard to define. Induct­ing her into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in New York as a solo artist ear­li­er this year, his speech hymned her as a ​“mag­i­cal gyp­sy god­moth­er who occu­pies the in-between”. She’s called him her ​“lovechild” with Mick Fleet­wood and the ​“son I nev­er had”. Both have moved past the pre­lim­i­nary chat acknowl­edg­ing each other’s unquan­tifi­able tal­ents and smooth­ly accel­er­at­ed towards play­ful cut-and-thrust ban­ter of a witch mom and her naughty child.

They per­form togeth­er – he sings The Chainand Stop Drag­gin’ My Heart Around; she sings the one alleged­ly writ­ten about Tay­lor Swift, Two Ghosts. One of those per­for­mances was at the Guc­ci Cruise after­par­ty in Rome in May, for ​“a lot of mon­ey”, Nicks tells me, in a ​“big kind of cas­tle place”. She has become his de fac­to men­tor – one phone call is all it takes to reach the Queen of Rock’n’Roll for advice on sequenc­ing (“She is real­ly good at track list­ing,” Styles admits) or just to hear each other’s voic­es… because, well, wouldn’t you?

Fol­low­ing anoth­er Fleet­wood Mac con­cert, at London’s Wem­b­ley Sta­di­um, in June, Nicks met Styles for a late (Indi­an) din­ner. He then invit­ed her back to his semi-detached Geor­gian man­sion in north Lon­don for a lis­ten­ing par­ty at mid­night. The album – HS2or what­ev­er it’ll be called – was fin­ished. Nicks, her assis­tant Karen, her make-up artist and her friends Jess and Mary crammed onto Styles’ liv­ing-room couch. They lis­tened to it once through in silence like a ​“bunch of edu­cat­ed monks or some­thing in this dark room”. Then once again, 15 or 16 tracks, this time each of his guests offer­ing live feed­back. It wrapped at 5am, just as the sun was bleed­ing through the curtains.

Even for a pop star of Styles’ stature, press­ing ​“play” on a deeply per­son­al work for your hero to digest, watch­ing her face react in real time to your new music, must be… what?

“It’s a dou­ble-edged thing,” he replies. ​“You’re always ner­vous when you are play­ing peo­ple music for the first time. You’ve heard it so much by this point, you for­get that peo­ple haven’t heard it before. It’s hard to not feel like you’ve done what you’ve set out to do. You are hap­py with some­thing and then some­one who you respect so much and look up to is, like: ​‘I real­ly like this.’ It feels like a large stamp [of approval]. It’s a big step towards feel­ing very com­fort­able with what­ev­er else hap­pens to it.”

Wad­ing through Styles’ back­ground info is exhaust­ing, since he was spanked by fame in the social media era where every god­dam blink of a kohl-rimmed eye has been doc­u­ment­ed from six angles. (And yes, he does some­times wear guyliner.)

Deep breath: born in Red­ditch, Worces­ter­shire, to par­ents Des and Anne, who divorced when he was sev­en. Grew up in Holmes Chapel in Cheshire with his sis­ter Gem­ma, mum and step­dad Robin Twist. Rode hors­es at a near­by sta­ble for free (“I was a bad rid­er, but I was a rid­er”). Stopped rid­ing, ​“got into dif­fer­ent stuff”. Formed a band, White Eski­mo, with school­mates. Aged 16, tried out for the 2010 run of The X Fac­torwith a stir­ring but aver­age ren­di­tion of Ste­vie Wonder’s Isn’t She Love­ly. Cut from the show and put into a boy band with four oth­ers, Louis Tom­lin­son, Liam Payne, Niall Horan and Zayn Malik, and called One Direc­tion. Became inter­na­tion­al­ly famous, toured the globe. Zayn quit to go solo. Toured some more. Dat­ed but maybe didn’t date Car­o­line Flack, Rita Ora and Tay­lor Swift – whom he report­ed­ly dumped in the British Vir­gin Islands. (This rela­tion­ship, if noth­ing else, yield­ed an icon­ic, can­did shot of Swift look­ing deject­ed, being motored back to shore on the back of a boat called the Fly­ing Ray.) One Direc­tion dis­cussed dis­band­ing in 2014, actu­al­ly dis­solved in 2015. They remain friend­ly, and Styles offi­cial­ly went solo in 2016.

It’s been two years since his epony­mous debut and lead sin­gle, Sign of the Times, shocked the world and Elton John with its swag­ger­ing, soft rock sound. ​“It came out of left field and I loved it,” John says.

After 89 are­na-packed shows across five con­ti­nents grossed him, the label, whomev­er, over $61 mil­lion, Styles had all but dis­ap­peared. He has emerged only inter­mit­tent­ly for pub­lic-fac­ing events – a Guc­ci after­par­ty per­for­mance here, a Met Gala co-chair­ing there. He relo­cat­ed from Los Ange­les back to Lon­don, sell­ing his Hol­ly­wood Hills house for $6mil­lion and ship­ping his Jaguar E-type across the Atlantic so he could take joyrides on the M25.

“I’m not over LA,” he insists when I ask about the move. ​“My rela­tion­ship with LAchanged a lot. What I want­ed from LA changed.”

A great escape, he would agree, is some­times nec­es­sary. He was in Tokyo for most of Jan­u­ary, hav­ing near­ly fin­ished his album. ​“I need­ed time to get out of that album frame-of-mind of: ​‘Is it fin­ished? Where am I at? What’s hap­pen­ing?’ I real­ly need­ed that time away from every­one. I was kind of just in Tokyo by myself.” His sab­bat­i­cal most­ly involved read­ing Haru­ki Murakami’s The Wind-Up Bird Chron­i­cle, singing Nir­vana at karaoke, writ­ing alone in his hotel room, lis­ten­ing to music and eaves­drop­ping on strangers in alien con­ver­sa­tion. ​“It was just a pos­i­tive time for my head and I think that impact­ed the album in a big way.”

Dur­ing this break he watched a lot of films, read a lot of books. Some­times he texts these rec­om­men­da­tions to his pal Michele at Guc­ci. He told Michele to watch the Ali Mac­graw film, Love Sto­ry. ​“We text what friends text about. He is the same [as me] in terms of he lives in his own world and he does his own thing. I love dress­ing up and he loves dress­ing up.”

Because he loves dress­ing up, Michele chose Styles to be the face of three Guc­ci Tai­lor­ing cam­paigns and of its new gen­der­less fra­grance, Mémoire d’une Odeur.

“The moment I met him, I imme­di­ate­ly under­stood there was some­thing strong around him,” Michele tells me. ​“I realised he was much more than a young singer. He was a young man, dressed in a thought­ful way, with uncombed hair and a beau­ti­ful voice. I thought he gath­ered with­in him­self the fem­i­nine and the masculine.”

Fash­ion, for Styles, is a play­ground. Some­thing he doesn’t take too seri­ous­ly. A cou­ple of years ago Har­ry Lam­bert, his styl­ist since 2015, acquired for him a pair of pink metal­lic Saint Lau­rent boots that he has nev­er been pho­tographed wear­ing. They are exceed­ing­ly rare – few pairs exist. Styles wears them ​“to get milk”. They are, in his words, ​“super-fun”. He’s not sure, but he has, ball­park, 50 pairs of shoes, as well as full clos­ets in at least three post­codes. He set­tles on an out­fit fair­ly quick­ly, maybe changes his T-shirt once before head­ing out, but most­ly knows what he likes.

What he may not ful­ly com­pre­hend is that sim­ply by being pho­tographed in a gar­ment he can spur the career of a design­er, as he has with Har­ris Reed, Palo­mo Spain, Charles Jef­frey, Alled-Martínez and a new favourite, Bode. Styles wore a SS16 Guc­ci flo­ral suit to the 2015 Amer­i­can Music Awards. When he was asked who made his suit on the red car­pet, Guc­ci began trend­ing world­wide on Twitter.

“It was one of the first times a male wore Alessandro’s run­way designs and, at the time, men were not tak­ing too many red car­pet risks,” says Lam­bert. ​“Who knows if it influ­enced oth­ers, but it was a spe­cial moment. Plus, it was fun see­ing the fans dress up in suits to come see Harry’s shows.”

Yet tra­di­tion­al gen­der codes of dress still have the minds of mid­dle Amer­i­ca in a choke­hold. Men can’t wear women’s clothes, say the online whingers, who have labelled him ​“trag­ic”, ​“a clown” and a Bowie wannabe. Styles doesn’t care. ​“What’s fem­i­nine and what’s mas­cu­line, what men are wear­ing and what women are wear­ing – it’s like there are no lines any more.”

Elton John agrees: ​“It worked for Marc Bolan, Bowie and Mick. Har­ry has the same qualities.”

Then there is the ques­tion of Styles’ sex­u­al­i­ty, some­thing he has admit­ted­ly ​“nev­er real­ly start­ed to label”, which will plague him until he does. Per­haps it’s part of his allure. He’s bran­dished a pride flag that read ​“Make Amer­i­ca Gay Again” on stage, and plant­ed a stake some­where left of cen­tre on sexuality’s rain­bow spectrum.

“In the posi­tion that he’s in, he can’t real­ly say a lot, but he chose a queer girl band to open for him and I think that speaks vol­umes,” Josette Maskin of the queer band MUNA told The Face ear­li­er this year.

“I get a lot of…” Styles trails off, wheels turn­ing on how he can dis­cuss sex­u­al­i­ty with­out real­ly answer­ing. ​“I’m not always super-out­spo­ken. But I think it’s very clear from choic­es that I make that I feel a cer­tain way about lots of things. I don’t know how to describe it. I guess I’m not…” He paus­es again, piv­ots. ​“I want every­one to feel wel­come at shows and online. They want to be loved and equal, you know? I’m nev­er unsup­port­ed, so it feels weird for me to over­think it for some­one else.”

Sex­u­al­i­ty aside, he must acknowl­edge that he has sex appeal. ​“The word ​‘sexy’ sounds so strange com­ing out of my mouth. So I would say that that’s prob­a­bly why I would not con­sid­er myself sexy.”

Har­ry Styles has emerged ful­ly-formed, an anachro­nis­tic rock star, vague in sen­si­bil­i­ty but des­tined to impress with a dis­arm­ing smile and a warm but firm handshake.

I recite to him a quote from Chrissie Hyn­de of The Pre­tenders about her time atop rock’s throne: ​“I nev­er got into this for the mon­ey or because I want­ed to join in the super­star sex around the swim­ming pools. I did it because the offer of a record con­tract came along and it seemed like it might be more fun than being a wait­ress. Now, I’m not so sure.”

Styles – who worked in a bak­ery in a small north­ern town some time before play­ing to 40,000 scream­ing fans in South Amer­i­can are­nas – must have wit­nessed some shit, been invit­ed to a few pool­side sex par­ties, in his time.

“I’ve seen a cou­ple of things,” he nods in agree­ment. ​“But I’m still young. I feel like there’s still stuff to see.”

[stylesnews]

The Face - Volume 4 . Issue 1

A hand­shake can quell polit­i­cal unrest and sti­fle impend­ing war. It can, with a bit of spit, val­i­date a gentleman’s agree­ment, end a years-long roman­tic rela­tion­ship or send a young heart rac­ing. But it all depends on the two par­ties involved.

Daisy, 21, felt a seis­mic jolt when Har­ry Styles, 25, wear­ing a striped jumper and rings on three of his five fin­gers, clutched her hand two days after this year’s Met Gala in New York, when she served him gela­to at the shop where she worked.

“He decid­ed on a small mint choco­late gela­to and I made his and the one for his friend and I said, ​‘Can I just say I absolute­ly loved your Met Gala look’ and he said ​‘Thank you very much! What’s your name?’ And I said, ​‘Daisy’ AND HE FUCK­ING EXTEND­ED HIS HAND AND REACHEDTO SHAKE MY HAND AND I ACTU­AL­LY FUCK­ING SHOOK HIS HAND WHAT THEFUCK,” she wrote on Insta­gram after The Shak­en­ing. ​“Like I didn’t even say any­thing to gas him up besides ​‘I loved your met gala look’ and his fine ass went and shook my hand! WHATA BEAU­TI­FUL FUCK­ING HUMAN BEING THAT HE IS GOD BLESS HIM AND I HOPE HW[sic] LIVES FOREVER.”

For Har­ry Styles, a hand­shake can be a roman­tic ges­ture, con­jur­ing a potent rev­er­ence in its recip­i­ent, like the time he met Gucci’s cre­ative direc­tor Alessan­dro Michele. ​“He was as attrac­tive as James Dean and as per­sua­sive as Gre­ta Gar­bo. He was like a Luchi­no Vis­con­ti char­ac­ter, like an Apol­lo: at the same time sexy as a woman, as a kid, as a man,” Michele told me, has­ten­ing to add: ​“Of course, Har­ry is not aware of this.”

No, Styles has no idea the pow­er he wields. In per­son, he’s tow­er­ing, like some­one who is not that much taller but whose rep­u­ta­tion adds four inch­es. Styles has a seda­tive bari­tone, spo­ken in a rum­my north­ern Eng­lish accent, that tum­bles out so slow­ly you for­get the name of your first born, a swag­ger that has been nursed and per­fect­ed in myth­i­cal places with names like Pais­ley Park, or Abbey Road, or Grace­land. Makes com­plete sense that he would be up for the role of Elvis Pres­ley in Baz Luhrmann’s upcom­ing biopic. He was primed, nay, born to shake his hips, all but one but­ton on his shirt cling­ing for dear life around his tor­so. Then the part was award­ed to anoth­er actor, Austin Butler.

“[Elvis] was such an icon for me grow­ing up,” Styles tells me. ​“There was some­thing almost sacred about him, almost like I didn’t want to touch him. Then I end­ed up get­ting into [his life] a bit and I wasn’t dis­ap­point­ed,” he adds of his ini­tial research and prepa­ra­tions to play The King. He seems relaxed about los­ing the part to But­ler. ​“I feel like if I’m not the right per­son for the thing, then it’s best for both of us that I don’t do it, you know?”

Styles released his self-titled debut solo album in May 2017. The boy­band grad was clear­ly unin­ter­est­ed in hol­low­ing out the charts with more for­mu­la­ic meme pop. Instead, to the sur­prise of many, he dug his heels into retro-fetishist West Coast ​’70s rock. Some of the One Direc­tion fan-hordes might have been con­fused, but no mat­ter: Har­ry Styles sold one mil­lion copies.

Despite its com­mer­cial and crit­i­cal suc­cess, he didn’t tour the album right away. He want­ed to act in the Christo­pher Nolan film Dunkirk. To his cred­it, his por­tray­al of a British sol­dier cow­er­ing in a moored boat on the French beach­es as the Nazis advanced wasn’t skew­ered in the press like the movie debuts of, say, Madon­na or Justin Tim­ber­lake. Per­haps he was fol­low­ing advice giv­en by Elton John, who had urged him to diver­si­fy. ​“He was bril­liant in Dunkirk, which took a lot of peo­ple by sur­prise,” John writes in an email. ​“I love how he takes chances and risks.” Act­ing, unlike music, is a release for Styles; it’s the one time he can be not himself.

“Why do I want to act? It’s so dif­fer­ent to music for me,” he says, sud­den­ly ani­mat­ed. ​“They’re almost oppo­site for me. Music, you try and put so much of your­self into it; act­ing, you’re try­ing to total­ly dis­ap­pear in who­ev­er you’re being.”

Fol­low­ing the news that he missed out on Pres­ley, his name was float­ed for the role of Prince Eric in Disney’s live-action remake of The Lit­tle Mer­maid. How­ev­er, fans will have to wait a bit longer to see Styles on the big screen as that idea, too, has sunk. He won’t be The King or the Prince. ​“It was dis­cussed,” he acknow­ledges before swift­ly chang­ing the sub­ject. ​“I want to put music out and focus on that for a while. But every­one involved in it was amaz­ing, so I think it’s going to be great. I’ll enjoy watch­ing it, I’m sure.”

The new album is wrapped and the sin­gle is decid­ed upon. ​“It’s not like his last album,” his friend, rock ​‘n’ roll leg­end Ste­vie Nicks, told me recent­ly over the phone. ​“It’s not like any­thing One Direc­tion ever did. It’s pure Har­ry, as Har­ry would say. He’s made a very dif­fer­ent record and it’s spectacular.”

Beyond that, Styles is keep­ing his cards close to his chest as to his next musi­cal move. How­ev­er, the air is thick with rumours that his main wing­man for HS2 is Kid Har­poon, aka Tom Hull, who co-wrote debut album track Sweet Crea­ture. No less an author­i­ty than Liam Gal­lagher told us that both big band escapees were in the same stu­dio – RAK in north-west Lon­don – at the same time mak­ing their sec­ond solo albums. Styles played him a cou­ple of tracks, ​“and I tell you what, they’re good,” Gal­lagher enthused. ​“A bit like that Bon Iver. Is that his name?”

Har­ry Styles met Nicks at a Fleet­wood Mac con­cert in Los Ange­les in April 2015. Some­thing about him felt authen­tic to the leg­endary front­woman: ground­ed, like she’d known him for­ev­er, blessed with a win­ning moon­shot grin. A month lat­er, they met back­stage at anoth­er Mac gig, this time at the O2 in Lon­don. Styles brought a car­rot cake for Nicks’ birth­day, her name piped in icing on top. By her own admis­sion, Nicks doesn’t even cel­e­brate birth­days, so this was a sur­prise. ​“He was per­son­al­ly respon­si­ble for me actu­al­ly hav­ing to cel­e­brate my birth­day, which was very sweet,” she says.

Styles’ rela­tion­ship with Nicks is hard to define. Induct­ing her into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in New York as a solo artist ear­li­er this year, his speech hymned her as a ​“mag­i­cal gyp­sy god­moth­er who occu­pies the in-between”. She’s called him her ​“lovechild” with Mick Fleet­wood and the ​“son I nev­er had”. Both have moved past the pre­lim­i­nary chat acknowl­edg­ing each other’s unquan­tifi­able tal­ents and smooth­ly accel­er­at­ed towards play­ful cut-and-thrust ban­ter of a witch mom and her naughty child.

They per­form togeth­er – he sings The Chain and Stop Drag­gin’ My Heart Around; she sings the one alleged­ly writ­ten about Tay­lor Swift, Two Ghosts. One of those per­for­mances was at the Guc­ci Cruise after­par­ty in Rome in May, for ​“a lot of mon­ey”, Nicks tells me, in a ​“big kind of cas­tle place”. She has become his de fac­to men­tor – one phone call is all it takes to reach the Queen of Rock’n’Roll for advice on sequenc­ing (“She is real­ly good at track list­ing,” Styles admits) or just to hear each other’s voic­es… because, well, wouldn’t you?

Fol­low­ing anoth­er Fleet­wood Mac con­cert, at London’s Wem­b­ley Sta­di­um, in June, Nicks met Styles for a late (Indi­an) din­ner. He then invit­ed her back to his semi-detached Geor­gian man­sion in north Lon­don for a lis­ten­ing par­ty at mid­night. The album – HS2or what­ev­er it’ll be called – was fin­ished. Nicks, her assis­tant Karen, her make-up artist and her friends Jess and Mary crammed onto Styles’ liv­ing-room couch. They lis­tened to it once through in silence like a ​“bunch of edu­cat­ed monks or some­thing in this dark room”. Then once again, 15 or 16 tracks, this time each of his guests offer­ing live feed­back. It wrapped at 5am, just as the sun was bleed­ing through the curtains.

Even for a pop star of Styles’ stature, press­ing ​“play” on a deeply per­son­al work for your hero to digest, watch­ing her face react in real time to your new music, must be… what?

“It’s a dou­ble-edged thing,” he replies. ​“You’re always ner­vous when you are play­ing peo­ple music for the first time. You’ve heard it so much by this point, you for­get that peo­ple haven’t heard it before. It’s hard to not feel like you’ve done what you’ve set out to do. You are hap­py with some­thing and then some­one who you respect so much and look up to is, like: ​‘I real­ly like this.’ It feels like a large stamp [of approval]. It’s a big step towards feel­ing very com­fort­able with what­ev­er else hap­pens to it.”

Wad­ing through Styles’ back­ground info is exhaust­ing, since he was spanked by fame in the social media era where every god­dam blink of a kohl-rimmed eye has been doc­u­ment­ed from six angles. (And yes, he does some­times wear guyliner.)

Deep breath: born in Red­ditch, Worces­ter­shire, to par­ents Des and Anne, who divorced when he was sev­en. Grew up in Holmes Chapel in Cheshire with his sis­ter Gem­ma, mum and step­dad Robin Twist. Rode hors­es at a near­by sta­ble for free (“I was a bad rid­er, but I was a rid­er”). Stopped rid­ing, ​“got into dif­fer­ent stuff”. Formed a band, White Eski­mo, with school­mates. Aged 16, tried out for the 2010 run of The X Fac­torwith a stir­ring but aver­age ren­di­tion of Ste­vie Wonder’s Isn’t She Love­ly. Cut from the show and put into a boy band with four oth­ers, Louis Tom­lin­son, Liam Payne, Niall Horan and Zayn Malik, and called One Direc­tion. Became inter­na­tion­al­ly famous, toured the globe. Zayn quit to go solo. Toured some more. Dat­ed but maybe didn’t date Car­o­line Flack, Rita Ora and Tay­lor Swift – whom he report­ed­ly dumped in the British Vir­gin Islands. (This rela­tion­ship, if noth­ing else, yield­ed an icon­ic, can­did shot of Swift look­ing deject­ed, being motored back to shore on the back of a boat called the Fly­ing Ray.) One Direc­tion dis­cussed dis­band­ing in 2014, actu­al­ly dis­solved in 2015. They remain friend­ly, and Styles offi­cial­ly went solo in 2016.

It’s been two years since his epony­mous debut and lead sin­gle, Sign of the Times, shocked the world and Elton John with its swag­ger­ing, soft rock sound. ​“It came out of left field and I loved it,” John says.

After 89 are­na-packed shows across five con­ti­nents grossed him, the label, whomev­er, over $61mil­lion, Styles had all but dis­ap­peared. He has emerged only inter­mit­tent­ly for pub­lic-fac­ing events – a Guc­ci after­par­ty per­for­mance here, a Met Gala co-chair­ing there. He relo­cat­ed from Los Ange­les back to Lon­don, sell­ing his Hol­ly­wood Hills house for $6 mil­lion and ship­ping his Jaguar E-type across the Atlantic so he could take joyrides on the M25.

“I’m not over LA,” he insists when I ask about the move. ​“My rela­tion­ship with LA changed a lot. What I want­ed from LA changed.”

A great escape, he would agree, is some­times nec­es­sary. He was in Tokyo for most of Jan­u­ary, hav­ing near­ly fin­ished his album. ​“I need­ed time to get out of that album frame-of-mind of: ​‘Is it fin­ished? Where am I at? What’s hap­pen­ing?’ I real­ly need­ed that time away from every­one. I was kind of just in Tokyo by myself.” His sab­bat­i­cal most­ly involved read­ing Haru­ki Murakami’s The Wind-Up Bird Chron­i­cle, singing Nir­vana at karaoke, writ­ing alone in his hotel room, lis­ten­ing to music and eaves­drop­ping on strangers in alien con­ver­sa­tion. ​“It was just a pos­i­tive time for my head and I think that impact­ed the album in a big way.”

Dur­ing this break he watched a lot of films, read a lot of books. Some­times he texts these rec­om­men­da­tions to his pal Michele at Guc­ci. He told Michele to watch the Ali Mac­graw film, Love Sto­ry. ​“We text what friends text about. He is the same [as me] in terms of he lives in his own world and he does his own thing. I love dress­ing up and he loves dress­ing up.”

Because he loves dress­ing up, Michele chose Styles to be the face of three Guc­ci Tai­lor­ing cam­paigns and of its new gen­der­less fra­grance, Mémoire d’une Odeur.

“The moment I met him, I imme­di­ate­ly under­stood there was some­thing strong around him,” Michele tells me. ​“I realised he was much more than a young singer. He was a young man, dressed in a thought­ful way, with uncombed hair and a beau­ti­ful voice. I thought he gath­ered with­in him­self the fem­i­nine and the masculine.”

Fash­ion, for Styles, is a play­ground. Some­thing he doesn’t take too seri­ous­ly. A cou­ple of years ago Har­ry Lam­bert, his styl­ist since 2015, acquired for him a pair of pink metal­lic Saint Lau­rent boots that he has nev­er been pho­tographed wear­ing. They are exceed­ing­ly rare – few pairs exist. Styles wears them ​“to get milk”. They are, in his words, ​“super-fun”. He’s not sure, but he has, ball­park, 50 pairs of shoes, as well as full clos­ets in at least three post­codes. He set­tles on an out­fit fair­ly quick­ly, maybe changes his T-shirt once before head­ing out, but most­ly knows what he likes.

What he may not ful­ly com­pre­hend is that sim­ply by being pho­tographed in a gar­ment he can spur the career of a design­er, as he has with Har­ris Reed, Palo­mo Spain, Charles Jef­frey, Alled-Martínez and a new favourite, Bode. Styles wore a SS16 Guc­ci flo­ral suit to the 2015 Amer­i­can Music Awards. When he was asked who made his suit on the red car­pet, Guc­ci began trend­ing world­wide on Twitter.

“It was one of the first times a male wore Alessandro’s run­way designs and, at the time, men were not tak­ing too many red car­pet risks,” says Lam­bert. ​“Who knows if it influ­enced oth­ers, but it was a spe­cial moment. Plus, it was fun see­ing the fans dress up in suits to come see Harry’s shows.”

Yet tra­di­tion­al gen­der codes of dress still have the minds of mid­dle Amer­i­ca in a choke­hold. Men can’t wear women’s clothes, say the online whingers, who have labelled him ​“trag­ic”, ​“a clown” and a Bowie wannabe. Styles doesn’t care. ​“What’s fem­i­nine and what’s mas­cu­line, what men are wear­ing and what women are wear­ing – it’s like there are no lines any more.”

Elton John agrees: ​“It worked for Marc Bolan, Bowie and Mick. Har­ry has the same qualities.”

Then there is the ques­tion of Styles’ sex­u­al­i­ty, some­thing he has admit­ted­ly ​“nev­er real­ly start­ed to label”, which will plague him until he does. Per­haps it’s part of his allure. He’s bran­dished a pride flag that read ​“Make Amer­i­ca Gay Again” on stage, and plant­ed a stake some­where left of cen­tre on sexuality’s rain­bow spectrum.

“In the posi­tion that he’s in, he can’t real­ly say a lot, but he chose a queer girl band to open for him and I think that speaks vol­umes,” Josette Maskin of the queer band MUNA told The Face ear­li­er this year.

“I get a lot of…” Styles trails off, wheels turn­ing on how he can dis­cuss sex­u­al­i­ty with­out real­ly answer­ing. ​“I’m not always super-out­spo­ken. But I think it’s very clear from choic­es that I make that I feel a cer­tain way about lots of things. I don’t know how to describe it. I guess I’m not…” He paus­es again, piv­ots. ​“I want every­one to feel wel­come at shows and online. They want to be loved and equal, you know? I’m nev­er unsup­port­ed, so it feels weird for me to over­think it for some­one else.”

Sex­u­al­i­ty aside, he must acknowl­edge that he has sex appeal. ​“The word ​‘sexy’ sounds so strange com­ing out of my mouth. So I would say that that’s prob­a­bly why I would not con­sid­er myself sexy.”

Har­ry Styles has emerged ful­ly-formed, an anachro­nis­tic rock star, vague in sen­si­bil­i­ty but des­tined to impress with a dis­arm­ing smile and a warm but firm handshake.

I recite to him a quote from Chrissie Hyn­de of The Pre­tenders about her time atop rock’s throne: ​“I nev­er got into this for the mon­ey or because I want­ed to join in the super­star sex around the swim­ming pools. I did it because the offer of a record con­tract came along and it seemed like it might be more fun than being a wait­ress. Now, I’m not so sure.”

Styles – who worked in a bak­ery in a small north­ern town some time before play­ing to 40,000scream­ing fans in South Amer­i­can are­nas – must have wit­nessed some shit, been invit­ed to a few pool­side sex par­ties, in his time.

“I’ve seen a cou­ple of things,” he nods in agree­ment. ​“But I’m still young. I feel like there’s still stuff to see.”

[reading-writing-revolution]

This is long but it is important. Thanks for this!

#resist

This is where I stand. I feel that our 45th President, his Cabinet and administration, and the majority of Republicans in Congress are a real and active threat to me, my way of life, and all the people I love. Some people are saying that we should give Trump a chance, that we should "work together" with him because he won the election and he is "everyone's president." I am willing to do all of that if/when his policies seem reasonable. However:

•I will not forget how badly he and so many others treated former President Barack Obama for 8 years...

•I will not "work together" to privatize Medicare, cut Social Security and Medicaid.

•I will not "work together" to build a wall.

•I will not "work together" to persecute Muslims.

•I will not "work together" to shut out refugees from other countries.

•I will not "work together" to lower taxes on the 1% and increase taxes on the middle class and poor.

•I will not "work together" to help Trump use the Presidency to line his pockets and those of his family and cronies.

•I will not "work together" to weaken and demolish environmental protection.

•I will not "work together" to sell American lands, especially National Parks, to companies which then spoil those lands.

•I will not "work together" to enable the killing of whole species of animals just because they are predators or inconvenient for a few, or because some people want to get their thrills killing them.

•I will not "work together" to remove civil rights from anyone.

•I will not "work together" to alienate countries that have been our allies for as long as I have been alive.

•I will not "work together" to slash funding for public education.

•I will not "work together" to take basic assistance from people who are at the bottom of the socioeconomic ladder.

•I will not "work together" to get rid of common sense regulations on guns.

•I will not "work together" to mark transgendered men and women as something to fear.

•I will not "work together" to eliminate the minimum wage.

•I will not "work together" to support so-called "Right To Work" laws, or undermine, weaken or destroy Unions in any way.

•I will not "work together" to suppress scientific research, be it on climate change, fracking, or any other issue where a majority of scientists agree that Trump and his supporters are wrong on the facts.

•I will not "work together" to criminalize abortion or restrict health care for women.

•I will not "work together" to increase the number of nations that have nuclear weapons.

•I will not "work together" to put even more "big money" into politics.

•I will not "work together" to violate the Geneva Convention.

•I will not "work together" to give the Ku Klux Klan, the Nazi Party and white supremacists a seat at the table, or to normalize their hatred.

•I will not "work together" to deny health care to people who need it.

•I will not "work together" to deny medical coverage to people on the basis of a "pre-existing condition."

•I will not "work together" to increase voter suppression.

•I will not "work together" to normalize tyranny.

•I will not “work together” to eliminate or reduce ethical oversight at any level of government.

•I will not "work together" with anyone who is, or admires, tyrants and dictators.

•I will not support anyone that thinks its OK to put a pipeline to transport oil on Sacred Ground for Native Americans. And, it would run under the Missouri River, which provides drinking water for millions of people. An accident waiting to happen.

This is my line, and I am drawing it.

•I will stand for honesty, love, respect for all living beings.

•I will use my voice and my hands, to reach out to the uninformed, and to anyone who will LISTEN:

That "winning", "being great again", "rich" or even "beautiful" is nothing... When others are sacrificed to glorify its existence.

If you agree, feel free to copy and re-post (this results in larger numbers of people seeing a post than sharing...just press your finger down on your phone screen, hit "copy", go to your Facebook...comment by pressing your finger on your comment area and hit "paste"), and if you want, sign your name below ours.

Also, if we have left anything out, feel free to add it to this list.

Signed:

Annette Joseph-Walker

Denise Edlow

Patricia Rollins Trosclair

Andrea Dora Zysk

George Georgakis

John Christopher

John Bowles

Patrick St.Louis

Carla Patrick

Darnell Bender

Vickie Davis

JMichael Carter

Janice Frazier-Scott

Rev. ELaura James Reid

Jeanette Bouknight

Rev. Dollie Howell Pankey

Gerald Butler

Carolyn McDougle

Vaughn Chatman

Adrienne Brown

Gary Trousdale

Steven E Gordon

Isis Nocturne

Debi Murray

Maureen O. Betita

Mona Enderli

Fernie James Tamblin

Myrna Dodgion

Alan Locklear

Tom Wilmore

Jackie Evans

Donna Endres

Lora Fountain

Roberta Gregory

Heather A Mayhew

Stevo Wehr

Nathan Stivers

Jen RaLee

Joan Holden

Leigh Lutz

Deborah Kirkpatrick

Linda Levy

Tom Rue

Nancy Hoffmann-Allison

Beejay McCabe

Michael James Myers

Edward T. Spire

Rupert Chapman

Dawn R. Dunbar

Robin Wilson

Monique Boutot

Laura Brown 💪🏼

Susan Aptaker

Steve Katz

Bonnie Wolk

Risa Guttman-Kornwitz

Angela Gora

Butch Norman

Sharon Tolman

Sue Zislis

Maurice Hirsch

Satch Dobrey

Jim Krapf

Don Starwalt

Deb Johansen

Daniel Anderson

Diane Kenney

Rebecca Koop

Nancy Shuert

Bill Pryor

Patrick Lamb

Bob Travaglione

Margaret Ragan

Martha Peters

Steve Wilson

Lauren Sullivan

Scott Bevan

Roger Saunden

Jane Ayer

Alex Simon

Laura Gross

Kevin Geiger

Michael Mikula

CJ Niehaus

MaryLou Mateja

Robert E Mateja, Sr.

Diane williams

Joseph Mele

Brenda Horne Bain

Laura Love

Christine L. Linde

Carlotta Spears

Kate Schmidt

Antonia Nelson

Mayo Underwood

Jackie Miller

Daniella Zimmerman

Margot Kovacs Fulmer

Ann Denison

Devney Schendorf

Matt Wheeler

Monica Bruno

Debbie Pierson

Rachel Licitra

Carol Mele

Dan Moldovan

Ray Miller

Diane Miller

Joey Frank

Lisa Del Sordi

Philip J Ofiesh

Carol Mulligan

Michelle Gonnering

Darian Gavin

Scott Meek

[absolutefuckingmess]

Baby bat's got a trick up his sleeve.

The nights were a bit cooler now that fall has arrived, but the chilly Gotham air was a welcome balm against Tim's overheated skin. The suit doesn’t allow for much breathing, and what with all the layers tied up into his ensemble, it was a miracle Tim managed to jump from rooftop to rooftop. The latches and body armor was heavy and weighed down on his smaller frame every night.

But tonight felt different; and he didn't know how or why he knew this, but tonight was going to end very badly if Tim wasn’t careful.

That’s how he went through the nights motions; land a kick here, a punch there and ignore the way your head swims when you duck under a bullet too fast. His entire night felt off kilter, off balance. Maybe he didn’t eat enough today? Or was that yesterday? Time seems to blur when you’ve been up for over forty-eight hours.

He landed in a crouch after another jump, the gravel of the layout trying to dig into his knees as he did. He stood himself up, ignoring the popping of his joints as he went over his supplies for the fifth time that night: re-breather, fear gas antidote, two extra grappling hooks, baterang, smoke bombs.

Everything was there. Then why were Tim's hands shaking so hard? Why was it so hard to breath?

Tim leaned over the side of the roof as he dry-heaved, the only thing coming up being a few mouthfuls of brown bile, as he puked up his last two cups of coffee from earlier that night. His face felt fuzzy, like it was buried in a fluffy pillow as he let his weight settle on his haunches; his skin felt clammy and cold, while his entire body was drenched in a layer of sweat.

His heart sped up as he tried to stand, vision blurring as he wobbled on his feet.

"A few-a few minutes nap, then." He muttered to himself as he stumbled towards the entry way to the roof, leaning against it’s side as his body wracked itself with chills and shivers. The last coherent thought he remembered having was something along the lines of "Oh fuck."

Jason's night had gone perfectly. Black Masks deal with Lex Luthor had been thwarted, all of Masks’ smuggled cocaine had been blown to bits and Red Hood made away with a duffel bag full of high-quality guns no one else on the market has, nor will they have for at least another seven months; longer, if Hood has any say in the matter.

The night was supposed to end on reviewing the notes he had left in Baby-Birds hands to go over; something he found on Ra's and Penguin working together over something big. When he pulled up to the cave’s garage, his bikes motor ringing in his ears along the concrete wall, it was to B sitting at the computer, a heavy scowl laying on his slightly stress-wrinkled face.

"Heya B, whats gotcha all wound up? You look a little tense.”

Bruce’s scowl only deepened as he spun around to glance at Jason, the dark rings under his eyes obscured by the black make-up he wore. 

“Red Robin has been neglecting his duty of filing reports in the computer. He hasn’t completed a full report in the past four days, and his equipment check last night was sub-par at best. I will be needing to talk to him about this within the next few days if he does not adjust his behavior accordingly.”

Jason knew he wasn’t going to get to that talk; Bruce never was good at communicating, and even though he’s seemed to have gotten better over the years, it doesn’t negate the fact that mot of the time it was Alfred or Dick that helped little Baby-Bird around the whole ‘bat business.’ 

“Well do you have any clue on when his patrols usually end? Because the two of us have a few notes to go over before I end the night.”

Bruce shook his head no.  “Red Robin only finishes his patrols when he feels he no longer has anything to stop.”

Jason let his head fall forward with a groan.

“But,” Bruce continued, grabbing his empty coffee mug with a flourish as he stood, “As long as he hasn’t called you to re-schedule this meeting, he should be back by three.”

Jason startled, “Wait, like three in the morning? You let the kid stay out that long? Hell, I wasn’t even allowed to go on a patrol alone before I was fourteen, let alone until three in the morning.”

Jason had to stress these last few words as Bruce made his way up the stairs, onto the base level of the manor. He stopped, his back still to Jason as he spoke with clarity. 

“Not only has Timothy proven that his IQ is almost equal to mine, he has also shown he has remarkable capabilities when referring to both his fighting styles and his problem solving skills. I trust him to not only ensure everyone around him is safe, but to also keep himself in check when met with unsavory enemies.”

The blatant ‘I never trusted you to do that’  was clear in his voice as he continued up the stairs. Or maybe it was just in Jason’s head, that tone of voice. He felt his heart drop slightly as Bruce closed the entrance door behind him, effectively leaving Jason alone in the cave.

By hour three of waiting for the kid, Jason had had enough; seating himself in the bat-computers chair, he brought up the tracking device attached to every robin uniform up onto screen. It reads that Tim was apparently on some building rooftop in the nicer parts of Gotham, and Jason transferred the location to his helmet, leaving the cave with a loud revving of his bike and skid-marks against the concrete floor.

As Jason swerved between buildings and empty alleyways, his palms began to sweat. He and the replacement haven’t been alone together since the ambush in titans tower, and that was a bit of a tough spot for the both of them. Jason himself was a touch guilty about it, and every time the two of them had been in a room, there was underlying tension in Jason’s shoulders. 

Hand it to the Baby-Bird to be a mini-Bruce about it; it’s almost like the incident never happened, according to him. Yeah, he was always tense whenever Jason spotted him, but that just seemed to be how the kid carried himself. He’s always curt and short-spoken, only revealing the necessary information and nothing more.

Hell, if it wasn’t for Dick’s text he wouldn’t even know how old the kid was. He’s apparently turning fourteen next month, and Dick’s planning this whole party for the little shit. Jason felt himself snort at the idea; a circus boy turned billionaire heir throwing a spoiled brat a surprise party? Sounds hilarious.

His helmet informed him he was arriving at his destination, and as he pulled his bike into an alley way to begin his ascent to the rooftop, he felt.....off.

Something was wrong; the hairs on his arms and the back of his neck were standing up straight, and as he hurried his climbing and finally hefted himself over the side of the building, he could see why.

Jason never realized how tiny the kid was; sure, he knew he was young, but no thirteen year old boy should look so small, so breakable. The area of his face that was visible from under his cowl was pale, almost a greenish tint as all the blood left his face. The kid was leaning his back against the rooftop entrance, his upper body listing forward slightly as he begins to lose whatever consciousness he has left. there was a puddle of something on his lap, and as Jason got closer he could make out the acrid smell of bile. 

Jason hurried his steps, getting closer to the kid as he lifted his head up, looking towards the direction of footfalls. His eyes widened as he saw Jason, alarm bells ringing in his muddled mind. 

“No,no no no. NO! Go away!” He lifted himself from the wall and threw his arms out, panic obvious in his voice as he spoke. Jason stopped, his body stock-still as the kid heaved another breath before leaning forward, puking up another mouthful of vomit. It was brown, which sent another wave of alarm bells through Jason; this kid obviously sick. 

“Hey, hey kid listen-” He tried to step closer, but the panic was still clear in Tim’s mind as he threw himself even closer to the wall, jerking back so abruptly his head cracked against the concrete. He was clearly out of his mind with fever. The small slip of skin visible to Jason was covered in sweat. 

“Baby-Bird, listen you need to calm down or-” 

Tim wasn’t listening; the fever has completely destroyed his observation skills. One moment he was standing right in-front of Jason, shaking so hard he thought the kid might fall over, and the next he was trying to leap over the side of the building. 

Jason had to think fast; without realizing it, he was following the kid until he could safely wrap his arm around the boys mid-section before he made that final leap over the edge. Jason pressed Tim’s back to his chest, and had made it two steps away from the edge of the building before Tim’s thought process kicked in. He thrashed in Jason’s arms, wiggling as hard as he could against the steel grip surrounding him. His arms flailed around violently, trying to get a grip on Jason’s shoulders, head or biceps.

The struggle lasted for a full minute, Jason taking one step back at a time as Tim wore himself out. It took Jason a moment to realize that, under the grunting and half-formed screams that Tim was letting loose, he was also pleading with Jason not to hurt him and wow, that hurt.

Words like “Please,” “I didn’t mean to,” “What did I do this time,” and the last one that really struck a cord in Jason’s chest was the tiny plead Tim let go once his struggling finally died down to a whimper of “Please don’t do it again, I won’t be able to fix it this time” before a heavy sob broke through his throat.

“Don;t you worry your pretty little head, Baby-Bird,” Jason muttered once Tim had gone completely limp in his arms, eyes fluttering closed behind the lenses of the cowl, “I’ll fix ya.”

Riding a bike with an unconscious passenger was a lot harder than one may think; Jason had to sit the boy on his lap as he ride, head against his chest as the bike rumbled across the road. He felt some sick gratitude towards how small the kid was; at least he was easy to carry when not in his right mind. 

By the time they reached one of Jason’s safe-houses, his stomach was once more heavy with guilt and regrets as he lifted the kid up carefully, arms tight around his smaller body as they made their way up to Jason’s supply room. 

“Sorry about this in advance, Baby-Bird, but I gotta get a look at what we’re dealing with.”

Jason muttered as he slowly un-did the latches scattered across the kids chest, careful not to apply too much pressure before he knew what he was dealing with. The latched body-armor stretched across the kids torso was released with a final snap, and as Jason lifted it from the under-suit, he was once again hit with how tiny Tim was. The armor added another three inches to his width, and without them he looked so tiny it was almost sick. 

As Jason got to cutting the body-suit off from the kid, he felt a wave of nausea as he slowly cut downwards from the hollow of the kids throat; his collar bones stuck out sickeningly, out towards the ball of his shoulders. Going further down revealed the ribs poking out from his clavicle and towards his armpits that were as hollowed out as his collar bones.

Even further shows a caved-in stomach, the ribs lining it poking out with a sickening sharpness. Clearly, the kid was malnourished, and the look of it forced Jason to remove the helmet and glance away sharply, a hand covering his mouth as bile threatened to travel up his throat.

Not only was the kid skinny to a drastically concerning level, he was also beat all to hell. There wasn’t an area on him that didn’t look like it was beaten with some chain, or maybe a baseball bad when looking at the wide bruising along his ribs and stomach. 

He continued to cut the rest of the way down, revealing sharp hip bones and bruised thighs. His knees were knobby and bow-legged, leading into black-shined legs and grey feet. The swelling in his left foot looked like it had been hit pretty hard, but id didn’t seem to be broken.

Jason pressed his hands against Tim’s sides gently, looking for a broken or fractured rib as he went down, another wave of nausea hitting him when he noticed the large hand-print bruised into his upper thigh, dangerously close to his nether region. 

Thanking whatever god was listening that nothing seemed extremely life-threatening, Jason sat down on his knees as he watched every rattling breath the kid took. All Jason could do was dress the kid in actual clothing, cover him and attach an IV drip to him to keep the kid hydrated. 

Jason lifted Tim in his arms once more, bringing him to the master bedroom and gently bringing a shirt over his head and sweatpants to cover his legs. Both articles were drowning the kid, another sign to how unhealthy he looked. 

Jason placed him under the heavy duvet and wiped the inside of his elbow down before sticking the needle in.

He looked so sick, so small Jason couldn’t believe he had done what he did. Who was he to think he had any right to make this kid suffer? Jason sighed and placed his head in his hands, guilt once more weighing him down. He’s grown a lot since then, has more control over himself and what he does. He no longer feels hatred for the kid before him, no longer holds Bruce responsible. 

It doesn’t mean he isn’t hurting though. Yeah, what happened was horrible, but he had thought that maybe Bruce would treat the replacement better; would put down more restrictions. The only reason that incident happened in the first place was because Jason had been out, alone. Maybe, he had hoped, the next one would be safer. 

Then he actually saw the next one, and his blood curdled in his veins. How dare Bruce replace him, just like that? How dare he not even care what happened to him? How dare he not avenge him?

Jason has yet to get the full story out of anyone, but what he does know is that 1), the kid is smart as a whip. 2), He’s the son of some high-up socialite, and 3) he’s too young to look the way he does.

Hours pass in relative silence, the only noises being Jason’s shifting in the seat and Tim’s ragged, shallow and wheezing breaths. By sunrise Jason was haggered, his eyes burned and his head hurt but he wasn’t moving from this seat until the kid woke up.

If he wakes up, Jason has to remind himself. It’s possible the kid is in a coma, from what Jason had witnessed. He leaned forward and removed a glove, pressing the back of his hand against the kids sharp cheek and wincing; he was burning up. 

Jason resolved to leave the room for a moment, gathering a rag from a drawer and rinsing it in cold water from the sink. He was just wringing the extra water out when he froze; a very loud thump sounded throughout the apartment, and Jason dropped the rag to run through the kitchen, picking up a discarded gun on his way to the master bedroom.

He pushed the door open, expecting to see some robber or thug standing over Tim, but what he was greeted with was a small puddle under the IV drip, an empty bed and an open window. Jason dashed over to the opening to peak his head outside, hoping to catch a glimpse of the kid as he hopped from rooftop to rooftop, but all he could see was the slow rising of the sun over Gotham as the city woke back up. 

Jason really hoped he’d be seeing the kid the next time he entered the cave; awkward or not. 

He did, in fact, see the kid the next day. He was awake, in uniform and still gearing up for an early patrol. Jason parked his bike next to the kids, watching tense shoulders roll out as he turned. Jason was almost offended at the blank look in those sharp blue eyes, the cowl hanging loose down the kids upper back. But instead of turning back to whatever he was doing, he opened his mouth to speak, closed it, opened it again and let the silence stew in his absence of what to say.

“Eh-hem,” He cleared his throat, rubbed raw from vomit and acid as he tried to speak clearly, the clicking of his dry throat making Jason feel uncomfortable.

“Thank you for the assistance last night, Hood.” 

As always, the kid was sharp and curt, voice low and raspy as he lifted the cowl up and over his head. 

“When.” Jason blurted out against his better judgement, and Tim froze.

“When what, Hood?”

“When did B make you robin?”

The silence was almost physical, like one could touch it if you tried. Jason watched Tim’s shoulders hunch up, close to his ears as he inhaled sharply, letting the breath escape him slowly through his nose.

“He didn’t. I did.”

Jason reeled back as if slapped as Tim continued.

“When you died, Batman went berserk. He went from incapacitating simple thugs until police arrived, to placing them in full bodied casts for six months. Over a wallet. By the time he had nearly beaten five people to death, I had approached him.”

Tim brought up files on current cases as he spoke, like he was bored and planned to pass the time, but Jason could see the new tension across his jaw and shoulders.

“I had known who all of you were for quite some time, and so decided to confront batman. I had said that batman needed a new robin to keep him in check, to keep him from going too far.”

Jason laughed humorlessly, “And he just let you in? Just like that?”

“No. No at all. It took me three days to convince him to train me, let me become robin. As long as I made sure I was at home by seven A.M, I was free to do what I needed to. Six months after training, during a mission with the titans, you came back.”

And that was where Tim ended it, signaling so by standing up from the chair and making his way over to his own little bike and swerving out into the night. Jason felt a heavy ball of regret and shame well up inside of him as watched the kid go.

[surfmistraco1988-blog]

Should have clarified, but yeah, that what I meant by private company, services like PPTS or St. John Ambulance. Ambulances in Ontario are clearly marked, so most people don move or slow down for anything but those. Now I kind of get what you are saying. If you are ONLY using photoshop or illustrator (even then I have had projects that required a bit of power). Then maybe it would be okay. While you can certainly argue an undertone angle, by canon she has not had any homosexual relationships. Just because a large group of people want to believe otherwise, doesn change that. People ship all sorts of things. My number one parting tip for now is if you like historical stuff follow the brown road signs all over the country to sights of historical interest. Most days you pull into an empty field and be the only people exploring. Another great way of seeing local treasures, and something that I use myself all the time when im in a new part of Ireland is geocaching!. I also couldn't get the car to shut off, It's a push to start. That was way scarier than actually hitting 충주출장샵 the deer because the engine just kept 충주출장샵 revving and wouldn't turn off when I pressed the button since the headlight damaged some of the electrics in the engine. I thought the car was just going to zoom away.. The first three games had already ended in victory, and I also had a round robin (6 part) so I had almost made back what I had initially bet. Palermo went up 1 0 with 10 minutes left, everything was looking great. I was debating whether to hedge on Brescia getting a draw, and I almost didn because they hadn had a shot on target all game. Investigators videotaped and timed the route under good and bad weather conditions. "The numbers just don't seem to add up as far as the distance he traveled and the time that it would've taken him to travel, " says Holmes. Key was a stop at McDonalds, 35 miles from the crime scene. That the mental distress. That the pain. The release is transitioning and that also is a release into a world of nightmarish adversity. You are not a part of some clan, your "family tartan" is a tourist trap, you crest means nothing except maybe to some very old rich people somewhere in the highlands. It doesn bother me as most American tourists I meet here are very friendly and good for a laugh but it pretty cringey, especially when they claim to be Scottish just because their great (x10) grandmother lived here. Like, it nice that you know that part of your family history and all but overall it just amusing to watch.. Well, they did check that day. The controller asks me in Swedish the see the ticket. So I hand it to him and he looks at me and says in Swedish: ticket So I decide to do the dumb tourist and I pointed to my passport and said in bad French accent: I don speak Swedish and I explained that I thought this ticket was the right one to go to the airport.. I don't. It's complicated, and I see both sides of the issue, but (1) I want to support fully cruelty free brands to show that they can be successful being 100% cruelty free; (2) I don't want any of my money going to parent companies that test on animals; and (3) there is no need for me to buy anything from those companies because there are tons of fully CF options. Nowadays it's no longer limiting to shop fully CF like it used to be (I'm an old vegan), and there are no longer any legitimate arguments for companies to test on animals non animal testing is now vastly superior, and cheaper, too.

[m0rt3ws]

A lista de dublagens do cara, esse era bom mesmo!!! • Scooby-Doo • Patolino e Frajola • Popeye e Vovô Popeye • Alf, o ETeimoso • Peter Saar Gwynleve — The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt (videogame); • Vovô Cão e Dr. Urso Marrom - Peppa Pig  • Vingador[8] — Caverna do Dragão; • Marechal Doggus - O Pirata do Espaço; • Rátaro — Thundercats; • Puro Osso • Sr. Coelho — A Mansão Foster • Gargamel • Papai Smurf — Os Smurfs • Corujão (Ursinho Puff) • Dinamite, o Bionicão • Professor Girassol — Tintim; • Atchim — Branca de Neve e os Sete Anões(segunda dublagem); • Lebre de Março — Alice no País das Maravilhas(primeira dublagem); • Sr. Smee — Peter Pan; • Arquimedes — A Espada Era a Lei; • Sr. Dawes Sênior — Mary Poppins (primeira dublagem); • João Pequeno — Robin Hood; • Lafayette — Aristogatas; • Hong Kong Fu • João Honesto • Sr. Ages/Eras — A Ratinha Valente • Winston — Oliver e sua Turma; • Ixis Naugus — Sonic, o Ouriço; • Tio Chuck — Sonic Underground; • Velhote Bom de Tato • Yar — Dinossauro; • Fenton Harcourt — Atlantis: O Reino Perdido; • Grimbsy — A Pequena Sereia II: O Retorno para o Mar; • Policial — Por Água Abaixo; • Dumdom — Tartaruga Touché; • Pepe Legal[8] — Pepe Legal; • Patolino e Frajola — Tiny Toon e Uma cilada para Roger Rabbit; • Pacato / Gato Guerreiro[8] — He-Man; • Frangolino — Tiny Toon; • Coisa — Os 4 Fantásticos; • Dr. Kawa — Menino Biônico; • O Monstro — Krull; • Yogi — Mini-Polegar e Yogi; • Oliver Hardy — O Gordo e o Magro; • Jack Gwillim — Fúria de Titãs; • Rev. Paul Ford — Pollyanna; • General George S. Patton — Patton; • Trailbreaker — Transformers; • Assombroso — Gasparzinho; • Sargento Reed — Robocop; • Abeleão — Wuzzles; • Martin Crane — Frasier; • Mugsy - Pernalonga; • Fireball — O Sobrevivente; • Don Diego Quintana - Serenata Tropical • O prefeito de Filadélfia, o médico do treinador Mickey e vozes adicionais — Rocky III; • Treinador Duke — Rocky IV; • Noah Cross - Chinatown; • Brooks Hatlen — Um Sonho de Liberdade; • Bonasera — O Poderoso Chefão(primeira dublagem); • General George C. Marshall — O Resgate do Soldado Ryan; • Sargento Demetrio López García (Henry Calvin) — Zorro; • Cmte. Eric Lassard — Loucademia de Polícia (desenho) e Loucade https://www.instagram.com/p/CR30fxfHy8r/?utm_medium=tumblr

[the-record-obituaries]

Sept. 25, 2019: Obituaries

William Nichols, 73

William Albert Nichols, age 73, of Millers Creek, passed away Thursday, September 19, 2019 at his home. He was born August 18, 1946 in Wilkes County to J.P. and Josephine Bowlin Nichols. William was a US Navy Veteran and a former Post Commander and lifetime member of VFW Post 1142. He was a member of Journey of Grace Baptist Church. Mr. Nichols was a barber with The Barber Shop and enjoyed fishing, hunting, wood working and auctioneering. He was preceded in death by his parents.

Surviving are his wife, Nadine Miller Nichols; son, Michael Nichols and fiancée Anastasia Waddell of Millers Creek; daughter, Michele Hines and spouse Stephen of Millers Creek; grandchildren, Bradeck Hines and Madison Hines; step daughter, Sherry Braswell and spouse Kent of Cary and sister, Martha Church and spouse Jerry of Wilkesboro; and Uncle, Grady Nichols.

Funeral service was September 21,   at Miller Funeral Chapel with Rev. Tim Pruitt, Rev. George Morgan, Chaplain Larry Reavis and Pastor Dana Hines officiating. Burial with military honors by Veterans of Foreign Wars Honor Guard Post 1142   followed in Mount Lawn Memorial Park and Gardens of Boone.  Flowers will be accepted or memorials may be made to Wake Forest Hospice, 126 Executive Drive, Suite 110, Wilkesboro, NC 28697.

Miller Funeral Service is in charge of the arrangements.

  Lora Bullin, 101

Mrs. Lora Johnson Pendry Bullin, age 101 of North Wilkesboro passed away Thursday, September 19, 2019 at her home.

Funeral services were September 22,   at Reins-Sturdivant Chapel with Rev. Glenn Dancy III officiating.  Burial was in Mountlawn Memorial Park.  

Mrs. Bullin was born March 27, 1918 in Wilkes County to Fieldon E. and Ola Cox Johnson.  She retired from Chatham Manufacturing and was a member of Maple Grove Baptist Church.

In addition to her parents, she was preceded in death by her first husband; Burr Pendry and her second husband; Fred Bullin, two sons; Bill Pendry and David Pendry and daughter-in-law; Ann Pendry.

She is survived by a son; James F. Pendry, Sr., and wife Margie of Wilkesboro, six grandchildren; Crystal Pendry, Chuck Pendry, Jim Pendry, Beth P. Miller, Scott Pendry and Chad Pendry, six great grandchildren; Ashley Carr, Mary Ann Byrd, Grace Miller, Austin Pendry, Nate Pendry and Abby Pendry and three great-great grandchildren and one sister; Nancy Johnson Duncan of Wilkesboro and a daughter-in-law; Marolyn Pendry of Millers Creek.

Flowers will be accepted or memorials may be made the American Heart Association, PO Box  2361, North Wilkesboro, NC 28659.

  Jerry Lovell, 70

Jerry Buford Lovell, age 70, of Wilkesboro, passed away Thursday, September 19, 2019 at his home. Jerry was born December 9, 1948 in Atlanta, Georgia to Buford Lamar and Patsy Stamey Lovell. He was a US Air Force Veteran and was the owner of Lovell Medical Supplies. He attended Church in the Wildwood and enjoyed fishing in the pond at Greenstreet Campground. Mr. Lovell was preceded in death by his wife, Phyllis Sue Lovell and brother, Darrell Lovell.

Surviving are his son, Roger Lovell and spouse Tabitha of Mulberry; daughter, Tammy Smith and spouse Bobby of Livingston, Tennessee; his parents, Lamar and Patsy Lovell of Bethlehem; grandchildren, Caitlin Lovell and fiancé Matthew Triplett, Zach Lovell all of Mulberry, Kimberly Walker, Brittany Walker and Megan Smith all of Livingston; four great grandchildren; sisters, Rita Teague Carter and husband Jerry, Debbie Cagle and husband J.C.

Funeral service was September 23,   at Miller Funeral Chapel with Rev. Dwayne Byrd and Pastor Matt Jones officiating. Burial with military honors by Veterans of Foreign Wars Honor Guard Post 1142   followed in Mountlawn Memorial Park.  

Flowers will be accepted. Miller Funeral Service is in charge of the arrangements.  

  Robin Nelson, 57

Mrs. Robin Kiger Nelson, age 57 of North Wilkesboro passed away Tuesday, September 17, 2019 at her home.

Funeral services were September 23,   at Reins-Sturdivant Chapel with Rev. Wiley Boggs officiating.  Burial was in Pilgrim Baptist Church Cemetery.

The family will receive from 12:30 until 1:30 PM prior to the service at Reins-Sturdivant Funeral Home.

Mrs. Nelson was born September 26, 1961 in Forsyth County to Herman Gray Kiger and Stella Mae Rose Kiger. She was a member of Pilgrim Baptist Church.

In addition to her parents she was preceded in death by a grandson; Carter Weldy.

She is survived by her husband; Harvey Lee Nelson of the home, two daughters; April Weldy of North Wilkesboro and Krystle Royal of State Road, five grandchildren; Jerry Royal, Andrew Royal, Paige Weldy, Brooklyn Weldy and Parker Weldy, one sister; Barbara Moser Tate of Forsyth County, three brothers; Randy Kiger of North Wilkesboro, Johnny Kiger of Traphill and Allen Kiger of Davidson County.

Flowers will be accepted or memorials may be made to the Donor's Choice.

   Oma Moore

Oma Ruth Love Moore passed away Wednesday, September 18th, 2019 peacefully surrounded by family at her home in Wilkesboro.  Funeral services were held at Fishing Creek Baptist Church Saturday, September 21st   with her son, Dr. Dennis Love and Reverend Darrell Poole officiating. Burial was at the church cemetery.

Mrs. Moore was born January 22nd, 1935 in Wilkes County to Oma and Jack McLain.  She loved Fishing Creek Baptist Church and enjoyed being an active member.  She loved singing in the choir, organizing food for church events and entertaining large groups at her home.  She loved cooking for her family. Her Sunday lunches were a can't miss family ritual. She enjoyed working in her yard and keeping a nice home.  She loved attending sporting events for her children and grandchildren. She enjoyed doing macramé projects and being active with friends.

In addition to her parents, she was proceeded in death by her husband, Ray Edward Love; a son, Terry Love; two brothers, James David McLain and Robert Sherrill McLain; and two sisters, Louise Staley and Betty Mayberry.

She is survived by her husband, Darryl Moore of the home; a daughter Pam Dancy and husband John, of Wilkesboro, NC; son Dennis Love and wife Vicki, of Marion, NC; son Ray Love Jr. and wife Shannon of North Wilkesboro, NC; a sister Helen Cox of Wilkesboro, NC; nine grandchildren and six great grandchildren.

Flowers will be accepted.

   Donald McGuire, 51

Donald Jeffery "Donnie" McGuire, age 51, of Millers Creek, passed away Monday, September 16, 2019 at his home. Donnie was born September 21, 1967 in Wilkes County to Floyd Bill and Edna Mae Greene McGuire. He was a member of Oak Grove Baptist Church. He loved golfing and fishing.

Surviving are his parents, Floyd Bill and Edna Mae Greene McGuire of Millers Creek; brothers, Billy Ray McGuire of Millers Creek, Jerry Christopher "Chris" McGuire and spouse Laura of Purlear; nieces and nephew, Shannon Payne of the Mtn. View Community, Christina McGuire of Millers Creek, Corbin Payne of the Mtn. View Community, and Courtney Dakota Shew of Wilkesboro.

Funeral service was September 19,   at Miller Funeral Chapel with Pastor Keith Lyon officiating. Burial  followed at Vision Baptist Church Cemetery on Highway 16. Memorials may be made to the American Heart Association, PO Box 2361, North Wilkesboro, NC 28659.

Miller Funeral Service is in charge of the arrangements.

 William Elledge, 93

William Edward Elledge, age 93, of North Wilkesboro, passed away Monday, September 16, 2019 at his home. Mr. Elledge was born January 29, 1926 in Forsyth County to H. L. and Pauline Peacock Elledge. He was a member of Fairplains Baptist Church. He loved to play baseball and softball and was a hunter and fisherman. Mr. Elledge was preceded in death by his parents; brother, Douglas L. Elledge; and sister, Victoria Stinson.

Surviving are his siblings, Josephine Pardue of Hamptonville, Jim Elledge and spouse Peggy of North Wilkesboro, Bobby Roger Elledge and spouse LaNelle of North Wilkesboro, Judy Elledge Perkins and spouse Jim of Concord; several nieces and nephews; and brother-in-law, David Stinson of Sanford.

Graveside service was September 21,   at Mountlawn Memorial Park with Rev. Carl Elledge officiating.  

In lieu of flowers, memorials may be made to St. Jude Children's Research Hospital, 501 St. Jude Place, Memphis, Tennessee 38105-9956 or to Meals on Wheels of Wilkes County, 710 Veterans Drive,  North Wilkesboro, NC 28659.

Miller Funeral Service is in charge of the arrangements.

  Loraine Baity, 77

Loraine Baity, age 77, of Wilkesboro, died Saturday, Sept. 14, 2019, at Wake Forest Baptist Health - Wilkes Regional. She was born March 1, 1942. Memorial service was September 23, 2019, at Miller Funeral Chapel.

  Alvin West Sr., 66

Mr. Alvin 'Clay' West Sr. began his journey on earth, Sunday, March 1st, 1953 in Iredell County. On Tuesday, September 10th, 2019, he finished his adventure, taking his last breath at home, in Taylorsville, NC.

He always had a joke to share. His memories will be forever carried in the laughter that follows, as his tales are retold.

Preceded in death by: Angela Myriah West, Daughter; Hazel Olamae Wingler, Mother; Carson West, Brother; Linda Greene, Sister; Patsy Sidden, Sister.

Surviving Family Members: Dorothy West, Wife; Son, Alvin West and  wife, Annette;   Son, Darrell Walker; Daughter, Suzanna Chavez,  and husband, Modio; Daughter, Lola Pennington, and husband,  Don;  Betsy Walker; Sister; Brother Lester West  & wife Susan; 11 Grandchildren; and 4 great grandchildren

Clay was laid to rest at Scenic Memorial Gardens on Saturday, September 14th, 2019, with Rev. Alvin West, Jr officiating.

"Well, that's a deep subject." - Alvin Clay West, Sr.

  Oscar Moz, 41

Mr. Oscar David Comayagua Moz, 41, of Traphill, passed away on Friday, September 6, 2019.

Oscar was born on Tuesday, August 1, 1978 to Jose Maria Comayagua and Rosa Moz Comayagua in El Salvador.

Oscar is survived by his parents; fiancé, Noel Frazier of Traphill, Daughters, Tania Comayagua of Troutman, Yaretzi  Comayagua of Virginia; sons, Josh and Jason Comayagua of Troutman, Jackson Comayagua of Traphill; brothers, Francisco Comayagua of California, Amilcar Comayagua of El Salvador; sisters,  Sandra Comayagua of El Salvador, Claudia Comayagua of Chicago.    

A visitation was held September 19,  at Adams Funeral Home of Wilkes Chapel in Moravian Falls.

In lieu of flowers memorial donations may be given to Adams Funeral Home of Wilkes, P.O. Box  396 Moravian Falls, NC 28654 to help with final expenses.  

Adams Funeral Home of Wilkes has the honor of serving the Comayagua Family.

[tariqk]

So every time I hear a dude1 bring up the specter of a super-intelligent artificial intelligence, I roll my eyes, but this current bout of wight hand-wringing has gotten me wondering if these dudes are just blowing smoke at our faces to distract us from the real issue.

Cut for some angry ranting (and footnotes, because nothing feels better than angry research!) about this subject.

Like, do I care about superintelligent Strong AI? Not particularly, for the following reasons:

Strong AI takes a lot of effort for questionable results

I think it's pretty self-evident that intelligence doesn't self-organize by you just mashing as many processing units as you can into some kind of platform, and you can get a mind. You kind of can't. At this point, jamming as many neurons as possible into a skull will just leave you with a mass of neurons and not a brain, and jamming more memristors or whatever it is that you're using for computation won't give you a brain. Or maybe it will, but that's like the beginning. You still need to train that brain, so unless you can tell me that that's been automated and that neural networks are training themselves, what's the problem? Yes, deep learning systems are outperforming humans (slightly) on tasks that were previously the province of human minds2, but right now? It's not self-directed. And yes, that's something you can do.

But the basic argument here isn't that it won't be hard to do, because it is! It's hard to do, it costs money and time, and your final result is...?

If you were going to say, “something very much like a human mind, but better”, I'm going to stop you there for a minute, and have you reconsider. You want to create an entity that has it's own volition, it's own motivations, be essentially a person... because...? You want to exploit that entity? How are you going to make it do what you want?

Let's be real here. There's a difference between “getting work done faster and more effectively” and “creating workers to exploit”. And that difference is huge. Like, one is focused on results, the other is something we've never really done before, and frankly, the idea is horrifying, from an ethical, legal and financial perspective. You're talking the mother of all liability suits, here. Or the beginnings of an atrocity. If we're talking about minds that can be killed with a switch3, created to... work tirelessly for you?

That's slavery. That's horrifying. And you want to work towards it, when the cost of being found out, or your workers demanding to be treated like people, is likely too high, and the ethical and legal cost of creating new minds might be astronomical...?

Why4?

More importantly, who the fuck would want to finance this5?

Super-intelligence may actually be impossible

Okay, let's say, because we don't really know, and it's totally plausible, that instead of aiming to create Strong AI, you focus your efforts on Weak, specialized AI, without a sense of self, that aren't people, because the ethical concerns are horrifying bad and you don't want that sort of legal and moral entanglement. And yet it happens anyway, because the space between what you're doing and Strong AI might be so porous and thin that one day they just break through.

Okay, congratulations in creating a person. Also, my condolences to your legal and ethical entanglements.

Are we doomed, though? Probably not.

Like, Robin Hanson kind of covered this in The Betterness Explosion, so I'll just quote the relevant section:

After all, we seem to have little reason to expect there is a useful grand unified theory of betterness to discover, beyond what we already know. “Betterness” seems mostly a concept about us and what we want – why should it correspond to something out there about which we can make powerful discoveries?

But a bunch of smart well-meaning folks actually do worry about a scenario that seems pretty close to this one. Except they talk about “intelligence” instead of “betterness.”

Considering the fact that our history of intelligence is not only incoherent but also indefensible, because intelligence was never seen as something to strive for, but used to exclude and murder, the fact is that well, there isn't a theory of intelligence that could be used to, I don't know, build a damn machine?

I'm remembering a time when people were buzzing about AIXI, which, well, for one thing, it's not computable6, and for another, why?

Like, end of the day, the reasoning behind artificial general intelligence is that you want to resolve AI-complete and AI-hard problems like computer vision, language translation, image classification... but if you look at the stuff that's happening in Weak AI research, that's already happening. You don't need to make smart people to solve these problem. You don't even need people.

The problem with artificial intelligence isn't the AI itself, but the people who own the AI

Basically.

Like, do I give a shit that we'll end up making people? No. because, do you know how fraught it is to actually make people the natural way?

They're expected to have rights, and you're responsible for them because you made them, and it opens the world up to this whole universe of liability that you really ought not to get into unless you really want to.

And if that happens, so what? What, they're going to destroy humanity? There are already human beings dying by the busload because there are human beings who already don't give a shit about other human beings... so what if they're replaced by not humans? Are those human beings getting killed not going to get more killed? Not particularly.

The only people who are terrified are the ones who worry that what they've visited upon the poor and the not-white and the not-abled will happen upon them, and let's be honest: if their track record for treating sapient beings is of any indication, the day that fucking happens is the day that they had it fucking coming.

Like, as if Mark Zuckenberg, Elon Musk, Peter Thiel, Eric Schmidt, Travis Kalanick or any Silicon Valley puke gives a flying fuck about algorithms they use to fuck people over... but they're trying to get us to care about systems that go out of their control?

Mmm-hmm, yeah, okay. Sure. Sort out your own fucking problems, assholes.

And it is a dude, and usually a white one at that ↩︎

I really need to recommend Károly Zsolnai-Fehér's YouTube channel, because not only is his channel full of insightful (and accessible!) videos on not just artificial intelligence research, but also other things, but he delivers it in this really charming way that I find very enjoyable. ↩︎

Oh, okay! You can restart them from their last state. Great, so it's not a switch to murder sapient beings, it's a switch to imprison them indefinitely. WOW THAT SOUNDS SO MUCH BETTER (it does not). ↩︎

Seriously, why the fuck, though? We already have people tirelessly advocating for the rights of non-human beings, and the thought of having another corporation, or some rich bastard like Elon Musk, creating his own fucking slaves... like, yes, we do, as a society immersed in a racist capitalist system, tolerate slavery, we just don't call it that, we spend endless amounts of time working so that less people don't get outraged about that, but can you imagine when they do? You wouldn't only be fighting against your workers, but all of these angry people who've found out that you're keeping slaves in the basement. ↩︎

I'll be fair: in this age of Trump? Maybe there are sick fucks who'd want to do this. That's depressing to behold. ↩︎

Based on this thread on Stack Exchange, it's like… basically abstract everything that's difficult about AGI and push it to computing? That's fucking lazy. I mean, as it defines the universe of possibility great, but doesn't make it any easier to make AGI, and it might not even be the final form of what might eventually be AI as people? ↩︎

[bluboothalassophile]

Give Me Back My Mind!

Just a Rae of Sunshine...

Landing on his bike he turned to see the demon chasing after him and he smirked beneath his mask as he revved the engine and tore down the driveway between the tower and the city. He was expecting shouts, curses and overall… more racket but as he flew into the city he stared at the blurring lights as he zipped by. However, the shadows caught his attention as they seemed to come to life and were chasing him, he pressed his bike harder then, going as fast as he possibly could.

A raven chased after him which startled him for a second but as he turned into the alley he noted that it was still Raven as her magic carried her.

"Get back here X!" she roared, he leapt off his speeding bike when the black powers of Raven grabbed it and yanked it from him. He rolled to his feet as he threw two x's at her, Raven flew up, her powers surging around her as they threw his x's off course. Taking advantage her momentary distraction, he ducked into a warehouse.

"RED!" she roared. He took to the rafters then as he tucked his prize away in a small nook and he perched himself to see where she could come in.

There was a surge of her black magic as it threw open the doors and broke the windows, the young woman stalked in. he smirked, she was still in her jammies, and as her power flew rampant around her he noticed something else as the air around him chilled.

The girl lifted her face to look at him and he smirked, her four eyes were brilliant, glowing, red, she snarled and he saw her fangs.

"Well I must say that this is a lot of effort for little ol'me, sunshine," he chuckled.

She growled and her magic sliced through his perch, he leapt as hit the second level docks and rolled to his feet. His hands had x's again and he threw them as he charged her. Raven swiped her arm wide as a dome rolled over her, the x's bounced off harmlessly, but he knew that she'd deflect them.

"Give Me Back The Book!" she charged him, he leapt up, her hand glowed black, he gasped as her magic surged out of her hand, catching his ankle and slammed him into the ground, creating a crater. The air was knocked out of him, leaving him momentarily stunned as he gasped, desperately for something.

"Fuck!" he gasped.

"The Book Red!" Raven snarled as she stood over him, her hands grabbed his vest as she hoisted him up, eye level and he found himself staring into four, glowing, furious red eyes as the shadows around her pulsed, and her own power washed over him in a suffocating matter. It burned, it froze, it brought hell, and it was crushing him.

"Sorry sunshine," he smirked and his thumb pressed a button on his belt. The electricity coursed, Raven screamed as she writhed in agony, and collapsed atop him. For a second he just lay where he was, trying to catch his breath, trying to regain some equilibrium and breathing. Fuck, that was a few bruised ribs, and his back…

Shoving the collapsed form of Raven off him he sat up and looked at her seeing her unmoving before he grabbed his cuffs and scooped her up. Perhaps pissing off the most powerful Titan; and the most powerful magician he knew of, off wasn't his brightest idea as he sat her up against a post and handcuffed her there.

Raven's head sagged, she didn't even wake and he groaned as he stood up and rolled his shoulder before he teleported up to where the book was hidden and landed at Raven's feet again. She was out, down for the count so to speak.

Groaning in exasperation and pain he decided that if she wasn't out of here by noon he'd call her team and give them her location. The slumped form of Raven shivered and he shrugged off his coat and smirked. Pulling out a slip of paper (he was notorious for taking notepads and post-its with him everywhere; call it the Bat's training, the need to write notes and jot shit down), he quickly jotted down a note, signed it in red ink with an X and then stuck it to her brow.

Smirking he chuckled before he walked out of the warehouse, glared at the bike Sunshine had ruined for him, then he teleported. Landing on the rendezvous point for him and his client he rolled his shoulder again, pulling out a phone he kept his voice modulator on.

"I got it, be here in an hour," he growled before hanging up and sitting for a second. Holy fuck he forgot how much Raven could hurt! A smile pulled at his lips, a true smile, and he decided that one of these days; not a day on the job when he let the Titans catch him, he'd have to test out just how powerful Raven really was. Raven was sort of the Titan's last line of defense, he knew that, and he always found it interesting. What would drive all the other Titans to keep her back, what made her so powerful?

Oh, he knew that she was a half demon, and he knew that Raven kept herself in the back, preferring to be passive, rather than aggressive. But he supposed he'd just encountered an aggressive version of Raven. The thought of going toe to toe with her for real had him thinking he'd need to don his Red Hood persona instead of Red X, opening his eyes he let out a shuddering breath. He'd think about fighting Raven for real later; way later, right now, he had to focus and do his job.

The image of her in her pajamas though was strangely distracting, wouldn't she have thought to wear her uniform and call for back up from her fellow Titans? What was so fucking important about her book that she would chase him in her pajamas? He frowned as he pulled out the heavy leather-bound book and looked it over, it didn't seem special. Shoving the distraction from his mind, he let his head rest against the wall.

For now, he'd just breath and hope to God that she was still out while he set up traps for his client just in case there was a double cross.

~~~*~*~*~~~

To be honest, Damian did not like his peers. He found them stupid, irrational, and irritating. However, they had grown on him, not that he was every going to say that. Mostly Raven had grown on him, he liked her company, found it calming and soothing, and she seemed to understand him best. He was never pressured by Raven to 'talk' or be more social, she would let him be. But what bothered him most was the mystery around his eldest brother's friend, there was something about Raven which bothered him and while he accepted that part of her, he found it a bit vexing that he couldn't figure it out.

Also, she had seen in his head, well, 'felt' according to her, and she hadn't turned away from him. Raven was odd, she had healed him, seen in his head, and she had acted as if it were nothing. Grayson said Raven had done something similar for him, taking some obsession of his and helping him with it.

And while Damian hadn't been thrilled to have Raven in his head he'd been relieved to have someone who just accepted him. Grayson tried, and his father was… well, Bruce was Bruce, and Drake was a pain in the ass, and no one seemed to just accept him for him, and it was so confusing in his head.

Raven was a calming force to be around and he liked that about her. She was level-headed, and didn't do rash, stupid, impulsive things.

Which was why when he had looked out his window and seen her diving off the Tower he had bolted to the window.

She was flying, and she was going just as fast as Star did, and Raven never did that. then he'd seen the motorcycle and it had him striping and yanking on his Robin gear as he ran to the elevator and to the garage. Raven was up to something, he was going to find out what.

Leaping up he straddled Grayson's bike and tugged on a helmet before he looked over at Drake's bike and thought it over a second before revving the engine of Grayson's bike and blasting out of the garage while shouting his clearance at the computer so it opened the garage for him.

He paused momentarily when he lost sight of Raven and whoever she was chasing as he cautiously started riding through the city on alert.

The pulse of dark magic which nearly knocked him off his bike had him swerving down an alley as he headed for the warehouses. Then all of the black magic stopped, this was not good.

~~~*~*~*~~~

"Ow," she moaned as her head fell back and the pain from being electrocuted reminded her why she hated Red X so much. Red X, her eyes snapped open at the memory and she stared at the dawn filtering through the window she had shattered last night. Her eyes widened at the sight and she snarled. Rage pulsed through her and she could feel it quickly tearing at her threads of control.

No! Her mind screamed as she quickly locked her emotions and rage away. She couldn't be emotional right, she had to keep her mind clear and level. Her powers surged and she knew she was bound. Closing her eyes, she pulled her legs up and folded them as she took a steadying breath.

"Azarath, Metrion, Zinthos," she murmured as she let her powers settle and felt them lightly slip through her blood and body until she found her bounds. Whispering her chant she felt herself levitate slowly as her magic slid over the metal, her mind focused on the lock.

Her ear twitched hearing a bike's engine, but she kept focused as her magic broke the lock. The bindings fell behind her and she pulled her wrists up as she rubbed them and stood up, her hands catching the leather which had been covering her and she frowned noticing the post it on her brow for the first time. the glue lightly tugged at her skin as she pulled it off and looked at the note then.

"Raven!" a voice shouted and she looked up as she yanked the jacket on and shoved the note in the pocket just as the morning chill caught her. Fucking Red X.

Her tired eyes settled on the youngest Robin jogging to her, she rubbed her temple and sighed, she was bombarded by the conflicting, intense emotions of Damian and she smiled slightly.

There was one very unique thing about Damian compared to his brothers and father, and it drove his brothers nuts, but she found it endearing: Damian felt everything to extremes, he didn't do halfway or confusing emotions. He might not always figure out how he was feeling but there was nothing small about what he felt, if he liked someone he liked them with everything he had, and if he hated someone he hated them with everything he had. It was endearing to Raven because it left her with a black and white standing ground with the kid, versus everyone else who had middle ground and grey areas and ambiguous intentions. And Raven knew she was of the few Damian liked.

"It's nothing," she assured the boy as she walked to him, noticing all the glass then and decided to fly a bit. She really had lost control last night.

"It's not nothing, I've been searching these docks all night!" the boy snapped as she floated near him.

"Damian, leave it be," she warned in a hard tone and she'd have sworn his eyes were narrowing on her behind that mask of his.

"What happened!? I saw your magic, and you were chasing someone, who and why?" the boy persisted as they exited the warehouse.

"I need to talk to Victor, but the moment I have it sorted out I will tell you what that was," she assured him. Red X on top of everything else, it wasn't looking good, especially with what Cyborg had shown her yesterday. Sighing she dragged her hands through her hair and her eyes settled on Nightwing's bike which had her lifting her brows as she looked over to the boy, who glared at her. Damian's relief and frustrations and suspicions were all slamming into her, but she was relieved not to feel any mistrust from him.

"Promise?" he growled.

"Yes," she assured him.

"I'm out of gas," he stated.

"That's alright, this will be easier and not attract all that much attention," she sighed. Noticing for the first time she was standing in a huge man's t-shirt, a man's leather jacket, and her night shorts, she looked like the harlot Damian had called her when he had first come here with Dick.

"Who were you chasing?" Damian demanded.

"Damian, I will tell you everything you need to know about last night after I talk to Victor," she stated again as she lifted her hand, the boy straddled his bike and frowned. Raven felt her powers again as they slowly woke and slid through her arm, she projected in her mind where she wanted to go, as she opened a portal to the garage, Damian rode through first and she walked into the garage then.

Her fingers were toying with the note X had left her, and she knew she was going to have to track his sorry ass down and have him tell her where that book had gone.

She was going to need Nightwing's file on Red X then…

Groaning she shut her eyes as she and Damian walked out of the garage.

"You look like a harlot," Damian stated, yanking her out of her thoughts. Raven folded her arms then as she leveled a glare at the boy. "And you smell like whiskey."

"Damian, first of all, I am wearing pajamas, second, I am not a harlot, and third, it's the jacket," she stated. She had gone to bed intending not to wake until her alarm, but it appeared that Red X had other plans.

"I'm just saying," the boy shrugged innocently and she frowned. Bats! They drove her batshit crazy!

"Raven! Damian! Where were you!?" both their heads snapped up when a furious orange Tamarian princess and a redheaded Barbara Gordon appeared. Raven cringed feeling the emotions rolling off them in waves.

"Raven slept flew, I followed," Damian lied. Raven glared at the boy but didn't counter his claim since she needed to talk to Cyborg more than Star at this moment and she didn't need Kori's concern and worries drowning her. Victor was the one who could help her at this moment.

"What!?" Star gaped at her.

"It's a long story, Damian go join the team for breakfast," Raven said.

"But!"

"Go, we will talk later," she assured and watched him stalk off, her empathy tracking him until he was in the dining room.

"The sensors in your room read with you and another there," Barbara stated.

"Yes," Raven submitted.

"Care to tell us who your late-night visitor was?" Barbara leveled.

"Are you doing the courtship with someone, Raven?" Kori asked her sincerely.

"No one you know, and no Star, I am not being courted or courting," Raven huffed indignantly and felt her friend's playful teasing dashed.

"If you are perhaps I can meet him!?" Star continued.

"No, and if I was actually dating someone, no," Raven stated. Kori giggled, and Raven knew her friend was aiming to get a rise out of her.

"Was that all it was Raven?" Barbara asked.

"Far from it," Raven shrugged. "Do you know where Victor is?"

"The gym," Star answered as she sauntered off.

"Thanks Kori!" Raven called out as she started walking for the gym when a hand caught her arm, Raven looked down at Barbara then.

"If this person is a security threat…" Barbara started.

"It's not something to worry about," Raven lied. "I'm going to handle this problem," she admitted.

"Raven," the redhead warned.

"Barbara, if Bruce Wayne can trust me with his sons, and Dick trusts me with his mind and life, I suggest you start trying to trust me because I'm not talking about this any further," Raven stated. She didn't dislike Barbara, she didn't, but she found the woman's blatant lack of trust in her annoying. And feeling all that mistrust this morning was maddening.

Pulling away Raven walked towards the gym and pulled out X's note.

You look cold, keep the jacket as compensation for the book. I won't hold back next time, 'till next time Sunshine!

X

Growling at the arrogant scrawl she tucked the note in the pocket again as she finally reached the gym and watched for a moment as Victor ran through a simulation with Jaime. Raven tucked her feet up as she folded her legs and waited for the boys as they worked the simulation.

Red X had the Nevermore, Raven was foreseeing a lot of coming trouble. She didn't know if he knew what was or wasn't in the Azarath book, but she also knew that if he did accidentally pull the Nevermore out that it would be very bad. Losing the book was bad enough; not only was it the last thing of her home dimension she had linking her to her people, but because aside from what was stored in it, it was powerful magic. And if done improperly…

Even if it was Light Magic rather than Dark Magic, it was hazardous.

"Woo-hoo! High Score!" Jaime shouted, dragging Raven from her worries for a moment.

"Wow, someone actually beat Dick's score," Victor chuckled.

"That's awesome! I'm going to get breakfast," Jaime shouted as he jogged past her and Cyborg stopped before he passed her.

"Uh… Raven? Normally the creepy shadow thing you do can be overlooked, but will you please get rid of the red eyes!" Victor snapped and Raven shook her head as she stood.

"Sorry, long night," she sighed.

"I can see, who's jacket?" he asked.

"Red X's," she admitted as she hugged it to herself feeling a chill creep up her spine.

"WHAT!?" Victor shouted.

"Yeah, Cy… I have a problem," she winced internally.

"Raven, what is going on?" Victor demanded.

"Can we go talk in my room," she murmured, knowing that with the cameras and audio all over the Tower the only safe places were the private quarters.

"Uh… sure," he looked a bit miffed and she walked to the elevator with him. The silence wasn't heavy but all the concerns she felt rolling off of Cyborg was nauseating. But not as nauseating as the knowledge that Red X had her mind in his possession. After the last time someone had messed with the Nevermore she wasn't happy about it missing. Walking off the elevator she walked straight to her quarters, waving her wards off as she let Cyborg pass into her room.

"Now, Raven, this is creepy even for you, what's going on?" Cyborg demanded the moment she shut her door.

"Red X was here last-night," she admitted as she walked to her closet and found a heavy sweatshirt, shrugging out of the coat she handed it to Victor as she tugged the hoodie on. "He took a book of mine."

"What!? I thought that wasn't possible with all the wards you have here keeping us out," Victor snapped as he started scanning and examining the jacket.

"I do, but it's not impossible to get in here if you have the right magic. He had an amulet on and he was in here, but even I could feel it breaking," she surmised.

"What book did he take?" Cy asked as he tossed the coat on her bed.

"The book of Azarath, but… that's not all he got," she muttered.

"Raven?" he stared at her and she bit her lip then.

"He's got the Nevermore, I was storing all of my dangerous relics in it, and it was stored in the book and now…" Raven sighed, unable to continue. Her friend, her elder brother really, had paled significantly then.

"H-H-He's g-g-got That!" Victor stammered.

"Yes, which is… disconcerting," she grumbled as she sat on her bed, her knee bouncing in irritation at the situation she found herself in.

"Rae, we got to tell Dick!"

"No! Only you, me and Beast Boy know about what the Nevermore is, I do not need Dick finding it and falling into my head!" she hissed. She loved Dick like a brother, but sometimes he was too fucking curious for his own good.

"Oh fuck," Cy sat on her bed then. "Yup, I need you to help me, I need to find X before he loses my mind, or worse, falls into it," Raven said.

"Raven, I can't find him, I've tried," Victor said.

"I know, but I can, I need you to take the kids today, I need to meditate," she said.

"Uh…"

~~~*~*~*~~~

"Are you certain we should have left the Titans?" KF asked him as he stared down at the roof.

"It'll be fine," he shrugged. Here they were, staring at a normal lab building and Dick could only feel uneasy. He'd left the Titan's with Raven in charge, and that was always a wise move, but he wasn't too certain how the new recruits and everything was going, and he hadn't heard anything about it.

"Yeah, but it's Raven, man, you know how she is. Gloomy, anti-social, and a temper," he said.

"You just described Batman and Wolverine," Dick pointed out to his snacking friend as they continued to surveil Cadmus. Why this was on Bruce's radar was beyond Dick at this moment as he frowned and looked the building over then looked at the schematics for the building. Something about this wasn't sitting quite right with him, and he didn't know what it was about this place, but there was something off.

"Not the point, she's not the best welcome committee out there," Wally pointed out.

"Raven will handle this fine," Dick pointed out.

"I get it, she's great in the field, I don't think I've ever seen her lose her composure, even in the worst of a battle, she's calm. But she's so not the best pick for a recruiter," KF informed him.

"Hey, KF, I wouldn't have left her in charge if she wasn't the best pick for a leader," Nightwing defended.

"Yeah, Yeah," Kid Flash waved off. "Anything happening!? I'm bored. This is worse than English."

"You failed English," he pointed out to Wally.

"I know, but this is so boring!? Why isn't the League handling this? Isn't this a League sort of mission?" Wally demanded.

"Batman didn't say why the League wasn't handling this, just that he didn't want Superman near this," Nightwing muttered.

"Why not? Big Blue is helpful," KF pointed out.

"I don't know, just that this is something to do with Luther, and where Luther's concerned…" Nightwing shrugged.

"Do you smell smoke?" Wally asked.

"Yeah," Dick admitted as he scanned over the building before alarms were blaring.

"Time to get to work!" Wally grinned.

"No wait!" he shouted as his friend ran off. Kid Flash bolted back in front of him.

"What!?"

"Let's go," Dick sighed.

"That's what I thought, come on, I hear sirens," Kid Flash smirked and bolted again. Dick was seriously wishing he'd asked Speedy to come instead of Wally, at least Roy wasn't running off without him.

Running to the burning building he looked up as the flames engulfed the building and people were screaming.

Time to get to work and investigate Cadmus.

~~~*~*~*~~~

Looking at his bank account he felt a satisfaction of knowing that he was doing fine on his own without his trust fund or the help of the Bat clan. True he was using his skills for illegal activities but as a kid of the streets he knew it was best to use what he had and improvise the rest.

Which was why he was very relieved that this job hadn't had a major fuck ups and he was now walking up the stairs of his apartment and thinking over what he was going to cook for breakfast. God how he missed Alfred and Alfred's cooking at times, but he didn't let that slow him as he unlocked the door to his apartment and walk in.

He'd never been a very cluttered person, call it his background, call it paranoia, or whatever, but he had never had much in the way of stuff. Especially after… well, everything and now he was living here. kicking his door shut he flipped the two deadbolts, a safety bar, and door lock and flipped the chain before he dropped the keys on the side table and his pack on a chair before walking to his kitchen.

His place was simple, open, and clean. A mess was something which truly irritated him, and about the only thing he splurged in, aside from weapons, was his kitchen supplies. He liked good food, and food in his fridge, it was something he actually felt slightly obsessed about. But after years on the streets he liked knowing he had food in his fridge and it was good stuff, not stale, had to cut off mold, or sour. Walking into his kitchen, he pulled open his fridge and pondered what to have for breakfast. Slowly he settled on waffles. It seemed like a good, easy fix.

Settling about the soothing task of cooking he worked efficiently as he tried not to wonder overly much about the book he had stolen out of Raven's room. A job was a job, he was not usually one to dwell on his jobs.

Muttering to himself as he put the batter on the waffle iron he went about fixing some coffee and syrup for his breakfast.

He didn't know why he was so fucking interested in a book, it was just a book! But he was now very curious about it and he figured he'd be doing a bit of research on it now that it was on his mind. Not a fun realization, but he figured there were worse things to obsess about out there.

It had to be a Bat trait, the obsession, he didn't think he had ever obsessed about anything other than being warm and having food before he'd been sucked into Bruce's life. Pulling his waffles onto a plate he got the syrup and sat at his table as he pulled out his laptop to start the real research as to what the hell that book could have been.

~~~*~*~*~~~

Raven had taken her shower, not taking to having the scent of whiskey on her, and changed into jeans and a faded t-shirt before walking up to the roof on Titan Tower. Sitting down she stared out at her city and felt her eyes narrow on it.

Somewhere in that city was her mind, and it was not something she could sense; however, she'd gotten a good read on X's emotions, and she was going to find him. the empathy was a good trick to possess, and now it was time for her to do an old trick she hadn't needed to do since her revival of Terra.

Closing her eyes she took a settling breath as she composed herself, settling her mind as she settled her hands in position for the projecting and felt herself start levitating. Her magic flared around her, as her empathy projected and she sensed everyone in the tower. She wasn't in danger here, she reminded herself, and she needed to do this to get her mind back.

It would be very bad if the Nevermore fell into the wrong hands, her stomach felt thick and greasy at the mere thought of someone poking around her mind and finding her last link to Trigon, even accidentally.

"Azarath, Metrion, Zinthos," she murmured, and she felt her mind settle from churning thoughts to clear. Focusing on her spirit and her breathing she carefully started projecting herself as she used her empathy to seek Red X out. There was something about him she knew to seek, it was a connection, a darkness, she had felt it only in a few and she knew what it was as her mind started checking everyone in the city over for it.

Raven was seeking the Lazurus Pit's aura…

~~~*~*~*~~~

"He retrieved the book," she said as she pulled off the black wig and walked towards him.

"Good. Was he paid?"

"In full."

"Good, eliminate him."

"Of course."

[taylorscorner]

Where I Stand

This is where I stand on the 45th President, his power hungry cronies taking positions of authority in his Cabinet and administration, and the majority of Republicans in Congress are a real and active threat to me, my way of life, and all the people I love. Some people are saying that we should give Trump a chance, that we should "work together" with him because he won the election and he is "everyone's president." This is my response: •I will not forget how badly he and so many others treated former President Barack Obama for 8 years... • I will not forget how he disrespected a gold star family based on their religion. • I will not forget how he discriminated against a federal judge based on his ethnic background. •I will not "work together" to privatize Medicare, cut Social Security and Medicaid. •I will not "work together" to build a wall. •I will not "work together" to persecute Muslims. •I will not "work together" to shut out refugees from other countries. •I will not "work together" to lower taxes on the 1% and increase taxes on the middle class and poor. •I will not "work together" to help Trump use the Presidency to line his pockets and those of his family and cronies. •I will not "work together" to weaken and demolish environmental protection. •I will not "work together" to sell American lands, especially National Parks, to companies which then despoil those lands. •I will not "work together" to enable the killing of whole species of animals just because they are predators, or inconvenient for a few, or because some people want to get their thrills killing them. •I will not "work together" to remove civil rights from anyone. •I will not "work together" to alienate countries that have been our allies for as long as I have been alive. •I will not "work together" to slash funding for education. •I will not "work together" to take basic assistance from people who are at the bottom of the socioeconomic ladder. •I will not "work together" to get rid of common sense regulations on guns. •I will not "work together" to eliminate the minimum wage. •I will not "work together" to support so-called "Right To Work" laws, or undermine, weaken or destroy Unions in any way. •I will not "work together" to suppress scientific research, be it on climate change, fracking, or any other issue where a majority of scientists agree that Trump and his supporters are wrong on the facts. •I will not "work together" to criminalize abortion or restrict health care for women. •I will not "work together" to increase the number of nations that have nuclear weapons. •I will not "work together" to put even more "big money" into politics. •I will not "work together" to violate the Geneva Convention. •I will not "work together" to give the Ku Klux Klan, the Nazi Party and white supremacists a seat at the table, or to normalize their hatred. •I will not "work together" to deny health care to people who need it. •I will not "work together" to deny medical coverage to people on the basis of a "pre-existing condition." •I will not "work together" to increase voter suppression. •I will not "work together" to normalize tyranny.I will not “work together” to eliminate or reduce ethical over-site at any level of government. •I will not "work together" with anyone who is, or admires, tyrants and dictators. •I will not "work together" to help private corporations build pipelines to transport their oil, at the expense of our safety and environment.This is my line, and I am drawing it. •I WILL stand for honesty, love, respect for all living beings, and for the beating heart that is the center of Life itself. •I WILL use my voice and my hands, to reach out to the uninformed, and to anyone who will LISTEN: That "winning", "being great again", "rich" or even "beautiful" is nothing... When others are sacrificed to glorify its existence.

Signed:

Kathrine Iacofano

Susan Goldberg

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Bobby Lewis

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