#SLAM DUNKS THIS ABSOLUTE UNIT DOWN

[roosterforme]

Yours Truly, Bradley Bradshaw Part 2 | Rooster x Reader

Summary: The collection of letters that Bradley received from the fourth grade class provides him with entertainment while deployed. He takes the time to answer their questions and send a package back to the United States via air mail. But he has your email address. He also has a bit of a crush and some questions himself.

Warnings: Fluff, language

Length: 4100 words

Pairing: Bradley "Rooster" Bradshaw x Female teacher!Reader

Check out my masterlist for more! Yours Truly, Bradley Bradshaw masterlist

A few days later, when Bradley was done with his training protocols for the day, he returned to his bunk with a different mission in mind. While he unzipped his flight suit, he eyed the box which was taking up most of his nightstand, and a smile found its way to his lips. He managed to find a notebook that nobody wanted along with a thick, padded envelope, and he was going to take the time to respond to the fourth graders who wrote to him. 

He'd spent hours poring over the letters, laughing at some of the questions from the kids and frequently picking up that one photo. He couldn't stop going back for more. For another look at you. Just one more look. Okay, this really was the last one. He had to toss it across the small room toward his duffel so he could focus on something other than your smile and the fact that he might have a tiny crush on a fourth grade teacher who knew absolutely nothing about him. Yet.

The note from Jayden was on the top, and Bradley opened it up and started to jot down a response.

Jayden,

It was so nice to hear from you and the rest of your class. To answer your pertinent questions, I am currently stationed on the USS Theodore Roosevelt. The most disgusting food in the mess hall is easily the cabbage rolls (which taste nothing like cabbage... or rolls). The best food in the mess hall is surprisingly the meatloaf. And yes, I would love to see a photo of your Cocker Spaniel. Please send one next time. I hope you're studying and doing your best in school.

Lt Bradley Bradshaw

The next note he decided to tackle was the one from Violet who had the tiniest handwriting he'd ever seen. The page had at least fifteen questions written out, but he decided to answer just a few for her. He had to squint as he skimmed through them again.

Violet,

You seem very inquisitive. That's a great quality to have, especially if you want to be a pilot someday. No, I did not attend the Naval Academy. I went to the University of Virginia. Yes, the Navy is way better than the Air Force. Yes, I can hold my breath underwater for three minutes. Yes, they actually made me do it. No, I don't think I could make it as a Navy SEAL. Yes, I have been staying hydrated and getting enough sun, thanks so much for asking. Keep studying hard, because you have a lot of school ahead of you before officer training.

Lt Bradley Bradshaw

Okay, so this was actually a lot of fun. Up next was a response to the note from Oliver, which made Bradley laugh every time he looked at it. 

Oliver,

Thank you so much for drawing the different Naval aircrafts for me. I hate to break it to you, but I actually do not fly the F-35 Lightning II. Yes, I know they look 'sickeningly cool'. Yes, I know it would be like 'slam dunking off the back of a dragon'. I guess I never knew I was jealous of those pilots until right now.... But I fly the equally cool if not quite as sickening looking F/A-18 Super Hornet. And yes, I would be more than happy to draw my own version of one for you. See below.

Lt. Bradley Bradshaw

The ten minutes he spent replicating his own aircraft to the best of his ability for Oliver churned out a pretty damn good result. He fished his phone out of the nightstand and took a picture to email to Nat when he had time, because she would find this whole thing amusing. Then he reached for the letters from Harrison, Nia and Jackie. He wrote his responses, and after a bit, he had a decent sized stack of letters all ready to go back to the fourth graders.

After a few more days, he worked his way through the entire class, and each kid would soon have a handwritten response on the way. He just needed to figure out what he wanted to say to you. The pretty teacher from the class photo that he now kept tucked in with his personal items. He worked on that one last, writing your full name at the top of the page and wishing you didn't go by the very non-specific Ms. which gave him zero clue as to whether or not you were married.

The package you sent was the nicest piece of deployment mail I have ever received. Thank you. I'm lucky it ended up in my hands. I'm impressed by how much all of your students have learned about aviation this year. I just hope I did them justice in regards to the questions they had for me.

I also hope you don't mind that I replied to each kid individually. They had some very amusing stories and questions, and I wanted to acknowledge all of them. But there was one question in particular that I was asked so many times, I thought I'd answer it here instead. My call sign is kind of a silly one, so it's okay if you all laugh. I go by Bradley "Rooster" Bradshaw, and my helmet is mostly red, yellow and black.

Your kids seem like a fun bunch, but I bet they keep you on your toes. Feel free to let them know they can write back to me again, but please include my name on the package this time. I don't know that I'd be lucky enough to have it fall into my hands again by chance. I'll just be here somewhere in the middle of the Pacific Ocean for a few more months, ready to answer any questions you throw at me. Hope to hear back from you soon.

Yours Truly,

Lt Bradley Bradshaw

The following day, he packed everything up and dropped it off with the rest of the ship's outgoing mail. There was a rumor that a helicopter would be coming to pick it up in the next day or two, and he wanted to make sure it got back to California and those fourth graders as soon as possible. On his way back to his bunk, Bradley stopped by the lounge to see if there was an iPad free, hoping to send a quick email or two. He was in luck. He also happened to have your email address memorized.

--------------------------

You yawned at your desk and checked the time on your computer. Within the next ten minutes, your classroom would go from silent solitude to mass chaos, so you took a minute to clear out your email inbox. You had a few messages from some parents and a reminder about Spirit Week from the superintendent. And a random piece of junk mail that must have slipped through the spam filters. You didn't know anyone with a US Navy email address, and you didn't know anyone named Bradley Bradshaw.

As you closed your laptop, you gasped and tried to pry it back open again as quickly as you could. The Navy! The package you sent a few weeks ago! Maybe it was someone writing back to your class! Of course it could just be someone saying they were sorry that they didn't have time to engage with your students, but you figured even that was better than nothing. 

"Come on," you whispered, entering your credentials again before your inbox reappeared on your screen. The email was just a few lines long, but it was addressed to you by name. You were smiling immediately as you read it.

I just wanted to let you know that I got the mail you sent to a deployed Naval Aviator. There's a package on its way to your school for your class. It should arrive in about a week or two. Your fourth graders provided me with several hours of entertainment, and I hope they find my answers to their many (and amusing) questions useful. Thanks for the laughs, and thanks for the photos, too. Can't tell you how much I've been enjoying them. Hope to hear from all of you again.

Yours Truly,

Lt Bradley Bradshaw

You squealed and pumped your fists in the air. Someone actually got the box! And he actually responded! The other, older teachers thought you were just wasting your time when you deviated from the lesson plans a bit. Literally all of them said there was no way anyone would write back, even though you took the time to go through the proper channels at Top Gun on North Island. But now you could rub it in their faces, all thanks to Bradley Bradshaw who sounded like he'd had as much fun with this whole thing as your class had.

Then your day really started as Violet and Oliver burst into your classroom, calling out your name with excitement in their voices. The rest of your kids followed behind them, already asking about the plans for the day and what kind of adventure you'd be taking them on in each subject. 

When you clapped your hands twice and said, "Good morning," they all clapped and replied with their own greeting, and then they sat quietly with their gazes fixed on you. "Guess who I just got an email from!"

"The president!" 

"My grandma!"

"My Cocker Spaniel!"

"Oliver's grandma!"

You just shook your head and tried not to laugh as you said, "None of the above. But do you remember when we wrote and packed up those letters for a real aviator in the military to read?" Most of the kids nodded, so you added, "Well, he emailed us! And he sent us some mail that should arrive in about a week!"

And telling them that was a mistake. Because you didn't know a moment of peace after that. Every morning, you had kids rushing into the room to see if the promised piece of mail arrived yet. Every day you had to disappoint them, but you were finding yourself a little disappointed, too. You wanted to know what this Bradley Bradshaw guy sent back. 

You'd responded to his initial email letting him know you and the kids in your class were delighted to hear from him and that you would let him know when the mail he sent arrived at your school. He didn't respond, but you figured he was busy. Too busy to constantly muck about with your class while he was thousands of miles away on a deployment. 

And that was what left you standing at your desk with your mouth hanging open in awe when the padded envelope did finally arrive one morning. Because when you carefully cut it open, you found not just one letter to the class but individual handwritten notes, one for each child.

"Wow," you whispered, pulling the note with your name written on the top out of the stack. This man seemed humble and sweet, and his letter made you laugh in more than one spot as you read through it. Then you read it again. He sounded apologetic about responding to each individual kid, but you felt like your insides were melting. Who would do that? Who would take the time to give individual attention to a bunch of nine and ten year olds besides you? And you were technically getting paid to do it. 

Bradley Bradshaw seemed willing to continue to engage with your kids, and you weren't going to stop him. Because starting that morning, he became something of a legend to your class. A celebrity. A real lieutenant in the Navy replied to all of their silly questions, and their love of aviation just grew from there. You figured you were going to have to keep your lesson plans going a bit longer while their faces lit up as you walked around the room and handed them each their notes. You had taken the time to skim them beforehand, often laughing at his sense of humor which seemed to jump off the pages.

"Can we write back to him?" Jayden asked as everyone read their notes from Lieutenant Bradshaw. "I have more questions."

You smiled and nodded. "Yes, you may write back to him." Then you postponed your geology lesson until the next day and let them spend the next forty minutes writing some followup letters. You took some pictures of them diligently toiling away at their desks, excitement on their faces. Then you bit your lip and sat down at your own desk.

As you started to construct an email letting him know the envelope had arrived, your thoughts drifted to what he might be like. Humble and sweet, for sure. But he also made it a point to tell you that the box from your class was the best piece of mail he'd ever received while deployed. Maybe he was a little bit lonely. Maybe he was single. Maybe he was stationed on the west coast. Your thoughts started to get ahead of you, and it was hard to reel them in when you imagined him excited to see another email from you. Smiling when he was handed another box from your class during mail call.

Dear Lt Bradley Bradshaw,

We got the envelope from you today, and my kids are absolutely thrilled! I'm not sure if you know how hard it can be to wrangle eighteen fourth graders all at one time, but they are currently sitting quietly and working on new letters for you to read. Once again, please don't feel obligated to continue correspondence if you're too busy. I'm sure you have other people you could be writing to who want your attention as well. I just wanted you to know they are overjoyed that a Naval officer took the time to answer their questions about aviation.

I have attached some photos as proof that they are sitting still. Thanks again for making their day.

You signed your name at the bottom the way you always would from your work email account, and then you attached the photos. After a brief debate about adding the selfie you took with Violet where most of your face was visible, you decided to just go for it. Adding it to the mix wouldn't hurt anything. It wasn't like this semi mystery man would be up all night thinking about you. 

But you found that you were still thinking about him when you went home to your silent house and made dinner that evening. Maybe he was a little bit lonely, but maybe you were, too.

-------------------------

It was amazing how infrequently Bradley found himself thinking about Vanessa. He was busier now with his duties picking up a bit more as his deployment wore on, but even when he was tired and in his bunk at night, his thoughts seldom settled on her like he was afraid they might. He didn't miss her or her half-hearted emails, and he wasn't craving the connection of reunion sex with her. 

Instead, he was thinking about what a group of fourth graders were learning about this week and what their cute teacher was up to. It had been a few days since you emailed him, letting him know that his package was delivered to your school. You made it sound like the kids were excited that he sent it in the first place, and when he really thought about it, he supposed some officers would have just eaten the snacks and tossed the notes in the trash.

He didn't reply to the email yet, still thrown off a bit by the pictures you attached. Your classroom was vibrant, and the kids were absorbed as they worked on more notes for him to read whenever they happened to be delivered to the carrier. But the photo with you in it held his attention longer than it should have. The fact that you were working at a school that was just a handful of miles from his damn house made him feel warm.

But what would he do about it? What could he do about it? Nothing. He didn't want you to think he was creepy. He still knew essentially nothing else about you. The only thing he could do was keep it friendly if not professional. Unless of course you did something to push the boundaries of conversation into a more personal realm. God, if you did....he didn't think he would be able to handle it. 

The next day, when he was heading out on deck to talk to the mechanics who were doing regular maintenance on the aircrafts, he took his phone. "Hey, you mind if I take a few photos of some of the engine parts? I want to send them to a class of fourth graders who will think it's cool."

"Go ahead, Lieutenant," the head mechanic replied. Then he smiled and asked, "You dating a teacher?"

Well. Wouldn't that be something? Bradley would never run out of curious pen pals. He would always have some fourth graders to take interesting photos for and to send notes to. He'd always have a classroom to visit as soon as he got home from a deployment.

He couldn't help but picture you as the teacher.

"Nothing like that," he replied, his voice a little gravelly. "Just writing to some kids who are learning about aviation."

After dinner, when he had a chance to use an iPad in the lounge, he did his best to put together a response to your email that would at least hint at the curiosity he felt. 

If all it takes is mail from three thousand miles away to get your class to sit quietly, then I should probably be writing to you every day. But I'm sure you're a great teacher. That's a given considering how much your students learned and shared with me. And I can assure you that I'm more than happy to take the time to write to your class. And you. Please don't think I feel obligated, because I do not. I want to.

I have attached a few pictures of some F/A-18 engine components as well as some of my cockpit controls. Each photo is labeled, but please let me know if you have any questions.

It was nice hearing from you.

Yours Truly,

Lt Bradley Bradshaw 

As soon as he hit send, he wanted to kick himself. Should he have included a photo of his face like you had twice now? Or did he already sound too desperate to hear from you and your class again?

"Shit," he muttered, looking around the lounge as if there was going to be someone here proficient in the art of getting to know a fourth grade teacher without sounding stupid. But it was too late now. All he could do was wait for the next mail call or hope you decided to write back to his ramblings by the next time he checked his email. 

-----------------------------

You were going to have to scrape your jaw off the floor. You had no idea what this man's face even looked like, but his hands were... something else. And his thighs... well, they were pretty great, too. It must have been too long since you got laid, because you were sitting at your desk in your classroom staring at the set of photos in your inbox, currently unable to look away from his right hand. It was wrapped around the throttle of his aircraft. It was elegant with attractive veins and rough calluses. You were sure that you were supposed to be focusing on the cockpit controls, but all you could see was that hand and his thick, muscular thighs below.

The next photo was no better for you. He was holding up his helmet with his call sign Rooster emblazoned across the front, and you were able to see his left ring finger. There was no wedding band. There was no evidence of an outline where a wedding band would belong. There was just his big, strong hand.

You whimpered softly while your students worked on their math tests. You couldn't help it as you took one last look before logging out of your email account. And now you needed to know if his face matched the very attractive image you had in your mind. 

When Jayden called your name, you rocketed to your feet like you'd been caught red handed. "Yes?" you squeaked, your voice sounding higher pitched than usual.

"I'm done with my test. May I have the hall pass and use the restroom?"

You handed it to him as the rest of your class finished working through the math problems. A few minutes later, when you collected the papers from them, Violet asked, "When is Lieutenant Bradshaw going to write back to us?"

It had only been a few days since you mailed him the second box of notes and some more snacks, but it made you happy that they were all so invested in learning more from him. 

"It will probably be a few weeks before we get anything in the mail. However... he did email me some pictures of engine and cockpit parts from the aircraft carrier for me to share with you guys." When you looked around the room, the kids were on the edges of their seats, excited expressions on their faces. With a laugh you added, "I was going to wait until tomorrow and use the projector to show them all to you, but if you're very well behaved for the rest of the afternoon, maybe I could pull them up on my computer for you to see them today."

Not two hours later, you were just as excited as the kids were to look at the photos... again. As they crowded around your desk, you opened up the first one of the cockpit to a barrage of questions. 

"Is that really his jet?"

"Is that the throttle?"

"What do all the buttons do?"

"Was this right before he flew it?"

Once again you were distracted, but you managed to click over to the next photo, and the kids gasped in delight. 

"His helmet is so cool!"

"It says Rooster!"

"That's his call sign!"

"Red is my favorite color!"

You just smiled softly and laughed. "Should we go ahead and start working on another list of questions for him?" you asked as you slowly scrolled through the rest of the pictures. "He said we can write back to him as much as we want to." When everyone cheered, you handed Oliver a marker and pointed to the board at the front of the classroom. "Let's start making a list."

You listened to all of your students call out questions for Bradley while Oliver wrote them down. Then Violet asked, "Can he send us a picture of his whole jet? From the outside of it?"

You cleared your throat and added, "Maybe he could get someone else to take the picture so he could stand in front of it. For size comparison."

Violet nodded, but you knew you were a fraud. Sure, it would be great for the kids to understand just how massive the F/A-18s were compared to an actual person, but you were the one who wanted to see all of Bradley. You were itching for it now. 

Later that night, you drank most of a bottle of wine and did something you promised yourself you'd never do. You logged into your work email account after nine o'clock. You skipped over the handful of unread emails from parents and clicked on the icon to compose a new message. With your liquid courage goading you on, you typed up a response to Lieutenant Bradley Bradshaw and hit send before you could think twice.

Thank you for the photos. They were very enlightening. We especially liked the ones where you were showing off your cockpit. Or I did, anyway. The kids liked all of them and started on another list of questions for you. Good luck getting rid of us now. 

We were wondering if you could have someone take a picture of you standing in front of your jet. For size comparison purposes. And also because my students would like to know what you look like. Hearing from you makes our day even better.

You couldn't believe how forward you were being with this man who you'd never even met in person, but you fell asleep thinking about his hands and what they might be capable of.

-------------------------

This Bradley makes me swoon. I've never wanted to be a fourth grade teacher so badly in my life. There is something that's starting to blossom between them even though they haven't even met in person. Thanks @mak-32 and @beyondthesefourwalls

PART 3

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[goldguile]

some observations about magic

HELLO NAUGHTY CHILDREN IT’S TIME TO REPORT BACK WITH MY FINDINGS BECAUSE I GOT IN TOO DEEP

a few notes before i get into it:

because everyone in the game has a spell list, i’m plowing ahead with the idea that everyone in the world of fe16, not just fodlan, can learn magic. it’s a fantasy setting, it’s chill.

i am ignoring actual stats and damage output that you would see in the game in favour of an in universe application, because like... the stats are obviously just for the game. in universe, there wouldn’t be such a thing. anyone could achieve similar results with enough study, perseverance, and hard work, though it might be more difficult to produce those results consistently.

rhea has a spell list but i am ignoring her because she’s not actually playable. it’s almost identical to byleth’s anyways, she just gets agnea’s arrow and loses aura.

this includes jeritza, anna, and the ashen wolves.

given the uniqueness of the spells sagittae and agnea’s arrow, i am placing them in their own “general anima” category-- i know agnea’s arrow is most likely a fire spell given its description but this is less headache.

crests are not considered here, as they generally conserve uses of magic, make one’s cast spells stronger... it can pretty obviously be assumed that a mage with a crest has an advantage over a mage without, but those without crests can still be formidable opponents in their own right.

okay, without further ado, time for peppermint to ramble about magic under the cut! ... this might get kind of sloppy and messy, whoops. if you want to get somewhere specific, i recommend ctrl+f-ing to (1), (2), (3), or (4).

(1) DISTRIBUTION OF MAGIC.

first off, i wanted to see if there was a specific type of magic that seemed easier to learn-- or at least, more common, so i compiled a list of all the spells with who learns what. ... by copying it off the wiki, shhhh. i also added the total number of people who learned it after everyone’s names.

REASON MAGIC: 

everyone can learn fire, as it’s the class skill, so the below mention is of those who can learn it naturally. 

fire: byleth, edelgard, ferdinand, caspar, linhardt, dedue, mercedes, sylvain, lorenz, raphael, leonie, flayn, catherine, alois, anna, balthus, constance, lysithea (enemy only, mage class though) (17/18)

bolganone: byleth, edelgard, ferdinand, caspar, linhardt, dedue, mercedes, sylvain, raphael, leonie, manuela, seteth, catherine, alois, balthus (15)

ragnarok: byleth, dedue, mercedes, sylvain, lorenz, leonie, hanneman, catherine, balthus (9)

thunder: byleth, dimitri, dorothea, ferdinand, bernadetta, felix, mercedes, hilda, manuela, gilbert, jeritza, anna (12)

thoron: dimitri, dorothea, ferdinand, bernadetta, felix, ingrid, hilda, marianne, hanneman, gilbert, jeritza (11)

bolting: hilda, manuela, constance (3)

wind: claude, petra, linhardt, ashe, annette, hanneman, seteth, flayn, shamir, cyril, yuri (11)

cutting gale: claude, linhardt, ashe, annette, ignatz, marianne, seteth, flayn, cyril, yuri (10)

excalibur: claude, linhardt, annette, seteth, flayn, yuri (6)

blizzard: bernadetta, ingrid, ignatz, marianne, shamir (5)

fimbulvetr: bernadetta, ingrid, ignatz, marianne, shamir, constance (6)

sagittae: claude, dorothea, petra, annette, sylvain, lorenz, hanneman, shamir, yuri, constance (10)

meteor: dorothea, hanneman, anna, hubert (enemy only) (3/4)

agnea's arrow: dorotha, lorenz, constance (3)

DARK MAGIC: 

without access to a dark seal, only edelgard, lysithea, hubert, jeritza, and hapi can learn dark magic naturally, otherwise every male character can learn miasma. fitting, as all of these characters except hapi MAYBE???? have ties in some way to those who slither in the dark.

miasma: hubert, lysithea, hapi

mire: hubert only

swarm: lysithea, hapi

banshee: hubert, hapi

luna: edelgard, lysithea

death: hubert, jeritza, hapi

dark spikes: hubert, lysithea

hades: edelgard, lysithea, hapi

hubert is the only character in the entire game who can learn mire, making him the only cast member with a unique spell.

FAITH MAGIC:

every character in the game can learn heal and nosferatu. thanks to this twitter thread, i headcanon that as much as the church of seiros would have you believe, faith in sothis and seiros are NOT what makes faith magic work-- it’s belief in something in general. because the church spreads the goddess narrative about faith magic super heavily, this accounts for, say, hubert’s weakness in it, for example. while not very religious, linhardt simply believes his spells will work, so they do.

recover: byleth, edelgard, dimitri, claude, hubert, caspar, dedue, felix, annette, lorenz, hilda, raphael, hanneman, seteth, cyril, catherine, alois, shamir, yuri (19)

physic: dorothea, bernadetta, linhardt, mercedes, ashe, sylvain, ingrid, ignatz, marianne, leonie, hapi, manuela (enemy only, but can’t use it due to being in the assassin class) (11-12)

restore: ferdinand, petra, linhardt, felix, mercedes, leonie, flayn, balthus (8)

fortify: mercedes, flayn (2)

ward: ferdinand, lorenz, ignatz, manuela, hanneman, gilbert, anna, constance (8)

silence: claude, marianne, manuela, yuri (4)

seraphim: edelgard, sylvain, ingrid, lysithea, balthus, hapi (6)

aura: byleth, dimitri, marianne, yuri (4)

abraxas: annette, lysithea, constance (3)

rescue: bernadetta, flayn, anna, constance (4)

warp: linhardt, lysithea, manuela, hapi (4)

(2) MAGICAL AFFINITY 

the next thing i looked at was actually magical potential but it makes more sense to put it as the last thing on the list SO ANYWAYS. 

while theoretically any aspiring mage could learn any magic with enough hard work and study, most will note a specific element is easiest to work with and have a tendency to lean towards it. this affinity may also be hereditary and run in the family. sometimes a particularily lucky mage will feel comfortable with all aspects of anima magic, simply picking one to start with. even rarer still, a mage may feel equally comfortable with two elements at once and focus on both of those at the same time.

below is a breakdown of who has which magical affinity! the criteria was simple: if x character learned x reason spell, they had an affinity for that element. if they learned more than one element, the one that popped up more often was the affinity and the other one was learned. if they were equal, the character possesses both affinities.

reason affinities:

if a character can learn additional magic to their affinity, i’ve made a note of it as their secondary. i do not count sagittae for this except for in the case of constance, as she learns both sagittae and agnea’s arrow, then only one other spell per element-- giving her a clear bias towards what i call general anima. meanwhile, lorenz learns an equal amount of fire and general anima magic, hence his own category in the list mentioning both.

as mentioned before, marianne can learn both cutting gale and thoron, but also learns both ice spells-- still making her affinity ice.

fire: caspar, dedue, mercedes (secondary: thunder), sylvain, lorenz, raphael, leonie, balthus, hanneman, catherine, alois, anna (secondary: thunder)

thunder: dorothea, dimitri, felix, hilda, manuela (secondary: fire), jeritza (secondary: dark), gilbert,

wind: petra, linhardt (secondary: fire), ashe, annette, claude, yuri, seteth (secondary: fire), flayn (secondary: fire), cyril,

ice: ingrid (secondary: thunder), ignatz (secondary: wind), marianne, shamir

dark: hubert, lysithea, hapi

fire + thunder: byleth, ferdinand

fire + dark: edelgard

thunder + ice: bernadetta

fire + general anima: lorenz

general anima: constance

faith affinities:

everyone learns heal and nosferatu, so they are not being counted here. typically, a unit will learn either recover OR physic as a secondary healing spell, not both, so the spells being evaluated are the ones learned after the first of the two. this makes healing the most common faith affinity.

mercedes learns both physic and fortify, cementing her faith affinity as actually being healing as opposed to just being the "learns no more faith spells" variety. she is the only character in the game with this affinity.

gilbert, balthus, anna, and constance are interesting in that they do not learn a second healing spell at all!

a balanced faith affinity is much like being comfortable with all brands of reason magic and simply picking a starting point. the characters listed there have an equal amount of support, healing, and utility spells!

flayn only learns a secondary healing spell at a-rank faith, keeping her in the balanced category as she only learns one support and one utitlity spell before that.

healing (physic/recover/fortify): hubert, dorothea, caspar, dedue, mercedes, ashe, hilda, raphael, seteth, jeritza, cyril, catherine, alois, shamir

offensive (seraphim/aura/abraxas): byleth, edelgard, dimitri, sylvain, ingrid, lysithea

support (ward/restore/silence): ferdinand, petra, felix, claude, lorenz, ignatz, leonie, manuela, hanneman, gilbert,

utility (rescue/warp): bernadetta

balanced: linhardt, marianne, yuri, balthus, constance, hapi, flayn, anna

(3) MAGICAL POTENTIAL

to determine this, i looked at were the amount of spells each character learned in total. while we’ve established that anyone can learn magic and those that apply themselves usually find themselves leaning to one aspect of reason/faith magic or another, another factor in magical study is potential. 

everyone can learn magic, but obviously some potential mages have a better aptitude for it than others. personally i don’t see it as a level of skill, per se-- a mage with lower magical potential can be just as deadly as a mage with high magical potential; the latter may just have more tricks up their sleeves. this is exemplified in the amount of spells they can learn! a mage with lower magical potential can master and cast powerful spells, but may find branching out from their affinity-- that’s the gist of it. for example: 

hilda can learn the most powerful thunder spell, bolting, but she still only learns six spells in total and all of them fall into the thunder or healing category.

8 spells seems to be the average potential, with 4 reason and 4 faith. nosferatu and heal ARE counted for this! some characters tend to skew into a preference for reason or faith, but i’m not getting that deep into it, that’s too much--

10 spells: linhardt, lysithea, constance, hapi

9 spells: mercedes, marianne, yuri, manuela, hanneman, flayn

8 spells: byleth, edelgard, hubert, dorothea, ferdinand, bernie, annette, sylvain, claude, lorenz, balthus

7 spells: ingrid, ignatz, leonie, seteth, shamir, anna

6 spells: dimitri, dedue, felix, hilda, raphael, jeritza, catherine

5 spells: caspar, petra, ashe, cyril, alois, gilbert

(4) takeaways

fire magic, as is a trend in most games, is the easiest to learn. even ragnarok, its most difficult spell (not counting meteor), has the most characters who can master it at 9.

bolganone, thoron, and cutting gale, despite being intermediate spells, are relatively easy to learn if you have experience with magic in general. ingrid, marianne, and ignatz can learn those spells without needing to know thunder and wind respectively, as they already have a preliminary ice spell mastered. seteth learns bolganone after mastering a preliminary wind spell.

the same goes for the highest tier spells-- even without being versed with their prerequisites, it is still possible to learn them; it just may be more difficult to do so.

despite thunder magic being generally accessible and easy to learn, its highest tier of magic ( bolting ) is the most difficult to master-- only hilda, manuela, and constance can. damn, hilda, you go. only constance can do so without issue-- 

ice magic is rarer and therefore more difficult to master without an affinity for it.

healing and offense-oriented faith spells are easier to cast than support or utility skills like restore or warp. close range healing is obviously easier than long range healing.  

for those with lower magical potential, faith magic (specifically healing) tends to be the easiest to grasp.

[crystalelemental]

BP tickets are getting updated! Thank god, I was beginning to think I’d crack and get one of the master pairs.

The general BP units are fine. Morty, Surge, and Erika are the big winners, but Karen and Zinnia are…fine. Zinniquaza finally pulled ahead this update so BP Zinnia’s a bit down on her luck, and I never liked Karen’s focus being on recoil. But an update to these options will be nice. I just want this particular set to be Gen 4 or later. All these regular BP units are Kanto, Johto, and Hoenn! That’s annoying to me. I’d like to see rep for other regions this time around.

For Sinnoh, maybe a Cheryl alt? I think it’d be fun. Give her something interesting as support again, I’d love it if they could do a crit buffer with minimal special attack buffing. Please. I need it for F2P reasons. My fear is Volkner. It’s probably Volkner. But the long shot is Cynthia. People pointed out that N is in Trainer Lodge despite being limited, and it’s a bit weird to make a small cast debuting in this mode involve limited options people may not have. So it’s possible that some limited characters get added through the BP shop. But an N or Cynthia would like be Master tier, and if Sinnoh gets one it’s probably Palmer, so…

Anyway, Unova should be Cheren. Like…be real about this. He deserves something. As much as I’d want an Iris, it should be Cheren. But there might not be a regular Unova option. Master level could easily be Train Bros. Huge popularity, fits the Battle Master image like Evelyn did, they’re a strong contender.

Kalos technically has one with Evelyn, but if they don’t give me a Valerie alt I’m gonna be a bit pissed.

Alola…I actually don’t know. I hate to be like this, absolutely none of the trial captains interest me, and I can’t imagine they go with a free Lillie or Lusamine. Maybe Gladion? Actually wait, Acerola. It’s right there.

Galar has so few people in, but Raihan seems like a slam dunk. Battle Tower Leon as a master tier very probable.

But. There is a problem. The anniversary trainer. “Hey look, Red has his classic outfit, maybe he’s the free unit!” And now there is at least one confirmed new Master BP unit.

Uuuugh

UUUUUUGH

[juduseye]

Hello, can I persuade you to tell me more about Doc and Castle's daughters? Who brought up first the idea of adopting? Did they get the kids as babies/toddlers, or adopted slightly older kids? Which one of them brings out pictures of the kids at any occasion he can? And anything else you wanna share, please *puppy eyes*

Omg I hope you are prepared for an essay. I’m jk but thanks for the question!! I would absolutely love to tell you some more about Doc and Castle’s daughters!

I always imagine that once Doc retires from rainbow, he doesn’t really retire and goes on to work with Doctors Without Borders and other groups where he can continue to help people within his expertise. So he ends up going to Haiti for a couple weeks after a major hurricane hits to help give people affected medical treatment. While he was there he meets a native woman named Ginette who works rescue missions with her husband and they become really good friends and Castle is just so glad that Doc has found friends and people who can look out for him. Disaster strikes just a week and some days later when Ginette, her husband, and their rescued passengers are capsized and drug under the flood water by a strong hidden current and ultimately drowned. This absolutely devastates Doc and he can barely stand to go to work some days and Castle tries his best from hundreds of miles away to help him through it. One day at work, patching up some of the survivors who were just brought in, he meets a young girl (she couldnt be over 4 years old) who has an ear infection. After her initial visit one of the nurses who works with him laments that the poor girl is Ginette’s orphaned daughter and they are currently looking for relatives to take her in with no luck. So over the next couple weeks, Doc tries his hardest to befriend the little girl (who he learns is named Renee) and to get her ear infection solved. Of course, Castle is taken through this journey with him over phone calls and face times. They meet over face time and Castle is just so sad that this sweet, super shy little girl is left on her own.

One day, about 3 weeks after Doc first met Renee, a nurse comes to his office to speak to Renee (he sort of unofficially took charge of her during the day since he was helping treat her ear infection and the two of them formed a small bond) and said she has someone she might want to see. From the doorway a slightly older girl (7 years old or so) steps out and Renee jumps into her arms. The girl is Naomi who was taken to a separate medical camp for treatment and they just now found her to unite the two.

Doc ends up staying in Haiti for a couple weeks longer than he intended, monitoring the girls and continuing his medical work. He still calls Castle often, their calls starting to get more and more filled with stories about the girls. Naomi is very very shy and working through her trauma in a different way than the younger Renee but they both have so much life and Doc just sings their praises. Castle is the first to mention it, asks very slowly during a comfortable silence over the phone if maybe they could look into becoming a new family of four. Doc is almost taken back, he hadn’t thought of that but once he thinks about it over night he really begins to see his life with the four of them. He asks around and the legals who are in charge of the girls case admit they hadn’t found any relatives alive or of mental soundness to take care of the girls and were getting ready to put them in a foster home. Doc asks if he could perhaps adopt the two and this takes him down a long long hole of all the legality and extra stuff he has to do to make it happen. Of course he has a talk with Renee and Naomi about the situation asking if they would be okay with living with him and getting their consent before going through with the adoption cases. Castle is taken through the entire process with him and it’s very long.

Ultimately, they finally get to take their new daughters home and live like a happy little family with some ups and downs but they have never been happier. Doc always brags about his daughters, how smart and tough and resilient and loving they are. He definitely shows them off at meetings and at reunions, Thermite thinks they are just the most amazing girls in the world. Castle never misses one of their events (Doc sometimes has to with work but he always watches the recording afterwards) and is number one involved dad who definitely did daddy daughter ballet with Renee and picks Naomi up so she can slam dunk basketballs in their drive way.

[stxrrywildflower]

scratch

pairing - bau team x teen!reader

summary - hotch confronts his worst fear when drugged by mr. scratch

warnings - angst, injury details, mentions of case, character death (in vision)

word count - ?

you knew you shouldn’t be at your dads work as they were working a pretty intense case, but jack was with his aunt and you weren’t comfortable being home alone. after one text to your dad, he told you to come down to the bau to sit in his office.

after responding with a simple ‘okay,’ you grabbed your things, just some extra homework and your phone.

the entire bau team was on edge, you could tell that just seconds after walking in. most of the team was standing around the board in the corner, your dad and rossi being the only ones absent. your eyes avoided the board, not wanting to see the crime scene photos as well as what you thought was monster sketches, no doubt done by spencer.

“hey,” you greeted. “where’s my dad?”

“hotch is down with some of the victims doing interviews. rossi’s over seeing them,” derek explained. you nodded to his words, “alright, i’m going to go sit in his office.”

there was barely any movement for the next two hours, the only noteable thing being your dad greeting you with a wave.

you did, however, jump up when a phone began ringing, followed by the teams expressions shifting and then all grabbing their kevlar vests.

“what’s going on?” you asked.

kate headed up the stairs and towards the office. your eyes darted around as the rest of the team exited the bullpen quickly. “kate, what’s going on?” you repeated.

“we think your dad may be in trouble,” kate stated. “he went to interview someone involved with the victims and he hasn’t come back.”

you gasped sharply, already begining to panic. kate noticed this, placing her hand on your back and leaded you into the office once more. you took a seat in the chair while kate sat on the couch.

“something tells me there’s more,” you mumbled.

“the unsub is after the woman hotch went to interview,” kate added. you pulled your knees up to your chest, drumming your fingers on your leg. “hey, he’ll be okay,” kate offered. you couldn’t do anything but hope her words would be true.

meanwhile, hotch stepped inside dr. susannah’s home. his gun was held low, just in case of emergency. after seeing the woman, he opened his mouth to talk to her. however, without warning, dr. susannah stabbed herself, bleeding out in seconds.

a fine mist was sprayed in his face, the familiar sent of sage spreading across his nostrils. knowing how dangers this could be, hotch did everything he could, even dunking his head into a stray bowl of water. another spray, more sage. this time, hotch could do nothing as the delusion took over.

one gunshot, spencer was down.

that was made clear by j.j.’s panicked screams. blood stained the door where spencer was shot, it was sickening knowing that it was from the hole in the back of his head.

hotch only managed to hear it. he didn’t know what he would have done if he had actually seen it.

second gunshot, dave doubled over.

the unit chief watched in agony as his friend and mentor was shot in the neck. and then derek appeared, kneeling beside rossi and applying pressure to the wound.

the third gunshot hit derek square in the chest, just above the vest. the profiler went down, his breathing stopping in just a few short moments. “morgan,” hotch gasped, in shock at seeing the agent killed right in front of him.

hotch couldn’t move, could barely speak. his entire team was down and there was absolutely nothing he could do about it.

“hotch!” you yelled.

why were you calling him hotch? you rarely called him anything other than dad. aaron or hotch was only used if you needed something or just to annoy him.

the unit chief lazily turned his head to see you rushing over to where he was tied up. you were wearing the same kevlar bed as everyone else. what were you doing here? you were only seventeen, not even done high school. why were you with the team?

“get out of here,” hotch commanded.

you began to work towards untying the ropes holding his wrists. “i’m not leaving dad, we need to get you out of here,” you replied. “besides, if i leave your then you can’t wear that tie jack got for you when shopping with jessica,” you joked.

that was all cut short ever so quickly.

one final gunshot rang out, you dropped on the floor, blood pooling out from the gunshot wound in your neck. you chocked, airway not cut off. the pain subsided after a minute, much like morgan, your breathing stopped.

“no!” hotch cried, thrashing around with tears in his eyes. almost everyone he loved was just killed in the matter of minutes.

“it’s a shame i know what your fear is now,” scratch taunted. “seeing your team die in front of you when there’s nothing you can do. oh and of course, how can i forget your daughter? or should i even call her that. she isn’t really your daughter is she.”

hotch thrashed around at that. “shut up,” he growled.

“i mean it isn’t biological. how does little jack feel about having an adopted older sister?” hotch wished he could lean forward and slap the smirk off of scratch’s face.

a car door slamming was heard from inside. “well your team is here for real this time. you might want to shoot me before they come in,” scratch shrugged.

“i need my gun.”

scratch handed his gun over just as spencer and rossi appeared in the doorways. still weak from the psychological torture, hotch lazily held up his gun to fire a shot. scratch easily avoided them, running out of the room and through the house.

“are you okay?” rossi asked, kneeling down beside the younger agent as spencer chased after the unsub.

“fine,” hotch answered. “i just want to get out of here.”

with the unit cheif being helped out of the home and scratch now captured, it was time to head out. scratch, however, managed to turn out of morgan’s grasp, grinning at hotch and tapping his head.

despite rossi’s wishes for hotch to go to the hospital, he shrugged it off, wanting to get back to the bau to make sure you were okay.

the car ride back was painfully long, no one saying anything. hotch was still in a fragile state, the team remained quiet as one thing could potentially set him off.

the second you saw hotch through the glass doors of the bullpen, you were out of the office.

“dad,” you sobbed, rushing forward to hug your father.

hotch sighed, hugging you tightly and cradling you’re head with your hand. you were okay, you weren’t hurt and that’s all that mattered.

☆ ☆ ☆

tags - @tinylumpiaa @rumplebutterbitch @itsmyblogandillreblogifiwantto @the-quarantine-diaries @ah-blossom @dr-reid-ismyspiritanimal @kissessforharryyy @garcias-batcave @spenceneedsahug @jjandreidsgirl @zoseph @spencerreidxoxo @marvelxmendes @mggstyles @ogmilkis @cm-is-kinda-cool @ssa-morgan

[bbgurlkitty]

Kinky story ~ waterfall

Warning: 18+ only

Genre: relationship

We were staying on a private island together on our honeymoon. We rented a pool with a breath-taking view of palm trees hanging over us. The sun is beating sun but there’s a nice, cool breeze. All alone, we decided we would go skinny-dipping.

We both have white ropes on. I dip my toes in the lukewarm water. It’s warm enough to feel inviting, but not too hot that it would burn my skin.

“You first,” I tell him, blushing and giggling.

“Alright,” he agrees, and throws his robe off, standing there naked. I stare at his sexy butt. His skin is sparkling in the sun. I love the hair all over his body. He looks like a wild beast. “Ahhh,” he says with relief, stepping into the water, “it feels so good.”

I stand there and watch him tread in the water. He sinks his head in and then comes up for air. He looks so relaxed and refreshed.

“C’mon, now,” he tells me.

So I drop my robe and watch him stare at my body with awe as he bites his lip. My breast feel especially plump and perky today. I run my hands over my body, feeling my hips, my waist, running my fingers through my hair. I feel so free!

He swims towards me and splashes water on me.

“Ahh!” I jump up and squeal, as he giggles. “Stop it!” I say.

“Hurry, you’re missing out,” he tells me, backing up to give me space to jump in.

I squat down and then splash my naked body into the pool. The water feels so therapeutic against my sore muscles. I dunk my head and then smooth my hair back.

He comes closer with a big smile. He grabs my face and gives me a soft kiss, which swiftly turns into a passionate make-out session.

I rub my hands against his sexy belly and pull him in closer so that our bodies are pressed together. I can feel his hard cock against my stomach. I kiss his cheek, then his neck, then his ears, and then nibble on his earlobe. I breathe heavily into his ear.

He does the same, kissing my cheeks, my neck, my ears. He is nibbling and biting. He moans into my ear.

We go back to kissing but very slow and softly now.

“I love you,” I say into his ear.

“I love you so much,” he says right back into mine. “You are so beautiful and lovely.”

“Oh,” I moan, “you are so handsome and sexy, and you’re so sweet and wonderful.”

He presses his forehead into mine so that we are looking deep into each other’s eyes. His brown eyes are so dazzling, and he finds my blue-green eyes so enchanting.

“I can’t wait to spend the rest of my life with you,” he says in a hazy voice.

“I can’t wait too,” I tell him.

By the side of the pool, are two beer cans. We crack them open and sip on them. We talk about how beautiful the scenery is, and how happy we feel. We laugh a lot and say a ton of funny jokes.

He lights up a very long joint that’s coated in kief. Sparking it up, he lets me take the first hit. I suck in a deep puff and then exhale hard. Coughing a little bit, I giggle and pass it back to him.

“How did you get to be so cute?” I pinch his cheeks, “you are soooo cute!!!” I squeal.

“You’re cuter,” he lightly pushes me, teasing me.

“No way,” I push him back.

“Yes way!” he pushes again, now splashing me a little.

Finishing up the joint, I splash him even more, and then dunk his head in the water. He grabs me and then throws me across the pool, as I scream, and land with a huge splash.

I chase him around the pool until I jump on top of his shoulders and cover his eyes. Then I reach in for a kiss.

He turns me around and then presses me against the wall, grinding his dick against my clit. He kisses me hard, squeezing my breast, as I grab onto his butt and dig my nails into it.

Next he lifts me up and carries me to the very end of the pool, where there is a huge waterfall. Standing right underneath, with the water pouring over us, we kiss.

A moment later, we step aside so that the waterfall is right next to us, and kiss more.

Our chemistry is so magnetic. I could never get sick of it. He is so physically attractive, but the attraction goes deeper than that, to a soul-level. His energy is so consuming. He is full of so much passion. He really makes the world a better place. When I look him deep in the eyes, time stands still, and nothing else matters, I can’t even see anything else. I know that it’s destiny. I know for sure that God created us, intending we would find each other and unite.

“Honey, you are the only one for me,” I tell him in all honesty. “I could never find happiness alone, or with anyone else. Not after knowing you.”

“Darling, you are my whole world,” he wraps his hands against my face, another kiss. “No one else can compare.”

“I was so nervous when we first met, I thought you were too good to be true, so that I couldn’t have you. But I always hoped deep down that we would end up together. I never gave up on that dream. I tried, but it was impossible,” I admit.

“I know we were both insecure, and we both played a lot of games, but I am so glad we finally made it,” he tells me.

“I was just trying to play it cool, and then I realized I needed to be honest about my feelings for you instead of keep on trying to hide it,” I say.

“I was very closed because I’m so easily hurt, because you mean so much to me. Every time you were distant, I felt like I needed to pull away and hide my vulnerabilities,” he says.

“I got so scared every time you pulled back, and my fears kept telling me to think negatively. I kept believing that you didn’t really care for me, that you didn’t really love me,” I say.

“I was so paranoid all the time, and I thought you would turn away and leave at any moment,” he says.

“Now I have so much more faith, and I know we are deeply in love with each other.”

“I am sure of it.”

“I’m sorry it took so long for both of us to open up. But down these walls are down for good.”

“I want to see every part of you from the inside out. And I want you to see every part of me.”

“Nothing can tear us apart,” I say.

“You can never get away from me,” he pulls me in even closer now, squeezing so hard, it hurts – but in a good way.

“Good,” I say.

We kiss even more.

And then we step out of the pool and dry off on a soft bed, both still completely naked.

Now we have pina coladas. He sparks up another joint that we share.

We talk more, and laugh more, and drink more, smoke more, and take in the absolutely beautiful scenery. I never felt more calm in my life.

I roll myself over on top of him, blushing and giggling. He looks deep into my eyes, giggling back, and pushing the hair out of my face.

“I don’t know why you make me laugh so much,” I chuckle, “I just feel so happy and excited around you.”

“Me too,” he agrees.

For a moment, we both pause, simply staring at one another like time is frozen.

“I want to make love to you,” I whisper in his ear.

“Give me everything,” he whispers back, “my one true love.”

More kissing, and then I head downwards, kissing his chest, and then his cute belly. I rub my face against his belly, it’s so manly and inviting. I kiss his belly-button. Then I lick around his stomach and he flinches because it tickles, and we both giggle even more.

Next I lick his cock as I fondle his balls. Jerking my hands against his cock, I shove it deep into my mouth until I gag. I continue blowing him for a moment as he moans out in ecstasy and pure pleasure.

Then he jumps up and pushes me down, hovering over me, he sucks on my boobs and licks my nipples. He presses his fingers against my belly-button ring and moves it around in a circle. He glides his face against the curves of my waist and I feel his stubble against my skin. He licks my stomach, then travels down to lick my inner thighs, massaging them lightly.

He rubs my clitoris until I’m soaking wet, then glides his fingers into my pussy. He licks my pussy all over and eats me out good. I moan and scream so loudly. My whole body is squirming around and trembling, I can barely stand it.

“Make love to me!” I beg.

He spreads my legs and rams his dick in deep. He goes harder and harder, slamming in and out. He flips me over and sticks his dick back in my pussy from behind. He slaps my booty over and over, until there’s a mark. Then he grips a handful of my ass as tight as he can. He beats my ass while continuing to slam his dick in me.

He rolls over and I roll on top of him and ride him like a cowgirl. He watches my breast bouncing up and down. As I’m riding him, he strokes his fingers hard against my clitoris. I scream out so loudly that it echoes across the whole island.

Now he jumps back on top of me and throws my legs in the air so that they’re pressed against his chest. He rolls his hips and I instantly orgasm, losing all control of myself and completely letting go. I cry out and my whole body shakes in ecstasy. I nearly black out, the pleasure is so strong. He watches me lose total control.

And finally, he lets himself go and orgasms too, finishing off.

We lay down together, catching our breath, totally worn out.

After a moment, we both jump back into the pool, still naked. He grabs yet another joint and once again sparks it up. We sit down so that the water is only up to our waist and share the joint. I rest my head on his shoulders, feeling blissful and protected.

[schrijverr]

I Wrote My Own Deliverance

Chapter 5 out of 10

Alexander Hamilton is reborn as Alex Hambleton. He is desperate not to make the same mistakes twice, but it seems he is stuck in the narrative, unable to get out. Familiar faces pop up all around him as he attempts to keep his previous life a secret and write himself out of the story.

On AO3.

Ships: none

Warnings: none, but tell me if I missed anything or if you want me to tag something!!

~~~~~~~~~~

Washington’s project had been the last one before his finals for this semester, which meant that after the finals week he would be done with this year. His first year so far had been a success, he was on his way, the first steps had been set.

The last few weeks went by in a blur as he worked through stacks of books, typed thousands of words and worked himself to the bone only to collapse at the end of his finals, ready to sleep for the rest of time.

Sadly that was not in the cards and the campus would be closing over the summer break, leaving Alex without a place to stay if he didn’t start looking soon.

It was still playing heavily on his mind when he got a text from an unknown number: Martha wants to celebrate your successes this year. If you are free for dinner this Sunday. - G.Wash

His shoulders felt lighter as he excitedly typed out a reply: Tell her I would love to come over and see her again. A. Ham

He usually didn’t sign off his texts, but he was willing to do as Washington did to make the man more comfortable and it reminded him of times when he signed all letters like that. From love letters to slam dunks in the media to grievous notes to surviving family members.

Sunday crept up on him and soon he found himself in his nicest pair of clothing on the steps of a big house as he nervously knocked at the door. Washington had been cool about his decision, but Mama M had always been scarier and he wasn’t sure what would happen when she saw him again.

The door was opened by a beautiful woman with a kind smile, who asked: “Alexander?”

A smile split his face as he replied: “Mama M, it’s good to see your face.”

Immediately he was pulled through the door as Mama M wrapped him up into her arms, before patting him down and telling him he needed to eat more and was he sleeping alright?

When her assessment of him was done, she turned stern and berated: “Now, young man, what were you thinking? I would love to hear how you came to the conclusion you did and broke Eliza’s heart, she was always such a kind young woman.”

He’d seen it coming, but the words were still like a stab in his chest. He had never really forgiven himself for what he had done, even if Eliza had. The Reynolds Pamphlet was the biggest burden he carried and the reason he wanted to prove himself.

Last time he had proven himself worthy of the History Books, this time he would also prove himself worthy of kindness.

“I messed up, Mama M.” he decided on honesty, “I made a mistake and I’m taking this second chance at life to do better, but yeah, I messed up big time and I honestly have no excuses.”

Mama M gave him one more look, before her features softened again: “That was the best answer you could have given, dear. Now, come in. I made beef and I have some vanilla ice cream, are those still your favorites?”

“You know me so well.” Alex smiled as he followed her farther into her home, looking at the pictures on the walls and the old-fashioned décor.

“I see you passed her grilling.” it was very strange to see Washington, former President of the United States of America and now prestigious Professor, in jeans and a Tshirt.

“It would seem so, sir.” Alex grinned back.

“Good then you can go set the table.” Washington smiled.

The dinner was nice. It felt only weeks ago when he had last sat there, even though it was centuries in a different home, surrounded by different faces of the same people. It was familiar in a new way, how he rambled about his classes and Mama M talked about the law firm she worked at, making Alex ask even more questions.

Slowly the conversation turned to the past and the too short retirement Washington had gotten to enjoy. He sighed: “Ah well, life goes as it goes. And Martha and I still go to Virginia each year over the holiday, so it’s not all for naught.”

“That sounds great, sir.” Alex said, then he mused, “I should be looking for somewhere to stay this holiday too, but everything is just so expensive and finding an extra job is hard. Though, I suppose there are quite a few homeless shelters in the city, I’ll figure something out.”

“You have nowhere to stay?” Mama M said, sounding more distressed than Alex had thought.

He quickly backtracked: “No- well, yes, but also don’t worry about it, Mama M. I didn’t mean to say that, just thinking. I’ll manage, really, nothing new.”

Alex was absolutely not helping his case, but he was panicking, so he cut himself some slack.

“You can stay with us, come to Virginia.” she offered, still slightly horrified, “We don’t mind and I’m not leaving you to fend for yourself out there for an entire summer.”

“That is really kind of you, but, uhm-” he shot a helpless look to Washington, who just held his hands up in surrender as he left Alex on his own, “I have a job,” yeah that worked and wasn’t even a lie, “and I really need it, I can’t take time off and traveling from Virginia to my job each day with public transport is going to be too expensive and takes too much time. I really, really appreciate the offer, Mama M, but I really can’t.”

“And what if you stayed here and had the car.” she countered.

“Mama M, I can’t-”

He hadn’t thought of a good argument, but luckily Washington stepped in: “And how will we get to Virginia then, Martha. It’s very sweet you want to help, but Alexander is an adult, he can make his own choices.”

“You and I both know that’s not true.”

“Hey!”

Alex got ignored by the two others who were having a staring match. Martha raised a brow and said: “He could drive us to Virginia, stayed the weekend then drive back by himself and come to pick us up at the end of our holiday?”

“Martha...” was all Washington said as a grin formed on Mama Ms face. She pleasantly smiled: “So that’s settled then. Alex you’re staying here. We still need a cat sitter for Hammy.”

Swallowing heavily Alex accepted, he knew better than to argue with Mama M when she had made up her mind, especially when Washington agreed, reluctant as it might be. Instead he smiled and sincerely replied: “Really, thank you so much, ma’am. You truly are a wonderful woman. Also, Hammy? Please tell me I don’t have another cat-counterpart, Mama M.”

“I do try, you charmer.” she patted his cheek, before rising to clear the table, “And, cat-you really is a sweetheart, you’ll like him.”

Alex jumped up to help her, trailing after her like a puppy as she switched topics to the latest essay for his blog.

[grumpyalpacaman]

Nexus Notes - Chapter One

"I already told you, you big dumb bastard, that energy core regulator isn't worth 3,000 Credits. It's not even close!" The young woman slammed her hands down on the clerk's table. Her eyes set in a narrow glare, she scowled between loose strands of bright red hair that fell in front of her face.

Behind the ramshackle stand of partially gnawed scrap metal stood the enormous shopkeeper.  The device she so coveted was tightly gripped in his huge, clawed hand. Dangling cables swayed to and fro and the polished chrome casing reflected the blinding glare of the sun. 

The taurus were the inhabitants of the planet Kakataka in the Aldebaran star system and the largest, most cantankerous of all sentient species in the galaxy. They were also notorious hoarders.

It erupted in a flurry of guttural growls, its ruddy brown scales rapidly scraping and clattering against one another to create a series of accompanying clicks. The chattering noises he emitted elicited a whir of life from a machine strapped to his broad, tapered chest. The gadget lit up and started to translate in a low, robotic voice.

"You don't know what you're talking about, Nexus. This a rare treasure. There is nothing else like it on Pantainos."

"Zakka, you are so full of shit," she said, as she reached into her lab-coat and withdrew a small pair of oval-shaped glasses. Slipping them over her nose, she peered past the imposing, alien shopkeeper to the staggering pile of discarded mechanical trinkets and components behind his kiosk. “I can see two more in the back from here!” Frantically, she removed her glasses and stuffed them back into her coat.

"3,000 credits or no regulator." 

The young woman stood up as tall as she could and crossed her arms over her chest in her best attempt to look authoritative. She was short and scrawny by human standards, not to mention leaning on a cane and absolutely minuscule compared to the seven-foot monster before her. "Listen here, you idiot, you have no idea what that's worth to me and you're just going to eat it anyway! So hand it over for a fair price and stop impeding scientific progress."

Without warning, the shopkeeper opened his jaws for the first time, the lower portion of his face splitting into two and spreading out in a slavering, triangular maw. Then, he chomped into the device in his hand. His shredding teeth crunched and tore the metal apart with ease as he ripped off a chunk and swallowed it before hurling the remnants straight at Nexus's head.

With only a moment of shock, she narrowly ducked under the incoming projectile. The move sent her stumbling and she barely managed to catch herself with her cane to avoid an untimely fall, face-first onto the cold steel ground. If the yelling earlier hadn't drawn the attention of the other merchants and customers that populated the market, this certainly would. Within moments, Zakka had dunked one of his whopping lizard paws into a pile of scrap parts and used it as a shovel to hurl yet more junk at the girl.

"Whoa! Is this how you treat all your regulars?" Head held low, she scurried away from the bellowing Taurus. Gears and batteries skittered across the ground and peppered her lab coat. One unfortunate stray something or other even bounced harmlessly, but no less annoying, off of her forehead. "Zakka, you Lunatic," she yelled as she departed the market square.

She looked back over her shoulder more than once on her way back to her apartment, just to make sure there wasn't an angry alien reptile behind her. It wasn't until she was nearly three blocks away that she stopped to catch her breath, leaning against the wall of a building and wiping her brow with the sleeve of her coat. Just from that short run, her muscles ached and her chest burned with exertion. "I left my apartment for that damn regulator and the dumbass took a bite right out of it," she said between gasps. “Still, I hope nobody calls the police on him. He may be a seven-foot, spiky asshole, but he’s still got the best stuff in the entire city. And perhaps more importantly, he doesn’t ask ridiculous questions like, ‘what are you gonna do with this?’ or ‘do you have a license for this highly unstable radioactive material?’”

She spent nearly a minute bent over and panting before rising back up and fanning out her coat to relieve some of the intense heat. “What I would do for a breeze right now. Just a little one.”

Pantainos City, built in the most habitable, lush part of the colony planet for which it was named, was in Nexus's own words, "Too damn hot in the Summer to be conducive to intellectual pursuits." So then why, she often wondered to herself, had the United Earth Federation decided to build its premier academies here? Pantainos was one of the UEF's earliest and most prosperous colonies and had become a grand centre for training and education in the past several decades. Academies and accompanying campuses for humanity's most prestigious schools in the fields of science and military had developed here and dominated much of the city. The best and brightest across all of UEF space were sent here to learn.

But far from the glamorous universities and labs at the city's centre, Nexus walked along the ill-tended streets at the fringes of the sprawling metropolis as she made her way home with a scowl on her face. Not that her neighbours could tell the difference between her usual scowl and today’s, extra perturbed scowl. 

The moment she stepped into the lobby of her apartment and felt the cool, temperature-controlled air hit her face, she let out a long sigh. The familiar sights of the dusty floor, the seemingly permanent ‘out of order’ sign on the secondary elevator and the ever-expanding patch of mould on the far wall were just about the only means through which she could differentiate this and every other apartment building on the black. Nexus whispered a silent thanks to the closest thing she knew to a religious figure, Joey the maintenance guy, that one of the two lifts remained operational. If given the choice between the stairs and sleeping on the crumbling bench in the lobby, Nexus would have to spend some time seriously weighing her options.

With only a brief stutter of resistance, the elevator ascended to the second floor and deposited her in the hallway to find yet another annoyance. "Great. If the heat and the taurus weren't bad enough, some ass-clown piled a bunch of boxes in front of my door!" she thought. For some reason or another, cardboard shipping boxes of varying sizes, piled six high, stood right up against the entrance to her apartment.

Without another thought, she stomped forward and delivered a swift, hard kick with a flip-flop clad foot to the side of the box mountain. Much to her chagrin, the pile barely moved. So, she took a step back and shoulder checked it with the entire, fairly insubstantial, weight of her body and this time she sent it tumbling to the floor with an appeasing clatter. She grinned down at her handiwork, hoping there was something both fragile and valuable within.

The commotion brought someone running almost immediately as a man stepped out of the open door across the hall, looking concerned. His expression promptly shifted to surprise and confusion as he spied Nexus standing over the upended pile of his belongings.

If he put on a uniform, he'd look like he walked right out of a military recruitment ad for the Federation. She thought immediately of a very large and very stupid dog. He was like a man-shaped golden retriever and just as blonde.

"Did you knock over my boxes?"

"Oops," she replied with a shrug as she reached for the keycard in her pocket.

"The hell, lady? I keep important stuff in those."

"Well then maybe you shouldn't keep 'em in front of my door." By this point, she was already daydreaming about punching him in his stupidly handsome face. Though she was pretty sure she’d break her hand on that square jaw. 

He furrowed his brow and attempted to speak up but upon noticing the cane in her hand, he suddenly became very stiff and cast his eyes toward the floor. "Uhm... Sorry," he said as he kneeled and started to gather up his things, shuffling them out of the way for her. "So that's your apartment then?"

"Yep, 37B," she said with the absolute most disinterest she could muster while jabbing a thumb toward the numbers posted behind her.

With an armful of boxes, he stood back and extended his free hand toward her. "I'm just moving in next door. I'm Parker Walsh."

Her eyes drifted back and forth between his hand and his face for several seconds. "Are you suggesting I make physical contact with you?"

"Generally speaking, an offer to shake hands with someone would imply that, yes." Yet more confusion was starting to creep into his voice.

"Ew.” Rolling her eyes, she turned, swiped her card over the electronic lock and stepped into her apartment.

"Ouch," he shot back. "Can I at least have your name?"

"Nexus," she said as she slammed the door behind her.

"There is no way that is your real name," he yelled with his lips scant inches from the door but to no response.

"Parker?" said another man, sticking his head out of the open apartment. He was thinner and less chiselled than his friend but with a sly, fox-like countenance. "What are you doing out here?"

Parker shrugged. "Neighbour girl kicked over our boxes."

"And so you quit unpacking to come out here and flirt with her?"

"Not at first."

"But you did flirt with her?"

"She didn't even give me a chance. It’s just not fair."

"My heart aches for you, brother. Now get back to work. We need everything set up by tomorrow."

"On it." With boxes in hand, he started back toward his apartment, taking one glance at the door behind him as he went. "Well then. See you around, Nex."

The moment she stepped inside her apartment and flicked on the lights, she felt her legs start to shake. She grumbled softly, finally allowing herself to wince at the constant pain she felt in her muscles and eased her body into the wheelchair lying in wait by the door.

Inside her apartment, where one might normally find furniture, decorations or just about anything, Nexus had cables, power generators and several large processors stacked against the wall. In the corner sat a desk with a pair of computers, razor-thin glass panes mounted on swivelling stands. Nexus produced a third, smaller device from inside her coat. With a few swipes on the surface, her chair wheeled itself over to the desk. Once situated, she began sliding her fingers across the dual screens and they came alive with images and information. Her eyes darting back and forth between them. Within arm's reach of her chair sat the single greatest scientific achievement of mankind, an espresso machine. The divine tool was accompanied by a mountain of discarded flavour pods, generally counting among the excessively sweet variety. Though that didn’t stop Nexus from addition several more teaspoons of those godly white granules once the machine had finished its business.

All this technology (save the espresso machine) was connected to a strange, ceiling-high object in the middle of the room. The device occupied the vast majority of the available floor-space. It appeared to be a huge mechanical ring of some kind; that stood eight feet high and across. At the moment, it was deactivated.

She looked upon the centrepiece of her chamber briefly, shook her head, and returned to her work. "Damn Zakka, always a pain in my ass."

It wasn't long before she noticed she had an update on her post on the local University forums. She wasn't exactly a student, but where else was she going to share her hypotheses?

"Oh fantastic, this idiot," she said with mock excitement when she saw who posted. "Hello, Student 681966, a man so boring he uses his student ID as his screen name." Nex skimmed over his latest dull refutation of her work and rolled her eyes. 

"Your ridiculous idea of a potential intersystem artificial intelligence program has no bearing in modern computer science. Even the most simple-minded of your species is aware that software is limited by hardware.

You persist in the idea that your entirely theoretical sub-space processor would alleviate this issue and allow a program to move freely between systems, but this has in itself a litany of issues. There is no evidence to support the idea that information can travel freely between sub-space and normal space. How do you propose such a device would maintain a fixed location within sub-space? In addition, the power requirements would be astronomical.

Fixed sub-space pockets have never been found to be a remote possibility and tests have resulted in failure, every single time. The only possible use for sub-space is point A to B travel through fixed gates."

With a guttural groan of frustration, Nexus swept a hand back through her sweat-matted hair. "This guy has no imagination."

Reclining in her chair steepling her fingers, Nex pondered the list of possible rebuttals. Everything from explaining the potential power of a flywheel energy storage system in the absolute vacuum of sub-space or reference to the sub-space tests performed by Earth scientists decades earlier that implied the possibility of direct access to sub-space beyond simple two-way passages. However, when she received a sudden response from a rather important contact, she decided to let her opposition stew for a little while.

Anxiously, she opened the message with a tap of her finger and pulled the contents up on-screen.

"I have acquired the information you requested."

That alone was all she needed to send her mind alight with fireworks. There was some more afterward about releasing the hold on the promised payments and how to contact him again. She absent-mindedly tapped out an affirmative response and delved into the attached files with all haste possible.

A few weeks ago she'd contacted someone who claimed to have worked on some classified Federation experiments performed on Pantainos. She'd been making a few inquiries about them and they had become a subject of great interest to her, even though they never got off the ground. What they were attempting to develop and why it failed is still unknown to this day, but Nexus's digging had told her that it had something to do with personal-sized sub-space gates, as opposed to the massive rings that transported ships across the galaxy.

"I was right," she muttered to herself after nearly twenty minutes of poring over the contents. "Schematics, test results, dates and locations."

She gleaned from the notes that they had managed to design a miniaturized sub-space gate, though from what she could find, it wasn't able to sustain itself before collapsing after only a few seconds. Several pages appeared to be missing, including details of who was involved and the purpose of the experiments, but all the technical data she needed was right here in these files.

Again she gazed upon the massive mechanism in the centre of her apartment, this time with new excitement and rattling nerves. She bit her lip and considered her options before giving a small nod of affirmation. "To hell with the regulator, I've got work to do."

She wheeled over to the huge ring and pushed herself out of her chair. For hours she consulted the new specifications and adjusted her machine. Multiple trips were made back and forth between the device and her computer and she went through around a dozen cups of coffee and sixty teaspoons of sugar. She scoured every crate of spare parts she had lying around (which was no small number) and the clamour of her tools filled the apartment until the early morning.

She awoke with a start around noon the next day. She had passed out in her wheelchair with a collection of her tools sprawled across her lap and around her wheels. She yawned, grumbled and rubbed the sleep from eyes shadowed by black bags.

Blinking rapidly, Nexus looked at her device, consulted the schematics and then back to the device. It was a match. Better than a match even. She felt she'd improved on the old schematics. "I did it?" She brushed back a tangle of red hair and chuckled to herself. "Of course I did it."

Still coming to, she mumbled out a few commands. "Computer, begin recording a new log now. " A small robot, not unlike an ambulatory tripod, came alive. There was a lens built into the machine’s head, which promptly veered in Nex’s direction.

She pushed herself to her feet and stumbled toward the terminal mounted at the edge of her ring-like device. "Sub-space portal NG Model-1, test 27, sans energy core regulator. Upgraded system to further compensate for the Verdricci effect. Added new subsystems to target a specific location within sub-space, based on new research documents. No more firing off randomly. Begin activation now."

Triumphantly, she punched in the key sequence to start up the machine and listened with glee as it whirred. Lights flickered on around the ring and sparks coursed across the empty space in the middle.

Staring into her would-be sub-space gate, Nexus's hands shook excitedly. "Alright UEF, let's see what you were up to."

The machine's laboured noises intensified and she could feel a charged tingle on her skin. Then, all at once, a disc of torn space appeared inside the ring, contained and stable. Her smile vanished, only to be replaced by a slack jaw and wide eyes. The sight beyond the portal sent shivers through her body and made her stomach churn. Floating in the vast emptiness of sub-space, was a cylindrical device surrounded by lifeless human corpses.

[stephhannes]

212.

one year ago, we left new york.

a week before we moved out of our apartment, i started cleaning. our kitchen was a straight-up disaster zone. when we first moved in, the AC unit in the kitchen was leaking underneath the tiles so everything was just….moist for awhile. for whatever reason, nathan refused to call maintenance whenever something was broken in the apartment so we lived with a wet floor for months until it started leaking in the apartment below us and they fixed it one day when i was at work.

because of that, there were weird remnants of amazon boxes that had melted and become a frankentile with the flooring. and we put off cleaning that for….the entire time we lived there. nathan’s whole concept of cleaning was “we can put it off until right before we move, it’ll be fine, we’ll still get our security deposit back.” i, however, could not live in a scum palace, so i would clean up once a week, but a lot of it slipped through the cracks. so the week before we left, there i was, cleaning all the cracks in the kitchen. i sat and scrubbed the kitchen floor for hours, painstakingly scraping up weird sticky spots and cardboard. there was a drawer that just had loose rice in it from a broken bag, and cleaning that was surprisingly tricky. i lysol’d the chicken shelf. i completely dismembered our stove to scrub underneath the burners. i swept up all of the onion skin and coffee grounds that had fallen in the crevice between the counters and the fridge. and then i moved onto the bathroom. while i wish i could have taken a match to the room, i just poured fabuloso all over the entire space, which is basically the same thing. my favorite part was when nathan came home one day and was like “wow, the bathroom looks so nice….why did you clean it?” and i was just like…..because, you idiot, we’re moving in a week and i’m trying to get a security deposit back. the only thing worse than having to clean all of the hair out of the sink was the period of time that our bathtub wouldn’t drain and i had to take a bath with every shower i took.

i’m a person who likes to be over-prepared. especially when it comes to things like traveling, or moving. i make lists, i get all my ducks in a row ahead of time and count them twice. nathan is the exact opposite. we left nyc on the morning of may 23rd, and i couldn’t quit work until may 21st, because i couldn’t afford to take any more days than that off. in my head, i anticipated that on the 22nd we would have been doing the final touches on cleaning and packing. we would have all our furniture out, all of the floors swept, everything we were taking back to texas in suitcases. the only thing we’d have out is the mattress so that we could go to bed at a decent time and be well-rested for our flight the next morning, the only thing we’d have to do in the morning is toss our mattress on the streets and leave.

but of course, that’s not how it panned out. the week leading up to moving, nathan did absolutely nothing in regards to packing. the only thing that got done was the prior cleaning i had accomplished. on may 21st, i got very drunk at my going-away party at work, came home at some stupid hour and fell asleep. i woke up at like 2pm on the 22nd, and nathan still hadn’t started anything. i had to go run an errand downtown, so i picked up the halal guys on my way back uptown. when i got back, we ate and then he went to the gym and then i was like uhhh ok i guess i should start getting shit together. so while he was at the gym i packed up all of my clothes. then, when i moved onto packing up the kitchen, i realized there was a lot of alcohol still left, and me, being a certified poor person, didn’t want to waste the money i had spent on it, so i started drinking while cleaning. when he got back from the gym, we accomplished my favorite part of moving- we slam dunked his nasty basketball shoes right into the dumpster.

we took turns throwing trash out into the hall, and leaving furniture down in the lobby. and eventually, around 4am, we had most of our garbage cleaned out of the apartment. also by this point, i had sobered up from drinking earlier in the night and was feeling dehydrated and terrible. all i wanted to do was sleep, but we still had so much to get done. by this point, i was getting stressed because we definitely were not close to finishing on time.

my breaking point was when we were trying to re-assemble our smoke detector. we disassembled it at some point early in our time living there because it would go off even if we were just boiling water. nathan struggled to put it back together for like 10 minutes and called me into the hallway to advise. me, being a person who’s done this before suggested, “oh so you have to flip that latch and then put the battery on top of it, then screw on the top,” and of course, immediately, nathan was like “no, that’s not right that doesn’t make any sense,” and after struggling for five more minutes i pushed him out of the way and was like, “oh my god let me do this” and i re-assembled it on my first try. because i was right.

we watched the sun rise over the GWB one last time.

our flight was leaving in 3 hours. we still had a couch, and a bed, and a table in the apartment. i had a headache. we hadn’t eaten in hours. so while nathan ran out to get bagels i cried for a solid 15 minutes out of exhaustion and stress.

i moved to new york with two suitcases. one for all my clothes/shoes, and one for towels, linens and pillows. somehow i thought i’d be able to leave new york with two suitcases, despite having accumulating even more stuff. i was shocked when i was actually able to fit everything that i owned and wanted to keep into one suitcase, my second one was basically just dedicated to nathan’s shoes and winter clothes.

when we were leaving for the airport i remember mentioning, “hey we should probably call an uber because i doubt all of our suitcases are going to fit into a taxi,” but nathan refused, so we walked two blocks to get a taxi and then had to spend a stupid amount of time playing jenga to get our suitcases into aforementioned taxi. two fit in the trunk, one was in the front seat, one was in my lap.

my suitcase was 10lbs overweight and southwest charges $75 for an overweight bag. so of course i lost my god damn mind and started crying and flung myself to the floor and started throwing things out of my bag and trying to shuffle things around to get it underweight. i was an airport goblin. here’s the thing: i’m actually very good at traveling. i’ve gotten my personal travel down to a science and i love flying and am usually very collected. but i was so stressed, i hadn’t slept in a day, and it truly brought out the worst in me.

once we made it onto the plane nathan told me that he never wanted to travel with me again because i am a disaster, and i promised that i’m not usually like that, but he definitely didn’t believe me- i’m so glad i made a good first impression. whenever we got to our parents’ houses back in texas i sent him a very nice text apologizing for being the human equivalent of a hurricane and he was just like, “it’s fine, you’re lucky i love you and also that i know exactly who you are.” which is true, i’m lucky that he knew and accepted exactly what kind of gremlin he was about to spend the rest of his life with.

despite paying a disgusting amount of money in rent, that was a dope little apartment. we had more space than we knew what to do with, literally half of our furniture in the living room was just a pile of nathan’s clothes because we needed something to take up some space. it was nice to have a doorman, even though there were a handful of times when i got stopped on my way into the building. my favorite time was when i rolled in at 3am after drinking with coworkers, and i had left my columbia ID in the apartment. usually this wasn’t an issue, but the person at the front desk stopped me for once and wouldn’t let me go upstairs without it. when you’re an actual columbia student, it’s not an issue because you can just give your student ID number to get in, but i was like “uhhhhh i don’t have one, i don’t go here, my husband does, please just let me into my home i want to be in my bed i am so drunk” and they were like “ok well he can bring your ID or he can sign you in,” and i was like “I PAY SO MUCH MONEY IN RENT HERE. MY ID IS UPSTAIRS, IN THE APARTMENT THAT I PAY RENT FOR, I CAN GO UPSTAIRS, TO THE APARTMENT I LIVE IN, AND BRING MY ID AND SHOW IT TO YOU” at this point, the doorman was DONE with me and was like, “well if i let you upstairs to get your ID, i’d still be letting you into the building without an ID and i can’t do that,” and i stood corrected, yeah ok touché, and then i had to call nathan to bring down my ID. luckily he was still awake, and since i was very drunk and love drama when i get stressed i started crying in the lobby while i was waiting for nathan to come downstairs. i would say this was my NYC rock bottom, but my NYC rock bottom was obviously the night i threw up in a mcdonald’s and 3 subway stations and lost my phone.

even though i was constantly stressed living in NYC, it was nice being able to come home to an apartment that wasn’t tiny, had a ton of natural light, and never had a rat (or carpenter bee) problem. i’m also so glad we got to avoid having roommates. we never really “moved into” our apartment- all of our furniture was trash we collected off of the streets, i never decorated anything, or even hung up all of my clothes. we knew we were going to be leaving new york after that year, so we tried to invest as little money as possible into the apartment. in fact, we invested so little money in the apartment that i didn’t have a mirror the entire time we lived there- we also had no overhead lighting. we found one lamp, so our bedroom got a lamp. if we wanted light in the living room, instead of just buying two lamps, we’d have to decide which room needed the light more and move the lamp accordingly.

when we moved to philly, even though all of our furniture was the cheapest we could find at walmart, we still actually spent money on buying matching furniture. pretty much all of our decor came from my old apartment in austin, but at least we tried to do some decorating. even though we put effort into having a kind of put-together home, it still felt less like home than 60 haven avenue did.

here’s a few pictures of our old apartment. first, the living room- where you can see “the pile” in its full glory. instead of folding and putting clothes away, nathan just dumped all of his clothing in a pile in the living room, partially because he didn’t care about organization and partially to just fill up some dead space. second, a corner of our bedroom- we fit a full mattress and still had a ton of space in the room. the window looked out at the GWB, which was my favorite part of the apartment. third, the bathroom- the only reason the shower curtain and bath mat look coordinated is because i brought them with me from my austin apartment. (the only reason we have a shower curtain is because i brought it. nathan didn’t think we needed one, and literally didn’t have one for a few weeks before i moved in). finally, the kitchen- it was pretty small but it did the job. this is a terrible picture of it, but you can see the amazon boxes that got fused to the floor when the floor started to leak. also pictured is a broom and dustpan, two items that sat in plain sight in the kitchen the entire time we lived there, but that nathan was still shocked to learn that we owned the first time he saw me sweeping the floors. 

[memoriashell]

webs

Characters / Pairing: Muffet, some vague Mettaton / Muffet, some vague Undyne / Muffet, some Napstablook, and if you really squint you might see some Alphyne in the bg.

crossposted on ao3 ft. the full extent of my notes

Notes: Hi @roxrezi, I'm your secret santa! Since I quite love myself some Muffet, I thought I’d write something with her for you. I also really wanted to try writing some Undyne / Muffet and Mettaton / Muffet, and somewhere along the way I went from planing out something with everyone’s first holiday on the surface to... an exploration of various route endings and not at all holiday related. Whoops. This was also supposed to be a lot shorter, but here we are at 4k words instead. I hope you enjoy reading this as much as i enjoyed writing it! This was done as a part of @undertalesecretsanta . Thank you mods for all your efforts in hosting the event! 

Summary:  Webs are a sticky, tricky thing, really. Fortunately, spiders know how to untangle themselves from even the trickiest of webs.

( an apt way to view the branches of fate, really )

A human, they whisper, a human is coming. Get the soul and you will be rewarded.

And so, once again, Muffet finds herself with a renewed purpose. She has grown tired of fussy monsters who will not help her, of having to swindle for even a little bit to be thrown her way. She won’t need to bake for profit ever again if she succeeds. She can finally relax.

Soon. Soon she will have enough, and everything will be alright. The spider clan will be rich and able to be reunited, and they can all be happy together, and she will be happy too—

( — and this is the thought she hold onto when the frying pan slams down on her body ).

i.

The Ruins are ( mostly ) empty. Same goes for Snowdin, and Waterfall—

She wonders if they were bored by the time they got to Hotland. Despicable, really, but seeing as they hadn’t harmed her or her spiders, she can’t completely hate them either.

No, that is a lie, Muffet absolutely detests that human. Her spiders may come first, but that does not make her heartless when it came to other monsters. But she is a woman of her word, there was no reason to kill a human that had supported her cause.

( Was it wrong of her to have done so? Perhaps. Maybe then, there would be a little more liveliness left in the Underground, flashy and loud— )

Napstablook is generous enough to assist her with arranging help with getting the spiders out of the Ruins; the fact that, despite everything, her spiders can be reunited is barely a silver lining, but she’ll take what she can get. The fact that she can afford to bring them home hardly matters, when the Underground is so sparse and the Ruins are opened up once again. It’s not even nearly as much of a hassle, as cold as Snowdin is to travel through. Traps and puzzles are deactivated, there is no need for those things anymore, so there is little but the cold to slow her down.

The spiders are back home, where they should be. Hotland is more or less the same, minus two voices— one loud and glamorous, one not so. Everything should be fine, by those standards.

But it’s not.

It is not.

The world just does not feel quite right.

ii.

Every king needs their queen— no, that is a lie. Mettaton needs no one, if she is to be honest, but she is good at her job.

Muffet dangles from her web, flaunting— a menacing flash of her flash of her fangs. Intimidate their ‘foes’ into confessing their ‘crimes’— work that she could leave to that skeleton, sure, but Sans has always been lazy. She, however, never slacks off.

( Perhaps no real wrongdoings have been done, but it’s fine discarding a few extra ingredients from the batch. Better than letting them sit and go bad— rotten ingredients were never any good. It would spoil the whole batch!

Besides, her pet, her darling Cupcake needed a treat to be rewarded with. What better than something she needed to get rid of anyways? )

It wasn’t like she did not benefit from it either. Why would she serve a fussy customer— no, let her rephrase that: Muffet found no point, no joy in serving someone who did not service her needs too. Even when that someone was the ruler of the Underground, known for whispers of sudden disappearances; she had enough pride left that she would not let herself be squished under Mettaton’s heel like some pest. Her spiders had been brought home with his generosity, and it is oh so fun to watch monsters squirm when she watches them with two, four, five eyes, and claps in joy with her hands— that is a thrill unlike anything else, one that even the capturing of a soul surely wouldn’t have brought. It is not all bad, the monsters had never done anything to serve her, why should she spare them now?

( There is a reason why monsters do not come to her parlor anymore ).

No, while the spider monster might hold a grudge for none of them to be willing to help her cause, that was then and this is now. This is a matter of business, dearie, did you not understand that? Muffet coos and is amused in her tittering, as she watches confusion spread across features.

Spiders may live with her now, but that did not mean that some did not linger in other parts of the Underground. Allow for the whispers to reach corners and make its way back to her. It was always a fun choice to make, what to do with that information. Let one of the ‘agents’ handle this? Handle it herself? Do nothing with it?

( Those who enter the parlor do not usually leave ).

Of course, she can always hand the task over to Mettaton, but she usually left that for the worst offenses only. It was much more delightful to watch and wait to see how he’d react on such occasions, if it was worth making a mess of himself for. More often than not, the answer was yes, and she would make sure the webs were keeping the prey in place, maybe paralyze them if they seemed particularly rowdy, but otherwise sat back to admire his work.

Despite it all, she does not think he’s a bad person— would that not make her a bad person too? Muffet knows that once, he was not half a bad person, despite what one might believe; she was once not an entirely bad person either, despite her arguments that she has remained unchanged all these times.

It wasn’t their fault that they were like this, was it?

“Darling,” He beckons for her, so she lowers herself from her web, dropping herself from the sticky silk with ease and onto his lap. She hardly weighs a thing to a monster made of metal, two hands settling themselves on his shoulders, two others coming up to cup his face. “Have you heard the news?”

“Dearie.” She returns, a brief kiss; her eyes blink at him. “You are the news~” Which is, technically speaking, true. MTT News was the Underground’s news source. Perhaps not like what it once was, but still news.

The robot gives her a look that seems unimpressed, but she knows he’ll let her get away with it ( almost anyone else would’ve been too scared to even consider talking back, she enjoys such privilege with glee ). “You’ve been holding out on me. There was an incident on the edges of Hotland?”

Ah, that. Well, what can she say? She knows Mettaton likes keeping away from the lab. She shrugs, fangs peeking out as she grins. “Someone simply needed a dunk in the river, ahuhu~~” A forceful dip, perhaps, but what did the details matter. If he can read between the lines and figure out what exactly that all means, it does not show; of course, he is an actor, she would not be surprised if he knows exactly and simply opts to not speak of it.

“Well—” He starts, a pause, she’s caught him off guard. Hadn’t predicted her answer. A mechanical clearing of his throat, before he speaks again. “Well, that still calls for a punishment... or perhaps a reward?”

There’s a gleam in her eyes, a grin and a giggle before she’s pulling back. “Already a step ahead of you~ I brought them back for you speak to, fufufu~”

“Ah, now you’re speaking my language, gorgeous.”

( A butterfly and a spider trapped in a web—

—who is really the victim here? )

iii.

Humans aren’t so bad, she decides. She still lacks enough to bring the spiders back home, and they were still stuck in the Underground, but they weren’t dead. It’s not all bad. They made an effort to help her, which is more than she can say for some monsters.

The shy, nerdy one passes through, sometimes, to check up on her; and she will flash her fangs at the scientist and giggle as she scampers off. Other days Muffet will leave her web, willingly, to see the spiders now that the Ruins aren’t closed off.

One time, she leaves to go through to Snowdin, try and figure out if there is a good way to bring the spiders home. Even if she’s cold, at least the Royal Guard is there to help her.

( Which roughly translates to, at least the Canine Unit was there to try and play with her. And then went to fetch Papyrus when they realized she wasn’t interested in them, who in turn fetched Undyne, because Undyne was likely to be more helpful at assisting ).

Muffet likes Undyne ( only kind of like that ) because she’s to the point. She doesn’t bother with trying to skirt around things— time is money, as the saying goes, and while Muffet is not really that greedy with her money, she’d much rather not freeze to death out in Snowdin. Unfortunately, the former captain has very little advice to offer, since the main issue is the fact that the forest is big and the spiders would probably die before they even reached town. The cold is not a foe that can be fought, unfortunately; she laughs a little when the warrior offers to beat up the cold nonetheless. On a more serious note, Undyne also offers to check in with Alphys for her opinion, which is favor she wouldn’t have been willing to ask for on her own, so she’s somewhat thankful for that.

She hasn’t visited with Napstablook in a while, so she does that— she nabbed some ghost pastries in advance for this particular occasion. Just because she only sold spider goods didn’t mean she was incapable of baking other things! For a very select audience, perhaps, but she liked to think of it less as business and more like the kind of favor one did for their friend. They were supportive of her cause and if she baked a few goods for them every now and then in return, what of it? They needed something good, they were always so blue— not that she can blame them for that, but that’s besides the point.

She realizes a little too late that her sudden visit has intruded on something— well, probably something, she’s not entirely sure if they are lying on the floor in accordance to ‘tradition’, or for some other reason. Muffet spares a brief glance to their other visitor, a figure she can recognize quite well, but opts to ignore for the time being.

“oh... i wasn’t... expecting to see you... muffet...” They greet her; the sort of dejected manner they hold themselves with has always made her frown ( she’s glad to see she’s not the only one, if the motion in her peripherals is to be any indication ).

“Why not? You’re my best customer~” Teasing, she’s only teasing as the basket is offered to them. “I had some... business to attend to in Snowdin~ I thought I would come by to keep you company afterwards.”

“oh, right... the spiders are still in the ruins... aren’t they? i’m sorry... i’d help if i could... but the snail business is... still pretty bad.”

Muffet tuts at him, as if she’d blame him. They were both suffering from not being to make money off their fellow monsters, Napstablook was just better natured about it. She was not, though. “Ah, speaking of that, dearie~ I’ve got quite the story about that!” She ignores the metallic sound of their third party getting up, ignores what she assumes to be a glare. “You remember the human who came through, yes? Quite a darling~~ Even helped donate to our bake sale a little~ Not that I knew that when I was fighting them. And—”

“Darling.” Mettaton drawls, and she knows she’s annoyed him. Good! She almost killed an innocent human on his behalf! He’s cunning, Muffet will give him that, but she does not enjoy being deceived like that. He should be at least half as annoyed as she is. “Your gossip is going to put me to sleep. Please change the topic before you bore me any more than you already have.”

“i... don’t really mind...” Napstablook chimes in, though they seem to go ignored.

“You’re no fun. Fine~” She pouts, four arms crossed; she’ll drop the topic for now. Besides, she doesn’t really need to give Napstablook something else to be sad about. “Would you like to hear about the gossip in Snowdin instead then?”

Later, when she leaves Blook Acres, she knows she is not alone, because she can hear the plodding of heeled boots, so she stops and waits for him to catch up— it doesn’t really make much of a difference since they both need to take Hotland’s elevator to get back to their respective homes, but there was no need for her to make him chase after her ( well, maybe it’d be fun to have someone chase after her, but she digresses. It’s a time waster right now ).

“I feel as though I might... owe you an apology.” He starts, and Muffet wants to snort a little— an apology would be far from compensation, but it might be a step in the right direction. If she’s feeling generous. “I was not aware that things were so dire for you. Allow me to make up for it.”

She’s still upset that Mettaton so easily played her for a fool— holding a grudge, however, feels foolish for now ( or maybe she’s being fooled again, only the angel knows ). “And what do you get out of it?”

“Well, I’d never! But, you know, if you’re offering— the spiders being saved from the Ruins would be quite a broadcast worthy moment.”

She groans because, of course, she should have expected there’d be a catch, and of course, it’s a ridiculous catch ( really, she was expecting something entirely different )— only fitting for someone with as much grandeur as him. It’s such a small price for her, though, so she will begrudgingly agree.

It’s better. Things are not the best— this is far from their best ending.

But it’s better, she can’t ask for much else.

iv.

People come. People leave. That is the way this world works, she knows. People come and go, and she has no intentions of trying to make them stay. Such is futile.

Muffet laughs and giggles at monsters who pass through her domain, at the ones that try and convince her to leave her home. What an opportune moment, is what she thinks, and so she stays, like always.

Silly scientists.

( While she regrets not tying Alphys up and playing with her a bit, she’s never seen the lizard so determined— frantic and anxious, yes, that is a given as far as she can tell, but determined is not. So she lets her go on her way, knows that something is coming her way and prepares ).

She is no hero— Muffet would laugh in your face at even the mere suggestion of such— she is no hero, she is not trying to defeat that thing for the sake of others.

No, such a greedy human deserves no pity, no break. One who may have supported her cause all the same, but that is besides the point. A being who has killed so many must have quiet some money— sure, it’s a shame she must go about funding her cause this way, but she thinks the monsters would have preferred it go to her than their killer. Surely, this time, she can succeed in bringing the spiders home. She can be happy knowing that, for a fact.

So she cackles when the thing finally decides to show up, pass through her nest— a foolish move, she thinks. Why would you go through her home? No one is more familiar with the webbed area like she is, it is so easy to catch the tiny little thing like the pest it is. It hardly even seems human when it stares her down like that, face devoid of any emotion. Unfeeling, unlike any monster. Muffet grins and bares her fangs at it and—

She is cocky, has hardly had the time to utter even a sentence; doesn’t notice the weapon until it has collided with her painfully.

v.

This isn’t right.

Her spiders scuttle around her feet, whispers of go home, go home, go home.

Muffet does not bake, she does not tease to munch on people— in this small town, too idle for anyone’s wellbeing, she does not do anything. A monster like her has no place here.

She might as well be a ghost.

( Go home, go home, go back underground.

If only things were that easy ).

Something happens out there, she knows— an echo of laughter falls from her lips.

She does not go out.

( Go back, go back.

She waits until they can go back ).

vi.

It is probably a good thing that their leader is a lively one, or else she thinks that monster’s spirits would’ve been much lower than they currently were. It was not as simple as turning on the television to watch Mettaton’s shows to make them smile anymore. A shame, truly, because while Muffet did not care for those kind of flashy things, had no care for stars of that caliber, she can recognize something has been lost from the Underground.

( A shame, but it really makes no difference to her in the end. Her spiders have been spared, so that’s all that matters to her. The safety of her spiders.

It’s easier to act like that’s all that matters, that things are better for her that way, at least ).

Their new ruler is much more brutal. Blunt. Blood-thirsty— and sure, Undyne’s always been kind of like that, probably. It was an admirable trait, for the head of the Royal Guard; it is a good trait for a ruler too, when supported by the people that she rules over.

Muffet tuts at her and wonders if she will grow to regret that, however, when her grief finally fades. She can mourn those who were lost, but she cannot do so forever. People will move past their grief, eventually... or die when their hope finally gives out.

( She leaves Hotland, passes the lab with its broken doors, forced open when it’d been quiet for too long. It is a sorry echo of what it had once been there. Of who had once been there.

It doesn’t matter, she reaffirms ).

One of her spiders accompanies her, riding on her shoulder; the others stay safe at home with her dear pet. She grabs onto her dress with two of her arms, lifts it up as she wades through the waters of Waterfall. She does not really care for the wet, rocky terrain of Waterfall, but she can afford to make sacrifices. It’s not like any of them have better things to be doing.

( Despite what one may think, she is not entirely all selfish. That said, she is not selfless either, she has her reasons for doing what she does. Her own trivial sort of gain ).

She leaves ghost pastries with Napstablook and checks up on the snails ( she does not care for that wet, slimy thing, but they are friends of the spiders, kind of, and they are tasty, so it’s only with brief prodding before she goes on her way ). Napstablook tells her what she needs to know in exchange for the treats, though she knows they would have told her regardless, just as she would’ve given them to them regardless.

She’s not at her former home, but the piano echoes in the corridors long before she is even close to reaching her. An echoing reminder of how much more empty Waterfall ( the Underground in general, really ) is these days, there is no Shyren to sing along with the occasional plink of an off key note. Once, Muffet would have come to Waterfall to see Napstablook and would have expected to hear the warrior training. Loud clanging of pots and voices yelling while they cooked. The piano playing might have been loud and passionate, fierce and angry at a situation like this, but it is much more dull and sullen now, an almost fragile sound. She finds the Empress draped over the piano, quietly— in a world of her own, probably. She wonders if she has cried today too.

( Once, Muffet thinks she might have not minded the Underground being so empty. She is not sure how to feel anymore ).

Two arms reach up to smooth her hair back into being ‘presentable’— she is pretty sure Undyne has never cared for her appearance, but a leader should look the part— two others gently pull her back in a gesture that could be considered a hug. “Your people await you, dearie~” There is a hum of acknowledgment and little more, but that is fine. She’s not here to fix what cannot be mended.

( Once, Muffet feels like this could have been love ).

vii.

Surface spiders are so very interesting, Muffet decides. When the human— Frisk— mentions to her that the surface has quite a variety of spiders, she did not think they meant it as sincerely as they did. They are so similar to the ones at her home, yet vastly different all the same. She wonders at what point spider monsters and human spider-animal-things changed, but that sounds like a biology thing that Alphys could probably answer in a way that would make no sense to her. So she will just wonder and appreciate the similarities between them— they can communicate with each other, so there’s that. Do the differences even matter, knowing that?

The surface world in general, is very interesting. Muffet does not technically need to bake anymore since the spiders are free, but she does need to make a ‘living’ of sorts, and baking is the easiest way of doing that. Humans may be skeptical of food with spiders in it, but her fellow monsters are finally coming around to her pastries, so all is well.

Well, sort of.

As good for business as all the attention is, it brings about some... unwanted guests. That is probably a generous way of describing the current pest.

“Cameras aren’t allowed back here, dearie~ No exceptions. Leave~~” She’s very to the point about it, easily weaving around Mettaton’s boxy build to get to the oven so she can check on what she’s baking— she needs no pests hanging about, nor does she need any additional distractions. There’s a pause where she thinks he’s actually going to put up a fight, but seems to think better of it and dismisses the camera crew with a wave of his hand. Not the outcome she’d expected, but better. Workable.

“I’m not stopping to talk to you, so speak up~” Muffet might have spiders to help her, but there is only so much they can do, which means she doesn’t have the time for a break. It’s probably good that she has the extra arms to pitch in.

“A brand deal would only benefit the both of us, you know. I’ll provide you with some proper advertising. If we combined our efforts, we’d be actual competition against Grillby’s.”

“Grillby’s doesn’t sell sweets~~ Humans, on the other hand... Still, I’m doing fine here. I don’t need your silly brand~” She bares her teeth in a way that she wants to be menacing ( unfortunately, Mettaton is not a tiny and naïve human, so he doesn’t even flinch— he laughs, the audacity! ); he looks put out, though, so she supposes that’s a victory.

Also unfortunately, Mettaton is stubborn, so even though she gets rid of him for the day, he returns no less than three times that week. Never alone, either, so as much as she would like to rid of him, it’s not so easy to do so. Business propositions are put aside for casual conversations, but she doesn’t trust him so easily ( she’s been deceived by him once before, no need to go doing that again ).

She feels uneasy, like— like she’s missing something. Like something should have happened. But nothing happens, and she’s not sure if that’s a good thing or not. They monsters more than deserve some peace after everything, so she’ll take the peace as a sign of good things to come.

( Even if it cannot last ).

[when-will-mail-come]

I wanted to translate the Animedia Magazine 2018 July Issue’s Gundam W portion like ↑ with the translation surrounding the picture with arrows, but I don’t know how to. Please be satisfied with ↓. For those that want to read the original text (that I photographed), go here.

1

37(Everyone) 450(Welcome～) to the Animedia Carnival

2

　The next legendary anime to be introduced is the following;『New Mobile Report Gundam W』. This work is one of the many『Gundam』series, and from April 1995 to March 1996 the TV series aired. In 1997 the 3 episodes OVA 『New Mobile Report Gundam W Endless Waltz』continuation was created, and in 1998 the re-edited『Special Edition』version of that was released theatrically. Even now after 20 years have passed its popularity has not waned, rerunning since February 2018 on TOKYO MX. Gathering interest even from people exposed to this work for the first time, there has been a resurgence in popularity.

　One point that needs a special mention with this work is that, it is the forerunner of a『Gundam』series that won fanatical female fans. Though 『Gundam』series are now supported by many demographics regardless of gender,『Gundam』fans before this work were mainly children and men, who the related merchandise targeted. The biggest factor behind how this work managed to capture the hearts of women, in this situation, was that the 5 main characters were prominent. Not only were the 5 main characters beautiful boys, they had strong personalities that were unable to be described in one word. Some acted calm, cool, and collected to fulfill their missions, while others took flabbergasting actions that were mind boggling. The interactions between them, and the words and deeds that exceeded the viewers’ imaginations, continued to charm fans. Especially Heero・Yuy for informing the heroine「I’ll kill you」 in episode 1, and also by blowing up his beloved mobile suit Wing Gundam, having a strong impression not seen elsewhere, with his loony¹ actions and a number of out-there¹ famous quotes, he had a presence that could only be described as peerless. The threatened gazes directed by the 5 boys who are by no means absolutely perfect, continue to capture the hearts of fans and refuses to let go even to this day.

¹loony, out-there: The magazine uses the pretty strong expression ぶっ飛んだ

3

The strongness of their PERSONALITY and GAZE is LEGEND TIER! The GUNDAM PILOTS that are RESURGING IN POPULARITY

4

450(Welcome～) Special Guest

Heero・Yuy role HIKARU MIDORIKAWA

【He・kah・rue・Me・dough・ree・kawa】Born May 2. From Tochigi Prefecture. Affiliated with Aoni Production.

——What kind of work is『New Mobile Report Gundam Wing』, to you, Mr. Midorikawa? Furthermore, if you had to choose one thing that made you happy, from your memories during the first airings, what would it be?

　My dream since I was a child was playing the main character in a serious robot work like『Mobile Suit Gundam』, so my dream came true. That made me happy, as you can imagine. Of course, plastic models of Wing Gundam that Heero rides on went on sale, so as person who was crazy about Gunpla² when I was a child, those were really happy days ♪

²Gundam plastic model = Gunpla

——With his unpredictable words and deeds and such, Heero・Yuy was a character with many sensational episodes. If there was anything that you struggled with while playing him, please do tell.

　Heero’s silent, so I think that having to impress the character on the audience within the limited few lines is difficult. However, I gained quite a lot of experience with silent characters with the role of Kaede Rukawa from『SLAM DUNK』(aired 1993～1996), so I managed to not struggle that much（^^;;

——This year marks the 20th year since the release of『New Mobile Report Gundam W Endless Waltz Special Edition』. What do you think about the fact that it’s still loved by many fans, even after over 20 years have passed?

　Maybe it’s  the fact that interesting things are interesting, no matter how many years pass? I mean it is full of holes that can be poked fun at, even though it’s by no means a gag anime (laughter). Apparently, there are also tenacious fans in America even to this day, not only limited  to Japan, so I think it’s a real amazing piece of work.

——If you were to give a message toward the following five of Heero, Duo, Trowa, Quatre, and Wufei, right now, what would the contents of the message be?

　I am truly happy, that I was able to meet you all. There is also a work that paints yourselves after the end, so if a chance presents itself, I’d love to breathe life into your grown selves. Well, I think that I’ll be indebted to all of you through games or whatnot, from now on too, so I look forward to working with you all then（^₋^）

5

◍Original Drawing/Yoshihito Hishinuma  Finishing Touch/Michie Hishinuma

6

Chang・Wufei

張五飛

(Voice/Ryuzou Ishino)

Holds the belief that might is right, and dislikes the weak fighting. Takes independent action often, and uses the Shenlong Gundam which he calls「Nataku」to destroy evil.

7

Heero・Yuy

(Voice/Hikaru Midorikawa)

Pilot of the Wing Gundam. Educated to be a perfect soldier, he did not show human-like emotions in the beginning.

8

Trowa・Barton

(Voice/Shigeru Nakahara)

Pilot of the Gundam Heavyarms, and was fighting in the battlefield ever since he could remember. To hide his identity, he performed as a clown at a circus troupe.

9

◀The Gundam pilots in brisk summer attire. The 5, although participating in the same military operations, are not a team so there is no sense of comradeship. It is only at the end of the story that the 5 unite. These relationships were novel

10

New Mobile Report Gundam Wing

◍Currently rerunning every Tuesday night at 10:29 PM on TOKYO MX

◍『New Mobile Report Gundam Wing』Blu-ray Box Limited Edition Complete 2 Volumes, now on sale by BANDAI NAMCO Arts. Each 30,240 yen (tax included)

◍『New Mobile Report Gundam W Endless Waltz』Blu-ray Box Limited Edition Complete 1 Volume, now on sale by BANDAI NAMCO Arts. 18,360 yen (tax included)

STORY〔New Mobile Report Gundam Wing〕/Humanity has constructed space colonies, determining the year they commenced space development as the year 1 A.C. (After Colony). Starting to see the indications of decline due to the increase of immigrants to the colonies, the countries of Earth form the「United Earth Sphere Alliance」, and counter the colonies. Possessing overwhelming military power, the Alliance Army oppress the colonies. Communications between each colony are cut off. Year 195 A.C.「Operation Meteor」is initiated by underground organizations of the colonies rebelling against the oppression of the Alliance. It was to have 5 Gundam units land onto Earth, and unfold subversive activity against the secret society「OZ」(Oz) that controlled the Alliance. The 5 boys, who are the agents, descend to Earth without knowing each other, and try to fulfill the mission while at times cooperating with each other, and at times rebelling against each other.

〔New Mobile Report Gundam W Endless Waltz〕/1 year after the battle　between Earth and the colonies. Although it seemed that the world was following the path to peace renouncing all military force, the mastermind of the colony organizations plots the domination of the Earth Sphere. The 5 ride the Gundams once again, and dive into battle.

11

Quatre・Raberba・Winner

(Voice/Ai Orikasa)

The heir of an extremely wealthy man, as well as a boy who pilots the Gundam Sandrock. Although gentle and kind, in the later half of the story, he comes to do nothing but seek revenge for a harmed family member.

12

37(Everyone) Time to Shine Famous Scene

　Episode 1 was full of iconic scenes that symbolized the person known as Heero. From trying to shoot down a civilian shuttle that was interfering with accomplishing his mission during his descent to Earth, to hijacking an ambulance that rushed over due to Relena`s report, who found him injured, it was a succession of barbarity. Moreover, he whispers「I’ll kill you」in her ear after ripping a birthday party invitation that she sent, going undercover as a transfer student at her school, all just due to the reason that「his face was seen by Relena」.

13

Duo・Maxwell

(Voice/Toshihiko Seki)

A kind boy who laments the tragedies brought on by war, and understands the value of life more than anyone, despite having a perfect command of Gundam Deathscythe which is also known as「God of Death」.

14 Relena・Darlian

(Voice/Akiko Yajima)

[orbemnews]

Housing Parents in a Pandemic: How About the Backyard? Major societal upheavals often catalyze changes in housing patterns, said Karen Chapple, the chair of city and regional planning at the University of California, Berkeley. She built an A.D.U. in her backyard during the country’s last major meltdown — the 2008 recession. “Crises, like the one we’re in right now, propel action,” she said. “It’ll make sense if the pandemic results in a surge in A.D.U. applications.” Even if the decision to build a unit is spurred by wanting to keep Mom and Dad close during or after the pandemic, there are longer-term upsides as well, Mr. Wegmann said. “When you look at it as an investment, the rents that these homes can fetch, especially in a hot-market location, are going to pay back the cost of building it much faster than other types of housing,” he said. “From that standpoint, the economics seem like an absolute slam dunk. Why wouldn’t these things just mushroom up by the thousands?” Mr. Wegmann believes that, in tandem with new laws like California’s, critical mass will make all the difference. “Once the business model has become more standardized and organized, and companies know how to get these projects down and churn them out, that’s when A.D.U.s will really start to boom,” he said. And, of course, there are social benefits to be had, too. “We’re definitely carrying the cost, but upsides like child care and family meals are invaluable to us,” Ms. Torrado said. She was hoping for her parents to settle permanently on her property last year, especially since she and her husband welcomed their first baby over the summer, but the virus delayed their move from Puerto Rico. In the meantime, Ms. Torrado’s sister is living in the house that will become their parents’. Source link Orbem News #backyard #Housing #Pandemic #parents

[allenmendezsr]

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It’s called VERT SHOCK.

And it’s a new system that YOU can use IMMEDIATELY to increase your jump a whopping 9 – 15+ inches.

All in less than 8 weeks.

Heck, most people see BIG results in as little as just a few days…

Regardless of your age…

Height…

Athleticism…

Genetics…

Take a quick look at what I mean…

“Using Vert Shock I went from nothing to dunking in only 7 weeks.”

— Joe Morales

Gilbert, Arizona · Vert Shock Member

“After Only 4 Weeks Of Vert Shock I Had My First Dunk EVER!”

— Andreas R.

Germany · Vert Shock Member

“I’m just a regular guy and could WINDMILL after only 6 weeks of Vert Shock!”

— Julian Agurcia

Rolle, Switzerland · Vert Shock Member

“Before Vert Shock I was barely dunking… just catching rim grazes. Put in the work and the results will come!”

— Vincent Smythe

Los Angeles, USA · Vert Shock Member

“I went from sitting on the bench, barely able to dunk – to averaging multiple dunks per game, becoming a starter, and winning the state championship!”

— Richard Guymon

St. George, Utah, USA · Vert Shock Member

“Before starting Vert Shock I was just grazing the rim.. After week 7 I threw down my first dunk!”

— Will Peters

Brookline, NH · Vert Shock Member

“Thanks Vert Shock! Check out my Dunk in a game on a defender.”

— Joshua White

North Carolina, USA · Vert Shock Member

“I was skeptical but the results are amazing. Vert Shock helped me make a Pro roster.”

— Paul Parker

Dallas, Texas · Vert Shock Member

“This is the best vertical jump program I have ever done and I’ve tried them all.”

— Chris Deroza

Brisbane, Australia · Vert Shock Member

“Hard work pays off.. Vert Shock helped me get my first dunk and now I can throw down lobs easy.”

— Sekou Roberts

California, USA · Vert Shock Member

“After about 5 weeks I finally threw down my first dunk and it felt amazing. This program is the best program out there and it really works.”

— Jani Kidd

Lexington, USA · Vert Shock Member

“You’re stuff seriously works! Thank you so much man!”

— Jon Gray

Oregon, USA · Vert Shock Member

Keep in mind those are 100% REAL results from real people just like you…

And all of them have gone into this system and come out on the other side a transformed DUNKING machine…

And I can’t stress this enough:

This isn’t another one of those pointless jump tutorials.

You don’t need to do heavy squats…

Crazy box jumps…

Annoying Deadlifts…

Or anything like that.

In fact, if you stick with me for just a few moments you’ll learn some of the exercises you’re probably doing are actually KILLING YOUR VERTICAL.

But first I want to tell you a little more about my VERT SHOCK system…

So far, I’ve helped over 20,000 people experience what I would consider the best feeling in the world…

Their very first dunk.

You’re the first person I bought a jump program from that actually responds…

Just emailing to say I threw down my first in game dunk tonight only 11 days into Vert Shock!

I’m too pumped right now thanks so much man!

Sent from my iPhone

Hey Adam,

Just wanted to say thanks for Vert Shock. I’m only in the 8th grade but I’m 6’2″ so everyone expects me to be able to dunk.

At first I was skeptical, but decided to give it a try.

This stuff actually works. I’m only 2 weeks into Vert Shock and I just threw down my first dunk ever!! I went from hardly being able to touch rim to DUNKING!

Thanks man,

– Josh

Adam,

I just got my first dunk ever and I’m only 13 days into Vert Shock!

Thank you so much for this program.

Sent from my iPhone

Rahul Jayaram

12 minutes ago ·

I have done Vert Shock for 2 weeks now and I can’t thank this program enough.

Before I started it I was grabbing rim with 1 hand from a running start. I can now grab rim with 2 hands from a STANDING JUMP!

I even threw down my first dunk EVER yesterday!

Hey Adam,

Just wanted to say Vert Shock is helping me so much.

I threw down my first ever dunk and I can even dunk off 2 feet now!

Thank you sooo much for this program!

Clifford Davidson

49 minutes ago ·

Thank you Vert Shock!

My vertical has exploded and I am dunking consistently now!

Vert Shock is one of the best programs out there and I want to thank Adam for helping me achieve my dream of dunking.

Here’s a vid about my experience with the porgram…

Maybe you’ve heard of Justin ‘Jus Fly’ Darlington…

His dunks are casually featured in Slam Magazine and Bleacher Report.

He was on TNT’s hit show The Dunk King.

And I’m happy to call a him a good friend of mine.

Like I said, he currently holds the title as the World’s #1 HIGHEST Dunker.

Here’s a picture of him accepting the first-place trophy at the Nike World Dunk Contest alongside LeBron and Anthony Davis.

Even though he may be considered the world’s top dunker, he wasn’t always flying around the world just to showcase his dunks…

Long story short, he and I grew up together in Canada.

And after using and mastering the 3 simple steps in VERT SHOCK, which you’ll learn too in a moment, he has taken his dunks to a whole new level.

And let me be clear…

I’d be a complete liar if I promised you’re going to jump 50 inches…

That’s ridiculous, Justin is an absolute freak of nature…

But, I will promise you one thing…

If you follow this done-for-you roadmap…

Consisting of just a few simple workouts each week…

You can throw down your very first slam in less than 8 weeks.

I promise you that.

Like I said, it is the best feeling in the world.

And today I’m going to share with you the roadmap to the dunk mecca…

It’s a new 60-day ELITE vertical trainer, which I call VERT SHOCK. 

And if you’re willing to stick with me for just a few minutes, I’m going to tell you everything you need to know.

Including exactly WHAT VERT SHOCK is…

WHY this training regimen works a group of leg muscles that you likely never hear about…

WHO has already thrown down massive dunks by following this method.

And most importantly HOW you can use this method to dunk in less than 8 weeks.

But first let me ask you something…

Before I go any further…

I really want you to think about it.

What would your life be like if you could throw down high flying dunks with ease… anytime you wanted?

Would you finally get that starting spot on your team?

Maybe you’d be the star who always gets the rock when the game’s on the line…

Imagine your whole school… maybe whole town… watching you throw down the MASSIVE dunks in games.

Imagine getting tagged in videos all over Instagram and Facebook…

Imagine catching the attention of college scouts nationwide…

That’s what happened to me when I used this system for myself.  (And I’ll tell you all about that in a minute.)

But first let me just say…

When you can dunk consistently it feels like almost anything’s possible.

And I can guarantee you NONE of this will ever happen:

NO MORE stretching your shoulders out of their sockets just to swipe the net

NO MORE being afraid to attack the rim in games and practices

NO MORE feeling unconfident when you step foot on the court

NO MORE whack tutorials and funky exercises trying to increase your vert

And last but not least…

NO MORE sitting on the bench when you DESERVE to be out on the court dunking on people

Just Take It From These Vert Shock Members…

“I went from struggling to dunk to throwing it down in games and ON PEOPLE.”

— Tramaine Anderson

Arkansas, USA · Vert Shock Member

“I can now bang on a fast break and am dunking on defenders!”

— Trelyn Bouie

USA · Vert Shock Member

“I’m only 5’8″ and this is what I was able to do after 2 weeks of Vert Shock.”

— Malik Amos

Louisville, USA · Vert Shock Member

“I’m a 5’10” white guy and after starting Vert Shock I can finally Dunk!!! THANK YOU!!”

— Brant Trease

Kansas, United States · Vert Shock Member

“Vert Shock is the only program online that will actually increase your vert. I dunked after only 5 weeks!”

— Aleksandr Salfetnikov

Washington, USA · Vert Shock Member

“Thanks to Vert Shock I’m finally able to Dunk!”

— Tyler Updike

Buffalo, USA · Vert Shock Member

“I’m a 5’9 freshman who could never throw it down. I used Vert Shock for just two weeks and I finally dunked!!!”

— Caleb Chappelle

Texas, USA · Vert Shock Member

“I’m Finally Able To Throw It Down And Dunk In Games Thanks To Vert Shock!”

— DJ McNew

Missouri, USA · Vert Shock Member

“I am only 5’5″ and after starting Vert Shock I can now throw down dunks AND alley-oops!”

— Emmitt Wheatley

Idaho, USA · Vert Shock Member

Hey Adam,

Program is going great!!

Just to give you a little background on me, I am 16 and only 5’7″. I already do have an impress vertical for my height, I can get the bottom of the box. But I wanted to increase it, so after I did the first pre shock phase day 1. I decided to see how much I my vertical increased.

Already I just barely touched the rim!! I am very impressed with this program, you really are a true hero!! Here is the pic of me touching it! Thank you so much for developing it this program it will really change my basketball career!

Thank you for making this awesome system that you made. I started the program with a 28 inch vertical. I am on Week 5 and I now have a 34 inch vertical. I went from barely dunking to doing tomahawk dunks. This system is great.

Thanks, Wyatt House

Adam,

First, I’m going to start by saying I was a lil skeptical of the program. But after nearly 2 hours sitting in traffic, I decided to give it a try!

After starting Vert Shock let me tell you – the results are amazing. For a player who didn’t even average 1 minute of playing time in high school your program helped me make a professional roster!

Here’s a pic of me jumping over the ball rack throwing it down after doing Vert Shock.

Thanks for a awesome program.

Richard Guymon

34 minutes ago ·

I’m a junior in high school who just last season could barely dunk. I sat on the bench all last year and was only on the team because I was tall. I had only ever dunked once in my entire life.

Then I did Vert Shock and now I average a couple dunks a game and even dunk on defenders. I’m also a starter on the team and have won multiple dunk competitions!

This year our team went on to win the Utah state championship. I had one dunk in the quarter finals, 2 dunks in the semi finals, and a career high of 4 dunks in the state championship game!!!

I can’t thank you enough for Vert Shock!

So what do you think?

Would you be willing to take the next 8 minutes to learn about the PROVEN jump system that could change your game, and ultimately your life, forever?

Please think about this carefully.

Because if you’re just someone that likes the IDEA of dunking…

But never actually wants to throw down a slam…

Do us both a favor and click the ‘X’ and leave this page for good.

If you’re someone that would rather have an ‘ordinary’ basketball career…

Maybe play a couple minutes a game…

But the only dunking you want to do is in video games…

Then the VERT SHOCK system is not for you.

Because this is an exclusive program only for those who want to be extraordinary.

Do you want to dominate your opponents and stand out in any gym you walk into?

Do you want to be recognized at parties and social events as “the guy that can dunk”?

Do you want to make it to the next level and make your parents proud?

Do you want to be the guy everyone talks about at school?

Let’s give it a go then.

“Your stuff seriously works! Thank you so much man!”

— Jon Gray

Oregon, USA · Vert Shock Member

“I used to get teased but now I’m dunking with ease and it’s helped my confidence a lot!”

— Zi Liu

Boston, USA · Vert Shock Member

“After 3 weeks I threw down my first windmill WITH EASE!”

— Ryan Derke

Palms, California · Vert Shock Member

My name is Adam Folker.

I used to play NCAA Division I basketball at University of California Irvine…

And later went on to play in the pros…

See I’ve traveled all around the world and played basketball against some of the best players you can imagine…

Kobe Bryant & Adam Folker

So trust me when I say –

Being an explosive player with a high vertical is not optional…

It’s NECESSARY.

I’m only telling you this because I used to think I could get by on my height alone…

Until life pitched me a quick curveball… and all I can say is…

Kobe Bryant & Adam Folker

If it weren’t for the 3 steps in the VERT SHOCK system, which I’m about to share with you, I would never be where I am now. 

Let me explain…

First, look at this picture of me in 9th grade.

Here I was, 14 years old… 6 foot 4. 

You’d think with that height I’d be a star right?

Well guess what…

I rode the freaking bench on my freshman squad. 

Just imagine how that felt…

Being the tallest guy on the team but your coach only subs you in if you have a double-digit lead.

And how could I blame him?

I was weak, had zero explosive ability… and worst of all…

Now when you’re this tall, and you meet someone for the first time, guess what they ALWAYS ask you…

“Wow do you play basketball?”

How do you think it feels when people define you by a sport…

And you aren’t even good at it?!

I’ll never forget one game in particular.

This girl I had a huge crush on came to watch…

And guess what?

I sat square on the bench for the entire 40 minutes.

My highlight of the night was a few layups during halftime warmups…

I’ll never forget being so humiliated…

I just wanted to get out there and prove myself.

So I went home that night defeated… but determined.

Over the next 6 months, I must have spent a thousand hours looking up everything I could on vertical jump training…

I tried absolutely everything I could find.

Box jumps…

Squats…

Calf raises…

Those funny jump shoes…

Air alert…

Ankle weights…

But none of it actually worked.

I was so close to accepting that NO ONE could improve their vertical…

I figured that maybe it was all genetics, that you’re either born with it or not…

And before I show you this, I need you to understand…

What I’m about to show you is the difference-maker between VERT SHOCK and just about every other jump program on the web…

It’s the ‘secret sauce’ behind my 3-step system…

And it’s going to really piss a few people off.

Especially those YouTubers, who tell you to do box jumps, squats, whatever…

Meanwhile they collect money from ads every time you watch their videos.

Trust me, they DON’T CARE if you ever dunk…

In fact, in their eyes it’s probably better if you don’t.

Just think about it: if you finally dunk, then you stop looking up their videos…

And then they stop getting paid!

I’m seriously so sick of it.

Because over the past 10 years, I’ve spent very close to 10,000 hours refining this method.

And I know the REAL way to get you up above the rim… it all starts with targeting specific muscles in your legs.

So right now, for the first time ever, I’m going to reveal this publicly.

Anyways here it goes…

That night I found a link to a scientific journal study.

And it wasn’t any ordinary study, it detailed a secret, Russian training technique which proved…

“Athletes… can… improve their strength and explosiveness while working to become more agile… in as little as 6 weeks.”

I was skeptical when I came across this. 

Could you really improve your explosiveness in 6 weeks?

Was I really doing it all wrong?

So I put it to the test…

And here’s what I discovered…

Because it trains a unique subset of your muscle tissue which we call your ‘elastic fibers’.

And without getting into too much deep science they’re essentially the muscle fibers that turn your legs into rubber bands.

When you bend your legs, tension builds up…

And when you extend them it releases…

It’s all very simple…

The only way to increase your maximum vertical is to target and strengthen your elastic fibers.

Stronger elastic fibers equal more tension which equals a higher vertical.

BUT…

If you don’t train using special exercises, you end up neglecting them…

That’s why you can work SO hard but never see any results in your jump height…

Let me say, if you’re skeptical, remember I was too.

After all – if this Russian workout program was so effective why hadn’t anyone taught it before?

Well there’s a couple reasons for that.

I already told you about the so-called gurus on YouTube dishing out misinformation…

The other reason? Well…

The magic behind training elastic fibers was actually developed by a Russian sports scientist named Dr. Verkhoshansky in the late 1960s…

It’s hard to pronounce so I just call him Dr. Vert, or Dr. V for short…

Dr. V developed the ‘SHOCK’ method to give the Soviet Union an unfair advantage in the Olympic high jump…

He discovered that repetitive training like squats and other ‘usual’ methods had little effect on athlete’s actual jump height.

It wasn’t until he implemented workouts that targeted these elastic fibers that he noticed real results in the athlete’s vertical jump.

This allowed the Soviets to bring home the Olympic high jump medal in 1960…

And 1964…

And 1968…

And 1972…

You get the point.

The Russians dominated the high jump with the SHOCK method…

Anyways, crazy as it all sounds, several scientific studies confirm your elastic fibers are the only way to increase your hops…

All you have to do is follow the routine which began with Dr. V’s work and you have the blueprint to strengthening your elastic fibers…

Which results in a higher vertical jump.

The only problem is…

Dr. V’s research and training regimen is kind of scattered all over the place.

And a lot of it has to be translated from Russian.

There’s even a manual that his younger daughter recently translated into English.

But it doesn’t give you the complete training program.

It took me nearly 6 months just to find everything and go through his journal articles…

Then another 5 years to test and research the methods…

I wanted to find the best approach to gain the most inches on your vertical jump…

I even got a Professional Strength and Conditioning Certification in the process… that’s how deep I was into this stuff!

So as you can imagine, this has kind of been my life for the past 10 years…

And I wanted to put it all into an easy to follow plan.

That’s why I’ve spent countless hours compiling everything I’ve ever found on vertical jumping into a downloadable, done-for-you action plan which I’ve named VERT SHOCK.

And if you’re interested, I’ll send you a link to download all of my research, as well as the full workout plan today.

It’s the only workout plan I know of that can guarantee you a dunk in just under 8 weeks.

And remember you don’t need to buy anything special to use VERT SHOCK…

It can all be done from your home and you don’t even need access to a gym to use it!

Also…

Don’t let the ‘SHOCK’ part of the title fool you, VERT SHOCK is not only the most effective way to increase your vertical…

But it’s the safest.

Because inside VERT SHOCK you are not doing any heavy weight lifting – so it will not stunt your growth.

Think about it, does anyone ever go up for a dunk with dumbbells?

Or ankle weights, or anything like that?

No.

And we want to practice how we play.

VERT SHOCK is designed to target your MAX vertical jump by activating your ‘elastic fibers’.

So that means no weights or other fancy equipment.

Because remember, weights alone will NOT strengthen your elastic fibers.

But here are the 3 very easy steps that will…

Check it out…

During the first 7 days of VERT SHOCK you will be introducing your body to the unique movement patterns and exercises of the program.

And I don’t want that to sound intimidating at all…

It’s not hard on your joints… it’s no more demanding than playing in a pick up basketball game or anything else you’ve probably tried.

In fact, it’s probably a lot easier. Remember, we’re going to be working SMART not hard.

Everything I’m going to be introducing you to is centered around unique jumping exercises combined with precise sets and reps.

This first step is called ‘The Pre-Shock’ phase and it’s designed to get your body ready to fly.

You will train 4 days this week for 30 minutes per session.

Even though it is only the beginning, most of our athletes already see a 3–5+ inch gain on their vertical jump in the first 4 days!

“I Just Started Vert Shock 3 Days Ago And I’m Already Dunking!”

— John Alexander Macdonald

United States · Vert Shock Member

“After Only 10 Days of Vert Shock I went from BARELY Being Able to Dunk to throwing down 180 DUNKS EASILY!!!”

— Juann Ricardo Rios Salcido

Mexico · Vert Shock Member

“I’ve never seen my body respond to something this quick… after 3 days I was dunking with ease!”

— Sterling Mason

Charlotte, NC · Vert Shock Member

Hey Adam,

Program is going great!!

My standing vertical was 19 inches and just on the second day it shot up to 23 inches!! Today is my rest day and then I’m back on the grind tomorrow getting started on the Shock Phase!!

Thanks for Checking in 🙂

Can’t wait to get to work tomorrow!!

i’ve been using this program for 5 days and i’ve already gained about 4-5 inches.

i believe in this program hands down.

Hey Adam,

Thanks for the program man I’m 6’2, 13 years old.

In just 2 weeks I can now easily can dunk it with two hands!!! Which means your program actually works!!!

I can’t wait for the weeks coming by.

thanks Adam.

Step 2 of VERT SHOCK training is designed to really push the limits.

Here we ‘shock’ your body into jumping higher than you ever thought possible.

This is where the real magic happens.

You will train on average just 3 days per week…

For a total of 40 minutes per session.

Each of your movements will carefully target those neglected elastic fibers.

It is important that you explode on every jump during this phase of the program…

…this is how you consistently reach your MAX vertical jump velocity and strengthen those elastic fibers.

After these 6 weeks you will be leaping higher than all your friends ever thought possible.

After these 6 weeks you will be leaping higher than all your friends ever thought possible.

“I’ve been doing Vert Shock for only 2 weeks now and I’ve gone from barely dunking in practice to DUNKING ON PEOPLE IN GAMES!!!”

— Caleb Reid

Delaware, USA · Vert Shock Member

“I started off barely grabbing rim and now I can DO THIS!!! THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR VERT SHOCK!!!”

— Trey Bonne

Kentucky, USA · Vert Shock Member

“I went from barely grabbing rim to DUNKING TWO HANDED EASY!!! Vert Shock helped me go from benchwarmer to STARTING LINEUP!”

— Jared Cleary

Florida, USA · Vert Shock Member

The final phase of the program is the ‘The Post-Shock Phase’.

Think of this as the icing on top…

Where everything your body ‘learned’ in steps 1 and 2 becomes cemented in your muscle memory…

Ready to be called on at any time so that you can rise up and throw down massive rim-rocking dunks on command.

You will train 4 days this week for an approx. 30 minutes per session.

We back off the intensity this week and allow your body to unleash a FURY of vertical jump potential.

This is the most exciting time of the program…

You will feel much lighter and springier on your feet…

Your strengthened elastic fibers will make it feel like a huge weight has been lifted off your shoulders.

“It feels so great to finally be able to dunk! I went from touching rim to dunking easily.”

— Finn Veeneklaas

Australia · Vert Shock Member

“Vert Shock helped my son Tom throw down his FIRST DUNK EVER! Thank you for such an effective program!”

— Justin & Tom Penkethman

Eltham, Australia · Vert Shock Member

“4 weeks after starting Vert Shock I threw down my first ever WINDMILL!”

— Boris Glamocak

California, USA · Vert Shock Member

And now that you know a bit about the process…

Let me remind you…

I’ve already shown you dozens of 8-week dunk transformations from some of our members inside.

If that’s not enough…

Take a look at this video.

That’s my highlight reel in high school.

After learning about the body’s elastic fibers, and specifically training them with my VERT SHOCK routine, my ability to dunk changed my life.

It got me a full ride basketball scholarship to a Division 1 school…

Took me around the world.  Getting paid a salary to play basketball with the pros.

If I couldn’t dunk, I really don’t know where I’d be.

Remember my friend Justin? VERT SHOCK did the same for him…

And now look at him, he’s the World’s #1 Dunker.

So with VERT SHOCK, I now want to pay it forward and help YOU reach your goals.

I know what adding over 15+ inches to my vertical did for me…

…But how can it help you?

Whether it’s impressing your friends…

Getting recruited to play college ball…

Or even making it to the NBA…

I want to get you to wherever you want to go…

But in order to get there, you need to get above the rim.

Like these guys…

Anthony Rose

Yesterday ·

i FINALYY dunked today after practice. everyone was watching and i went up and dunked one handed. Special shoutout to Adam Folker and his workouts they gave me 13 inches on my vertical

Marc Hille

12 hours ago ·

Hey guys, everybody who is out there and wants to increase his vertical should use VertShock as I can say that this was working for me.

I am now in 5th week of the programm and finally dunked for the first time. For erverybody who wants to do the same the programm not only help you to Dunk but also it makes you more athletic in everything you do on the court rebounds,defense,absorbing contact etc.).

Also the workouts are very easy to do and you only need is some space outside or in the gym to do them. Every exercise is shown in a detailed video. There is no doubt that Vert Shock is the fastest and easiest way to increase your vertical. Thank you very much for creating this awsome programm Adam Folker

#VertShock #FolkerSystem

Nick Olexa

57 minutes ago ·

I googled vertical jump programs and spent well over $200 trying to achieve my childhood dream to dunk in a game and none of it worked! Then I found Vert Shock.

I said never hurts to try so I bought it and after 1 week my vertical increased 4 inches and I could dunk one handed. After 4 weeks I gained almost 7 inches and could just barely dunk 2 hands.

After finishing the Vert Shock program I gained more than 12 inches and bam I’m dunking 2 hands. Thanks to Adam and Folkersystem I achieved my dream.

And today I want to do the same for you…

All you have to do is…

I want you to be one of the lucky few who tries my new 3-step VERT SHOCK system today.

And I suggest you hurry, because there’s a limited number of access codes I can give out.

Just to recap, VERT SHOCK can take you from zero to dunking in just under 8 weeks.

And remember it’s the only program of it’s kind…

Because it actually zeroes in on those elastic fibers in your legs…

Which can improve your vertical as much as 9-15+ inches in just a few weeks.

And if you’re ready, I want to send you an access code…

But before I do…

I need you to understand how seriously I take this program.

This isn’t one of those YouTube playlists where you can just watch a few videos… skip a few…

It’s a very clearly scheduled 8-week regimen.

Like I said earlier, this is not a complicated program.

And it’s not that tough (remember – we’re working smart, not hard).

In fact, it takes just over 90 minutes per week to complete.

You don’t need to be athletic.

You don’t need to be strong.

You don’t need any fancy equipment.

But – you do need just one thing…

You need to WANT to dunk.

That’s it.  If you can promise me that one thing…

…I can promise to take you to the rim.

And it all starts with my VERT SHOCK program.

Now in case you haven’t guessed by now…

Access to the VERT SHOCK training system is not free.

And I’m sorry, I wish I could just give it to you for free.

But the fact of the matter is I would be losing money… and would very quickly need to it shut down before going bankrupt.

Between all the cash I spent doing the research, hiring a team to film and edit the videos, creating and hosting websites, producing and publishing the training manuals…

And acquiring the ‘Professional Strength and Conditioning Certification’…

I’d estimate I’ve already spent over $55,400…

Now I can’t charge you $55,400 for VERT SHOCK…

Even though it’s cost me a lot to make it available to you.

So today I’ve lined up a very special price for this jump training program.

And if you take me up on it now, I know you’re going to love it.

But before I tell you the awesome deal I have lined up for you, let me throw in a few more things to really make this a no brainer…

Ballin’ Bonus #1

$17 Value YOURS FREE!

No matter how well or hard you train, there’s 4 ‘Jump Killers’ which will sabotage your success and prevent you from ever jumping any higher.

Chances are, you’re doing at least one of these right now.

Inside this FREE bonus you will discover:

How to ditch the BS that’s stealing your vertical jump power so that you can finally break free from the handcuffs of feeling overlooked and underestimated…

The #1 common mistake ALL players make when trying to increase their vertical… (Heck I bet you probably did this today…)  And the easy solution to get you flying higher than ever before…

How to avoid a common misconception most “experts” tell you when it comes to training your vertical jump so that you can avoid the frustrations and pitfalls.

Ballin’ Bonus #2

$29 Value YOURS FREE!

Training, technique and targeting the right muscle fibers are all very important.

But sometimes a few quick and dirty ‘hacks’ are just what you need to add an extra couple of inches.

Inside this free bonus we spill the beans on 5 of Justin’s dirty secrets to getting up there by any means necessary.

You’re not going to believe these simple dunk ‘cheats’ of his…

Ballin’ Bonus #3

$49 Value YOURS FREE!

The best program in the world is worth squat if you don’t follow it.

So, to prevent you having to rely on your willpower too much, we’ve included a simple weekly email check-in system that increases your consistency and thus results through solid behavioral psychology.

We’ve got your back!

Ballin’ Bonus #4

$19 Value YOURS FREE!

Would you believe that there are common everyday foods that sap your body’s ‘springiness’ and cap your maximum jump potential?

It’s true.

But not only that, there are also a bunch of foods which serve as jump fuel, making your body learn these ‘shock’ motor patterns of ours faster and easier than ever.

Follow this simple step-by-step checklist and maximize your jump potential today.

Ballin’ Bonus #5

$59 Value YOURS FREE!

Inside this free bonus module you will discover:

The “MCV” secret to instantly increase your vertical jump by altering your approach velocity… you’ll be shocked at how fast this works.

A simple but deadly effective “launch pad secret” to 10x your power transfer during takeoff for MASSIVE hang time…

Why you must ALWAYS aggressively pull yourself towards the ground before you jump… this is the #1 most effective way to EXPLODE your vertical and dunk faster and easier than ever.

And much, much more…

Plus if you take me up on my offer to join VERT SHOCK in the next few minutes…

I’m going to really sweeten the deal by throwing in these 5 extra juicy, PREMIUM bonuses…

But only for a limited time.

BALLIN’ Bonus #6

The ‘Power Leak Fix’ for Overnight Hops

$25 Value

BALLIN’ Bonus #7

Olympic High Jump Hacks Revealed

$25 Value

BALLIN’ Bonus #8

The Slingshot Secret to Instantly Jump Higher

$25 Value

BALLIN’ Bonus #9

The VERT SHOCK Maintenance Program

$39 Value

BALLIN’ Bonus #10

The ‘Dunk Now’ Visualization Workout

$26 Value

BALLIN’ Bonus #11

The VERT SHOCK Vert Tracker Workbook

$17 Value

But when you agree to try VERT SHOCK right now, you won’t pay anywhere near that…

Because I really want to give you the best deal possible.

But when we’re dealing with something as special as Dr. V’s dunking secrets, I can’t just give this information out to everyone.

And if I set a low price tag on VERT SHOCK, guess what?

Everyone would buy it.

That devalues the information…

And the next thing you know, all of these fake YouTubers, which you already know I hate, would take the whole VERT SHOCK system…

…Put it on their channel and make advertising money off my research and PROVEN methods.

I’ve seen it happen before.  And I’m not gonna let it happen to me.

Because everyone who’s already joined VERT SHOCK would be pissed.

I don’t want tons of mad dunkers sending me angry emails…

I’d rather have a select few very, very happy (and skilled!) dunkers inside the program.

With that in mind, I’m keeping distribution of VERT SHOCK as small as possible, and ultimately protected from the masses.

That’s why I have to keep my prices relatively high…

So I hope you understand why the published price of VERT SHOCK will soon cost you $138.

Now considering how much this system can affect your vertical…

At least 9-15+ inches in under 8 weeks…

Plus, the $330 in free bonuses…

Is $138 Really Such a High Price?

Would you be willing to pay $138 to be a guaranteed superstar on your team?

To throw down huge dunks in front of your whole school…?

I mean what do you pay for a new pair of sneakers…

$120 for a pair of Kobes?

$130 for a pair of LeBrons?

Sure they make you look and feel cool on the court…

But let me ask you…

How much has a pair of shoes ever REALLY changed your game?

I’ve played basketball for over 20 years, and I don’t know anyone that’s ever gotten a scholarship for wearing pricy shoes.

But I know plenty of people who’ve gotten full rides for their ability to dunk a basketball.

Myself included…

I received somewhere around $44,000 in tuition money just because of my dunking ability…

And I got paid much more than that to play in the pros…

So please understand, dunking is a very valuable skill.

And I’m dying to see how much it could change your life… so I’m going to do something very special for a limited time because I want you try it today.

If you agree to try out VERT SHOCK today, I’m going to give you the best price I’ve ever offered…

I know you’re going to love this special rate.

First, take one last look over EVERYTHING you’ll receive when you agree to try VERT SHOCK today.

Access To My System – VERT SHOCK

Once you sign up, I will IMMEDIATELY email you access to the VERT SHOCK members only website.

There you can find EVERYTHING including training videos, worksheets, and all the details behind the step-by-step workout plan that will have you dunking in less than 8 weeks.

You’ll find that every video is very easy to follow along in the VERT SHOCK system… so you can be rest assured you’re doing everything 100% correctly.  You’ll find additional specific tips, tricks, and techniques I’ve perfected over the past 20 years to shock your body’s elastic fibers for the absolute best high flying results.

Weekly Check-Ins

How lame would I be if I just gave you access and that was the last you ever saw of me?  Don’t worry, that’s not what’s happening here…

When you sign up for VERT SHOCK, it’s just the beginning of our relationship together…

Every week I’m going to send a few emails your way because I want to make sure you’re staying on track.

I’ll also be around to answer specific questions and give feedback.

I want you to know that we are in this together.

Plus, these FREE Ballin’ Bonuses…

BONUS The 4 Vertical Jump Killers

($17.00 Value)

BONUS 5 Dirty Secrets to Jumping Higher ($29.00 Value)

BONUS Jumper’s Diet Checklist ($19.00 Value)

BONUS The Instant Inches Formula:NBA Jump Secrets Revealed($59.00 Value)

BONUS The Power Leak Fix for Overnight Hops ($25.00 Value)

BONUS Olympic High Jump Hacks Revealed ($25.00 Value)

BONUS The Slingshot Secret to Instantly Jump Higher ($25.00 Value)

BONUS The VERT SHOCK Maintenance Program ($39.00 Value)

BONUS The ‘Dunk Now’ Visualization Workout ($26.00 Value)

BONUS Vert Tracker Workbook ($17.00 Value)

Oh and one more thing…

But I can only 100% promise this if you sign up today.

Exclusive bonus

$97.00 Value

If you try VERT SHOCK today, Justin’s authorized me to give you access to this rare jump course…

Inside he reveals ALL of his top secrets to throwing down massive, contest winning dunks.

If you think you’re too short, or unathletic, you need to see‑this…

Because inside this never seen before course you’ll discover:

How to unlock 9+ inches of raw vertical jump using professional dunk champion secrets…

How to use “strength multipliers” to quickly become an explosive world class jumper even if you’re skinny and unathletic (combine 2 or 3 of these for insane results…)

How to re-wire your muscle memory and install the silky smooth jump mechanics of the world’s best dunkers…

3 “leg hacks” to unlock instant inches on your hops…

How to easily dunk WITHOUT PALMING THE BASKETBALL… (This is a game changer if you’re looking to throw down your first dunk…)

A weird takeoff approach used by Jus Fly for maximum propulsion and explosiveness every time…

How to build confidence in your jump ability FAST so that you dunk without hesitation in games…

Plus much much more…

It’s a full course filled with videos and training manuals detailing all of Justin’s juiciest dunk secrets laid out in step-by-step modules so that you can quickly install them into your hops.

But like I said, this bonus will not last forever…

And here’s the part you’re going to love…

Look, I just want this to be the easiest decision you’ll ever make.

I’ve told you that by implementing the techniques you’ll find inside VERT SHOCK you can easily expect to improve your vertical by 9–15+ inches in the next 8 weeks.

And because I want you to make this decision today…

I’m going to give you a once-in-a-lifetime offer that sets you up for life-changing dunks through this one-of-a-kind program.

If you sign up for a risk-free trial of VERT SHOCK today, I’ll knock 50% off the listed price.

That means you’ll get instant access to everything inside the VERT SHOCK system.

AND I’ll send you EVERYTHING else I just told you about all for the low, low price of only $67.

That’s over $427 in value for just a fraction of the price.

And I’m so confident that VERT SHOCK is going to have you dunking in 60 days or less that I’m going to put my money where my mouth is.

So if you go through this program and you absolutely CANNOT dunk in the next 8 weeks (that hardly ever happens by the way).

I will send you a 100% refund.

No questions asked.

All you need to do is send me a quick email with the subject line ‘Refund Request’… and the money’s yours.

There’s nothing to lose.

And everything to gain…

So what do you think…

Is $67 worth the life-changing opportunity to finally dunk a basketball?

It’s your call, but it’s time to make a decision…

And Like They Say…

“The Worst Decision Is No Decision”

Plus 11 Bonus Modules (Total Value: $427)

LIMITED TIME OFFER!

The way I see it, you have three options.

Ignore Everything You’ve Learned Today

You can do absolutely nothing…

Even after everything I’ve showed you today…

The VERT SHOCK system…

Dr. V’s research…

Elastic fibers…

If you want to pretend the facts don’t exist, that’s ok.

But when you get dunked on by that average-height guy in your next game, you’ll always wonder if he went through VERT SHOCK.

And maybe he did.

So option #1 is you can walk away and wonder “what if” for the rest of your life…

Risk Everything By Going At It Alone

You can take what you learned today and go at it alone…

And good for you.

At least I’ve given you a ton of information today… so I’d say you’re much better off than most.

Now you know a lot of YouTube videos and so called jump ‘experts’ will lead you to dead ends.

So you could try to spend your time going through all of Dr. V’s research like I did…

It will probably take you a long time…

Like I said, it took me thousands of hours to compile everything…

Plus it took even longer to optimize VERT SHOCK for the maximum results in the minimum time (5+ years of testing and research!)

But if you’re someone that would rather spend a lot more time…

Doing a LOT more work… just to save a small amount of cash…

Well, then that’s your choice and I’m perfectly fine with that.

Just know, it took me over 5 years AFTER finding Dr. V’s research to finally perfect and finalize the VERT SHOCK system.

Or you can take the final option…

Let Me and My Proven VERT SHOCK System Guarantee You a Dunk in the Next 8 Weeks… By Adding 9–15+ Inches to Your Vertical Jump

Take one tiny action today…

And it could have one of the greatest possible impacts on your life.

All you need to do is click the ‘ORDER NOW’ button right now.

I’ve already done all the hard work for you. (That’s what you’re paying me for, after all!)

All you need to do is follow this done-for-you roadmap… consisting of just a few workouts a week…

And you can see as much as a 3 to 5-inch increase in your vertical in the first 7 days!

And 9–15+ inches over the course of the next 8 weeks.

The fact of the matter is…

There are already plenty of people inside the VERT SHOCK program who thought they were “too short”…

Too “unathletic”…

And “didn’t have the genetics”.

…And they’re all dunking now

So why shouldn’t you?

Why not take the risk-free opportunity to lay down your first dunk in the next 60 days with VERT SHOCK.

And most people see results MUCH faster.

But the clock is ticking…

So what are you waiting for?

Simply click the “ORDER NOW” button below and let’s get started.

I’m looking forward to watching your dunk videos…

Regards,

Adam Folker Founder, VERT SHOCK Spring 2018

Plus 11 Bonus Modules (Total Value: $427)

LIMITED TIME OFFER!

P.S.  Don’t forget all the cool bonuses you get when you sign up for VERT SHOCK today…

Including the exclusive Jump Like Justin bonus system… This usually retails for $97… but today I’m giving it away for FREE.

In total VERT SHOCK’s taken nearly 10 years to put together…

And today you can take advantage of 10 years of dunking wisdom for the low price of $67. 

I’ve already helped over 20,000 students take their dunking to the next level…

And I want YOU to be next.

So don’t hesitate…

This offer expires soon.

And you can’t get VERT SHOCK anywhere else…

Less than 8 weeks from now you could throw down your first slam!

Plus 11 Bonus Modules (Total Value: $427)

LIMITED TIME OFFER!

FAQs

What exactly am I getting?

After ordering Vert Shock you will be emailed your username/password to log into the members only portal. Inside you will be able to access the complete Vert Shock program along with all of the bonuses and Jump Like Justin free bonus course. You can access the members portal on any device connected to the internet!

How does it work?

Vert Shock uses strategic exercises and set/rep combinations to target your elastic muscle fibers. This produces explosive gains in your vertical jump.

Do I need any equipment?

No. Vert Shock does NOT require any equipment or access to a gym. You can do the program at home.

Is it safe?

Yes. Vert Shock does not use any heavy weight lifting so it will not stunt your growth. Vert Shock is safe for all ages. Of course you should check with your doctor before doing any physical exercise.

Does it expire or do I have lifetime access?

After ordering Vert Shock today you will be locked in and have lifetime access to the program. You Vert Shock program does not expire and you can log in as many times as you want.

I am in-season, can I still do it?

Yes, and you will get the same if not better results even though you are training in-season. The intermittent training schedule allows for you to plan your workouts around practice times.

I can’t even touch the rim. Is Vert Shock too advanced for me?

Nope. In fact, you are the exact type of person who will see get the biggest jump gains from this program. You have so much room for improvement that just a few tweaks will see you gaining many inches very quickly.

What if I need help or have questions in the program?

After you purchase you will instantly be given a login to the members only site. Here you will be able to read and post in the private forum as well as ask me any questions you may have.

I’m really busy, will this program take up all my time?

No. We’ve designed this program for busy people like us so you only need less than an hour max 4 times per week to get all the results from it.

How long do I have to wait to get access to Vert Shock?

Vert Shock is a digital, online membership site meaning you get instant access to all the materials and videos the second you join, even if its 4am. Since there’s nothing to mail and no physical books etc, we can keep our program really affordable, saving you a ton of money for all this cutting-edge training.

I’ve never even worked out before, can I still do it?

Vert Shock is safe and works for all ages and levels. The program requires no weights or special equipment and can be done at home. Exercise videos of each movement are included so there is no prior workout experience needed.

My jump is already pretty high at over 40 inches. Will Vert Shock help me?

Yes, but not as much as say, a newbie obviously. You’ll still be able to add a few inches to your hops without much trouble though.

Can I trust you with my credit card?

Without a doubt and here’s why. All our payment processing is handled by a separate billion-dollar company that has been around for decades.

It’s called Clickbank and it’s responsible for millions of transactions per month with the latest security in place. We trust them wholeheartedly and have never had any issues at all.

We were very careful about who we decided to work with and these guys are the best, hands down. You have nothing to fear whatsoever and if you’re still nervous about it, feel free to pay with Paypal. We accept both Paypal and credit cards.

Are the testimonials real?

Yes! If you would like to get in touch with any of the athletes that provided testimonials just ask!

Plus 11 Bonus Modules (Total Value: $427)

LIMITED TIME OFFER!

[junker-town]

The final 4 quarterbacks in the NFL playoffs, ranked

Jimmy Garoppolo and Patrick Mahomes are looking to lead their teams to Super Bowl 54.

Patrick Mahomes comes first. Then who?

Picking the top quarterback remaining in the 2020 NFL playoffs is easy. Patrick Mahomes is the reigning MVP. Last week, he threw three touchdown passes in less than four minutes of game time (and five touchdowns total) to turn a 24-0 deficit into a 51-31 victory over the Texans.

After that, things get dicey. The playoffs are loaded with passing talent, but Mahomes may be the only sure thing if you’re looking for a 300+ yard performance in the conference championship games.

Aaron Rodgers has led the Packers to 14 wins this year, though he has done so while turning some of his responsibilities over to a proficient Green Bay running game and a better-than-usual defense. Ryan Tannehill, who finished 2019 with the league’s top passer rating, has just 160 passing yards in two playoff wins combined. Jimmy Garoppolo proved he can be a consistent positive passing force for the best team in the NFC, but when his head coach wanted to put away the Vikings, Kyle Shanahan specifically took the ball out of his quarterback’s hands.

The result is a tangled mass of good and occasionally great passers, all of whom are capable of pushing their teams to an NFL title. Let’s break down this race.

1. Patrick Mahomes, Chiefs

Mahomes’ greatness in Kansas City boils down to three things:

a) the ability to avoid pressure in the pocket and extend plays long enough for even the stoutest coverage to break down,

b) an innate connection with his game-breaking wide receivers and tight end, who know exactly where to find holes downfield once Mahomes is forced to go off script, and

c) a cannon arm that can hit tiny targets in the pocket, on the run, or even while he’s in the process of being tackled.

Mahomes knows just exactly how to bring linebackers and defensive backs out of coverage and toward the line of scrimmage. He’s capable of taking a patch of open field in front of him and turning it into a first down — like he did with a game-high 53 rushing yards last week. But if you slide up to cut off those scrambles, he’s usually just waiting to create a big play in the void you’ve left behind. Here’s what he did last postseason:

#SomethingSmart I said it during the game but out of structure, Mahomes is playing chess while others are playing checkers. He wants Kelce but holds the ball and widens to get linebacker Anthony Walker to commit before getting rid of the ball. pic.twitter.com/4VWEUcch5r

— Kent Swanson (@kent_swanson) January 15, 2019

Though his attempt to defend his MVP award was derailed by a midseason knee injury and Lamar Jackson’s brilliance, Mahomes remained a top tier — and somehow under-the-radar — quarterback in 2019. He ranked among the league’s top five passers in interception rate, yards (and adjusted yards) per pass, and SIS’s passing points earned despite taking a step backward in most counting stats following his breakthrough 2018.

His deep ball accuracy was actually better this fall than it was in that MVP season. He improved that number from a 42.7 percent completion rate to 48.6 percent (counting playoffs) in 2019. That was on full display in the Divisional Round when he torched the Texans with five such throws.

Mahomes’ ability to do just about everything well makes him a nightmare to defend. He can torch you at the line of scrimmage or effortlessly flick it deep. That makes him a slam-dunk choice for the No. 1 spot.

2. Aaron Rodgers, Packers

Rodgers hasn’t been his typically superhuman self in 2019. The Packers went 13-3 in the regular season and stand at the doorstep of a Super Bowl anyway.

That’s not to suggest Rodgers was a bad quarterback by any means. Saddled with a receiving corps that featured Davante Adams at the top of the depth chart and a range of unheralded targets behind him (Allen Lazard, Marquez Valdes-Scantling, Geronimo Allison, and Jake Kumerow foremost among them), he still managed to throw for 250 yards per game while leading the league in interception rate.

The combination of Aaron Jones and a defense that’s stepped up to make big plays in clutch moments has limited the amount of moments where Rodgers has had to put his team on the back and make a play that seems to defy the laws of physics. At 36 years old and coming off a season when his scrambling abilities were diminished, it may be fair to wonder whether the two-time MVP can find that extra gear to devastate opponents in the postseason.

Even so, the team is in good hands should the Packers’ playoff hopes rest on Rodgers’ ability to find Adams downfield. Green Bay rode the Seahawks’ steadfast refusal to double-cover Adams in the Divisional Round. That win saw the Pro Bowl wideout haul in eight catches for 160 yards, two touchdowns, and one pivotal third-down conversion late in the game.

Aaron Rodgers. Bad man. #GoPackGo #NFLPlayoffs : #SEAvsGB on FOX : NFL app // Yahoo Sports app Watch free on mobile: https://t.co/8lgzlFahDc pic.twitter.com/IRGGyOJ3v7

— NFL (@NFL) January 13, 2020

Rodgers didn’t have to be a superhero against the Seahawks — he just had to be smart enough to carve up Seattle’s porous pass defense. He’ll face a much tougher challenge against the 49ers’ second-ranked unit in the NFC title game. That could necessitate the return of Rodgers prime to figure out Richard Sherman and the San Francisco secondary.

3. Ryan Tannehill, Titans

Tannehill has been relatively quiet this postseason. Early leads have meant he’s been able to win by handing the ball off to Derrick Henry roughly twice as often as he’s thrown passes.

That, along with an occasionally solid but often underwhelming Dolphins career, has some Titans fans concerned in advance of their biggest game of the year. There are still bright spots, however.

More than 10 percent of his passes in the playoffs have ended in touchdowns. With top choice A.J. Brown blanketed by double coverage throughout the postseason, he’s turned to players like Anthony Firkser and Kalif Raymond.

Ryan Tannehill throws his second touchdown pass in as many attempts as Khalif Raymond gets behind the defense and hauls in the diving catch. #Titans lead 14-0 #TENvsBAL pic.twitter.com/wC2IOFiH7f

— Titans Film Room (@titansfilmroom) January 12, 2020

While his most memorable touchdown of the season so far was the result of a heroic effort (and butt-planting) from Jonnu Smith, it was Tannehill’s mastery of the moment that made that happen. The veteran quarterback stepped back to create space in the face of a blitz and, realizing it was third down, took a chance downfield.

Tannehill put this pass where only his tight end could get it. That trust was rewarded by an absolutely bonkers play from Smith.

JONNU SMITH. A one-handed grab to put the @Titans ahead! #Titans #NFLPlayoffs @EasyMoney_81 : #TENvsBAL on CBS : NFL app // Yahoo Sports app Watch free on mobile: https://t.co/81PYwJcw9t pic.twitter.com/tNgiSLK5Vh

— NFL (@NFL) January 12, 2020

In October, Tannehill took over Tennessee’s starting quarterback role from Marcus Mariota. In the process, he led the league in yards per pass (9.6) while completing more than 70 percent of his throws. His 117.5 passer rating was the best the league’s seen over a full season since 2013 and fourth-best since 1970.

He did this despite getting sacked on roughly one out of every 10 dropbacks. He did this while turning second-rounder Brown into a rookie of the year candidate atop a mostly overlooked receiving corps and without starting tight end Delanie Walker, who played in just seven games due to injury.

That was all extremely impressive. He’s going to have to tap into that version of Tannehill at some point if he’s going to lead the Titans to their first Super Bowl win, though.

4. Jimmy Garoppolo, 49ers

Garoppolo finished the season with an efficient 8.4 yards per pass, a 102 passer rating, and four fourth-quarter comebacks (tied for the league lead). The fact he came in last in this ranking is a testament to the other quarterbacks remaining in this year’s playoff field.

The former Patriot has demonstrated he’s gifted passer who can not only spot opportunities, but also slip the ball into rapidly closing windows. There are major questions to unpack about his ability to identify coverage and throw the ball downfield in clutch situations, however.

Garoppolo’s breakthrough has been marred by ugly interceptions. Five of his 14 picks this year have been the result of linebackers dropping back into the defensive backfield to snipe away a pass that never got to its intended target.

The 49ers’ gameplan has been to bring Garoppolo along fairly slowly with a steady diet of short, relatively easy throws. His completed passes went for an average of 12.1 yards per reception, which ranked sixth in the NFL. However, his average throw traveled only 6.3 yards past the line of scrimmage — 40th among qualified passers! If opponents can find a way to keep his targets (namely loosed bull George Kittle) from rumbling for massive gains after the catch, it could mean Garoppolo will have to hit some deep balls.

There’s hope there. Garoppolo only threw 32 passes than traveled 20+ yards — fewer than any quarterback who threw at least 300 times except Drew Brees. He also turned 19 of those passes into big gain completions to compile a sterling 59.4 percent completion rate on deep balls. No other qualified passer in the NFL even cracked the 50 percent barrier.

It wasn’t always pretty — and sometimes it took some significant adjustments from his wideouts — but it worked.

Garoppolo has already torched the Packers once before, throwing for 253 yards and a pair of touchdowns in a 37-8 win back in November. He even got to show off his ability to place a ball downfield to a wide open Kittle to make all Green Bay’s defensive nightmares come true at once.

A similar performance in the NFC title game would prove his Niners don’t have to rely on their running game to win the conference. And it would tell the world his slot at No. 4 was way too low.

[septembersung]

I’m making this it’s own post and not reblogging anything because I don’t want to Start Something, I just want to voice some frustration and work through some thoughts. 

I’ve been married for five years next month. Five years. Not a lifetime, but long enough to have been through some real amazing peaks and some real devastating lows. I’m a stay at home, committed-to-homeschooling mom. And I still don’t, after five years, have any idea what “wifely submission” looks like. Not in the way most people talk about it. The only thing I know for sure it doesn’t bear a whit of resemblance to what a lot of good-intentioned Catholic women say it does. 

Under the cut because this got way longer than I expected.

I hear the “let him make the decisions!” thing a lot. A large group of women I know once commiserated about how they lined up everything just so, so he could “lead.” Listening to their examples, I thought, ladies, the only leading going on here is you leading him around by the nose. How degrading. What a load of garbage. Is he a child? Incapable? Does it really make him feel powerful and manly when you manipulate the world so he can slam dunk it every time? Do you really want your marriage to be about babying one giant child and raising little people? 

Manipulating your husband into making every single decision, or giving him the absolutely final say on everything, is not a good idea. I’m his wife, not his mother. It is not my job to line up balls on tees so he can hit them and I can cheer from the stands. And odds are he simply doesn’t have the expertise or the knowledge to be making every single decision. 

“Homemaker” is not also not - let me emphasis, not, - synonymous with being an “Ephesians 5 wife.” Whatever submission looks like, it is not exclusively the domain of homemakers. 

I could never, in a million years, have anticipated that I would desire to be a SAHM. I’m a writer with a degree only good, professionally, for teaching and an armchair theologian who’s still telling myself, three years later, that my graduate theology degree is only “postponed for financial reasons,” not “given up on.” I always expected to be teaching or otherwise working in an academic setting. It’s self-evident to me that writing and dealing with the faith are my God-given talents and it would be a massive waste, not to mention spiritual suicide, to stifle that. I’m a SAHM because the minute they put my firstborn in my arms, I knew I could never, in a million years, bear to be parted from him on a daily basis, to abrogate the bulk of his physical raising and educating to someone else. Thanks to the miracles of modern technology, friends who like to babysit, and my incredible husband, I now get just about best of both worlds: homemaker and writer. To my shock, my desires and what’s best for our family life ended up falling down extremely “traditional” lines. 

But that’s personal. That’s my situation.  I know so many good Catholic wives - on a whole spectrum, from committed TLM-goers to my good friend who, bless her heart, despite my best efforts still thinks it’s a great idea use the orans position at various points throughout the mass - who work outside the home. Some do it because their families cannot make it on one income. Some do it because they are good at what they do and they love it. All of them with children struggle with making the right decision they can in their circumstances for their family - and that includes the good of their children, their husbands, and themselves. Whatever “submission” really looks like, it doesn’t, and can’t, mean “automatically a homemaker,” because it completely ignores the reality of how God made us and the world we have to live in. It ignores that the wife-mother is a person, too, whose needs and desires have a right - an obligation - to be cared for and met.

What we can, as Catholics, say for sure, is that modern society is built to disrupt the nuclear family and take mothers away from their infants, and fathers away from their children, and we ought to fight that tooth and nail every way we can. Especially the missing fathers part, because it’s so often overlooked, and when fathers are gone at work twelve hours a day, it puts an impossible burden on the mother and means the children are effectively fatherless most of the time. But that doesn’t mean that women working, in or outside the home or in some combination, is some kind of inherent evil. Pretty sure St. JPII killed that notion explicitly with one little sentence: “Thank you, women who work!” Not to mention the rest of his Letter to Women and a dozen-plus other writings.

Besides “I’m going to set everything up just so, so my husband can feel powerful and like he’s making all the decisions!”, another model of “submission” that I hear a lot is the husband gets the final say in the event that husband and wife cannot come to an agreement; it’s a stalemate breaker. I think this arbitrary and stupid. If a husband and wife who love each other and are on good terms are at such loggerheads over something so serious that they can’t come to any kind of agreement or compromise, who’s to say it’s the husband who’’s actually right? If it’s that weighty of a matter, giving any one person an automatic “my way or the highway” card is an invitation to sin and disaster. Most cases, compromise is possible. And times where it’s not... when you really love your spouse, it’s amazing what you can come to terms with. For example: my husband and I both desire two things for our family, the importance of which is flipped in each of us. I have come to the conclusion, after much soul-searching, that his #1 priority should also be my #1 priority, even though it’s not what I naturally desire. Because what I really desire is a united family, and what’s best for our children. And I realized I’m afraid of his priority, because of the work and difficulty it might - might, not a definite “will” - mean for me. And fear is a terrible reason to avoid something. This is what major decisions look like for spouses who love each other: we love each other so much that we are each willing to sacrifice our heart’s desire, if necessary, for the other’s happiness. In our case, thank God we’ve had a lot of time to work out this problem, and will have a lot more time before any action is called for. I have come to see, based on the practicalities of the situation, that I am the one who should yield - if it even comes to that, and that’s a big if; that my first desire is not necessarily the right and best one. I’m not yielding because “he’s the husband,” I’m yielding because it’s what’s best. And depending on how the particulars fall over the next year, it may yet be him yielding - because of what’s best for the whole family.

My husband and I have different strengths and weaknesses, just because of who we are but also in large part because of the wildly different family cultures we were raised in. I’m detail and schedule oriented, a planner, something of a neat freak. He is... not. I’m also definitely a control freak; I have a very strong personality, make snap decisions, like to move through life at a fast pace, and I’m verbose. He’s quiet, needs time to think through decisions, likes to improvise and go with the flow, moves slowly, and often appreciates it when someone has A Plan he can jump on board with. Consequently, I make a lot of decisions. But because I love him, and I’m not a tyrant, and I try not to be incredibly rude, and because apparently my natural state is “selfish jerk,” I have to deliberately slow down and function as a team and not a one-woman army. “What do you think? Here’s my ideas. Here’s our options. Please give me feedback. Do you see problems, have concerns? What are your suggestions, desires?” I don’t do this because I’m trying to be “submissive,” I do it because we are a team, because our happiness and welfare affects all of us, because I love him value his input, and I know from awful experience that I can, without at all intending to, run roughshod over anyone because I barrel on ahead, lost in my own visions, without considering other perspectives. So I compensate by making myself slow down and dig for feedback. I work especially hard at this in my marriage, but I also have to check myself in my friendships, just because of the nature of my personality. For me, this is a “people relating to people” thing, not a “submission” thing.

If “headship” and “submission” have any meaning at all in the rigors and trials of daily life, in the particular circumstances of how life actually works, they have to be part of the reality of our personalities and situations. Being holy isn’t going to look the same for everyone. For me, I have to work especially hard to give others’ voices a proper hearing. For others, including some women I know, it’s a challenge not to be a doormat. Being a doormat isn’t holy. Having no opinions, never making decisions about anything, not being a leader, isn’t being a “holy wife.” It’s declining to take up the mantle of leadership as a wife and a mother that is yours by virtue of your vocation. 

I have a sneaking suspicion that one reason “wifely submission” is a thing is because it is all too easy for women to rule the way my unfettered fallen nature wants to - as an absolute dictator. We’re often in charge of the home and the children, for a variety of reasons; it would be all too easy to relegate husbands to the back seat. That’s not wrong because it’s the role reserved for the husband, it’s wrong because no one, husband or wife, is supposed to be doing that. That’s not sacrificial leadership. When one spouse rules over another, we’re fulfilling the curses, the consequences, of the fall. It’s only when we come together as one person, one flesh - not two halves coming together to make a whole, but two wholes mingled into another, different, better whole, more than the sum of its parts - where each voice is given hearing and respect and decisions are made mutually according to the needs and talents of the family, that we live out Ephesians 5. You cannot consider “submission” in terms of universal actions or dictates or personality requirements - beyond the general standards of sanctity for everyone -  you can only see it as part of a working whole: the wife sacrifices herself for her family, and the husband sacrifices himself for his family - she works for the family, and he works and dies for it. It’s bound into our natures as male and female, fully realized in the bond of matrimony, not into who does the dishes and who brings home a paycheck. That’s why in her wisdom the Church has given us the term “mutual submission.”

What does that look like on a daily basis? For me, it looks like trying to not be a selfish ass. For my husband, it means working a job he doesn’t like so we can make ends meet and then coming home and helping me out because I need him, sacrificing a lot of his free time for us, and it means in return that I do a lot of things I really don’t want to because he needs down time and I’m the only one who can give it to him. It means I’m largely the idea generator and I bring those ideas to the table for us to work through together. The particulars going to look different in your marriage. And I can almost guarantee it won’t end up looking like you think it will. 

[tumblunni]

Favorite foods for team galactic?

Oh wow, I’ve actually never really thought about this! Weird! O_OI don’t really have any ideas?? Umm.. hmm.. first thoughts that come to mind...

Well you’d probably think mars likes cute cakes or something, and jupiter probably loves cute cakes or something, and i totally headcanon Charon bakes cute cakes or something, and Saturn is cute and probably likes cute cakes. Also Cyrus’s secret weakness is cute cakes.IT IS THE ONE THING THEY ALL AGREE ON

Charon is probably the biggest sugar fiend aside from that. I just imagine him being all fancy poshman as he eats froot loops out of a wine glass.

Mars.. I can probably see her liking stuff like BBQs and steak and etc. She’s the cutest but also the toughest! She should have cliche shonen protagonist tastes! 100% lover of all meat products. Beef bowl destroyer!

Jupiter... well... she’s probably the biggest alchoholic? I think charon probably drinks too, but Jupi is the one who’s like ‘i can live entirely off of wine and nothing else’. And she probably likes the finer things in life, while charon is just like grandpa manchild who eats trash chocolate nonsense and pretends it’s posh just cos he can. (”Rowan my friend, you really must overcome your childlike obsession with sucrose products.” *eating exactly as much candy*)I have no clue yet on jupiter’s actual favourite food, though. I just think she’d probably eat her meals with the best table manners, she’d always be the quiet one slowly eating a fancy dish in the background while the rest of the admins are all GRARRR SHOVE CHICKEN WINGS IN MY FACE and GRARR SHOVE CHICKEN WINGS IN MY FACE: Fancy Poshman Version (tm)Which would be funny cos also Jupiter is the one who works out the most. I think she actually eats the most and loves food the most, she just isnt such a loony about it. And she’s always very strict about making healthy meals to fit with her workout routines, even if it also means she eats the most protein and fatty foods too. I think she’s probably always snacking in the back of meetings but its always like a protein milkshake or a granola bar, and she refuses to ever eat anything she hasn’t prepared herself unless she meticulously checks all the nutritional details....and then mars is just GRARRRR SHOVE CHICKEN WINGS IN MY FACEso its another reason they’re such rivals to each other XD

I do not know about Saturn! I am clueless so far!I like to give him a personality of being the most practical and serious one, with a hidden goofy cute side. But I’ve already said someone else is the health fiend of the group...Well, he’d probably be the weakest to cute food, at least. Physically cannot stop his hands jumping to his wallet when he sees a tiny pancake shaped like a teddy bear! Probably likes to make cartoon themed bento boxes for his grunts. Is the most universally beloved team mom to the underlings! (tho i think jupiter is like the team mom to the other commanders)

And I have a lot of headcanons that Cyrus struggles with an eating disorder, and other types of low-key self care issues. i feel like he’s so obsessed with his plans that he barely eats or sleeps. He’d probably just buy a bunch of actual astronaut food and be like ‘i can get all my nutrition from this tiny pill, twice weekly’ and just generally be NOT MAKING GOOD LIFE CHOICESI figure if he’s ended up looking so zombielike at a mere age 27 then he’s really not taking care of himself... poor bastard...The commanders and grunts try to help him out but he’s all ‘STOP BEING SENTIMENTAL’Just imagine everyone friggin slam dunking him into the nap room and he’s like ‘I REFUSE. I DEFY YOU, SLUMBER!’ And everyone sits on him so he can’t get up.Oh and DEAR GOD when he gets sick it is even more of an uphill struggle to get him to stop working! He could be in a thousand degree fever and he’d still stumble down the hall and sit at his desk scribbling the same word over and over again on his notepad, convinced that if he chugs enough nyquil he’ll see the face of god. he is ABSOLUTELY that post about combining nyquil and dayquil to achieve quil.

I think maybe if everyone combined their efforts into a big team cookoff it’d be very adorable. If they could put aside their differences enough to actually make something good, instead of all making their own separate stuff and then shoving it together into a murky soup of sinister doom. If they could all team up to make a proper family meal, then I bet it’d be good enough to make even Cyrus try some!...actually that could be a cool sidequest or something. Help unite everybody to make breakfast in bed for a sick bossman!GIVE ME ALL OF THE SLICE OF LIFE STUFFS WITH THESE EVILS