#and it all becomes to loud like a cacophony of instruments with no direction and out of tune

[fumble-art]

Oversensory

[tigerkirby215]

5e Seraphine, the Starry-Eyed Songstress build (League of Legends)

(Artwork by Jennifer Wuestling. Made for Riot Games.)

I mean I’m going to have to build her eventually, right? Honestly Tasha’s Cauldron comes out tomorrow so I may as well take a bit of a cheat day and make a build for the new champ. I mean I still have to and pick out a bunch of spells so at least I’m doing that?

Samira build is going to come out sometime in the year 3587 lol.

GOALS

Lookin' for a song in everything I meet! - Seraphine is a stage performer, rallying the whole crowd into song to make it loud and proud!

You're all breathtaking! - Seraphine can unite everyone around her with shields and heals. COUGH SONA COUGH.

Sing it with me! - When the time comes Seraphine can bring the whole world closer together! Good thing she isn’t mute.

RACE

I would really love to do a funny joke and say that Seraphine is a Tiefling or an Orc or something but no: she’s a Human. I can’t even justify any of the Eberron races so we’ll just be going for good ol’ Variant Human.

As a human you can increase two ability scores of your choice: pump up your Charisma and Dexterity to keep fit and beautiful. You can also learn a skill of your choice and for hearing so strong you can hear the voices of a dying nation inside your special necklace take Perception proficiency. You can also take any language of your choice so I’d suggest one that fits with your group, or whichever one you think is Korean. Actually I think Seraphine sung in Chinese which also made people mad? Man Riot can’t stop making her controversial, huhn?

But of course the main appeal of Variant Human is the free feat at level 1. I think Alert is pretty good for mimicking super sensitive hearing. Along with a +5 bonus to initiative you can’t be surprised nor can you be snuck up on. Being able to hear everyone has its perks, huhn?

ABILITY SCORES

15; CHARISMA - If you’re gonna get the crowd to adore you you’ve gotta look the part.

14; CONSTITUTION - I don’t care if Seraphine is a squishy midlane mage we simply don’t need anything else more. Feel free to swap this out with a different stat if you want better roleplay but worse health.

13; DEXTERITY - You need to be able to keep your balance on a moving platform as well as be able to dance along with the K/DA crew.

12; WISDOM - Seraphine’s big thing is being able to hear the emotions of everyone. Knowing what makes people tick is Insight, which is a Wisdom skill.

10; INTELLIGENCE - Seraphine is just your average, everyday girl. Ditzy and a little clueless.

8; STRENGTH - Seraphine can best be described as “petite.” Muscles in the chest hurt your nice soprano.

BACKGROUND

Now you may not know this but Seraphine is a singer, which is a type of Entertainer. As an Entertainer you get proficiency in Performance (obviously) and Acrobatics as well as a music instrument of your choice (Indie Seraphine plays guitar so grab a Lute) and a Disguise Kit, so maybe you can disguise the fact that you’re a copy of So...

Being the premier superstar of Piltover means that you get to tour around a lot By Popular Demand. You can perform in exchange for a place to stay, and doing so will get people to notice you! "Music helps you keep your head up."

(Artist unknown. Blame LoL Wiki. Artwork made for Riot Games.)

THE BUILD

LEVEL 1 - BARD 1

YOU MAY BE SURPRISED TO HEAR THAT SERAPHINE IS A BARD. As a Bard you get proficiency in three skills as well as three instruments! Choose whatever instruments you want (you mostly sing, and the majority of magical instruments are Lutes anyways which you’re already proficient in) (my secret advice? Pan Flutes and Horns have a few magic instruments) but for your skills take Insight to hear the crowd, Persuasion to rally the crowd, and Arcana to learn why your magic crystal is screaming.

You also get Bardic Inspiration! Seraphine talks about being inspired so she can inspire others, and you can inspire your allies with a d6 to add to Attack Rolls, Saving Throws, and Skill Checks!

But of course Bards are spellcasters with Spellcasting too! You can learn two cantrips from the Bard list: Prestidigitation will let you get some special effects on stage and Vicious Mockery doesn’t have to be mockery... It would just be a lot cooler if it was.

You also learn four spells from the Bard list: Comprehend Languages will let you understand everyone’s song, and Faerie Fire will let you light up their life. On the more unnerving end Dissonant Whispers will let folk listen to your crystal, and Detect Magic will let you tell exactly what kind of magic you’re hearing. That’s weird: why is the Hextech crystal radiating Necromancy?

LEVEL 2 - BARD 2

Second level Bards are Jack of All Trades, being able to add half their proficiency bonus to any skill check. Because you see the rhythm in everything! Additionally you get Song of Rest, helping your friends take a break and recover more health during short rests.

But most importantly you get another spell! Another way to cheer someone up is to give them a good laugh, and Tasha’s Hideous Laughter will make them do just that! Maybe they’re laughing about the fact that Riot keeps insisting your not a copy of Sona? Oh don’t worry the jabs at Seraphine as a character are just gonna keep coming.

LEVEL 3 - BARD 3

Third level Bards get Expertise in two skills: choose Insight to hear the souls of both cities, and Performance because... yeah duh. You don’t become famous in a day.

But much more importantly you get your choice of Bard College, and for the rich and fabulous the College of Glamour will make sure everyone loves you! You can now officially captivate the whole audience (up to your Charisma modifier) with your Enthralling Performance, charming them and making them idolize you and defend you on Twitter. To both shield your allies and speed them up with Surround Sound Mantle of Inspiration takes a Bonus Action to give them Temporary Hitpoints and let them take a reaction to move out of danger. Yeah this was pretty much on a silver platter for me so I figured I’d take it.

You can also learn another spell and for an effective Beat Drop take Hold Person, rooting them in place for long enough that your ADC can do their magic.

LEVEL 4 - BARD 4

4th level comes with your first Ability Score Improvement. Charisma is pretty much everything for us now so pumping that up would be helpful!

You can also learn another spell and another cantrip! For your cantrip Dancing Lights will let you light up your stage and also pulls double duty by letting your dumb human eyes see in the dark. As for leveled spells Suggestion is a more direct form of emotional manipulation, suggesting actions for the other person to take. These actions can’t be directly harmful or against what the character would normally do, but “you should buy my $30 release skin” is a fairly ordinary request, right?

(Picture from Seraphine’s Twitter. Yup Seraphine is definitely real.)

LEVEL 5 - BARD 5

5th level Bards get Font of Inspiration, allowing their Bardic Inspiration to come back on a Short rest instead of a Long rest. This is great because your Bardic Inspiration die also increases to a d8, increasing your Mantle of Inspiration Temp HP too!

You can also learn third level spells but the keyword here is can because I’m actually going to stick at second to take spells like Calm Emotions. Man you’ll never guess what this spell does.

While Calm Emotions is a nice spell feel free to deviate from my builds as you see fit. Like seriously a temporary ceasefire is nice but so is a huge Fear cone.

LEVEL 6 - BARD 6

6th level Glamour Bards can make people dance like they have a magical instrument from Ionia. Mantle of Majesty lets you Concentrate on a not-spell once per Long Rest and get the ability to cast the Command actual-spell as a Bonus Action for one minute. Command lets you make one word commands at your enemy as long as they can understand you and you aren’t asking them to do something harmful to themselves. So commands like “Dance!” “Sing!” and “Cheer!” are all viable (though perhaps not effective in a teamfight.)

You can also add another spell to your spell list but again the third level Bard spells aren’t too enticing to me, so take Enthrall to make sure they concentrate on you and you alone.

Oh and you get Countercharm, letting you use an action to give allies against Frightening and Charming effects. Or they could buy some Tenacity. Or you could get a Paladin.

LEVEL 7 - BARD 7

7th level Bards get 4th level spells and Confusion will get the crowd mixed up in the noise, resulting in a cacophony that would sound like unbearable noise to most. Because it is unbearable noise. But at least your friends can fight them in the madness.

LEVEL 8 - BARD 8

8th level Bards get another Ability Score Improvement. Do you know what’s helpful for a class based entirely on Charisma? Maxed out Charisma!

You know what else is helpful? Charm Monster, so you can talk to any crystal scorpions that might be looking for their family. I mean, assuming the Brackern speak human.

(Picture from Seraphine’s Twitter. Yup Seraphine is definitely real.)

LEVEL 9 - BARD 9

9th level sees your Song of Rest increase to a d8. Does this ability scale really poorly? Yeah kinda.

At least you get 5th level spells now. If you want some high notes that’ll dance around you Animate Objects will let you make a bunch of tiny objects to hit your foes! Honestly at this point all the Enchantment spells become uhhh... evil? So we have to go for a different school if we want “good” spells.

LEVEL 10 - BARD 10

10th level Bards get Expertise in two more skills: Persuasion will help you shift the hearts of a nation. Take whatever skill you want as your secondary one since it honestly doesn’t matter too much. (I personally opted for Perception.)

But more importantly it’s Magical Secrets time! This will let you get any spell from any class’ spell list and add it to your own! Most of the time when you get this feature you want to grab some stuff at the max level you can cast but I’m actually going to go down to third level for some support and buffs! For a healing aura around you take Aura of Vitality from the Paladin spell list. To quickly charm a crowd Incite Greed will force everyone to be charmed by you as they want to see your 50 dollar Brackern Corpse... I mean Hextech crystal.

Along with your two Magical Secrets you also get another cantrip. Message is always good to keep plans in team chat.

LEVEL 11 - BARD 11

11th level Bards get 6th level spells like Otto's Irresistible Dance, which forces everyone to get into the rhythm! It’s much harder to fight when you’re dancing: it’s like being stunned! Good thing only you can force a stunning dance on enemies.

LEVEL 12 - BARD 12

12th level Bards get an Ability Score Improvement but now that your Charisma is maxed you can grab Inspiring Leader to rally everyone together for an awesome performance!

(Artist unknown. Blame LoL Wiki. Artwork made for Riot Games.)

LEVEL 13 - BARD 13

13th level Bards see their Song of Rest increase to a d10, and this is the point where I make a joke about Song of Rest scaling poorly.

You at least get 7th level spells, and because none of these really fit Seraphine I’m going to suggest Mordenkainen's Magnificent Mansion for a K/DA stage. But again I need to remind people that I’m picking options for RP and you’re welcome to build the character however you want. Take what you think will be useful and make your own song!

LEVEL 14 - BARD 14

14th level Eloquence Bards have Unbreakable Majesty! As a Bonus Action you can put on your Ultimate Skin to force enemies to make Charisma saves if they try to attack you. If they fail, they’ll target someone else! This is a great way to keep the damage off you since you don’t exactly have great HP or AC. Do remember that it only lasts for a minute though, but you can get it back at the end of a Short or Long rest.

Additionally you get two more Magical Secrets! If you want to sing to enemies far and long (but maybe not Wide) Gravity Fissure is a Dunamancy spell that forces everyone in a line to take a massive amount of damage and be pulled to the center of the spell.

Now that you got your ultimate the world is honestly your oyster. My recommendation to get a crowd to put their hands up would be Chain Lightning, but that’s more because the spell is good than because it fits Sera.

LEVEL 15 - BARD 15

15th levels get their maximum Bardic Inspiration die of a d12! This also means that your Mantle of Inspiration will now give everyone 15 temporary hitpoints! "Harmonize!"

LoL Wiki doesn’t let me link to voice lines anymore and that’s a true crime.

And hey; 8th level spells! If you want to make some Gamers™ mad about your “cash grab” Twitter account just inflict them with Feeblemind so they can spam pictures of Skarner like the marketing department gets to choose what the champion designers make. Because remember: even if Seraphine isn’t real the people pretending to be her are, so don’t be an ass please!

LEVEL 16 - BARD 16

Who likes ASIs? We haven’t used our hyper-sensitive hearing enough so take the Observant feat for a +1 to Wisdom and a +5 to passive Perception and Investigation. And the ability to pick up on lyrics by reading people’s lips!

Are there more useful feats? Yeah, but we build for character here. If you want a powerbuild check out Reddit.

(Picture from Seraphine’s Twitter. Yup Seraphine is definitely real.)

LEVEL 17 - BARD 17

17th level Bards get to pretend that Song of Rest is a good ability! It’s a d12 now so I’m sure it’s useful now that your party all have around 100 HP!

But you finally get access to your mythical 9th level spells! Honestly all the options are great for a girl who has everything, but I’m going to go for the fun Music Video option of True Polymorph. Turn Akali into a dragon! Turn Evelynn into a demon! Turn Skarner into a battery! The possibilities are endless! (Unlike the #BrackernRights memes.)

LEVEL 18 - BARD 18

18th level Bards get their last two Magical Secrets. This is also the last two spells you’ll be getting so better make them count! Of course the best way to make a spell count is to Wish for anything. With this you can finally unite Piltover and Zaun, as long as you believe enough! Or you can bring back Skarner’s family...

For something a little more in-character and a lot more immediately practical: Mass Heal is the perfect Catch-22 to negate any burst. A burst of 700 HP to everyone is never not useful for a bit of Redemption.

LEVEL 19 - BARD 19

19th level Bards get their last Ability Score Improvement: we have an uneven Wisdom score thanks to our last Feat so eh. May as well take Resilient Wisdom for better saving throws and even scores.

LEVEL 20 - BARD 20

20th level Bards have Superior Inspiration! When you roll initiative and have no uses of Bardic Inspiration left, you regain one use. That is literally how the ability is worded. I mean, okaaaaay? At least you can spam Mantle of Inspiration a little more?

FINAL BUILD

PROS

Whole world hears me now! - You’re a full caster with no multiclassing! 9th level spells: no strings attached! You’ve even got a nice spread between Concentration spells and Non-Concentration spells, as well as both utility and combat spells.

Everyone fights to be heard; I'll fight to listen - Being a Bard means you’re good at just about everything, and particularly good at a select few things. 29 Passive Perception? +17 to Persuasion?

We've only just met and I'm already inspired - Who would’ve guessed that a Support class built to support well would be a good support? You’ve got charms, heals, and CC a plenty along with Inspiring Leader to bolster everyone before a battle and Mantle of Inspiration to keep everyone moving with the music!

CONS

Stage fright? Never heard of it - A lot of your BADDEST™ toys are locked behind big spell slots. You’ve only got two 6th level slots, and just one 9th level slot despite having three different 9th level spells to choose from. Again feel free to build your spell list however you want as I just picked what fit in character.

Pretend it's a big rehearsal - Your DEX is meh, your CON is meh. 140 HP isn’t godawful but it isn’t great when you’ll likely have 14 AC at best with Studded Leather. You know what’s really hot right now? Tattoos. See if your DM’s a cool dude who’ll pass you a Rare Barrier Tattoo from Tasha’s to essentially get Medium Armor! Elven Chain is also nice and pretty.

Joy's too quiet without sorrow on the downbeat - I don’t want to make two points related to your stats but they’re the only thing that’s really hurting in this build. Your only good stat is Charisma: and everything else ranges from meh (+2 in DEX / WIS / CON) to bad (0 in INT, -1 in STR.) While you’ll still be able to roleplay with Jack of All Trades skills your Saving Throws hurt. Your concentration is bad and anything heavy will break your petite spine in two. Luckily INT saves aren’t common but anything Strength or Constitution based will quickly put an end to your performance.

Uniting the world in song isn’t easy, but if anyone can do it it’s you. Harmonize, move with the rhythm, and unite everyone through song. There’s nothing you can’t do, and no one can bring you down down down down down down. Well, except perhaps an angry crystal scorpion monster and his army of Twitter followers.

(Artist unknown. Blame LoL Wiki. Artwork made for Riot Games.)

[mistressemmedi]

why is Hans Zimmer so important? He just did music for movies, no? I'm not trying to be rude, just curious sorry

Omg not rude at all but I’m so sorry anon, you’ve unleashed an answer that has become an essay about me gushing over Hans Zimmer. 

First off, Hans Zimmer is a musical genius when it comes to scoring movies. Like, he’s up there with Morricone. Alan Silvestri is another one. 

What’s peculiar about him is that he uses various methods of ‘telling’ the story through the music that doesn’t use just an orchestra but also rock/electro/synths etc. He is able to write and capture the mood of the movie/story/moment etc. so well. 

I’ll give you an example, since this is a motorsport blog (most of the time) we’ll use Rush and the main song ‘Lost But Won’. Give it a  full listen (I know, I KNOWWW it’s 6 minutes long) before continuing to read below - best done in a quite small room or with earbuds 

You’re a driver. An F1 driver. 

In the beginning we have the strings, they bring you to the track. 

The French horns pick up, reminding you that... This is it. This is the race of your life, of your career. There is palpable excitement in the air but it’s subdued because of how important this moment is. 

Those few notes from the guitar remind you of the nervousness that you’re feeling, which is weird. This is not your first grand prix, for fuck sake.

You look around, at the mechanics and engineers trying to give you a last word, the last advice before you settle in and go for the drive of your life. The bass picks up, the low notes helping you focus more but the nervousness intensifies. It settles in at your throat, like a weight you can’t swallow. 

The strings of the guitar are now moving faster, the notes coming out more hurriedly. It matches the pace of your heart because your eyes locked in on the car of your rival, the man you need to beat to get that title. The nervousness now is gone, giving space to  a spark of excitement from before. 

The voice from the single violin reminds you that it’s time. 

Off you go for the formation lap. 

The cello starts to play, through turn 1, turn 2, and you know this track well. It’s an ebb and flow of just you and the car, you don’t need to think. Your hands automatically move in sync with your feet. Brake. Clutch. Accelerate. Brake again. Last turn, you can see the start line. 

There’s a small pang of sadness as you stop the car for the start. It’s the last race, it’s been a long season. But is this enough? Why can’t we race one more time?

But no, this is it. You can do it. 

Get to the mark, line up. Wait. 

Drums start. It’s lights out and away we go. 

Same as the formation lap, turn 1, turn 2. You start well but your rival started better. Not to worry, this is your element. The chase for the win. 

The tempo picks up (around the 2:50 mark) and now the strings are working in coordination with the guitar. Time is irrelevant, is it lap 20 or 40? The only thing you can see is the back of the car in front of you. Time is something left behind after turn 5 & 6. 

You almost got him but it’s not quite enough. The hairs on your arms raise up a bit, and you don’t even realize that you’re smiling. The trill of the chase, of making that pass stick and showing everyone that you are the best. 

Turn after turn, and all your focus is accelerating down the main straight, braking as late as you can. It’s raining, when did that happen? 

The crescendo of the strings, guitars, horns, drums is now absurdly loud. It almost matches the hammering of your heart in your chest. You realize that you’ve been holding your breath for the past... how many minutes?

Main straight again. And you see it, the sign that says “P2, 5 laps to go” (at 3:30 mark)

What? How did that happen? We’re still racing! You’re not in front! More time, we need more time!

The excitement of the chase gives way to the bass guitar, which is vibrating with your anger. 

The drums are louder. They urge you to go fast. Faster. 

There’s a  tinge of desperation now. The shrieking voice of the high notes coming from the electric guitar are a reminder that you will not make it time. You will not win this. 

Faster. You need to be faster. 

It’s a cacophony of instruments, feelings and god knows what else. 

Last corner. Finish line. 

You didn’t make it. 

(At 4:50) Suddenly the tempo is gone, you feel like you’re out of breath. Everything boiled down to this final race and you tanked it. 

The repetitive three single beats from the drum almost feel like a final send-off to your championship dreams. It’s gone. It’s all lost. How fitting, almost like a gun salute at a funeral. 

(At 5:35) You get out of the car, you don’t feel like celebrating. 

The lone violin prompts you to look at your rival, the winner who stole everything from you. 

But did he really? He’s also one of your closest friends on the grid (as much as you can call a competitor ‘friend’). The respect, the camaraderie he showed you through the season. He never pulled his punches while racing and always gave it his all, trusting you to honor him the same way. 

You can hear the guitar again (at 6:10) reminding you of that feeling before the race, that small spark of excitement. 

You nod at your rival, he nods back in a gesture of respect. A small thank you for the battles on track this past year. 

Maybe you even smile a bit. 

The violin’s last note ends. There’s always next year. The next championship is definitely yours. 

Listen to it the song again. 

Now, obviously the story in Rush is a bit different, but you can tell that this song was written specifically about being fast, about racing, about winning and losing.

Bonus song from the Rush soundtrack would be Stopwatch. Excellent 2 min little thing.

The way that Hans Zimmer is able to direct the orchestra through the tempo changes of the score is amazing. And let’s not forget the man composed the music himself. WTF right? Amazing! 

If you have the chance, listen to Interstellar. I don’t know how but somehow he managed to explain how it feels to be in space, how it feels to be lonely, the desperation of survival etc... With music. Incredible. 

Also, listen to his original Pirates of the Caribbean score. You can’t tell me that listening to “He’s a Pirate” one cannot help but imagine Captain Sparrow running around Tortuga with a bottle of rum lol. 

Anyways, I’m a massive fan of Hans’ work and I’m extremely jealous of Lewis who got to sit down and pick his brains.

[dfhvn]

Album of the Week: Deafheaven ‘Ordinary Corrupt Human Love’ // Stereogum

Feature by Chris DeVille via Stereogum After the soothing sound of the ocean tide, the first instrument you hear on Ordinary Corrupt Human Love is a piano. Soon its somber neoclassical arpeggios are intertwining with the yearning slide guitar that has marked many of the most pleasant interludes on previous Deafheaven tracks, and before long the song has bloomed into an elegant suite not unlike the second half of “Layla.” A loosely swaying drumbeat lifts the music to a low cruising altitude. A woman’s voice low in the mix reads poetry about a transformative twilight stroll, evoking smoke-blinded eyes and geese “shrieking into what was left of the evening.” It all builds up so naturally and gradually that when Kerry McCoy’s guitar goes whipping upward into “November Rain” theatrics and George Clarke’s harsh black metal growl finally enters the frame, they feel of a piece with the beauty surrounding them — clouds that ominously gather for some thunderclaps before dispersing without a storm.

The downpour eventually does roll in on “You Without End,” but even at the peak of its fury it never approaches the blistering intensity that has historically introduced a Deafheaven album. Consider it a thesis statement for Ordinary Corrupt Human Love. Although unmistakably the work of the band that gave us twin masterpieces Sunbather and New Bermuda — with help from producer Jack Shirley, their very own George Martin figure — these seven tracks err on the side of Deafheaven’s most accessible impulses. Sublime atmospheric beauty lingers over everything like a haze. Gnarly classic rock riffs rip across the chaos as if beamed in from FM radio. Clarke and his bandmates actually sing a few times, and gorgeously so. It’s the prettiest and least metal album yet from a band sometimes maligned for being too pretty and not metal enough. Among skeptics, the rap against Deafheaven has always been that they’re a token fashion accessory for indie poseurs who know nothing about metal. This is at least partially true; as an indie poseur who knows nothing about metal, I’ve been a devoted Deafheaven fan ever since Sunbather fulfilled the promise of debut Roads To Judah and gave them their big crossover moment five years ago. Where many of their peers and influences have not connected with me, this group’s fusion of black metal, post-rock, and shoegaze triggered a violent euphoria in the depths of my soul. Deafheaven satisfied a hunger I didn’t know I had for grippingly visceral yet blindingly beautiful heavy rock music. The scene politics around them are as meaningless to me as the music itself is meaningful. Many of my fellow dilettantes felt the same way, but so did quite a few lifelong metal zealots: Who cares what you call it when it rules this hard? Deafheaven, however, seemed to pay at least some heed to the authenticity police. Their first album after becoming media darlings, 2015’s New Bermuda, wasn’t a straightforward black metal release by any means, but it edged closer to that polarity. The dreamy, poppy qualities that gave Deafheaven entry into the critical mainstream were riding shotgun, conceding the driver’s seat to absolute combustible brutality. New Bermuda was louder and harsher than the already loud, harsh Sunbather, less like being overtaken by a wave of magnificent translucent destruction and more like being viciously beaten by an army of invaders. Whether this was a purposeful response to the backlash was unclear — and fortunately New Bermuda was brain-fryingly spectacular regardless of motive — but the album struck me as a band working hard to show off its metal bonafides.

Ordinary Corrupt Human Love swings hard in the opposite direction — or rather, at times it swings quite gently and gracefully. Rather than the ennui of Sunbather or the foreboding of New Bermuda, this is an album about love and intimacy and nature and epiphany. It sounds like the natural creative runoff from the placid, bougie LA life described in our recent cover story, the healing aftermath following years of hard living. Which is not to say every song forgoes Deafheaven’s signature heaven-collapsing-into-hell bombast the way “You Without End” does. Advance singles “Honeycomb” and “Canary Yellow” plus “Glint” add up to more than half the album’s run time, and all of them find this band doing what they do best, crafting grandiose genre-agnostic symphonies that build to peaks of ecstatic celestial bombardment. All the other elements of this band’s sound feel so much more monumental when leading up to an onslaught of blast beats, gleaming tremolo noise, and shrill indecipherable shrieking.

Yet even those songs in the classic Deafheaven mold add new details to the formula, be it the group chant that courses through the end of “Canary Yellow” or the Camaro-jamming Thin Lizzy breakdown in “Honeycomb” that regularly moves me to gleeful air-guitar outbursts. It’s clear Deafheaven are pushing not to repeat themselves and to continue expanding their arsenal. Sometimes, as on “Near” and “Night People,” that amounts to a disarmament. These are songs on which the band never revs up beyond a baseline shoegaze drift and Clarke trades his usual rasp for conventional melodic singing, in the latter case accompanied by Chelsea Wolfe. His voice is deep and maudlin, accentuating the drama in entirely new ways — not least of which the ability to make out what he’s singing about without the aid of a lyrics sheet. (Some of the album’s more impressionistic lyrics — say, “I have wondered about the language of flowers/ And you, elaborate mosaic, greeting me,” or “And alabaster lips unseal/ So I may recall the soft timbre of whisper in its stillness” — are better left obscured by screaming, when they can embody whatever meaning you want them to.)

Ordinary Corrupt Human Love is bookended by two songs that split the difference between your usual Deafheaven cacophony and those decidedly scaled-back ballads. It begins with the aforementioned “You Without End,” the expansively pretty overture that has drawn more than one comparison to Mellon Collie And The Infinite Sadness. And it concludes with “Worthless Animal,” a 10-minute post-metal epic that just builds and builds and builds, like the soundtrack to the raddest flight simulator of all time. As Clarke barks out more surrealist gobbledygook about “the ladies cradling streams of buttermilk current” and such, his bandmates rise skyward, vigorously careen through turbulence, and eventually soar out into the great unknown, presumably to discover another chapter of the Deafheaven story. In the meantime, we’ve got this one, presenting masters of tumult giving peace a chance, still capable of demolishing you but sometimes content to let beauty escape into the world unscathed.

Ordinary Corrupt Human Love is out 7/13 on Anti-. Pre-order it here and stream it here.

[erlenmeyertrash]

storms and stardust

i’m totally not a day and a half late to the platonic analogical day or anything, it’s fine

dedicated to @virmillion , the sunshine to my stardust

words: 2684 | pairings: platonic analogical | warnings: mentions of storms(?), slight anxiety- if you need anything tagged please let me know

tag list: @zerogettie , @five-hour-anxiety , @lovelylogans , @shattered-raine, @lakesandquarries , @randomslasher , @pantasticpanini (if you want to be added just hmu and i’ll add you!)

The stucco ceiling looms overhead, each ripple and wave jumping into a vivid third dimension and constructing an intricate inverted topography. It is synesthesia of sound, each wiggle of the sprayed-on texture signifying a hiss and each smattering of longer ridges bringing forth a crackle and each solidified bubble of air fabricating a pop.

A storm rages outside, the window a weak defense against the onslaught of pure loud that is heavy precipitation. The rain is less a pitterpatterpitterpatter of the evening’s preceding showers and more an ambiguous yet steady roar of a billion soldiers diving into battle all at once. Thunder rumbles distantly in the background- the drummer boy keeping his infantry’s time.

It is during this storm that his eyes dance across the artificial skyscape, allowing the hissing, crackling, popping terrain to map out the steps as his gaze wanders and his mind wonders. The shadows of sleep have eluded him, crowding themselves into the corners as his eyes adjust to the lack of light and his brain whirls as though battered by the very winds assailing the exterior of the house.

His thoughts scamper over some new untrodden path, ever trailblazing, never pausing, rushing and stumbling over themselves, an onslaught, torrential, why can’t he s l e e p? His eyes hiss crackle pop pop p o p hiss crackle- wait no, backtrack- hiss crackle crackle crackle p o p their way around his ceiling, each tango, each waltz, each envisioned piece of choreography organic and new.

Oxygen fills his lungs near capacity as some responsible part of his subconscious prods him to remember to do so, the not-quite-hiss-not-quite-huff of a deep inhale adding to the cacophony of vibrations intercepted in his eardrums. The pillow settles microscopic distances as his head is subtly jostled by the movement opening his airway. The sheets do not rustle until he straightens a crooked leg, fabric sliding over skin as his muscles tighten.

There have been far too many consecutive nights where unconsciousness evades him; in this particular instance, the raging downpour is well-received as it quells the aching silence that is his simultaneous refuge and prison. When the only sound is no sound, his brain must play the part of composer and conductor but it is rather tone-deaf and so poorly keeps time. The rain is a welcome conversation on which to eavesdrop before the infamous concert begins.

Before he can realize their appearance, thoughts on the history of the universe are subversive, slipping into his mind and disrupting all other trains of thought like shells swirling underneath the tides currently crashing into his windowpane. The silica composing those shells and the sand and the glass was formed a mere 200 million years into the existence of the universe- the fusion of sixteen protons into one singular silicon unit. Stellar nucleogenesis: the formation of molten, shifting plasma inside starlight expanding across the silence of space, making 26 elements to eventually compose the most simple carbon-based life. 26 elements inside those stars. 26 letters in the modern English alphabet. 26.2 miles in a marathon, the likes of which his brain is currently undertaking in a full sprint.

Then those tides are turning, the melodic roar of water on the roof and walls forced to yield to the vibrant dissonance of sleepless night ramblings. The conductor’s baton is waving wildly but the instruments have a mind of their own. He just wants to sleep. He doesn’t know when his eyes stopped leaping and bounding over hiss crackle pop but he realizes he has been boring a hole into the spot directly above his right eyebrow for some time now. Maybe the roof will leak and he’ll have an excuse to get up, to move, to do something to occupy his thoughts.

The creeeeeaaaak of the floor outside his bedroom door, then, occupies his thoughts.

He bolts upright and shoves the swishing sheets down his body, squinting at the sliver of space under his door, suddenly transfixed and hoping there is another indication of a something that could battle his brain. That the creak wasn’t a sigh of the foundation, wasn’t a random blip on the radar. Please.

Pale yellow light seeps in from the hall and that is all the impetus he needs to throw his feet off the side of the bed, standing and clumsily swiping his hand across the bedside table. His glasses click clack clatter as his fingertips stumble into them and he hastily yanks the spectacles over his razor-sharp gaze before running the few short steps to his door.

He throws it open, the hinges letting out a sharp whine of protest, and suddenly the storm outside receives a burst of energy anew; more thunder echoes across the skies as the droplets assault any surface they can reach and he makes eye contact with the figure that was slowly creaking its way down the hall.

“...Logan? What are you doing awake?”

From his few short steps away, Virgil speaks first. His voice is gruff and gravelly, but there is a tremor there, a pitch far too high, too alert for such a time of night. His eyes betray his chronic lack of sleep but also show no symptoms of actual tiredness- they are wide and bright and Logan exhales with a whoosh.

“I couldn’t sleep,” he confesses, his own vocal cords vibrating at a frequency of fatigued frustration. Those too-wide eyes are covered by shaggy lilac locks as Virgil tilts his head.

“Why not?”

Logan taps his forehead, a cold fingertip thumping against the skin just above his right eyebrow. “Can’t stop thinking.”

“About?”

Logan couldn’t really explain that his brain turned the ceiling into a topographical map that was also stage directions for a dance and he thought about shells and the origin of the universe and it’s raining but his window is underwater and-

No. Too complicated. A shoulder shrug seems to work as Virgil’s face twists into one of sympathy.

“I, uh. I get that.”

The following utter silence is so jarring to Logan’s hoof-hammering racehorse of a mind that he is too shocked to notice how awkward it quickly becomes. He is, however, pulled out of the reverie a short moment later, when a loud CLAP of thunder shakes the house and Virgil flinches as though the bolt of lightning nearly singed his shoulder.

“Are you alright, Virgil?”

“What? Yeah. Yeah, I’m fine.” Virgil squirms under Logan’s piercing gaze- even more so as the logical side doesn’t appear to have any desire to respond. His stare is somehow cold but not harsh- just a searing, soundless intensity of headlights that have Virgil frozen in the middle of the road.

“...It’s just-” Virgil runs a pale hand through his hair, rolling his shoulders forward to pull the hood of his jacket closer around his neck- “I’m a little… on edge. The storm is. Uhm. Loud? It’s stupid, I know,” he stumbles on, “but-”

“It isn’t stupid at all,” Logan interrupts, breaking his stare with a slow blink. “Storms do bring about a decrease in air pressure, which can affect a person’s normal breathing rate. The sudden loud noises and bright flashes, of course, can also heighten a person’s anxiety.”

Virgil rolls his shoulders again, ducking his head and staring at his sock-clad feet. Logan hears an audible click in his mind as the pieces fall into place.

“...However,” Logan continues, suddenly feeling a fidgety tingle skittering down his fingertips as he adjusts the corner of his glasses. “There are several measures one can take to alleviate adverse effects. Turning on dim lighting or ambient noises as well as blocking external sound and light sources through a multitude of methods may all serve to allow you to feel more at ease and potentially get some rest. The company of another may also help you relax.”

Da-dum. His heartbeat punctuates his last sentence. Virgil’s eyes widen infinitesimally (you’re never going to live that one down, are you?). Logan ducks his chin and readjusts his glasses that have not moved at all.

“...Would it be agreeable if I accompanied you back to your room? It may help ease your nervous state, and it is of no consequence to me, seeing as I am already awake.”

A low rumble of thunder rolls over the roof- not as sudden as before, but Virgil still seems to tremble ever so slightly. He swallows and nods curtly, overgrown fringe intermingling with his eyelashes.

“...I mean. If you don’t mind. That’s. Uh. That’d be... cool, I guess.”

After a pause- Logan blinks and the image of a quarter-rest is burned into the backs of his eyelids, now- Virgil leads the way down the hall towards his room, the soft swish swish swish of socked feet and cotton pajamas more distinct without windows to amplify the swirling storm outside. He pushes open the door and Logan’s ears are immediately filled with the snare-drum sound of water hitting windowpane, rattatatratatatratatat drilling its way through his skull. His eyes snap towards the uncovered glass spanning the wall across from Virgil’s bed.

“Goodness, that is loud. Why don’t you have any curtains?” Logan gestures to the empty rod above the window, finding he actually has to raise his voice to be heard over the assailing precipitation. At his inquiry, Virgil stuffs his hands in his pockets and shrugs. Logan clicks his tongue and turns to look back at the window.

Rattatatrattatatrattatatrattatat It’s so loud! Logan’s thoughts are on the defensive, struggling to tip the scales of sound in their favor as his mind whirls around possible solutions. He blinks hard at the window before- Oh.

Obviously.

“Virgil, you have extra blankets in your closet, correct?”

Virgil glances up from his feet. “...Yeah?”

“I suppose those will work. Let’s get them out and go about covering this window to muffle the noise, even if only a little.”

Virgil obediently shuffles to his squeeeak-ing closet door and begins tossing several blankets onto the floor of his room; Logan turns in a slow circle, surveying the rest of the dimly-lit surroundings. He grabs Virgil’s chair from the corner of the room and drags it in front of the window, taking one of the heavier blankets and tying two of the slightly-frayed corners around the empty curtain rod. Virgil backs out of his closet and stares at him, hands hugging his elbows and finger.

“While I am doing this-” Logan pauses as he shoves one end of the blanket down the rod, expanding its area before he starts on the other corners- “I would recommend you search for some ambient or white noise sounds on some audio application on your laptop. That or some calming music may help overpower the noise of the storm.”

Logan’s tongue peeks out from between his teeth as he busies himself with several knots, stepping down every few seconds to grab another blanket off the floor. He hears the shuffling of feet and the soft whuff of the bed mattress as Virgil sinks down, followed by the rhythmic clicking of keys.

Soon, soft piano music warbles through the laptop speakers. Logan finishes his last knot moments later, hopping down to the floor with a thump before adjusting a few of the blankets. To his pleasure, they did a more-than-adequate job of muffling some of the noise. Rather than the torrential tapping of droplets on the glass, the storm’s presence is reduced to a steady hissing. Logan adjusts his glasses and turns to Virgil, who has set his laptop on the bedside table, the soft gray glow filling the room alongside the calming piano chords.

“Is this better?” he asks, satisfaction evident his face as Virgil nods with a shy smile. Logan heads towards the other side of the bed, wasting no time in sliding under the extra soft blanket spread over the comforter and sidling up next to Virgil.

“Now.” Logan shimmies fractionally, causing the sheets to flutter as he eases his weight backward. His shoulder grazes against Virgil’s, and as he stills, they remain in contact, warmth slowly transferring back and forth, attempting to establish an equilibrium. “Would you like to talk about anything?”

Virgil is silent. Logan tilts his head to better see the anxious side, who is squinting across the room at the makeshift curtains.

“...Would it be too weird if I… um. If you talked, and I just listened?”

“Not at all. What would you like me to talk about?”

“Um. Anything? You pick. I don’t want to make you talk about something you don’t like.”

“Fair enough.” Logan shifts his gaze skyward, letting his pupils pick up the pace held what seems like forever ago in his room. Hisssss crackle crackle pop pop p o p crackle pop hiss pop crackle pop.

“...The universe, as most theorize, came into existence approximately 13.8 billion years ago. We know this, of course, by measuring the distance between different galaxies and their rates of change, as well as observing older stars. 13.8 billion years ago, every bit of mass and energy was condensed into a singular point- and then it exploded. Massive amounts of pressure and enormously high temperatures dominated as everything burst forth.

“For the first instant in time- ten to the negative thirty-second power of a second, to be exact- the radius of the universe expanded extensively as the sheer force of the explosion radiated outward. The first ‘particles’ to exist that we are aware of, such as quarks and leptons, composed- I suppose “matter” must be the correct term here- the matter of the universe at this point.

One microsecond into the existence of the universe, these basic particles formed protons; and there is a statement there, I suppose, about the universe’s first creation being something positive. One-hundredth of a second into the existence of the universe, nuclear fusion began of protons with one another due to the still-extremely-high pressures and temperatures- the conditions perfect for the strong nuclear force to become evident. From then, up until the universe was three minutes old, it is theorized that the universe created the first four elements of the periodic table: hydrogen, helium, lithium, and beryllium.

These are not, of course, sufficient for formation of the carbon-based lifeforms we know of today. Carbon is only fused into existence some 200 million years later, along with the other first 26 elements, which include phosphorus and sulfur- the bases for DNA and proteins, respectively. I suppose there is another statement there about how much time the universe put into crafting living organisms such as you and me.

Though I suppose we aren’t living, not technically, not really. We are Thomas’ personified personality aspects, and though we may often act alive, it is a-”

“Too meta, dude.”

Logan’s hand jerks- lost in the recesses of his own mind, he has completely forgotten another person is slumped next to him. He blinks, realizing the foreign object pressing on his side is actually Virgil, who has shifted so his head is leaning slightly on Logan’s shoulder. Logan makes no move to adjust him- the weight is warm and comfortable, and he leans his own head in slightly until his cheek is flush against Virgil’s mop of lavender-and-chocolate hair.

Lavender. That would help him sleep as well.

“My… apologies,” Logan mumbles, failing to stifle his yawn, before continuing. “The first 26 elements are made inside stars via this stellar nucleogenesis- a series of fusion reactions- but simply those 26 are not enough to comprise the complex life forms... of today. Our bodies, to give an example, also need heavier elements such as... iodine and copper. The heavier elements are brought into being through supernova nucleogenesis. When... much larger stars... expand and eventually explode, it is theorized that these heavier elements were formed through nuclear fusion reactions with… oxygen and silicon. Silicon has… a specific structure, deemed silica, that comprises a pseudo-skeleton of several… early life forms. And glass. And so then… all the elements for life are in… the dust emanating from star explosions… People are... made of stardust, isn’t that…”

[theliterateape]

The Trouble with Transactional Relationships and Recognizing Them

by Don Hall

"Who the FUCK spends $288.00 in a Denny's?!"

Back in the 80s, the Wild Wild West was known as King 8 Casino & Hotel and was host to the King 8 Grill. At the time it was one of the hottest spots to eat in Vegas off the strip. Today, the King 8 Grill is a Denny's franchise and separate from the casino and hotel. Managers can still comp guests (and staff) but the company pays the Denny's Corporation for the courtesy.

Given the lack of perks for the guests, the Denny's comp is about all the managers at the West have to placate those with a beef.

The machines are rough around the edges. Approximately a third of the Game Kings and Buffalo's are decades old and break down frequently while players have money in them. In the earlier days of Vegas, slot machines were mechanical. Today, they are almost entirely Microsoft computers, monitors, and bugs.

✶

I noticed one of my cocktail waitresses at two tall Buffalos. She was flanked by two women who were both a solid foot taller than she was and highly animated, talking and gesticulating wildly. I came over, saw that the two machines were frozen. One had $11.00 in it. The other had $10.00 but had frozen during a Bonus Round. I tapped my waitress out. "I got this."

I held up my hands dramatically.

"I'm going to predict the future!" I exclaimed. "I'm going to get into these machines and do my level best to get them up and running so you can continue playing and you can get your bonus round. For the next ten minutes or so, I will endeavor to fix this. But I'm going to say something now that, if I cannot get things up and running, will not change from now to then. If I can't get your machines up and running, you will be given your $11.00 and $10.00 back, no question but you will not be awarded for a Bonus Round unplayed. You will now commence to bitching about this while I work."

And bitch they did commence.

For eight minutes I pulled out all the tricks. I checked the bill validators. I unplugged and plugged back in the silver box, the blue box, and the main computers. I put in my special reset card and reset both machines twice.

All the while, the two women yelled non-stop about how they treat people at the MGM Grand, about how one was a nurse and if something didn't work with a patient it would be on the hospital to compensate them, that the casinos were all making so much money that we could afford to pay out Bonus Rounds even if they weren't played. During the cacophony, I learned that they were mother and daughter but hardly looked it, that they were there with 'boyfriends' who they didn't really know too well (neither could get the mother's male companion's name right), and that they played here at the West all the time.

"OK. I tried. I failed. As I predicted, you will now be refunded the money in your machines."

Immediate discord.

My hands went up again. "Alright. I hear you. Here's what I can do. For you (the mother) I can give you your $11.00 back. That's it. My apologies and $11.00. For you (the daughter) I can either shut down the machine and you can wait for a slot technician to come and fix it and then play your bonus round. That'll happen next week and I can call you if you win anything. Or I can refund your $10.00 and offer you a meal at the Denny's for your trouble."

A pause.

"How about four meals? There's four of us."

I did a quick calculation in my head. I could get away with four meals at Denny's and justify it if for no other reason than to shut these ladies up and move on with my day.

"OK. I can do four meals."

The four of them, satisfied, walked over to the Denny's. I went to the cage and got them their $21.00. I handed it off as they were getting drinks. "This is on the house," I told the waitress.

I went about my business.

Ninety minutes later, the Denny's waitress came over to give me the bill so I could fill out the comp slip.

"$288.00?! What the hell did they freaking order? Holy Shit!"

Four steak dinners. Four milkshakes. Four desserts. Three breakfasts, a sandwich, and a meatloaf platter to go along with two more milkshakes. An order of brownies. The list went on. I was stunned and furious.

I was so caught off guard, I left the casino to smoke and vent out loud to myself. The first trip around the property I was angry at them. The second trip, I realized I was pissed at myself. I had opened the gate; they had just walked through it.

Twenty minutes later, I came back and noticed they were still there. No longer at the Denny's but back playing the machines. I knew that as soon as my general manager saw the $288.00 comp, it was my ass but I thought I saw a way out. I approached the four, all smiles.

"Did you enjoy your meal? You should've because you got enough food to serve a football team!" And they laughed.

"You sticking around? If you are, can I get you some drinks on me?"

They were and I could. They ordered four double shots of Patron. $72.00 in tequila. "Absolutely!" I said. I was betting these idiots wouldn't be able to tell the difference between Patron and El Toro so I had the bartender pour four double shots of the latter. A $1.80 comp.

Sure enough, they didn't know the difference between premium tequila and horse piss so they were feeling quite taken care of. I kept this up, delivering my fake Patron double shots every 45 minutes or so, chatting them up, directing them to slots that I told them were big payouts but, in fact, were more like donation boxes.

Six hours later, they were plastered and had lost over $6,000.00. I had made my $288.00 back and then some.

A few months later, I saw them in the joint again. The mother was having a problem with her free play points. There was no chance I was being suckered twice. I explained that I could email our marketing department to look into it but there was nothing I could do for her at the moment.

"What about some Denny's?" the daughter asked.

"No. I'm sorry but I can't give out Denny's for a $5.00 free play issue."

"That's alright. We already jacked up that stupid manager." They both started laughing. They didn't recognize me as I had shaved my beard off since our first encounter. "We ordered $300.00 in food. We ate on that for two days. That white boy was DUMB."

Yes. He was.

✶

In the casino most of the relationships are openly transactional. That's the very nature of the business. The casino wants people to come in and lose their money on slots. The people want something in return if they keep losing. Everyone is looking to get one over on everyone else. The nicest encounters from the nicest people can turn ugly in seconds as soon as the staff refuses a request.

My difficulty in life has been my inability to recognize these transactional relationships outside of the casino.

When we moved to Vegas, we came out here with a friend who financed the move in exchange for our help. He was disabled and couldn't handle the move. We were friends and it all seemed kosher until we arrived and the move was complete. The transaction had been concluded but the relationship was cemented in our obedience to more transactions. After all, he was still disabled and expected that we would continue to do his bidding and as soon as either my wife or I refused a request, we became his enemies.

My second marriage was transactional. She wanted someone to produce her artistic inclinations; I wanted someone brilliant to create shows I would produce. When I stopped producing shows of any kind, she moved on to a mutual friend for a year before we divorced.

In the earliest days of the theater I founded in the nineties, I thought we were all in it together but whenever I attempted something that would benefit us all and I failed, my failure resulted in my perceived comrades in arms turning on me in a split second. I spent the first several years of that endeavor constantly worried that the ensemble would simply leave should I not meet the transactional requirements in place. Eventually I got tired of that pressure and when people left only to scorch the earth with tales of what an asshole I was, I couldn't be surprised.

I was definitely the asshole. I reneged on the premise of the relationships. I was there to serve them, they were there to be served. I rejected the premise thus the promise.

Upon reflection, I've never been great at making friends. I can lay blame on a host of reasons for this but I'd wager that the rolling stone nature of my growing up has me gaining status and relationships based in large part from what I can supply. I'm worth your time because of what I can do for you. As soon as I find myself resenting the transactional nature of the friendship, as soon as I stop doing things, the relationship becomes null and void.

I'm getting on in years at this point and I find a healthy sense of misanthropy is settling into my bones. My earlier inability to understand the transactional nature of so many of my relationships—from the assistant I trained at the public radio station who was instrumental in my resignation to the misperceived friends I had in Chicago who abandoned me in the face of controversy—has fostered a desire to be left alone.

Yes. There was a time when I blamed them, was angry at them. After a second walk around the property, I realized that I had opened the gate; they just walked through it. If anyone is to blame (as if assigning blame is either necessary or helpful) it is most definitely me. I am the asshole. I entered into the agreement of friendship in exchange for industry. I no longer have any desire for that sort of bought and paid for relationship. Thus multiple burnt bridges to multiple transactional friendships.

I am, gratefully, beginning to recognize those relationships based on mutual interest, common enthusiasms, and equal transactions. I'm beginning to see the joys of friendships without strings attached, without a contract.

✶

With the economy having taken a hit and employment moving further and further online, it concerns me that so much of our communication to one another has become strictly transactional. GoFundMe, Patreon, Buy Me a Coffee, OnlyFans. As our relationships grow exponentially from in-person to online, the mixed message of being a "friend" (the definition changing before our very eyes and meaning everything from 'friend' to 'subscriber' to 'follower') and a transactional partner is murkier.

I mean, Christ, I just started to see the difference in my own life and I'm over half a century old. I wonder if my niece is able to see the difference now that so many of her relationships are primarily digital. I wonder about kids who've spent the past year in lockdown and who's only relationships are within the social media platforms.

From this position I'm in, having realized the emptiness of transactional friendships, I offer a caution. Take a moment or two and reflect upon your relationships. The ones that are predicated on transaction are doomed.

[sulfurousdreamscapes]

My hand was trembling as I touched the pale curtain and moved it to the side, taking care not to make too much sound. Inside, the three women wearing white were hunched over a table, and through them I could catch glimpses of the bronze device. The scene made stand transfixed. I’d been on ships to Rome and Rhodes, even to the sands of Egypt, but not once had I seen an object so utterly uncanny.

The women argued with each other, and one of them was quite flushed in the face. She pointed fingers at the device and then at the other women, and her grey-blonde hair were starting to come undone. She was using a lot of words I didn’t understand, but could tell were related to the sciences, perhaps to the science of numbers. The second woman, with hair the colour of wine, was shaking her head for the most part. The third woman, with jet black hair and a more youthful face was deflecting the angrier woman’s accusations.

I decided not to push my luck. If the women kept the device from me, I’m sure they had a reason. There’s a reason for all things, my mother always used to say. I didn’t want to believe her when she said it, but I’m coming to agree over the years. Rest her soul. I withdrew my hand from the curtain.

Just before the pale white cloth could obscure me, the angry woman caught a glimpse of me. I could see her charge towards me through the translucence of the curtain, and I stepped back instinctively. She emerged right out of the curtain, her face so contorted, she could have hurled thunderbolts with more ferocity than Zeus himself.

She gripped my by the wrist and dragged me into the inner chamber, where the other two women were staring at me, their arms firmly folded. “There,” the angry woman said, throwing me towards the device. “Take a good, long, hard look, sow.”

The device had a large circular… handle of some kind, and several smaller ones. Inscriptions in both words and individual letters adorned the circular decorations on the box. There were scrolls lying about the table, which contained both armies of flowing letters and diagrams of the stars. There were many circles, so many circles, all labelled with names and terms.

“What is this?” I asked, “Is this… the Oracle?”

“We are the Oracle,” the wine-haired woman said, doing nothing to help me up. “But this, this is the machine.”

The black-haired woman smiled, but not to me. “There are gifts the gods have given us. This is our gift to the gods,” she said.

“What does it do? Is it alive?” I asked, and the latter question made the two women laugh.

The angrier woman returned, having locked the door leading out. “Well, she’s seen it, what do we do now?” she asked her colleagues.

“We’ll let her go,” the black-haired woman said. “She won’t tell anyone, will she?” Her question was directed at me.

“No,” I said. I wasn’t sure if I was lying.

Rho, Sigma, Tau. The angry one. The wine-haired one. The black-haired one. I traced the letters on the wall as I lay down next to it. The letters were formed between all the dust. The three women that formed the Oracle. They could see anything, tell any fortune, reveal any fate. And yet, they relied on artifice.

I wondered who made it. Somehow, the idea that the women may have constructed it by themselves just never occurred to me. No, it had to be a man: some scrawny man with grey-white chest hair and a face that did him no favours. Or perhaps it came from a god, and the women are in fact just not in the know.

Whatever the case may be, one thing was clear: no one knew about the machine. No one was supposed to know about the machine. If the word got out, things could be very different. Fire from the gods. The Oracle was wise to keep the knowledge to themselves, I thought, but this created a greater, more frightening question.

Why did they trust me?

I could see their faces burned into me. Rho, especially, with her large, Persian-looking nose. She had a knowing smile on her face. Like she knew that I was something more than even I imagined. Like she was appraising a gem.

The next day, I returned to the Oracle in the evening, making sure not to be seen. I pretended I was delivering pomegranates. Setting them aside, I peeked into the chamber again, and there it was: the machine. But the women were not around. So I got in, and I touched the machine.

It made no movement whatsoever, and that was fine. I wouldn’t know what to do if it did start. It was the strangest contraption I’d seen. In the distance, I heard footsteps. I stood up, and saw Sigma walk into the chamber from a portal at the far end.

“I knew you’d be back. We all did,” she said. “You’re curious. That’s a good quality to have in a girl. Not many will agree with that sentiment, but curiosity will take you far.”

“It usually gets me in trouble,” I sheepishly said and entertained the idea of presenting a few pomegranates.

“That’s fine. Trouble is temporary. Knowledge is forever. It’s an acceptable sacrifice,” she said, and rested a hand on the machine.

“So how do you use it?” I asked, eyes once again devouring the bronze machine.

She laughed lightly, and touched me on the shoulder. “All in due time,” she said. “But first, you’ll have to give up everything. You’ll have to become a part of the Oracle.”

I stepped back, and looked at Sigma and then the machine. It was not an easy decision to make. I eyed the portal leading back out.

“Will you promise to teach me the device if I say yes?” I asked.

She nodded. “You will learn that and much more.”

I gripped the handle with my palm, and Tau gripped my hand over it. She nodded at me, but all I could think was how rich and beautiful her hair looked in the sunlight. I felt my hand hurt as she pressed on it, and I took the cue to turn the wheel on the machine.

The sound was hideous, like a number of rocks were being crumbled by some godly hand. A loud clang, from the inside, and several clicks, as well the sound of some kind of strap let loose. Then, like a woodpecker, it went on and on. The device would be fascinating in itself for the sounds it could conjure. Like a musical instrument that needed no one to play it, and composed beautiful cacophony.

I ran my hand across the bronze casing of the device, and I smelled a faint burning smell. It alarmed me, but Tau didn’t seem concerned. She looked at the device like she was watching an actor in a play. She was mesmerised. Entertained, but also expectant.

The various discs on the machine spun and swirled, the labels going too fast for me to track them. I’d looked at all the scrolls explaining the meanings and the operation of the device, but I wasn’t sure if I understood much of it.

“Did you make it?” I asked Tau while the machine calculated.

She shook her head with a frown. “You have to understand something. This machine, it was made by humanity. That’s all the credit anyone’s going to get for it. It’s a gift from humans to the gods.”

“So was it here before you became an Oracle?” I asked. I had a knack for asking the right questions back then.

She looked at me now, and her frown looked like it must physically hurt her face. “You need to be careful about how curious you are,” she said, “It could get you in a lot of trouble one day.”

It made me break out into a smile. “I agree with that,” I said, “But Sigma-”

I was cut off by a sharp ringing sound and a clang from the machine. The new positions had been established. We immediately got to recording the information on an empty scroll.

Rho and Sigma were impressed with my ability to interpret the information. I wasn’t really sure if I should be proud of that, considering I made up whatever came to mind and can be confirmed with the information obtained.

If that’s how the Oracle worked, then I wasn’t sure if it was worth believing in. At the same time, there was the machine.

I had to get it away from these women. I had to understand how it worked, who made it, and what more it can lead to. It was practically criminal that it was locked up here, where no one knew about it, or saw it. I had to do something.

The machine was heavy in my hands. I was covered head to toe, like some desert tribal, but there was no choice in the matter. I definitely could not go to my house: that's the first place they'd search. I was too conspicuous to go to a tavern. From the hillside path, I could see the harbour with all its lanterns. I set the machine down on a flat rock and sat down next to it, huffing. The harbour, I thought.

I took off the robe and used it as cloth to bundle the machine in. I slight a long stick under the knot and hauled it on my shoulder. It was a beautiful night to disappear into. The stick was sturdy, and didn't crack or bend under the weight of the machine. I held it with both hands as I made my way down the hill and into the thick of the city.

I slid past the alleys and around hay carts. Dogs barked at me and I hissed back at them. I made sure my face looked dirty, and my hair was dishevelled. Look right, and you can pass for anything in the city. And for now, I was just a vagrant passing about the harbour. I walked around it several times, trying to get a feel for the area.

One of the ships was preparing for departure the next morning. When the lights dimmed and no one was watching, I carefully made my way up the plank and onto the ship. I knew how these ships were laid out, so finding a hiding spot wouldn't be very hard. The men were out in brothels and inns, drinking and whoring, so I could catch a brief bout of sleep and ready myself. The captain was unlikely to accept a woman passenger, let alone a stowaway, so I decided to sneak out of the ship as dawn approached.

And on this day of all days, I slept soundly.

The ship was sailing before I could object. I carefully lay the stick down on the wooden floor, and reached the deck. Men, men everywhere. Looking, staring. Like I was mad. They weren't wrong.

I explained to the captain that I was a poor, drunk vagrant who found her way onto a ship by accident. The captain looked quite agitated, but some sense of propriety made him respect me. He offered me passage, but warned that I will have to leave as soon as the ship docked.

I returned to the machine, and found it gone. I searched the ship, and on the deck, found a sailor presenting it to the captain. I gripped my hair. He was looking at it with great interest.

I ran to secure it from him, but stopped halfway through. Was I really going to challenge a captain in the middle of the sea? No, I thought. I stole it before, I just have to steal it again. It will be simple.

And now, lying on a plank that bobs up and down in the see, I feel myself about to faint. The salt water is tempting. The ship has gone entirely under. I'm the only one still alive, by the looks of it. I haven't eaten for what feels like days. I don't know when the last time I drank water was.

I decide to embrace the sea that swallowed my machine.

Today’s throwback story is not about a spoon. It was quite popular.