#code name: eternity

[scifipinups]

Ingrid Kavelaars Code Name: Eternity (1999)

[kwebtv]

Ingrid Kavelaars as Dr. Laura Keating and Cameron Bancroft as Ethaniel in "Code Name: Eternity"

[random-autie-fangirl]

Chara: I'm wanting everything to end instantly

Asriel: And I'm wanting to go on unchanging forever

🔥🔥🔥THE BEEF WITH LINEAR TIME SIBLINGS🔥🔥🔥

[rainbow-journalist]

I was playing Undertale when...🎭

Oh God, Makoto?! I put Chara's name as his name, luckily it worked haha! Playing it every now and then because I downloaded it on my mobile (I don't have a working computer), and unfortunately some functions don't work when I downloaded it again. (I made a backup) I haven't been playing games lately, so I only play every now and then. I still have my Monika after story, Project Sekai, and some retro games, but I'm not playing much. (I should visit Monika )

I made this drawing to relax, I really like using these colors on him, even though I also love him as a blonde, his hair color can be confusing sometimes. I like to make him visually different from Yuma, but I may make them exactly the same at some point, don't worry. I hope I'm not bothering anyone by using different colors for them. 🥺

Playing with the characters' color palette. 🏳️

[scarefox]

I need the Anti Reset and Eternal Butler universe to get an AI-Robot that only speaks nonsense because it scraped too many false google results and troll posts.

[waiting-foratrain]

okay wow your blog popped up as recommended, I saw ur pfp and thought Wow That's Just Nona only to click on ur blog and ur like I Know ^u^

i Am nona ! 💗

[chicago-geniza]

For the record I also have a list of Wiadomości contributors who are so insane they could only exist in the specific conditions that created them, and I appreciate them as Products of their Time. First example: Maria Jehanne Wielopolska

[stargirl230]

Shop update!

I’ve just updated my inprnt with a ton of recent artwork and everything's on sale - so now’s a great time to get holiday gifts (or just a little treat for yourself!) while supporting a local artist <3

(reblogs appreciated)

[elena1701a]

From the 90s: Brimstone, Code Name: Eternity, Now and Again, Dark Skies. I was going to add Seven Days, but I’d forgotten that it actually ran for three seasons!

Do me a favour and reblog this with a show you like that was cancelled after only one season. I don't mean shows that were always meant to be miniseries or shows that work perfectly well as a standalone story, or shows that might still get renewed. I mean shows that are and will forever remain unfinished. The more obscure the better.

[fazcinatingblog]

Waking up in the middle of the night in a cold sweat because I told my mum about buying full priced Skechers and she told me she got Skechers recently for $50 at DFO. Sigh. Live and learn.

[kitkatscabinet]

Nothing fucks with my baby

Simon Riley x wife reader

Summary: Simon is the Earth orbiting your sun and he'll do anything to keep you safe and happy, even if that means resorting to bloody means.

Word count: 1.4k

Warnings: attempted non-con (not by Simon)

@ghosts-cyphera for you pookie, hope you enjoy!

Eight months. It’s been eight long, tortuous months since Simon saw you in person. Eight months of living off brief Skype calls interrupted by work schedules and shitty internet cutting out mid-call, an age since he’s touched you. Since he’s breathed in your scent and cradled you against his muscular chest, since he’s tasted you. Pictures of you weren’t enough, even if you’d gifted him a set of delectable Polaroids showcasing your gorgeous body decorated with black and white lingerie.  

Long deployments had never bothered him, not until you’d become the central part of his life. Simon was the Earth, orbiting your sun reverently and fervently. He’d worship you on his knees for eternity if that’s what you desired.

His appetite for you has always been ravenous, but his need for you has been greatly nourished after months of no contact. The door to your shared home swings open with a bang, the anticipation coursing through his veins diminishing his control in a way he knows you’ll scold him for. His bag is dropped carelessly in the foyer as he stalks through the space, a man on a mission to find you. Not even the weary exhaustion after months of shit sleep and shared communal spaces would deter him from his mission. 

You’re not in your home office or the bedroom and Simon’s frustration simmers under his skin as he marches straight back out the door. It’s only the knowledge that you’ll be devastated to have missed his surprise homecoming that tempers his annoyance. 

Ghost is beyond irritated by the time he arrives at your work, not necessarily at you, he knows how seriously you take your career, it’s one of the reasons he was so drawn to you. Once some lowly private had made a snide remark about you being the breadwinner, scoffing at Simon for letting his wife ‘emasculate’ him like that. It was only Price playing damage control that kept him from a dishonourable discharge that day. He had no regrets, especially after the incident taught people to keep your name out of their mouths. 

It’s late, well past working business hours when he keys into the building using the code you’d given specially for him. So it shouldn’t surprise him how empty it is, most of the lights turned off as he made his way to your office, but Simon hadn’t survived over a decade in the military without learning to trust his gut. A distinct uneasiness settles in his body, narrowed eyes surveying the space for anything out of the ordinary as he increases his pace to get to you. 

The light in your office is on, the door is left open carelessly and gives Simon a clear view of the sight of you bent over your desk trying not to cry as a man holds a gun to your head and fumbles with your sleek dress pants. Simon thought he knew rage, but any anger he’s ever felt is drowned in comparison to the sheer righteous fury that alights his veins. 

He closes the gap in record time, red filtering out the corners of his vision and spraying over his knuckles as he rips the interloper away and viciously lays into him. Any slurred words pleading for mercy are ignored and shut down as Simon’s fist renders the man’s mouth an inoperable bloody mess. 

His arm aches furiously by the time he pulls back, chest heaving with breaths that have long since been silenced from the scumbag that now lay dead on the floor of your office. It’s the sound of your shaky sobs that pulls Simon back from the brink, immediately darting towards you, shaky hands stained with blood cradling you against his bulk gently. 

He’s vibrating with an explosive cocktail of fury, fear, outrage and relief. You press yourself tighter against his chest like you’re trying to burrow into the safety of his ribcage. Simon can’t bring himself to speak, mouth dry and tongue heavy as he buries his face into the top of your head. The silence is broken by the shaky inhales of your rattling breaths and sobs. 

All too soon you’re pulling away, even when he fights to keep you safe and sound against his chest. “Simon? What… what’s going to happen with-” You try and turn your gaze towards the corpse staining your carpet but Simon prevents you with a hand grasping your jaw, preventing you from getting a glimpse at the carnage. 

“Don’t worry your pretty little head darling, I’ll take care of it. But first, let's get you home yeah?” He walks you from the building to your car with a supportive arm wrapped around your shoulders, tucking you against his side before sliding you into the passenger seat of your car. It’s a testament to how shaken you are that you don’t protest, remaining silent and clutching the hand that grasps your thigh like a lifeline. 

It doesn’t take long to tuck you into bed, wrapping you tightly in the blanket like it will protect you from the horrors of the outside world. The adrenaline had faded from your body making way for the exhaustion. Simon doesn’t leave your side until he’s sure the clutches of sleep have pulled you under, and even then, it's with extreme hesitation that he stands and leaves the bedroom, reaching for his phone to make a call. 

Luckily, you don’t wake even once in the hours that follow as he waits for news of the cleanup. He spends that time alternating between checking in on you, watching you breathe peacefully and pacing the linoleum floors that you’d insisted on. 

A single knock on the front door pulls him from the spiral of thoughts that threatened to pull him further and further into darkness. He opens the door to an unimpressed Price, who pushes his way in with Gaz and Soap trailing after. Expectantly he stares at them, watching as Price lights a cigar and takes a long drag. 

“It’s done. Did you have to make such a mess though son?” It’s an innocuous enough comment but one that raises Ghost’s hackles anyway and he shoots a venomous glare at his captain that would never have been acceptable in any other circumstances. His shoulders tense and it takes everything in him to keep his voice somewhat level. 

“That fucker laid his hands on my wife!” He inhaled shakily as he remembered what he’d almost been too slow to prevent, unable to prevent the rise of volume as he yelled at his captain, “My wife! He’s lucky I didn’t paint the room with his insides!” The baritone of his booming snarl is loud enough that even Soap flinches slightly with widened eyes. 

There’s a tense silence but his captain nods, something like approval in his gaze before his eyes slide towards the right and Simon turns just in time to witness you call his name, voice hoarse with sleep and eyes red from tears. 

He crosses the space and curls you against him in record time, nonchalantly throwing a dismissive wave towards his team who simply nod in understanding and file back outside. “Were those the boys? You didn’t have to kick them out” you murmured though Simon was already hushing you, leading you back to bed with a firm hand on the small of your back. 

“Don’t worry ‘bout them lovie, they were leavin’ anyway” he waved away your concerns, finally kicking off his shoes, trapping you in his arms and pulling you down onto the mattress. You squeak at his actions, giggling as his stubble tickles the skin of your neck. 

Despite how pent-up and desperate for your touch he is, Simon makes no move to escalate the situation, settling you in his arms and simply breathing you in. Neither of you speak about the earlier incident, not willing to shatter the peace. Though Simon lets out the occasional hum when your hands trace gentle circles over his heart, focusing on the steady beat of his pulse beneath your palm. 

Inevitably the lingering emotions of the day would have to be dealt with, but not yet, Simon would allow himself to relish in the peace just a little longer.

[kwebtv]

Code Name: Eternity - Syndicated - May 14, 2000 - November 19, 2000

Science Fiction (26 Episodes)

Running Time: 60 minutes

Stars:

Cameron Bancroft as Ethaniel

Ingrid Kavelaars as Dr. Laura Keating

Andrew Gillies as David Banning

Joseph Baldwin as Byder

Gordon Currie as Dent

Olivier Gruner as Tawrens

Jeff Wincott as Breed

[webism]

CHAPTER ONE: The Businessman.

kento nanami x fem!reader. nsfw.

your first night at Tsukumo's Angels, and you get put on the phone sex line.

masterlist. read on ao3

You sit on a peeling leather couch that sticks to the back of your thighs in the heat. An old metal-blade fan sits mounted on the wall to your left, but it’s a sorry excuse for one—someone blowing on you would quicker dry the sweat from your brow. It’s not as dingy as Toji’s apartment, which you suppose is an upside: things are looking brighter already. Yay.

The beautiful woman sitting across from you in a small black tank and jeans—in this weather���taps her nails against the surface of her desk. Her blonde hair gates her vision a little, but you can still feel the sharpness of her gaze on your skin. She’s sizing you up. You aren’t sure if you like it. 

“So,” she leans back in her seat. “Your name was..?”

You look up at her, at the way her hands are clasped together. She could look down at the faded resumé in front of her and see your name written as clear as day, but she asks you instead. Maybe to hear it from your own lips.

You tell her your name, and she parrots it back to you to test it on her tongue. She decides that she likes the taste. “I’m Yuki Tsukumo. I own Tsukumo’s Angels, the finest budget escort service in the city.”

You knew that, of course, but you nod as a formality regardless. “It’s a pleasure to meet you.”

Yuki smiles at you—wide and toothy and ever so beautiful. She reaches into her drawer and pulls out a cigarette, lighting it and taking a drag. She blows her smoke to the left and you almost forget just how hot it is in her office. “I hear you’d like a job?”

You’re going to hell. Every late-night-TV preacher and grandmother in the congregation would tell you the same thing. It’s not just what you’re doing—it’s what you’re thinking, what you’re willing to become to make it out of this.

When you were younger, stupider, you’d fear hell like nothing else. Eternal heat, endless suffering, a constant lack of breath, a pit with no end. Now, you’re starting to think it might feel a lot like this city at night: oppressive heat rising from the pavement, the air thick and stifling, and an unshakable sense that something, or someone, is watching you.

Toji used to call the nightlife a cancer. And although he rarely managed the truth, this might have been one of the rare times it slipped past his lips. You tug at the hem of your dress—a little too tight, a little too short. It’s what you had to work with, cobbled together from a half-hearted thrift store run and whatever nerve you could muster.Yuki didn’t say anything about a dress code, and maybe you’re stereotyping yourself here, but you’re out of your element and this dress is short enough to strip the attention from your fidgeting hands. 

The fluorescent lights outside Tsukumo’s Angels buzz faintly as you approach, the words glowing in neon pink that is reflected in the puddles on the concrete. The heavy metal door creaks loudly when you push it open and step in. 7 on the dot. You’ll be here tonight, so you don’t have to worry about finding a place to live until tomorrow. Don’t think about it.

Inside, the air is cooler, though not by much. The same peeling leather couch greets you, as does the same faint smell of smoke and something cheap, floral, and over-applied. Yuki isn’t at the desk this time, but a tall man in a plain white button-up leans against it, his arms crossed. He’s an attractive man, a cigarette hangs from his lips—you’re starting to see a trend in staff here. 

“You the lamb?” He asks, though the way he looks you up and down tells you he already has an answer to that question.

“Lamb?” you ask.

He smiles, moustached lip curling upwards in something mocking and dangerously sultry. “Yeah, you’re the lamb—” he extends a hand for you to shake “—Shiu.”

Shiu has a rough grip, you note. Not mean or calloused like you’d expect from a man of physical labours, but just… rough. “It’s nice to meet you,” you hum. He laughs. 

He takes another drag from his cigarette, the ember glowing brighter in the dim light, and looks you over once more before flicking the ash into an already overflowing tray on the desk. He blows a plume of smoke toward the ceiling, eyes narrowing slightly as the smoke curls. “You look familiar. I’ve seen you here before?”

You shake your head. “You haven’t.”

Shiu narrows his eyes even further, takes in the way your dress clings tight, how your frame stands in front of him. Your nerves… the tinge of excitement beneath them. “Have we..?”

“No!” your eyes widen, voice a little louder than you intend it to be. “Sorry. I just got out of a relationship so… no, we haven’t…”

“A breakup, huh? That’s always an interesting reason to land somewhere like this.” His voice lowers. He’s toying with you. “What’d he do? Not give you enough attention? Leave you out in the cold?”

You don’t owe him an explanation: you’re here and that’s all that matters, but you find yourself shrugging regardless. “Something like that.”

Shiu smiles, something teasing but not quite mocking. “Right, well if you’re here as a rebound I’d advise you to walk your ass right back out of that door. You’ll get attention here, for sure, but this isn’t the place for… soft comforts.”

“I’m not here for comfort.”

“Good,” says Shiu. “Keep it that way. You’re here to provide a service, an experience, but not without boundaries. Those lines blur when you start wanting cuddles and reassurance after, and when the lines blur you aren’t doing everything in your power to keep yourself safe. These men—and women—pay for sex for a reason. Remember that.”

You know. You know. There’s nothing warm and fuzzy about being an Angel, or a lamb, as he puts it. Still, you want to make the most of the hole you’re in. You narrow your eyes at Shiu and hope he doesn’t chide you for changing the subject when you ask: “and what about you? Are you—”

“For sale?” A door behind Shiu pushes open and in walks Yuki Tsukumo. She’s ditched the jeans from yesterday for a long black dress: one that hugs her figure and flows like liquid down to her ankles. She looks taller, and a whole lot cleaner than the gritty lobby you stand in. “Give me a good offer and I’ll rent him out to you. Shiu is security, he’ll take care of you if and when you need him to.”

Shiu scoffs at Yuki’s joke and takes a step to the left so that she can slot in next to him. Yuki, your boss, looks you up and down. You catch the way her gaze lingers on your dress, though you can’t tell if it’s judgement or approval behind her lashes. She flits her gaze to Shiu. “Are you trying to scare my lamb away, Kong?”

Shiu shrugs. “I haven’t decided yet.”

Yuki rolls her eyes and lands her gaze on you once again. Seeing you so out of your element, she gives you a soft smile to try and ease your nerves. “You’ll be okay here. I showed you my office yesterday, I’ll be in there if you need me at any time, okay? You’re never more than a few steps from security and if you have issues with anyone, co-worker or client, you can come to me.”

Weirdly, that does soothe you. Though your moment to take a breath quickly passes when Yuki straightens up and turns on her heels with only a nod for you to follow. “Come then.”

The door she came from leads down a long hallway with dim fluorescent lights flickering overhead. The walls are bare, the paint chipped in spots, revealing patches of old wallpaper beneath. Yuki doesn’t wait for you to catch up; her heels click with purpose on the tiled floor, echoing through the narrow space. You’re almost at the end of the hall before she speaks again, her tone matter-of-fact. “I’m not going to throw you in the deep end, but you’re not getting a soft landing either. I’ll introduce you to one of my angels, Utahime, and she’s going to walk you through our phone sex services. Sound good?”

Without waiting for a reply, Yuki steps through another door and leads you into a big lounge area. Against the back wall are a bunch of mirrors and vanity stations, makeup and hygiene products littered over each tabletop. A few girls in even fewer clothing sit and do their hair and makeup, chatting amongst themselves and shooting you soft smiles as you and Yuki walk past. 

Your boss steps over to a cream chaise lounge against another wall where a girl around your age lays splayed across the cushioning. She’s wearing a dress like yours, short and black and very ‘sex-sells’, and is tapping away on her phone with such rapt attention she doesn’t notice the two of you approach until Yuki clears her throat. 

“Utahime,” she drawls and gestures to you. “This is our newest lamb. I’d like you to walk her through our phone services tonight. Doable?”

The girl—Utahime—looks you over. She looks a little bored, gorgeous black hair falling over her shoulders and her nails still tapping absentmindedly against her phone screen. Her perfectly arched brow raises, just slightly, before she finally glances at Yuki.

“Doable,” she says with a lazy shrug. “I have the businessman booked in for a call in half an hour… maybe he’d like a session with the new girl?”

You look at Yuki, who looks at you in the same breath. She seems to think about something before ultimately nodding. “If you can get her up to speed before he calls, let her have a go with him.”

“The businessman?” You ask.

Yuki smiles. “He’s a hard worked man, but he’s so unfamiliar with his sex drive that you’d think he was a priest. He might actually benefit from talking to someone new.”

You nod—sex therapy for a businessman couldn’t be that hard. Utahime stands and adjusts her dress before grabbing your wrist and parting from Yuki to pull you across the lounge and into a room off to the side. Utahime’s grip on your wrist is firm but not unkind, and loosens once youre in what she introduces to you as the studio. 

It’s so much nicer than you expected. The room is decently sized and lit up with warm fairy lights. Almost like a recording studio, there are doors to a few booths across the wall, each one decorated to the nines with pillows and blankets and a station for water and personal items. A few low tables hold candles, fake or otherwise, alongside a small black box of… what you imagine might be toys. A plush little sofa sits in each one too, for comfort. 

“Nice, right?” Utahime hums and gently pushes you into one of the booths. “Everything’s designed to make you more comfortable. Clients pick up on that, even over the phone. It’s all sound-proofed in here too, so if you get into it you can be as loud as you want. Seriously, make it yours. You’ll be in here a lot until you start taking in-person clients.”

Utahime sits down on the floor and tosses a pillow in your direction. You startle a little but look at her with a knowing smile at her efforts to start feeling familiar. “So,” you start, sitting down on the plush sofa and toying with the small headset that hangs from the armrest. “The businessman… tell me about him?”

Utahime leans back against the wall and props her chin in her hand. “The businessmaaaan. He’s sweet. He’s only called in once before, spoke to me but got too nervous to do anything more than talk about his day. He was polite—apologised about ten times for wasting my time, which, by the way, he wasn’t. He’s got this earnestness about him that’s kind of rare. But you can tell he’s not used to this kind of thing. Not even close. It’s… cute.”

You look at her, a soft smile crosses her lips. If it wasn’t just work you’d think she had a soft spot for him. “Do you think he’ll mind talking to me instead of you? Changing things up might make him feel even more nervous.”

Utahime shakes her head. “I think he’ll appreciate someone who’s also new to this. You can learn from each other. He’s booked to call in twenty minutes. We could do some practice calls until then? I’ll show you the ropes.”

She puts her hand up to her ear to simulate a phone and you laugh at the gesture. “Sounds good.”

Meanwhile, in his small apartment bedroom, Kento Nanami—the businessman—paces from door to dresser. Back and forth, back and forth. He tightens his tie, and then loosens it just to feel unmade and tighten it again. 

Why did he book a second call? The first was ridiculous, he talked to a nice young lady about officework woes and quarterly reports and hung up after an hour with a call-girl sized dent in his wallet and no sexual relief to show for it. He’s of half a mind to walk over to his mirror and start practicing lines, but he hasn’t yet lost so much of his decorum.

For the next ten minutes, Nanami sits with his fingers drumming over his thighs, dull thuds against his slacks. He’s lost in his mind, is he even aroused? Capable of being aroused? He can’t remember the last time he jerked off—last month?

He’s two minutes late to call by the time he next checks his phone. “Shit,” he mumbles, fumbling to the contact saved under ‘Personal Services.’ Nanami stares at the screen for a moment, his thumb hovering over the call button. He clears his throat, adjusts his posture, and exhales sharply through his nose before pressing ‘CALL’.

The line rings, once… twice… and then— “Tsukumo’s Angels, what’s on your mind?”

His breath hitches. He shouldn’t freeze like this, but the poor man simply cannot help it. “Good evening,” he sounds clinical, and his mind is working faster than his mouth because he’s talking before he can register the words that leave his lips. “You… aren’t who I talked to last week.”

“I’m not,” the voice says, Nanami picks up on an edge of unsurety that traces your words. “You’ve caught me on my first night… you could get to know me, if you’d like to.”

Nanami nods, and then realises you can’t see him. “I’d, uh, I’d like that.”’

There’s a soft hum of acknowledgement from your side of the call, and Kento stops feeling the need to toy with his tie. “Great,” you say, your voice steadying a little. “So… why don’t we start with something easy? Tell me a bit about yourself.”

Nanami hesitates. “There’s not much to tell. I work in finance. My days are… predictable, for the most part.”

“Predictability isn’t always a bad thing,” you reply gently. “But I get the feeling you aren’t fulfilled.”

"You could say that. It’s a practical job. It pays the bills." He pauses, then adds, almost reluctantly, "though I think I’d like a vacation.”

From your spot on the sofa at Tsukumo’s Angels, you lean back and glance at the door. Utahime had stepped out a few minutes ago, giving you space to settle into your first call. “Are you a beach man or a mountain man?”

“Beach,” his reply is immediate. He clears his throat. “There’s something calming about the ocean. The sound of the waves, the salt in the air… it’s grounding.”

You smile at the vivid image his words paint. “I get that. The ocean feels endless in a way that’s comforting, doesn’t it? Like it can hold all your worries for a while.”

“Yes. Exactly that. I’d read, listen to the water, just exist.”

“What does a man like you read?”

“Anything classic. I like things tried-and-true, change is… difficult for me. Hemingway maybe. Or Murakami, if I’m in the right mood.”

“Tasteful,” you reply. “And if I were there on the beach with you, could I distract you from your book, or are you diligent in your focus?”

In his room, Nanami’s mouth goes dry as his cock twitches in his slacks. You haven’t even said anything lewd, but he’s feeling oddly restless nonetheless. “I like to think I’m a focused man,” he starts, shuffling back on his bed to rest against the headboard. He takes his glasses off and rests them on the bedside table. “But under the right circumstances, I could be persuaded to set the book down.”

“Careful, businessman, I could take that as a challenge.”

“I’d hope so.”

He’s blushing at his own words and, in the same breath, reaching downwards with his free hand to palm as his hardening cock. He takes a sharp breath in and prays to every god he’s ever read about that you didn’t hear him.

“You’re saying I’d have to earn your attention?” Your question is honeyed. 

“I suppose,” so is his reply. 

“Good, I like working for my meals.”

Nanami snorts— “what, you’re going to eat me?”

“Yes,” your voice makes his cock jump. He sighs and pulls his slacks down enough to hook it out. “Have you ever wanted something so bad that you’d consume it whole if you could?”

Nanami thinks for a moment about a promotion, and then shakes his head. His mind jumps instead to the hypothetical beach retreat, with a book in one hand and the back of your head in his other as he pushes your mouth down on his cock so deep you’re gagging and drooling all over the place. Ungentlemanly, but enough of a visual to incite his tip to start drooling precum. He smears it over the head with his thumb, and nearly chokes on his words. “I have.”

“That’s how I feel. There’s an intimacy to taking care of someone, especially when they’re stressed like you. I bet your muscles are so tight they’d be hard under my hands. Being the one to relax you, make you feel good? That’d make me feel good.”

Nanami hums. “Usually I’m the one doing the servicing.”

“I don’t doubt that. You should be the one being taken care of. Poor thing, working so hard every day: carrying all that weight on your shoulders. You deserve a break.”

Poor Kento moans at that—a break. God, the things he’d do for a break. He feels almost pathetic pumping his cock to the thought of reprieve from the monotonous 9-5 he lives, but he hasn’t felt this good in a long time. His breathing grows heavier as your words coil around him. “You’re… ha, you’re good at this. It’s your first day?”

“Don’t distract me,” you hum. “Tell me what you’re thinking about.”

“You,” he exhales. “Your eyes. Looking up at me. Or your hands on my thighs. How you’d touch me like you know me. Like we know each other. Like we’ve done it a hundred times before and still aren’t sick of each other.”

He doesn’t know why he says that, why his fantasy quickly shifts from a beachside blowjob to the domestic life. To lazy morning sex or late nights in the kitchen that turn from snack runs to you hoisted onto the counter with his head between your thighs. He pictures you, whatever you look like, laughing as he kisses your neck and brings home gifts carved out of his paycheck. He pictures a life shared, and feels awful for it.

“Sorry,” his strokes falter. “Sorry I don’t  know why—”

“I like that thought,” you stop him from spiralling. “Maybe we have. Maybe in another life you’d come home to me every night, waiting for you… ready to make you forget about everything but the way you make me feel.”

His chest heaves as his hand works faster, stroking his cock at a near brutal pace to the images you plant into his mind. You’re in his bed, you’re bent over his desk, you’re lazing on the sofa with him, you’re up against the wall in his shower. “Fuck.”

“I’d know you inside and out,” you continue on, and he swears he can hear a slight hitch to your breath—are you touching yourself? He pictures phone sex operators sitting bored at a desk as they read from a script. But you sound…invested. Heated. “I’d know exactly how to take care of you. You’d come home exhausted and I’d make it all better—god, you’d know all of me too.”

Nanami’s hips jerk up into his hand as he feels his release start to build. It’s already dizzying, after such a long dry spell, and his head tips forward in want.“You’re—ha—too good at this. How the hell… how are you—”

“Shh,” you soothe him. “Don’t think. Just feel, just let me take care of you… even from here. You’re touching yourself, yea? Imagine it’s my hand, stroking you after a long day, love. Or maybe I’m riding you, letting you lay back and feel me around you… you wouldn’t have to do a damn thing.”

His free hand fists the sheets as he imagines the warmth of your body pressing against his, the way your nails might scrape lightly over his skin. He pictures your head tilted back, lips parted in ecstasy as you moan his name over and over again. 

“You’re driving me fucking insane,” he rarely curses like this. Still, he’s never indulged in something like this before—never let himself slip into the raw, visceral need he now feels. The restraint he’s so practiced in every aspect of his life is dissolving fast, leaving him chasing the pleasure you’re pouring into him.

“Good,” you hum. “I want you to let go for me, give me everything you have all pent up. I can take it.”

Nanami’s pace turns frantic, hips fucking up into his fist as he strokes himself at a torrid pace. His mind is hazed with fantasies of a simple life, domestic and passionate and before he can stop himself and force a few more minutes of pleasure he’s cumming—hard. A strangled moan, one made for porn, leaves his lips and is met with a sharp intake of breath from your end. Nanami feels self conscious for a moment, drawing his now-sticky hand from his cock as he listens to the phone—were you uncomfortable?

Far from. You hardly realise you have your dress hiked and your hand under the fabric of your panties until you’re timing your orgasm with the businessman on the other end of the call. This is far from protocol, but the last time you’ve been spoken to about making love was when you and Toji first started dating, when he was still sweet on you. Sex since then has been rough and passionate and bruising and great, but never love-making. 

You try and stifle your sounds, not knowing yet if it's appropriate for you to touch yourself alongside your clients. You hadn’t intended on it, that’s for sure. You blink the blur from your vision as you try and regain your composure, sliding your hand out of your panties and holding it up in front of you—your fingers glisten under the soft lights and you scramble for a tissue to clean yourself off. 

The silence on the phone between you isn’t uncomfortable, but it’s charged. “Are you… okay?”

“Yes,” you breathe out a lot quicker than you need to. 

“Good,” he says, and you can almost hear the faint smile in his tone. “I was worried I’d—well, that I’d crossed a line.”

You shake your head, even though he can’t see it, pressing your lips together to stop yourself from blurting out how very far from uncomfortable you’d been. “Not at all. I guess we both… just got caught up in the moment.”

He hums in agreement, his voice still a little strained, and something about the lilt of his voice lays deep inside of you. Maybe this line of work isn’t for you if… after one call with a man you don’t know otherwise, you’re already starting to feel open with him. When he speaks, you can hear the nerves lacing his words. “I’m not unhappy it happened.”

“Me neither. You’re full of surprises, Mr. Businessman.”

“You have a way of coaxing them out of me,” he replies. “If I call again, will I get to speak to you?”

It’s a simple question, yet it still implies something more. There’s no rule against it—not officially—but getting closer than needed with clients has already been explained to you as a messy line. Still, you’ve just fucked your fingers to his voice and the fantasies he spoke of—you aren’t in a habit of keeping straight edges. 

“Maybe,” you reply, leaving the door open just enough. “Ask for the lamb.”

“The lamb?” He laughs, you like the sound. “I’ll remember that.”

“Please do.”

There's a moment of silence, and you can see Utahime’s shadow in the frosted window on the door. A quick glance to the clock tells you that an hour has passed already. As if sensing your coming end, the businessman speaks. “My time is almost up. Take care of yourself.”

You stare at the door. “You too, Mr Businessman.”

“Nanami,” he corrects you gently. “You can call me Nanami.”

The call ends with a soft click, leaving you sitting there and rpelaying his correction in your head. Nanami. 

You’re so lost in thought that you barely register the door creaking open. Utahime steps in, and it’s only when her gaze drops to your lap that the realisation hits—your dress is still slightly rucked up, and your flustered attempt to straighten it comes a moment too late.

“Oh, lamb,” she drawls, crossing her arms and leaning against the doorframe. “Caught you, didn’t I?”

Your cheeks burn as you stammer, “It’s not—”

“Relax. It happens to everyone eventually.”

You gape at her, mortified. “This doesn’t happen to everyone.”

Utahime grins, her black hair falling over her shoulders as she dips her head down in laughter. It’s not teasing—moreso friendly. She’s trying to laugh with you, not at you. Though still embarrassed, you feel a little less like you want to melt into the couch as she continues. “And you know what that means?”

You tilt your head at her. “What does it mean?”

“That you’ll fit right in here, lamb.”

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[thatonegayship]

What Bill wants for his big day:

So Bill doesn't have a birthday sure, but is there some sort of Bill Cipher Day? Demonic celebration?

..and if so, does dip know?

Oh man, there probably is! Bill's absolutely the kind of guy to have a whole Day Of Celebration devoted to himself. Likely it's not on any sort of earthly calendar basis, too, so it'll come up at some time when Dipper least expects it.

Because, c'mon. Bill's fantastically knowledgeable - but he's absolute shit at filling Dipper in on important information beforehand.

[mostlysignssomeportents]

A Democratic media strategy to save journalism and the nation

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/12/12/the-view-from-somewhere/#abolish-rogan

As unbearably cringe as the hunt for a "leftist Joe Rogan" is, it is (to use a shopworn phrase), "directionally correct." Democrats suck at getting their message out, and that exacts a high electoral cost.

The right has an extremely well-funded media ecosystem of high-paid bullshitters backed by algorithm-gaming SEO dickheads. This system isn't necessarily supposed to turn a profit or even break even: the point of Prageru isn't to score ad revenue, it's to ensure that anyone who googles "what the fuck causes inflation" gets 25 minutes of relatable, upbeat, cheerfully sociopathic Austrian economics jammed into their eyeballs. Far right news isn't a for-profit concern, it's a loss-leader for oligarch-friendly policies. It's a steal: a million bucks' worth of news buys America's ultra-rich a billion dollars' worth of tax-cuts and the right to maim their workers and poison their customers for profit.

Meanwhile, the Democrats have historically relied on the "traditional media" to carry their messages, on the ground that reality has a well-known leftist bias, so any news outlet that hews to "journalistic ethics" will publish the truth, and the truth will weigh in favor of Democratic positions: trans people are humans, racism is real, abortion isn't murder, housing is a market failure, the planet is on fire, etc, etc, etc.

This is a stupid policy, and it has failed. The "respectable" news media hews to a self-imposed code of "balance" and "neutrality" that is easily gamed: "some people say that Hatians don't eat pet dogs, some people do, let's report both sides!" This is called "the view from nowhere" and it gets Democrats precisely nowhere:

http://archive.pressthink.org/2008/03/14/pincus_neutrality.html

Balance and neutrality are bullshit, an excuse that has been so thoroughly weaponized by billionaires and their lickspittles that anyone who takes it seriously demonstrates comprehensively that they, themselves, are deeply unserious:

https://www.techdirt.com/2024/12/10/la-times-billionaire-owner-hilariously-thinks-he-can-solve-media-bias-with-ai/

Press neutrality – the view from nowhere – isn't some eternal verity. In terms of the history of the press, it's an idea that's about ten seconds old. The glory days of the news were dominated by papers with names like The Smallville Democrat and The Ruling Class Republican. Most of the world boggles at the idea that a news outlet wouldn't declare its political posture. Britons know that the Telegraph is the Torygraph; that the Guardian is in the tank for Labour (and specifically, committed to enabling Blairite/Starmerite purges of the left); the Mirror is a leftist tabloid; and the Mail is so far right that its editorial board considers Attila the Hun "woke."

Writing for The American Prospect – an excellent leftist news outlet – Ryan Cooper proposes a solution to the Democratic media gap that's way better than the hunt for the elusive "leftist Joe Rogan": sponsoring explicitly Democrat news outlets:

https://prospect.org/politics/2024-12-12-democrats-lost-propaganda-war/

The country is a bleak landscape of news deserts where voters literally didn't hear about what Trump was saying he would do, and, if they heard about it, they didn't hear from anyone who could explain what it meant. The average normie voter doesn't know what a "tariff" is, and chances are they think it's a tax that other countries inexplicably pay for the privilege of selling very cheap things to Americans.

Ironically, this news desert is also a crowded field of hungry, unemployed, talented journalists. What if Dems funded free newsgathering and publication in news deserts that told the truth? What if these news outlets, by dint of being an explicitly partisan, party-subsidized project, refused to adopt all the anti-reader practices of other websites, like disgusting surveillance, intrusive advertising, AI slop, email-soliciting pop-ups, and all the other crap that makes the news worse and worse every day?

Cooper recounts how this was actually tried on a small scale, to modest good effect, when the Center for American Progress subsidized Thinkprogress, an explicitly leftist news outlet. This was going great until 2019, when corporate Dems and their megadonors killed it because Thinkprogress had the temerity to report on their corrupt dealings:

https://www.thedailybeast.com/thinkprogress-a-top-progressive-news-site-is-shutting-down/

And, Cooper points out, this isn't what happens with far-right subsidy news. Right wing influencers, personalities and writers can stray pretty far from the party line without getting shut down.

I love the idea of a disenshittified, explicitly political leftist Democratic news media. Imagine a newsroom whose purpose is to get its message repeated as widely as possible. It wouldn't have a paywall – it would be Creative Commons Attribution-only, allowing for commercial republication by anyone who wants to reprint it, so long as they link back to it. It wouldn't wring its hands over AI ingestion or whether a slop site that rewrote its articles got to the top of Google News. That's fine! If the point is to get people to understand your point of view – and not to attract clicks or eyeballs – other people repackaging your content and finding ways to spread it is a feature, not a bug.

Back in the Napster Wars, entertainment industry shills – like Hillary Rosen, who oversaw a campaign to sue tens of thousands of children before becoming a major Democratic Party power-broker – used to tell us that "you can't compete with free." That's not entirely true, but it's not entirely false, either. If your news is a loss-leader for a democratic society that addresses human flourishing and a habitable planet, then you can make that news free-as-in-speech and free-as-in-beer, and avoid all the suckitude that makes reading "real" news so fucking garbage.

For the past five years, I've been publishing a newsletter – this thing you're reading now – that has no analytics, ads, tracking, pop-ups, or other trash. As a writer, it's profoundly satisfying and liberating, because all I have to care about is whether people engage with my ideas. I literally have no idea how many people read this, but I know everything people say about it.

That's how the news worked back in the good old days that everyone says we need to return to. Writers and editors measured the success of a story based on how the public reacted to it, not based on clicks or metrics that told you how far someone scrolled before they gave up on it. The supposed benefits of "data-driven" editorial policy have not materialized – the "data-driven" part is the search for an equilibrium between how surveillant and obnoxious a website can be and your decision to stop reading it forever.

Outlets like Propublica have done well by adopting much of this program, albeit without any explicit leftist agenda (the fact that they seem leftist reflects nothing more than their commitment to reporting the truth, e.g., Clarence Thomas is a lavishly corrupt puppet of billionaires who've showered him with riches).

The fact that they've been as successful as they are on a national beat – and partnering with the scant few regional papers to do some local coverage – just proves the point. The Democratic Party doesn't need its own Joe Rogan – they need a nationwide network of local outlets, sponsored by the party, committed to never enshittifying, bringing relevant, timely news to a nation in desperate need of it.

[juicybeetz]

So after staring at this thing for a half hour or so, here are at least the first few lines from the Marriage Agreement in Beetlejuice Beetlejuice:

By signing the contract (below?) the above party Lydia Deetz agrees to enter into an eternal, everlasting marriage of love. Lydia Deetz agrees to marry the irresistible Beetlejuice in a marriage a long time in the making and agrees to becoming the loving wife of Beetlejuice and satisfy all his needs. By signing this contract “I Lydia Deetz agree that I am of sound mind, Beetlejuice is the one I want, the one I have always wanted and needed. I love that man, and I cannot wait to finally marry him.” By signing this contract, Lydia Deetz agrees to declare her (something) love and affection for Beetlejuice and declare void any previous (something) between the two of them (and I can’t make out the rest of the sentence… not sure if it’s voiding previous marriages or voiding any negativity between the two of them). Lydia Deetz agrees to remain a committed wife of Beetlejuice in life, death and afterlife, and will remain by his side through every living and dead circumstance. This agreement shall be governed by and constructed in accordance with the laws of the afterlife.

I would try to decipher more but doing just that part above gave me a headache. 😵‍💫 The text is unfortunately very blurry and the film grain on top of it doesn’t help. There’s a part I really want to read about that talks about what would happen if any code violation would occur between either party, but, again, I am in pain just trying to decipher the first few lines. 😆

The only part of the movie where some of the text is easily readable (easier than in the church scene above, anyway) is when he signs Lydia‘s name on the agreement (see below). The only problem is that it’s just the right side of the agreement that’s visible. Sigh. Really wish that they released the whole document somewhere because it’s pretty cute and I bet there are more funny things in it.