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muneca-lemon-steppa · 3 months

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Alfie noticing that guys who are way younger than him (like Michael? John?) having a thing for reader, who is close to age to these young gentlemen but has only eyes for ol' man Alfie? Thoughts?

Near Deadly Sin

Alfie Solomons x F!Reader; fluff

AN: IM BAAAAACCCCKKK hello my loves it’s taking me forever to write again but I’m glad to be back. I miss you all and hope you all are doing well!!! MUAH - Mo

No. No this acidic flame burning between his ribs is not jealousy.

Not at all.

The embers stoked in his chest. The flames licking up his neck and around his ears. These are normal… manly… sensible reactions.

Alfie had been invited for ‘drinks’ with the Shelbys. He had refused adamantly, and was only coerced upon your promise to accompany him and to never. leave. his. sight. As if you would ever be far from him or out of his thunderous gaze. But as he is sitting across from Thomas and Arthur and Polly, he is regretting ever bringing you near this nonsense. This den of wolves and snakes. The murmurs of Thomas faded like the crackle of a radio as he focused in on John Shelby’s lustful gaze over you. With every sweep of his young and unbridled eyes and suck of his teeth, Alfie became more and more enraged. Not that you noticed. You didn’t notice John’s roving eyes or the quickening pulse of your husband next to you. You were content sipping the tea Polly served, making quiet conversation with Ada in the corner, holding a babbling Karl.

Alfie knew there was supposed to be a deal or something tonight. Or maybe an update on a job. Or something. It didn’t matter. Fuck the business. Fuck the Shelbys. Fuck John Shelby. Fuck it all. Standing quickly, pushing through the screaming pain of his back, Alfie grunts, “Darling get your coat. We’re done here.”

Your head spun, “Meyn Likht?”

“Up. Coat. Now. Cyril needs us.”

You press your lips in a firm line. Holding back your tongue from lashing at him for his impromptu exit. You knew what he actually meant. Thinking of Cyril was his code for indicating murderous intent that needed to be snuffed out immediately. You watch Alfie as you slip on your coat, going to Thomas to whisper something just out of your reach. Had you heard him, you would have heard the volcanic timber of his voice promise, “You control that little brother of yours Tommy yeah? It’s against holy law to look at another man’s wife like he been doing. Will have to go back to Mosaic law if he don’t shape up.”

With heavy stomps he approaches John, who is trying yet failing to keep a stone expression. “You keep them eyes to yourself little boy. Or someone may just take ‘em from you.”

“Darling? Cyril needs to be let out and will not wait for you!”

With a firm pat on the cheek Alfie turned away, gripping your waist firmly, hand as hot as a brand on the skin under your dress.

It’s late now, Alfie is fuming under the crisp sheets and thick quilts layered living on the soft bed. He’s pretending to read. Putting on his glasses and taking them back off again to stare at the ceiling. You emerge from the bathroom, face flush from the hot water, and hair pulled away from your bare shoulders. Arms crossed across your chest, you sit on Alfie’s side of the bed, “You want to talk about it like a grown up now?”

He huffs and shifts lower into the bed, as if to hide from you. With a shrug you walk back to your side, shuffling your sock feet across. You crawl back in bed, back to Alfie to let him fume. It was better than fighting with him to get him to share his feelings.

“He was looking at you.”

“Well Karl is a baby darling.”

“Not Karl! John fucking Shelby! Little bastard was undressing you with his eyes! And you said nothing!”

Ah… there it was.

You let yourself sit up to look at your husband’s face. Folded up into himself, glasses precariously balanced on his nose, cheeks ruddy from rage. Jealousy was his greatest sin and vice. Bigger than rage. Bigger than his love of rum. He was an only child and as such he grew into a man who did not like to share. Not even your image. You curled up next to him, like a cat preening for attention. “Meyn Likht… I didn’t even see him. You shouldn’t be jealous of a figure of vapor.”

“What you don’t notice the… the young men just staring at you? Gapped mouths like dead fish?”

“Those children?” You hum, gently kissing his scruffy jaw and temple.

“Those… men closer in age… to you.”

With that you crawl into his lap, looping your arms around his broad shoulders. “Darling… what could I do with those men? I’d break them.”

“Break them?” He chuckles, gripping you tighter.

“They’re too soft. Too pretty. No. I like my men… rougher… more sturdy… someone who can stand strong and not worry about their pretty face getting dirty. I like my old man.”

“Do you now?”

“Love him even. Deliriously in love with him. Couldn’t live without him.”

Before you could take another breath, he was on you, kissing all over your face, tickling you with his rough beard and mustache. “Good Lord woman you make me feel 20 again.”

#alfie solomons #alfie solomons x reader #alfie solomons x you #alfie solomons fanfic #alfie solomons x y/n #peaky blinder fanfic

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strangesoulmates · 1 year

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Cyril is back in the pet hospital. He took a sudden and dramatic turn sometime last night. He'll see his neurologist again in the morning.

Hoping he'll rebound again, but it's clear we're on borrowed time here. I just want to know how much more of it I might be able to hope for.

#cyril update #pet illness tw

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starberry-cupcake · 1 month

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This is a one chapter update because this chapter was 25 years long and I don't want my post to be also that long, even though you're all being super nice about it (thank you ♥).

previously, in harroweena the ninth:

this happened

now, chapter 6:

harrowbean wakes up and is taken somewhere in a wheelchair

we get no sleep in this ship

we get no face paint, no black robes, no sleep, no security from people who wanna suffocate you in your sleep, no explanations

lyctors need a union

as in unionization, not as in a combination of people, that they did when slurping their cavaliers

the person carrying her is very upset at everyone

turns out, she's a lyctor

her name is mercysomething

we have an ortus 2, a mercysomething and an augustine

harrow mentions eyes again and says that Lyctors "kept their own faces, but the eyes they stole from someone else. You had been lucky that your own transition was not as startling"

Lucky, you say...

I don't know about that

anyway, this mercysomething is supposed to be the saint of joy

I'm assuming lyctors are given their names through the ancient art of sarcasm

on that note

harrow: "if you had not of late become the Saint of Emesis"

me: wait, I gotta look something up real quick

me: yeah, that's funny

mercysomething is angry and in a hurry

a bunch of time is spent with mercysomething being angry and treating people like crap and being unpleasant

she's arguing with everyone she comes across and takes harrow to a hangar

yandere twin is sitting on a crate watching a necromancer make a ward with blood and bleeding to death in the process

harrow sits next to her and they are like sportscasters of blood-painted wards

according to the necrocasters, it's a ghost ward

yandere twin updates harrow on the fact that they're at war and they've been attacked and they're down to three Old Lyctors and two Baby Lyctors

it would explain why mercysomething is upset all the time

mercysomething wants to take the emperor somewhere else and the guy commanding the ship doesn't want to let him leave

emperor guy comes in and kind of does this to mercysomething

yandere twin and I are LIVING for all this pute/salseo/gossip/however you wanna call it

harrow isn't as interested

I complained in gideon because gideon wasn't interested in things I wanted to look into and now I'm gonna complain about harrow not being interested in Drama

emperor the fool says: "I know exactly who is behind this terrible blow, and they were fools to show their hand"

yandere twin and I

when emperor guy sees the necromancer bleeding out he goes "for fuck's sake"

it's a quote, not me being funny ha ha

remember when I said this guy is a mess?

that's becoming exponentially more evident

I want to punch him in the face at all times

I don't know how people can be respectful to this dude

the reason there isn't any face paint for harrow in this ship is that the emperor uses it every morning to paint on his clown face

they've been alive like 1000 years or whatnot and they're all a fucking group project going off the rails

so emperor guy, mercysomething, not!dulcinea (now in a coffin package), yandere twin and harrow get in a ship inside the ship

a smaller ship inside the big ship where the emperor has been for the past bunch of years

the small ship has the blood ward for the ghosts

but, before going in, emperor the fool fixes the necro that's bleeding to death

I honestly think she would have preferred to just die

which, same, if he was my boss

necros also need to unionize

cavaliers more than anyone tbh

if cavaliers unionized, idk if there would be any lyctors

emperor guy and mercysomething argue about people they know and we don't yet know

and mercysomething was telling harrow previously that the former ninth was prettier than her (anastasia, heart don't fail me now, courage don't desert me) and telling yandere twin the former third was prettier than her (cyrus? cyril? something like that)

which, absolutely juvenile behavior for someone who's like a 1000+ years of age or whatever

why would we care who she finds prettier????

ANYWAY, throughout this I was once again thinking

nobody here has G & P initials

it's been driving me mad this whole time

gideon and harrow found that former lyctor quarters

and it said "ONE FLESH, ONE END. G. & P."

that was before the note with gideon's name in it was read

and all this time I was thinking those were a set of necro-cav from the previous lyctors

but nobody here has those initials

the only P is the cavalier of Ortus 2 and there's no G

which is DRIVING ME MAD

if the G is the previous Gideon, the one not!dulcinea mentioned, it would explain why there was a note that mentioned a Gideon in the quarters

it would not, however, explain who the fuck that other gideon is, who P is and why they aren't in the list with the other combos

augustine is a former fifth because his cav's last name is quinque

mercysomething's from the eighth because her cav's last name is oct, and because she's annoying to be around

ortus 2 is from the second, because his cav's last name is dve

cyril cyrus whatev is from the third because the cav is trinit and mercysomething mentioned him to yandere twin, who is from the third

ulysses is from the fourth because the cav is tetra

not!dulcinea is seventh because the cav was heptane and because it was a very important thing in the previous book, as we've established

anastasia (dancing bears, painted wings) is from the ninth because the cav is novenary and she was mentioned to harrow

cassiopeia must be sixth, because it's what I have left, but I don't recognize the root of the last name to make a clear parallel from the top of my head

the emperor's guardian is A.L.

I'm taking note of an emperor's guardian who isn't around anymore

could it be ice cube barbie???? idk fam, she's looking at him a lot

giving me magic knight rayearth vibes again

this but with backstabbing instead of love

ANYWAY, all of this to point out that there's no G & P and it's driving me up the wall

now, to a very important thing

VERY IMPORTANT

for me, maybe it's just me

the enemies or whatever are called "remnants" and their leader apparently has been gone for "nearly 20 years"

this is me desperately making timelines with gideon's mom and gideon's birth and the 2 details I know about gideon's mom and her birth

you know what, I'm gonna quote, since I went to fetch it

"One day eighteen years ago, Gideon's mother had tumbled down the middle of the shaft in the drag chute and a battered hazard suit, like some moth drifting slowly down into the dark. The suit had been out of power for a couple of minutes. The woman landed brain-dead. All the battery power had been sucked away by a bio-container plugged into the suit, the kind you'd carry a transplant limb in, and inside that container was Gideon, only a day old."

I'm gonna just...put a pin on that that in the cork board

I don't know you guys, I'm just gonna

let me pin that

I'm probably being wrong a lot more than what I'm getting right but I'm just telling you what goes through my mind, if I'm making a fool of myself, it's too late to act like I'm not a fool

I am also putting my clown paint on like the emperor

MOVING ON

harrow thinks the emperor talks in plural about her at one point and idk if that's the case tbh

we then get emperor guy explaining how they need to go to their safe space base with a name I can't remember

a fancy name very lord-of-the-rings-y

let's call it emperor's mojo dojo casa house

and to get there as quick as they need to, they have to cut through the River

the one with the ghosties and ghoulies

that's what the ward was for

if they went through regular means, it'd take too long and, doing it this way, they could be there super fast, but they need to get in the River and come out the other way in the right spot

and intact

so it's this situation

so, in order to do that, they have to hold on to their souls and their cav souls and whatever they've got using the skills from the first test

I want to point out, once again, WHO PLANNED CANAAN HOUSE AS A TOOL TO GET LYCTORS TO LEARN THINGS?????

THEY WERE NOT DOING ALL THE TESTS

THEY WERE FIGHTING FOR THE KEYS

SOME DIDN'T EVEN KNOW THERE WERE TESTS TO BEGIN WITH

JUDITH WAS LIVING IN LAW AND ORDER

we didn't even get to all the tests, people started dropping like flies

because the emperor had one loose lyctor who thought she was in a telenovela

ANYWAY

the point is, if they drift too far while crossing the River, something else can come into their bodies

we did learn that, because it happened to duracell bunny nephew back in canaan house

but we learned it because mayonnaise uncle thought he was tough shit and ruined it, not because of the tests

harrow, doing her best, thinks "you felt alone in your head"

WHICH IS GREAT for our gideon notes

also, no camilla mention or appearance in this one

(I'm having a lizzie bennet theme going on for Reasons for the time being)

so, we're leaving harrow and yandere twin trying to learn for the first time how to not die by crossing the River because the emperor plans things terribly and mercysomething is too preoccupied being upset at everything all the time

#luly reacts to tlt #harrow the ninth #harrow the ninth spoilers #tlt spoilers #the locked tomb #long post #gif cw

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oldinterneticons · 1 year

Note

You know any old nostalgic social medias that still exist? The only ones I've found so far are hi5 and Xat

Huh I didn't know hi5 was still around. Let me do some digging:

MySpace: still around (barely - looks like the front page hasn't been updated since early last year), but nothing like it was back in the day. Two clone sites that work and look the same was as old-school MySpace, SpaceHey and Friend Project exist.

LiveJournal is still up and some fan communities are still active there. It was bought by a Russian company years ago and there are some concerns about that, but it still works in the same way it used to. Still popular as a social site in Cyrillic-language countries. LJ's software was open source so there were a lot of clone sites of it. Dreamwidth is the main one in use, but DeadJournal and InsaneJournal are also still around.

Obviously DeviantArt is very much still popular for posting art, though looks very different than it used to.

Open Diary and Diaryland are still hanging in there! These ones were some of my favourites way back but not many seem to remember them, they were very early (pre-LJ, I think!) blog sites. Open Diary doesn't look nostalgic anymore but Diaryland does. I also know a lot of people from OD migrated to Prosebox, which is another neat little diary site (but looks quite modern).

Gaia Online still looks fairly active and the layout is largely stuck in the late 2000s!

ChickenSmoothie, a virtual pet site

Neopets is still going, though since so much of it was built on Flash lots of the old games etc are gone :(

Never used Quotev myself so idk how it used to be, but looks like now they are part quiz, part Wattpad-like site?

Honestly UQuiz is a nice little spiritual successor to Quizilla imo.

Still lots of old-school forums out there if you look for them, certainly not for as broad of a range of topics as there used to be but here are some directories to get started.

Looks like some country and language-specific sites that people mentioned in the notes like Skyrock, Metroflog (there's 3 of these if you Google??), Animexx and Kaskus are still active or trying to come back

MyYearbook became Meet Me

Vampire Freaks lives on as a store only

Bzoink, an old survey/quiz/forum site, is still around.

Of course, if you just want to look at old sites, the Internet Archive and Archiveteam's wiki are good places to start.

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ef-1 · 7 months

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WHERE is the AD18 post you liar 🤕 jk ilysm pls take your time I'm just curious

sorRY I FORGOT OKAY

let me preface this by saying that there really wasn't anything notable about AD18 (Fernando was "retiring" but we knew that for months in advance, Charles was replacing Kimi at Ferrari but we knew that for months in advance, it was Daniel's last race at RB but we also knew that for months in advance etc) most of what I feel about that weekend is probably nostalgia but. It was the ✨️vibe✨️ the vibe was so immaculate. Drivers used to say that the last race of the season feels like the last day of school but 2018 really just captured that sentiment, no one wanted to be there but in the best way possible you know?

Formative event for me personally was Sebastian and Lewis trading helmets. I think what makes #sewis compelling now is how far they've come. But how far they've come also has the added disadvantage of neutering and sanitising what Seb and Lewis were back in the day. I mean 2018 literally started in Aus with Lewis telling Seb he wanted to wipe the smile off his face. At the beginning of 2018 Lewis was a 4 time champion, tied with Seb. Seb said again and again and again that he had a vested interest in Lewis not winning anymore championships, for his sake and for the sake of protecting Michael Schumacher's record. Anyway it was like. WILD and heart-warming and a very big deal

Re: Fernando retiring. So like. At that point, his last race of his career*, Fernando had already shat on McLaren in literally every fucking conceivable way, calling the engine an f2 engine (gp2), when asked about the very expensive updates on his car he replied "feels good. Much slower than before. Amazing". And ofc in AD18 he couldn't leave without one last jab, his race engineer was trying to gas him up to fight for p10 and he's like "you can fight for that 1 point ☝️ Fernando🔥🔥 1 point is on the table💯" to which he replied "👹I HAVE 1 THOUSAND AND 8 HUNDRED POINTS⁉️👹"

Re: re Alonso retiring, they painted him an ugly ass mural (support artists pls but it looked funny) in the driver's meeting room and during the important drivers debrief while Carlos was giving a lecture about safety or something Daniel lost it and Fernando filmed him losing it

nothing will ever go harder than this im afraid + obvi it was the champions sending Fernando off with 🍩 but fate is a fan of aesthetics so Kimi who was supposed to do donuts with them retired from the race (I think it would have thrown off the composition of the photo with 2 red cars so I'm glad)

Lewis offering Seb a Monster and Seb replying "I prefer Red Bull" (<-I Died that day)

During the last Team Principal conference of the year, of course they sat Christian and Cyril next to eachother. And of course they asked him about losing Daniel and the renault engine, to which Christian decided the best way to answer that question is to remind Cyril that while they're both basically the same age, when Christian was the youngest TP in F1, Cyril was working in the kitchen 😭

In conclusion it was chaos and I loved it so much and it will forever hold a v special place in my heart

#2018 was very very VERY painful but AD was beautiful and iconic and bitter-sweet and for the history books #f1 #daniel ricciardo #lewis hamilton #sebastian vettel #fernando alonso #Christian Horner

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sofia-d-asb · 7 months

Note

I played ASB so many times ❤️ and when romancing Cyril I never played it different. You mentioned in the last ask about a slow burn with him, do you get it by rejecting to stay the night with him but continue to flirt?

I really want to replay it now to experience this new path, could you give a bit more info how to get it please? And does Will have a different romance path as well?

btw, loved the latest traitor path update....I cannot wait to fully experience his path💔

There are two ways to trigger the slow burn version of Cyril's romance:

First, is by not flirting with them at all. At the end of the dinner scene, select "Something—I'm not entirely sure what—anchors me in place", then "I feel at ease, in your company," and "Spending more time together. The prospect is... alluring," or "I do feel at ease in his/her company, but I'm not about to admit it out loud."

Second, flirt with Cyril as usual, but stop at a kiss.

Will does not have a different romance path. It's specific to Cyril because I thought that some MCs would not want to sleep with them at the first opportunity (whereas Will is a slow burn in any case)

If you want more tips for the romance paths, you can check the quick guide I wrote on Steam.

Glad you enjoyed the latest demo update for Arcadie: Cold Lands! It's a ton of fun to write.

#arcadie second born #ask #cyril #romance

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johnwickb1tsch · 2 months

Text

The Night Nurse ~ Chapter 10

A John Wick x Helen Fic

Masterlist / Chapter Map

Author's note: It's been a minute since I posted on this fic, I'm so sorry!! I lost a good chunk of this chapter to an untimely computer update (fuck you very much Windows) and I was so frustrated I just had to let it sit for a while. BUT I finally managed to re-write it, so here we are! I hope you enjoy! 💗💗💗 (Oh and the illustrations here are from the turn of the century version of Afanasyev's Russian Fairy Tales, the book John hid his marker in, in JW3...you'll see why.😉)

Times gets tough

Oh, they get tougher

Hold on to me

I got you, darling…

-I’ll be your man, The Black Keys

The walls of his library were lined with built-in bookshelves, filled to the brim with antique and vintage books. A single leather reading chair sat in the corner with a lamp and a small table. A larger table took up the center of the room with a proper book cradle. Helen breathed in, reveling in the magical smell of old books. She realized that this must be where John gets some of that intoxicating scent of his, bottom notes of leather and parchment paper. The chair in the corner looked well-worn, and she imagined him spending hours of his downtime just sitting and reading away the day.

For the umpteenth time, it squeezed her heart to the point of pain.

Throughout the course of the tour, they did not let go of each other once. John didn’t seem to mind handling books with one mitt of a hand, the fingers of his left laced tightly with Helen’s.

“Do you still have your book of Russian fairy tales?”

“Yes.” Gingerly he pulled it from a shelf, resting it in the cradle on the table.

They perused the book together, Helen leaning against his shoulder. He was warm, and solid as a tree, and for a heady moment it was difficult to concentrate on the antique tome, no matter how beautiful. The illustrations were utterly gorgeous, and she mentally kicked herself into focusing. She thought about a young John toting this beloved book around the world with him like a Lost Boy with his teddy bear, and the thought succeeded in tying her up in inextricable knots.

John turned to a page of an illustration of a lovely peasant woman in the woods, holding a torch made of a glowing human skull. “Oh, who’s that?” asked Helen.

“That’s Vasilisa the Beautiful,” answered John.

She hovered her finger over the first line of Cyrillic, careful not to touch the paper. “What does it say?”

John read it aloud, his voice low and all for her, and she sighed a little, not understanding a syllable. For some reason hearing him speak another language so easily, and something about the lilting cadence of the language in his deep voice, the soft shh and musical ya sounds of the Russian words inspired a curl of lust in her belly, a small thrill zipping down her spine. She shuddered lightly, and prayed he hadn’t noticed.

He absolutely noticed, his pupils blowing wide with desire. Doggedly, he kept them fixed upon the page below.

“Is that, ‘Once upon a time’…in Russian?”

“Something like that. This is a Cinderella story about a young woman who outsmarts her wicked stepmother and the Baba Yaga with her determination and the help of her magical doll. It’s one of my favorites.”

He’d seen a bit of himself in Vasilisa as a young man, straining under the yoke of his unforgiving masters. He turned the page to reveal a witchy old woman riding in what looked like an upright log. Helen couldn’t suppress a grin. “Oh look, it’s you, Baba Yaga.”

John snorted at that. “I still don’t know what idiot started that damned nickname,” he groused.

Actually, he suspected it was Marcus, but he’d never found out for certain.

“It sounds fierce, at least.”

His lips twisted in a smirk, and he couldn’t help himself from turning to look at her, then. Their faces were torturously close. “Think I should get some flaming skull torches for out front?”

“Yes, I think the neighbors would love that,” she deadpanned, and more felt than heard John’s responding chuckle.

He turned the page to a new illustration of a strapping knight on a black horse. “Oh hello, handsome. Who’s this guy?”

John narrowly resisted the urge to ask if she had a thing for men in black, even as that telling warmth clouded his brain.

“That’s…Night.”

“The night Knight?”

“Yeah.”

“Hmm.” Her lips twisted in a cheeky smile. “Nice. I like him.”

“You would.”

“I have excellent taste, John.”

He found himself looking at her mouth again, thinking her taste would be excellent. For the umpteenth time, he managed not to kiss her by the skin of his teeth. By the way she was looking at him...maybe he didn't need to be exercising such restraint. But maybe that was the excellent wine talking

Maybe he really was an idiot.

“So...in reward for being clever Baba Yaga gives Vasilisa one of the skull torches. She takes it back to her house, and when she lights the candles her wicked step mother and awful step sisters burn up.”

“Oooh. And she lives happily ever after?”

“Well...she marries the tsar, for what that's worth.”

Helen wrinkled up her nose, communicating her opinion on that. “Overall, I give it a nine out of ten.”

John couldn’t help it then. He actually grinned, showing teeth. “Glad you liked it.”

“Thanks for sharing with me.”

“My pleasure.”

She was still leaning on his shoulder, and was it him, or had she somehow sidled even closer, her body pressed to his side? Her eyes traveled leisurely from him to the book to the chair in the corner. It was then that she noticed that the bookmarked novel on the side table was a mass-market paperback she recognized quite well.

He’d taken her recommendation on the Codename Villanelle spy thrillers, despite teasing her about her taste in books, what felt like a lifetime ago that fateful night in the subway. The fact that he was on the second one touched her to no end, and she squeezed his arm.

“Aww, you’re reading about Eve and Villanelle,” she purred. “You like them?”

“Yes. You were right, they are fun.”

“Taking notes from Villanelle?” The Russian spy was wickedly clever at finding ways to kill her targets.

“Maybe. That poison hair stick was something. Think I could pull it off?” Helen reached up to curl a lock of his dark hair around her finger with a smile, and John couldn’t stop himself from closing his eyes, overwhelmed by the sensation of her touching his hair.

He was hopeless.

“Oh, definitely. You could so rock the man-bun.”

John rolled his eyes at that, reluctant to admit that he often did when training.

Helen looked back to the book, now with what John was learning to recognize as a sly glint in her eye. “I’m on practically the same spot in that book,” she noted. “Want to read me a chapter?”

John looked at his reading chair, the comfortable old soldier that it was. It was also the only place to sit in the room, and he went a little cross-eyed at the thought of Helen curled up in his lap in it.

There would be zero reading done, of that he was certain. He would debauch her for the first time in that chair, and maybe again on the table for good measure.

A virulent heat licked at his collar as he imagined it. Fuck him, but she was making him blush.

“Sure. Let’s take it to the living room,” he proposed, ignoring her lips pursed in a theatrical pout.

Minx. She knew exactly what she was doing to him—and he was increasingly unsure why he wasn’t just letting her have her way.

He scooped up the paperback book, her hand still firmly clasped in his other while he led them back to the recessed living room. He set the book down on the couch. “Want another glass of wine? I’m going to clear these dishes.”

He needed to clear his head, and he felt Helen look at him with some disappointment that felt a little bit like being stabbed.

“Can I help you?”

“No, this is your night off. Sit, relax. I’ll be right back.”

“Okay.” She seated herself on the couch with only the book for company.

She watched John practically flee into the kitchen, and wondered if she’d done something wrong.

Regaled by the sound of clinking dishes and the faucet running, Helen looked around at John’s shelves. They were rather bare, though she noticed he had a bit of a CD collection on display. It plucked at her nostalgia for the days before everything could be so easily accessed via the hand-held computers known as phones but so rarely used for actually talking.

Standing, she decided to be nosy and thumb through them. He seemed to favor classics, from classical music, to rock and blues. There was very little on the shelf dating from past the 90s, and that made her smile for some reason.

“See anything you like?”

She turned to find John with two freshly-filled wine glasses in tow. He set them on the coffee table, before joining her at the built-in cd tower.

“Some good stuff here,” she agreed with a Chili Peppers cd in her hand. The fiery pool with the ocean in the background on the cover tickled the nostalgia center in her brain for sure. “Who are these guys?” She pulled out a black and white album with a high contrast photo of a guy with glasses, and a bearded dude.

“Never heard of the Black Keys?”

“I don’t think so.”

“Oh, honey.”

She chuckled. “Ok, do not pull the my taste in music is better than yours card. I will leave.”

“I wouldn’t do that,” he defended with a sly close-lipped smile. “I reserve that card only for books.”

She snorted in answer, and found herself gravitating closer to him, even just standing there looking at his music. She just couldn’t help it.

That really was some good wine he served with dinner.

She watched as he popped open the jewel case, feeding the CD into the slot of his player. He hit a couple buttons, and the speakers erupted with a very bluesy distorted guitar riff. It was loud, and John laughed a little as she jumped—conveniently, into his arms.

“Sorry.” He turned down the volume slightly, his arms circling her waist almost of their own volition. It felt so easy, being with her. Maybe from the very moment they’d met, it just felt like she should be in his arms, and acting on it made something loud and uneasy always clamoring in the back of his brain to go quiet. She swayed her head and shoulders a little to the beat; it was impossible not to.

“John?” she asked from beneath his chin, brushing the soft scruff of his beard with her nose. It filled him with a tingling warmth, in the very marrow of his bones, a pleasure in this closeness that just seemed too good to be true. It was like a drug, better than cocaine or heroin or anything else he’d ever tried, and he didn’t know how he would ever let her go.

“Yeah?”

“They made you learn ballet at your…school, but do you like to dance?”

He’d spent so much time in night clubs, hunting, and acting as backup muscle for Tarasov while he closed business deals, but it wasn’t a setting he really enjoyed. He wasn’t sure he really classified the writhing and arm waving one engaged in at the club as dancing. He was familiar with other dance forms, but they didn’t come up often in his life.

“I feel like you’re actually asking me a different question,” he teased, leaning into her to reach out to skip to a different track.

“I am?”

“You’re asking if I want to dance with you?”

The first metallic notes of Dan Auerbach’s guitar rang out, and John swayed to the beat, a hand on her svelte waist pinning her close. With a smile she moved with him, her other hand finding his.

“Do you?”

He looked down at her with a glint of mischief in those shining dark eyes, and so much warmth that a flood of heat washed through her from her hair follicles all the way to her toes. This man. She really would follow him anywhere. Maybe the wine they’d drank lubricated this thought process, but she knew that didn’t make it any less true.

John knew that his answer to any question that involved an activity with her would be a resounding yes. Groceries? Yes. The dentist? Fine. Just hold his hand. He was broken for her.

“Of course I do.” He lifted his arm to guide her in a turn before pulling her close again, and she simply couldn’t help it. The joy in her heart soared.

Then the vocals in the song began, and Helen couldn’t help the fuzzy warmth that spread in her chest. Need a new love? I’m ready. Want my time? I’m willing.

There wasn’t a huge amount of open space in the living room, but John was very good at making do, leading her in steps to the beat, throwing in fun checks and turns and behind-the-back maneuvers that made her giggle. She knew she sounded drunk. It was on him though, far more than the wine. He made her happier than any one had in a very long time. Maybe ever, if she was being honest with herself.

To make things even worse, the chorus of the song rang loud in her ears with the infectious guitar riff: I’ll be your man. Mmm, I’ll be your man. She didn’t know if he picked this song on purpose for the lyrics, or the intoxicating rhythm, but she felt it in her bones, and in her heart, and every cell of her being; she was so attuned to this man.

She almost tripped when he attempted to twist her up like a pretzel in a figure-eight step, but he caught her, laughing with her as he held her close.

“I’m not that good,” she apologized, clinging to him more than she really needed to. He was just…so solid, and if she was being honest all she really wanted to do was climb him like a fucking tree.

His arm around her waist was like a warm band of iron, and he smiled gently down at her. She felt herself melting like chocolate in the sun, her knees gone weak beneath her.

“That’s ok. I’ve got you.”

She couldn’t stop the sigh that escaped from her throat. Because, she knew it was true, and not just here being silly dancing in his living room. She realized she trusted him not to drop her no matter what they were doing, or what they were facing. That kind of faith in another person, much less a man, was a rare and precious thing.

“John…” she said softly, looking up into his warm dark eyes from so very close. She wasn’t sure if she was asking a question, or if she just needed to cite his name like a prayer, invoke him like a saint in her personal pantheon. Maybe it was madness, but wrapped up in his arms like this, he felt like something to believe in.

Her eyes drifted down to his mouth, those full lips she’d coveted since the moment they’d met, if she was telling the truth.

This was the moment that John’s will to fight it broke at last. He felt it inside, not like a hard snap, but a definite release, like a boat coming unmoored, being swept down a swift stream. There was no more resisting. He was lost to her.

Pulled like a magnet, he finally leaned in that fraction of distance to press his lips to hers. His kiss was like a sunrise in her heart; warm and bursting, soft and sweet. She couldn’t stop herself from standing on tiptoe with a low moan, looping her arms around his neck as she pressed her body against his. It won her something like a deep growl that thrilled her to her toes, and greedily she wanted more.

She teased the seam of his mouth with her tongue, begging entrance he gladly granted. She felt the tremor in his arms as he held her, so tightly that he nearly lifted her from the floor. He kissed her like a starving man offered a life-giving meal, and her fingers fisted in his hair at the back of his head, holding him to her, holding on.

His heartbeat a thundering timpani in his ears, John felt like Helen’s lips on his was the answer to a question his heart had been asking his whole adult life. She was the air he breathed, the sustenance necessary to live, and the desire to drink her down, to eat her up, was a dogged, insistent demand from the darkest depths of his soul.

He never wanted to let her go.

With a ragged breath he pulled back to rest his forehead against hers, his fingers digging into her sides. She might have bruises later.

She didn’t mind.

She wanted his hands, rough or gentle.

She wanted all of him, and if he didn’t return his mouth to hers she was going to scream.

“Helen,” he panted. “I—”

The tinny electronic sound of his phone ringing in his pocket interrupted what might have been a foolish—or a life changing—confession. “Fuck,” he cursed under his breath, knowing he had to answer it. That was the deal with the devil he’d signed, when he didn’t really have any better choice. He was on call all the time.

“I’m sorry,” he apologized.

She nodded, but did not extricate herself, leaning on his shoulder while he pulled the device from his pocket. It was Viggo Tarasov, and his heart dropped like a stone. It was rare that the boss Himself called. He absolutely had to answer it, and he had a feeling he wouldn’t like what his pakhan had to say.

With a heavy heart he lifted the phone to his ear, his other arm still wrapped possessively around Helen.

“Da?”

“Good evening, John.”

John fought to keep the impatient snarl out of his tone, but feared he failed royally. “Evening, Viggo.”

“I’ve just heard some interesting things about your latest adventures about town. I think we need to talk.”

That was probably the understatement of the century.

“When?”

“Now.”

Of fucking course.

“I can be there in an hour.”

“Good.”

Viggo hung up, and John clenched the phone in his fist, fighting not to throw it across the room. He knew Helen heard every word for the way she sighed with disappointment, snuggling into the bend of his neck. The sensation of her front molded to his was heaven, and he didn’t know how to let her go.

“I’m so sorry,” he apologized with lips to her forehead. “I have to go.”

“I understand.” There was some consolation, in that she sounded as devastated as he was.

“You’ll be ok here? My house is your house. Help yourself to anything you want.”

She made a kittenish little sound that sent all his blood straight to his groin. “What I want is leaving,” she informed him with a pouting lip, tugging on the front of his shirt.

He couldn’t stop himself then from stealing another kiss, a deep and probing thing that left her breathless and starry-eyed.

“I’ll be back as soon as I can,” he told her.

“Promise?”

“Yes.” John wondered what Viggo had in store. If he was in trouble, or if his boss would send him out to teach the Medvedev boys a lesson tonight. He didn’t want to go hunting that night. Everything he truly wanted in the world, he realized, was standing right in front of him, looking up at him with melted toffee eyes. He cupped her cheek, memorizing every detail of her all over again.

He realized with a startling clarity that he could never get enough of her.

The intensity of his stare sent a thrill jetting down her spine. “John…” He worried her a little, when he got like this. She wasn’t afraid of him, exactly—but some little intuition in the back of her brain sang out that something bad might happen.

“It’ll be alright,” he told her, sensing her unease. “I have to change.” He kissed her forehead again, and disappeared up the stairs to his room.

Helen plopped down on the couch with a sigh, crushed with disappointment but knowing this was how it was, and she understood more than ever now that it wasn’t his fault or his choice. She picked up the Villanelle book, No Tomorrow, stroking her thumb over the cover, but not cracking it open.

When John stalked down the stairs he was wearing one of his slim-fit all black suits again, his hair slicked back from his face. He looked beautiful, and predatory, sleek as a panther stalking in the jungle, and fierce attraction warred with dread in Helen’s breast. She had a feeling that someone might die tonight, and it was so strange to think in those terms with such a sense of acceptance.

At least she knew John’s prey would be no one innocent.

“Don’t forget you owe me a chapter,” she said in a sing song tone as he approached, waving the book, trying to lighten the pall that had fallen upon the room.

The smile he paid her was filled with melancholy; she felt it like a knife between the ribs. “I won’t,” he assured her, taking her hand to press his lips to her knuckles. He paused, looking down at this beautiful woman seated on his couch, with her legs that went on forever and the warmth in her eyes all for him. There was nothing he wanted more, than to stay there with her. To lay her down and kiss every inch of her perfect flesh. He probably should have told her that, but he just sighed, and let her go.

“I’m going to leave this here, just in case,” he said, all business as he showed her a blocky black automatic pistol. “There’s one in the chamber. All you have to do is pull the trigger. It has a long trigger pull but please do not touch it unless you need it, and be very careful.” He stashed the Glock in a drawer beside the couch. “I’ll leave the alarm on. If it goes off I’ll get an alert on my phone.”

With wide eyes she nodded. “Do you…think the Medvedevs will come here?”

“No, or I wouldn’t leave you here alone.” He honestly thought this was the safest place for her. “But…” One never knows.

“Okay.” He could tell that he managed to scare her a little, and he hated himself for it.

“I’m being paranoid,” he tried to assure her. He dared add, “Because you’re precious to me.” She softened then, and stood to wrap her arms around his neck once more. Embracing her was as intoxicating as kissing her, and again John warred with himself as to how he was going to leave.

“Come back to me,” she demanded softly, kissing the soft scruff of his cheek.

“Always,” he answered without allowing himself to think about it, pressing his lips to hers in a long, gentle kiss filled with all the yearning in his heart.

Reluctantly, he slipped from her grasp, and didn’t look back.

She watched him go, admiring his tall dark form even as he was leaving her.

She heard the roar of the Mustang starting in the garage, and the trail of its growl as it prowled across the driveway, disappearing down the street into the night. She couldn’t help but feel like her heart sped away with it.

#john wick #john wick fic #john wick x helen #helen wick #john wick the night nurse #keanu reeves

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echo-heo · 1 year

Text

Problem with Discord's new (and old) font(s) and its treatment of non-Latin text

Before getting into it, I'm gonna say that I'm not going to criticize its aesthetics or "readability". These feedbacks are rarely helpful from the designer's perspective especially coming from people who don't know much about what goes into designing a typeface, and because readability is really, really subjective.

I was happy to hear that discord was changing its font, especially when I found out that they are adding support for Vietnamese. Previously, discord used Whitney, a humanist sans serif font with Latin, Greek, and Cyrillic support. Unfortunately, Whitney doesn't support all Latin characters in Unicode, and crucially it doesn't support Vietnamese characters.

Text font not supporting a script is usually not a problem, the fallback font will take care of it for you. The problem occurs when there's partial support. Vietnamese uses Latin, but it also has a ton of precomposed vowels with diacritics. This is what Vietnamese looks like on my phone, where the font change hasn't taken effect yet:

here's the same text with unsupported characters highlighted in red:

It might not look that weird because the fallback font on my phone happened to be somewhat similar in style to Whitney, but depending on the device it may be completely unreadable. I submitted a feedback a while ago asking them to address this issue

This is why when I heard that discord was changing its font to add Vietnamese characters, I was excited. This is what the same text looks like in gg sans.

All characters harmonious!

However, after receiving the update I was disappointed because the new font now no longer supports Greek and Cyrillic. This alone is not really a big problem, because Greek, Cyrillic and Latin characters rarely occur in the same word. Although it is disappointing that they are no longer harmonious, it's not that big of a problem. The problem though, is that they decided to include Δ, Ω, μ, π (capital delta, capital omega, lowercase mu, and lowercase pi) into the font.

Depending on the device and rendering settings, it might look like it fits well with the fallback font, being almost unnoticeable, or so noticeable that it's hard to read. These four glyphs are often included in typefaces that only support Latin as they are often included in Latin lettersets because of their use in mathematics and science, so I thought it was simply an odd oversight.

Then I found out about this:

(As of 2022/12/3 9:22 pm UTC+9 I couldn't recreate this. It may be because of css setting or because they've already fixed it. I'm hoping it is the latter) They decided to include katakana characters to be only used in the shrug emoticon.

I was massively disappointed when I heard this news because it means they did not care at all about global accessibility when making the new font. I was under the impression that they were doing it at least partially to address this issue. I was under the impression that maybe they've heard us complain and complain about the font only having partial support for Vietnamese. Maybe they've realized the core problem. But no, it's clear that they still don't know what the problem is.

Maybe I should have realized it sooner. Did you know, Discord limits the amount of diacritics that can be attached to a single character, even though in a lot of non-Latin writing systems diacritics are crucial because they represent vowels, consonant clusters, et cetera?

Moreover, did you know that Discord has a limit on how many diacritics you can have in a single message? This means if you have a copy pasta in abugida writing systems such as Devanagari, Thai, Khmer, Lao, Bengali, Burmese, et cetera, the vowel diacritics are just going to disappear after a while, rendering the text unreadable?

Affected portion underlined in red. I assume these are done to prevent zalgo, which really shouldn't be done by Discord itself, not to mention that typical "zalgo" diacritics are usually IPA diacritics with actual use, which can often stack in a zalgo-like fashion.

Did you know that Discord enforces strict text line height, even though some writing systems need more horizontal space than latin to be legible? Anything outside of the bounds are cut off and rendered invisible.

Anyway, do you remember when I said I wasn't going to talk about aesthetics and readability? I kind of lied. I am going to talk about them.

A lot of people seem to be saying that the new font is bad and that it's significantly less readable than the previous font. I have doubts about whether this is actually because of the font itself or because they're simply not used to it yet. My guess would be the latter. However, that doesn't mean the solution is to make these people shut up and wait till they get used to it.

There is no universal solution for readability and legibility. The truth is that different people have different needs, and this is no different when it comes to typefaces. Ideally, discord should provide an option to change fonts. Many platforms do. They've been refusing to implement it because, I dunno, brand image?

There is also a bigger problem with how UI designers design in general. They only design around Latin in mind, even though different writing systems use space differently. Many Brahmic scripts use ligatures and diacritics stacking above or below the main character. If you care about non-Latin scripts not appearing illegible, make it so that UI elements can accommodate for that, or something.

I'm bad at writing conclusions, so there you have it. Me rambling about a thing that I care about that apparently everyone else should too.

#accessibility #writing systems #type design #discord #typography #long post

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