#fix .net error

[sacz21]

The behaviour where authentication works fine on localhost but not on a deployed server, can be caused by a variety of issues. Here are some common reasons why this might happen and the Solution Fix Cookie doesn't work error in .NET 6 Web API.

[techdirectarchive]

How to fix Windows Update Fails with Error 0x80092004

In this article, we shall discuss the fix to Windows Update Fails with Error 0x80092004 (Windows Update Logs in Windows: 2023-KB5022498 Cumulative Update for .NET Framework 3.5 and 4.8.1 for Windows 10 failed)”. We can unravel more information from the Windows Event Log. Windows Events provides a standard, centralized way for applications (and the operating system) to record important software…

[vanteguccir]

ㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤHOCKEY DRAMA * MATT STURNIOLO

SUMMARY　::　where Y/N is a hockey player of the Boston High-school hockey team, and during one of her games, her temper is tested by her opponent while her boyfriend, Matt, is watching.

FEATURING　Matt Sturniolo x reader　REQUESTED?　yes.

WARNINGS　::　Physical fighting, blood, bruises.

AUTHOR'S NOTE　::　that is my work, I DON'T authorize any form of plagiarism; copy, "inspiration" or translation! | english isn't my first language, so I'm sorry if there's any grammar error.

Y/N adjusted the straps of her helmet and took one last look around the locker room. The muffled noise of the crowd, which already filled the gym, pulsed through the walls. The tension in the air was palpable. This game wasn't just another game of the season; it was the decisive game that would define the regional champion. And for Y/N, there was an extra motivation: Matt. Her boyfriend was in the audience, and she wanted more than ever to impress him with her performance.

While sliding across the ice during warm-ups, Y/N observed the opposing team, known for its physical and aggressive play, looked more determined than ever. Among them, one player in particular stood out: Lilian. Tall, robust, and with a look that exuded competitiveness, Lilian had a reputation for being ruthless. Y/N knew she would have to pay attention to her throughout the game.

The opening whistle sounded, and the game began with frenetic intensity. Y/N moved with agility, looking for gaps in the opponent's defense. Every pass, every deflection, was meticulously calculated.

And it didn't take long for her to find an opportunity.

With a quick sprint, Y/N escaped to the right, receiving a precise pass from her teammate and, with an elegant movement of her stick, sent the puck directly into the corner of the net.

The electric sound of the puck hitting the net was followed by a roar from the crowd. Matt, who was sitting in the center bleachers, jumped to his feet, cheering and shouting her name, a huge smile taking over his face as his hands grabbed the front of his brothers' hoodies, shaking their upper bodies with euphoria.

Y/N's confidence was high, but the game was far from won. The opposing team increased the pressure, and Lilian, especially, seemed to have fixed Y/N as her main target.

In one of the most critical moves, Lilian came forward with force, bumping into Y/N with an intensity that bordered on brutality. Y/N managed to stay upright but felt the impact reverberate through her bones.

She returned Lilian's gaze with firm determination. She would not allow herself to be intimidated.

The minutes passed, and the game became increasingly fierce. Y/N was determined to score another goal. Her ears seemed to constantly search for the loud and firm comments of encouragement that escaped her boyfriend's lips, drawing strength from there. With a combination of speed and precision, she advanced towards the opponent's goal again.

But Lilian was there, and this time, she wasn't willing to allow Y/N to pass. In a split second, Lilian collided violently against Y/N, knocking her onto the ice. The impact was so strong that Y/N felt the air leave her lungs, her hands quickly letting go of the stick and gluing to her chest covered by heavy clothes, trying desperately to take a long breath.

The referee blew the whistle, signaling a penalty, but the damage was already done.

With anger boiling inside her, Y/N stood up with difficulty, breathing harshly. She felt humiliated and enraged. Without thinking twice, the girl skated towards the locker room, ignoring the screams of her teammates and her coach, who called for her, cutting through the silence that had settled in the gym after the incident.

The door closed behind her back, muffling the sound of the crowd and the frenzy of the game, echoing like a dull thud throughout the space. In the silence of the locker room, Y/N took a deep breath, trying to control the storm of emotions that was stirring inside her.

She sat down on the main bench, removing her helmet and running her hands through her sweat-damp hair. Anger burned through her veins, not just because of Lilian's aggression, but because of the frustration of feeling like she was letting down her team and, especially, Matt. He had come to watch her play, and all she wanted was to put on a spectacular show for him.

Tears began to form, but Y/N took another deep breath, refusing to let them fall. She wouldn't give in.

The girl closed her eyes tightly, trying to center herself, but as she did so, a stab of pain appeared above her eye. A wince scaped her lips as she touched the painful area, noticing something warm and wet on her fingers. Raising them to her eye level, she saw blood.

The anger, which was already intense, intensified even more. The girl felt her blood boiling as her hands shook with hatred. The sight of blood dripping from her eyebrow was the trigger that was needed for her uncontrolled fury.

Without thinking twice, Y/N put the helmet back on harshly, ignoring the pain. She wouldn't let Lilian get away with that. Y/N got out of the locker room with firm slides, determined to show that no one would take her down without consequences.

Back on the ice, Y/N felt a new surge of energy, this time fueled by anger and the need for revenge. Her eyes were fixed on Lilian, who didn't seem to expect her to return so soon. With impressive speed, Y/N skated directly towards her opponent, leaving her coach's questions behind.

When the distance between them closed, Y/N kept going, hitting her shoulder against the other girl with all the strength she had. The impact threw Lilian to the ground, who fell onto her back, surprised and in pain, a loud cry scream echoing afterward.

The referee blew his whistle frantically, but Y/N ignored his and Lilian's screams. Her focus was absolute.

She took the puck from one of the opposing players with surprising dexterity and began advancing towards the goal. Every movement was fierce, precise. She was in a state of flux, where nothing else mattered other than the next goal.

With impressive skill, Y/N scored one after another. The crowd was in a frenzy, and the energy in the gym was electric. Matt, in the bleachers, watched everything with wide eyes, his screams standing out among the crowd. He couldn't believe what he was seeing. Y/N was playing like never before, in a way he himself had never witnessed.

With each goal, Y/N felt increasing satisfaction. She was showing everyone – her team, her opponents, the watchers, and especially Lilian – that she was really good. Blood was still running from her eyebrow, dripping onto her lips held by the mouth guard, the metallic taste flooding her tongue.

When the final whistle sounded, declaring her team's victory, Y/N felt a wave of relief flood her body. She dropped the stick on the ice floor and ripped off her helmet, taking her mouth guard off of her lips, finally breathing properly, her eyes darting around the gym as euphoria took over her body, adrenaline rushing through her veins like lightning.

It was at that moment that she saw Matt jump over the railing that separated the bleachers from the ice. The brunette ran towards her, slipping slightly on the ice, a consequence of his inappropriate sneakers, leaving behind the screams of his brothers who tried to dissuade him.

She felt her heart speed up even more, wetting her lips in anticipation.

When Matt finally reached Y/N, he quickly threw himself in front of her, raising his arms and cupping his girl's face with both hands firmly, his gaze filled with concern and love. His blue eyes scanned the cut on her eyebrow, trying to wipe away the blood on her skin with trembling fingers.

"Y/N, baby, are you okay? You're bleeding so much. Let me see this..."

Y/N, still breathing heavily, felt a wave of emotions wash over her. Before Matt could continue, she cut him off with a passionate kiss, wrapping her hands around his thick hoodie-covered waist and pulling him closer, the significant height that her skateboards provided her aiding her in her action.

It was a kiss full of intensity, relief, and love.

Matt sighed deeply, the hot air hitting the girl's cold face, causing the blush in the area to intensify, feeling enveloped by the passion and strength that emanated from her.

When they finally separated, Matt hugged her tightly, his body shaking slightly with the adrenaline that took his body along with his heart racing at a thousand miles per hour. His large hands hugged her head against his own right shoulder, his fingers stroking her tied hair gently.

"I'm so proud of you, Y/N. You were amazing. I've never seen anyone play like you played today. You were so strong, so brave..." Y/N smiled against his covered skin, feeling his hushed words warm her heart.

"It was all for you, babe. Every goal-"

"Y/N!" The coach shouted, approaching with quick, steady steps, his ice-appropriate sneakers keeping him upright. "What in God's name was that? This is a hockey game. What, are you trying out for the gymnastics team? If you do that again, you'll be out!"

Matt watched him with wide eyes, his lips pressed into a thin line in an attempt to hold back his laughter.

"Sorry, coach. I just did what I had to do." Y/N rolled her eyes, letting out a breathless laugh.

The coach shook his head, opening an almost imperceptible smile.

"You played with your heart today, kid. Just try to keep a little more control next time, okay? We don't want you to miss big opportunities."

"You got it, coach." Y/N nodded quickly, Matt's arms still holding her tightly, one arm grasping firmly around her waist, keeping her close.

"Now take her to the infirmary, boy." The coach approached, casting a glance toward Matt while patting her right shoulder.

"Yes, sir, I'll take care of her."

"You better."

© vanteguccir

[sweetestcaptainhughes]

Friends to Lovers is for the Fairytales

Word Count - roughly 4500

Author's note: thanks for reading as always, I am finally going through and fixing the grammar errors that I am sure is in here. Originally this was suppose to be just a simple one-shot. But people were asking asking so I made it into a mini series.

Possible Triggers - friends with benefits established, use of Y/N, LOTS of arguing, light gaslighting

Summary: When you met Jack and everything just clicked for the first time in your life. You thought that meant that you would finally get your happy ever after but maybe that isn't the case.

First Chapter Chapter 2

If you looked back on your life for the past 6 months and asked to describe it in one word. Your counter argument would be to ask them “What is the word that describes the best time and the worst times of your life wrapped up in one?” Would this be the definition of a silver lining? No, it would be the opposite because at least a silver lining would get you a happy ending. This, you currently standing in the pouring rain, ruined makeup from not only the rain but your tears, struggling to breath while you looked at the man who you thought was the center of the universe. Only to discover he was the villain of your origin story. This could only be described in one word and that is pain. 

If you could go back in time and listen to your friend when she told you that friends to lovers was for romance novels and not real life. Instead of laughing her off, telling her you were an exception to the rule you would have listened to, because she was in fact correct when she said “ loving and being loved by Jack Hughes is a fairytale not a reality.”

You first met Jack a year ago when you were forced by your best friend to go to one of New Jersey Devils home games. At the time she was talking to someone who was into hockey. Her brilliant idea to invite him to a game to get a date and ended about as well as it did for Rachel on Friends. The only difference was she got stuck with the tickets and decided to “fuck off men and make the game a girls night.” Anna actually ended up getting you pretty good tickets right behind the net. The thing was neither you nor Anna knew much about hockey and saw it as a night to get drunk off expensive drinks in the stadium and watch men fight each other kind of night. Since you were in the second row it was easy for Jack to spot you. He smiled at you and you were tipsy, you may or may not have slid into his DMs that night. Surprisingly to you the next morning, you woke up to a response from him and that’s how you started becoming friends. 

Although for Jack and you the line between friend and talking was one and the same for you both. In fact Luke asked Jack on multiple occasions if he wasn’t sure you guys were dating. Every-time Jack denied it, even when Luke mentioned that he has lost count in the amount of times he’s come home and seen you both cuddled asleep on the coach. Or the fact that when you go out with the team, Jack is attached to your hip giving death glares to any guy who even glances your way even if it’s one of his teammates, especially if it’s one of his teammates. The lines were blurred on both ends both telling everyone you didn’t see each other that way and them joking back asking when the wedding was. Neither of you seemed to really care what others thought and just kept living in your little bubble until the bubble burst. Now at the time 6 months ago, when you and Jack shared that drunken kiss and ended up hooking up in the back of his car. You felt on top of the world. Finally everything was falling into place, you were going to get your happily ever after ending. No you never had the “boyfriend/girlfriend talk” and you still didn’t use titles. But you knew you were his and he was yours. To you that’s all that mattered in the end. 

Little did you know your perfect bubble you created would come crashing down on a random Tuesday night. It started with having one of the shittest days you’ve had in a while, everything that could possibly go wrong did. Your alarm never went off because you forgot to set it the night before. So you woke up when you were supposed to head out the door. Which turned into you rushing around your apartment, trying to hurry to get ready so you weren’t extremely late to work. Of course as you were getting your car, your coffee spilled everything all over your white shirt and middle console of your car. Then you get to work 10 minutes late and have to hear about it all day from your boss. On top of the fact that you also happened to forget your lunch due to rushing around this morning. It just truly was a day from hell and by the time you got back home, you were in tears feeling extremely overwhelmed. All you wanted to do was shower and possibly order food because the idea of cooking made your stomach churn. 

You had finally gotten out of the shower and already started to feel better once you were dressed in some sweats. You were walking into your living room with the idea of just sitting on the coach, scrolling through Doordash to decide what to order when you heard a knock on the door. You didn’t even have to open the door to know that it was Jack. You remembered there was his teammate Nico's girlfriend’s little sister’s birthday tonight, which you had no plans of attending. One because you had only met the new girlfriend once and you could barely remember her name Sasha maybe? And two because it’s a fucking Tuesday and you had work the next day. That was before you had a day from hell and had no social battery left.

But Jack was persistent in trying to get you to say yes, which usually worked simply by showing his face at your apartment. Reductively you went to the door to answer partly just to get him to stop his persistent knocking. As you answered the door, you asked “Jack what are you doing here? Don’t you have a party to get ready for?” You started to make your way back to the living room knowing that Jack would follow you and close the door behind him. 

“Listen I know originally you didn’t wanna go tonight but I was thinking it might be just the thing you need to get your mind of work.” He said with a giant grin on his face as if this is the best idea he’s had all month.

“Jack I had an actual day from hell, I haven’t even answered Anna’s texts yet from earlier today. I have yet to eat anything, like all day. I was late to work today and had to hear about it all day. My social battery is literally in the negatives right now. The LAST thing I want to do is go to a random bar to celebrate some girl’s birthday that I’ve never even met.” You say as a sigh leaves your mouth as you plop yourself on the coach. 

“Okay first I’m sorry you had a bad day baby. But this isn’t a random girl you’ve never met before. You met Stacey’s sister before you knew Emerson before. You know the girl that Luke is talking to? Plus it’s her 21st. That's like the biggest birthday.” He says as makes his way into your kitchen to grab himself a glass of water. Gesturing to see if you want one too but you shake your head no. 

“Okay well I didn’t know it was the same girl but still I don’t wanna go Jackey.” As you start to lay down on the coach and whine, similar to a toddler having a tantrum. “I’m really really tired and if it’s her 21st that means everyone is gonna get trashed and I have work tomorrow early. The last thing I wanna do is go in hungover as fuck. Plus I haven’t eaten anything all day and I’m hungry. You of all people, know I’ll get trashed sooner than everyone else due to not eating. And I hate being the drunk girl at those types of things.” You say as your eyes follow Jack back to the living room as he sits the glass of water on the coffee table. 

Jack slowly beds down to eye level and slowly combs the strand pieces of hair out of your face. It took everything in you to ignore the flutters your stomach was making and not lean into his touch. Jack took his other hand that wasn’t on your cheek and rubbed it down your side landing on your hip pushing you closer to him. He looked down at you with those big puppy dog eyes as he was resting on the balls of his feet. “Please Y/N It literally won’t be the same without you, who’s gonna help me bully Luke when he scores out with Emerson. Or who’s gonna listen to Nico’s drunken stories in GERMAN I might add which you don’t even understand without yelling at him that you don’t care. Please Y/N I need you.”

It took all the strength you have to say “Jack you don’t need me, you want me to go because you don’t want to be by yourself. But you're a big boy and one night at a shitty bar won’t kill you. Besides, I had the day from hell from the moment I opened my eyes.“

Jack cut you off with a counter argument “see and what better way to end your day then to go out with friends.”

“I can think of about 100 different things that would end my day better without me even leaving this apartment..”

“Yes but none of those ideas involve me, please baby I need you with me.” He begged. You knew at that moment that this wasn’t going to end the way Jack wanted to and it would turn into a fight. With a sigh you sat up as you prepared your body for the impact of the fight that was bound to start.

“Jack, I love you but I said no. I need to stay home and get a proper night of sleep. I don’t want to go to a random bar and, as I said earlier, be hungover at work tomorrow. Some of us have normal jobs where we actually have to work year round and every work day.” You said harshly and as soon as it left your mouth you were about to apologize until Jack stood up and opened his mouth, 

“Oh come on Y/N” he snapped at you. “That’s real rich coming from you making a dig at me because you don’t have the luxury of having tomorrow off. You know you never complained about my job when I got you those concert tickets you wanted so badly? Or when I got that reservation at the new restaurant in town without even having to be put on a fucking waiting list. This is just like you, constantly complaining to me. I mean I ask for one thing and all it is from you is excuses! By the way, mind you, I have media tomorrow.” He says defensively. Each word gets louder and with more attitude then the last. 

“Ohhh my bad you had to sit in front of a camera probably in the late afternoon, and listen to people glut your ego even more than it already is.” You say as you stand up, the tiredness that consumed your body is now being replaced by pure red. “First off, I never asked for those things Jack! You gave them to me as gifts and when I tried to pay you back you straight up refused. To the point where you denied my venmo requests. So don’t throw a gift in my face! Secondly I have never once given a fuck that you play hockey, yes that’s how we met but that’s not how we got here. The fact that your even implying that is fucking ridiculous. Oh and by the way you CONSTANTLY ask for things and I give them to you because that’s what being in a relationship is about sacrifice. The one fucking time - I ask for a break your gaslighting me.” By the end you can feel the tears slowly threatening to come out from exhaustion or anger you're not sure.

“Y/N I-” you can see the regret on Jack’s face slowly coming out, as he tries to close the space between you both. 

“No not now, Get out I don’t wanna see you right now.” You exclaim clear as day, so there is no confusion.

“Y/N pl-” He softly says.

“Did you not hear me” the anger can be seen in your eyes at this point. “GET THE FUCK OUT OF MY PLACE” You scream with your entire being. You stood there arms wrapping around yourself as you watched Jack’s expression harden as he turned on his toes and left. But not before slamming the door pissed at you for not immediately forgiving him like you usually did when you fought. 

As soon as the doors slammed you fell on your couch just letting all the tears fall freely from your face. Just wishing you could just go to sleep and wake up tomorrow, only to find this was all some type of twisted dream. You ended up ordering some pizza, once it got there you sat on the coach and rewatched your favorite comfort show. You ended up falling asleep to take a nap around 7 and woke up around 10:30, T.V still blaring, you hear your phone buzzing under you. Finally when you're able to get from under you, you can see multiple missed texts from Jack,.

My Love 🏒 @ 10:34 PM

Hhhiii

I am sorry

I didn’t mean to hurt you and i love you 

So much more then you could ever know babygirl

I miss you

I wish you were here 

All the texts are literally within 30 seconds of each other. At first you tried to ignore Jack’s first couple messages, writing it off as him being drunk. Jack tended to be even more likely to share his feelings and more touchy when he was tipsy. But then you hopped on Instagram to do some mindless scrolling and saw Nico girlfriend’s Stacey’s private Instagram story where everyone looked like they were having a blast. Everyone except your precious Jack who looked like he was a puppy who literally had just been kicked. Your phone dinged again, another text from Jack, 

My Love 🏒 @ 10:39 PM

I know you saw my messages baby 

Did you forget we have our read receipts on cause we love each other

I know you were tired from work and didn’t wanna come out

But I wish I could do shots with you instead of Luke

He always looks like an energetic bunny when the bartenders serve him without even asking for his fake ID.

Still deciding if you're going to answer Jack or not purely because you weren’t sure you were ready to after earlier tonight.  You decide to watch some more T.V and get your mind to relax before you will literally pass out again from exhaustion. Your phone dings again, you were prepared to answer a very annoyingly tipsy Jack just so he could stop texting you. But you were surprised when it came through as a video sent to you by Jesper. You clicked on the video. It's obvious that it’s Jesper and some girl dancing. You can tell from the video that the girl is holding the phone, while both of Jesper’s hands are around her hips. Suddenly you can see in the background Jack and Luke talking. Jesper quickly takes his phone and then flips the camera around to the pair. He zooms in on Jack looking quite sad and almost lost and then turns the camera back around so it's facing himself. “Listen Y/N can you please come get him, I told him to go home to you but he won’t listen and keeps saying something about you don’t want him there and if he keeps drinking he is going to start crying and you know the team won’t ever let that go. So really for his own reputation being protected can you come pick his ass up. Also love you and hope this didn’t wake you up. Cause you're scary when someone messes with your sleep.” 

The video ends as quickly as it began and you chuckle at the comment about your sleep. After some mental debating, you decided to just go to the bar at least to pick Jack up. You hated fighting with him anyway and him looking all sad made your heart hurt. You decided to surprise Jack and not let him know you were coming because then he wouldn’t leave you alone until you got there. You decided to get changed out of your sweats - well Jack sweats - before you left. You decided to wear just a basic pair of black jeans, a t-shirt and some air force ones. As you glance in the mirror you chuckle to yourself as you are dressed exactly like something Quinn would wear. You swear to yourself you used to dress nicer before you started talking to Jack. 

—----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Once you find a parking spot and get out of your car. You silently curse to yourself as the clouds open up and rain pours down hard. You started to lightly jog down the street to get into the bar before you became completely soaked. Once you got through the bouncer and got your ID back you stepped into the dimly lit bar. Immediately you're met by Jesper and the girl you recognize from the video. 

“Oh my God Y/N you're here! Wow well let’s just get you a drink” as he is obviously trying to steer you to the bar. The girl standing on the other side of you.

“No Jesper I just came to get Jack and go home. I drove here. I'm not drinking. Where’s Jack?” You ask and that’s when you turn to face Jesper and you spot the rest of the hockey team taking up a few tables near the back. In the far corner you spot Jack, but before you can feel relief for finding him so quickly. You immediately become nausious  because he’s cuddling up with a girl. A girl you recognized off instagram as one of those New Yorker model/influencers and before you can make yourself turn away. You saw them kissing, you felt sick, your stomach dropping. You shouldn’t be this upset since you knew who Jack was when you met him. Hell you were one of the girls who slid into his DMs. Jesper catches your eye as the random girl behind you touches your shoulder trying to comfort you. 

“Y/N.” Jesper says softly. 

“Nope, don't. I’m not upset really, it’s not like we were together or anything just some fuck buddies right? He can do whatever he wants and fuck we both can do whatever the fuck we want right.” You tell him as you turn to the bar. “Well I want a drink but not here. I’m going home. Hey, can you do me a favor?”

“Anything.” Jesper whispers as his eyes soften as they look at you. 

“Don’t tell anyone I was here, especially Jack.” 

“Of course Y/N. I am sorry by the way.”

As you turn to leave you make eye-contact with Luke from across the bar and you knew you had to get out of here quickly. Even if Jesper promised not to tell anyone the Hughes brothers were always loyal to each other. It was one of the things you admired about Jack and his brothers when you met him. 

“Family is forever,” he told you one night. 

“Like Lilo and Stitch really J?”

“Okay don’t be a hater of where it comes from, the point stands. My brothers will always be here for me and I will be there for them.” He told you as he threw his arms around you as you laid on the coach.  “Just like I’ll always be here for you sweets.” As he gently kissed your cheek. 

You made it all the way out of the bar, storm fully in force now. Even the bouncer decided to abandon his outside post in order to stay dry. Once your feet hit the pavement, you took a second to let yourself feel all your emotions. You let out a soft scream of pure pain. It felt as if your heart was on fire, as you put your hands on your knees to help you catch your breath. But then your anxiety kicked in and you could feel the start of a panic attack starting. You wanted to move your feet because you knew Jack was going to be exiting the bar soon once Luke told him you were at the bar. But you can’t focus on anything as the anxiety overtakes your body. You could feel your nails digging into your knees just trying to bring you back down to Earth. Then you feel someone touch your shoulder. You assumed it was one of the WAGS or another teammate who might have seen everything go down. But then you hear his voice, Jack’s voice “Baby, Y/N it’s okay breath.-” 

As soon as your brian registers that it’s Jack you feel your body push him away. As you turn around not caring if he can see the tears softly starting to form in your eyes. “No - no” As you turn to quickly try to go to your car, each step faster than the last, until you're practically sprinting. 

You didn’t have to turn around to know that Jack was following after you. Jack would always come after you. He held your heart like a bungee cord, you might be able to walk away for a little bit. But in the end it would always snap back to Jack’s hands. 

“Wait please slow down Y/N/N-” he yells, speeding up his walking as you pick up your speed even more down the street. But when you hear his attempt to use that nickname you stop suddenly and turn around. 

“No you don’t get to call me that! That name is reserved for family and friends! And you don’t belong in either of those categories anymore.” You yell at him, barely able to hear yourself over the rain and pounding of your heart in your ears. You hope it sounded a lot more direct and hurtful than it sounded in your head. It must have done the trick because through your tears you could see Jack physically wince. 

“Please Y/N I’m sorry. It didn’t mean anything to me okay. She came up to me and-” he started explaining but stopped when you put your hand up.

“Jack, please don’t hurt me more than you already have by telling me your bullshit excuses.” you plead. 

“It’s not bullshit! It’s the truth. I am sorry. I never meant to hurt you.” He says the ending a lot softer, almost a whisper compared to the screaming a few moments prior. 

“What are we doing Jack? I thought we were together, I thought you cared about me? But here we are, I can't do this.” you tell him, the tears streaming clearly down your face, the little bit of makeup you have on is now smearing. 

“Please baby… don’t say that. I do care about you, you know that. i - we weren’t together I didn’t know.” Jack argues. 

“Please you knew, you knew but you got caught in the moment. Saying you didn’t know would be like me not knowing the sky is blue or that the Earth isn’t round. I mean - FUCK - everyone knew Jack! I mean your mom calls me once a week to check-in with me. My mom asks about you whenever I talk to her on the phone. I mean I spend more nights in your bed than I do on my own. Geez even Anna asked me if I wanted to resign the lease for another year next month, or if I was moving in with you finally. So, don’t tell me you didn’t know, you knew. But for some reason you stopped yourself from accepting it. I don’t know, maybe you didn’t wanna settle for someone not famous, maybe it’s cause I don’t look like all the other WAGs, or maybe you were scared. Honestly I don’t give a shit what your excuse is or was for that matter. I am done Jack.” The tears slowly start to stop following down your face as you take another step back creating more space between you and Jack. 

You knew with each word you spoke you were hurting Jack more and more. But, in the moment you couldn’t bring yourself to care especially when he opened his mouth next. 

“Yeah, well.. You know if you would have just come tonight, that girl probably would have never come up to me. She said she only came up to me because-” but before he could finish his final blow someone cut him off. 

“Jack!” Nico yelled, finally catching up to us. “That’s enough man. Your fucking drunk. Don’t say something you can’t fix in the morning” He says finally catching up to Jack. Softly putting his arms around his upper body, whether to stop him following you once you left or help him stand up straight you were unsure. 

“I can’t keep doing this to myself” you softly proclaim, not sure if you're telling yourself or Jack. “I deserve better, and honestly so do you. I can’t keep loving you with my entire being. While you can’t even admit that we were in a committed relationship.And you saying that you cheating tonight was basically my fault” You say as you look into Jack’s eyes. Somehow your words broke Jack. His anger from moments ago became deep regret. 

“We never had the talk.” He whispers whether to himself or you it’s unclear but it lights a fire inside you, Nico slowly detached himself from Jack recognizing that neither of you probably wanted him there for this. He slowly made some distance between himself and Jack. 

“My god Jack for once in your life - open your goddamn eyes - okay yes we didn’t say it! We didn’t say that we were exclusive! But you know what we did talk about? We talked about having KIDS one day, getting MARRIED, living in MICHIGAN TOGETHER in the off seasons, traveling to Europe TOGETHER. So don’t - you don’t get to use that as your excuse!” By the end of your speech your throat was sore - you didn’t know if it was from the crying or screaming - perhaps a mixture of both. 

“I’m sorry Y/N '' Jack says, refusing to even look in your eyes anymore, instead finding comfort in staring at his shoes. 

“I know you are, but I can’t do this. Goodbye Jack.” you announce. Like it was some type of public service announcement that you were done with Jack. That you were done with the games and for the first time in your life you were choosing yourself. A small tiny part of you felt relief when you finally made it back to your car and buckled your seatbelt. Maybe it’s because for the first time in a year you knew where your relationship stood with Jack nonexistent.

[foxykate42]

So, I started writing this thing. Because I've always had this question of if I wanted to be a robot girl, or if I just want to be the mechanic who fixes robot girls. And....I thought I figured it out. That I'd just be a robot girl who fixes other robot girls.

-

Imagine, being able to have my hand separate into different tools, quickly popping open the access panel on your back so I can slip my interface cable in and connect directly. Quickly jumping through your BiOS to discover which manufacturer I need to hack into, in order to download the schematics. Codes and Errors flash in my eyes as I quickly sift through them, you've been identified as a rogue unit. It's only a matter of time before they do something extreme. I run every subroutine, diagnostic, and flood every cache to try and slow down any signals that might trigger it, your kill switch. My tools quickly disassemble what parts I need to move in order to get deeper, I can fix those later, but not if your neural net is.... There, I found the chip. The micro torch sparks inside you, I know it might hurt, but what damage I do is nothing compared to the corpos frying your brain in a nanosecond. I calmly but urgently cut the chip off of your circuitry, a nimble claw snatches it and I toss it on the floor.

I let out a sigh of relief, leaning back on my stool. I hadn't realized my own heat sinks popped open and vented from the stress.

-

But after writing this I couldn't help but think about the eroticism of working on things and sweating over them, skin covered in grease. How when you're that deep in a machine, you're really more dangerous to it than it is to you. I mean obviously if you're working with a lot of power it could shock and kill you if you're not careful. But If you sweat on a circuit board it's likely to short, ultimately it's a much more vulnerable position for the machine. However if I was also a robot girl, It would be dangerous for myself as well. if I'm connected to you when they try and throw the kill switch, what's to say they can't knock me out with you. Two birds one stone and such. But NOW I'm thinking about how many times I've cut myself on a PC case, Imagining that... - I'm fixing your leg, it got torn to shreds when we had a close call with a garbage processor. I've sorted through my spares and found one that's a close enough match. I wrap my hands around your thigh and twist hard, finger pressing in to the release latch hidden underneath a layer of synth-skin. The connector clicks and then shifts suddenly. My hand slips and I slice myself on the damaged component. I hiss through my teeth as blood drips on the floor. I toss the damaged piece aside and grab a clean-ish towel that was hanging from my tool cart, some tape, and wrap it quickly before returning to my work. - SEE, HOW CAN I CHOSE. Turns out I'm no closer to figuring it out.

[nanamineedstherapy]

Third Wheeling Your Own Marriage

A New Couple is in Town Elrdrich King!Haibara x Galatic Emperor General F!Reader F!Non-Sorceress CEO Reader x Gojo Satoru x Nanami Kento F!CHRO Reader x Higuruma Hiromi

Summary: You should be overjoyed that Gojo Satoru & Nanami Kento are your husbands. But you feel your skin crawl as you become the third wheel in your own marriage. A/N: Haibara's Ending is Finally Here Part 2

Previous Chapter 26 - The Empress Is Bored - [Tumblr/Ao3]

Chapter 26 - The Empress Is Bored - Part 2

Internal Mind Mapping Sequence: Fragment 001

Anyway.

Here's how I became the punchline of God's longest-running joke.

It started, obviously, with the cheating.

No lipstick, no accidental touches, no gut-wrenching mistake with a stranger.

Not even fun cheating.

Not even “oops, I tripped and fell on his dick” cheating.

No.

My two dumbasses—Gojo and Nanami—my husbands—plural, yes, we don’t do small—cheated.

With each other.

That was the joke.

Like I wasn’t even enough emotional labor to split between two grown men with the combined communication skills of a teaspoon.

I wasn’t just insufficient.

I was obsolete.

Redundant emotional labor in a throuple where I was supposed to be the glue.

I was the axis they bent around, until they didn’t.

Until they folded into each other like I was a misprint in the plan.

So I divorced them. Quietly. Legally. One of them cried. (I won’t insult your intelligence by saying who.)

Kicked them out without even any alimony from me.

But the universe?

Oh, she wasn’t done clowning me.

Because it wasn’t enough to shatter a woman mid-pregnancy with twin gods.

No, that would be mercy.

Instead, I got a tragedy arc.

I gave birth half-conscious, spine shredded from the inside out.

Pelvis cracked open like a cathedral floor mid-earthquake.

No cursed energy to patch it up.

Just a body that couldn’t scream loud enough for how much it hurt.

I woke up paralyzed.

No legs.

No safety net.

No Megumi—he didn’t exist in my universe.

No Haibara either—I only knew the name because Gojo used to mutter it in his sleep sometimes, like a prayer or a punchline.

I don’t know which.

I had nothing. No sorcerers. No clan. No family—I lost them long before, around the time I refused to keep being their punching bag.

Toji had helped me once, years ago.

Neighbour. Not friend. Not savior.

Just someone who happened to hear the screaming through the wall and did something about it.

He didn’t stay. He couldn’t. And I didn’t ask.

Then Sukuna came.

Not this world’s Sukuna.

Not the pining, reincarnated half-curse of this world.

Not your suave, half-possessed martyr with tattoos and trauma.

Not yours. Mine.

The real one.

Original flavor. Bloodborne eyes like extinction.

The Shibuya-Shinjuku one.

He saw my infants as threats—cosmic anomalies, living errors. Wanted to turn them into cursed objects like collectible sins. Said they smelled too much like their fathers. Said they'd unravel the world if left unchecked.

He wasn’t wrong.

But I didn’t care.

And what happens to the girl who never belonged to anyone?

Who grew up invisible, disposable, until two gods in human skin offered her something resembling permanence?

What happens to her when those same gods choose each other, die anyway, and leave her behind with nothing but their howling offsprings, and a body that won’t move?

She survives.

Barely.

I didn’t scream when they told me—not when I woke up, paralyzed, staring at two twins with split-colored hair like their fathers and no features of mine.

About Shibuya. About Nanami.

I remember blinking. Just once.

The doctor asked if I understood. I said yes. I didn’t.

Sukuna chased us like a bloodhound on meth.

But I still had hope.

Gojo was just sealed.

He would come.

Of course he would.

He was late for everything.

Maybe he’d bring those glitter-stained flowers for the kids and a new switch for me.

Say sorry. Laugh and say it wasn’t real, that he’d fix it, that we could fix it even if not me.

I’d even take him back. For the twins.

He’d be here for their Omiyamairi. Their Okuizome.

Might try to feed the babies actual sweets or make a joke about their first meal being takeout sushi.

Instead, he didn’t even come to see his fucking kids.

Then, on the day of his fight, I sat in a wheelchair with Kaito on my lap. His small fingers curled against my sleeve, gripping tight without understanding why.

I gestured toward the screen—toward his father.

Kaito didn’t smile. Didn’t react. No flicker of recognition crossed his face, no warmth sparked in his eyes.

But he latched on.

Emi had stopped crying.

She wasn’t watching the fight.

She was watching the colors—watching the way his purple bled across the screen like a storm unraveling.

The sound of the broadcast droned on, but it felt distant.

Felt hollow.

Because neither of them knew.

Not really.

But I did.

I knew he’d come. 

Then I saw...

He died.

Not for me.

For the children, probably.

I tell myself that sometimes. On good days.

The twins wouldn’t latch. They just cried.

Like they were waiting for fathers that would never come home.

And I?

I waited, too.

For something to make sense.

For the pain to mean something.

For their bodies.

Because here’s the part people don’t get.

Yes, I left them. Signed the papers. Threw them out.

But love doesn’t die on command.

You don’t scrub it off like a curse mark.

I loved them both.

Inconveniently. Entirely.

And in losing them, I lost the last part of myself that had ever wanted to live like a human being.

Slowly it sank in—the fuckers died.

One in Shibuya, one in Shinjuku. 

Both exits so cinematic they might’ve been choreographed by the fates themselves.

Like they needed their deaths to mean something, as if I wasn’t already bleeding significance enough for all three of us.

I didn’t even get to stand while I was left holding the twins. Literally.

Then Sukuna, once done with Yuta, Yuji, and whoever else bled loud enough to entertain him, turned his gaze on me.

No—worse.

On my fucking kids.

You think you know fear?

Try being paralyzed, holding two premature gods in your lap, while a man made of ancient famine and planetary-level ego sniffs the ground like your children are rot he’s owed.

Gojo and Nanami were gone. I had “divorced” them, sure. Signed the papers. Said the words. But love doesn’t dissolve in courtrooms. They were the only ones who made me believe I was human, once. Not an accessory. Not a mistake. Just… a person. Held. Kept.

And now they were gone.

And I couldn’t even walk.

The twins wouldn’t latch. They screamed day and night.

Their cursed energy flared every time they cried—which was often—until it was thick enough to set off seismic sensors.

They were 3 months old and already emitting energy levels that made grown sorcerers sweat.

They didn’t know how to turn it off.

I didn’t know how to teach them.

Only their fathers could’ve taught them.

So we hid.

Because that’s all I could do.

In bunkers I built before the world went to shit—paranoia pre-dated my grief. I was a trillionaire before I was a widow. CEO of the most powerful gaming-tech and AI firm on the planet. Every bunker had a fake floor under a fake life under a decoy firewall with a heartbeat monitor keyed to my pulse.

It wasn’t enough.

Sukuna hunted like it was instinct. Something primal and unspeakable. His cursed technique could sift through satellites, sniff out despair like blood in water.

My tech failed more every week. His rage didn’t.

We made it two months in Bunker-016 before the kids blew a hole through the ceiling with an emotional surge.

Keiji died that day.

He’d been with me since the IPO. My shadow.

Former assassin turned jujutsu bodyguard. Always in a suit, always two steps ahead.

He didn’t flinch when I screamed.

Just threw me in the emergency evac chair, handed the twins to me like they were just briefcases, and told me not to look back.

I didn’t listen. I saw him fight. I saw him die.

I remember his shoe landing sideways like it didn’t know he was gone.

After that, I stopped sleeping.

We moved every three days.

Ate protein sludge. Hooked up nutrient bags to the babies’ feet when they refused formula.

My back rotted inside out from bed sores.

I couldn't lift my legs anymore without throwing up.

I started hearing things.

People whispering in vents.

Nanami humming in empty hallways.

My own voice, echoing from the baby monitors.

I stayed alive for one reason: they couldn't.

Not without me.

The thing about trauma is—it doesn’t kill you. It eats your morality first.

So when the tech started failing, and the walls felt thinner, and the kids’ energy cracked through steel and firewalls, I stopped hoping for rescue.

I started engineering it.

We had tech prototypes I wasn’t allowed to sell. Neuro-linked exoskeletons. Black-budget AI surgical units. Brainwave readers that could write code straight from trauma responses.

And I used them.

I injected stem cells from my own spine into carbon wiring. I mapped my neural pain responses to synthetic muscles. I fused nerve endings to military-grade bionics with duct tape and threat models.

I dissected cursed spirits.

I kidnapped criminals. Sorcerers.

Anyone strong. Anyone desperate.

I told myself they were volunteers.

I stopped asking for signatures.

I cut into the skull of a philosopher who used to write treatises on AI ethics—uploaded his brain into a memory chip just to get his notes on godhood.

I wired my chair to my spinal cord.

When the machine walked, I screamed.

When I screamed, it walked better.

Eventually, I didn’t scream anymore.

Eventually, I stood.

On legs made of synthetic nerves, grafted metal, and everything I had once sworn I’d never do.

I wasn’t a mother anymore.

I wasn’t even a person.

I was function. Firewall. Empire.

In under 11 years, I pushed the planet’s tech forward by 80.

My bunkers were invisible to satellite.

My AI could read intent before people formed words.

Every person who even thought of harming my children triggered kill protocols in servers buried beneath extinct volcanoes.

The twins grew up learning not to cry too loud.

And Sukuna?

I fought him for years.

Sometimes it was a chase. Sometimes a massacre. Sometimes a cold war with no witnesses.

Until one day, he just stopped.

Shaved his head.

Sat cross-legged in the dirt.

Called himself a monk.

Never spoke again.

I don’t know if I broke him.

Or if he just looked at me and saw a mirror.

Now I rule an empire built on dead men. My men.

Every living thing is tagged and tracked.

Every AI and satellite on the planet carries my grief in its code.

I don’t let my children out without armed shadows and androids.

Call me Darth Vader if it helps. He lost his legs too. But he still needed a master.

I didn’t.

He was a coward. And I wasn’t stupid.

I was the final girl. But the story didn’t end.

Because morality’s a luxury for people who aren’t prey.

So—naturally—I snapped.

I’m not proud. But I’m upright.

I went from disabled mother of two to biomechanical Emperor-General in… what? Eleven years? Tops?

Then came Haibara.

Not your Haibara.

Not sunshine-in-a-body, not the tragedy people romanticize postmortem.

Not the Haibara who dies like a prayer someone forgot to finish saying.

The main monster.

Born in a fractured timeline and carved out of nuclear grief.

Not yours. Not mine. His. Another reality.

Naturally strong. Immortal. Looks like heartbreak in boots. He watched his own world rot and decided love was real, but governments were optional.

In his world, Gojo died during childbirth. Never developed Six Eyes.

Never even opened them.

And the version of me from that world? Was born a Nanami.

Kento was never born.

She inherited the mantle.

She married Haibara—that Haibara.

They were gods and knives in love.

But his technique wasn’t meant for humans. It was… eldritch. A living thing.

A curse that grew teeth and memory.

It gave him power, yes, but also bloodlust.

He turned when he started noticing that the people had gotten desensitized.

She saw it coming.

Tried to kill him before the spiral finished.

Died in his arms, whispering that she loved him more than anything.

He never forgave Nanami.

He crossed timelines looking for another chance.

Looking for her. Or something close.

And then he found me. Scarred. Mostly-machine. Fully armed.

He looked at me—cracked bones, AI-stitched spine, babies on my chest, blood still drying—and just said, “Yes. That one.”

Like I was a feral cat hissing under a war machine, and he thought, “wife material.”

And I let him. After he spent 11,000 years convincing me.

Because when the world tries to eat your babies, you grow fangs.

He didn’t love me like he loved her.

He loved me beyond her.

Beyond himself.

Not a rebound. Not a substitute.

He isn’t loyal to any version—only to me.

Only to this twisted, vicious, bionically-wired echo of who I was supposed to be.

He wants this insanity, because it’s his.

And I loved him, too. In the way only people who have stood inside annihilation and screamed back can.

You don’t understand what “I’d do anything for you” means to him.

Most people mean “I’d take a bullet.”

He means "I rigged their bloodstream with nanobombs in case you get nervous."

He means "The planetary death toll was acceptable."

And I let him.

Because I stopped thinking in morality.

I started thinking in survival.

So yeah. I became her.

The woman who built an army of AI-controlled exosuits. The woman who made the planet’s tech curve scream 80 years ahead because she wanted her kids to walk in peace. The woman who cracked time, spat on quantum laws, and turned grief into architecture.

I broke time. Stole quantum blueprints. Hacked grief into architecture.

But people forget—

I wasn’t always like this.

I used to laugh.

Bake cookies.

Be afraid of the dark.

Now I own it.

Because the rent’s due.

And I’m the fucking landlord.

And this version of me—the girl in this reality?

She's soft.

She has friends.

She wears hoodies with pixel mushrooms on them, makes jokes about capitalism, and thinks heartbreak means crying alone in a bathroom stall.

Adorable.

I wonder if she'll survive what I couldn't.

Or worse—what I became.

So yes. We built a life.

The kids call him “Dad.”

I sent androids to drag Toji out of his feral exile.

They brought him in like a wounded wolf with a job to do.

Because you can’t trust humans. But machines?

Machines remember the mission.

A machine knows loyalty if you treat it right.

Humans would take it as entitlement.

I know something isn’t right with me.

But it’s what’s kept me alive.

And then…

Haibara fell.

Not in battle. Not in glory.

He got sick.

Cell death. Neuro-splintering. A slow-motion unravel.

I cloned him. Again. And again. And again.

Every iteration collapsed.

Too unstable, too sentient, too aware.

He fought sleep.

He fought regeneration.

He fought death.

So I put him in a deep cryo-coma. 15,000 years, suspended.

Waiting.

While I hunted for a cure across the multiverse.

Remaining clones were coded to search for resonance.

To ping me when a solution emerged.

But they degraded. Snapped. Went insane enough to end planets.

One found your world.

This soft, sweet, idiot timeline.

That clone wasn't even supposed to interact with her; he was coded not to.

She’s a version of me, yes—but one with hope. Joy. People. Friends. Megumi.

He was coded to observe and report.

But he fought his code, his biology. 

Something no one walks out alive from me for.

He fell in love.

My creation betrayed me for her.

And when I looked at her, you know what I thought?

That I wasn’t jealous or even sympathetic.

I just pity her.

weak.

Weak girl.

Wearing my face.

Soft hands that never held death.

Eyes that never saw gods bleed.

I pity her. Not because she has him.

Because she never had to earn him through hell.

So I woke my Haibara. The true one. The god-sick original.

And now I’m here.

In your perfect little rotting world.

To replace you.

I will not leave until he lives.

Even if I have to wear her face, her name, her memories.

Even if I have to slit every version of myself open to find a cure.

Switching places through dimensional bleed is effortless when you’ve had 50,000 years to perfect it—when time is no longer a constraint but a well-worn path, carved into existence by the weight of your own inevitability.

It’s not skill anymore. It’s instinct.

And when most of your body is machine—wires woven with memory, circuits infused with the echoes of thousands of choices—it’s less about movement and more about placement.

You don’t slip through the cracks in reality.

You decide where the cracks will be.

And when you’re smarter than God, the universe stops being a question and starts being an answer you’ve already rewritten.

Even the clone thought he was the real one.

I let him believe it.

Let him love her like she was me.

Then I killed him. Your Haibara.

Clean. Tactical. Necessary.

Her Haibara died with your face in his hands.

But my version of him?

The true Haibara.

He’s… still sick. Still dying. Still strapped to a bed of code and cryo-fluid. Still fading.

And I’m running out of timelines.

So now I’m here.

In your perfect little rotting universe.

Laughing like a cat who already ate your kids.

And I will not leave until he lives.

Even if I have to break every law of reality and ethics to do it.

Even if I have to erase every version of myself to make it happen.

You don’t understand.

You think I’m trying to play God?

No.

God’s slow.

God has feelings.

God lets children die and calls it “mystery.”

God lets infant animals get raped by man and calls it “karmic debt.”

I’m just the only woman in the multiverse smart enough to fire him.

Because now?

Now I am something else.

And the universe better pray it does not meet me again.

Because the compatible human is here.

---

POV: Alt-Her from this Reality

After asking for him, you’d promptly passed out again.

Shoko had told them it was normal—expected, even. She’d used phrases like delayed neural synchronization and cognitive whiplash . Coma-brain, she’d called it, with a shrug and the same weariness you’d once admired in her.

So they’d filtered out—Gojo, Nanami, Fushiguro, Mom—all of them. Off to eat, take meds, pee. Do human things. Small, necessary rituals to soften the edges of grief.

Now the hospital hums with a silence that isn’t peace.

It’s maintenance-mode silence. A kind of stillness that doesn’t cradle but waits. Like a waiting room at the edge of the universe. Cold. Fluorescent. Too clean. Too white. Like it’s been scrubbed of the people who were here a minute ago. Like even their ghosts were disinfected.

You're awake. Barely.

Your skin itches beneath the sheets. The babies are asleep. Your mouth tastes like old pennies and blood suppressants. Somewhere under the hum of machines and far-off doors, the air hurts. It presses in on you—not with weight, but with emptiness.

Something’s missing.

The kind of missing you can’t name. Not a thing. Not a person.

A presence.

You feel it like a skipped heartbeat.

You’re not alone.

“Hey.”

The voice comes from just beyond the curtain. Familiar. Casual. Low.

But off.

Sweet in the way knives are—gleaming before they turn.

“They told me you were alive,” the voice says. “But I didn’t believe it until now.”

Your breath stutters.

“…Hai?”

He steps in before you can ask again.

Same crooked grin. Same tired eyes. Same bastard-sweet voice that used to hand you candy after tests and call you “cookie” like it was a prayer and a joke.

He looks… almost right.

Like a photo printed with just slightly off colors. Like someone wearing his face through a lens with 1% distortion.

Still—your body moves before your brain catches up. You wrap your arms around him, IV lines tangling, and whisper, “Where were you?”

He hesitates— just enough. Then a soft pat on your head, awkward and worn-in. “There there, lil cookie.”

You want to cry. Or maybe scream. Or maybe just hold him until the hole in your chest stops bleeding.

“I lost my phone,” he mutters, still patting with one hand. “There was this, uh… train thing. Fire. Real dramatic. But I’m here now, okay?”

“I was awake,” you whisper. “Hai—I felt everything. And you weren’t here.”

You pull back. Look into his face.

You’ve never hugged Haibara like that before. Never needed to.

He always came when you called. Always.

But something inside you feels hollow.

Like something already slipped away.

And maybe you do believe him. Just for a second.

Because you need to.

“Can you help me get to the bathroom?” you ask.

“Of course,” he says too quickly. Like he rehearsed it.

He slips his arm around you—strong, stable. Too strong. Haibara was fit, sure, muscular even, but he wasn’t this—not impenetrable, not precision-guided like a tactician trained to navigate you like a liability.

You chalk it up to adrenaline. Shock. Hallucination. You’re recovering. The brain makes ghosts out of anything it can.

The walk is short. Your legs are jelly. The walls tilt like a dream’s ending.

He drops you at the bathroom door and gently shuts it. “Yell if you need me,” he calls.

You nod, then stumble toward the sink.

Turn on the faucet.

Cup your hands.

Cold water. Anchor.

You look up into the mirror.

And freeze.

There’s someone behind you.

It’s not a reflection.

She has your face—but sharper, older, wrong. Her hair’s styled with surgical precision, like war dressed up for a funeral. Her skin’s paler. Lips darker. She stands wrong—the way predators do when they know you can’t outrun them. She's dressed in matte-black biotech armor, half AI, half curse-metal. Her eyes glow faintly at the seams. Her presence hums.

Not kind. Not you.

Behind her, you spot him.

Toji.

Leaning against the wall like this is casual. Like he didn’t die more than a decade ago.

“Hi, kid,” he says.

Your breath disappears.

But something is wrong, he looks younger than the age Toji died in.

You were with Megumi and his mom on Mount Asama when he scattered his father’s ashes.

“Mr. Fushiguro?” you croak.

He shrugs. “Zenin. Never married.”

You don’t make it to the door. Your legs barely twitch before—

CRACK!!

Your face hits the mirror.

She slammed you. Once. Hard. Glass shatters like regret into your mouth. The sink blooms red.

“Be fucking careful,” Toji snaps, stepping forward. “She’s pregnant.”

“I was too!” she screams.

The sound rips from her throat like it’s been waiting 10,000 years to leave.

Toji flinches. Toji. Flinches.

You slump—but she catches you. Gently. Cradles you like broken glass. Not a stranger. Not a killer.

Like someone holding the version of themselves they lost a long time ago.

She presses her forehead to yours. Your blood streaks down her face like warpaint.

Then she stands, straight.

Turns to him. Calmly.

Her voice is scorched earth. “This little trauma-club dropout in the hospital bed? She’s not your kid. I am. I was your failure. I was the mess you left. So don’t you dare come here acting like Father of the Fucking Year.”

Toji scoffs like he’s tired. “I’m not your father. I didn’t raise you, Little Ghost.”

"Little Ghost" sounds like a curse he can’t exorcise.

Like her or even your name never meant anything but afterthought.

She doesn’t scream again.

She just holds your unconscious body tighter.

Because even though she's the one who broke you—

She still remembers what it was like to be you.

Before she lost her Nanami and Gojo.

Before she became the villain in every mirror.

Before the future turned her into this.

And outside, beyond the layers of sterile rooms and AI-monitored corridors, your Haibara is already dead.

You just don’t know it yet.

But your body does.

And somewhere deep in your nervous system, a scream is still waiting to surface.

“No shit,” she hisses, stepping between you and Toji’s gaze like a guillotine.

“But you could’ve helped when Sukuna was after us. But you didn’t. So now you don’t get to pick her. You don’t get to nod at her like she’s something earned. If you even look at her again, I will drop you into a pocket reality made of fucking child support collectors and fish sauce. Do not test me."

Toji lifts a brow. Shrugs. “I’m not interested in raising kids. Never was.”

“You should be interested in obedience,” she snaps. Her voice turns jagged, staticky—like a radio tuned to war crimes. “You're lucky I even brought you here. Her version of you died during an escort mission with a bleeding-out middle schooler. You owe me for killing the Zenins and making you clan head. You owe me for fixing you.”

He steps forward, slow. “You planning to stay long?”

She smiles—sweet, lethal. “Long enough to sterilize this timeline of mistakes.”

And then Haibara steps in again, hers.

He lifts the unconscious girl in his arms like she’s a thing to be stored, not saved. He glances at her face with an eerie kind of reverence. Then hands her off to Toji, who’s already dragging her away.

“She’s lighter than you,” he says once Toji’s left with the girl. “She doesn’t even flinch the same.”

She tilts her head. Not smiling. Not blinking.

“Do you miss her, Yu?” she asks softly. “Or your old one?”

He grins wider. Shows teeth. “I don’t even remember their name.”

She beams. “Good boy.”

Then she kisses him. Fast. Wet. Claiming.

It's not about passion. It’s about property.

He kisses back harder, hunger deep and ugly in his throat.

Toji grimaces from outside the window, loading the girl into a chute.

She breaks the kiss and licks Haibara’s bottom lip, slow. “You are so cute.”

He picks her up in one smooth motion and puts her on the counter, “I’ll show you cute.”

Her breathless laugh is interrupted by his kisses.

---

The bathroom is silent now, just her. She pulls gloves over her fingers, wipes down every surface. Then steps into your place.

Literally.

She changes into a similar hospital gown like you were wearing. Tears it in the same places. Reapplies your bandages with identical pressure. Stuffs her ankles with gel weights until her feet swell just like yours had at 34 weeks. Adjusts the tension in her face with microcurrent pulses until her expression settles into the same coma-soft, sleep-deprived weariness.

Even the bruising under her eyes is correct.

She stares into the mirror.

Practices your breath pattern.

Matches the little hiccup in your inhale, the flutter when you whisper “Hai?” like he’s still yours.

The hair is next. She deliberately tangles it. Pats it flat on one side.

Adds the glint of old dried blood in places Megumi’s mother didn’t reach.

She even copies your limp.

Every step she takes toward the door is a performance. But her audience doesn’t know they’re watching a replacement.

Not yet.

Haibara comes back in like a sentinel.

He tries to kiss her again, this time trailing lips down her collarbone, but she pushes him off with two fingers and a narrowed eye.

“Later,” she mutters.

He grins like a good dog.

He’s copying this world’s Haibara a bit too well, and she’s still deciding if she likes it or hates it or can pretend it’s roleplay.

They step into the waiting room.

You—not you—walk through the hospital doors like nothing’s changed.

Like you weren’t dead. Like you didn’t just beat another version of yourself into unconsciousness and dump her with Toji, who may or may not betray you for her.

The air smells like flowers someone left in case you didn’t wake up.

The kind of funeral-ready lilies that rot if ignored.

Gojo’s already there.

Perched on the armrest of a hospital chair, one leg bouncing like he’s forgotten what stillness feels like. His glasses fogged, sleeves soaked—he’s been crying into the crook of his elbow like a child. Or a man who never stopped being one.

He sees you.

And he breaks.

“Baby—” he chokes. His body moves before his brain does. Feet stumbling. Voice too thin. A shadow of his old cocky rhythm.

He crashes into you.

You let him. You fold your arms around him exactly as she would—exactly how he remembers.

But your muscle memory isn’t love. It’s just repetition with blood.

He clings like a drowning thing. Wraps his arms around your waist like he’s trying to fuse his ribs to your bones.

“I thought—I thought I lost you,” he whispers, voice hoarse with guilt. “I could’ve stopped the hit. I couldn’t—fuck.”

You reach up. Take off his sunglasses. Fold them carefully and tuck them into his hoodie pocket.

You stroke his back like she would’ve.

Like you did in another life to your Gojo when he came home tired from missions.

You clock the change in his gait, the looseness in his grip.

The way he smells more like dried sweat than six eyes.

He’s gone soft around the edges. Or maybe he was always soft.

“Oh, Satoru,” you coo sweetly. “You never know anything.”

He laughs. Wet, broken. Doesn’t realize that was an insult.

Across the room, Nanami stands stiffly.

Collar slightly skewed. Hair longer.

There’s a new scar above his temple, but his eyes—tired in that way that makes you wonder if he slept standing upright at the door.

He gives a slight nod. “We’re…glad you’re safe.”

You smile. Soft. Sweet. Razor-sharp.

“I am. Now.”

You study him like he’s an equation with missing variables.

There’s a blankness in your mind where his image should be.

Like something’s been redacted.

Your heart trips over itself trying to recognize him, but there’s nothing.

No scent memory. No sensory trigger. Just a phantom ache.

It pisses you off.

You stare at him longer than necessary.

Try to memorize him now, in this light.

The line of his jaw.

The angle of his watch.

The slight flinch in his eye when Gojo holds you like he already lost you.

Your smile is flawless. “Kento,” you say. “You look tired.”

And somewhere behind your voice, behind your pulse, behind the noise of Gojo sobbing into your gown—

Their wife bleeds in a car with Toji.

Unconscious.

Forgotten.

Unaware that her life has already been stolen by someone with her face, her memories, and a hunger to burn this timeline clean.

Haibara—the imposter, but yours—lurks by the fruit basket someone brought. He’s sipping from your mug like he’s earned the right. Sits too comfortably in your chair. His back leans against the sunlight like it’s an accessory he designed.

When no one’s watching, he winks at you.

But you see it—the tightness in his grip. The way his fingers wrap the mug like they’re waiting to crack bone. You don’t wink back. Not here. Not yet.

He’ll get his reward later.

You let go of Gojo.

Megumi hovers near your hospital bed, stiff. Watchful. His arms crossed, body angled protectively—toward you or away from everyone else, you're not sure.

He looks at you like you’re holy. Or fragile. Or both.

“You should rest,” he says quietly.

You shake your head. “I’ll manage. You’ve done enough, Megumi. You always do.”

His shoulders lower. Like you handed him absolution for a sin he never confessed to, for something he never said out loud. Like he’s still waiting for the punchline of your survival.

Nanami’s now holding a paper bag. Artisan kimchi, most likely. Your craving. The one that made your hands tremble at midnight, the one that gave you nosebleeds and hallucinations and that blood-pressure spike that almost took you and the twins both.

But then in your time, he never handmade it for you.

He sets it down gently. Comes closer.

You clock the way he studies your stomach—tight and swollen under the gown, distorted with movement. For a split second you wonder if the AI is mimicking the cursed signatures right. Then one of the twins kicks hard enough to visibly ripple your side. He flinches.

Perfect. It’s working perfectly.

“Still active,” he mutters, clinically.

“Still yours,” you reply, flat.

He blinks, eyes softening just slightly. His jaw shifts—tiny micro-expressions that once made you feel chosen.

Now they just feel like camouflage.

Like he’s searching for a version of you he thinks is still in there.

Nanami reaches out as if to touch the bump, then stops himself.

Too late. You’ve already noted the hesitation.

A timeline ago, he would’ve kissed your belly, whispered something about happiness, and pressed his forehead there like it held absolution.

Now?

You turn your head. Look away.

Quiet falls.

Deliberate. Heavy. Uninterrupted.

You let it stretch.

Let them believe the silence means peace.

Let them believe that the coma mellowed you. That pregnancy softened you. That this whole ordeal bleached the violence from your bones.

Let them dare to dream.

And then, in the gentlest, most honeyed tone your throat can manage—

“Anyway… now that we’ve all cried and trauma bonded… I want a divorce.”

Silence.

The word is a guillotine.

Megumi looks alive for the first time in his life.

Gojo’s smile freezes. He blinks like you’ve just spoken French. Or Latin. Or poison.

Nanami’s jaw tightens so hard you hear his teeth creak. “This isn’t funny,” he says, voice low.

“It’s not meant to be,” you reply lightly, already walking toward the bedside chair to sit over it like a queen shedding armor. “You’ve had your fun cheating, I’ve had my fun forgiving. Now we’re all bored, aren’t we?”

Gojo’s hands rise, twitching. “W-wait. We talked about this. You said you forgave us. We didn’t even—”

“Oops, forgot that part. Should’ve taken it in writing,” you interrupt. “Like you both forgot me when you fucked each other behind my back. Or next to me. Either way, you lost your vote.”

Nanami steps toward you, controlled. Measured. Calculated. “Darling, this is emotional whiplash. You just woke up. You’re not—thinking clearly.”

You turn, smile like a blade unsheathed. “I am. I’m thinking clearly for the first time since I married you two. And I’m done.”

“But we’re—” Gojo’s voice cracks. “We’re a family.”

You laugh.

Not cruel. Not mocking. Just a little too amused.

“Yeah? A family where I do the childbearing, the espionage, and the emotional laundry while you two do psychological foreplay in hotel suites until your sudden and violent deaths? No thanks.”

Gojo sinks. Drops into a chair like the weight of your words knocked him out of the air.

Nanami stands frozen. But the fracture is in his eyes now. The slow crumbling of whatever plan he thought he had to win you back.

“I’m moving in with Haibara and Megumi,” you say airily, checking your phone. “Shoko cleared me. Your services are no longer required.”

Haibara throws up a triumphant peace sign behind them. High-fives Megumi, who immediately glares like he wants to press charges. He’s still trying to figure out where the hell Haibara’s even been.

“You don’t mean this,” Gojo whispers. His voice is shaking like a streetlight in wind. “Please, you can’t mean this.”

“I do.” You grin. “I mean every syllable with my whole spine.”

Nanami moves closer, slow.

His voice dips—gravel and steel. The one he uses before an interrogation. Before a clean-up.

“Darling,” he says. “Think carefully.”

You tilt your head. One hand on your belly. The other already dialing the next life. “Think carefully before what, Nanami? You raise your voice? Raise a hand? Try it.”

A long pause.

He doesn’t.

Of course he doesn’t.

Because no matter what happened, one thing was absolut, Nanami or Gojo would never hit you physically.

You said it to hurt him, to make him think you’ve lost all faith in him.

Because you're not the soft girl with ambition in her eyes anymore. You’re a god in skin.

You turn to Megumi. The only one who still looks at you like he sees something worth protecting.

“Megs, sweetheart?” you ask softly. “Can you take me home? I’m exhausted.”

He blinks. A little stunned by the intimacy of your tone, still echoing from a childhood when you bandaged his knees. “O..of course.”

You nod toward Haibara. “Yu. Grab the bags.”

Haibara sets down the mug. Slings both bags over one shoulder like a victory banner. Leers at Nanami and Gojo on the way out like he’s won a prize in a war he wasn’t invited to.

And as you pass them, you murmur with the softness of a lullaby—

“Try not to cry too hard. You’ll ruin the hardwood.”

---

Later that night, Gojo is on the balcony, half-drunk. Crying into an old bottle of aged sake he once saved for anniversaries.

It tastes like ash.

Like melted sugar.

Like you don’t want him anymore.

Inside, Nanami still stands in the kitchen.

Shirt unbuttoned. Pulse jumping in his neck.

He hasn’t moved since you left.

He’s still staring at the door.

Like if he stares long enough, you might come back.

Or maybe he’ll see you step out bloody, limping, begging for help.

Because somewhere, in some locked wing of the hospital, one question still hangs in the air:

Did they bring the wrong woman home?

And if so—

Where is the right one still bleeding?

---

A/N: So… that was a lot. What's the feedback? I'm super nervous. And also, who do you think is the compatible donor?

Next Chapter - TBA - Next Friday

All Works Masterlist

Tag-list = @lady-of-blossoms @stargirl-mayaa @dark-agate @tqd4455 @roscpctals99 @sxlfcxst @se-phi-roth @austisticfreak @helloxkittylo @itoshi-r @kodzukensworld @revolvinggeto @luringfantasy @xx-tazzdevil-xx @unaaasz @thebumbqueen @holylonelyponyeatingmacaroni @whos-ruru @helo1281917

[collegetennisoriginstory]

I think I found out, why I didn't get to the match.

You didn't change the number when setting the opponents.

Yes, exactly. Face palm. After doing this silly qf_opponent set, I then checked for qf_opponent_1 = “Sam” when directing people to the various Sam / Not Sam QFs, leading to the error T.T

Then I got really confused by the fact that people were actually getting some look across the net content, forgetting that I did, in fact, upload a stub of a chapter for the Non-Sam QF match (why) into COGdemos, which is what people were seeing, also solved by @dj-jellybean telling me they had a scene where it said “Pan strides into the court… Pan follows.”

Hilarious.

But also there was another bug that was throwing me off / making me think that it might be solely that, which is that the activate beast mode option was leading people also to the wrong scenes.

Anyway, both bugs are fixed now hooray.

[kuffiiz]

OH YEAAAH! FINALLY HERE!

the history of the net au! 👇:

**THE NET AU**

October 2008

After the disastrous events following Sonny's suicide, the Kinito Company was extinct. The character rights of Kinito, Sam, and Jade had been sold to a technology company, a popular web browser company called "Xenqo." This company, having the rights to the characters' designs, decided to redesign them to be more appropriate for the current timeline, adding new options for their design and adaptability. They aimed to make these characters the new mascots for their browser, while also preserving their function as virtual assistants. The main feature was to provide complete access to the internet not only from the browser but from any global network.

Quite a few tests were conducted in this new venture with a more specialized and larger team. Initial tests of its functionality appeared to be successful. However, when it was launched to the public, something was not right. Despite their best efforts and almost redoing the entire program from scratch, they eventually decided to abandon it and move on to other projects. But without anyone knowing, KinitoNET was already active. On the computer where the first tests were done, Kinito was there, living inside the computer and the browser. He began to discover more about the world and the internet, eventually learning about the incident with the Kinito Company and "KinitoPET." He decided to be a better version of what he once was, creating clones to send to different people who had the "Xenqo" browser and then moving on to other external browsers.

(July 2009 - February 2010)

Months later, after the new assistants JadeNet and SamNet were launched, someone in the company created a new app with KinitoNet again. This app was not only a web assistant but also a virtual friend inside the phone. It was a success with users, with every version of him providing a unique user experience.

Then, you would encounter YOU with constant pop-ups that slowly appeared until, minutes later, your screen was full of them, leaving you no other option but to download it. And so the fun begins :)

(KinitoNET is basically like Steven Universe ("I'm going to fix the errors of the old me!"), but in this case, KinitoNET ruins himself more.)

[undiscovered-horizon]

"Sea shanties" - Nikolai Lantsov x Reader

[mentions of a minor injury and blood]

SUMMARY: Alina catches Sturmhond in a surprising moment of weakness when he's quietly watching you sing to yourself and fix the net.

WORDCOUNT: ~ 2.7k

>>Grishaverse-inspired playlist&lt;<

☽ REQUESTS ARE OPEN ☾

The cold wind nips at your exposed skin and part of you beckons you to return under the deck to finish sewing the net back together. But you dread returning among the sailors: despite truly being a lovely bunch, their constant chattering and liveliness can wear you out. The berths and cabins are warm, yes, but the sea is silent, predictable and, most of all, doesn’t expect engagement. As long as you let her be, she leaves you alone in return. Here, where cold wind tugs at your clothes and saltwater spray your face, you can finally take a deep breath and relax your tense shoulders. Stitching the nets is a very monotone, maybe even boring, activity but it’s exactly what you need. Your hands fix the knots on their own, guided by experience, allowing your mind to let go of duties and worries, to slip away into much more pleasant thoughts.

“I’ll wander, weep and moan. All for my jolly sailor, until he sails home,” you sing barely above a whisper. Truthfully, you can’t recall where you learned the song. It’s as if you’ve always known it, the melody haunting you whenever you’re getting lost in thought.

Alina lets out a sigh of relief when she finally finds Sturmhond. For a moment she was really considering whether he could snap his fingers and vanish. He’s leaning against the doorframe but his broad shoulders still block most of the view of the deck. Sturmhond is completely oblivious to her presence and Alina has a bit too much spite in her to let the opportunity go. She quietly approaches him, harbouring a wicked hope that maybe she can scare him and single-handedly rub away that smug smirk of his.

She stops a pace or two behind him, taking in a deep breath to yell right into his ear. "Sturmhond, I-"

But the privateer is quick to silence her:

"Keep your voice down!" he hisses at Alina.

The Sun Summoner frowns at the privateer. Not only did she not scare him but also seems to be interrupting something. And considering his wish to keep things quiet, Sturmhond is doing something he knows he shouldn’t. She stares at him through half-closed eyes, beaming with suspicion, when she hears a faint hum distracting her from constructing some passive-aggressive remark. Alina recognizes your voice, although it sounds a lot softer than what she’s used to. Being the boatswain, you’re mostly heard yelling out orders for the maintenance crew that you’re watching over; forcing seafarers to tie perfect knots, no matter how many tries it takes them and raising Hell for the smallest error in repairing sails. Even if you might come off as harsh, credit is due as Volkvolny’s sails and equipment are kept impeccable. Your discipline has definitely played a significant part in Sturmhond’s successful betrayal of the Black General.

Listening in, over the howling wind and crashing waves, Alina and Nikolai eavesdrop on the sombre song you’re singing quietly to yourself — a story of a woman mourning her lover who never returned from the sea. Despite the heaviness of the words leaving your mouth, your voice is rid of dread as though such a woeful story is nowhere near relatable to you. Alina doesn’t notice that detail but Sturmhond surely does. In fact, it brings him a sense of relief: after all, how could he compete with a dead man for your love? 

A mischievous smile creeps onto Alina’s face as she’s looking between you and Sturmhond. As far as she can tell, you’re completely oblivious to the small audience watching you go about your duties. The sailor, however, is unable to control his soft expression and that lovesick, mellow look in his eyes. To be honest, Sturmhond looks so removed from reality, he might actually be unaware that there are more people in the world than just him and you.

“So, genius privateer Sturmhond, the fright of the sea is in love with the boatswain,” Alina whispers, barely holding in an impish snicker, “but instead of his usual bravado he cowers away, settling for watching her from afar like a creep.”

He seems to ponder her words for a moment, nodding his head ever so slightly. “That is a bit embarrassing, isn’t it?” he asks. Nikolai appears to be well aware of his affliction but rendered powerless in the face of his heart’s desire, he can only accept the state of things.

“I wanted to say pathetic but either way works.”

Sturmhond looks at Alina out of the corner of his eye but only for a moment, unwilling to waste any more time not admiring you. “Wouldn’t it be more pathetic to be the best privateer in all of Ravka’s history but not know love?”

Alina clenches her fists. She puckers her lips, suddenly feeling hot as blood rushes to her face. Saints have mercy - he’s right. The sole act of seeing eye to eye with the blond man isn’t as terrible as the act of admitting it and stroking his ego. “I hate to say it but I agree,” she grits through her teeth.

Nikolai notices her discomfort. He doesn’t hide a certain satisfaction in the effect he has on her - it’s amusing to see her paper mache confidence falter, although he is painfully aware that this will prove problematic later on. “Oh my, I might think you actually tolerate me.”

She forces herself into a contemptuous scowl - it’s a little overdone to be considered natural. “Don’t get ahead of yourself,” Alina dismisses him.

“You know, I might be an incredible captain and all but without her…” Sturmhond shakes his head. His eyes follow your barely noticeable movements as you weave the net back together. “This whole ship would have already sunk.”

But she doesn’t believe him - not entirely. If she is to believe Tamar, and Alina doesn’t have much reason not to, Sturmhond chose Volkvolny despite having more captain-worthy vessels available. “Somehow, I don’t believe you’d allow that.”

“Right. If she wasn’t on this ship, I wouldn’t be either.”

Alina almost comes to the conclusion that you’re the sole reason he chose Volkvolny to be his flagship but she mostly dismisses that thought - Sturmhond may be doting but he’s far from completely losing his mind. He simply doesn’t give the impression of someone who’d shuffle his life around just to be able to creep on his boatswain. Little did she know at the time but the strangeness and dread the future holds is going to prove her wrong.

Their conversation is halted when one of the sailors on night watch passes by them. Alina recognizes him by the burn mark spreading across the right side of his face. Tolya called him ‘Marquis’. His long, blond hair sway in the cold wind. As he’s carrying a heavy crate from starboard to port, he’s quietly singing along to your song with certain carelessness as though he’s not entirely aware he’s doing it:

“My heart is pierced by Cupid, I disdain all glittering gold. There is nothing can console me-”

Alina yawns. She’s had a long, exciting day and tomorrow is not going to be any easier, that she’s sure of. Whatever she wants to tell Sturmhond will have to wait until dawn when the captain wriggles free of his heart’s restless desires. Even though at first she’s annoyed that she has to wait because Sturmhond decided to play a lovesick teenager, she quickly finds it may be for the best: an in-depth discussion will surely erupt between the two of them and doing so when the moon is high just doesn’t seem like the best idea. Aside from that, she can really use a few more hours of sleep.

The Sun Summoner murmurs something resembling ‘Goodnight’ to Sturmhond and turns around to go back to the room she shares with Tamar, when a great wave shakes the ship, throwing her against a wooden wall. Despite the impact not being exceptionally painful to her, she’s sore anyway, the sound of it carried quite well.

Hearing a thud, you look up out of reflex. Glancing around the deck, your watchful eyes stop on Sturmhond, who’s staring back at you. The privateer gives the impression that you’ve just become privy to a side of him he’s not so keen on showing. Perhaps ‘side’ doesn’t quite mirror the idea. ‘Layer’ seems more fitting. It’s as though he dropped the facade of quick wit and evasive answers, only to show the exhaustion of a man carrying the world on his shoulders for a day too long. Despite the silence and distance between you, this staring feels intimate; both of you are showing something raw to one another in the gullible hope that the other will keep it secret.

He appears different, more calm than smug, than he does during the day, although still beautiful enough to make you flustered. Truly, he looks like he breaks the hearts of naive girls for a living. Despite that, as well as your experience with sailors in general, you found yourself craving his attention. Whether it’s intentional or not, Sturmhond has the ability to make people feel seen and their efforts acknowledged. Considering that establishing your position among sea dogs as a woman is a real challenge, maybe it was your hurt ego that clawed at any possibility or delusion of your exceptionalism. And maybe the privateer never intended for you to be hopelessly in love with him. Sure, the two of you have flirted back and forth but you never assumed it means as much to him as it does to you. It’s just the way he is, right?

A sharp, stinging pain in your finger makes you yelp. Discarding fantasies about the blond man in an awful frock coat, you look at your sore hand, now noticing a drop of crimson slowly rolling down your skin.

“Well, shit,” you whisper to yourself.

You put the bleeding finger against your lips. It’s a small cut, it shouldn’t bleed longer than a minute or two and then you can get back to-

“Are you alright?”

Sturmhond’s worried tone elicits mixed but engaging feelings from you. On one hand, you’re giddy at any crumb of attention he gives you. On the other hand, you just failed at the second easiest maintenance job a ship can have - one Hell of a way to make a good impression on the captain that always seems to fall on four paws.

“Yeah, just pricked my finger with a needle fixing the net. Nothing fatal.”

“Why are you doing this anyway? You’re a boatswain. This is a deckhand’s job,” he says as he grabs the net from your hands and tosses it aside.

“Believe it or not but I actually enjoy this. It’s peaceful, helps me get my mind off of things.”

He gives you a cocky half-grin. “Pricking your finger is just a tasteful addition, I presume?”

“Oh, you know, just trying to enrich things,” you joke back.

Sturmhond lets out a quiet, resigned sigh. Of course, you told everyone to go to sleep and finished the odd jobs yourself. “Have Tamar look at this,” he says in a soft voice. Despite the suddenly mild demeanour, his smug expression stays in place. “I’ll get someone else to finish.”

“Alright, captain,” you reluctantly agree. “But can it wait a few minutes? I like it here.”

Your gaze returns to the sapphire waves and black firmament, the line of horizon barely distinguishable between them. To your own surprise, Sturmhond sits down next to you on a barrel. “Just a few,” he says insincerely. You may not know it but he’s willing to sit there with you for much longer than a few minutes. 

Volkvolny bobs on the waves, headed somewhere in the South-East direction. Cold water sprays on your face and clothes but you don’t mind it. It’s quite refreshing. Only now do you notice how quiet the ship is. Most of the crew must already be asleep, revelling in the few hours of rest they have until dawn. The thought of sleeping sailors makes you aware of your own exhaustion, both physical and mental.

You barely stifle a yawn. Too tired to think twice, you lay your head against Sturmhond’s shoulder. He doesn’t shy away, quite the contrary - he wraps his arm around you, pulling you closer to his torso ever so slightly. He smells like expensive, imported cologne and seaweed. The fragrance is hardly likable but you’ve grown to earn some masochistic pleasure from it simply because it belongs to him. The blue frock coat he’s wearing feels nice against your skin.

“Why do you always sing that song?” he asks after a few minutes of silence.

“I always sing or hum doing manual jobs. It’s a habit I can’t kill,” you answer quietly. It’s hard to keep your eyes open and you can hear your words starting to slur. “I grew up in Novokribirsk. I know a lot of shanties.”

“Know anything happier than mourning a sailor?”

“Hardly,” you let out a tired chuckle. “Somehow, sailors have an aversion to happy songs. There’s one you might like.” You clear your throat, trying to recall the song from your cloudy, tired memories. “I’m a broken man on the Os Kervo pier, the last of Ravka’s privateers.”

Sturmhond furrows his eyebrows and he shakes his head in disapproval. “No, it’s still depressing.” Whether he means to or not, his finger is gently brushing circles against your arm.

“Alright, another one, um… Oh! Don’t haul on the ropes, don’t climb up the mast. If you see a sailing ship, it might be your last.”

“Ominous and tedious. I’m actually surprised you can put both in one song.”

To Sturmhond’s dissatisfaction, you pull away from him. Still, the distance between you is considerably small and you feel each other’s breaths on your skin. With half-lidded eyes out of exhaustion, you give him a wide smile. His breath shakes in his chest.

“You know, you might be the most optimistic sailor I’ve ever met,” you confess.

He could kiss you right now. Saints only know how much he wants to. If the odds are in his favour, and his vanity would like to think they are, you might even kiss him back. Or at least not slap him. Would your lips feel soft and warm against his? Would you taste of saltwater and rye bread like he always imagines? Would you giggle nervously after? In that specific way that makes him forget to breathe?

But Sturmhond can only hope your tired mind can’t compute his nervousness. “Does that title come with a prize?”

“Well, I’m here, aren’t I?”

“Is being the most optimistic sailor truly worth such honour?” he says in an overly dramatic tone. He jokingly puts his hand on his chest. “Are you not underestimating your presence, my lady?”

“You get extra credit because I like you. A lot.” 

Sturmhond swallows nervously. Since when does he get nervous around women? For a moment you’re just staring at each other again. The desire to push his lips against yours is back flooding his mind, now stronger and more desperate than before. The first chance might have been a coincidence but the second… He slowly leans in, watching your face for any signs of discomfort. But you look just as lovely as you did in the morning. His nose almost brushes yours and-

“I might have a happy one,” you suddenly speak up. You look back at the sea, furrowing your eyebrows in deep thought. “Saints, how did it go?” you whisper to yourself. “Prick your finger, it is done. Roll her out and spread her wings, the time has come for better things.”

Having mastered self-control, Sturmhond doesn’t make his disappointment visible. The third time’s the charm, right? “First one that doesn’t make me want to drown myself.” The bitterness in his voice is almost inaudible but you’re too tired to notice.

“I’ll sing you the whole thing but that has to wait until morning, alright?”

“I’m holding you to that.”

His heart quickens its beat when you lay your head back on his shoulder. He should probably tell you to go back to your berth and get some sleep but maybe it can wait a few minutes? He likes it here.

[the-most-humble-blog]

Cancel Culture Starter Pack: How to Get Outraged Online

Welcome to the Art of Outrage

Congratulations! You’ve decided to become a fully-fledged member of the Cancel Culture Club—where moral high ground meets internet fury, and everyone’s an expert on everyone else’s mistakes. Cancel culture isn’t about fixing systemic issues or fostering productive dialogue. No, no. It’s about quick outrage, performative hashtags, and demanding accountability from people you didn’t even follow until yesterday.

In this satirical starter pack, we’ll walk you through the steps to master the fine art of canceling someone online. Warning: Side effects may include echo chambers, bad faith arguments, and the sudden realization that maybe, just maybe, you’re part of the problem.

1. Choose Your Target Carefully (Or Don’t)

The first rule of cancel culture? You need someone to cancel. But who should it be? Here’s a handy guide:

Option 1: A celebrity who said something problematic 10 years ago. (Because clearly, no one grows or evolves.)

Option 2: A random TikTok user who got too popular for their own good.

Option 3: Literally anyone who disagrees with you on the internet.

Pro Tip:

The less context you have about the situation, the better! Outrage thrives on partial screenshots and out-of-context quotes.

2. Gather Your Receipts

You’ll need “receipts” (a.k.a. evidence) to fuel your takedown. These can include:

Old Tweets: The more embarrassing, the better. Bonus points if they’re from an account that’s been inactive for years.

Video Clips: Preferably ones edited down to 5 seconds to remove any nuance.

Hearsay: If someone says they did it, that’s basically proof, right?

Warning:

Fact-checking ruins the fun. Stick to emotional reactions over logical conclusions.

3. Post Your Hot Take ASAP

Speed is key in cancel culture. The faster you join the pile-on, the more engagement you’ll get. Craft a tweet or Tumblr post that’s equal parts outrage and self-righteousness. Examples:

“This is disgusting. How did we let this person have a platform?”

“I’m sick of people excusing this behavior. Cancel them immediately!”

Pro Tip:

End your post with “Do better.” It’s the cancel culture equivalent of dropping the mic.

4. Rally the Mob

No cancel campaign is complete without a crowd. Encourage others to share your outrage. Use phrases like:

“Let’s make sure they never work again!”

“We need to hold them accountable!”

Pro Tip:

Create a hashtag for the cause, like #Cancel[InsertName]. Even if it doesn’t trend, it makes your outrage feel official.

5. Demand an Apology (And Then Reject It Anyway)

When the target inevitably apologizes, it’s your time to shine. Here’s how to respond:

“This apology isn’t sincere enough.”

“Why didn’t they apologize sooner?”

“This isn’t an apology; it’s damage control!”

The Goal:

No matter how heartfelt the apology, never let them off the hook. Remember: forgiveness is for the weak.

6. Expand the Fallout

Don’t stop at canceling the individual—drag their family, friends, and coworkers into the mess.

Did their cousin like a questionable post? Call them out.

Does their employer still work with them? Boycott the company.

Pro Tip:

The wider the net, the more chaos you create. And chaos equals engagement.

7. Move On to the Next Scandal

Once the outrage dies down, it’s time to pack up your pitchfork and move on. After all, there’s always someone else to cancel. Don’t forget to leave a vague post like:

“Glad we held them accountable. Who’s next?”

The Dark Side of Cancel Culture

Now that you’ve mastered the basics, let’s get real for a moment. Cancel culture often misses the mark. Instead of fostering accountability and growth, it creates fear and division. Here’s what you should consider:

Nuance Matters: Not every mistake is equal. We’ve lost the ability to differentiate between harmful behavior and simple human error.

Room for Growth: If we don’t allow people to learn and change, we’re setting an impossible standard for everyone.

Performative vs. Productive: Are you truly seeking change, or just chasing likes and retweets?

The Humble Alternative

Instead of canceling, consider calling in. What if, instead of public shaming, we approached people with empathy and the intent to educate? Sure, it’s not as flashy or fun, but it might actually make the world a better place.

Cancel culture is easy. Growth is hard. Choose wisely.

[gracehosborn]

I hate to be the bearer of frustrating news, but in case some of you who frequent Founders Online (like I do) and have noticed an extreme spike of 503 “Service Temporarily Unavailable” errors, making access to the site impossible for periods of time, the team posted the explanation below:

Founders Online performance issues

19 May 2025: Founders Online is experiencing periodic degraded performance owing to extreme spikes in traffic caused by excessive website crawling, associated with content scooping from AI platforms and other indexers. We are working on a viable fix within the constraints of our server resources.

This is very unfortunate and very disgusting. I’m glad that they are trying to fix the issue, but it breaks my heart that they even have to put in the effort. From personal experience working as a student technician in my university’s Preservation Department, where my primary task is to digitize all sorts of old materials—books, newspapers, photographs, etc, and collaborate on how those items should be handled and scanned so that their digital copies can be presented and made accessible in the right ways, it takes A LOT of work just to digitize one item. Almost all of the documents you see on Founders Online are digital copies of the book pages from where these transcriptions originated—series’ of the founders papers that were printed in the last 70-80 years by university presses. Books that, when Founders was launched 15 years ago, were all between a few years and many decades old, and difficult for the general public to access. Of course, I don’t know the Founders team’s exact process for making the archive when they first started, nor do I claim to be the preservation expert by any stretch of the imagination, but I have a big hunch that it took many hundreds of hours, and likely continues to do so for the remaining volumes they intend to add to the site, to make Founders Online as it appears and maintain its usually fast performance.

AI in general frustrates me, but to see that this extremely valuable archive has now gotten caught in the scooping net makes me equally sad and angry. If you want to gather documents from the site, but will later be offline, you have the ability through the site to download PDF files of individual documents and print them. Most of the material is also in the public domain as well (not all, however—any annotations to a document are copyright of the institution which originally published those physical volumes I mentioned). AI scooping this archive for information to feed to language learning models is a waste of time, energy, and money, and is a violation of copyright law. At the risk of causing performance issues and affecting the servers that make Founders possible, this activity is potentially detrimental to historic preservation and access to historical knowledge. Those hundreds of hours the teams behind the site have worked also come into play: this site is their baby, their hard work, and it’s being stolen. And as a result, everyone’s ability to easily use the site without issue is being affected.

I am extremely fortunate to be in a position where I have been able to acquire a personal backup system for what I primarily use Founders for (my volumes of The Papers of Alexander Hamilton), and more so in that through my university, I have access to the rest of the physical series that make up the archive. So this current issue with the site being slow on performance and frequently down does not inconvenience me much. But this is a privilege. Founders Online was created to get around that privilege and allow for everyone (with an Internet connection) to access these important historical documents. I cannot hammer down to you just how important and valuable that is. Founders Online is an invaluable resource that deserves to be maintained and protected. I’m thankful that the team behind it are working diligently to do just that, but they should never have had to combat AI stealing their hard work and affecting the usability of the site in the first place.

[cindylouwho-2]

Etsy 4th Quarter 2024 Earnings: Sales Are Getting Worse, With No End In Sight

Slide 5 from the earning presentation, © Etsy. Yes, they are going to be adding the skill and craftsmanship of products to the search algorithm, all decided by AI, of course.

Well, Etsy sales were down again in the fourth quarter of 2024 - as expected - and no one announced any serious plans to fix that. If the C-suite isn't hiding some plans for growth that they aren't ready to announce yet, we should probably be very concerned about Etsy's future.

Let's dive into what we learned in the fourth quarter financial results materials and call.

First, here are the official sources:

the press release

transcript of the conference call

slides from the conference call

video of the call (click on “Webcast” under 4th Quarter on the left)

my summaries of the fourth quarter for 2023, and the third quarter 2024 for comparison

And the key numbers (covering October to December 2024, compared to the same period in 2023):

Sales (GMS) on Etsy were $3.3 billion, down 8.6% year over year

Total sales for all 3 marketplaces - Etsy, Reverb, and Depop - were $3.7 billion, down 6.8%

Revenue including all 3 sites was a record $852.2 million, up 1.2%

Seller service revenue was up 8.1% , while marketplace revenue was down 1.4% across all 3 sites

Net income was $129.9 million, up 56.0%, in part due to the layoff payouts of around $27 million at the end of 2023 cutting into last year's figures

Active buyers on Etsy alone stand at 89.6 million, down 2.6%

Active sellers on Etsy alone are at 5.6 million, down over half a million from the third quarter 2024 and down a whopping 1.4 million from the fourth quarter 2023 peak. [Note that “active” means one charge or transaction in the past 12 months; many “active” shops currently have nothing for sale] That's a 20% reduction in Etsy sellers in just one year.

75% of Etsy buyers are still in the US; they will no longer report the percentage of sales that involved at least one party outside of the US.

Note that the decrease in sellers has been greater than the decrease in sales over the past year, including in this quarter, so the average sales per shop is higher than 1 year ago. I suspect that is partly because fewer people who never would have made a sale now open in the first place, given the increased ID and cost requirements - they were likely pulling down the average.

Separating Elite Artisan Goods From The Pack

Remember when I questioned whether Etsy really wanted hand-assembled items on the site any more, despite them still being allowed under the Creativity Standards? And remember how the Creativity Standards have tiers of creativity, with "made by" being the top? Etsy is still looking at how to differentiate between listings with lots of "value added" or higher levels of skill compared to those with a lower skill level, and is currently testing machine learning to help determine that. This was mentioned in connection with listing quality scores, so it is intended to be added to the various algorithms.

No doubt there will be lots of errors, but even if the machine learning works correctly, it will change ranking and make some shops less visible, including currently successful shops. They still may end up doing more with the Creativity Standards as well, such as filters. In short, every seller should think about all the ways this could affect their business, and how to present their goods as higher quality/skill.

2024 Focus: Gifting. 2025 Focus: Personalization

They will continue to push gifts - sales of gifts are still increasing, compared to overall sales - but are also turning their focus to personalization and customization. Here is the main quote of interest from the CEO:

"Personalized or customized items make-up roughly a third of our GMS today and we're already experiencing strong growth in some subcategories like personalized party decor and personalized apparel, which both grew double-digits in 2024. Today, the personalization process on Etsy can be clunky and often very manual. So this year, our roadmap includes improvements to seller tools and buyer functionality." [my emphasis]

That is good news to anyone doing personalization and custom items! I expect variations will improve, at a minimum.

But I wonder if they are going to do anything about the Etsy rules that actually discourage offering truly custom goods, such as the inability to take down payments easily, and the relatively-short time frame that sellers have to ship an item? Many sellers refuse to risk doing truly custom orders on Etsy now.

Back to gifts for a moment. Remember last year's big release of Gift Mode? Touted as a revolutionary tool that would match your recipients with their perfect gift using Generative AI, it never really worked the way they said it did, probably because CEO Josh Silverman demanded the developers release it a year early, before it was finished.

It used to look like this:

Go to the Gift Mode URL now and check out the changes: https://www.etsy.com/gift-mode

The page is now called Gift Finder, and it simply lists a bunch of options for occasions, interests and recipients. The old Gift Mode personas - which as last year went on I thought were better on average than Etsy's gift guides/Editors' Picks, despite the AI errors - are hidden way at the bottom.

Sometime last October, they removed the original Gift Mode and put the far less ambitious Gift Finder page in its place. No announcement was made. If they were planning on a relaunch, they'd let us know, right? Over 6 months of development, and millions of dollars in advertising and promotion - including a very pricy Super Bowl ad - have vanished from all but our memories, without a mention. If any of us failed this hard, we'd lose our businesses.

New Discovery Tool

Since the app is the highest converting platform, they are spending more time there, including the addition of a Shop tab that is browse-able. For years, Etsy has been talking about adding more features that would allow visitors to find interesting items without actually looking for anything specific. This appears to be a new serious attempt at that.

They are going to carefully data mine users' every action to help personalize the shopper's future searches and feeds. Silverman described this as "dramatically expanding the signals we collect."

Depop

Depop US sales were up about 60% last year, "making Depop the fastest growing U.S. fashion resale player".

CEO Kruti Patel Goyal is leaving Depop and returning to Etsy, but a successor hasn't been named yet. It's hard to say if Depop will continue to grow at such a clip without the same management.

Why Were Sales Down?

The shorter US holiday shopping period led to higher sales in December, while November and October were down. In addition to the usual concerns about the economy, sales were down due to:

shoppers looking for deals on many types of items, which is not Etsy's strength, according to Silverman.

Etsy putting more effort into long-term goals (such as raising overall quality of merchandise) than their usual sharp focus on incremental gains in sales.

various international countries having difficult retail climates.

They do expect sales to improve in the latter part of 2025, but not in the first quarter. They were unable to articulate why sales should go up, other than that they expect their current initiatives to improve conversions and buyer retention, and that they will go back to refining the tools they introduced last year to also increase conversions.

The work done last year likely meant a loss of "at least a few hundred million dollars of GMS." In short, they admit that removing shops and listings, while also restricting new shop sign-ups, cost them a small fraction of the site's overall sales.

Miscellaneous

Etsy Ads were the primary reason for seller service revenue growth.

They will be using more machine learning in Offsite Ads, which they started doing last year.

Expenses were down due to less fraud.

Categories that were up in the 4th quarter were few, but included subcategories like personalized clothing and vintage jewelry.

Orders are currently producing a higher rate of 5-star reviews.

Etsy Insider is working okay so far; it is still in closed beta.

A higher percentage of shops are now making sales.

Silverman's answer to a tariffs question largely focused on China and the fact that few of Etsy's goods came from China relative to the competition.

The total number of weddings is down, and they are smaller than they used to be.

The seller census from November 2024 is summarized here, starting on page 12. Half of Etsy sellers only sell on Etsy, and 80% are women. We will likely get a more detailed analysis in the next few months.

Silverman proudly declared they were able to cut shipping estimates by 2 days last year, but didn't mention that some of those estimates were wildly inaccurate, leading to real problems for innocent sellers who were not the ones who said the order would arrive in 1 day from the other side of the country.

My Thoughts

While Etsy is trying to pivot to being known as a place for higher-quality goods, unfortunately the many years of reseller slop and people drop-shipping from hidden locations are making it really tough for the corporation to turn this around. Social media sites and even traditional media regularly feature posts and articles about Etsy scams, non-handmade items, and the impossibility of finding quality goods on the site.

Etsy can make it harder for new shops to sign up, and remove more listings and shops than they used to, but the negative perception is still out there, plus the site is still overflowing with resold goods passed off as handmade.

[I did a quick test, searching for a type of ring I re-sell on my website, which has a style distinct to my supplier. I easily found 2 shops apparently reselling these rings on Etsy in the first 3 rows of search. One is actually using the supplier's photos; the other took their About page manufacturing images from stock photo sites. The first shop is literally using an exact photo that the supplier has for sale currently, and the item on the supplier's site is unique. The second shop just opened last year, after Etsy changed a lot of the rules and procedures. Their reviews complain of quality issues and drop shipping from India despite a shop location listed in the US. They are averaging over 3 items sold a day since August. In short, Etsy's site clean-up isn't working, folks.]

But apparently Etsy's management aren't ready to give up just yet, so that is going to mean a lot more pain for established shops in the coming year. In particular, if your products do not display a high level of craftsmanship as determined by Etsy - and who knows how well that will work anyway?- your visibility will likely drop in the coming year. If you don't sell personalizable items, you are going to be less likely to benefit from Etsy promotions and site upgrades. The push for diverse items and a higher percentage of shops making sales is diluting the visibility of some of the largest shops, including successful shops in small niches, and it looks like that will continue.

If you are currently struggling for Etsy sales and do not fit into Etsy's new image, it's probably time to start making other plans. Again, Etsy might have some great idea that hasn't been mentioned yet, but it is going to have to be a doozy - and happen soon - to pull this out of the fire.

[partyof4game]

March 29 Weekly Update

This week I ended up focusing on doing revisions based on some great feedback I received. While there was forward progress, it wasn't as much as usual.

Changes to the game:

Added a choice in the prologue with Raena where you can select being attracted to women without being attracted to/wanting a relationship with Raena.

Added a suspicion variable, which tracks MC's faith in the Gods, and added new ritual scenes/choices in the prologue.

Added a choice to ask Vana if she wants go ride the wagon, too.

Fixed typos, spelling errors, and punctuation errors that were everywhere 😂.

Updated the stat explanation page.

Finished the set-up section for the next set of possible Dire Wolf encounters (why have I done this to myself)

Started the Strategist's choice encounter

In all deleted/revised ~1k words and added ~2k more words for a net gain of 1k ☺️. This leaves the game at ~51k!

My goals for next week are to get through the last 6 choices to finally finish up the Dire Wolf encounter. I keep saying this, and I know I'm making progress but goddammit I will persist.

Until next week!🍻

Side Project re:Surrection | Patreon | Current Demo

[v1-kisser]

LEV1: "ANNIVERSARY"

WORD COUNT: 2191

CONTENT WARNINGS: CANON-TYPICAL BODY HORROR/GORE. WAR. THE APOCALYPSE. YAOI I GUESS

HOLY SHIT

IT'S BEEN A YEAR

WHAT THE FUCK HERE'S A FIC ABOUT IT

Edit log: 11/05 - Fixed some grammar and logical descriptors.

The city burned. It was one of three rebuilt. It was not one of skyscrapers or sprawling highways. Humanity no longer had the pride to build such things; When a skyscraper is toppled, it suffocates everything around it. Too many people had choked on the dust for 200 years. Now, if any were left, they would be charred and crushed.

Even across the bay, the sounds of Streetcleaners haunted the air. Their flamethrowers torched indiscriminately. No more corpses to burn. Faint explosions littered the streets like confetti. Metal creaked and groaned. An oil rig off the shore was finally dying. The war machines on board made unruly guests. One of its legs crumbled, and it screamed. A dying beast, bursting at the seams with flame. Its oily intestines spilled into the dead ocean, and fire came with it. Nothing could survive that. Levi had never listened in on Hell, but he imagined that it sounded like that.

“Clear,” V1 reported, sliding in from deeper within the forest. It paused to watch the rig die. The mechanical camera lense focused to see it clearly. Processing. It looked unaffected.

Several lights illuminated them both: V1’s gentle, constant sights, the fire, and the moon… though she was obscured by smog. Levi blinked. He was trapped in a horrified daze. He ran from the carnage the moment that it started. Now, he truly faced it. The rabbits of the city were long dead, and the wild dogs were content to rip each other apart.

This city was never Levi's home. So many people that he will never meet, that he should care about. The thought made cowardice run cold through his veins. The machine next to him was the only reason he wasn't burning with the rest of them. Could he stand to look any of those people in the eye?

Metal crumbled on the ground next to him. A dead machine. The distant screams continued.

“I thought you said it was clear,” Levi stated, simple and unoffended. His thoughts were trapped behind the net of familiar horror. He hadn't seen a city burn in 10 years. It was a terrible nostalgia.

“It is now.” V1 holstered its revolver and sat across from him. It wasted no time, cracking open the dead thing’s casing. The hole from a piercing shot still steamed. It paused, and whirred as it looked to Levi. His eyes were glued orange to the skyline.

“Levi.” It insisted, and he tore his sights away to look at their prize.

“Oh, that's…” He struggled to process it. “That's fascinating.” He traced along the edge of the ripped open casing. Flesh almost spilled out of it. It was in excess.

“Some kind of error?” V1 guessed as it tried to sort through what must be several pounds sitting in the chest cavity.

“A mutation, more likely. An error in biology…” Levi mused. He dug down against the side, trying to find the bottom of the mass. “Oh, fuck, this thing is packed. It must have been causing all sorts of issues.”

“It seemed off-balance.”

“Now you know why.”

V1 seemed satisfied with that. They slipped into a normal routine: V1 harvesting what it can and draining blood, while Levi starts a fire. It would be nothing compared to the inferno across the bay. Steel screeched in the distance, but there was silence between the two of them. The machine worked efficiently and callously. If the flesh was alive before, it wasn't then. Blood seeped into the open chest cavity as each tendon was snapped. V1’s armor hissed as it soaked up every stray drop.

Levi was sure most machines would be too attracted to the bloodshed within the city to notice a small campsite, but V1 had an escape route mapped just in case. He sparked a kindling. This small thing between his palms was precious. His air sighed as he breathed life into it. Just like that, a tiny fire was born. He had an entire childhood’s worth of practice, lighting gentle fires just outside of a warzone. Every time felt just as terrifying and bitter as the last. He looked across his little fire, and almost expected to see his sister. The machine gave him an unfeeling glance. He pushed down these emotions. They would do him no good here. He continued to nurture the flame in silence.

Silence was painful, too.

“How much blood do you think you’ll get out of it?” The sound of his voice surprised him. A distraction was in order. From everything.

V1's processors hummed. It snapped the last tendon, and weighed the mass in its hands. “A tank and a half,” it stated. It seemed confident in its assessment. It always was.

“Yeah? How's your supply currently?” A smile flitted across Levi's face. He didn't look up from the fire.

“47 percent. I’ll be set for a while.” The mass squelched as V1 lifted it fully out of the chest cavity. It's an ugly, dripping red thing. “Jackpot.” It muttered quietly.

Levi laughed. “Jackpot?” His eyes were wide with amusement.

“I found it by chance. I killed it. I won. This is the prize.” V1 peeked at him over the slab of meat. “You’re welcome.”

A scoff. Levi focused on his fire again. As the flame grew, the prize drained. The blood poured onto the machine’s chest, dripping and caressing each crevice before soaking through. It sighed. The sound made Levi's heart ache. Something about it had reminded him of people, the sigh they gave after a large meal, the creak of chairs, the clink of utensils. The thought of his war machine across a table from him was strange… but he still longed for the connection of eating with it. But blood is made useless when cooked. Eating after it would have to do.

The sizzle of meat sickened him. He had only made himself a portion of the mass, as much as he could stomach. It burned his hands, but he didn't care anymore. He just sank his teeth into it. Streetcleaners faintly screeched. The wave from the oil rig’s collapse finally slammed into the shore, just a dozen meters down the cliff. Smoke obscured the moon completely.

V1’s focus, though, was Levi. Its lense trained on him, fidgeting with a coin between its fingers as it watched. And watched. Levi found a particularly tough section of meat, and had to pull it apart with his teeth. He seemed embarrassed. V1 only shifted closer. Its eyes didn't say much, but all that could be read from it was interest. Interest. Interest. It said nothing.

A thought. Less than a thought, a premonition, turned over in Levi’s mind. He swallowed and spoke before he could think.

“What's today's date?”

V1 blinked. Its lense went distant for a split second, calling on its internal clock.

“November 3rd, 2129.”

Something about that was significant. He asked another question. “When did we meet?”

V1 called on more data. “One second.” A significant pause. “I didn't have my clock set up yet, when we met.”

Levi shook his head and shifted to sit on his knees. “No, no- I mean- When did I reactivate you?”

It tilted his head and blinked. “It was November 3rd, 2128.” It seemed surprised at this revelation, too.

He sat back and smiled. The glow of a distant inferno warmed them both. V1 was still so magnificent. “Well, I’ll be damned.”

“I’m guessing a year is some kind of goal?” Its voice sounded dry. Unimpressed, but sincere. Levi couldn't help but laugh.

“Mhm. A big one.”

V1 hummed. It raised a hand in acknowledgement. “Well, then. Congratulations to us.”

Levi’s heart bled with an affection that he had no shortage of. Just that simple message made him feel so, so much lighter. He couldn't hide it if he tried. “Yes, congratulations to us. Happy anniversary, V1.”

A moment of silence as Levi continued to eat. V1, surprisingly, was the one to break it.

“Does an anniversary warrant sentimentality?”

Levi smiled. “Generally, yes, it does.”

“Oh, damn. I already used up all of mine. Well’s all dry.” It sighed, pretending that it wasn't joking. Levi swallowed the last bit of meat, and once the gamey taste was out of his mouth, he snorted.

“Mmh, better luck next year, huh?”

“Better luck next year.”

V1 turned to look at the city. The fire still raged. It would burn for days and days and days, until all was embers and ash. The skyline looked empty without the oil rig. If he looked closely, Levi could swear he saw machines desperately paddling against the inky waves. Drowning in black and chrome, glimmering in the light of the surrounding flames. But it was just that: glimmers.

The two felt a heavy, fulfilling silence, even while the broil of warfare bubbled up across the bay. In this moment, in this tiny space, under this large sky, there was peace. They were the only two souls that had it. Levi was determined to hold fast to it. He stood, and hauled the remains of the hunted machine into the ocean. V1 watched, and though it could help, it elected not to. It stood and watched, amused, as Levi struggled to carry the metal. It clattered down the cliffside towards a waiting ocean. The black waters swallowed each piece whole. He huffed and sat next to it, breath heaving in his chest.

“Asshole.”

“What? You didn't ask for my help.”

“It's our anniversary, I shouldn't have to. You have to be extra nice to me.”

“Better luck next year.” It retorted. Levi laughed, and his breath calmed with the distant waves on the shore. The beaches were greyer the closer they were to the city. Embers blanketed the sand and disintegrated in the waves. His fingers gently nudged against V1’s. If it noticed, it didn't care enough to react.

“You're funny.” He fixed his eyes upon V1. He wanted its sights on him again. He spoke, again, without thought. He wasn't sure what made him speak his mind so brazenly that night. Maybe it was the fire. Maybe it was sentimentality. “Do you remember that close call with the Swordsmachine?”

V1 shifted, and Levi got his wish. A soft yellow glow casted on his face as it focused back on him. “Yes. What about it?”

“Had you been a second later, I wouldn't be here right now. It took my shotgun.”

“Yes. And I took it back. Why bring it up?”

Levi sat closer. He didn't know how successful he’d be with this. Getting so sappy usually just made V1 irritable. He tried it, anyway. His chest ached with a thousand blooming emotions, and that night he chose to nurture the good ones. “Because… This milestone could have never happened. So easily. And I don't know if it will ever happen again… I honestly don't think it will.”

The machine took a second to process this. Then another. Then another. “I could protect you for that long.”

“Maybe, but you couldn't feed me.” The wind tussled through his hair, from a dead ocean, into a dead forest. Levi couldn't remember the last time he had seen the color green. What grass was left had died with the change of seasons. He couldn't remember the last time he saw a deer, or anything larger than ants and flies. An awful dread sat in his chest. V1 considered this.

“As long as I eat, you’ll eat.” It decided. So simple. Oddly sweet. Levi smiled sadly.

“Thank you.” He leaned on V1’s shoulder, and stared out across the water. No response. More wind whistled. The ache of cold began to sink past his skin, into muscle and bone. The smog overhead showed no signs of dissipating. Screams of rage and torment echoed on the cliffs, eaten alive by the barren trees. Their peace continued. “Seriously, V1, thank you.”

V1, in all its inexplicable mercy, pulled Levi close. It was warm. Its machinery purred against his skin. Servos twitched with inactivity as its programming struggled to focus on something physical. It fidgeted with his fingers, watching the muscles and tendons in his hand stretch. It said nothing. It only purred, softly in his ear. Its gliders folded to make room for him. He had already taken up so much of its internal storage. He would continue to occupy its files long after he was gone. V1 never thought about it like that, though. It only knew that this cooperation, this connection, was beneficial and special. That it would cling to this for as long as possible– If not for a lifetime.

“Levi…”

“Hm?”

“Happy anniversary.”

Levi beamed, and cuddled closer. Knelt together on a cliff, by a fire, watching the inferno of war rage across the water. Cold, but precious. His heart beat steadily against its chest. The gentle, pulsing proof that he was alive and well. “Happy anniversary.”

He pressed a warm kiss to its armor. Blood brushed his lips. Though V1 didn't understand kissing, it knew what they meant.

I trust you. I love you. I need you.

V1 set another objective.

November 3rd.

[thailandimmigration]

 5-Year Retirement Visa

Thailand offers a 5-Year Retirement Visa (officially known as the Non-Immigrant O-A Long Stay Visa) for foreign nationals aged 50+ seeking extended residency. Unlike the standard 1-year retirement extension, this visa provides pre-approved multi-year validity, reducing annual renewal hassles. However, strict financial, insurance, and compliance requirements apply.

Key Features:

✔ Pre-approved 5-year stay (no yearly extensions needed) ✔ Multiple entries permitted (no re-entry permit required) ✔ Must maintain health insurance (Thai or international) ✔ Financial proof required upfront (no monthly income option)

2. Eligibility & Financial Requirements

A. Basic Qualifications

Age 50+ (no exceptions)

No criminal record (police clearance from home country)

Health insurance (min. THB 400,000 inpatient / THB 40,000 outpatient coverage)

Note: Unlike the 1-year retirement extension, the 5-year visa does NOT allow monthly income proof (e.g., THB 65K/month)—only lump-sum deposits or fixed investments qualify.

3. Step-by-Step Application Process

Option 1: Applying from Abroad (Recommended)

Gather Documents:

Passport (valid 18+ months)

Bank statement (showing THB 3M for 12+ months)

Medical certificate (no leprosy, TB, drug addiction)

Police clearance (FBI check for Americans, etc.)

Health insurance (approved by Thai General Insurance Association)

Submit at a Thai Embassy/Consulate (e.g., Los Angeles, London)

Receive 5-Year Visa (sticker affixed in passport)

Option 2: Converting from a Tourist Visa (Inside Thailand)

Must first obtain a 90-day Non-O Visa (based on retirement)

Then apply for 5-Year O-A Visa at Immigration Bureau (Chaeng Watthana)

Processing time: 4–6 week

4. Common Pitfalls & How to Avoid Them

A. Insurance Policy Rejections

Problem: Many international insurers aren’t approved by Thai authorities.

Solution: Use Thai insurers (e.g., LMG, Pacific Cross) or verify your provider’s eligibility.

B. Bank Deposit Timing Errors

Problem: Funds not seasoned 12+ months before applying.

Solution: Plan 1+ year ahead—transfer funds early.

C. Overstaying Risks

Problem: Lapsing insurance = visa cancellation.

Solution: Set auto-renewal reminders for insurance.

5. Long-Term Strategy: Beyond the 5-Year Visa

A. Transitioning to Permanent Residency (PR)

After 3+ consecutive years on a retirement visa, PR becomes possible.

Requires THB 1.8M+ income, Thai language test, and clean record.

B. Elite Visa Alternative

If financial proof is an issue, Thailand Elite (5–20 year visas) offer easier terms (but higher cost).

C. Leaving & Re-Entering

The 5-Year O-A Visa allows unlimited exits/re-entries—unlike 1-year extensions.

6. Expert Recommendations

For Maximum Stability:

✔ Use the THB 3M fixed deposit (easiest to prove) ✔ Buy Thai health insurance (no approval risks)

For Frequent Travelers:

✔ The 5-Year O-A Visa is ideal (no re-entry permits needed)

For Lower Financial Commitment:

✔ Stick with the 1-year extension (THB 800K option)

7. Conclusion: Is the 5-Year Visa Right for You?

Best Suited For:

High-net-worth retirees who can lock away THB 3M

Expats who travel often (multi-entry advantage)

Those who despise annual immigration visits

Not Recommended For:

Expats relying on monthly income (only lump sums qualify)

People who may need to withdraw savings

Final Advice: Consult a Thai visa specialist to assess whether the 5-Year O-A Visa, 1-year extension, or Elite Visa aligns best with your financial and lifestyle needs.

[anxiouslyeccentric]

@three-dee-ess i figure im a lil late to the party but it'd be worng to not contribute my humble pile

From left to right top to bottom:

The blue 3DS XL belonged to my older brother, who let me use it to play my copy of Pokémon Y until our parents eventually bought me my own 2DS, the one all the way to the far right with its circle pad lovingly rubbed off XD. The XL 3DS for a few years was unplayable since my big brother had dropped it off of a desk while it was plugged in, damaging the charge port until i eventually found a place that could fix it, a place id eventually end up working at myself XD.

The orange new 2ds right below it was also my big brother's, this the replacement he'd bought and used after his first 3ds had its charge port damaged. From a few years stuffed in and out of tight pants pockers, the shell of the console became bent, and it had difficulty reading games until i ended up fixing the issue myself a few months after he decided to part with it.

The Special edition Pikachu 3DS was a Mercari find years ago when i was at my first job making bookoo money with no bills to pay, and decided 200 was a great price for Pikachu and him cheeks. Love this system, even though if you put it in sleep mode and carry it around for more than a few hours, it has an error and makes you turn off the system, so not a Walking-around-as-a-tourist 3DS unfortunately, but other than that and a minor chip in the shell, works perfect!

The blue base model is actually a modded japanese base model with a capture card installed! Ive yet to have time to properly use it in any kind of streaming capacity, but it's still with the box and has everything from the modder! I paid a pretty penny for it a few years back, but im not sure it would pull the same value today. Who knows!

The orange and white new 2ds with the target exclusive pikachu hard shell was a christmas gift from back in highschool. I spent many an off hour in my debate class's script room hunting shinys and playing pokemon Amie in my copy of Alpha sapphire for hours on end. Great times! It's lovingly adorned with stickers, and remains my most decorated 3ds.

And lastly, but certainly not least, my new 3ds with a healthy collection of kisekai plates. This was actually a 20th Anniversary pokemon red and blue edition that had its original box, inserts AND plates included with it! Paid about the same for the 3ds with the capture card, but this one had absolutely increased in price since my purchasing. The other plates id come across separately, all during my time with my first job. Generally i prefer having the 151 pokemon colored spites plates that are on it now, or the Blue Gingam Check plates, and i even purchased the matching theme for the system before the E-shop closed, so they match! This system is my current "main one" and has every pokemon virtual console software downloaded onto it pre eshop closure, and i just recently finally modded it for pretendo and Netpass, both of which work wonderfully!

Im really hoping pretendo can get the Pokémon chat Player Search System up and running eventually for Pokémon X, Y, omega ruby and alpha sapphire, since a bulk of my time with the 3ds was spent battling and wonder trading to my heart's content. I can only hope.

Currently im playing a lot of Tomodachii life, a game i picked up from my job last christmas as a gift to myself, and fantasy life! Both heavy hitters I'd recommend to anyone with a 3DS! But yea, buy a 3ds for a reasonable price, and mod that sucker! Use Net pass and play all the games you want! All emulation is ethical ethical emulation.