#fleet management service providers

[priyanair90]

https://project-lithium.com/

[acarelogistic]

Current business climate requires fleet management to be effective especially for organizations that involve themselves in transportation and supply chain. Being one of the leading fleet management service providers, Acare Logistics has developed a set of services with the purpose to meet all your fleet management needs, minimize your expenses and improve your functionality. Being experienced in working with different kinds of fleets of different industries, we provide the best solutions for any transportations you may need.

Importance of Fleet Management

Fleet management has been defined as the process of managing a company’s vehicle to achieve its intended function effectively. It comprises everything from car maintenance and tracking of routes to handling and fuel control. Fleet management has great potential to help to decrease specific costs when operating the vehicles and to increase customer satisfaction while noting the presence of regulatory obligations.

Our service at Acare Logistics is unique because we assess the needs of your business and come up with the best solution for fleet management. This means no matter big or small your company is, with our services you not only are able to conduct your operations smoothly but also are able to generate the optimum amount of profit.

Pan India Transport Service: Interconnecting the Businesses All Across the Nation

During the evolution of the businesses and their growth, the requirement for the appropriate means of transport becomes more tangible. Acare Logistics is a company that provides Pan India transport solutions to the companies located throughout the country to transport goods securely and on time. This has have helped us to have a large network as well as a large fleet of properly maintained vehicles used to meet your requirements.

For your domestic transport needs, whether it involves transporting goods over long distances or the final mile, our Pan India transport services a suitable for different industry. We boast of our ability to overcome specious logistic conundrums and to deliver efficient transportation services that ensure your chain of supply is not interrupted.

Why Acare Logistics for Pan India Transport Services?

1. Nationwide Coverage: We have insisted on having our centres in all the major cities and regions of India; thus, guaranteeing your goods safe and timely delivery.

2. Reliable Fleet: We provide our clients merit worthy and good condition vehicles that are equipped with technology and well maintained.

3. Experienced Team: We are a team comprised of highly qualified experts who’s main goal is to deliver unparalleled quality services in regard to your transportation requirements.

4. Flexible Solutions: Our transportation services are flexible, which allows us to develop specific solutions that can be implemented in your business.

Integrated Supply Chain Management: Streamlining Your Operations for Maximum Efficiency

In today’s highly competitive business environment, the supply chain management has become a core competency that most enterprises consider crucial to competing effectively in the market. Acare Logistics provides a complete solution of supply chain management services for your processing needs that make your processes more efficient, cost effective and effective. Every aspect of the supply chain, including but not limited to the sourcing of materials, manufacturing, inventory, shipping and delivery, are handled by our end-to-end solutions.

Advantages of Integrated Supply Chain Management

Supply chain integration focuses on integration of all aspects of the supply chain from suppliers to manufacturers, distributors and retailers to form a harmonized system. Through the incorporation of these elements, firms are in a position to cut on lead time, decrease on inventory costs, better customer satisfaction and improve the firms’ competitiveness.

As Acare Logistics, we offer supply chain solution services that meet the needs of your business by employing a professional approach. This integrated method guarantees that each component in your supply chain is well coordinated and in this way, your supply chain is characterized by high flexibility.

Why Acare Logistics for Integrated Supply Chain Management?

Comprehensive Solutions: Supply chain management services consist of sourcing and procurement, order and transportation and distribution and delivery.

Expertise and Experience: Our skilled group of supply chain specialists provides clients with information accumulated in years of experience in the field.

Customized Approach: This means that in handling their finances we understand that every business is special and has its characteristics. Our solutions will suit the needs of your supply chain since we’re developed uniquely for your needs.

Technology-Driven: We employ the innovations of technology and the analysis of data to help in the enhancement of your supply chain.

Conclusion

Acare Logistics is one of the premier fleet management service providers that offers excellent transportation and supply chain solutions based on the current demands of the organizations in India. From Pan India transport solutions to end-to-end supply chain solutions, we’ve got what it takes to make your business thrive.

Choose Acare Logistics as your partner for logistics today and see how professional and thorough services can impact positively on your enterprise. Get in touch with us, about our services and how we can assist you to achieve your operational requirements.

[monika2029]

India's Largest Electric Mobility as a Service Provider | 100% Electric Fleet | B2B | Employee Transportation | Business Travel | Charging Infrastructure. To know more about this service visit the website

https://project-lithium.com/

[rideboomindia]

RideBoom has implemented several sustainability measures to reduce its environmental impact compared to Uber and Ola. Some of these measures include:

Electric and Hybrid Vehicles: RideBoom has introduced electric and hybrid vehicles into its fleet, which reduces greenhouse gas emissions and noise pollution. This is a unique feature among ride-sharing apps, as most companies rely on traditional fossil-fuel powered vehicles.

Carpooling: RideBoom offers carpooling services, which allow multiple passengers to share rides and reduce the number of vehicles on the road. This not only reduces emissions but also helps to alleviate traffic congestion.

Route Optimization: RideBoom uses advanced route optimization technology to reduce the distance traveled by its vehicles. This helps to reduce fuel consumption, emissions, and wear and tear on the vehicles.

Sustainable Fleet Management: RideBoom has implemented a sustainable fleet management system that ensures all vehicles are properly maintained, which reduces emissions and extends the life of the vehicles.

Carbon Offset: RideBoom has partnered with carbon offset providers to offset the carbon emissions from its operations. This means that for every ton of CO2 emitted, RideBoom invests in projects that reduce greenhouse gas emissions, such as reforestation or renewable energy generation.

Vehicle Scrappage: RideBoom has implemented a vehicle scrappage program, which encourages drivers to retire older, polluting vehicles and replace them with newer, cleaner ones. This helps to reduce emissions and improve air quality.

Driver Training: RideBoom provides training to its drivers on eco-friendly driving practices, such as reducing speed, accelerating smoothly, and avoiding idling. This helps to reduce fuel consumption and emissions.

Partnerships: RideBoom has partnered with local organizations and government agencies to promote sustainable transportation options and reduce emissions in urban areas.

In comparison, Uber and Ola have also implemented some sustainability measures, but they are not as comprehensive as RideBoom's. For example:

Uber has introduced electric and hybrid vehicles into its fleet, but it has not set a target for transitioning to 100% electric vehicles.

Ola has also introduced electric and hybrid vehicles, but its sustainability efforts are more focused on promoting electric vehicles in India.

Both Uber and Ola have implemented carpooling services, but they are not as widespread as RideBoom's carpooling program.

Overall, RideBoom's sustainability efforts are more comprehensive and targeted toward reducing emissions and promoting eco-friendly practices in the ride-sharing industry.

[ltwilliammowett]

The Admiralty

I often mention the Admiralty, as some sort of vague governing body, but i think have not explain what it is and what it does. Well the term is used to describe the goverment department which was once responsible for Britain's naval affairs. In fact, until the union of Scotland and England in 1707 it was the English Admiralty, and the Scots had their own version. The term is - or was- used by other countries, and of course it had its equivalents to the US Department of the Navy, which is now part of the Department of Defense. The French equivalent was the Ministère de la Marine, but it is now run as part of the centralized Department of Defence. Today, Britain's naval affairs are administered by the Ministry of Defence.

The Admiralty in Whitehall, London

The origins of the Admiralty date back to the late 13th century and the reign of King Edward I (reign 1272-1307). He appointed a Lord High Admiral as the head of his small navy, and gave him a suite of offices in London. These offices became known as the Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty, and when they met for their regular meetings they were known collectively as the Board of Admiralty. The Sea Lords were senior serving officers, who tended to handle operational matters, while the Lords of the Admiralty were civil servants or politicans who dealt more with administration and governance. This system continued in use for almost 7 centuries until the Admiralty was disbanded in 1964. From then on all three of Britain's Armed services were administered by the Ministry of Defence. The Admiralty building stands in London's Whitehall and in the time of the 18th and 19th century and aspecially in wartime its offices were a bustling hive of activity, with officers arrving in the hope for a ship, or to be court- martialled, or to receive their orders. Admirals, civil servants and politicians went about their business, holdings meetings, making judgements ans sending or receiving a welter of reports.

But the Admiralty was more then just a place where the Royal Navy was administered. There were also the Admiralty Courts, where piracy and other naval cases were heard, but the High Court of Admiralty was the highest and heard all British maritime cases and the Prizes (where it was determined whether a ship was a legal prize or not and how much prize money came out) until it was dissolved in 1875.

The High Court of Admiralty

The Navy Board (formerly known as the Council of the Marine or Council of the Marine Causes) was the commission responsible for the day-to-day civil administration of the Royal Navy between 1546 and 1832.

As the size of the fleet grew, the Admiralty sought to focus the activity of the Navy Board on two areas: ships and their maintenance, and naval expenditure. Therefore, from the mid- to late-17th century, a number of subsidiary Boards were established to oversee other aspects of the board's work. These included:The Victualling Board (1683–1832). Responsible for providing naval personnel with food, drink and supplies. The Sick and Hurt Board (established temporarily in times of war from 1653, placed on a permanent footing from 1715, amalgamated into the Transport Board from 1806). Responsible for providing medical support services to the navy and managing prisoners of war. The Transport Board (1690–1724, re-established 1794, amalgamated into the Victualling Board in 1817). Responsible for the provision of transport services and for the transportation of supplies and military equipment.

Each of these subsidiary Boards went on to gain a degree of independence (though they remained, nominally at least, overseen by the Navy Board.

So you see it was more than just a place where old admirals met for brandy, it was the heart of the navy and its administrative headquarters.

[scotianostra]

29th March 1958 saw the death of Sir William Burrell.

In 1876 William entered the firm at the age of 15, and on his father’s death in 1885 he and his eldest brother George took over the management. the firm was already prospering, but under their shrewd direction it reached a position of international standing in worldwide tramping and in ship management.

Burrell was a collector from an early age, buying his first painting when aged only 15, but it was Glasgow’s industrial ascendancy that would allow him to continue financing his passion for art, and the added success of the firm his father founded.

Building and buying ships when world markets were weak, Burrell built up and sold two great ocean-going fleets, providing him with the wealth needed to search the world for art and antiquities. Even better, his global shipping contacts meant he knew where and when certain treasures were being auctioned.

Burrell was far from alone in this passion, and as his fellow Glasgow industrialists grew wealthy, they too invested in art – both ancient and modern – to show off to their friends. Where Burrell differed, however, was that he was no show-off.

He was a serious collector, with wide-ranging interests and passions. By 1900 he had become a respected collector in the fields of late Gothic and early Renaissance European art and late 19th century French art.

In 1901, Burrell was one of the largest donors of artworks to the Glasgow International Exhibition. This was an event which left an indelible mark on the city, with the opening that year of the much-loved Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum. In 1927, Burrell was knighted for services to art and for his public work.

But Burrell was certainly no snob when it came to his collection. He was a believer in free education for all and wanted the people of his home city to be able to access his fine collection. It’s for this reason that, in 1944, he donated his entire collection to his home city – a collection that contained more than 9,000 items at the time.

Shortly afterwards, Hector Hetherington, then Principal of Glasgow University, famously said of Burrell’s collection that it was:

“One of the greatest gifts ever made to any city in the world”.

By the time of his death in 1958, Burrell had been collecting for 75 years - and what a collection it is. From Chinese and early Islamic ceramics to Late Gothic and Early Renaissance works of art from Northern Europe, including tapestries, stained glass, sculpture, arms and armour, architecture and furniture.

Burrell’s collection takes visitors on a tour of 6,000 years of world history, connecting them to the people who made the exquisite works and to the people who have owned them down the centuries; making exciting new connections through time and place.

At the time of his gift, Burrell had stipulated that any new gallery must be 16 miles from the city centre. This was partly because he believed that a rural setting would show the works to their best advantage, but also to place them far away from possible damage by atmospheric pollution caused by Clydeside's heavy industries and tenement chimneys. By the time of Burrell's death in 1958, a suitable site had still to be found.

That problem was solved in 1966, when Mrs Anne Maxwell Macdonald gifted her family’s 360-acre Pollok Estate to the City of Glasgow. Although a mere four miles from the city centre, it seemed the perfect location for the vast Burrell Collection.

That said, it took a further 17 years, and an international design competition, before architect Sir Barry Gasson’s £20m building opened to the public.

The combination of exceptional art and architecture set within one of Europe’s largest urban green spaces was an immediate success, described by The Glasgow Herald as ‘a magical mystery tour and an aesthetic event rolled into one’. The Burrell Collection has since been a key driver in Glasgow’s transformation from a place of post-industrial decline to one of the great cities of culture.

In October 2016 the building closed for a major £68.25 million refurbishment. The Burrell Collection reopened today, its greatly expanded spaces promise improved access, understanding and appreciation of one of the world’s most extraordinary personal collections.

[usafphantom2]

Czech Republic officially joins the global F-35 Lightning II team

Fernando Valduga By Fernando Valduga 01/29/2024 - 19:37in Military

The government of the Czech Republic has signed a Letter of Offer and Acceptance (LOA) formalizing its intention to acquire 24 5ª generation Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning II aircraft.

Through the U.S. government's Foreign Military Sale (FMS), the Czech Air Force will receive its first aircraft in 2031, which will be in the latest advanced configuration of Block 4.

“We are pleased that the government of the Czech Republic is now officially part of the global F-35 Lightning II program,” said U.S. Air Force Lieutenant General Mike Schmidt, executive officer of the program at the F-35 Joint Program Office. "This partnership with the Czech Ministry of Defense will supply and sustain F-35 aircraft for decades, while providing the Czech Air Force with unparalleled interoperability and ensuring that it has the ability to combat current and future threats."

In addition to the aircraft, the acquisition also includes personnel training, services and logistical support, in addition to the development of other support services, ensuring successful deliveries of all 24 F-35 jets.

"With the signing of the Letter of Offer and Acceptance between the Czech Republic and the U.S. governments, the Czech Republic becomes the 18ª nation to join the global F-35 program. We are honored to partner with the Czech Air Force as their F-35s join other European nations in strengthening and increasing interoperability, significantly increasing NATO's deterrence capacity,” said Bridget Lauderdale, vice president of Lockheed Martin and general manager of the F-35 program. "The F-35 is the best solution for the future fleet of fighters in the Czech Republic, with 5ª Generation capabilities, increasing the country's effectiveness in the 21st century Security battle space."

The F-35 is the preferred European aircraft to replace old fighter fleets, offering unparalleled interoperability with NATO and other nations to provide a key discriminator for the U.S. and its allies in the coming decades. By the 2030s, more than 600 F-35 fighters will work together in more than 10 European countries, including two full U.S. F-35 squadrons stationed at the Lakenheath RAF Air Base. It is also the only hunting in production currently that will create jobs in the next 40-50 years and will allow strategic industrial partnerships with the Czech industry.

The F-35 now operate on 32 bases around the world. To date, Lockheed Martin has delivered more than 990 F-35 jets, trained more than 2,280 pilots and 15,400 maintainers, and the F-35 fleet has exceeded almost 773,000 accumulated flight hours. Lockheed Martin continues to work side by side with F-35 operators to ensure that allies stay ahead of the evolving threat.

Below is the statement published by the Ministry of Defense of the Czech Republic:

Minister of Defense, Jana Cernochová, along with U.S. Ambassador Bijan Sabet, today signed a Memorandum of Understanding between the Czech Republic and the United States on the acquisition of twenty-four fifth-generation F-35 fighters, which is the most important project in the history of the Czech Armed Forces. The ceremony brought to the fore the negotiations on the future of the Czech supersonic capacity and marked the conclusion of this contract.

The acquisition of 24 American F-35A Lightning II aircraft was authorized by the Government of the Czech Republic in September 2023. By the end of March 2024, it was necessary to complete a series of administrative steps and formally complete this phase of carrying out this strategic project through the celebration of the Memorandum of Understanding between the Czech and U.S. Government and the so-called Letter of Offer and Acceptance (LOA), the acceptance of which signs an agreement with the U.S. Government.

The Memorandum was signed today by the Minister of Defense of the Czech Republic, Jana Cernochová, with the United States Ambassador to the Czech Republic, Bijan Sabet, in the presence of the Chief of Staff General of the Czech Armed Forces, Lieutenant General Karel Rehka. The LOA, which was delivered in Prague at the end of 2023, was signed by the Director General of the Arms and Acquisitions Division of the Ministry of Defense of the Czech Republic, Lubor Koudelka, after the completion of all the administrative steps required by Czech law.

The agreement includes industrial cooperation, which was hired by the Director General of the Industrial Cooperation Division of the Ministry of Defense, Radka Konderlová, last week. There are eleven projects prepared with Lockheed Martin and three projects with Pratt & Whitney with an added value of 667 million dollars. They will have the participation of 13 Czech companies and universities involved in four areas: component manufacturing, research and development, pilot training, maintenance and services of the F-35.

The Czech Republic discussed its own signature with the United States in recent weeks, as the time and place of convenience were identified. Taking into account the health problems and the subsequent convalescence of the United States Secretary of Defense, Lloyd J. Austin, this option to sign the Memorandum of Understanding in Prague was eventually selected. "I promised that the contract for the American F-35 aircraft would be completed by the end of March and I fulfilled the promise. This agreement between governments brings our country and its armed forces to a totally new era, in which not only our military, but also modern equipment rank us in the first league of NATO's European Allies. In fact, fifth-generation aircraft are the backbone of North Atlantic Treaty Organization fighters. In addition, its acquisition will significantly increase the combat readiness of the Czech Armed Forces,” said Minister Cernochová after the signing.

“The F-35 system is the only one that fulfills the mission on future battlefields and ensures effective defense together with our Allies against external aggressions, if necessary,” said the Chief of Staff General of the Czech Armed Forces, Lieutenant General Karel Rehka.

The acquisition process is scheduled for eleven years, with the arrival of the first aircraft in 2031. Along with individual payments, the Comprehensive Implementation Plan is being developed to define the introduction of the F-35 system in the Czech Armed Forces environment. Specifically, the plan covers personnel, training, infrastructure, services and logistical support and the development of all other auxiliary services, in order to receive the progressive deliveries of all 24 units of the F-35 without problems from the beginning.

The Gripen fighters of the Czech Republic will be in operation until at least 2035, when the F-35 reach the final operational capacity. (Photo: Soos Jozsef / Shutterstock.com)

The Swedish Gripen fighters in the Czech Air Force inventory will have fulfilled their mission until 2035, when the F-35 system will reach its full operational capacity. There are intense negotiations underway with the Kingdom of Sweden on the operation of the Gripens within the specified time.

Tags: Military AviationF-35 Lightning IICzech Republic Air ForceLockheed Martin

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Fernando Valduga

Fernando Valduga

Aviation photographer and pilot since 1992, he has participated in several events and air operations, such as Cruzex, AirVenture, Dayton Airshow and FIDAE. He has works published in specialized aviation magazines in Brazil and abroad. He uses Canon equipment during his photographic work in the world of aviation.

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[dogmetaph0r]

SIC ‘EM

Chapter 3: Sit...

A/N: FIIIINALLY it's Fia time!!! Emetophobia warning in this one, sorryyyy they are so frail like baby birds 2 me....this one kinda sucked to write, not because of the content but because I had to get so many timelines straight (side note, the individual sections of these chapters kinda jump around a bit timeline-wise since we're in multiple different POVs). Apologies if there are inconsistencies because I (hopefully) won't force that kind of lore accuracy on myself ever again yayyy <3 this one has more Shelby brother humor and hijinks, so enjoy a lot of sass and questionable medical practices. Fun fact, the use of De Selby pt 1 and 2 actually provided most of the inspiration for Sam's backstory. Of course listen however you please, but for the best author-endorsed experience, I recommend listening to De Selby Pt. 1 during the beginning of the second part of the chapter.

Pairings: M!OC x F!OC, M!OC x Tommy Shelby

Warnings: descriptions of violence, PTSD episode (and poor handling thereof), hospitalization, blood and injury, vomiting, mild suicidality, narcotic misuse

Soundtrack: De Selby (Part 1) - Hozier // Army Dreamers - Kate Bush

Summary: With Sam injured, Fia journeys alone to Birmingham General Hospital with the help of a few friendly faces along the way. Meanwhile, Sam struggles with long-buried memories and Tommy grapples with the idea that he might've been had. Reunions and truces abound, some less expected than others.

It took two long days by horse and caravan to reach the stain on the map known as Birmingham. The skin of Fia’s lips and fingers were bitten raw in that time, dotted with pinprick-small scabs. What she’d heard on Saturday was so vague– Sam was injured, he fell unconscious on the way back, and they had rushed him to the hospital in Birmingham –that her rabbit-quick thoughts had no choice but to conjure new scenarios, each more horrific than the last. She couldn’t sleep. She could hardly even sit still long enough for it to be a possibility. Better this than overworking the horses, she told herself until the words hardly meant anything. Despite the sourness of guilt that sat in her mouth at the thought, she cursed the fact that Fleet Ypres and Queen Bathsheba couldn’t just go faster, trot on longer, need less.

But Fia was kind, and Ypres and Queenie were good girls. Every break took exactly as long as it needed to take, and every step was chosen for comfort over speed. Queenie had been hers as a child, bottle raised and babied through her clumsy, long-legged filly years. As such, she was more than happy to share the weight where Fia needed her, be it hitched to the head of the vardo or trailing alongside with a light pack of provisions. It soothed her fears to know that no matter what, Ypres would be taken care of in her rider’s absence.

Word had spread like lightning from one Pollyanna Gray to Fia’s employer through the telephone lines (bless the telephone for such a service), and Mrs. Davies had kindly allowed her to leave the mending until she returned. After losing her husband to the war, the old woman had grown a soft spot for Fia and her man that, in her own words, would be the absolute death of her. With only just enough breath left to thank her as she dashed out the door, Fia bundled up her and Sam’s few belongings and bid Fleet Ypres onward as quickly as she could manage that very afternoon.

After miles and miles of fresh spring air and fragrant grass, Birmingham’s stench of coal, garbage water, and drunkards was an assault on her already sensitive nose. She was glad for the fact that Danny had returned for Meska just days before, as she was sure that the grating industrial noise alone would have spooked him and his delicate sensibilities, never mind the sound of her dry heaving by the side of the canal. The horses stood idly by, shifting their weight as they grumbled nervously at the barrage of new stimuli. Now and then, she felt Queenie’s broad head nudge between her shoulder blades between shuddering breaths and uncontrolled cramps of her stomach. A small comfort, but a noble and appreciated attempt nonetheless.

A shuffling noise from a few yards away startled Fia from nitpicking her reflection in the oil-slick canal. Her heart dropped as she spun, expecting trouble, but her fears were quickly quelled when she was met with a quartet of dirt-smudged children. They clustered together around the tallest, a boy who couldn’t have been older than seven holding a tattered ball in his hands. The tiniest, a little girl, was beaming with all her might.

“That’s pretty,” she said, pointing a pudgy little finger at her vardo.

Now that the girl mentioned it, the vardo was probably the brightest splash of color Fia had seen since she’d arrived. It seemed that the very walls of the city were blanketed with grime and soot, long obscuring any indication of art and life that once belonged to the working people of Small Heath.

“Thank you,” Fia said, kneeling in front of the girl. “Have you ever seen one of these? It’s called a vardo.”

The girl shook her head, blonde braids whipping about her shoulders, and a skinny, freckled boy grasped her by the shoulders and pulled her back to the safety of their little group.

“Who’re you?” The boy asked, nose screwed up in suspicion.

“Are you a princess?” An older girl stepped forward. “With a carriage?”

“Your hair is big.”

“May I pat the dark horsie?”

“Are you gonna have a baby?”

Fia blinked at the bombardment of questions, unable to contain the laugh that sneaked out of her. Sweet Mary, if her little one was even half as curious, she had her work cut out for her. “You can pat her, if you’re gentle,” she told the girl already stretching her hand out to press her palm against Ypres’s curious nose. “And yes,” she turned to the boy with the ball, who was pointing at her belly, “I am having a baby, in a few months’ time.”

“Well– well I saw a vaw-dy one time,” the freckled boy shouted over the delighted squeals of his friends as Ypres took deep, inquisitive huffs of the tops of their heads. “In Mr. Charlie’s yard.”

Mr. Charlie, she thought. As in Charlie Strong? His stables were the ideal place to leave her horses and the vardo where she knew they would be safe from thieves and vandals. Perhaps Charlie would even be able to give her more information on what the hell was going on. She smiled at the little one, standing and smoothing her hands over her skirt.  “Would you take me to see Mr. Charlie?”

It didn’t take long to find the scrapyard belonging to John Shelby’s uncle after that. The children ran alongside and in front of the vardo (thank god for Ypres being so well-broken, with the number of times she had to remind them to be careful), beckoning her along with excited hoots and hollers. Their five-person crusade stopped just at the perimeter of the yard, the children falling quiet and shy as Charlie Strong squinted through the glare of scrap metal in the sun. He was an unassuming man, skinny and wiry with the lean muscles of hard labor. The edge of his peaky cap, however, glinted silver in the sun, and she could see the long-healed trophies of past fights littering his bare forearms.

“I know you,” Charlie called out as she hopped down to lead her horses forward. “You’re one of the Lee girls.” He unlatched the front gate, pulling it aside and beckoning her through. “Must be. You look like your pop. Got your mother’s nose, though.”

Fia smiled, unhitching the horses when they were far enough into the yard. “Does that get me a discount on stabling?”

Charlie laughed. “Good try. Nah, I’ll be reimbursed by Tom, I’m sure. Here for your sister?”

“Actually,” she said, assisting Charlie in untacking the horses and putting them in stalls fragrant with fresh barley straw, “I’m looking for Sam Lovell. Henry Lovell’s son? He was brought to the hospital a few days ago.”

Charlie frowned, grunting. “Haven’t seen him here. But the hospital is too far into the city to walk. You’d be better off finding your sister and waiting with her.”

Fia deflated, anxiety prickling her brow. She certainly would not be better off waiting. Esme had, presumably, no clue that she was even here. While she was sure Esme would never turn her away, it had been so long… who’s to say she wasn’t cross with her for running off? For turning her back on the Lees over a boy? “He’s hurt, Mr. Strong. Badly.” Charlie tracked the motion of her hand to her lower belly, eyes widening minutely.

The older man huffed a labored sigh, rubbing his chin as his eyes drifted over an incomprehensible mess of scrap metals and old, rotting wood. His eyes settled over a tarp on the gray water. “Tell you what, lass,” he strode over and yanked the canvas from the top of an engine-powered longboat, hopping aboard in a well-practiced motion. “I can get you as far as Digbeth through The Cut.”

Relief flooded her as she stepped onto the boat, Charlie’s hand firm on her arm to keep her steady on the rocking boat. She’d never been on a longboat, though in her life she had seen quite a few being led by canalside horses up through the waterways of England. It was smaller than she remembered as a child, though it could’ve been that the engine took up far more space and she had been far smaller many years ago. The whole of it was sooty despite having been covered, but Charlie laid out the clean side of the canvas tarp for her to sit on a sagging bag of horse feed.

“Right, if we’re all situated…” A clank came from the engine somewhere behind her, and the boat jolted to a start in the water. She looked back to see Charlie standing as tall and proud as a captain next to the smoke stack as it began to spit up clumps of charred black soot. “If you tend to get boatsick… just try and aim away from the deck.”

Fia cringed.

Whistle-whine roar of rockets. Shrieks like dying animals. Skull-rattling impact. Rain of dirt, shower of rocks.

Bomb after bomb, mud, blood, gunpowder in his nose. Mud, blood gunpowder. There were hands at his back, foreheads pressed to his shoulders, fingers gripping and pulling and scrabbling at his drabs. Get down, Lovell! Get the fuck down, you fucking idiot!

But for what? There was nothing to fear, nothing at all. How different was this from the blaze of fireworks? How much colder could the cold of a grave be, compared to the cold of the trench? How much darker could the dark get, when night already smothered the smoke-choked skies of Belgium? Who would miss him that didn’t already?

The skies settled to silence, a violent quiet ringing in the ears and vibrating the skin. Had it ended already? The war? The fight? Or just his fight? Sizzling earth like the scorched soils of hell, glittering-glistening-glowing fragments of mortar metal, hunks of meat shining in the light of the moon. Pieces of soldiers who once were. In a deep dark like this, which way was up and which was down? Were these gleaming surfaces the remains of metal and flesh, or were they stars? Was that inky black above the open air, or was it the bile-piss-gore-soaked earth? Who could say that these weren’t angels of death surrounding him, opposing him, pulling him up to heaven or down to hell. Whichever fucking way they were dragging him.

Lance Corporal, stand down!

It was so peaceful. Trembling-soft was his fellow-in-arms, clinging like hope to the leg of his pants.

Don’t, Sam, don’t. Stay here, Sam.

Sit down. Sit down, Sam, we’ve got you, that’s it.

How different could it be to climb out of the trench?

Oh my god! Oh my god!

Not so different. But here, away from the heat of a dozen hot mouths panting like dogs, he could feel the snow. Oh, the snow. It kissed the bridge of his nose, ran down the sides of his cheeks, dusted his eyelashes. Was that death, embracing him there? Did it reach out with ice-cold fingers, melt against the heat of his skin only to pool again in the hollow of his throat? Did it not caress him like a lover? Did it not whisper promises of peace, of freedom, of numbness?

Thud. Crushing, collapsing. Fire. Fire. Burning, sticky ribs, fingers grasping at frayed flesh and shredded wool. Some raw new cavity in his side blooming open like a flower, wet boiling globs of something flowing like rivers down his shirt, down his fingers.

Enemy fire! Oh god, oh fuck! Fuck, he’s down!

Down, down, down. Slower than snowfall, hotter than flame. Can’t breathe, can’t breathe. Thud. Mud, blood, gunpowder. Can’t breathe.

Can’t breathe.

Can’t breathe.

CAN’T BREATHE–

Sam! Sam!

Wake the–

“ –fuck up!” John batted open-handed at the side of his face, Sam’s forehead damp with nightmare sweat and tense with fear.

“Fuck!” Arthur shouted, fumbling with something to the sides of him, and before long his hands were tied fast to the rickety metal frame of the cot.

“Hold ‘is head, he’s thrashing.”

“Someone get his legs! Sam, breathe! Breathe!”

“Can’t,” Sam gasped, ribs pressing and pulling, rising and falling with no relief, a fish on a line dragged to dry land. He coughed, body wracked by pain. “Can’t breathe. Can’t breathe.”

“You’re breathing.” Tommy’s hands were on either side of his face, thumbs at the tender hinges of his jaw. “Shh. You can breathe if you pull it together. You hear me? Calm down. Good, see? You’re doing it.”

“Do something, mate, he’s going to go full Barney any second!”

“He’s already gone, listen to him!”

Sam was shouting something between burning wheezes, the words bursting from him like steam through the cracks in his armor. Arthur and John shared a look, shock and realization steeling their faces.

“Lance Corporal, you need to breathe. Now!”

Like someone had snapped their fingers and lifted a spell, Sam’s lungs could expand and draw gulps of blessed cold air along the roof of his mouth, the back of his dry throat. It hurt like hell. It burned like fire. But fuck, he could breathe. He tried to sit up.

“Who–”

Tommy hushed him, one hand on his shoulder and the other on his forehead, ice-cold and steady. “That was just Arthur, Sam. The war’s over. Rein it in, eh? You don’t need to report to anyone. We’re in Birmingham, in the hospital. It’s Sunday. Do you remember?”

Sam shook his head instinctively within the limited space offered by Tommy’s broad hands. Too many words. His head felt like wet wool and his stomach like a bag of acid, roiling and frothing and threatening to spill over. His mouth flooded with saliva, the room spun, and–

Sam gagged and shuddered as rust-colored bile spilled from his mouth, just barely making it to the floor beside his bed. God, it hurt. His body cramped from the bottom of his stomach up to the top of his chest, white-hot needles pricking the twist of his abdomen as he leaned precariously over the side of the cot with one arm pulled uncomfortably back by the leather cuff around his wrist. Tommy’s right hand didn’t leave his forehead, pushing his greasy hair out of his eyes as Arthur patted his back hesitantly.

Rolling back into place was its own agony, bandages tight around his empty stomach and head still swimming. “The fuck–?”

“John, get the doctor?” Tommy replaced his hand with a cool, damp cloth, rising to draw the curtains away from the warped window panes. Pale beams of morning sunlight struck the wooden floorboards and clean tiled walls, illuminating spartan rows of empty hospital beds and a side table with piles of blood-dotted rags. The metallic, chemical smell of antiseptic singed his nostrils, but it was preferable to what was before. Mud, blood, gunpowder.

“We’re going to let your wrists out of the restraints. Will you sit still? If you can sit still, we won’t need any medicine because it won’t hurt. Got it?” Tommy’s voice was gentle and light as he knelt at the side of his bed, like Sam was a landmine he feared would go off if he stepped too heavily. The leather manacles fell away, and Sam’s hands came up slowly to rub the raw, red lines marking the bones of his wrists.

Tommy nearly smiled. Nearly. Relief softened his gaze, even as Arthur cringed at his other side and threw a small hand rag down onto the splatter of acidic bile. “Very good, Sam,” Tommy hushed. “That’s much better.”

Sam blamed his ears pinking on the disgruntled expression on the doctor’s face as he entered, taking in the poor attempt at mopping up the contents of Sam’s empty stomach.

“Concussion,” the bearded man proclaimed as he set a large leather bag on the bedside table, “has a tendency of upsetting the stomach. As does your medication, but there’s little to be done about that.” He threw a knowing glance at the leather cuffs dangling from the sides of the bed. Sam had the distinct impression that this wasn’t the first time he needed to be restrained.

The doctor withdrew several tools one by one– stethoscope, hypodermic needle, medicine vial, magnifying glass. Tommy and Arthur were employed in propping Sam upright, setting thin pillows behind his back. After a quick check of his lungs (Sam scowled at the diagnosis that his earlier inability to breathe was, essentially, all in his head), the doctor took the microscope to his pupils, scrutinizing the way he flinched and blinked at the bright bedside lamp thrust in his face. 

“All looks well,” the doctor announced, speaking more to the Shelbys than to Sam as they adjusted him to a lying position once more. “If we can go a day without coughing anything up, I believe the rest of the recovery may be done at home.”

Arthur frowned. “But the, ah… the vomming, Doc?” He gestured crudely to the now-soaked rag on the floor, the unmopped fluid now tinged a light brown.

“Likely an aftereffect of last night’s fit,” the old man dismissed. “In his panic, he may have tried to swallow it down with the remains of the nosebleed.”

Sam’s eyes widened. “S-swallowed what?”

All three of the men turned to look at him as though they forgot the subject of the exam was still lying there.

Tommy stood by his bedside, leaning down with a warning look at Arthur. “You’ve coughed up some blood,” he elaborated. “From your lungs.”

Sam’s jaw dropped. “Pardon the fuck–” he coughed (blissfully dry this time, though something in his chest grated uncomfortably) “–the fuck out of me?”

“Only a little!” Arthur said, hands out as though Sam were ready to lunge at him. “Only a little. Just a few times last night, just after you got in.”

“Nothing too terrible,” the doctor said, demeanor blasé as he drew a portion of the liquid medicine into a syringe. “It’s not uncommon with the type of injury you sustained.” Memories trickled in through the spaces between words. There had been a fight at the race. Aintree? Yes, Aintree, where he’d been hired as a spy for the Peaky Blinders. The fight wasn’t real, until… oh, yes, it became real. Real enough to be thrown against a tentpole, slammed to the ground, socked in the face. But who…?

John Shelby sauntered into the room with a pack of cigarettes in hand and a scabby split down his lower lip, but when he caught the fury boiling in Sam’s eyes, he turned heel and sauntered right back out.

That bastard. “I’ll fucking beat your ugly face in! Again!” Sam pointed at John’s back as he left.

Tommy sighed, putting his hands in his pockets as Arthur closed the door behind the doctor. “I’d rather you didn’t,” Tommy said. “Wouldn’t fix anything.”

The doctor cleared his throat. “Alright, this is just a little painkiller. Something to help you sleep a few more hours without incident.” The tip of a needle was pressed into a vein in his arm, pinching as it entered. Sam’s face screwed up in discomfort at the warmth under his skin.

“See, we could’ve gone with an intravenous drip and saved the trouble, but you were… resistant to that option last night.” He looked meaningfully at the bruises on Sam’s arm, standing out in stark contrast to the pale skin of his inner elbow and the circumference of his wrists.

Sam pouted, the aches of the previous day throbbing in his bones and muscles before they began to melt away. This was something he did remember a portion of, when he concentrated: wriggling out of his restraints and ripping the needle-tipped tube out of his arm in an attempt to escape before being cuffed again. The doctor packed his belongings into a neat leather bag, taking the bribe Tommy passed him on his way out the door.

“When’s Florence getting here?”

Arthur sat on the windowsill on his left. “Soon, mate. Real soon.”

“Tomorrow, hopefully,” Tommy added.

Sam was quiet, picking at the lint on his blanket as his eyelids grew leaden and low. He’d never been to Birmingham. Never even been in a hospital, a real one, the provisional war hospital notwithstanding. How would Fia know where to look? If something went wrong, how would he find her? The patrin signs would come down from Haydock; he’d have to retrace their steps all the way up north to find her trail. It all frightened him so badly, the idea of her traveling unprotected out in the West Midlands where muggings and murders abounded. Where gangs just like the Peaky Blinders vied for control over every square inch like mutts fighting over bones in the street.

“It’s… Sunday, right?” His voice was just a quiet mutter, pensive and somber. “Can I… can I have a Bible? Just to have it. I’d… I think I need it.”

Tommy and Arthur looked at each other, both men shifting uncomfortably. “We can do that, yes,” Tommy said. “Arthur?”

Arthur nodded and took it as his cue to leave, mentioning something about tracking John down to guard the door.

Tommy leaned against the windowsill within Sam’s periphery. “I want to apologize.”

Sam frowned. “For what?” There could have been a billion reasons, he knew, but none that came to mind as immediately relevant. Everything that could’ve been said already had been, he thought drowsily.

“I couldn’t find whoever had lamed the horse.”

If it weren’t for the subject matter, Sam would’ve laughed. It felt like so long ago, seeing to Little Tsarina’s hoof and feeling the pain of what had been done to her. “Oh my,” Sam said instead, the corner of his mouth twitching as he resisted a smile. Everything felt honey-slow, thoughts trickling through his mind too fleetingly to follow. “What made you think of that?”

Tommy couldn’t meet his eyes. Instead he rubbed a cigarette around his lips, cracking the window behind him for the smoke to dissipate as he lit the end. “No reason. Never mind.”

Sam wanted to demand more information, but the bed was so comfortable, and the pillow so soft, that he had no choice but to sink into a blissful, dreamless sleep.

After twenty minutes on the water (and only one retch over the side of the longboat), Charlie docked at Digbeth Branch Canal and pointed her in the direction of the red bricked and gray spired building in the distance. The cobbled roads were slick with a mess of garbage and petrol, and the sidewalks weren’t much better. Her riding boots were a poor match for the smooth stonework, and by the time she slid around the corner to Birmingham General Hospital, she was panting and overwhelmed, hands on her knees as her stomach flipped unpleasantly. She idly wondered, curls thrown around her neck and face haphazardly, whether or not the hospital staff would mistake her for a patient with the way she stumbled through the door. Fia didn’t have much time to ponder her concerns when her march through the sterile hallways of the hospital was abruptly stopped by something solid and suit-clad, gripping her upper arms and gentling her–

“Florence, hey, it’s alright,” John said. He looked a bit ridiculous once Fia had the wherewithal to take him in, lower lip scabbed and swollen and cheek bruised plum purple.

“John Shelby?” She backed up, brows furrowed. “What happened? Is…”

“Sam’s alright,” John reassured her, hands on her shoulders. “It was… there were some mistakes made.” He averted his eyes, embarrassed. Fia made a mental note to interrogate him about that, but she had no time to waste on arguing with him. She had to see Sam.

Pushing through John’s half-hearted attempt at slowing her down, Fia kept moving until she reached the large oak door– Room 26, John had shouted to her as she left –and, hands trembling, turned the handle to let herself in.

Dust motes floated gently through the golden beams of sunlight cutting in from the windows, an unnerving peace disturbed by the door slamming against the wall. Sam sat propped upright in the hospital bed, looking thoroughly displeased and uncomfortable as a spectacled doctor pressed a stethoscope to the right side of his chest. His glazed eyes lit up when he saw her, and only the quick reflexes of the man standing guard by him– Arthur, judging by the mustache and peaky hat –kept him from jolting up from the bed.

“Fi,” he gasped, interrupted by a rattling cough that doubled him over in pain.

“Sam,” she sighed, the fight draining from her body when she saw him– alive and in roughly one piece, thank God.

“Florence-Maria? Hang on, are you p–? ”

“Arthur, relax. Good afternoon, Florence.”

“Hello, Tommy. Arthur.”

“Tom, she’s–”

“I am, Arthur. He knows.”

“But Tom, is–?”

“Arthur, relax or go outside.”

“How about we all relax,” the doctor shot an accusatory look around the room, hand on Sam’s shoulder to guide him back into a reclined position against the pillow bolstering his back. Sam obeyed, sweet gray eyes never leaving Fia’s.

She approached his bedside carefully, heart still pounding from her mad dash. This wasn’t in the plan Sam had told her. He said that they would keep him away from the fighting, offering plausible deniability when the raid started. As things always had when the Shelbys were involved, things had evidently not gone to plan. The everpresent dark rings under Sam’s eyes were somehow even darker with mottled purple-green bruising, shades of shadow flooding across the bridge of his nose where a splint obscured the apex of the damage. Fia’s eyes followed as the doctor brought the stethoscope back in place, shaking his head in frustration at the commotion. Sam was bandaged around the ribs, more of the same colorful bruising peeking out from the edges in watercolor splotches.

“Hi, love,” she said, sitting in the seat that Arthur had left behind as Tommy told him off in the background.

“Hi,” he responded, smiling, voice quiet and clipped from the limited breath he was able to draw between the bandages and the pain.

“No talking, please,” the doctor grumbled.

Sam put a finger in front of his lips and playfully shushed her, which made her laugh in spite of herself. The doctor packed up his kit, explaining that his lungs were fine, ribs in the same state as the day before (and what the hell could that have meant? Fia’s jaw tightened with anger) and that after today, Sam just needed a few weeks’ rest at home with a very short daily walk to prevent pneumonic buildup. No ‘dirty money jobs’, he emphasized, darting a sharp look between both Sam and Tommy. Presumptuous, she thought. Sam’s scared of dirty money jobs and Tommy’s scared of me. No lifting, no running, and no strenuous exercise. The doctor drew a small amount of clear liquid from a little bottle into a syringe, pressing the tip of the needle into Sam’s vein as he winced. No smoking (not an issue), no drinking (somewhat an issue, if Sam’s expression was anything to go by), and absolutely no fighting (doubly not an issue, if she had anything to do with it). Sam took these orders gladly, nodding along with the doctor’s words even as his eyelids started to droop.

“Right, I’ll let Mr. Lovell rest. I suggest everyone do the same, if he’s to be discharged.” The doctor gathered his kit, shaking hands with Tommy on his way out as the gangster slipped what appeared to be a wad of cash into his palm.

Fia let the latch click shut on the door before casting a fierce glare at the men remaining in the room. “What happened?”

Sam snapped back into consciousness with a sharp inhale and gave her a wide, sleepy grin while the brothers did their best to avoid making eye contact. Arthur shoved his hands in his pockets as though the temperature in the room had dropped, and Tommy coughed awkwardly before scratching his nose with his thumb.

“There was… a disagreement,” Tommy started, choosing his words carefully, “between Samuel and John.”

Arthur nodded, staring at his shoes. “And the plan was for there to be a fight– not a real one, just makin’ a show of it –and they. Well.”

“I coughed blood out me lungs,” Sam slurred, still smiling as the scouse accent grew thicker than she’d ever heard it. The other two men shot an admonishing look at him.

Fia’s brows arched up towards her hairline at that. She blinked, casting a knife-sharp sidelong glare at the Shelbys as they did their best impressions of invisible men. “You what, love?”

“Only a little,” Arthur added quickly before Sam could elaborate, which Tommy echoed. Sam laughed, which, for lack of a better word, sounded crunchy before a spike of pain forced him to trail off into a hiccuping grunt.

She had to clench her eyes tight and count to ten before the impulse to wallop them each about the head subsided. Sam whined in pain, throwing a hand out to the side to grope at the side table. Tommy quickly intercepted him before he could get at the tiny vial of liquid medicine, tucking the bottle into a drawer and keeping the man’s hand restrained. Sam settled for holding onto his thumb as the first dose took effect, leaving Tommy standing awkwardly half-bent at the waist as Sam quickly forgot what, exactly, he was doing in favor of watching the dust dance circles above his head.

“The doctor says he’s got a concussion and a cracked rib,” Tommy explained, trying and failing to reclaim his hand. “Pleurisy and a small contusion. Meaning he’s–”

“I know what a contusion is, thank you,” she interrupted, voice even and assertive despite the rage boiling in her veins. “Do I even want to know what he’s on right now?”

Tommy muttered a quick “probably not” under his breath, taking Sam’s answering giggle as an opportunity to slip away. Fia gave Arthur a look instead, raising one eyebrow in a bid for him to elaborate.

Arthur shifted uncomfortably and toyed with the vines of a choked little philodendron sitting in the window, wincing when a leaf broke off and crumbled between his clumsy fingers. “Only a little morphine,” he said, voice tight and hesitant. “Morphine,” Fia huffed, pinching the bridge of her nose.

“...Only a little.”

“A little,” Sam confirmed sloppily, pinching his fingers close together as if to demonstrate how little. Without the coordination granted by a clear and sober mind, he seemed unable to focus enough to make his fingers cooperate fully, frowning as he flexed his hand before letting it drop heavily to the bed. Fia stewed at the added context and held his hand as he sank into drug-saturated unconsciousness once again.

Tommy paced aimlessly around the room, lost in his head as Fia’d grown to know was common for him. He didn’t speak until it was clear that Sam had fallen asleep, halting little gasps of breath evening into a more gentle rise and fall of his chest within the bounds of the tight bandaging. “He didn’t want it, but it became necessary overnight.”

For any other person, she would’ve taken it as confirmation of the agonizing pain a rib fracture could induce. But this was Sam, her Sam, and he was a stubborn git. He didn’t like to show weakness– something to do with the early childhood he hardly spoke of. Fia remembered the time when he had been bitten by a client’s horse and had neglected to tell her until he undressed that night, the skin around his shoulder blade grazed raw and bleeding around a perfect ring of bruise-mottled tooth marks. Even when she’d fussed over him, he refused anything stronger than whiskey to dull the pain. It was his fault, he’d claimed, that he lost focus. If it didn’t get infected, it wasn’t worth spending the money on. Something like a broken rib, while excruciating, wouldn’t be fixed by expensive pain medication. So if it wasn’t pain that forced the doctor’s hand first…

“He was reporting for duty again, wasn’t he?” Fia’s shoulders drooped as the realization set in. “Wasn’t himself. Is that it?”

Tommy’s face went still and contemplative as he paused at the foot of Sam’s bed. “He was terrified,” he said, one hand tracing the tarnished metal bars of the footboard. “When the blood came up, he just screamed and screamed. It was hurting him to do it, but he just kept screaming.” Tommy’s expression was drawn, the angles of his face gaunt in the dramatic shadows of the sun-soaked room.

“They had to dope him up,” Arthur added somberly. “Said he’d puncture a lung the way he was struggling. The nurses tied him down when he came to, and from there… well, it was just easier to keep him calm.”

“Fought us all like a cornered animal.” Tommy rubbed the back of his hand, the movement catching Fia’s eye long enough for her to notice the tender-looking scratches gouged into the thin top layer of his skin, red and stark against the paleness of his wrist. Had Sam done that to him? Fia had never seen him get violent. Frightened, sure, when the phantom bullet between his ribs flooded his lungs with fire and kept him sunken in a dream. Confused when he woke up with the illusion of cold mud between his fingers, and frustrated when his attempt at smoking a cigarette ended in him lurching up the contents of his stomach into the wild grass at the side of the road. But violent? It was difficult to picture. Impossible, even, with the lengths he went to shield Fia from the horrors of the Great War. It wasn’t in his nature.

Then again, she had never seen Sam injured in such a way before. They hadn’t sent him home to recover from being shot, the bullet having avoided vital organs on its way out of his body and the battlefield of Ypres in dire need of every soldier they could keep. His fate stalled and uncertain in the base hospital, Fia hadn’t even heard of this injury until he came home freshly discharged and stitched together again when the bloodshed ended. Sam never liked the feeling of his breathing constricted after the war, always tugging the collars of his shirts open after too long buttoned up. His ribs were a particularly tender point, something he always shielded when Fia’s hand brushed a little too close to the shining scar of his bullet wound. It hurt her heart to think of how Sam must’ve been suffering before someone had made the executive decision to flood him with morphine.

“Wasn’t like that until the blood came up,” Arthur explained, wiping the shreds of dry plant from his hands and coming over to stand by her side. “He was in good spirits that first day, all things considered. Woke up a little confused but he was alright. Even cracked some jokes when we were tryin’ to carry him in.”

“Must’ve had a nightmare,” Fia said. She brushed the back of her hand over his sweaty temple.

Tommy hummed. “You said he’d been out of sorts when we were introduced.”

Fia nodded. The peace of early mornings, more often than not, was shattered with strangled cries of fear as Sam awoke from yet another nightmare, shouting for mercy, shouting for backup, shouting military nonsense. She would never be allowed to hear the details, but Sam would at least let her hold him and bring him down from the terror. Those were the nights that Sam could find rest in the first place. She figured he thought he was clever in trying to hide how little he slept, but the dark weariness of deprivation had long sunken into the lines and hollows of his face.

“So he leaves tomorrow?” She asked, voice smaller than she’d wanted it to be. Sam’s breathing was still shallower than was comfortable, the whispery puffs from the slight part in his lips the only indication that he was breathing at all.

“Hopefully,” replied Tommy. “So long as there’s no blood tomorrow, he can rest at home.”

Fia nodded, unable to look away from the slow rise and fall of Sam’s chest. When the sun began to sink in the sky, Tommy offered her a place to stay at Watery Lane. Fia wasn’t quite sure what she’d answered, but Tommy seemed to be satisfied with it as he ushered Arthur out, speaking in low tones with him about guards for the door and eyes on the doctors and nurses. It unnerved her, the seriousness with which they spoke. Of course she didn’t want any of their enemies to catch word of their arrival at the hospital, but Sam wasn’t a threat. He wasn’t a target for their enemies. Not even a regular associate of their gang. A guard outside the door made sense for just about anyone else, and she wasn’t about to talk them out of it, but it was frightening to think that Tommy found it necessary in his own city.

Once the sky had darkened, casting a deep inky blue over the otherwise-empty hospital room, the gangster at the door escorted in a kind-eyed older nurse.

“You ought to go home and get some rest, love.” She puttered around the room, checking Sam’s vitals and restocking all manner of bottles and boxes. “He’ll be alright overnight with so many eyes on him.”

A yawn threatened to escape her at the idea of putting her head down on a pillow of any sort, regardless of how lumpy or Birmingham-scented. The offer Tommy had made her was tempting; a lock on the door, wood in the fireplace, a tub to wash up in, a room that didn’t reek of antiseptic and sickness. She nodded drowsily, leaving Sam with a kiss on the forehead and a vice around her heart. The excitement and nerves of the day subsiding had left her weary to the bone. No sooner had the heavy double doors of the hospital shut behind her than a meek whimper reached her ears. Fia’s head whipped to the side.

Those were her eyes. Her nose. Those curls were the ones she’d learned how to braid before she learned to navigate her own, those hands the ones that had wiped the dirt from her skinned knees and the tears from her eyes. That expression on her face was the one she’d carried after their last argument, when Fia had lashed out because John Shelby was tearing her world in half and taking the portion he’d claimed miles away to Birmingham. That was the very same quiver in the very same chin.

“Flossie,” the woman breathed, voice cracking.

Fia’s throat clicked. “Esme.”

“Fuck,” Arthur hissed. “Fuck! What do we tell ‘em?” Arthur paced back and forth, fingers brushing over his mustache.

Tommy took a drag of his cigarette, the cherry glowing in the brisk night air. At the rate he was going at, he would run out shortly. The two of them watched as John drove Florence and Esme to Small Heath, the sisters pressed shoulder to shoulder. “We don’t tell them anything,” Tommy said, smoke trailing from his nostrils. “Not until we have all the details. It doesn’t leave us.”

Arthur paused. “Not even to John?”

“Especially not John. You know who he’ll point fingers at. I wouldn’t want it to drive a wedge between Esme and Florence.”

Arthur scoffed. “Since when did you care so much about things like that?”

It was a fair question, but Tommy bristled nonetheless. He cared about what he wanted to care about, and that was it. “I don’t. I care about the fallout.”

Arthur nodded, kicking a cigarette butt. “I don’t know that Florence would sabotage us.”

There was a beat. “I wouldn’t rule it out. For all we know, she’s already seen the paper.”

The night wind swept over the spires of the hospital with a ghostly howl. Arthur shivered, drawing his coat more tightly around him. “Do you want another man with eyes on the door?”

Tommy dropped the smoldering cigarette butt to the ground, making his way to the car. “Make it two.”

It was blissfully quiet in Esme and John’s house– if it could be called theirs, seeing as it shared space with an expansion of the betting shop. John had gone up to bed and to check on the kids, letting them have the parlor to themselves. Quiet was something that Esme had assured her was rarer than gold. Six beautiful little terrors, Esme had huffed, though the corner of her lip had twitched up as she said it. Four of John’s by his late first wife, two of both of them: Katie, John Jr., Annie, Albert, Daniel, and—

“Florence is two months old now,” Esme said, taking a sip of her tea as the two of them sat together in the parlor around midnight. “We’re thinking of calling her Flora around the family, to differentiate and all.”

Fia bit her lip as she smiled. She might’ve been surprised if she didn’t know her sister so well. Since they were little, a toddler and an infant, Esme would walk around with Fia on her hip despite just being barely tall enough to lift her. To everyone she’d meet, Esme would proclaim “Flossie is my baby”, and would mind her so carefully that their mother hardly even had the opportunity to do it herself. Even as a teenager, Fia had been the only one to call Esme’s bluff when she rebelliously declared that she didn’t like children. “You don’t like other families’ children,” she’d giggled. “That’s not the same thing.”

The house, while a modest size for a family as big as theirs, was lavishly decorated. It felt a bit like home, all these silks and paints and jewel-toned tiles. With everyone asleep, though, it lacked the warmth of a tiny caravan packed full with Lee children all trying to play in the same space. It was like a large, pricey decoration without the vibrancy of daylight. An addition onto the Shelby empire.

Esme shared the sentiment. “I keep wishing for that house in the country,” she said, pouring another cup for Fia– no milk, two sugars. “I need space. I feel cramped in this dingy city.”

Fia snorted. “I know what you mean. Been here for less than a day and the novelty’s worn off already.” She sighed deeply, settling into the brocade couch. “What’s it like?”

Esme swallowed her mouthful of tea, silently requesting elaboration.

“Being out here. Living…” like a Shelby.

“...Like a Shelby?” Esme smiled behind her teacup. Her older sister wasn’t the only one who was easy to read, it seemed. Fia rolled her eyes, but nodded. Esme thought for a moment. “It’s sort of like learning a new language. The more you speak it…”

“The easier it is to fit in?” Fia tried optimistically.

Esme sighed, less enthusiastic than she had been before. She collected their cups and saucers, loading them onto a tray with the teapot and carrying it to the kitchen. Despite Esme insisting that she stay off her feet for once, Fia trailed behind her, hands behind her back like a child in a shop instructed not to touch anything.

“The easier it is to forget what you’ve spoken your whole life.” She twisted the handle on the ceramic sink, allowing sputtering water to soak the dishware. “I don’t think you’d want it for you and your kid, if I know you. There are some things I like, though. It’s very comfortable to have everything we need, and then some. Nice to not have police breathing down my neck when I enter the shops. On top of that, I help out with the bookkeeping when needed, so I know they don’t think I’m stupid.”

There was always a caveat when her sister spoke in that tone. “But…?”

Esme whipped her head around, eyes desperate. “But it’s so bloody boring!”

The two of them giggled like little girls, doubling over into each other until their laughter gave way into silent shaking, then heaving gasps for breath.

“Christ,” Fia said, wiping her eyes. “Is it really that bad?”

“Worse,” Esme said. “I’m not joking, Flossie, I literally don’t know what I’ll do when the kids are all in school. Do I need– do I need to knit? Is that what wives do, knit scarves for the kids or whatever? Can’t bloody well have a garden in this smog. Forget chickens, they’ll go missing as soon as you hatch ‘em in this fucking neighborhood.”

“No,” Fia groaned, dragging her hands down her face. “I swear, Esme, if I ever move to the city and start knitting scarves, you’ll need to put me out of my misery.”

Their fit subsiding, they worked in companionable silence at washing and drying the dishes. Esme bumped her hip against Fia’s, jostling her as she dried the lid of the teapot.

“What’s your problem? Madwoman,” Fia laughed.

Esme just looked at her for a moment, warmth in her brown eyes. Their mother’s eyes. “I dunno. I missed you.”

Fia’s throat tightened. “I missed you too.”

Their goodbye, though temporary, was no less tearful. Fia was sent off with a little container of peppermint tea for the nausea and back pains, and Esme made sure Finn let her into the Shelby house next door, watching until the lock clicked. Three seconds later, Fia saw the beam of light from her sister’s parlor wane as she closed her own door behind her. Her heart ached something fierce the rest of the night.

“Samuel.”

Sam blinked awake, skull leaden and eyes heavy. Had he slept through the entire day? What time was it? The sky was watery blue, not yet light enough to give him much visibility through the thin slits in the curtains. He could make out the silhouette of a figure at the foot of his bed. For half a second he debated the possibility of it being some weird morphine-induced twist on his usual nightmares, but the click-snap of a lighter igniting revealed some details: broad hands, clean-shaven face, cigarette dangling from his lips. The smell of tobacco, not mud-blood-gunpowder. He relaxed a touch.

“Tommy,” he grumbled, drawing a hand up to rub at his dry eyes. “It’s early as all hell.”

“Get up.”

He froze. There was something about his voice that signaled danger, but if he moved on instinct now, he wouldn’t make it far. Between the state of him and the fact that Tommy was undoubtedly armed, he made the smart decision to stay in place.

“Dunno if I can. Tom, is everything alr–”

“What the fuck,” Tommy hissed, “do you think this is? Huh?”

The barrel of his pistol glowed blue in the dim light. Oh, hell.

“Tom, I don’t know what’s going on, but I don’t think I can–”

“Get up and explain this!” A stack of paper landed on his lap. The lamp on his nightstand flicked on, and Sam’s heart nearly lept out through his throat when he saw that Arthur Shelby had been looming in the corner the whole time. The shadows cast on his face from below were something he didn’t think he would forget anytime soon, nor was the scowl he wore that twisted them into a wicked mask of fury. Sam swallowed, dry throat clicking as he turned his attention to whatever it was that Tommy had thrown at him.

From the way it had been folded, it appeared to be a newspaper, wrinkled and frayed at the corners as though it had been passed through many hands. The grayscale images were difficult to parse at first, but he recognized the shapes of the largest ones: Aintree racecourse. A gun.

“And this.” Arthur dropped another, newer one on top of it, the pages still smelling like ink. This time the main image was of an older woman’s smiling face. The sketch adjacent to it looked worryingly familiar.

Sam blinked, gritting his teeth as he pulled himself fully upright in the hospital bed. “You two are scaring me real bad now.”

“Psalms 94:1,” Tommy spat. “Sound familiar, Sam of God?”

“No, it doesn’t!” Sam huffed, exasperated. “Tommy, come on. Enough with the riddles.”

“The Lord is a God who avenges,” Arthur recited, the Bible they’d procured for Sam on Sunday open on the side table, “O God who avenges, shine forth.”

Tommy placed his hands on the footboard, looming over it to where Sam was caught in that piercing glare, no opportunity to look away. “We’ve got you found out, Samuel.”

That made Sam’s heart stop. What the fuck could they have found out? None of his silent guesses comforted him, leading him down darker and stranger paths. Did they know what the war was like for him, beyond what he’d divulged? Is that why they were reading the Bible to him? Did they know? A cold sweat broke out over his skin.

“I- I don’t know what you’ve heard,” Sam stammered, one placating hand up in front of him, “but I never… I wouldn’t. I’m not like that.” Who the fuck had snitched? Was it someone laying in the rat-infested, sodden trenches with him? A superior officer? Fuck, was it the American?

Tommy forcefully expelled a sigh, hovering the muzzle of the gun on top of the newest newspaper, right over the sketch. Right over my right kneecap, Sam thought, shuddering. “Tell me who that is.”

Black hair, sunken eyes, long nose… “That’s me.” Sam’s shoulders sagged a bit. Alright, so it’s probably not about that event. But Tommy was still glaring at him, vivid blue meeting dull gray.

“And what,” he tapped the headline sharply with the gun, “does this say?”

“Come on, Tommy, we don’t need to–”

“Read it.”

Sam was silent.

“Alright,” he snapped, ripping the newspaper away and pointing at the other one. “Let’s backtrack. Fucking tell me what this is about, then.”

Sam stayed silent, looking at Arthur for support and finding none behind hardened eyes. “I can’t.”

Tommy pushed himself back upright, holstering his gun and placing his hands on his hips as he paced towards the window. “Sam, you can’t play clueless all day, alright? This is the kind way, what we’re doing here. We don’t have to be kind.”

“I am clueless!” Sam shouted, even as the effort squeezed at his already-aching ribcage. “Tommy, really, I don’t know what you want from me right now.”

“Read the fucking headline! Tell me what you’ve done!”

“I can’t!” he said, hardly choking the words out. “I can’t.”

Tommy took a step toward Sam with coldness in his eyes, but Arthur put his hand out to intercept him.

“I can’t fucking read.”

Both brothers blinked before Tommy pointed the gun at his head. “You’re a fucking liar.”

“I’m not,” Sam panted. “I can’t read, mate. I– I never learned.”

“You slipped a note into Arthur’s pocket back at Aintree,” Tommy hissed. “Psalms 94:1. That’s what it said. Couldn’t help but make this about your guilty fucking conscience, could you? Did you pray about it? You were the one standing right next to him before we left. You were the one who told us to bet on that horse, and you were the last one to see her before she was taken out of the race.” Tommy cocked the gun as he stepped closer. “You asked for a Bible on Sunday, and now you’re telling me you can’t read?”

“I just hold onto it,” Sam pleaded. “I don’t read it, it’s just– it protects me, s’all. Just a comfort.”

The cold muzzle pressed against his forehead, and Sam went still. Of course it would end like this. All this time he had between Belgium and now was borrowed, anyway. It only made sense that someone would find that out eventually. He closed his eyes and expelled a shallow breath before staring Tommy down. If Tommy was going to take his life, he wouldn’t get the comfort of fear and submission.

A rattling noise across the room caught everyone’s attention just before the heavy door swung open. “You can’t go locking doors like that,” John said as he entered, slipping a lock pick back into his pocket. “That’s a fire hazard. And an… everything hazard, if you want to– hey, hang on.” The man pointed around in a triangle at Tommy, Arthur, and the gun.

Tommy didn’t look away, but he did tilt his head a bit as John announced his entrance. “John, lock the door behind you.”

“No,” he said, crossing his arms. Sam had a vision of John as a stubborn child, refusing to leave until his older brothers included him in their game. “You’re gonna have to explain this here. You two have been acting strange since last night.”

Arthur strode over to pat John on the chest. “We found our rat, Johnny-boy. Aintree’s ours once again.”

John looked confused, attention darting back and forth between Arthur and Sam. “But… how? You mean Sam?” He wrinkled his nose. “No way. Sam can’t have done it.”

“And why is that?” Tommy only pressed the muzzle harder into Sam’s head, forcing it to tip back slightly. Now his heart was racing. The chance of survival was an intoxicating feeling, now that it was a possibility. He peered down his nose at Tommy’s face, no longer cold and empty but pinched in confusion.

“Because,” John said. “Sam can’t read, and the ink on that note was fresh. Right, Arthur? It had to have been written right before you found it in your coat.”

Arthur grumbled, but nodded. He fell quiet, looking to Tommy for guidance.

Tommy’s eyes narrowed. “He can read, John. He asked for a Bible.”

John scoffed. “And Finn keeps those ratty old boxing gloves in his room. Doesn’t make him good at boxing.” John sidestepped Arthur, coming over to tug at Tommy’s shoulder. “Don’t you remember? It was big talk when his dad went insane. Sam hadn’t learned it yet, so he never did. The Lees gave me the whole story.”

“He’s not insane,” Sam said, flushing. “He was kicked by a horse.”

John shot him a look. “Hey, stupid. Don’t fight me on semantics when I’m defending you, alright?”

Sam shut his mouth with a click. Tommy took a few steps back with John’s persuasion, but he kept the gun trained on the space between Sam’s eyes. “There was chaos in that tent,” Tommy said. “How do you know it wasn’t him who pulled the trigger? He’d have every reason to shoot that woman and try to blame you.”

John barked out a laugh at that, chest puffed up with pride. “His sorry arse was too busy being dragged out of harm’s way by yours truly. And besides, I would’ve felt a gun somewhere on him while I was beating him black and blue, if he had one.”

Tommy seemed to accept this, at least temporarily. He holstered his gun, patting John on the shoulder before he paced a nervous lap around the room. Arthur stared down at his feet, embarrassment coloring his ears red.

“So,” Arthur said, clearing his throat, “if it weren’t Sam… who did it?”

“Hello,” Sam tried, voice creaky and dry. “Hi. Can someone tell me what just happened?”

All three brothers looked at him as though he were a ghost. Had he not spoken up, would they have just continued like this? It was a marvel that any of them had women in their lives, all stuck in their own bubble as they were.

Tommy picked up that morning’s newspaper he’d thrown to the ground, dusting it off and handing it to John. At the sight of it, John’s eyebrows raised. He looked at Tommy, who nodded, and then back at the headline.

“Sam, mate,” he said, voice wavering. “Forget snitching. Forget murder. Someone’s framing you for a fucking assassination.”

[myristicisms]

Pale fingers look shockingly lively against the silver strands of hair they roam through, blunt nails gently scratch against the scalp they linger upon while a soft hum rumbles through the shardbinder's body, affectionate in a way while she idly toys with the child's hair. It's refreshing to see him so calm, not picking a fight with other children or running amok in the house playing knight and while Miriam enjoyed humouring the boy's vivid imagination, she was more tired than was typical upon returning from a mission. The order wasted no time in utilizing her services and loathe as she was to be away from her son for too long, she at least had someone she trusted to watch over him and apparently that someone had delighted the child enough to placate him enough to be content with curling into her side, searching for a warmth that tragically her body could not provide.

While not frigid, the ebony haired woman wasn't known for having a high body temperature, typically she'd be lucky to stay luke warm to the touch when the weather was warm but on cooler nights she tended to be no better than cold water. The thought leaves her rather bitter, especially when she can feel his tiny frame tremble against her ribs in a subtle shiver, ( that won't do at all. ) If only she'd learned to augment something as simple as proper heat regulation, instead she settles for slightly rustling the boy in order to reach over the side of the sofa, nimble fingers taking hold of one of the many carefully folded blankets from the basket set to the side before awkwardly unfolding the large sheet of plush fabric.

Enhanced senses had long since left Miriam picky about what sorts of fabrics she can deal with against her bare skin, something that's come in handy quite well too given how much Nero seemed to enjoy the soft feel of her blankets, her tastes were expensive but she demanded the highest quality possible, especially if the items in question were for her son. A soft laugh tumbles from her tongue, amusement sparking in her belly as she playfully lays the blanket over the young boy's frame. “ Oh hm... I could have sworn Nero was with me... ” Mirthful and full of jest, she feels the young boy wriggle against her ribs beneath the large fabric until a little head of silver manages to pop out. “ There he is! ”

These little moments are ones she intends to cherish and make memorable, between the soft fabric laying overtop her legs and the pleasant weight pushing into her side, elbow digging into her ribs and all, she can't help but to be just as delighted as she often was when spending time with the child. Time was fleeting, such was a fact she'd long since forced herself to come to terms with and yet Miriam was still happy nonetheless, soon he would be too big to curl against her like this and he'd grow disinterested in spending time with his mother but for now she'll take what she can get.

@sleeplesswork ;;

[ 𝐒𝐎𝐅𝐓 ] ― receiver wraps a soft blanket around sender’s shoulders ( MOM MIRIAM AND NERO OBVIOUSLY!!!! I just love mama miriam looking after her young son (*≧∀≦*) i was torn between this one and the brushing hair option … soooo if you prefer that >:)) )

[beardedmrbean]

The House approved a measure late Tuesday that would slash Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg's taxpayer-funded government salary to just $1.

The bill — which was introduced by Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga. — was passed via voice vote Tuesday as an amendment to the 2024 Financial Services and General Government Appropriations Act, the standalone funding bill for the General Services Administration, Securities and Exchange Commission and other related agencies.

"I’m proud to announce my amendment to FIRE Pete Buttigieg just PASSED the House. Pothole Pete staged fake bike rides to the White House and used private planes funded by taxpayers to receive awards for the way certain people have sex," Greene said in a social media post Tuesday. "American taxpayers should not be on the hook for paying for his lavish trips or his salary."

"Pete Buttigieg doesn’t do his job. It’s all about fake photo ops and taxpayer-funded private jet trip to accept LGBTQ awards for him," Greene added. "I’m happy my amendment passed, but he doesn’t deserve a single penny."

Since taking office in 2021, Buttigieg has faced criticism for Republican lawmakers in response to several crises that have faced the Department of Transportation.

For example, in February, after a train carrying vinyl chloride, a dangerous colorless gas, derailed in East Palestine, Ohio, Buttigieg was criticized for his apparent inaction and for waiting several weeks before traveling to the site of the derailment. 

In addition, there have been multiple instances of mass commercial airline cancellations during his tenure for various reasons, including a pilot shortage. Republicans and Democrats alike had called for Buttigieg to take decisive action to ensure air travelers are protected from such cancellations.

And while Buttigieg has spent much of his tenure addressing commercial delays, he has used government-managed private jets on at least 18 occasions since taking office. Those flights sparked an ongoing inspector general probe and, according to information obtained by Americans for Public Trust (APT), have cost taxpayers tens of thousands of dollars.

PETE BUTTIGIEG TOOK GOVERNMENT JET TO NYC FOR RADIO INTERVIEW, ACLU MEETING BEFORE FLYING BACK HOURS LATER

In one instance in September 2022, Buttigieg used a government jet for a roundtrip journey to Montreal. During the visit, he attended a ceremony hosted by a large Canadian gay rights organization and received an award for his "contributions to the advancement of LGBTQ rights."

Buttigieg's office has further stonewalled additional information about his use of the executive fleet.

Secretary Buttigieg continues to blow off the American people who simply want to know the true cost of his taxpayer-funded private jet trips," APT Executive Director Caitlin Sutherland told Fox News Digital on Tuesday. "After multiple FOIA requests, a lawsuit, and an ongoing inspector general investigation, Buttigieg's office still refuses to provide vital details about using a private government jet for a swing state tour, which appears more akin to campaigning than official DOT business."

"Buttigieg looks to be politicizing his role and making it clear that he believes he’s above accountability and transparency, a dismissive attitude that seems to be endemic throughout the Biden administration," Sutherland said.

And the transportation secretary came under fire last year after it was revealed he vacationed in Porto, Portugal, while his agency and the White House were locked in tense negotiations with rail worker unions to avert a strike that could have had a dire impact on the U.S. economy. The Department of Transportation said at the time that the vacation was a "long-planned personal trip." 

[tamapalace]

Tamagotchi Uni Uses AWS, Amazon Web Services

The Tamagotchi Uni is the first Tamagotchi to ever connect to Wi-Fi, which enables it to receive over the area updates, programing changes, and more. How exactly is this all being done by Bandai Japan? Well Bandai has built the Tamagotchi Uni on the Amazon Web Services platform (AWS).

The details of this are actually outlined on a recent article on the Amazon Web Services blog. The blog post provided a detailed view on how Tamagotchi Uni use AWS to achieve secure and reliable connectivity and quickly deliver new content updates without leaving customers waiting.It details that Bandai Co., Ltd., the company responsible for product development and sales, adopted AWS IoT to realize the concept of globally interconnected Tamagotchi, enabling users to interact with each other.

Bandai partnered with their cloud development partner, Phoenisys, Inc., to connect and manage million of Tamagotchi devices. One of the critical features was the over the air software updates which uses the jobs feature of AWS IoT Device Management to distribute the latest firmware across all Tamagotchi devices without causing any delays to customers.

To make Tamagotchi Uni IoT-enabled, Bandai establish the three key goals, which was implementing secure connections, scaling the load-balancing resources to accommodate over 1 million connections worldwide, and optimizing operational costs. The article even features the AWS architecture for the Tamagotchi Uni, which is interesting.

AWS IoT Core is used to manage the state of each Tamagotchi Uni device, which helps retrieve distributed items and content. AWS IoT Device Management is used to index the extensive Tamagotchi Uni fleet and create dynamic groups on the state of each device, facilitating efficient over-the-air (OTA) updates. FreeRTOS is used to minimize the amount of resources and code required to implement device-to-cloud communication for efficient system development. AWS Lambda is used to process tasks, delivering new announcements, and registering assets. Amazon DynamoDB is used as a fully managed, sever less, key-value noSQL database that runs high-performance applications at any scale. Amazon Simple Storage Service (Amazon S3) is used for object storage service, each of these data stores are used to manage the various resources within Tamagotchi Uni. Lastly, Amazon Timestream is used to accumulate historical data of user’s actions like downloading items and additional content.

The article also details how Bandai is handling large scale firmware updates to Tamagotchi Uni devices which are executed at a rate of 1,000 units per hour which would have resulted in a delay for some devices. The team actually designed job delivery as a continuous job which automatically updates the devices under certain conditions. This is using fleet indexing that runs a query to see which devices meet the criteria for the update to be pushed out to it.

Lastly the article details how Bandai conducted system performance testing at a large-scale to emulate what it would be like after the device was released. They verified the smooth operation and performance of updates through their testing.

Be sure to check out the full article here on the Amazon AWS blog.

[pwlanier]

A gift to Vice Admiral I.M. Kuznetsov

Wall panel "The Trug". 1975. Wood, bakelite, painting.

In the lower right corner of the image is the author's signature. In the lower left corner of the panel is a gift engraving: "Joseph Matveevich Kuznetsov on his birthday. S. Zavyalov, A. Pronin, Yu. Fedorov. 28.3.1975"

From the collection of the family of Vice-Admiral I.M. Kuznetsova.

Joseph Matveevich Kuznetsov (1915-2009) - Vice-Admiral (1967), Associate Professor (1975), Candidate of Naval Sciences (1976), participant of the WWWI, participant in the defense of the city. Sevastopol. With the beginning of the Great Patriotic War at the disposal of the intelligence department of the headquarters of the Black Sea Fleet, since May 1942 - commander, senior commander (11.1942 - 8.1944) in the operational part of the 2nd branch of the RO headquarters of the Black Sea Fleet, officer-operator of the Office of the Senior Naval Chief in the port of Zimnichi of the Danube Flotilla (8 - 12.1944). Head of the Convoy Service Department of the Operational Training Department of the Operational Division (12.1944 - 1.1945), Operator Officer (1.1945 - 5.1946), Head (5.1946 - 7.1947) of the 2nd Department (Operational Support) of the Operational Department of the Flotilla Headquarters, Commander of the 1st Separate Guards Division of the DUF Torpedo Boat Brigade (7.1947 - 12.1950).

Repeatedly made successful flights to the enemy's shores with the task of reconnaissance and landing of reconnaissance and sabotage groups in the enemy's rear, made 7 combat exits into the deep rear of the enemy. During the battles on the river. The Danube took part in the development of operational documents for the combat operations of the Danube Flotilla, successfully performed the tasks of the command to manage the units during the battle and communication with army units. As an operational duty officer, he provided combat management of formations and units. Chief of Staff (10.1953-11.1956), commander (11-12.1956; 2.1957 - 9.1959) of the Naval Base Swinoujsce of the Baltic Fleet. Commandant of the Kronstadt Naval Fortress (9.1959 - 11.1960). Commander of the Tallinn Naval Base (11.1960 - 8.1963). Deputy Head of the Higher Naval School named after M. C Frunze (8.1963 - 5.1966). Head of the Navy Personnel Department (5.1966 - 8.1969). Assistant (8.1969 - 2.1975), dep. (2 - 9.1975) of the Main Command of the Navy for Naval Educational Institutions - Head of VMUZ (8.1969 - 9.1975). At the disposal of the Commander-in-Chief of the Navy (9 - 12.1975). Since December 1975 in reserve. Senior researcher at the Research Institute-2 of the Ministry of Defense of the USSR in Moscow. (1976-1985). Of the Supreme Soviet of the Estonian SSR of the 5th convocation. Delegate of the XXII Congress of the CPSU.

[soonsweetheart]

The Virtuous Wife

Guide to Becoming a Proverbs 31 Woman

A wife of noble character who can find? She is worth far more than rubies.

We can develop a noble character by following Gods teachings. Let’s dig a little deeper!

Her husband has full confidence in her.

Trust is built over time. Just as we trust fully in the Lord, we also must trust fully in our partners and vice versa.

This isn’t only about remaining loyal, but also about being emotionally vulnerable in marriage.

She works with eager hands.

Life is a blessing! God does not promise us an easy life, but one in which we can trust in His continual guidance. So, that being said, make the most of your time.

Doing the dishes means we have food to eat. Washing laundry means we’re blessed with clothes to wear.

She gets up while it is dark; she provides food for her family.

I’m not a morning person. Not at all. But God has blessed me with the gift of time and I am learning to value each moment by waking up early to spend time with Him.

We have an amazing opportunity to show our love to our families through services like preparing food for them . Just like Jesus served others!

She sets about her work vigorously; her arms are strong for her tasks.

Do all things for the Lord! Even mundane chores can be a form of worship and service.

Femininity is not an equivalent to being weak. Rather, she is a strong woman and a provider.

She sees that her trading is profitable.

As much as I love shopping, it’s important to recognize the importance of money management.

She opens her arms to the poor and extends her hands to the needy.

Jesus calls us to humbly serve others. Some ways to do this are to volunteer at a local food pantry, donate to charities, donate old clothes, give blood, etc.

Don’t forget the key word: humbly. What we do in secret, our Father will reward us for.

Her husband is respected at the city gate.

Marriage is a union of two flesh becoming one. Wives are representatives of their husbands and vice versa.

Likewise, it’s essential to choose a husband wisely. A man of God.

She is clothed with strength and dignity, she can laugh at the days to come.

Strength comes from the Lord. Rely on His power and understanding, not your own.

Laughing at the days to come means having complete faith that God will provide. Rejoice always, in the good and bad, for this is the will of the Father!

She speaks with wisdom and faithful instruction is on her tongue.

Let your wisdom and instruction be the words of God through you. Study your Bible everyday, even for just a few minutes, and pray that He will give you understanding.

She watches over the affairs of her household and does not eat the bread of idleness.

Watch over your loved ones and guide them to Christ.

Idleness is a trap! It leaves us feeling guilty and like we’ve wasted our time, whereas being productive makes us happy and feeling accomplished. Please, utilize the precious time God has given you to serve Him.

Her children arise and call her blessed; her husband also, and he praises her.

This verse is about how your faithfulness and service to God will be a light to others. Let your children see your blessings, attribute them to God, and be praised.

Charm is deceptive and beauty is fleeting; but a woman who fears the Lord is to be praised.

Charm and physical beauty are not qualities that God is looking for, neither is a man of God prioritizing.

Let your beauty be from within. Fear the Lord, or in other words, respect Him and recognize the great works He has done.

Give her the reward she has earned, and let her works bring her praise at the city gate.

All of the above seem like quite a lot to keep in mind, but it’s a journey God will guide us through.

Keep in mind that this is not for nothing, but for the glory of God! Not only will you be praised by your loved ones, but by the Almighty!

[lya-dustin]

All is bliss

Chapter 40

Cw: mentions of family deaths, depression and a blood oath

Gif by @asongoficeandfiresource

Taglist @mercedesdecorazon @darylandbethfanforever9 @sweethoneyblossom1 @watercolorskyy @alexandria-millie @ewanmitchellcrumbs

Driftmark and Dragonstone had fallen once more and what was left of the loyalists scattered making the Battle of the Gullet a victory for them but comes at a great price.

Only a third of the fleet was able to survive and no one is surprised that it was Lys’ part that was left untouched.

The Lyseni Admiral brought gifts and two dragonseeds who turned cloaks seeing the battle lost.

Hugh Hammer and Ulf White would be given lands in the Reach if they managed to quell the rebellious lords.

Addam of Hull and Nettles had regrouped in Celtigar Isle before joining Daemon in the Riverlands, but not after ordering the dragons in the Dragonmont be unchained.

Perhaps having Silverwing here will aid Aemma’s spirits now that Jacaerys is dead.

Baela would likely escape and avenge her betrothed, but Dreamfyre would return to Helaena and provide some safety for the city when Aemond leaves it unguarded.

“Oh, good, I need your advice, little brother.” Aegon acts as if this were any nameday and not less than a day after his wife’s younger brothers were killed in his name.

“What do you think of this crown for Aemma. I know hers matches mine perfectly, but I want something she can wear with colors besides red.” Aegon shows him the gold diadem with seven jewels laid in seven-pointed stars and its matching jewelry.

It was a lovely thing; she’d like it well enough, and he says so.

Of course, material things don’t hold much meaning to her because when you grow with all the wealth and luxury at your fingertips it stops being special.

Fuck, Aemond’s lost count how many times mother has given him seven-pointed star pendants.

The way to Aemma’s heart was through meaningful gifts, something Aegon thought a waste of time because they weren’t spectacular enough for him.

“What did you get her?” his brother asked knowing he can mock it all he wants because it is always something simple and understated.

“A book of poetry.” With red carnations pressed on a poem about forbidden love.

Red carnations signified love and passion, and he was counting on Aemee knowing that.

She’d only see it in private where she’d be free to bite her lip at the romantic meaning of it.

“You are so boring sometimes; I don’t see what she sees in you.” Aegon smiled with pride thinking he had the best gift.

“A functioning cock, perhaps.” The prince regent said with a casual shrug.

This brought out the darkness in Aegon. “How did you know?”

“Jena, she warned me that my services are far from over.” The One-Eye answered unafraid of the bitter edge in his words.

Gods, he hated serving as Aemma’s concubine.

He enjoyed being her lover, but utterly loathed he was must toil for another man to reap the rewards.

Vhagar’s eggs had been plenty, varying from Silverwing’s silver white to the Cannibal’s pitch black.

The greatest of these was the great black one with dark green webbing.

Balerion reborn.

Aegon will want it, Aemond will be forced to offer it to him.

But he wants it for his son.

He had hoped he’d been wed to Aemma by now and if that had occurred, the egg would he placed in the cradle with their son as is custom.

Perhaps he can offer the golden egg Vhagar got from coiling with Syrax, after all Sunfyre and Syrax had been clutchmates even if the latter had hatched four and ten years before the former.

Aemond knows which one Aemma would choose for Aenys: the blood red one that may be Meleys’.

“The Gods give, and the Gods take. If I had known this was going to happen, I would’ve taken Sunfyre and left instead of hiding in the Sept.” his brother spoke with regret and did his best to shove it away the moment his sunken eyes threatened to mist. “But mother and grandfather never cared to listen to us, so why mourn what could have been, eh?”

Aemma’s hair is arranged like a veil made of two braids divided in seven ways and the rest is gathered up in a bun, Aegon’s gift fits her perfectly and yet the seven gemstones are as lifeless as hers.

There had not been a peep about Luke, Arrax had been shot down, but its rider remained a mystery.

There was hope yet.

“You can’t let yourself leave like that again. Do you hear me? You. Cannot. Give. Up.” Baela shook her by the shoulders when the nagging pit in her stomach told her Luke was dead as well.

“If not for us, for your babe.” Baela held back her tears as bravely as she could, but in the end both girls stand there on her rug clutching to each other as the grief overtakes them. They sit in front of the fireplace where just seconds ago burned offerings to their dead.

Baela in her rage and grief had cut her hair up to her chin, burning her silver mane as they prayed in High Valyrian for a peaceful afterlife for their dead.

She loved Jace, they were set to wed on her six and tenth nameday because Jace wanted her to be sure and have the power to refuse if she didn’t wish to marry him.

Their dragons had chosen each other as mates and Vermax was supposed to bring forth a clutch of eggs on the next moon.

Now all those hopes and dreams Jace and Baela had for their future had died with him.

Eventually, Baela would be made to wed a man loyal to Aegon because she is a ward of the crown. Perhaps this husband will be a good man and deserving of her, but Aemma doesn’t think it likely.

All is bliss in the court of Aemma the Great, Alys Rivers’ words become more ironic and crueler with each passing day.

“I won’t, I promise.” The young queen nods in understanding and pulls herself together.

“Then prove it to me.” The girl said pulling out a hidden dagger and cutting her palm. “Let us swear a blood oath: we will avenge them, and we will take what they have stolen from us. With Fire and blood.”

Aemma takes the bloody knife and repeats the oath as she bites back the pain as they bind their hands with the ribbon Jace gave Baela, “We will avenge our dead and take what is ours with fire and blood.”

When Sharako Lohar enters the Throne Room as a hero, Aemma knows Baela’s knife won’t be the only thing to kill him the moment he is alone.

[rideboomindia]

How RideBoom auto rickshaw plan is differ from rapido and ola

Here are some key ways the RideBoom auto rickshaw plan may differ from the offerings of larger players like Rapido and Ola:

Target Market:

RideBoom may be focusing more on serving the needs of traditional auto rickshaw drivers and commuters, a segment that may not be the primary focus for the larger ride-hailing platforms.

By catering to this market, RideBoom's plan could offer features and benefits tailored to the specific requirements and challenges faced by auto rickshaw drivers and passengers in its local market.

Operational Model:

RideBoom's auto rickshaw plan may have a more decentralized, community-driven approach, potentially involving partnerships with local auto rickshaw associations or cooperatives.

This could allow RideBoom to better integrate with the existing auto rickshaw ecosystem, leveraging local knowledge and relationships.

Technology and Innovation:

As a smaller, more agile player, RideBoom may be able to innovate and implement new technologies more quickly to address the unique needs of the auto rickshaw market.

This could include features like specialized mobile apps, digital payment solutions, or fleet management systems tailored for auto rickshaws.

Regulatory Approach:

RideBoom's auto rickshaw plan may navigate local regulations and licensing requirements more adeptly, given its deeper understanding of the market and closer ties with the auto rickshaw community.

This could allow RideBoom to offer a more streamlined and compliant service compared to the larger platforms, which may face greater bureaucratic challenges in certain markets.

Customer Service and Support:

RideBoom's smaller scale and localized focus may enable it to provide more personalized customer service and support to both auto rickshaw drivers and passengers.

This could include dedicated hotlines, in-person assistance, or community-based problem-solving mechanisms that cater to the specific needs of the auto rickshaw ecosystem.

Sustainability and Social Impact:

RideBoom's auto rickshaw plan may have a stronger emphasis on supporting the livelihoods of traditional auto rickshaw drivers, potentially offering better earnings, training, or social welfare programs.

This could position RideBoom as a more socially responsible player, committed to empowering and integrating the auto rickshaw community into the evolving transportation landscape.

While Rapido and Ola may have greater resources and scale, RideBoom's auto rickshaw plan could leverage its local market knowledge, community-based approach, and innovative solutions to differentiate itself and better serve the unique needs of the auto rickshaw segment. Effective execution and a deep understanding of the local context will be critical for RideBoom to carve out a sustainable niche in this competitive market.

[thetruearchmagos]

The Aircraft Carriers Of The UC Civil Defence Service

Hey folks! Felt bad about not releasing any Worldbuilding content recently, wanted to do something nice to get me back into the rhythm of things. Enjoy!

Tagging @lividdreamz @athenswrites @theprissythumbelina @thatndginger @the-stray-storyteller @hessdalen-globe @caxycreations @writeblrsupport

The Warp's Rescuers

For as long as the great Warp between the 12 Worlds has been plied - and that is a longer time than modern history knows - those who have sailed its depthless and endless expenses have faced death, destruction, and simple and utter disappearence as a simple risk of the mariners trade. Even the safety of the Contours is not a complete one, and it can never truly be known just how many ships have gone down with their crews in the ages past.

In the modern day, though, the business of inter-World communication and movement is a much safer one for all involved. Developments in the ships and crews themselves have certainly helped, but the creation of a truly - for the most part - international and wide reaching institution of at-sea search and rescue has saved the lives of thousands of mariners at sea. The United Commonwealth, acting primarily though its Navy and Civil Defence Service, has committed itself to this transnational endeavour with all its usual vigour, and in all its might and wealth hs provided for one capability no other state could dream of; the Rescue Carroer.

What Do You Do With A Fleet Of Spare Ships

The first trans-Warp 'Rescue Carriers' were a relatively recent development, borne out of the helpful confluenbce of two seperate events. Going into the 140s A.S., the Navy had found itself with the unprecedented luxury of having more carrier hulls than it either wanted or needed. Caught in the middle of a mass rearmament initiative on a scale not seen since the Chainbreaker War, and which would similarly find its conclusion in the 1st Great War, the Service had been inclined to retire in large numbers its previous class of 'Fleet' carrier, the Union's, in order to make room on the yards, docks, and crew and squadron rosters for the newer Valorous-class to take over. Many of the newer Union's would remain in naval service as true carriers or converted for work as amphibious vessels, but a sizeable portion of the fleet was "too old to service aircraft that weren't obsolete, too new to scrap without pissing off Parliament, too useful to consider selling to our allies, and present in too large numbers to convert". That would have left the Directorate of the Navy with quite the challenge, if an alternative and interested buyer had not made itself known.

UC-CDS Goes Inter-Global

As part of a more general bonanza towards the expansion of UC foreign policy and influence abroad, a number of schemes had been trickling in that saw the domestically minded Civil Defence Service see its purview expand well beyond Commonwealth soil. The Police Service had been in the business of overseas deployments for a century by then - and in existence for about that much longer than the CDS - but it would pose a massive challenge to the already behemoth institution to grow its reach so far. At home, CDS covered everything from the ambulance service to firefighting, and had indeed already provided assistance in a limited capacity to disaster relief operations beyond Commonwealth border. This new initiative, however, would see a far greater expansion of the CDS's resources and mandate than that, from providing full scale vaccination, medical, and firefighting services to foreign nations which lacked those services, to participating in the training of foreign recruits on UC-pattern exported equipment for their own use. It was quite a tall order, but bar one it would have been manageable.

Treaties

That 'one' was Article XXI of the Conference on Maritime Conduct. A triumph of UC statecraft, among a bevy of other treaties, Article XXI forced an absolute commitment by all signatory states to do all in their power to save a stricken vessel and its crew of any nationality or background in time of need. To meet this commitment, the rest of the government decided to dump the job onto the backs of the CDS, which had a long-running obligation to do the same for vessels nearer to UC waters as a coast guard. This would be different, however, as the treaty and the UC's chosen interpretation of its requirements meant that the CDS would need to provide coverage as much as possible to the waters of foreign states where it had never before operated as well as almost the entirety of the open oceans, and most daunting of all, the the vast and unknowable expanses of the Warp, so large that only the UC Navy itself could come close to being able to claim the ability to project assets and activity across it.

Clearly, CDS would need their help.

Old Ships Learn new Tricks

At sea SAR operations were an intensive, expensive process, and to cover the vast stretches of both the oceans pf the 12 Worlds and the surface of the Warp it was believed that only aircraft would suffice. Able to patrol vast stretches of open waves from high up and move quickly to respond to ships in need, CDS had already retained a sizeable ground-based aviation fleet larger than some state's air forces before its new mission had been shoved onto its lap. While a slight expansion of that terrestrial force could suffice to aid in near-shore overseas missions to provide maritime SAR, in the open ocean and the Warp sea based aviation would be required. Aeroships flying off the decks of CDS cutters were useful, but mostly lacked the range, endurance, or speed needed, though their ability to stay stationary while airborne at low altitudes meant they could be useful. For the issue of long-range patrolling, however, they would have to approach the masters of finding small things in a big sea with aircraft.

Smelling a potential publicity bonanza for the Service, in addition to all the actual strategic benefits behind a partnership when it came to the foreign policy of the UC, the Directorate of the Navy and Directorate-Generale of Defence quickly agreed to the proposal put forwards by the CDS. Two middle-aged Unions were first selected, the former UCS Dynamic and Dauntless who'd already had a fair decade under each of their belts. These would serve as initial training and experimentation ships, meant to allow the CDS to get some experience in the field of non-combat related carrier operations. A suite of demilitarised, and quite obsolete, aircraft was also provided to see which of them would make good patrol birds or which might fill some other useful role, such as aerial tankers or controllers. These initial tests would conclude in 145 A.S., and quite satisfactorily for all involved. It was eventually decided that a total of twenty Unions would be provided, with modification costs to be shouldered by a special Parliamentary allowance, with the ships themselves to be based in adapted civilian ports and serviced in civilian yards to take pressure off the needs of the Fleet. The first ship of this new breed, UCS Umbrage, would conclude these works in early 147, and the last, UCS Marvel, at the turn of the decade.

In addition to the ships themselves, entire new wings of the Civil Defence Academy would be created for the purposes of training the new skills these operations called for, and the Navy itself would have to impart skills and doctrines created over generations and adapted to the CDS's needs to the organisation on a wide scale. From the deadly dance of open-ocean underway refueling to the near-mystical intricacies of Warp navigation, it is a testament to their cooperation and professionalism of both organisations that in the first three years of CDS carrier operations, only fifteen major accidents occured a backdrop of near continuous and frenetic activity, none of them fatal for CDS personnel or those they were rescuing.

Good Service

The fruits of this investment, as great as it was, would quickly make themselves known. Four ships operating on the Warp's 'Layer 5' in 148 A.S., the industry preferred and officially mandated Layer for merchant commerce, would conduct an average of sixteen major missions every month each. Ranging from collisions to the wrath of an errent Warp Storm, such incidents in the past had proven easily fatal, but thanks to the timely arrival of rescue professionals guided by the flying eyes of the CDS's new carrier pilots these sailors more often than not made it out alive. Over a hundred sailors would be rescued directly by aircraft and aeroships flying from the three carriers' decks by years end, and the over two thousand saved across the Warp by the CDS and third-party ships providing assistance owed much of their survival to the crucial air provided by CDS patrol aircraft even if the carriers were not directly taking part.

Diplomatically, the knowledge that thousands of families across the 12 Worlds owed their loved-ones lives to the efforts of the United Commonwealth was quite the boon, and more broadly symbolised the UC's commitment to 'good-faith acting on the international stage' in a manner no other polity could match. The public credibility of the UC more broadly in the period was mostly on the uptick across the decade, with the exception of a few crises, and such visible policies as this were key in maintaining that credibility on the world stage.

In conclusion, it was with good reason that Foreign Commissioner Konrad Krantz, the United Commonwealth's senior diplomat across almost forty years, the architect of almost the entirety of the UC's modern insitution of statecraft, and the victor of three Great Wars, would refer to this particular piece of almost spontaneous policy as "one of the best things the Commonwealth had ever done for itself, and the rest of the 12 Worlds too I'd imagine."