#google docs hell

[soaringbubblegum]

Me opening my Google Docs like it’s a cursed vault of ancient secrets:

🧠: you should really organize these 👁️: shut up I know where everything is by vibe

✨ current doc titles include:

"jason hits someone with a fridge (metaphorical?)"

"tim_drake_emotional_damage_FINAL_finalv2"

"sukuna_fixes_nothing_but_makes_it_worse.docx"

"out of context horny but it’s about trust"

"this will never see daylight but i’m writing it anyway"

[shorthaltsjester]

Critical Role: 10 Years of Storytelling

Campaign 1, Episode 115, "The Chapter Closes." // Taliesin Jaffe, in "As D&D booms, 'Critical Role' makes its own kind of nerd celebrity" by Sarah Parvini // Campaign 3, Episode 31, "Breaking Point" // On Loving by Forugh Farrokhzad, tr. Sholeh Wolpé // The Legend of Vox Machina at NYCC 2022 // 8-bit Stories // Campaign 1 Wrap-Up // “Without You Without Them” by boygenius // Campaign 2, Episode 141, "Fond Farewells." // Campaign 3: Behind the Set // Letters to Milena by Franz Kafka // Campaign 1, Episode 115, "The Chapter Closes." // Explanation of the final Vex’ahlia playlist by Laura Bailey // Liam's Quest: Full Circle // Backwards by Warsan Shire // Exandria Unlimited: Kymal, Part 2 // Explanation of Fearne’s second playlist by Ashley Johnson // Lighthousekeeping by Jeanette Winterson // San Diego Comic-Con 2023, Critical Role: Fireside Chat & Cast Q&A // Exandria Unlimited Cooldown: Divergence Episode 4 // Campaign 3, Episode 23, "To the Skies." // Explanation of the final Percy playlist by Taliesin Jaffe // "For Good" by Stephen Schwartz // Campaign 3, Episode 91, "True Heroism." // Exandria Unlimited: Calamity, Episode 4, "Fire and Ruin." // Campaign 3, Episode 121, "A New Age Begins."

[nopanamaman]

Secret Stash is now a Google Drive!

Should be easier to update and look through:)

[ziyechs]

joe'marr bengals reunion — a (somewhat) comprehensive timeline

1 — “have you spoken to the cincinnati bengals and what would it mean to reunite with joe burrow there?” — “i have talked to the bengals. i don’t know how many times i’ve talked to them though. but, me and joe, you know, i wouldn’t mind going back with joe. if we go back together we’re trying to do nothing but get back our chemistry and have some more fun.”

2 — “i'm really excited for this draft. i don't really know what's coming but, you know, if me and joe could get back to it... i’d love to have some fun with him again.”

3 — “i assume you'd be okay with a potential reunion in cincinnati if that were to happen?" — "yeah, i wouldn’t mind.”

4 — “me and joe talked about [a reunion] maybe like three, four times actually. we talked about it a good bit of times. he texted me this morning, just letting me know: ‘get your bags packed’, so i guess that meant that was gonna be the pick. i don’t know if that was a hint or what. so, he sent me that little text this morning, i was like ‘okay… i'm ready, bro’.”

5 — “what was your reaction like when he was lowkey recruiting you?” — “i actually was believing him sometimes, sometimes i was like ‘stop playing with me’ and sometimes i was just like ‘okay bro, i gotcha, i'm ready now’ so. i believed him this morning when he told me, you know, pack my bags. so that's when i finally was like: ‘yeah he might really be calling this’ so that's when i took his word.”

6 – “jimmy burrow, did joe tell you—he’s always been kind of coy about what he said to the bengals—did joe tell you that he wanted the bengals to select ja’marr?” — “yes, i think we figured that… and eventually… yes, he pretty much told us that he wanted ja’marr.”

7 — “it was like a week before the draft, ja'marr said: ‘dad, joe texted me.’ […] he didn't say what he said, you know. but he said: ‘joe just texted me’, [...] so he had talked to joe like... or texted with joe once or twice that week. and then he told me, he said: ‘dad, if i get with joe, we're gonna kill’ [...] so he was all excited about getting with joe.”

8 — “what was the first thing joe texted you when you got drafted by the bengals?” — “make sure your bag's packed and ready. yeah, that was what he told me.”

9 — “the cincinnati bengals are on the clock now. earlier that morning, i had got a text from joe. he said: hope your bags are packed. i know it's me, at the moment, that's what i'm saying to myself. i can't wait to be a part of it.”

10 — articles: 1, 2, 3, 4

[thelovebug1968]

Mwah

[nat1nonsense]

Screaming crying throwing up thinking about Orym and Dorian waking up together in a way that’s not that different from all of the times they’ve waken up together before, but also *so incredibly different*

[stygiansauce]

🦃 morning / afternoon / evening!

Scarian is the classic <3 ive only written them once for a friend and it took me… months… got stuck on one scene and avoided it for ages (and then got into taurtis x grian but that’s another story)

Cub and Scar being brotherly and inseparable is soo <3333 everything to me. Have you read “closer to another shore”? Oh my god. Changed my life. And scar and Cub within that book… absolute peak. Devoured it twice over and once more on top of that. Very much recommend if you want to tear your own heart out and crush grian like a bug!

ooo! I'll have to give that one a lookie!

I have this whole scale AU for Scarian that I'll write one day. it's bound to be my hardst work yet (yeah including the historial research and mapping nightmare that is Dealing Despair), because Splinter is one of those fics you have to plan every single scene out to make it all come together in the end.

My goal with Splinter) whenever I get around to writing it, it is to have like a fraction of coolness Birrdie's as above, so below has?? It's still one of my favorite fics of all time and I strive to write an AU like that one day. Splinter isnt the same thing? it's like a past life kind of thing, but the part im trying to emulate from aasb is the "oh something is happening here...I am scared of it" vibe.

Eitherway, if you want a good Grian fic (with some Scarian) THATS the fic. This is the fic I give to all my friends new to the fandom/to fanfiction. I shove aasb and Dirges in the Dark at them because those are the two fanfics I want on my shelf YESTERDAY. Like physical copies. (I am working on that actually....)

OKAY I'VE YAPPED ENOUGH! Time to clock in for the writing shift today <3

[dancing-dawn]

uni deadlines hell is one bitch of a writer's block

[greenteabelle]

a missing scene from the misaeng valentines au , if you will , released to the public as requested by @poetryincamelot !!

When Geurae hears the familiar rush of footsteps coming from behind, he's tempted to start running. 

But alas, he's never been able to escape from Han Seokyool's clinginess before. 

"My darling Geurae." Seokyool croons as he naturally wraps an arm around Geurae's shoulders to pull him closer. The latter stumbles slightly from the action, though he does nothing more than shoot a glare at the perpetrator. The sight only seems to amuse him further, however, as they come to a stop in front of the lifts. "Did you sleep well?" 

"Yes, I did." Geurae answers drily, pressing the lift button with some difficulty because of how clingy the bastard is. He tries to pry the Seokyool off his shoulder, missing his days of having personal space, only for the offending hand to slide down to his waist instead. Barely containing a flinch when the man lightly pinches him there, Geurae decides to accept his fate. It won't prevent him from squirming every so often though. "You're here early; Do you have a lot of work to do?" 

The lift arrives with a melodic ding and they walk in, briefly detached from each other. As Geurae habitually presses the 15th and 16th button, Seokyool practically wraps himself around him from behind, chin tucked squarely in the crook of Geurae's neck. 

"What a woeful day it is, to be coming in early for work on such a special day!" Seokyool bemoans. 

"Is today a special day?" 

"...Jang Geurae, it's Valentine's Day. Why else would you be fully booked with meetings today?"

"Thanks for the reminder, but why and how do you even know my schedule?" 

"I asked here and there." Seokyool vaguely answers, with no attempt to explain how he managed to overhear the information through sheer determination. He instead digs through his briefcase to pull out something. "Anyway, it's because I wanted to give you this." 

Geurae looks down, only to be surprised by an intricately embroidered pouch. He accepts the gift, carefully studying it with slight awe as he brushes his fingers over the silky fabric and impressive recreation of a bowl full of black and white Go stones. 

"It's beautiful." 

Geurae can feel the pride radiating off of the man's chest after he says that. He pulls open the drawstrings of the pouch to find an assortment of Hershey's kisses. Geurae almost snorts.

"Do you like it?"

"Yeah, I do. I didn't know you knew embroidery."

"It's a hobby I picked up from my grandma. Since you liked it, I'm glad."

"But… it's too much. I don't have anything to give you." 

Surprisingly, Seokyool lets go of Geurae and steps into his field of view with a mischievous expression. He clears his throat, leaning in as he taps his cheek pointedly without a word. When he sees Geurae scrunch his nose in disgust, Seokyool almost laughs off the matter and is about to step away-

-When Geurae's expression morphs into one of consideration. 

Before Seokyool can do anything, Geurae speaks up. 

"I suppose it will have to do."

And he tilts his head upwards and brushes his lips gently against Seokyool's cheek. 

The action must have only lasted mere seconds, yet Seokyool feels as though an eternity has gone by. He barely stops himself from reaching out to touch the man's lips, just to make sure that they were truly as soft as it felt on his skin, instead cupping his cheek with a hand. As if it would retain the sliver of warmth that still remained. 

The lift dings.

"I'll see you later, Han Seokyool." Geurae murmurs with suspiciously pink ears, before stepping out of the lift. He gives a small wave as Seokyool slowly turns to face him, like he still can't quite process what has happened, until the doors close. "Happy Valentine's Day." 

Inside the lift, Seokyool's face burns, though his smile is giddy.

[a-thenais]

[TEMPLATE BY @hexeddocs] (Reposted it because the white borders were bothering me *very* much*) After literal months, I finally completed this beautiful template for my OC Lucifer, from my series of novels (the “Nova Apocrypha Vulgata”). And let me tell you, it was so fun and so tiring at the same time to fill it out, especially for someone who’s used to editing pictures and graphics on GIMP and not Google Docs, but I wanted to give it a try and, oh well, I am very impressed with the results. I changed the fonts a bit to keep them “on brand” for the ones I always use for my novels’ edits or added new ones I liked like “Fondamento”. I added some gold to some of the pages for that Lucifer™ aesthetic and there it is. (I’m kind of unsure about this last one change, but whatever, I’m too lazy to save everything again). I hope y'all like it and that I made no spelling/grammar mistakes (English is my second language, sometimes a few errors here and there can appear). Thanks again to @hexeddocs, the template is amazing and very easy to navigate even for people who never used GD for these purposes! 💜🐍 Planning to make more using a friend’s template specifically for angel characters 🤗 Zoom to take a better look and read better! (Please, do not steal/take inspiration/copy any of the information contained in these slides).

[trickstersaint]

a few people have asked to see the full text for aromanticism which i would love to provide in a nice beautiful format where it all looks how it does when you play it. however the insides of it look like this!

and that is 6161 words across 93 passages and i am just not willing to go in there and copy/paste or screenshot them all one by one. so! what i do have is like. almost the raw data, just all of the text of it; not organized by anything and it's got all the command language in there, but it is searchable and you'll be able to follow the little titles through it if you'd like. linking that for you here on my little webbed site in case that satisfies anyone's needs <3 you just have to promise not to judge while you're looking at the guts of it i was learning to use twine as i made this and it is not as gorgeous beautiful when you're not looking at it through the reader interface haha <3

[hiranospiercing]

[69fandom-fanatic69]

I know I like, never post outside of reports, but I've been watching Markipliers Poppy Playtime playthrough again and with teh release of ch 4 I've gotten obsessed with Dr. Sawyer so....

✨️NEW OC TIME✨️

So, unlike most takes and x reader fics I've been imagining this disgruntled, reluctant woman in her thirties (who has had no association with Playtime Co outside of maybe watching the advertisements growing up) being dragged along by her 20 something year old dipshit friends into the Playtime Co. Factory.

Shit obviously goes down and all her friends are dead. She (somehow) manages to make it down deep enough into the factory that she "runs into" Harley without interacting with most of the bosses (Mommy Long Legs, Cat Nap, etc.)

I say "run into" because it's more like she stumbles into his area (whatever the fuck you call it) and she makes a hide out nearby while he just silently observes with mild intrigue for a while.

She's been subsisting on sheer manic spite and the flesh of the (evil) smiling critters dolls (with great reluctance)

Might make her a unique character, might reuse one of my current ones and slap them into the story.

If you wanna use this stupid idea of mine please just credit me. Cool thanks.

[floofysmallbob]

does anyone have any good fics where vi works for Silco and jinx was in Stillwater?

[xiolette]

hmm if you're doing requests... Roxas + Oathkeeper/Oblivion? I love your headcanons on that, and your writing is super nice, so seeing them in prose form would be sweet

Roxas was sprawled on the floor after a sparring session, breathing heavily from the exertion of just trying to keep up. Axel stepped on his hand and kicked his Keyblade away when he let go.

Axel sighed, “Y’know, at this point it’ll be months before you get solo mission privileges.” He knelt down but didn’t offer to help him up. “You throw all your weight around and tire yourself out before you can do anything.”

Roxas gasped and struggled to catch his breath, “You’re just too fast.”

“Please,” Axel snorted. “I’m not even the fastest one in the Organization and there are plenty of Heartless that are faster than me.” He stood up and put his hands on his hips. “You don’t need to keep up, y’know. All you need to do is defend and look for my weak points. No one’s asking you to run after me.”

Roxas pouted and looked forlornly at his disarmed Keyblade. He stretched out his hand and willed it to come back. It just sat there uselessly. It didn’t even glow. Roxas pouted even more.

“Still getting the hang of that?” Axel observed, not cruelly but not kindly either.

“I can do it.” Roxas insisted, before trying again.

Nothing happened.

Axel rose an eyebrow and strolled over to the Keyblade. He placed his boot on the hilt and pressed down until it dissolved into shards of light. He brushed the shards off his coat with the air of someone putting out stray embers. He hid his grimace and looked back at Roxas. “You need to learn how to break things.”

That was the biggest problem with the kid. As vicious as he could get, he was never vicious enough. Something always held him back and that was going to kill him someday. Axel hated to admit it, but he didn’t want to see the kid go quite yet.

He sighed and waited for Roxas to finally get up. Once he did, Axel swept out his leg to knock him down again.

Well, at least the kid finally learned that the fight isn’t over as long as the two were still in the training room - he jumped out of the way, barely wobbling on his landing. The Key was back in his hands in a flash - just in time to catch Axel’s Chakrams before they could slice across his face. Just as quickly, Axel dispelled his weapons and grabbed the Keyblade with his own hands. The audacity of the move loosened Roxas’ grip and Axel yanked the weapon away before it could burn through his gloves. As the Key clattered to the ground, Axel summoned his weapons and pushed Roxas back.

“You can’t keep dodging forever,” said Axel as he continued to block the way to the Key.

Roxas snarled and lunged. Axel kicked him in the stomach and watched him drop.

“Your focus should be on your enemy,” Axel nudged the boy over and placed his boot on his chest. The hatred in the kid’s eyes almost looked real. He ignored it and continued, “You’d be dead by now if this was an actual fight.”

Roxas struggled and clawed against his boot, but Axel pressed down.

“I’m not letting you leave until you call back your weapon.”

“And if I can’t?” Roxas spit.

In response, Axel pressed down even further. “If you can’t do something as simple as that, then there won’t be much use for you in the long run. Did you really expect me or the rest of the Organization to hold your hand forever?”

Roxas didn’t reply. His hand stretched towards the Key as if he could will it within his reach. His eyes screwed shut and beads of sweat formed at his hairline from the concentration. The more pressure Axel applied to his chest, the more the edges of his form seemed to flicker.

Axel felt something eerily close to pity slink around in his chest. “Let it go,” he said, lessening the pressure of his boot just enough for Roxas to catch his breath. “Whatever it is that’s holding you back, just let it go. Focus on the Light and snuff it out.”

Roxas paused, though the muscles of his arms and shoulders were still tense while the muscles of his eyes relaxed. His hand twitched, but still, nothing happened. Axel shook his head and prepared to shift his weight back to the boot on the boy’s chest.

Then, he noticed that the Key on the ground was gone.

He lept out of the way just in time to avoid Roxas slashing through his body with the new Key in his hands.

It was different from the one he held before. It was no longer a reflection of Sora’s. No, it was something else entirely: sharp and vicious and absolutely oozing with Darkness. Axel smiled wide, baring teeth that have grown a little too sharp in his rekindled excitement. Roxas was crouched low to the ground with his eyes trained on Axel. For the first time, his glowing blue iris’ actually froze Axel in place with how cold and impersonal they were.

In a flash, Roxas was in front of him.

If Axel was human, he wouldn’t have been able to dodge the vicious swipe aimed at his abdomen. He shifted his form and broke his back to let it bend in a way it wasn’t supposed to. Roxas responded by slashing at the legs that precariously held him up. There was such little time before the movement and the impact that Axel couldn’t quite avoid it. He tried to transport out of the way, but he still materialized on the other side of the room with a new cut on his leg.

With the added distance between them, Axel had enough time to further observe the new Key in Roxas’ hand. It was black, with a purple layer of dripping, pulsating Darkness covering it. The cut on his leg burned with it, like poison. He hissed in pain and cast as minor of an Esuna as he could that would alleviate the burn without wasting too much energy.

Roxas flash-stepped in front of him, already mid-swing. Axel was only just able to catch the blade with his Chakrams before the teeth could catch his face. He noticed the barbed keychain wrapped around Roxas’ hand and tilted his head. Interesting.

Roxas gnashed his teeth and pressed down even harder. Axel dispelled his Chakrams and leaned to the side, punching Roxas in the gut when he overbalanced.

“Good effort,” he commended, as the kid wheezed. “You actually managed to get a decent hit on me,” The hit was more than decent with the Poison effect on top of it, but he didn’t want to stroke the boy’s ego too much.

“I’m not done yet,” Roxas spit, still holding to his Key for dear life. Axel only just noticed the blood dripping from his hand, the slashes on his glove from the barbed chain.

“You are,” Axel replied, simply, strolling out of the training room to emphasize his words. “You have a fighting chance out here, now. Congrats.”

The kid’s glare was different than it was before. There was an actual hint of danger now - he finally earned his place as a real threat and he seemed to know that.

Axel smiled, friendly in all but intention. “Same time tomorrow, Key-Bearer.”

He walked away before Roxas could respond, but the cold blue of his glare followed him down the hall.

[ehlnofay]

my tes secret santa for @anotherclassicpretence! truth be told I've been having a tad bit of writer's block lately but some of your prompts were VERY interesting (I liked the idea of writing delphine before the main quest a lot... this more or less counts) so I hope I've done them justice. hope you're having a splendid holiday season!

...

“Steady on, Hilde,” Delphine says with a brusque, manufactured sort of calm. “You’ll do yourself a mischief.”

It's a relief, she thinks, that the day Hilde has elected to barge in with world-upending news is a convenient one; it isn’t as though Riverwood is the kind of place to attract crowds, most of the time (part of the reason she chose to live here at all) but the inn is unusually quiet now. Orgnar is nominally organising something in the cellar, which means that he’s spending an hour swapping two bottles around and calling it a day, and the dining hall is warmed to a swelter with the ever-going hearthfire, and utterly empty. No-one’s come in for lunch yet. No rooms rented out last night, either, so it’s all silent on that front; it’s just Delphine and her wet cotton cloth, wiping down the stained tables till they shine, and Hilde with her hair wrapped and her string of beads tangling round narrow, hard-knuckled fingers. She’s sat herself on the chair with the wobbly leg; it needs fixing soon. Ordinarily, Delphine would herd her onto another, but right now she doesn’t think there’s anything in the world that would get Hilde to listen.

“Hark at her!” she complains to the bead-string - all marbled glass dyed blue and red and yellow, clinking together on their leather cord. “Do a mischief - do a mischief - it’s as if she can’t bloody hear me -”

Delphine swipes the cloth over the chip in the corner of the table. “I hear you,” she replies (does she ever hear her). Hilde’s hands are white where the necklace bites into her skin; her lips are pinched into a puckered line. Her eyes are red-rimmed and fierce. “Hilde. I’m going to get you a drink to calm your nerves, and then we’ll talk it over properly, all right?”

“Talk it over,” Hilde repeats, high and scornful, and then her face screws up quite suddenly as if all the fight has fled it - the wrinkles in her cheeks deepening to uneasy valleys, knuckles pressed to the thin slat of her mouth, beads digging hard into her cheek. “Nine have mercy… thank you, Delphine.”

The inner corner of Delphine’s lip snags, near imperceptibly, between the blunt ends of her canines. She nods once, and she ducks behind the bar, folding the cloth with damp precision as she goes. The cask of ale is near empty, the mugs lined up on their shelf, sparkling clean, cutlery rattling around in its tin. It's not fancy - Riverwood is a small, old town, built on the bones of an older one, and no matter how well-run the inn has been since she bought it it's not exactly a prime destination, but it's a good sort of a place. And innkeeping is decent work. Keeps you busy. Keeps your ear to the ground. Gives you something to focus on, in the meantime -

When Delphine grabs a tankard, she notes with some incredulity that her hand is trembling. She stills it. She pours the ale until the cup rim is flecked with froth.

(Gives you something to focus on in the meantime, in between real work, while you're waiting -)

(There is a feeling rising in her body, foaming like the ale; a sour, stomach-turning excitement, as if she's in her twenties again and wet behind her ears, biting back all the intrigue. Like she has an unlined face and fresh armour and is standing again in line for her induction ceremony. Like she's staring something in the face and thinking, finally.)

Delphine caps the cask. She is not in her twenties, and she is not staring anything down; bar Hilde, a seventy year old woman with tannin-stained hands and the latest in a line of tall stories. Delphine didn't get this far (how far?) (still alive, isn’t she) through credulity. She's a pragmatist through and through - won't believe anything she hasn't seen evidence of with her own eyes; and yet.

And yet.

She sets the mug down on the table; a pale and lukewarm drop slides down the pewter, just next to the handle. She'll need to wipe it all down again, after this.

Hilde takes it, absent-minded; the beads slither from where they’re strung around her hands to rest in a smooth curve over her chest. Her hands are shaking - she doesn’t seem to notice, or if she does, she doesn’t stop them. There is a look about her, all of a sudden, that seems dreadfully, fixedly haunted, like a woman looking down the barrel of a cannon, some rapid-rigged explosive, something to level the town. Like she’s caught the apocalypse’s eye. Delphine reaches out, perfunctory, and pats the back of her hand; Hilde grimaces and downs half her tankard in one long, desperate swig.

Light’s coming in through the window-slats up by the rafters, dull and gold, dust motes in the shafts of it. It makes the white wimple of cloth swaddled hastily around Hilde’s head shine in places.

“Big as the mountain,” she mumbles into the lip of the tankard, fingers wrapped tight around its handle, “black as night - flew right over the barrow like something fit to block out the sun.”

Delphine’s teeth scrape over that spot at the corner of her lip. She can’t help but say, “Are you sure -”

“I know what I saw,” Hilde snaps. Her knuckles and lips are blanched and colourless. Liquid sloshes over the edge of her cup with her sharp, abortive gestures. “I saw a dragon.”

Delphine is very careful not to let her face do anything at all, there.

(It’s adrenaline, she knows; the pointed, muscle-coiled readiness to move - to act - to make a plan in service of a solid end and carry it off perfectly; the comfort of seeing possibility roll out before her like a long many-doored hallway, like a road she might be able to walk instead of these four walls she’s circled for too many years. Innkeeping is decent work - keeps her ear to the ground - keeps her busy in the interim, but it’s not what Delphine does, not what she’s been trained to do; not a purpose, not something to strive for, and oh, Divines -)

(None of this is substantiated. Delphine is not a rash and green youth, not anymore and not again, and she will not start running away with silly fantasies before she’s checked anything at all; she has had her fill of disappointment, and should know better than to invite it - should know better than to start spinning grand plans, before she’s even sent out some missives to the pale cobweb of contacts she has left - over the barrow; west, then - is there a significance, to the barrow? Does she have anything about it in her side room? Nine, it’s times like this she misses the old library and the mad old codger that kept it, and, no. No.)

(Yes.)

“It’ll come back,” Hilde’s saying with fearful certainty; lips flecked with spittle and beer-foam, hands still shaking. “It’ll come back, and it’ll kill us all, and then you’ll believe me -”

“I believe you,” Delphine tells her, and it is inexplicably, regrettably true. (She’s thinking about the library. She’s thinking about the dragonlore. She’s thinking that if dragons are back, someone will have to do something about it - and oh Divines how she has missed being the one to do something about it.)

Her hands are still, but only through some effort.

She feels like she’s been dozing for twenty years and only now has been shocked awake.

Hilde looks at her, white-mouthed and white-scarved; she frowns, a tense, sour thing, and she says doubtfully, “You look like you need a drink.”

Delphine laughs. It’s a short, gruff bark of sound. Her hands are flat on the tabletop; her hair is coming loose in thin wisps from the tight knot at the base of her skull. Sunlight trickles through the windows, golden-fresh. “No,” she says. “No, thank you, Hilde, I'm good."