#i was gonna go through great lord first but i. i cannot function without a dancer in hard mode i really cant

[sieglinde-freud]

finally using dancer inigo… this is actually the best thing thats ever happened in the history of ever oh my god… hes dancing 🥹

[teeny-tiny-revenge]

I feel like it's being overlooked (in favour of focussing on "Izzy is in unrequited love with Ed") that a big chunk of Izzy's identity builds on being Blackbeard's first mate. That's something that's super important to Izzy, though. He's the next best thing to the best pirate ever. Deep down, Izzy probably wants to be Blackbeard. He wants the power and the respect and the fame. And he gets a lot of that already as Ed's first mate, because the Ed of pre-Stede days isn't a hands on boss and doesn't care about a lot of the little things. Izzy gets to lord over the crew and feel powerful, because the respect Ed inspires translates down to him.

A big chunk of Izzy's driving motivation in season one isn't jealousy and dislike of Stede (though that's there as well). But at the forefront, Ed offered Izzy a promotion. After Ed's retirement (which banks on Stede's death), Ed said Izzy could become captain in his stead. Take on the mantle. Take over that powerful position. Finally step out of Ed's large shadow. And Izzy wants that! He wants that so bad that when he sells out Stede to the Navy, him getting captaincy of the Revenge (and custody over Ed) is what Izzy asks as his price.

When he gets that, he's actually really happy with it. We don't see any sign that he's concerned for Ed's wellbeing or that he misses Ed around after Ed and Stede are taken to the academy. No, Izzy has a ship and crew at his command. He can give orders all day and he can ask people to salt his food for him! Izzy is contented that way!

But unfortunately for Izzy, he isn't Blackbeard. He isn't a great sailor. He can't tell there's gonna be fog in the evening looking at the morning clouds. As much as he would love to be able to formulate a genuis plan to save them all, it ends up being "fight to the death against the Spanish after killing all crew members who don't want to fight". Izzy isn't Blackbeard, and he doesn't inspire loyalty in the crew by being a charismatic genuis. Within days, the Revenge crew grow so tired of Izzy's reign that they decide to throw him overboard.

So Izzy has learned that he cannot be Ed, he cannot be this great captain he wishes he was. But fate hands him back the next best thing, the position and identity that he's been very satisfied with for years: Ed returns to the Revenge, immediately and automatically reinstating Izzy as his first mate. Izzy is back where he started, is back to who he was all this time, and he's very afraid of losing this again. Izzy has learned the painful lesson that he isn't anyone without Ed (which is a lesson he definitely needs to unlearn if they go the redemption route btw - he'll need to learn who Izzy is without Blackbeard). So of course he pushes back so hard when Ed starts to very clearly move away from this role. Izzy can only imagine a crew respecting the captain through fear. The person he sees Ed becoming does not inspire fear. Izzy's entire power and position are 100% dependent on Ed inspiring fear in the crew so that this respect can shine down on Izzy as well. And that's what Ed is threatening and why Izzy gets so mad at him.

Izzy in the beginning of the Kraken reign is happy! Down a toe, but Blackbeard is himself again! He looks so smug about it all at first. Ed is keeping both their positions, and he's playing into Izzy's headcanon for who Ed is. Izzy is satisfied! And then it falls apart. Ed is going increasingly off the rail. The vibes are bad. I think Izzy doesn't understand a bit of what Ed is going through and what he's feeling, Izzy doesn't even understand what Izzy is going through and feeling because he wanted this but now it doesn't feel good? What Izzy understands/believes though is that he needs Blackbeard to be someone, so Ed not functioning right is bad news, and Ed wanting to fire and replace him is super bad news. Izzy is once more at risk of losing everything!

It's probably the biggest step in Izzy's journey this season that he sides with the mutiny and the attempt to kill Ed after all. Because it'll end with Ed gone and Izzy doesn't know who he is without Ed.

i really think the fandom takes on where izzy's at in this season are not putting anywhere near enough emphasis on the fact that the one and only thing that drives him to break down and make an attempt to change the situation is ed threatening to fire him. this was incredibly explicit; i really don't think it's possible to read in any other way. that line is literally echoing in his head when he talks to the crew. it's not the toes it's not ivan it's not the treasure it's not the drugs it's not the constant raids it's not the refusal to make port it's not concern for the crew. he was willing to deal with all of that. it is specifically that blackbeard told him, and told him casually, that he is replaceable.

[lunarblazes]

hi trafficblr. i cannot believe i have to explain watchers in the year of our lord 2021, but alas, martyn inthelittlewood has thrown a bat at the quietly humming hornets nest that lives in my brain and i’m now mentally unstable. so without further ado, here’s the complete Luna Explains Watchers And Grian’s Relationship To Them In Evo (please be nice to luna he binged grian’s series in like a month over summer break because hyperfixation brain go brrrr and nobody else’s because he’s the worst) HERE WE GO

grian did a series called evolution smp back in 2017, before his entrance onto hermitcraft, with a bunch of other friends of his, including jimmy, martyn, big b, pearl, taurtis, system zee, and nettyplays!

that series introduced the concept of the watchers, angel-like beings who facilitated the portals between versions for the evo smp, because evo was basically like time traveling through updates, from the very first multiplayer functioning update to the end update! i say until the end update, but that’s not where it really ended for most people. that’s where it ended for grian.

grian was the admin and owner of evo smp until around mid 2017, when he left the server due to drifting interest and a feeling that it was taking over his channel. now. this is where the watchers come back into play.

the watchers and grian had. a weird relationship. the watchers enjoyed testing players, giving riddles and gifts and little dungeons for them to find the next version portals and to give them goals. their most explicit goal for most of the series was find the end.

now as you may know. grian is a little shit. and in his evo days, he was even MORE of a little shit!

he had the only mob farm on the server and used it to get frankly insane amounts of gunpowder, and with a little desert locating, he gave himself a nearly unlimited supply of tnt. to give you an idea of how he used this tnt, there was a war between the police and the mafia. netty once said that she feared grian more than both the police AND the LITERAL FUCKING MAFIA. and he wasn’t even INVOLVED IN THE CONFLICT

grian also used clay as the primary building block for his base. that seems minuscule but i promise i’m gonna get back to the watchers it’s important for you to remember the clay,

so the watchers like fucking with players, right? they like testin em. giving them great challenges. making em better people. from what i have just said do you think evo grian would be considered a good person

grian decides to steal clay from the watchers’ temple. clay that was put there explicitly to test who would take it. the next day, he wakes up to obsidian covering every single one of his chests and a statue of an angelic woman in the middle of his base with a sign that instructs him to mine all the clay in the statue and burn it to purge himself of his greed

guess what grian does to the statue! you’ll never guess!

yeah he explodes that shit. oops.

he says EXPLICITLY that he will not listen to the watchers. he considers them bossy and authoritarian and rather than burning the clay he blows up the entire statue with frankly excessive amounts of tnt

SO. we have established that evo grian is a sacrilegious little bitch at this point right (the statue incident is not the only time he does this but it is the most memorable one)? grian’s evo series ends with a dragon fight where all of the players go to the end and are split up to each fight the dragon alone. they all beat the dragon, presumably, but when they step through the portal, they are not greeted by the usual end poem…

instead, the blue and green text at the end are the voices of the watchers, who speak directly to the players— they’ve chosen grian, of all people, to join them in the watcher’s realm, and the poem and series ends with him saying goodbye to his friends and home, a new blood red text entering the changed poem. and that’s all the canon evo stuff! it seriously ends so… suddenly, on grian’s end? jimmy had just pranked him before they set off, one of his buildings in downtown evo was in ruins from the tnt, and he just. vanished entirely. never returned to fix anything ever again.

now, the listeners! i admittedly don’t know much about the listeners, but from what i know, jimmy and martyn piqued their interest. after grian was taken, the players returned to evo, searching for new chunks to call home since the older chunks were becoming increasingly glitchy and corrupted from constant updating. except jimmy. jimmy was plucked up by the listeners and made to do a quest in the abandoned evo world before finally being sent back to the rest of the server, where he and martyn reunited. the listeners appear to be a rebellious faction of the watchers, and knowing what we know now, we know that the listeners were right to tell the evolutionists not to trust the watchers. the listeners warned the evolutionists that the watchers weren’t as peaceful as they seemed, and it seems like they’re right.

“so, luna,” i can hear you saying, because i’m epic as hell and can sense all your lovely questions before they’ve even been asked, “that’s all cool and all, and your nerd shit is crazy, but what’s that mean for last life?”

well!! a few things.

1. martyn is either a listener or still listener-aligned. (you’re more of a… listener.) i think it’s more of a player-patron situation rather than he IS one, just because i think it’d fit better.

2. martyn has been used as a pawn by the watchers to enforce the game and curses they started. they admit to being the ones behind the boogeyman curse (3, 2, 1– all it took) and they had a vendetta against scott because he defied their curse. and scott won. take that bitchass angels haha L

3. the watchers had promised martyn that all of his allies would be safe (impulse, mumbo, jimmy… make it to the end), excepting, notably, grian.

4. oh yeah grian’s straight up not supposed to be in last life and also is a runaway watcher (oh. HIM. he was only meant to watch). so like after evo something happened and he booked it outta there and straight into a death game. or he made the game but went rogue when he decided he didn’t want to go through with it. diversity win???

5. oh boy the watchers are EVIL. we have actual evil watchers now that’s. crazy HDKSFJ in evo they were only presented as calm, angelic beings; it’s only in fanon that they took on that more sinister side, but, well! it’s not just in fanon now i guess!

hopefully this post helped some people! i did my best to stick to canon with the summary. i also went off memory and my own knowledge exclusively, so! if you have any corrections or additions, just rb this post with them and i’ll put them on my blog :^D! happy finale day guys and what the fuck, martyn, if you’re seeing this. this is everything i’ve ever wanted but also i’m devastated how could you.

[dailyaudiobible]

07/29/2021 DAB Transcript

2 Chronicles 24:1-25:28, Romans 12:1-21, Psalms 22:19-31, Proverbs 20:8-10

Today is the 29th day of July welcome to the Daily Audio Bible I’m Brian it’s great to be here with you as we continue our journey through this week and push ourselves into the end of the week. And obviously we’ll get there, one step at a time, day by day taking the next step forward together. And our step today leads us back into the book of second Chronicles. We’re reading from the New English Translation this week. Second Chronicles chapters 24 and 25 today.

Commentary:

Okay. Our reading for the book of Romans today, the letter to the Romans is potent. It is, at least in…to me, one of the most potent clear descriptions of what life is supposed to be looking like, what our postures and motivations are supposed to be looking. Like we’re moving through the theology of Paul and we’re understanding, like okay we’ve died to the law, we’ve been resurrected with Christ, sin doesn't have a claim to us, all of the things that we’re discussing about the transformative nature of salvation, the things that happen because we believe. We believe leave Jesus. And often when we acknowledge…when we acknowledge to ourselves that we still struggle with plenty of things that plague us from our history or our presence, and there are times that it feels like, you know, we’re not being transformed without moving forward. Sometimes it feels like we’re moving backward and what it this supposed to look like? And, so, we can look at…at the things that are laid out in the New Testament as essentially a new law that we have to live up to and the same result happens. We realize we can't make ourselves perfect. We have no power to do that no matter what color prescription gets laid out about how we should be living. It's difficult for us to be perfect all the time. And yet there are postures of our hearts that we do have a say in, right? And we do have a mind and although it may play tricks on us we do have a say in what we are going to put into action. And we have all kinds of thoughts swirling in our minds, but we do have a say into what we going to then engage our body to participate in. So, we do have control we just…we just can't keep self-control 100% of the time. Paul lays out today a picture of what this transformation process should be looking like within ourselves and within the body, the body of Christ, the followers of Jesus on this earth, what we’re supposed to be living into and what our lives are supposed to be. And there are plenty lists like this found in the Bible. So, you know, we’ll go back through this, but rather than going back through this and looking at the ways that were failing and just kind of allow the condemnation to descend upon us, so that we’re like, yeah, I can't…just I can't…I can’t keep up with all this. Let's look at what's described here because what's described here will be what we want and what we’re going for. And we’ll also see that we’re failing at it, but let's at least ask ourselves, are we even trying at these things? Because not trying, yeah that might be failing, but trying to live in this direction, beginning to move toward these things slowly, systematically, that is transformation, but we have to be participants in it. In other words, we have to collaborate with what God is doing with in us by surrendering to what He is doing within us rather than shutting it down and trying to take control and being our own sovereign, which we probably know pretty well leads us in ways we don't want to go. So, let’s kinda look back over what Paul is saying today. He says that we should present our bodies as a sacrifice, a living one, like not one that's, you know, gonna die and be burned up, a living sacrifice, Holy y and pleasing to God. That's where we start. And according to Paul, that's reasonable. So, it's not beyond us, it’s the default, it's the reasonable thing that we should do in response to the love of God for us. We’re told to not conform ourselves to this present world. In other words, to conform ourselves and use the tactics and convictions of the world around us. Instead of that we’re supposed to be being transformed by the renewing of our mind, renewing of our mind. Re-new. New all over again of our minds. We’re actively participating in this. We’re actively cooperating and collaborating and purging the things in our minds that lead us in all kinds of directions, whether that be in action or in stuff that we push down inside of us and hold their, bitterness and rage and anger and jealousy and envy. When these things come up into our minds and get triggered that's when we capture them. We observe what's going on. We see where that is leading us. We surrender it to God, which is reasonable and allow the renewing of our mind so that we are then awake and aware enough to test and approve what the will of God is, what is good and well pleasing and perfect. And that just gets us through the first two verses in Romans that we read today. Paul goes on to tell us we should think more highly of ourselves. Then well…then we should, and we shouldn't be comparing ourselves to each other. Rather, we should be sober about who we are and know that all that we have has come from God. God is…I’m quoting Paul. “God has distributed to each of you a measure of faith. For just as in one body we have many members and not all the members serve the same function. So, we who are many, are one body in Christ and individually we are members who belong to one another, and we have different gifts according to the grace given to us.” So, Paul’s saying like, yeah, this isn’t a game of comparison, this isn’t a game of being better than, this isn’t a game of even measuring up, this isn't even a game. All you have to do is be. You have been gifted by God. Do that. Be that. So, Paul is like, if the gift you were given this prophecy then do that, if it's serving then do that, if it's teaching then do that, if it's exhorting then do that, if it's giving and contributing then do that sincerely, if its leadership than do that with diligence. If it’s being merciful, then do that with cheerfulness. There are things that are true of you that have always been true of you that need to be offered to God's people and to the world, not so that you can be validated, not so that you can compete or be better than somebody else, or that you can be less than somebody else, so that you can be who you are. And do we not spend most of our lives in a struggle in that direction just trying to be who we are while being confronted with all of the pressures that are pulling us in a million directions and pulling us apart so that we’re not whole. Paul’s saying yeah, live…live your life as a living sacrifice. That’s a reasonable thing to do in response to God who has come for you, who has come to rescue you. Be who you are. Let the glory of the Lord shine through you as compared to no one else. And then he goes on to say, love must be without hypocrisy. Abhor what is evil. Cling to what is good. Be devoted to one another with mutual love showing eagerness in honoring one another. Do not lack in zeal, be enthusiastic in spirit, serve the Lord, rejoice in hope, endure suffering, persists in prayer, contribute to the needs of the saints, pursue hospitality, bless those who persecute you, bless and do not curse, rejoice with those who rejoice, weep with those who weep, live in harmony with one another. Do not be haughty but associate with the lowly. Do not be conceited. Do not repay anyone evil for evil. Consider what is good before all people if possible, so far as it depends on you. Live peaceably with all people. Is this not the life we’re invited into? Is this not where we’re trying to go? Is this not who we want to be? Because this is the description of what it looks like to be transformed. And we can look at these things and see the places that we’re failing but we have to be fair and say am I even trying? And let's try with all of our might knowing that in our own strength we cannot sustain perfection, we cannot sustain any of this. I mean just get a bad night sleep and you can't control your day. But can we look at these things and know that they all have action involved. Like this is a collaboration. We’re not just going to be able to sit on the couch and be sanctified. The things Paul says are actions, things that we have to participate in. Like be devoted, do not lack in zeal, rejoice, contribute, bless and do not curse, rejoice, live in harmony, do not be haughty, do not be conceited, do not repay anyone evil. You see, these things aren’t just gonna happen. We have to do them. We have to try. We have to live in this direction and read train ourselves, renew our minds, retrain the way that we react to things. So if we’re used…if our default position is to strike back when we’re struck, whether…whether physically or with words, if somebody is gonna bring some kind of thing against us with words then we’re gonna strike back and take them down with even harsher words. If that's our default position we have to catch ourselves in it and understand that we’re supposed to bless those who persecute us. We’re supposed to bless and not curse. We have to try. We have to retrain ourselves by opening ourselves to the renewing of our minds, the Holy Spirit's activity in our lives. So, we have to catch ourselves and remind ourselves this isn't the way I'm going. And, so, to go where I want to go I have to do this differently. We have to re-train re-new, collaborate in the renewing of our minds. And, so, there's an awful lot here in just a few paragraphs from Paul today that really…really affects the way we live. And let's take that into our day and ponder it.

Prayer:

And Holy Spirit we invite you into that, into that pondering. In fact come Holy Spirit and reveal to us the places that we’re not even trying, because that would explain so much, so much of the state of affairs of our lives. Help us Jesus we pray. In your mighty name, we ask. Amen.

Announcements:

Dailyaudiobible.com is home base, it is the website, it’s where you find out what's going on around here. So, check it out. If you’re using the Daily Audio Bible app you can check out these things by using the little Drawer icon in the upper left-hand corner. Places like the Community section where the Prayer Wall lives. The Daily Audio Bible Shop, where there are resources for the journey through the Scriptures in a year. So, check that out.

If you want to partner with the Daily Audio Bible, thank you humbly. If this mission to bring the spoken word of God to anyone who will listen anywhere on this planet any time of day or night, and to build community around that rhythm so that we’re not…we’re not in this alone and we begin to realize we’ve never been in this alone. If that is life-giving to you than thank you for your partnership. There’s a link on the homepage at dailyaudiobible.com. If you’re using the Daily Audio Bible app, you can press the Give button in the upper right-hand corner or the mailing address is PO Box 1996 Spring Hill Tennessee 37174.

And, as always, if you have a prayer request or encouragement you can hit the Hotline button in the app, which is the little red button up at the top or there are a number of numbers that you can use depending on where you are in the world. In the Americas 877-942-4253 is the number to call. If you're in the UK or Europe 44-20-3608-8078 is the number to dial. And if you are in Australia or that part of the world 61-3-8820-5459 is the number to call.

And that's it for today. I’m Brian I love you and I'll be waiting for you here tomorrow.

Community Prayer and Praise:

Good morning Daily Audio Bible community this is Diane Olive Braun from Newburgh IN an encourager, one of many. It is 6:55 AM on July 27th 2021, and it is Tuesday and we have the story of how great great kings came against Jehoshaphat. And he had several options, but he chose the right one, he chose to stay in the presence of the Lord and to yield his will to the Lord and to say we can't defeat this vast army, we don't know what to do but our eyes are on You. Holy Spirit help us to remember this story of Jehoshaphat and how he went to the Lord. He did not deliver himself. He trusted himself in the hands of the Lord and that is the safest place to be. So, we trust ourselves in your hands, we are your very own children. You are our very own God, and we love You and we magnify You and we glorify You and we humble ourselves under Your mighty hand…

Hi DAB family it's James here from the UK it's been a long time since I've put in a prayer request but here I am and here I’m…this is what I'm doing. I'm…I would really appreciate prayers for my family. In particular, our family holiday is coming up. It's been a really stressful year. And I know it's been a stressful year for so many people. But we are just loggerheads a lot of times with our three teenagers and, you know, it goes…it moves…it changes from a relationship with our kids where you can go on a holiday and you know that people are going to be, you know, really having…having a great time to one where, you know, this is going to be putting ourselves through quite some ordeal. But I feel like this is a really important time for us to be together. And, so, I'm just asking for prayers that we would be able to humble ourselves in front of each other and allow ourselves just to be real, be natural, be normal, but also be respectful and just rekindle a sense of family. And, so, I'd really appreciate your prayers for that. Thanks. Thanks family.

Hey Brian, hey DABbers, hey happy family. I just wanted to share…Oh my name is Mary and I've been listening now for maybe…well just started at the beginning of the year and I just wanted to share that I had a dream last night about the Global Campfire and how it's like this constant flame. And then I’ve thought Oh my gosh what a symbol of the Holy Spirit this Global Campfire that we share together. So, I just wanted to share that because I thought that that was a…a really nice God inspired dream that I had about just how wonderful and we’re so blessed to have this community. So, Brian I just thank you so much for doing this for all these years and for bringing us together. No matter where we are in the world, we have this eternal flame of this Global Campfire. So, I thought that was cool. Anyway, everybody have a great day and we’ll see you around the Global Campfire. Bye.

Hey faith fam it's Holly Heart. Career of Contrite Spirit I really like the story you shared about helping someone both physically and spiritually it helped…it brings me such joy when I can help people. I'm sure it does you too. Dear Lord please watch over Jose and please let him get the help that he needs. Joe the Protector. Dear Lord please watch over my brother Joe. He needs help at his new workplace, which is full of non-believers Lord. Use him to help save some of those fellow workers or clients. You have a purpose for him in being there. Joe my husband’s also in the same kind of situation at work and it is very difficult. I am praying for you both. Cindy from California. Dear father please help Cindy heal the cause of her RSD. She cannot bear the pain and needs you to comfort and to heal her. Thankfully Overcome. Congratulations on making it an entire year. I'm glad that you have lots of people praying continually for you and now I am one of them. Dear Lord please watch over Thankfully Overcome and please help her continue on this path that she is on towards you. Zach. Dear Lord please watch over Zach's marriage. He needs Your guidance. They both need to feel You’re loving touch so that they can treat each other the same way. Esther from Orlando. Dear Lord, please help to guide Esther in her living situation. Please help to alleviate the fear she’s having because with you Lord there is no reason to fear Anonymous. Dear Lord, please watch over the anonymous caller who said she needed a new beginning. She lost her husband brother and family dog. So much pain. She is not in this pain alone Father. Her…she has a daughter and two sons, and they also need healing and a new start. Please help bring them Your divine peace. Please help her find a good career so that she can care for her children and please help them find an exceptional living place. In Jesus’ name we pray. Amen.

Good morning this is Emily in Minnesota. High DABbers. Brian's message today, oh, so great. Psalm 22 1 and 2. My God my God why have you abandoned me. I groan in prayer but helps seems so far away. I cry out during the day, but you do not answer and during the night my prayers don't let up. Lord Jesus thank you so much for hearing our cries, understanding our grief and our pain and loss and suffering on…in this world. Things I’ve heard in the last few years in my story from others I cannot imagine. There are no words. You're living out my worst nightmare. Our society is not comfortable with grief, loss, lament. Our tears are better when wiped away around others. I've seen this. I've learned to journey through my grief and lament one tear at a time at the foot of the cross with a Father that knows earthy brokenness and suffering and listens unconditionally when I know it and not. Please continue to lift up my family through our losses. As most of you know, my parents are…my families out of state and I have a brother who lost his wife to cancer with a young family in November 2020. My parents are simultaneously diagnosed with Alzheimer's and dementia in the summer of 2019. I have another brother who is homeless and is struggling with mental health or addiction out of state. And then I lost my son, college freshman, to suicide spring of 2019. My own family is to choosing to turn away from God in this time of loss but they know His presence and I continue to pray. Thank you. Have a wonderful day.

[grimelords]

My April playlist is finished! Please allow me to take you on a journey from the heaven of THP Orchestra to the hell of Inter Arma over three action packed hours. Specially sequenced for maximum enjoyment, there’ll be at least one thing in here you’ll love - I guarantee it. Listen here.

Good To Me - THP Orchestra: I've said it before and I'll say it again, the number one way to find good songs is to go through the whosampled page for Duck Sauce's 2013 album Quack because every single thing they put into that album is a bonafide classic.

I'm Your Boogie Man - KC & The Sunshine Band: I saw Jungle last week and they were absolutely amazing, and the venue started playing this song as soon as the house lights went up after the show which is an extremely good way to get people to not leave your venue and boogie instead. My favourite part of this is near the end of the second verse where he gets even lazier than normal with the lyrics and just says "I want to love you.. ah.. from sundown.. sunup".

Work It Out - A-Trak: I love this new A-Trak song that sounds like a secret lost bonus track from Discovery right down to that specific wah sound on the guitar.

Starlight - The Supermen Lovers: There was all this news last year that Music Sounds Better With You by Stardust was getting remastered and rereleased for its 20th anniversary and was going to finally be on streaming services that seems to have just.. not happened. It never materialized so now I'm stuck listening to the 2nd rate but still extremely good Music Sounds Better With You knockoff, Starlight by the worst named band ever The Supermen Lovers. The songs aren't even that similar particularly but that's just my personal feelings.

Girlsrock - Siriusmo: A friend of mine is a sort of expert on the whole Ed Banger mid-late 2000s electro scene and it's extremely good because he'll just send me songs like this every now and then that are totally sick and make it feel like there was somehow thousands of hours of this kind of music produced at that time and only the tip of the iceberg made it to public consumption.

11:17 - Danger: Somehow I didn't even notice that Danger had a new album in January but I'm finally listening now and it's a proper return to form and really, really good. This song sounds like if the haunted VHS tape from the The Ring was taped over an 80s workout video.

Ultrasonic Sound - Hive: I went to a 20th anniversary screening of The Matrix at The Astor and great news: that movie still kicks ass and rocks completely and has possibly gotten better in the two decades since its release. Someone had curated a really good mix that they were playing in the foyer after the movie and this song was in it. A heady mix of drum and bass and nu-metal guitar crunch that feels like a 1999 calendar picked up by a strong wind and slapping you in the face.

Homo Deus VII - Deantoni Parks: STILL loving and finding new things to love about this Deantoni Parks album for the third month in a row. I'm repeating myself but this music is just so good and feels so completely original to me. It's a great mix of complete technical mastery and the self imposed limitations of a restricted sample palette. Forcing himself to do absolutely everything he can with the sound and fairly well exhausting it over the course of 9 minutes.

Catacomb Kids - Aesop Rock: There's a good line to trace between this and Acid King by Malibu Ken where Aesop Rock's been thinking about Ricky Kasso for like ten years now which is interesting. There's lots of just very nice sounding lines in this like "Crispy the godsender who thunk over a quarter plunk to local Mortal Kom vendor". Just good weird word combos painting a very impressionistic picture of growing up. "deplanting cadavers" "zoo-keeper facelift". Very nice.

Mask Off - Future: I've never listened to Future much which is weird because he's very good but this is a song that just comes into my head pretty often. Metro Boomin's brain is huge and the vibe he created on this is just amazing. Wringing this sort of atmosphere out of the sample without sacrificing any of the trap beat at the center of it is such an achievement.

Old Town Road (Remix) - Lil Nas X and Billy Ray Cyrus: Everything that could ever be said about Old Town Road has probably already been written by now but my favourite part is finding out that the sample is from Ghosts by Nine Inch Nails which means it's also Trent Reznor's first writing credit on a #1 song. Absolutely praying for Trent and Atticus to join Lil Nas X and Billy Ray Cyrus on stage at the Grammys to perform this.

Claudia Lewis - M83: Every so often I remember just how good Hurry Up We're Dreaming is and listen to it on repeat for a while. It's absolutely amazing. Start to finish (except for Raconte-Moi Une Historie which SUCKS) it's just fantastic. I looked up why this song is called Claudia Lewis and it turns out that has an extremely good answer "I was surfing the web & found this website with space poems – Claudia Lewis had 3-4 space poems on this site. They were pretty bad space poems but I found it super moving, there was something very innocent about it. She’s probably super young like 12 or 14 but I don’t know her or how she looks or anything about her. I just know that she writes cheesy space poems."

OK Pal - M83: Every single musical element of this song is just perfect. I love the huge broad chords, the synth bends, the massive drums, the inverted Dead Flag Blues monologue. It's just beautiful.Little Secrets - Passion Pit: Passion Pit is currently on a 10th anniversary tour for Manners and I feel age 100 which is no good. But this song is good and it contains in my opinion one of the all time greatest drum fills after the first chorus. Huge, super air-drummable, and very functional: perfect.

Blood - City Calm Down: I think "I'm the one who wants your blood" is just such a great an evocative refrain and I wish he said it one million times more in this song.

Television - City Calm Down: Absolutely love the idea of writing a song about how bloody TV is the bloody opiate of the masses that sounds like a Clash cover in 2019 and sounding so deliberately out of the zeitgeist and doing it so well and with such conviction that it’s absolutely great.

I Am The Resurrection - The Stone Roses: We went to Andrew McLelland's Finishing School and he played this as his last song in honour of Easter Sunday and described it as the greatest piece of acoustic dance music he's ever heard which is honestly not a bad description - it's an absolute jam.

Daisy - Pond: It's very cool that there's like an evil, mirror version of Tame Impala that exists in Pond. I think every band should have that.

Crying Lighting - Arctic Monkeys: Basically the reason this song is on this list is because I got stuck in a loop of saying "your pastimes, consisted of the strange and twisted and deranged and I hate that little game you had called "crying lightning" in a Werner Herzog voice to myself and I thought it was funny.

Keeping Time - Angie McMahon: Angie McMahon is so damn good at songs and I cannot believe it! She's only got like 5 and they're all incredible. She’s gonna be huge!

The House That Heaven Built - Japandroids: Sterogum had a really good writeup the other day about Post-Nothing turning 10 years old that turned into a wrap up of why Japandroids are such a good band and why Celebration Rock is a perfect album and it really crystallized a lot of my feelings about them. They're number one on my list of Bands That Make You Want To Start A Band for a good reason and this article really nails the whole young men figuring it all out feeling of Japandroids' music. I really think both Japandroids albums should be called Youth And Young Manhood but Kings Of Leon already took that name. I remember when my friend first turned me on to Post-Nothing he said he didn't want to tell anyone else except me because it was so good and it was Best Friends Music and I really believe that. It’s best friends music through and through. When I saw them a couple of years ago it was as part of a sort of impromptu road trip with my best friend and I think that was the best context I could have given it. It's absolutely one of the best shows I've been to in my life and also Osher Gunsberg was in the crowd behind me but that's not part of the story. https://www.stereogum.com/2041439/japandroids-post-nothing-turns-10/franchises/the-anniversary/

Motor Runnin - Pist Idiots: The pub rock revival just keeps getting better and better. At the minute it's basically just Bad//Dreems, West Thebarton and these guys but I'm sure there's a million other bands bubbling under that are just about to break as well. I love this song, it's just straight up old fashioned pissed off rock and roll that somehow doesn't feel old fashioned at all.

Chains - As Cities Burn: As Cities Burn have reunited and have a new album coming out and I'm extremely wary of it because they're potentially ruining their previously discussed perfect streak. This is the first single and it's.. good I guess. It's kind of just normal and sort of outdated, a little bit of a step backward into safety for a band that was always changing and moving forward. I think I have a worm living in my brain though because I keep listening to it just because I really love the drum sound. They're very nicely mixed. Some very nice sounding drums.

Whacko Jacko Steals The Elephant Man's Bones - The Fall Of Troy: I was talking with some friends about young musicians because of Billie Eilish, and so we were talking about how Alanis Morrisette won a grammy when she was 21 and Taylor Swift won a grammy when she was 20 and Lorde made Royals when she was 17 and all that but what people don't realise is Thomas Erak wrote Doppelganger when he was 20 and it was his second album. He's 34 now and his music sucks badly. That's insane. What will happen to me when I'm 34? Chilling to think about. 

A New Uniform / Patagonia - Tera Melos: I think Patagonian Rats is still my favourite Tera Melos album. Toss up between that and Untitled actually. But I love this one for how cohesive it feels. For a band whose whole ethos is chaos it's amazing how well it all comes together as a complete work tied up with a bow by the Skin Surf reprise near the end. I love this song because it's two sketches of songs tied together into one little chaotic lump and the big Primary! Secondary! finale is just so satisfying.

Talking Heads - Black Midi: Black Midi finally have actually proper recorded songs on spotify! The way Black Midi is getting talked about at the moment really feels like the days of blog buzz are back, it's crazy. If you haven't seen it yet here's the KEXP session that's rightfully getting them so much attention https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TMn1UuEIVvA I've watched it so many times and it's really something. The best part is the comments are full of music dudes just naming every band ever. "this sounds like if slint, polvo and hella did crack and had a gangbang" yuck "imagine them opening for Swans and/or Daughters" yuck "they're like if Minute Men and Frank Zappa had a baby and that baby dated the child of Talking Heads and Can but then got dumped for their best friend who was adopted and raised by their single parent Voivod but they were cool and stayed friends and listened to Tortoise and Thelonious Monk and got stoned and started a band and conquered the world." yuck "Slint meets Sonic youth meets Pere Ubu meets drive like jehu meets Beefheart...these guys took all that is deranged and twisted in rock and made one big soup of it!" yuck. Anyway the point is they rock completely and here's my addition to the band names: the way he sings sounds like Sting lol.

Walking On The Moon - The Police: This song makes you dumb I think. It's like the dumbest song in the world and listening to it makes your brain mushier, which makes you dumb and stupid. It's very good.

Rubber Bullies - Tropical Fuck Storm: I saw Tropical Fuck Storm opening for Kurt Vile the other day and it was absolutely incredible. My first time seeing them properly, not counting the live soundtrack they did for No Country For Old Men which was was a whole different kind of amazing. It feels like Gaz has finally put together a band that can keep up with is ferocious energy and the result is scary - they basically tore the place apart which makes them a funny opener for Kurt Vile who was as chilled out, relaxed and fun as you'd expect. They played this song near the end of their set and somehow I hadn't really noticed it when I listened to the album but now I can't stop listening to it. It's so good. I love the increasing paranoia of the backing vocals, especially in the last verse as it builds and builds.

Taman Shud - The Drones: This might be the best Drones song. It's a list that's constantly being revised in my head but it's top 5 definitely. It's nice listening to Feeling Kinda Free now knowing what he was going to do with Tropical Fuck Storm because it's all here. Fighting against the constraints of his regular sound and regular songwriting and eventually finding the solution in forming a whole new band. I love this song for a million reasons but the escalation of the disregard is very good. “I don't care about Andrew Bolt or Ned Kelly or the southern cross or the union jack” and you're nodding and then he says ‘I don't really care if you're a pedophile’ and you're nodding but slower. I get what he means in terms of media hype and whatever but it's still a very funny line. Anyway "why'd I give a rats about your tribal tats? You came here on a boat you fucking cunt" is grade A.

Dawn Patrol - Megadeth: The best thing about Megadeth is the sort of half baked politics. Dave Mustaine is the best kind of moron, he engages with everything at a gut level but believes he's being very cerebral about it at the same time. This little intro song about a nuclear post-apocalypse is so good because it's a legitimate warning and a response to legitimate worries but it's also like.. wouldn't that be sick if we had to wear gas masks and carry assault rifles around because all the nukes exploded and everyone was dead. What if there was zombies.

Rust In Peace... Polaris - Megadeth: The story behind Holy Wars... The Punishment Due is so good. "Mustaine has said that at a show in Antrim, Northern Ireland, he discovered bootlegged Megadeth T-shirts were on sale. He was dissuaded from taking action to have them removed on the basis that they were part of fund raising activities for "The Cause", explained as something to bring equality to Catholics and Protestants in the region. Liking how "The Cause" sounded as was explained to him, Mustaine dedicated a performance of "Anarchy In The UK" to it, causing the audience to riot. The band were forced to travel in a bulletproof bus after the show" I just love him. I'd like to share a Dave Mustain quotes about this song also. "I was driving home from Lake Elsanon. I was tailgating somebody, racing down the freeway, and I saw this bumper sticker on their car and it said, you know, this tongue in cheek stuff like, ‘One nuclear bomb could ruin your whole day,’ and then I looked on the other side and it said, ‘May all your nuclear weapons rust in peace,’ and I’m going, ‘'Rust in Peace.’ Damn, that’s a good title.‘ And I’m thinking like, 'What do they mean, rust in peace?’ I could just see it now – all these warheads sitting there, stockpiled somewhere like seal beach, you know, all covered with rust and stuff with kids out there spray-painting the stuff, you know." Goes ahead and writes a kick ass song from the perspective of a nuclear warhead containing the line "rotten egg air of death wrestles your nostrils".

Planet B - King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard: King Gizz are Megadeth now and I love it! The cold war is global warming now and we desperately need new thrash metal about it to save us!

Primodial Wound - Inter Arma: If you can't tell by me including three of their songs on this playlist I'm still having an absolute time with Inter Arma. Something I really love about this band is their ability to sit in a vibe for so long and expand on it. They're not songs with narrative arcs and multiple contrasting sections, they're songs that just kind of dig deeper on themselves. This one starts deep and then by thinning out entirely at around 6 minutes in only gets darker.

Howling Lands - Inter Arma: This song made me dream of a Dark Souls game where Inter Arma does the soundtrack. It's a peabrained thought but it's one that really got me thinking. This is boss music of the highest order: a song seemingly about itself and the hellbound denizens cursed to perform it in the arena of hell.

Sulphur English - Inter Arma: It's extremely funny to listen to this song a bunch of times and be completely blown away by the total power and ethereal majesty of it and then look up the lyrics to find out that it's about Trump in that very good way of putting normal thoughts through a metal lyrics filter "The charlatan sets his eyes towards the throne / tongue adrip in revolting ecstasy" "Sever the corrupt tongue of the imperious fool / silence the gangrenous root of his abhorrent voice"

Peepin' Tom - Courtney Barnett: When I saw Kurt Vile he brought out Courtney Barnett to play Over Everything as an encore and it was so good to see just how much a hometown crowd loves her. Everyone lost their shit! We love our good friend Courtney! I think I've written about this before but Peeping Tom is one of my favourite Kurt Vile songs and I think Courtney's version is even better. Her voice is perfect for it and she really has to show off her range to do it which I love. The super deep 'peeping' to the high cascading 'tom' is a perfect musical moment to me.​

listen here

[logancreatesworlds]

The White Queen - (Aro x black!super spy!reader)

Author’s Note:  Okay, so we’re gonna switch gears a little bit.  I found of picture of this beautiful woman (she’s in the collage) and this idea came to my head.  Hope y’all like it.  Thanks!

Warning:  Violence, poison, bit of angst, and a little bit of blood and sex.

Disclaimer:  None of the images are mine.

Prologue

SPLASH!

“Tell me the truth!”

You began to break.

All the lies you had told...the graves you filled...it was all catching up.

“I can’t,” you whispered brokenly.

SPLASH!

“The truth!”

“I can’t!”

“Why?” He asked brokenly.

You looked down, your mouth dry.

“Because...,” you said solemnly, “Because it will hurt you.”

“Aro is coming here?”  Bella asked, her amber eyes widening at the dark news, “When?”

“In a few hours,” Alice Cullen responded as the Cullens hurried up to get ready, “They’re moving fast.”

Indeed, the Volturi did arrive at around 4pm that wintry Thursday evening.  Nobody would have thought anything of importance was up, but Aro’s face didn’t have that usual maniac glee that made other vampire tremble.

Something was wrong.

“Aro,” Carlisle greeted, trying as always to keep the peace, “What a pleasant surprise.”

“Carlisle,” Caius replied seriously.

Aro was silent.

That was odd.  The only time Caius spoke was when he was yelling for someone to be executed.

“Is something wrong?”  

Caius took a moment to reply. 

“There is a matter of concern,” the vampire lord said in an unusually calm manner, “We need to talk.”

After Carlisle let the Volturi into the living room of his him, he got straight to the point.

“You are not speaking Aro,” Carlisle noticed, “What is the problem?”

“He is distracted,” Caius replied frankly, taking off his trademark overcoat and crossing his arms over his black shirt.

“I am right here Caius,” Aro snapped.

The first words the First King of the vampire race had spoken since he arrived.

“I know,” Caius replied, “But you are angry and emotional - which means that you are in no place to rule at the moment.  Let me handle this.”

All of the Cullens’ eyes widened.

Caius never spoke to Aro like that.

“What’s the problem?”  Carlisle asked, finally understanding the weight of whatever issue was before him. 

“A human knows about us,” Caius answered, “We need to find her.”

“What is her name?”

Caius, resisted the urge not to snap at the continuous questions, but he went to answer them regardless.

But Aro intervened.

“(Y/N),” he answered.

“How did this happen?”

“...It all started out months ago,” Aro began.

You walked elegantly with the other guests into a dark and mysterious location.  

Your camera hung around your neck, along with your black Afia frames, which went nicely with your snow white Armi pantsuit.

You made no sound except for the soft clicking of your Giuseppe Zanotti suede sandals on the hard marble floor.

They were also white.

Everything about you, sans your skin, was...white.

“This is Secret Castle of Volterra,” your tour guide introduced.

You remember her name was Heidi.

“It is the oldest and most private structure in the whole city.”

You mentally snorted at the lie.  

That was what Heidi always told the foolish people who were dumb enough to take up on her of “an all-expenses-paid vacation” or “handsomely-paying job.”

After all, who would have known better than you?

You had been scouting her, watching her for weeks.

“The people of Volterra built this great place as a haven of holiness to protect them from the vampires who would prowl the night,” Heidi continued as she led you and the others through the castle.

You had to give it to her.  She was a good little actress.

“Come along everyone,” she said silkily, “We’re almost to the best part.”

Here we go, you thought, readying yourself for the worst.

You all came to two large doors, which opened up.

As you entered with the large group, all of the details came into your view, including the three ethereal men sitting in the thrones and waiting.

All according to plan...

“Ah Heidi my dead,” the head man greeted, “Right on time.”

He was more handsome than your other targets.  He was tall, with hair as long and dark as his suit, and his eyes - in all of their carmine red glory, contrasted sharply against his pale skin.

A vampire...

“Yes, my lord,” Heidi replied with a bow, “They are here, just as you commanded.”

3...2...1...

“Good,” your target replied as the other two men stood from their throne.

Others seemingly came out of nowhere, all with the same red eyes and pale skin.

Then, the doors shut and locked.

Now.

“Feast, my dears,” The vampire commanded, holding his hands out grandly.

The blonde besides him was the first to tackle a human.  

You gasped, pretending to be surprised at his brutal technique, as he seemingly ‘came up for air’ - showcasing his now bloody mouth.

The people screamed and you did too, running where they did so as to avoid being eaten.

Blend in, be silent.  That was what you were taught.

Within less than ten minutes, you were the only one alive.

You cowered back into the stone wall behind you as your attackers closed in on you from all sides.

Your formerly white suit was now crimson with blood, and you waited until your target appeared, ready to take a bite.

If you were unsuccessful, you would be drained of all your blood and your body would be disposed - no name, no date, no obituary.

But you were never unsuccessful...

He came closer...closer...

Never.

You could feel his breath on you.

Lights, camera...

“AHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!”  You screamed fearfully, putting on your best show as you cowered away from him.

“Aro!”  a male voice shouted, “Don’t!”

Your target looked over his shoulder.

“Why?” He asked.

So that was his name...

The man, whose face seemed bizarrely morose, came forward and grabbed his hand.

The man’s hungry gaze then turn to intense surprise. 

Within a minute, he was off of you.

“Clean up this mess immediately,” Aro commanded, “Everyone clean up.  Jane, get her to a room and clean her up.”

Though your brown eyes were wide and your body shook as if riddled with fear, on the inside, you smiled.

“Mission Opening” was a success.

You sat silently in the room that ‘Jane’ had placed you in, waiting patiently for your target to come to you.

It was dark, but even if your imagination used to run wild as child, you were still the scariest thing present.

The door opened and you turned around.

Deep, shuttering breaths...

Nervously, you whimpered as you backed away from him into the corner, trying to make yourself look as small as possible.

“Please,” he said softly, “Do not be afraid.”

“A-afraid?”  You replied as you made your eyes wet with tears, “Why would I be afraid?  S’not every day that you live through a group of innocent people being attacked by vampires.”

“You know of our kind?”

“Watching you suck people’s blood kind of gave you away,” you replied, wiping your cheeks dry.

Aro smiled softly as he came toward you.

He moved almost as silently as you did...

“Shhhh....,” he soothed wiping your eyes as your brought the tears back out.

“Calm down.” Aro said softly, “I will not harm you.”

Your breathed out a sigh of relief.

“Please let me go,” you pleaded in broken tone, “If you’re planning to hold me for ransom then you should know I have no money-”

“Shh...,” Aro soothed, gently tracing your soft lips with his fingers, “I told you.  I will not harm you.”

“Then...why won’t you let me leave?’

“Because,” Aro replied, grabbing your hands in his, “You are very special to me.”

July 13th

“My love, are you sure you don’t want something to eat?”

“Honey I’m positive,” you soothed, “Besides I see something far more delicious right now.”

A hungry look glimpsed in Aro’s eyes as you grazed his stone chin with your manicured fingers.

You and he decided to step out for a night on the town and were flanked by Felix, Demetri and Jane.

As the two of you walked, he told you everything you wanted to know about “The Cold Ones.”

“Tell me more about your kind,” you said, curling closer to Aro as your white trench coat billowed in the nightly Italian breeze.

“What else could there be?”  He asked, “We are immensely strong, we do not sleep, we drink human blood - though the man I told you of in Washington lives off the blood of animals along with his...family.  What else is there?”

You stopped, taking his hands in yours and looking deep into his eyes.

“Why did you spare me that night?”

Aro sighed, “Because you are my mate.”

Intel on mating habits acquired.

“Your mate?”

“Yes,” Aro answered, “Each vampire, male or female, has another half - a mate to call their own.  This person is their soul mate, and the vampire cannot function without them.”

“Then...what will happen to me?”

“What do you mean?”

“I am human, honey,” you answered, “I am inching closer to death while we speak.”

Aro smiled softly, taking your cheek in his hard hands, “That is no problem, my love.  I will turn you into one of us.  Then we shall be together forever.”

“I like the sound of that.” 

You smiled and leaned close, planting a kiss on him.

Aro smiled and kissed you again, making your lip lock deeper.

“Forever.”

In that moment, you were compromised.

 That night, you sat in Aro’s study, looking nervous.

His “wife” Sulpicia had found you two in a particularly inappropriate position on top of Aro’s desk.

SMASH!

You winced as the glass broke.

Needles to say, she wasn’t taking it too well.

Against your better judgement, you snuck out of the study and took the short journey to the throne room to see what was happening.

They were at each other’s throats.

“Aro I will not accept it!” Sulpicia yelled. 

“I DO NOT CARE WHAT YOU WILL ACCEPT!”  Aro roared.  “SHE.  IS.  MINE.”

“You abandon me for her!”

“Wow, my dear,” Aro snapped venomously, “How perceptive of you!”

“You have been different ever since she came here,” Sulpicia ranted, “You are not as cold as you used to be.  You are gentler, calmer.  ...You are happy.”

“YES SULPICIA, I AM HAPPY!”  Aro ranted, “I have not felt this way in the thousand years I have been like this.  I am myself when I am with her.  I can tell her anything.  She is kind and sweet...gentle.  She is intelligent and the only woman cultured enough to understand the value of The Merchant of Venice.  And the best part?  She’s all mine.”

A tear cascaded down your eyes as you listened to him speak.

Nobody ever said anything like that about you before.

“So yes Sulpicia,” Aro spoke, “I am different with her, because I am happy.  You can either accept that, or I can dispose of you like you were never here.”

“You will not disregard me,” Sulpicia growled, “I will kill that Moorish whore before you-CUUGGGGHT!”

Aro had her by the throat.

“On second thought,” he said coldly, “You services are no longer required.  Goodbye, my wife.”

Then, Aro yanked Sulpicia’s head off like it was plastic and kicked it across the room.

“Jane,” he called.  

The young blonde came in.

“Please have this...trash burned.  I do not wish to smell the filth anymore.”

“Yes Master.”

For the first time since you left, you were unhappy.

Aro had killed someone for you.

It wasn’t that you were shocked.  You knew the kind of man he was, the kind of ruler he had to be...

But when he killed Sulpicia, he had committed a fork - one attack on her, the other on your heart.

Indeed, you thought, Compromised.

September 4th

You curled into Aro, trying to slow down your rapidly beating heart, as her brushed your 4C curls - which were now wet with sweat.

The two of you, after hours of lovemaking, were now curled up naked in his bed.

“Honey that was amazing,” you praised, grazing his chest.

“Mmmmm I’m glad you enjoyed it,” he said with a smile, “Thou it was quite the vision to see you so wet for me.  Those moans of yours are...sinful.”

“You are unkind sir,” you teased, placing playful kiss on his lips.

“Then perhaps you should punish me,” Aro said seductively, pulling you into his arms and meshing his tongue with yours.

KNOCK KNOCK!

Aro huffed as you rolled off him.

He always hated interruptions.

“Aro,” Caius called, “If you are done producing your body weight in sperm, we have business to attend to.”

Aro growled, but relaxed slightly when you kissed his jawline.

“Fine,” he called, “I shall be there in a few minutes.”

“You’re leaving?”  You asked as he got up to head to the bathroom.

“Not leaving,” he answered, sparing you a loving look, “Just working.  Relax for the day, and I shall return later.  We will pick up right where we left off.”

You sighed with exaggerated air as you crawled on the bed, “But I want you to stayyyyyy.”

“My love,” Aro chastised, “Are we really going to - ”

“Mmmmm,” you moaned, parting your legs and rubbing your clit, holding your parted legs wide open so he could see.

Aro bit his lip and the scent of our sex his nose.

“Fuck Aro,” you moaned, your fingers catching a rhythm as you stuck your butt up, “I need you.”

Aro growled, swiftly returning to bed and flipping you over.

“I suppose we could have a quickie,” he said.

Shortly after, your moans filled the castle.

September 4th

This was the longest time since your ascension that you were able to act like yourself.

You did not have to be prim and proper around Aro.  

He loved you whether your were perturbed, goofy, grumpy...

He loved all of you.

Sure, you were compromised, but you didn’t even give C.H.E.S.S. or the Intel they wanted that much energy anymore.

You were happy.

“You are good at this game,” Aro commented, as you moved another white piece on your board.

A Nimzo-Indian.

“Thank honey.  And to my credit, I have been playing for a long time,” you said as Aro moved another black piece on the board, “You might want to be careful though. My bite is worse than my bark.”

Aro smiled, “Well I am sure of that.  You proved that well enough last night.”

You laughed as Aro winked at you.

“You flirt,” you giggled.

“Oh we are way past flirting, my dear,” Aro replied, taking out a book.

“What is this?”  You asked as he handed it to you.

“Just open it.”

Your eyes narrowed playfully, but you did as he said.

You flipped through the pages of The Merchant of Venice copy and your eyes furrowed with interest when you noticed a gap in the pages.

Flipping to it, your eyes widened when you founds its source and held it up to the light.

“Holy shit,” you said.

“It is not much but - ”

“Aro I love it,” you said, “It’s beautiful.”

“Good,” Aro replied, coming around from the chess game, “I want you to admire your engagement ring.”

Oh shit.

“W-What?”

He knelt down in front you, taking your hand in his.

“(Y/N) (Y/M/N) (Y/L/N), I have never met any woman like you.  You are perfect for me in each and every way and I cannot live without you.  I need you not just to be happy, but to live.  (Y/N)...will you marry me?”

C.H.E.S.S. never allowed operatives to marry.

Too many loose ends and distractions.

Still, a ray of hope glimmered inside of you, the kind that said that you could outsmart a government organization.

You could make this work, you were sure you could.

You just had to tie up some things first.

“Yes,” you said tearfully, “I do.”

“You proposed to her?” Esme asked with large eyes.

“I loved her,” Aro answered, “So yes, yes I did.  I was planning to turn her right after the wedding but...well, you understand.”

“So let me get this straight,” Emmett said, “You’re saying that you - Aro Volturi, king of all vampire kind, fell in love with a woman who turned out to be a super spy and now that she’s disappeared, you want us to help you find her.”

“Pretty much,” Caius said casually, “You didn’t even hear what happened when she left.  I had to find out her dirty little secrets.”

November 3rd

Aro walked to the room you two shared, ready to confront you.

Even with the coming of the wedding, and everyone (sans Caius of course) being cherry for the upcoming occasion, you - for some odd reason, were not happy.

Everybody had caught onto your mood swing.

Instead of being your happy, cultured and goofy self, you were cold, quiet and withdrawn.

Aro opened the door to the room and his eyes widened.

You were nowhere in sight.  Your clothes had been left there, and the window was open.

You were gone.

That sent Aro into panic mode.  All of the vampires in the Volturi had immediately been called back from any assignment and ordered to search for you.

After three days, Caius came into Aro’s study.

“Aro,” he said urgently, “We need to talk.”

“Not now Caius.”

“Yes now!”  Caius snapped, “It’s about (Y/N).”

“What did you find?”

Caius came in a dropped a thick manila file on his desk.

“I had a couple of scouts head to the United States to search for her.  One of them came across a government worker who was about to incinerate her file.”

Aro was confused.

“Her file?”

Caius gestured to it, and Aro flipped through it.

“She is not just a normal woman, Aro.  She’s an operative for the Clarigate Hessian Eradication Secret Society, also known as C.H.E.S.S, based in the United States.  She has over three hundred confirmed kills and she is skilled in multiple forms of martial arts ranging from Jujutsu to Muay Thai.  She is also well versed in the use of multiple military grade weapons.  They call her The White Queen.”

Aro was flipped through the file, looking at all of your victims.

Government workers...rich moguls...German chancellors...they had all fallen by your hand.

He froze.

Everything...every single thing about you...was a lie?

Aro roared with rage, flipping over his desk.

“Find her,” Aro growled, “Bring her back to me!”

“I didn’t take it too well,” Aro explained.

“Holy shit,” Renesmee mumbled.

“Young lady,” Bella chastised, “Language.”

“No,” Caius said solemnly, “She is right.  This woman got to us in a way that no human has.  She lived with us for months, learned endless secrets.  If we do not find her...it could mean the end of all vampire kind.”

Just then, Jane rushed back in. 

“Master,” she said hastily.

That was the first time Bella had seen her shocked.

“Jane...what is it?”

“She’s here.  The White Queen is here.”

Aro, Caius, The Volturi and all of the Cullens rushed to the back yard to see the commotion.

You stood there in your trademark white bodysuit, waiting patiently.

“(Y/N),” Aro said.

“Hello honey,” you greeted solemnly.

“You lied to me,” Aro growled coming toward you, “You broke left me.”

“I know that.”

“You disappeared without a word!”

“I know that too.”

“Was everything a lie?  Our love...all of it?!”

You shook your head, a tear dripping down your cheek, “No.”

“The what was the truth?”

“The truth...is that I love you.”

“You are a government operative.  How can I be sure that you are telling me the truth?”

You said nothing. 

After all, and given the circumstances, Aro was right to suspicious.

Aro roared with rage as he rushed toward you.

Remembering your years of training, you sidestepped him and used his strength to flip him a few feet away.

Getting up after his tumble, he glared at you.

“So that’s who you really are,” he said venomously.

“Yes,” you said gravely, “Attack me again Aro.  Maybe you might kill me and make things simple for me.”

“SIMPLE?! RAHHHHHHHH!”

Aro fought you with pure rage and you blocked every single move.  Everyone watched as the two of you went back and forth in a blur of black and white.

Before the Aro could strike another blow, someone got between the two of you and pushed you apart.

“Enough!”  Caius commanded, “Everyone calm down!”

“She lied to me!”  Aro said angrily, “She left me!”

“I know that,” Caius growled, “But she came back.  And you will hate yourself if you kill her.”

Aro calmed down slightly, but his glare never left you.

“Now,” Caius ordered, turning to you, “You have some explaining to do - ”

“Caius I can’t tell - ”

“Do not dare argue with me after what you did.  You are going to explain and you will do it now.”  

You backed up, “I just came to say goodbye.  I do not have time for explanations.”

“Then you will make time.”

You were grabbed by Felix and Demetri and knocked to the ground.  Jane came and wrapped your arms and legs with hard cables.

“Get her inside,” Caius ordered, “We’ll make her talk.”

You sat across from Aro in the Cullen’s dark basement.

While you were tied to a chair, his arms were crossed and his eyes sharp and narrow.

Oh yeah, he was pissed.

“Why?”  He asked.

“Why what, Aro?”

“Why did you lie to me?”

You shrugged, “You were my target.  I had to collect Intel.”

“Intel on what?”  Caius demanded.

“...On vampires.”

“So that is what this...C.H.E.S.S. is?  An organization meant to hunt us down?”  Carlisle asked gently.

You nodded.

“So you don’t love me then.”

You looked up at Aro, “How did you come to that conclusion?”

“You lead me on for months, charming me...getting me to love you.  Was it all for me, or were just charming me for information?”

“No...no it...it started out as any other mission.  Then...after that kiss we shared months ago...I fell for you.”

“When was our first kiss then?  If you love me so much then you should be able to recall when it happened.”

“July 13th, 9:40 pm near the Caffè di fiori,” you answered instantly.

Aro sighed, momentarily satisfied.

“You could have just told me the truth,” he said.

“I was going to.  After you proposed I immediately started making plans to disappear off C.H.E.S.S.’s radar forever.  I was going to go all the way - fake my death, destroy my files - you name it.  But it wasn’t that simple.  They wouldn’t let me leave since The Queen’s Gambit hadn’t been completed.”

“The Queen’s Gambit,” Caius repeated, “I assume that’s code for your mission to spy on us?”

You nodded, “When an operative becomes compromised, or defects to the enemy side, they have to be put down.  They put a Code Zugzwang on me.  I’ve had two assassins come after me just this last week.”

“I assume you handled them?”

You nodded.

Aro’s eyes were narrowed again, “You’re not telling me everything.”

“What?”

“Do not what me.  You are withholding something.”

You shook your head, “Aro I swear...I’m not.”

Before you knew it, Aro had you by the neck and your body was resting on the chair’s hind legs.

“Tell me the truth,” he growled.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about!”

Aro huffed, sitting you back upright.

“Get the water,” he told Caius.

SPLASH!

“Talk!’  Aro growled.

He knew how you hated getting your curls wet. 

The water always made the oil on your scalp itch.

“I said I don’t know what you mean!”  You snapped.

SPLASH!

“Dammit Aro!”  You snapped, “Stop it.”

“Not until you tell me the truth,” he said brokenly, before pouring more cold water on your head.

SPLASH!

“Tell me the truth!”

You began to break.

All the lies you had told...the graves you filled...it was all catching up.

“I can’t,” you whispered brokenly.

SPLASH!

“The truth!”

“I can’t!”

“Why?” He asked brokenly.

You looked down, your mouth dry.

“Because...,” you said solemnly, “Because it will hurt you.”

Aro knelt in front of you, holding your head in his hands.

“Tell me the truth,” he demanded.

“His name is Jack Barnett.  They call him The Player.”

Aro held you in his arms as you told him everything about you - the real you.

When you were eight, your parents were murdered by vampires.

Jack Barnett, a hot new elite agent for the U.S. Secret Service found you.

It was then after meeting you an taking you in that he got a brilliant idea.

An organization, dedicated to wiping the scourge of all supernatural creatures, carried out by young and talented child soldiers who would be nurtured into mindless soldiers.

You were the first.

Jack nurtured you, told you that you were his “special girl.”

It was only after you learned the meaning of sexual assault that you finally understood what that meant.

“He...he raped you?”  Aro asked.

You curled closer to him on the couch as all of Cullens and Volturi members listened in.

“Three times,” you confirmed with a nod, “He thought I forgot.  I was actually planning to poison him after this last mission.  But I didn’t anticipate you.”

Aro smiled, “So...you love me?”

“More than you could ever know.”

“Then we should confront C.H.E.S.S.,” Caius suggested, “And Mister Barnett will die first.”

The Volturi murmured in agreement.

“In that case,” Carlisle said as the Cullens stepped forward, “We’re helping too.”

“Plus I really want you to show me some of those coll fighting moves,” Renesmee commented, plopping down next to you.

You laughed lightly, pinching her cheeks, “Of course I will.”

The next morning, Aro watched from the back porch as you taught Renesmee the Throat Punch and Reverse Roundhouse Kick.

“Your wife is impressive.”

Aro looked over his shoulder to see Bella come up beside him.

“Your daughter isn’t bad either,” Aro replied casually, noting how Renesmee was swiftly catching onto your training.

“She is a fast learner,” Bella said, “And I imagine you are happy to have your Queen back.”

Aro snorted lightly, “A little bit - yes.”

“Good,” Bella commented, patting him on the shoulder, “You should keep her around.  She had a good effect on you.”

Aro smiled again, waving back at you as your smiled and waved at him.

Perhaps you did.

It had been a funny turn of events.

You - the woman who had entered the world with lie on top of lie on top of lie, now lit up his world with justice, honor, truth and happiness.

Ha, the White Queen always did win after all...

Author’s Note:  Aaaaaaaand that’s all folks!  Gosh, this was a long one!  Hope y’all liked it.  I worked REALLY hard on it.  Comment to let me know what you think!  Thanks guys!

@shinyanchorface  @tenaciousarcadeexpert  @princesswagger15  @macfizzle  @valynsia  @siriuslycollins  @hekaates  @twilight-sapphire-lover  @plussizeappreciationfics  @dumbchick  @witchiewinchester  @stark-red19  @emmettjasper  @nerdycaramelgirl  @amethyst-dreams-and-candy-canes  @lovelynervouschaos  @belauriette  @dreatine  @cynbx  @naturally-bri

[cyberenergyshock]

taking a closer look at the jinzo archetype & its members

there’s very few monsters in the yugioh tcg that actually have stated lore- konami seems to really like implied lore through cart art and card effects, and relationships within archetypes as well as cards outside of them. with that in mind, i want to share my observations about the five monsters in the jinzo archetype!

before i begin, i want to get one simple but very important technicality out of the way, and that is this: robots, androids and cyborgs are all different things.

robot: a machine created with little/no intended resemblance to a human being, including bipedal robots like gundams who are meant to be piloted 

androids: a machine created with a clear intended resemblance to humans, either by looking exactly like one or looking very humanoid

cyborg: a human or humanoid with mechanical enhancements

the japanese name of this archetype is 人造人間 (jinzoningen), which translates literally to “artificial human” and translates officially to english as “android”. in addition, the original japanese names of all of the jinzo monsters are as follows:

人造人間－サイコ・ショッカー (Jinzōningen - Saiko Shokkā)

人造人間－サイコ・ジャッカー (Jinzōningen - Saiko Jakkā)

人造人間－サイコ・リターナー (Jinzōningen - Saiko Ritānā)

人造人間－サイコ・ロード (Jinzōningen - Saiko Rōdo)

人造人間７号 (Jinzōningen Nana-gō)

as well as having “android” prefixed before all of their names, the archetype is also all purely machine-type, as opposed to several other monsters who clearly have cyborg augmentation but retain their original typing, like giga gagagigo. based on this, it’s safe to say that the “jinzo” monsters are all purely mechanical beings—they are NOT humans who have been experimented on, or who have received cyborg augmentation.

moving onto the monsters themselves, in order of release date:

this card was released before the first actual “jinzoningen” monster, and considering that the word “jinzoningen” is also just a general word meaning “android”, it’s debatable whether this card is even technically part of the archetype, but since the wiki treats it as one, i’m just gonna go for it anyways. jinzo #7 is a very shoddy-looking android, and the numbers printed on his armor seem to imply that he is attempt #7 of his creator’s attempt to build a functioning machine, since the assumed jinzo numbers 1-6 are nonexistent in the card game. and based on his similarity in appearance to the other jinzoningen monsters, he very well may have been the first step, the “gateway” to the creation of the others. his effect is very simple, but possibly implies that he has exceptionally high speed or agility to avoid the other monsters in the way of the player, and also to make up for his poor offensive and defensive capabilities.

jinzo - lord was released years after the original jinzo in 2008, but i’m putting them both together in the same bit of analysis, because based on lord’s way of summoning, the implications are clear—jinzo - lord is simply an upgraded version of jinzo, rather than a separate monster entirely. 

unlike #7, jinzo is clearly a polished machine, fully complete in his construction and capable of several highly destructive functions. his name “psycho shocker” implies strong psychic abilities that are capable of inflicting physical damage, and his attack in the anime, “cyber energy shock”, is an electric ball of pure dark energy. also implied by his attribute, dark energy most likely contributes to a large part of his function, possibly held internally by a strong magnetic or magical field. his main skill is disabling trap cards with his presence, which can translate more generally as incredibly high intelligence and strong psychic ability that allows him to forsee danger before it happens and disable the things that he already knows pose a threat. in his upgraded “lord” form, these abilities are strengthened even further, now having the ability to outright destroy these threats and inflict karmic return blows with his psychic powers. he also gains six tendrils sprouted from his back, which may be used for restraint and generating electrical shocks from the spikes at the tips. since he is a machine, he may also use these to download information from other machines into his CPU, based on their flat appearance, as if they’re meant to be inserted somewhere. overall, being the ace of his entire archetype, he is a very powerful, very intelligent android capable of great harm in many different ways, though he appears to be somewhat of a glass cannon—his defensive capabilities are below average, so his only option is to serve his purpose with his several different abilities, or give into being overpowered by the enemy; a black-and-white choice fitting for a mechanical mind, but his high intelligence may imply also imply sentience, making his decisions not so clear-cut should he form attachments to others.

returner is a comparably small android to all the others, looking to be the size of an average human. he shares a lot of the same qualities as #7, but in returner’s case, he seems to be built with more of an intentional emphasis on agility, being incredibly thinly built and only possessing a large CPU where his head is and large shoulderpads for protection. the purpose that his second effect seems to imply is a sort of “distress call” upon destruction. his defensive capabilities are only slightly below-average, and he can hold his own against weaker opponents with ease. upon being destroyed, he immediately calls for the return of a fallen comrade, possibly implying that he uses his remaining energy and power to reanimate a destroyed or dysfunctional jinzo for just enough time to take down the larger opponent they were facing, before both of them return to ruin. 

interestingly enough, despite being a “call for help” type of android, he was built with a human-like mouth that was then sewn shut, making him unable to actually speak, which is much more visually gruesome than the other mouth-like masks the other jinzoningens have. guess the creator of the jinzoningens had a pretty messed up sense of humor. 😱

jector is very interesting, as he seems to have been built as a direct defensive counterpart to jinzo himself. his japanese name, “psycho jacker”. directly implies his purpose as a hacker, as do the multitude of tendrils connected directly to his CPU. his second ability allows him to use his full power to hack into the opponents strategies and reveal all of their abilities, providing intelligence to his team and then immediately requesting backup from jinzo, bringing him to attention, and if the situation is dire enough, directly bringing him to jector’s location. his first ability—to change his data to “jinzo”’s—is what his english name implies; the ability to “project” himself into jinzo’s role. this way, not only is he able to utilize jinzo’s specific support items, such as “amplifier” (which can ONLY be equipped to jinzo), but he is also able to take on the full appearance and abilities of jinzo - lord, who can only be summoned by tributing a face-up “jinzo” on the field and cannot be summoned any other ways. his intelligence is possibly even superior to jinzo’s, as he seems to have been built with the sole intent of creating an incredibly competent data-gathering machine who can then use it to support jinzo’s conquest. jector is, without a doubt, the best support member for jinzo, possessing high defensive capabilities, the ability to hack into vital intelligence for his team, and even the ability to copy jinzo - lord’s own abilities in a pinch. 

whoever created these androids seems to have been trying to create an android with a combination of human intelligence and raw destructive power, and have been trying for a while before they eventually got it right. upon jinzo’s creation, their focus moved on to creating androids to support his conquest, resulting in the birth of jector and returner. jinzo is a dangerous weapon capable of mass destruction, but he may also possess too much intelligence to be held down by any one commanding force for too long. jector and returner are loyal only to jinzo, so wherever he decides to go they will most likely follow. there’s really no telling what such intelligent androids would decide to do if left to their own devices, since, despite their attribute, there’s nothing in their cards or their anime appearances that directly imply that they’re evil or destruction-bent. there was that one jinzo spirit from GX that wanted to become human so he could destroy the world or whatever bUT COME ON, GIVE THEM A CHANCE-

anyways, let me know what y’all think or if you have anything to add!! reblog with commentary, reply, add stuff in the tags, or anything you want, really, this was really fun to write and it could be a fun discussion to have! :>

[paniniville]

things aren’t so great right now, y’all

i owe various institutions nearly $500 and have $2 in quarters to my name at the moment. i don’t get paid for another week and a half, but i’m getting fuck all for hours and by that point i’ll owe even more money, so there’s no climbing out of this hole any time soon

i’m missing two of my most important meds, and won’t even be able to get the prescriptions for another three weeks or more, lord knows if i’ll be able to afford them.

mal needs the rest of his shots and to get neutered, very soon -- something which i had the income to take care of when i adopted him, but my hours got cut horrendously and as such now i do not

i have a pile of rotting trash bags on my porch that i cannot afford to take to the dump

i’m not even sure if i’ll be getting my tax return, because i owe so much to the state for student loans. and even if i do get it, i don’t know when that’ll be, and it won’t be enough to cover even half of what i need right now

my dental health is so bad that i’m afraid of going to the dentist to even find out how much i have wrong with me and how much it’ll cost. i’m in constant pain from cavities and broken teeth, and brushing/flossing/mouthwash is sensory hell on top of painful on top of not having the spoons to do it in the first place

i’m stressed and want to cry 24/7. i’m barely medicated and barely functional. i keep swinging between too much sleep and not enough. most of my food is ramen or from the freezer or a can.

i’m trying to get the last commission im working on finished so i can repost my commission info without feeling guilty, but even writing is too much for me to handle most of the time without my proper meds

i’m really not in a good place right now.

my birthday is on saturday and i have no friends in the city to spend it with. i don’t even have the money to treat myself to a nice meal.

if any of yall feel up to helping, my commissions are always open, but turnaround will be slow until i can get my meds again. or you could sponsor a fic/chapter and get a shout-out and a message posted with it. or, if you’re feeling generous, i’ve got a paypal.me page;;; if you leave your tumblr url with any donation i’ll drop by your blog and draw you a doodle as a thank you???

im sorry im just. things aren’t going great and words are hard. i haven’t even been able to talk to folks all that often now because i’m a mess of anxiety and stress. i kinda just wanna become one with the void, yknow?? i don’t know how i’m gonna pull out of this, so right now, all i can hope for is that i hold on long enough to get my meds back and hope that proper brain chemical levels come with a better understanding of how to start fixing my situation

thank you for taking the time to read this. i love you and hope you are doing well. i know how hard it is to scroll through tumblr and see people in bad situations like this, so i’ve been holding off on posting it at all, but i’m just at the point now where i don’t think i have any other options. i’m so sorry.

[codyfernaesthetic]

Dichotomy

 Part 14

Summary: Mallory is searching for answers. Michael is searching for his path. They both find each other.

Author’s note: Context, context, context!!! I’ve never been more nervous about a chapter. lol. This monster might confuse you, especially if you didn’t spend hours researching the Salem Witch Trials in both history and AHS canon. This is deep cut stuff. If it’s wanted, I can answer any questions on who or what an event or person is, or whatever. It’s mostly the first part, so after you get through that you should be in the clear. Hopefully it’s explained well enough to not be confusing. I know you guys are smart, I’m just anxious about where this takes things. I want it to be interesting and evident how it’s relevant to the story. But enough rambling. Let’s find out what Michael and Mallory find out about themselves and each other! never 

Warnings: Blood, language, NSFW (Nothing explicit)

A lone woman, a refugee from her broken home, found herself weeping in a dingy motel room in the city. She was pregnant, the catalyst for her ostracization from her abusive parents. She didn’t know where to go or what to do. She’d stolen cash from her father’s wallet and run away. The guy who’d gotten her pregnant had hit the road the moment she told him, and she couldn’t afford an abortion. She’d decided to make her deathbed the ugly, stained spring mattress of the motel room. Her face was wet, her fingers trembling as she poured out a bottle of pills in her hand.

A burst of white light shot through the room. The woman screamed, dropping everything and backed up against the wall, staring as this light took on a humanoid shape.

“Do not be afraid, Agatha.”

The voice was gentle, it sounded as if it came from everywhere and nowhere at all.

“Who are you?”

The light hovered closer.

“Do not be afraid to bring forth this child.”

Agatha felt a warmth caress her belly like a hand.

“I have set aside this child for a great purpose. You shall give birth to a daughter, and upon her 18th birthday she shall become pregnant, through no will of man, but by mine. And her child shall be my chosen one, who will save this world from destruction.”

She gawked at the message, doubts and fears assailing her.

“How can I possibly take care of this child? I have nowhere to go!”

Tendrils of light spread about, “Take no care as to how you will be provided for; behold, lilies of the valley neither toil nor sow, and kings are not clothed like one of them.”

Agatha crawled closer, enraptured. She reached out her hand to touch the light, electricity buzzing on her fingers.

“All right,” she answered breathlessly, “I’ll do what you say.”

The light faded, leaving Agatha in blissful assurance that all would be well.

When she took a shower that night, she noticed a new mark on her body, like raised scar tissue.

A single star over her heart.

1692

Sarah Good was among the first to fall in the Salem Witch Trials. She was a homeless, pregnant beggar despised by the community; she was tried and imprisoned, leaving behind her husband and 4 year old daughter Dorothy, who was also taken into custody upon suspicion of witchcraft. After the 4 year old was released, the trauma she suffered left her unable to function and she spent the rest of her life as an invalid. Her mother meanwhile, gave birth in prison to her sister Mercy; but the newborn died mere hours after her birth, then Sarah was led to the gallows and hung declaring to her judge and executioner, Judge Matthers, “God will give you blood to drink.”

Heartbroken and desperate, Sarah’s husband begged the newly risen Supreme of the escaping witches to raise his daughter back to life and give her a chance to live freely. She agreed, bringing the newborn back to life. Mercy Good was given into the care of Hephzibah Green and her young daughter Jescha, and was renamed Mara, meaning bitterness. The witches escaped, leaving the horrors of Salem behind. Years passed and justice for Sarah Good was left undone…

25 years later

The town of Salem, Massachusetts lay sleeping under the pale moon, its people having put away their business for the day and said their nightly prayers for protection over their souls during the night.

All except for Judge Matthers, who sat at his desk by the candlelight working into the late hours. He stifled a yawn, dipping his quill in the ink pot.

A noise disturbed him. Something against the window. He inspected the origin of the disturbance, seeing and hearing nothing else. He had just made it back to his desk when the front door swung open with a loud bang. The old man jumped and stilled his heart, shuffling over to close the door.

“Working late into the night, Your Honor?”

He turned, startled at the new voice. A young woman in her mid twenties stood in his home, dark eyes flashing with rage.

She lifted her hand, “Detendo.”

His body was thrown against the wall, his limbs gluing to the wooden surface, paralyzed. He couldn’t make a sound.

The woman strolled toward him, “Dost thou remember a woman by the name of Sarah Good?”

His mind raced back to a gallows, a fiery, deranged woman he’d condemned as a witch.

She continued, “The woman you hung 25 years past in your self-righteousness?”

She stepped closer, “I am her daughter.”

His eyes widened in terror.

She gave him a malicious chuckle, “Aye, the one pronounced dead when you showed my mother no compassion. I hath returned from the grave to exact her prophecy upon thee. Innocent blood you spilt, but in thine own sin-cursed blood shall ye drown.”

She reached into her cloak, whispering, “Patentibus.”

His mouth opened without his consent. He started shaking.

She held up a closed fist to his face, “Behold the vengeance of Almighty God, Most Honorable Judge, and the vengeance of Mercy Good.”

She opened her hand, blowing a white powder into his mouth. He coughed violently, his body trembling harder as she waved her hand to drop him to the floor. Blood poured from every orifice, his skin turning a disgusting gray as his blood splattered all around him before he collapsed dead. She spat on his corpse and left the Judge’s home, slipping away without a trace.

_____________________

Jescha confronted her upon her return. Mara hung their clothes on the line, her adopted sister asking, “Where wast thou really?”

She didn’t look up from her work, “Repaying a life for a life.”

“Hast thou no regard for your own safety?” She scolded.

“Not since my birth hath the town known me, and even then presumed dead.”

She crossed her arms, “Thou canst not put the coven in such danger.”

She looked up at her, shrugging, “I have not. No man recognized me and I did not use my given name. All is well, justice has been done.”

She huffed, stepping beside her to help her finish her chores, “Some justice shouldst be left unto the Lord.”

Mara nodded, “‘Twas if I be His messenger.”

“Beware of pride, Mara. Lest thou think thyself too important.”

“I have thee to blame. Thou hast told me I am special.”

She smiled, “And ye are. Thou art also as stubborn as the ass of Balaam.”

She bumped her, “Aye, but the stubbornness of the ass twas the Lord’s will.”

Mara had no desire to become Supreme; she was happy to spend her days tending her garden and living in peace, despite both Jescha and Hephzibah’s insistence. She did eventually attempt The Seven Wonders at their behest, only to fail the very last.

“T’would be lying if I said I wasn’t disappointed,” Jescha told her after the tests as they sat by the river.

She laughed, “Should I take that as compliment or criticism?”

“Both.”

“Why?” She skipped a rock, “If I am not the Supreme, then I am not the Supreme.”

Her sister pouted, “I had such faith that ye were.”

“And why hast thou not attempted the Seven Wonders? Go and show thyself to be the Supreme.”

She balked, “If thou couldst not do it, then surely I cannot. I am merely a garden witch.”

Mara feigned offense, “Careful of thy words, I am merely a garden witch.”

She leaned her head into the crook of her neck, “No, not merely. You are among the most powerful of our coven.”

Mara patted her, “Thou art just as essential as I. Providence will grant you great things, dear Jes. I’m sure of it.”

“As I am sure of you, Mara.”

The two women continued in their happy states. Jescha eventually moving away, marrying into a rich family. Meanwhile, Mara’s descendants continued the line of powerful witches. Until a girl was born with the power of special connection to the spiritual world, claiming communication with the entity most commonly called God. This woman’s name was Agatha, who did give birth to a daughter she named Leah. And according to Agatha’s predictions, Leah did become pregnant at 18 years old, though no one ever knew who the father was. And Leah gave birth to a beautiful baby girl she named Mallory.

_____________

Mallory sat on her grandmother’s knee, listening to her story. When she got to the end, Mallory clapped gleefully, “That’s me!”

Agatha ran her fingers through her granddaughter’s hair smiling wistfully, “That’s right, Mallie. Grandma knew you would be born even before she had mama.”

“Do I have magical powers?” She wondered in awe.

Agatha cupped her face, “You have more power than anyone, Mallie. You have the blood of Salem and the heritage of divinity.”

She bit her lip excitedly, “Do you still have the star?”

“No, but you do, don’t you?”

She nodded, “Mama says it’s a birthmark.”

“It is. It’s a very special birthmark. It’s a sign that you are gonna save this world one day, Mallie.”

Leah and Mallory’s stepfather found them sitting out in the garden, dragging a pouting Mallory from Agatha to go home. Leah would always try and undo her mother’s damage, telling Mallory that her grandma was senile and delusional. But to Mallory, she was the only one who understood her, the only one who confirmed the deep sense of destiny she’d felt even as a little girl. She especially became a safe haven when Mallory turned 13 and was found levitating in her bed by her stepfather. Her parents dragged her to several priests as more powers manifested; the ability to manipulate fire, psychic visions, disappearing and reappearing, etc. They believed she was worshiping the devil or possessed by a demon. Mallory was forced to endure several painful exorcisms, her powers manifesting in the middle of them due to her emotional distress. This only fueled their fear. The worst incident was when Mallory found a dead rat in their yard, torn to shreds by a local stray cat. She brought the rat to the front porch, cradling it in her hands. Her parents screamed for her to put it down, but she only placed one hand over it, closing her eyes and breathing deeply.

The rat stirred to life, its wounds completely healed, even appearing younger. It scampered off in its new life while she stared in amazement at her own power.

It was the last and worst exorcism she had before running away to live with her grandmother. When her grandmother died, she felt like she’d lost her only home.

Then, a woman named Cordelia Goode announced nationwide that she ran a school for women with exceptional powers, witches.

Mallory packed her bags and left for New Orleans.

_______________

There is no love which is not pain

There is no love which does not bruise

There is no love which does not fade

There is no love which does not live from tears...

Michael felt as if he was thrown back into his body; like he was snatched away on the cusp of discovering the final truth. He gulped in air desperately, looking around him. Mallory lay there still in a peaceful trance. She should have woken up with him.

He went to her, touching her face, “Mallory…”

She remained unresponsive.

“Mallory!”

She was still breathing, but was lost in his past, being buried beneath his darkness.

He picked her up and carried her to his bedroom, lovingly laying on his black silk sheets, propping her head on a few pillows.

Hours passed...days...weeks…

“Mallory, please,” he begged everyday, “Please come back to me.”

He refused to leave the house. His food, his work, everything was ordered to be delivered to that single room. Several Cooperative members pleaded with him snap out of it; they promised to place a guard at the house, to set up a cycle of servants so he could be notified if or when she woke up. They were met with fury.

All the while she was plunged into the deep dark waters of Michael’s past. She witnessed everything, felt everything he experienced. It was enough to surely kill her.

She finally came to after nearly two months of unconsciousness. Michael was at her side immediately, caressing her sweat-soaked face. “It’s ok,” he whispered over and over again, “It’s ok, I’m here.” Her breathing calmed, her mind cleared; she looked at him, seeing beyond him. It was as if she’d journeyed through his soul, seeing every crevice, every hidden thought, surveying every molecule of his essence. It was terrifying. She saw slit throats and corpses, demonic claws sinking into his heart, endless dark. It was sorrowful; brimming with abandonment and loss, desire to change, but no one to help, a small, scared child thrust into the arms of people who only saw him as a means to an end, a tool. Bottomless loneliness and a starving for love, true, faithful love. But more than anything... It was beautiful. He was beautiful. Despite it all. She should hate him, she should want him dead. But only love flooded her heart. There was a bond between them now that their souls were bare before each other, a golden thread that weaved among their atoms, threading them together; they were darkness and light, a dichotomy, two coexisting infinities that could never be separated. She took his face in her hands, admiring every detail of his face; she touched their foreheads together, breathing him in. “You will never be alone again.” Tears sprung to his eyes, his fingers brushing over her neck. The thread tightened, pulling them closer and closer together until their lips connected. Michael groaned the moment their lips touched, ferociously pouring out every ounce of built up sorrow and desire. Emotion overflowed in both of them; tears began to fall upon their lips, and they shared them, letting go of every pretension. Michael snapped his fingers, their clothes disappearing. They became a mess of entangled limbs and passing breaths. He kissed all the way down her body, wrapping his arms around her thighs. She sighed, her skin burning with each touch of his lips. She entwined her fingers in his silken hair, threading through it assuringly. He gave a gentle bite on her stomach, earning a surprised moan. He looked up, concerned, searching to see if she was displeased. Her pulse quickened, slick heat burned between her thighs as she looked into his pleading gaze. “I’m fine,” she whispered, “That felt so good,” she pressed her lips to his forehead, “You make me feel so good, Michael.” A desperate noise left his lips as he pulled her closer, leaving more love bites on her stomach and inner thighs, relishing every utterance of praise from her. He snaked his hands under her and started to lay on his back, Golden hair spilling on the black silk. He looked up at her under heady eyes. “Take your throne,” he begged breathlessly. She bit her lip, pulling herself over him; he made quick work with his tongue, tasting her with desperate ferocity. Her legs trembled; her grip on the headboard tightening as the pleasure exploded through her body, primal moans and worship flowed from her like a hymn. Michael’s fingers gripped and dug into her flesh; the taste of her dripping on his tongue sent a jolt of need through him. Unable to bear it, he reached down and attempted to relieve some of his growing desire for release. With a heavy breath, Mallory slid herself down his body, straddling his stomach. He was taking in air like a dying man, his tongue running over his lips with little moans of pleasure. He looked up at her, eyes begging and submissive. He traced his hands over her, cupping her breasts, massaging them, treating them like sacred objects, reverently venerating her skin. He slid his fingers up to her throat, slowly curling around it gently, whispering in an uncertain tone, “Mine?” She kept her eyes on him as she took his thumb and wrapped her lips around it, biting and sucking. His other hand traced down her body to feel her wetness coating his stomach. She leaned into his touch, sighing and raking her nails across his chest. Her own need curling into thick tendrils in her core. She leaned down, giving him a passionate kiss, “Yours.” He groaned, bucking his hips, tears pricking at the corners of his eyes. “Please, Mallory,” he could barely speak, the need building within him stealing all of his words. He sat up to grip her face and pull her into a desperate, devouring kiss. “Take me,” he whined, “Please, take all of me.” She kissed him again, but he pulled back with a needy grunt, “I need you. I need to feel you surrounding me, please. Oh, please, Mallory...” the rest of his pleas were unintelligible noises of wanton hunger. She slid down further, lowering herself; he released a shaky, prolonged moan as she took him. She vocalized her pleasure with each thrust of her hips, her rhythm and speed building with her desire. Faster. Harder. Both of them riding out their pleasure, their bodies relentlessly chasing its zenith until Their release struck them like lightning. Michael couldn’t temper his volume as he screamed out her name like an irreverent prayer. Mallory could barely breathe as pleasure like bursts of light shot through her veins. They collapsed together, slick with sweat and languid. Michael, with little strength, wrapped his arms around her, planting lazy kisses on her face and neck. She clung to him like a survivor to her last hope. “Mine.” He breathed into her ear. She kissed his neck, “Mine.” They would delight in each other several more times that night, much slower and gentler. A sensation washing over them that neither of them had felt in a long time... Peace

__________

The two new lovers were wrapped up together, sleeping as they hadn’t in years. Michael’s face was buried in Mallory’s neck like it was his refuge; her legs circled his waist, hands still entangled in his hair.

A faint hum disturbed her rest. She opened her eyes to find herself staring up at a night sky, stars dotting the velvet canvas. She eased herself up, glancing around at the field where she had first met the being posing as Cordelia. Only this time, instead of the greenhouse, a large, wispy tree curled its silver branches up to the sky, gorged, white fruit with speckles of gold hung low upon it. She approached, curious at the sight.

A rustling of footsteps caught her attention. The woman stood there, still in the guise of Cordelia, staring at the tree with forlorn eyes.

“This is not how I intended this to happen,” she sounded far away, “It was all supposed to be much simpler than this.”

Mallory glared, feeling no sympathy, “Why couldn’t I bring Cordelia back?”

She sighed deeply, meeting her gaze, “You can’t cheat death forever, Mallory. Eventually it comes to claim its due.”

She stepped toward her, “You’re lying.”

She closed her eyes and rubbed her temple, “I won’t let you, that’s why.”

“Who are you?” She demanded.

The woman shook her head, pouting slightly, “I have imagined this moment for years, eager to welcome you with open arms. And now here we are, and you already hate me.”

Mallory took another confrontation step, “Who are you?”

She smiled ruefully, holding up her arms as if in defeat, “Simply...I am God.”

Mallory stared.

“I am the bringer of light and creation. I am the light from which the daughters of Salem draw their power. And you” she dared to come closer and brush the back of her fingers over Mallory’s cheek, “...are my daughter.”

“I don’t understand,” was her dumbfounded response.

“You see, Michael’s father and I,” she chuckled, “Satan as he likes to be called, he and I are a balancing scale...a dichotomy which brings the universe into order. There is good and evil, light and dark. From the very beginning of time, we have fought for balance in the universe. However, there came a point where we stopped fighting for balance, and began fighting for dominance,” her face darkened, “He decided that he wanted to tip the scales, create chaos and violence over the whole earth. And now it is time to tip the scales back again. I am tired of his malevolence and wrath, I want to create a new world. One where death and disease is an ancient memory,” her smile returned, wistful, “And I will use you Mallory. I will use you to build this new creation. You were born to rule a new earth.”

The memories of the stories her grandmother told her crashed over once again.

“I’m just a witch.”

She cupped her face, eyes widening, “No, Mallory. Oh, you are so much more. Don’t you understand? No witch has ever been able to do what you can, because you are not simply extraordinary, you are divine.”

That doesn’t explain why you refuse to let me resurrect Cordelia.

She threw her hands down, turning in a huff, “Can’t you think of anything else?!”

Storm clouds began to gather on the horizon, “I have just told you that you are the daughter of God who will bring about a new world, and you’re worried about one stupid witch. Cordelia had to die. So did every other member of the coven,” she shook her head, frustrated, “Mallory you are my daughter, but it is also true that you are a witch. If every other witch was dead then the power of Supreme would transfer to you.”

Her words from before crossed her mind, “I wasn’t the next Supreme.”

She turned away from her, “No, Coco was.”

That was a punch to the gut. A sudden flash of a vision appeared before her. Her ancestor, Mara...and her adopted sister Jescha, who faded into Coco.

Her knees trembled. The woman went on, belligerent, “She was a vapid, stupid little girl but her powers were growing and given time and attention she would have ascended after Cordelia.” She faced Mallory again, a regretful expression scrunching her face, “Michael planned to kill everyone in the Outpost, I made sure that if no one else, Coco wouldn’t survive.”

“You wanted Michael to kill the coven,” the revelation shook the ground beneath her.

She held out her hands, almost in penance, “I know you cannot understand, but what I did was for a greater plan, a greater good.  The witches had to die...Mead had to die. It was a mutually beneficial arrangement. Michael’s father and I knew that in order for both of our children to be put on the right path...there had to be a catalyst. Mead’s death forced Michael to the Cooperative and allowed me to ensure that you would have all the power you needed to stop him.”

Fire exploded from Mallory’s fingertips, threatening to consume the woman; but she stopped the fireball, extinguishing it.

“You killed them!” Mallory screamed.

“Me?” her shoulders sagged, hurt, “Mallory it was Michael who walked into Robicheaux’s and erased your sisters.”

“You not only watched it,” she cried through gritted teeth, “you set up the pieces for it to happen.”

She tried to touch her, holding out her arms as if to embrace her, “I know my ways are difficult to understand!” Mallory knocked her back, “Don’t!”

The woman regained her stance, watching her daughter with pleading eyes.

“You think you’re different from Michael’s father? My life, Michael’s life, all of our lives are nothing but a game to you! You didn’t care about stopping the Apocalypse, you cared about winning. You and him are the same thing with different masks.”

“I am trying to make a new world!” she screamed, thunder peeling from the distance, “I want to mend everything that Michael has broken. And the only way for me to do that is if you defeat him.”

Mallory was shaking visibly, “I won’t hurt him. I won’t.”

She scoffed, “He sheds a few tears and suddenly you think you know him? He is a curse, an ugly blot on creation that should never have taken his first breath.”

She attempted to embrace her again, “You are my chosen vessel, my beautiful shining light that will destroy darkness once and for all.”

“I don’t want whatever world you create,” she spat.

The woman grew deadly serious, her voice dropping to a low, threatening tone. The storm rolled closer and closer, “Mallory, don’t make me hurt you. This will end on a battlefield, whether you choose to go willingly or not.” Mallory turned away from her, “Go to hell.”

She opened her eyes in Michael’s bed, hearing his steady breathing beside her. She clung to him and began to cry.

He awoke with a start, looking her over and trying to comfort her, “What’s wrong?”

“I know exactly who I am. And I wish I didn’t.”

He held her tightly, fully aware of their plight. He caressed her hair, “Every light casts a shadow, Mallory.”

She sobbed, “I won’t hurt you.”

“We won’t have a choice. Prophecy-“

“Fuck prophecy,” she pulled back, “fuck their stupid games,” she kissed him, “I love you.”

He breathed in deeply, laying his forehead on hers with an expression that declared his knowledge that this bliss couldn’t last; it was never going to.

“I love you,” he whispered against her lips.

...there is no happy love.

But it is our own love.

[unfortunate-stranger-losers]

(asoue-sideblog) Do you have headcanons for autistic ASOUE characters, to complete the trifecta?

oooooh absolutely let’s do this thing

For starters- I should mention that it’s pretty easy to assign special interests to the ASOUE characters, seeing as most of them have one (1) interest that defines them, so I’m just gonna list that at the top to get that out of the way and then go for other headcanons :D

Violet {gifset of her own here}

Special Interest: Inventing, but she probably had other minor SIs like Female Finnish Pirates and Nikola Tesla

Her hair in her face normally doesn’t bother her but becomes a sensory issue when she’s thinking too hard, and tying up her hair when she’s thinking has become part of her Inventing Routine

Tends to hyperfocus on her inventions/plans to the detriment of basically everything else around her 

Really dislikes being put into social situations; during parties she’d hide in the corner with a book or a watch to take apart and put back together

Figured out how to sew just so she could make her and her siblings weighted blankets; she’s found that Sunny tends to like them best, but they all love them

She’s definitely got insomnia, and would stay up all night working on a new invention if her siblings didn’t keep track of her and help her get to sleep

Klaus {gifset of his own here}

Special Interest: General Literature, but he definitely gets hooked on a lot of topics he reads about. And I feel like during the canon timeline he got a special interest in the VFD Mystery

Blunt AF and literal to a fault

Literally infodumps all the time, and often doesn’t even realize he’s doing it until it’s been an hour and the conversation has moved on three times. His sisters, the Quagmires, and Fiona (for the brief time he knew her) were the only ones who weren’t really bothered by this 

Often doesn’t understand verbal instruction, and definitely has trouble understanding metaphors and sarcasm

Unlike Violet, who was a bit more social, before the fire Klaus didn’t have many friends aside from his sisters. He couldn’t pass as neurotypical as well as Violet, and so a lot of the other kids saw him as the “weird” one. He usually didn’t care, especially since he preferred to stay inside and read, but he did get a bit lonely sometime. He considers Violet his best friend, as they understand each other much better than they can understand anybody else 

Most of his minimal social skills were learned by watching his parents talking to their friends, which means he’s talked like an adult from a very young age

Sunny {gifset of her own here}

Special Interest: Cooking! Though it’d also be cool if at some point Sunny becomes interested in snakes, trying to figure out all about her bff Inky

Cannot focus on anything at any point; she gets distracted incredibly easily and tends to triple-task herself 

Overstimulated by noise quite a lot - in the books, that’s the reason the rattle’s noise scared her 

Is incredibly blunt, to the point where she can’t remember the last time she lied. This isn’t as much of a problem when she’s still speaking in baby-talk, but once she starts using actual words, Violet and Klaus have to figure out how to keep her from straight-up telling people they’ve burned down a building

Wears a lot of weighted clothing, and even as she gets older she still stims by biting 

Has absolutely no sense of time - can’t remember if that conversation with Klaus over Bea’s birthday cake happened last week or last month, also she was talking to Vi ten minutes ago… wait, no, an hour… or two… 

Duncan 

Special Interest: Journalism of any kind, thinks he wants to be an Investigative Journalist someday 

Definitely the least social of the triplets, social interaction kinda gives him anxiety and he’d much rather go over compare newspaper stories than attend parties or join clubs

Tends to infodump about Dorothy Parker or the different types of Journalism on anyone who will bother to listen, usually Isadora. As much as Quigley wanted to listen, he really couldn’t pay attention to anything at all 

In contrast, Duncan is actually very good at paying attention, mostly because he takes notes on everything he’s heard and every conversation he’s had

Absolutely hates Prufrock for more reasons than just the obvious; he hates having to sit still for so long, be around so many other people who all seem to understand interaction better than him, and be judged more on test-taking than actual knowledge. Also I can guarantee that Prufrock did not have any accommodations for neurodivergent children 

Has a very strong sense of justice, which is definitely why he especially hates corrupt newspapers and will rant on how much he hates The Daily Punctilio to anyone who will listen 

Isadora 

Special Interest: Poetry, probably specifically the works of Ogden Nash and Lord Byron (and Sappho, let’s be real)

Poetry is really the only outlet she has to emotional expression; for the life of her, she can’t figure out how she feels about anything any other way

Verbally stims by repeating famous poems to herself, or sometimes throwing in her own work and reciting it on repeat

Incredibly good at memorization, almost better than Klaus- she can recite the entirety of Rime of the Ancient Mariner if need be

Brutally honest, especially to people she considers rude; she will not hesitate to tell Carmelita exactly how much she hates her 

She and Quigley were both disasters when put together because they were both Incredibly Impulsive, though in different ways: her impulsivity tended to manifest in rushing into situations without thinking through the consequences or doing something without reading instructions, while his impulsivity tended to be more “our parents are gone so i’m cutting the sleeves off of all of my shirts, they’re like 85% of my impulse control”

Quigley 

Special Interest: Cartography and Geography, he definitely used to have a collection of cool-looking globes and maps 

The most obviously autistic of the triplets, he tends to completely ignore social cues, forget that people have boundaries, and stim whenever he gets nervous 

Waaay too trusting of people, and easily deceived because he kinda forgets that people would just lie to each other 

Has intense difficulty sitting or standing still and paying attention; if he’d been sent to Prufrock, he probably would’ve tried to run away before the first week was up

Needs mental stimulation at all times, or else he’ll go do something wild like try to bungee-jump off the roof with glued-together rubber bands while Isadora cheers him on and Duncan desperately drags him back inside 

Sleep is a Foreign Concept 

Hand-flapping and jumping up and down are his main stims, but Modern!Quigley 100% has a million of those sequin pillows to run his hands through and shares them with Sunny, who also adores them 

Fiona 

Special Interest: Mycology, but she also sometimes gets intense fixations on types of marine life, which is to be expected when she’s constantly surrounded by the ocean 

Unfortunately Widdershins never really pays attention to her when she infodumps, so she gained a habit of talking to herself. The Baudelaires and Phil were among the first people to actually listen to her when she talked about her favorite fungi 

Incredibly fascinated by how the Queequeg works and all the details of how it functions, which is how she ended up being the Chief Engineer, even though she’s not super great at actually fixing things  

Gets really bored by things that don’t interest her, and often will find a way to distract herself, whether she wants to or not (see: “When I want her to research the life of Herman Melville, she works slowly, but she’s quick as a whip when the subject is mushrooms”) 

Actually very sensitive to touch, especially from people she doesn’t know. Will really only make physical contact with people she trusts 

Even though she’s technically pretty introverted, she’s very codependent, and panics when she thinks she might have to be alone

When she’s not in uniform, Fiona wears mismatched clothing and doesn’t care how bad it looks; it feels good and that’s what matters to her, so who cares if she’s wearing a pink sweatshirt with a green skirt and two different kinds of shoes? 

so yeah, the vfd kids are very autistic and i love them

{stranger things autism headcanons} {losers club autism headcanons}

[justagoddamnbranch]

Lord help me I’m back on my bullshit

Welcome back to awkward and meaningless (since it has little weight irl) science class! Today's topic: mermaid and siren reproduction!

First I'm gonna discuss the science of it, then I'm gonna go on to the cultural aspects.

Scientific:

Most aquatic people (excluding some hybrids like Chomper) possess a vent called a cloaca. Now the main function of this vent, in real life, is to be an all purpose hole. Waste is removed, semen is taken in and actually expelled from it! I know a lot of porn out there depicts sharks in particular with two dicks, and while yes the external genitalia (claspers) are doubled in sharks, it's not quite a dick. Claspers serve as a funnel for semen to be transported, kinda like a laundry chute, rather than the hose mammals possess. Basically it's just a fin with grooves in it. The aquatic people on this blog also have cloacas and claspers, though they're slightly modified for monster oc purposes.

As stated previously, both mermaids and sirens have cloacas. These cloacas are modified though, and they carry their souls in this area. Having their soul there makes it easier to expel excess magic in the form of urine, to protect the soul from predators, and allows for quicker and easier mating. All they have to do is flex the muscles around the cloaca to open it further, expose the soul to their partner, and rub it against their partner's. Some sirens have claspers, but unlike real life claspers, they use them to simply allow even easier and prolonged access to their partner's soul. This is done by inserting but claspers into their partner's cloaca, and gently spreading the walls. Once mating is done, the soul is retracted into a cavity just above the cloaca and in front of the birth canal. 

This is not to say that they only have sex in order to mate, though. While soul to soul contact is very likely to result in offspring (as I have detailed before here on this blog), other forms of soul stimulation are possible. Due to their size and anatomy, sirens will almost exclusively have recreational sex orally. Mermaids differ slightly, have the benefit of duller claws and less webbing between their fingers, so it is possible they can have manual sex (hands only). 

Cultural: 

Sirens

Mating is very sacred to sirens, as it is a vital process to ensure the continuation of their species and to an extent, their culture. For this reason, there are a lot of stipulations for reproduction.

Mating must be done during the mating season (June through September, usually, or whenever the water is warmest)

A mating pair must not be interrupted

The two fittest individuals must mate with each other at least once

No harm may come to pregnant individuals

No harm may come to children

Pregnant individuals must may have their work time halved, and may also have a half portion more [of food and supplies]

Mating is usually initiated by a display of fitness that may include racing, roughhousing, dancing, hunting, singing, crafting, etc., depending on the desires of the submissive party. For instance, an individual more interested in strength would be most impressed by hunting and roughhousing,  but an individual interested in stamina would by impressed by racing and dancing. These displays can be private or public, or both, depending on the group. Public displays are similar to the olympics, where there are different categories depending on individual strengths, and that most people watch them. In public displays, two individuals may try to impress the same third party, and will compete. This competition is usually non-violent, unless the third party so desires. When both individuals are satisfied with each other’s displays, they will generally remove themselves and find a safe place to copulate. Private mating is usually between two parties who have either already mated or have made previous arrangements to be mates that year. Therefore, private mating requires no competition and will usually take place at the beginning of the season, before public mating.

Once mates are chosen and mating is finished, they must stay together for at least one year in order to care for the pregnant party. Some individuals will remain with each other for much longer than that, however. Gestation takes approximately one year, though there are some who pup early. Generally, pups are born between April and August, with those born in May-July being the most fit. Pups born outside this time are suspected of being conceived illegally, meaning outside the mating season. If the pups parents are found being guilty of mating outside the season, they are disallowed from participating the next eligible season.

Pups will take about 1-2 years to become fully self sufficient and big enough to live on their own without fear of many predators. However, pups are not considered adults until they are eligible for mating, which is anywhere between 18-25 depending on their exact group. I know some of you are like woah, what? Really?? 25? But even in real life sharks, like the great white, take about 26 years to become sexually mature, so 18-23 is really not that unrealistic.

Sirens do occasionally have recreational sex, though it is not all that common. Generally this takes place between two individuals who, for whatever reason, cannot participate in that year’s mating. Though on occasion a mated pair will strengthen their bond through sexual contact. Outside the mating season, however, sirens have very little to no interest in sexual activities and/or contact.

Mermaids:

Mermaids also hold mating with a certain reverence, though they are a bit more relaxed in their regulations. Mermaids do also have mating seasons (spring and fall), though it’s not uncommon to see them mate before or after this time. While a mated pair is the most common arrangement, many have a mating group. Usually mating groups have mostly dominant or submissive individuals, but there are quite a few with a good mix. Sometimes entire pods will mate with each other, though this is very rare. Mates are generally determined by the individuals’ preferences, rather than fitness. Mates may stay together long term, or may only be together for conception. Copulation will usually be private, though in certain groups it is public (these are usually the aforementioned mating pods). 

Gestation will usually take about 10 months per calf, though it can be shorter or longer. While calves can be born any time, the most births correlate with conception during the mating season. This means most calves are born during Jan-March and July-September.

Unlike siren pups, mermaid calves are dependent on their mothers during the first few weeks of their lives. This is because unlike sirens, mermaids produce milk, and the calves will subsist off of it instead of being able to hunt right away. This means it takes about 5-10 years before mermaid calves are completely self sufficient. Once calves are self sufficient, many will enter their pods as a sub adult, or will go off and find a new pod. While most mermaids will be sexually mature by the time they are 12 years old, they are not considered emotionally mature enough to mate until they can prove themselves in a trial of adulthood. This trial includes mastery of hunting and combat, a long distance swim, and some experience with crafting. Most individuals will complete the training for this, and pass the trial by age 18, though some may pass it later.

Just like reproduction, mermaid culture is very relaxed on recreational sex as well. While most recreational sex will happen between mates, it’s not uncommon to see it between friends. It is seen mostly as a bonding exercise, therefore it’s not any more special than if they were conversing over a meal. Generally the thing seen reserved only for mates is sleeping together, as it shows full trust in the other individual to protect and care for them. 

[networkingdefinition]

Cinnamon Quotes

Official Website: Cinnamon Quotes

(adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push();

• A person of good intelligence and of sensitivity cannot exist in this society very long without having some anger about the inequality – and it’s not just a bleeding-heart, knee-jerk, liberal kind of a thing – it is just a normal human reaction to a nonsensical set of values where we have cinnamon flavored dental floss and there are people sleeping in the street. – George Carlin • Agent Jones switched to the big screen and a grainy video of MoMo sitting at his enormous desk, a swivel-hipped Elvis clock ticking behind his bewigged head. ‘Death to the capitalist pigs! Death to your cinnamon bun-smelling malls! Death to your power walking and automatic car windows and I’m With Stupid T-shirts! The Republic of ChaCha will never bend to your side-of-fries -drive -through-please-oh-would-you-like-ketchup-with-that corruption! MoMo B. ChaCha defies you and all you stand for, and one day, you will crumble into the sea and we will pick up the pieces and make them into sand art. – Libba Bray • Almond milk + cinnamon crunch = major key to success. – DJ Khaled • And Mocha’s berry, from Arabia pure, In small fine china cups, came in at last. Gold cups of filigree, made to secure the hand from burning, underneath them place. Cloves, cinnamon and saffron, too, were boiled Up with the coffee, which, I think, they spoiled. – Lord Byron • Anyone who gives you a cinnamon roll fresh out of the oven is a friend for life. – Daniel Handler • As a rule, I do not approve of messing around with coffee. No sugar, no milk, no chocolate, hazelnuts, cinnamon, no nothing…. Just drink it black, the way God does – Klay Thompson

jQuery(document).ready(function($) var data = action: 'polyxgo_products_search', type: 'Product', keywords: 'Cinnamon', orderby: 'rand', order: 'DESC', template: '1', limit: '68', columns: '4', viewall:'Shop All', ; jQuery.post(spyr_params.ajaxurl,data, function(response) var obj = jQuery.parseJSON(response); jQuery('#thelovesof_cinnamon').html(obj); jQuery('#thelovesof_cinnamon img.swiper-lazy:not(.swiper-lazy-loaded)' ).each(function () var img = jQuery(this); img.attr("src",img.data('src')); img.addClass( 'swiper-lazy-loaded' ); img.removeAttr('data-src'); ); ); ); • Cinnamon bites and kisses simultaneously. – Vanna Bonta • C’mon, Amy, cinnamon rolls are calling us.” Dan put a hand to his ear. “Do you hear? ‘Amy? Dan?'” he squeaked. “‘Come and get my sugary, sticky goodness! – Judy Blundell • Cotton balls is an example of something I would buy, but not want to have as a nickname. Cinnamon buns, on the other hand, is something I would buy and want to have as a nickname. ‘Are you Cinnamon Buns?’ ‘You bet your sweet ass I am.’ – Demetri Martin • Fantasy is silver and scarlet, indigo and azure, obsidian veined with gold and lapis lazuli. Reality is plywood and plastic, done up in mud brown and olive drab. Fantasy tastes of habaneros and honey, cinnamon and cloves, rare red meat and wines as sweet as summer. Reality is beans and tofu, and ashes at the end. – George R. R. Martin • For something warm, try adding cinnamon sticks and nutmeg to apple cider simmering on the stove. You’ll get the added benefit of making your home smell amazing. – Clinton Kelly • Have you tried the cinnamon things?” Poppet asks. “They’re rather new. What are they called, Widge?” “Fantastically delicious cinnamon things? – Erin Morgenstern • Her tiny hand gripped mine with a surprising warmth, and in a shocking wash of emotion, I felt everything I knew shift. The scent of cinnamon and baby powder hit me, and as my eyes widened, my heart melted, making room for her. – Kim Harrison • His smell—the scent of a demon, cinnamon incense, amber musk—wrapped around me, filled my lungs. I felt like I could breathe again, without every breath being tainted by the stench of dying cells. The smell of him seemed to coat my abused insides with peace, and flow down into the middle of my body to spread through my veins. I filled my lungs again. While I could, before what was undoubtedly a hallucination vanished. – Lilith Saintcrow • I actually put peanut butter on my bagel. I really like peanut butter and I like to ruin the bagel. You know what’s even crazier that I do sometimes? I do cinnamon raisin bagels with peanut butter. It is really, really out there. – Evan Peters • I always go to the lowest common denominator for that ingredient. So if I think squash, I try to think what it means to me — and if it doesn’t mean anything to me, I’m not gonna do well when I cook it. So [squash] means to me: fall, maple syrup, cinnamon, and things just come into your head so you can narrow the vortex and make it a bit smaller and you go with something because there’s no time. – Geoffrey Zakarian • I always make my favorite pancakes with milk, and I also add some fruit – like a banana or apple with some cinnamon sprinkled on top. I also sometimes put peanut butter on my pancakes! – Gabriela Isler • I can’t tell you enough about cinnamon. Cinnamon is an awesome spice to use and it goes great with something like apples in the morning or in a mixture of fruit or in your oatmeal or even in your cereal. – Emeril Lagasse • I don’t know if I’ll find the cinnamon girl. I think I already did, but I’m still singing, who knows. – Neil Young • I eat a huge breakfast every morning – it’s what I look forward to. I’ll do steel-cut oatmeal with blueberries and strawberries, an egg white scramble with mushrooms, zucchini, and onion, and a piece of cinnamon Ezekiel bread with almond butter. I could do that every single day. – Heather Mitts • I like cinnamon rolls, but I don’t always have time to make a pan. That’s why I wish they would sell cinnamon roll incense. After all I’d rather light a stick and have my roommate wake up with false hopes. – Mitch Hedberg • I love Christmas! I’m not religious, but I love the trappings of the season. I love the decorations, and the music, and Santa, and the festive food, and the cinnamon- and vanilla-infused aromas. – Jane Cleland • I love the scents of winter! For me, it’s all about the feeling you get when you smell pumpkin spice, cinnamon, nutmeg, gingerbread and spruce. – Taylor Swift • I realize that it’s like spices in the kitchen. I need that turmeric. I’m sorry, but cinnamon isn’t going to substitute . I feel that I can teach my listener about a new word they can use too. “Well, what words are part of my own community, even if I’m monolingual, that I’m not allowing myself to use in a public sphere?” – Sandra Cisneros • I really don’t think I need buns of steel. I’d be happy with buns of cinnamon. – Ellen DeGeneres • I was just taking out my trash and I had, like, 300 cans of Diet Coke. It was just like, ‘How did that happen?’ I don’t even remember buying them. I also like Cinnamon Toast Crunch. My addictions are pretty much the only things I consume. – Robert Pattinson • I wasn’t eating the right kinds of calories. I didn’t know about healthy carbs such as brown rice and lentils. Now I eat small meals throughout the day: oatmeal with cinnamon to start, fruit and yogurt as a snack, and vegetables or with chicken or tuna, and a healthy carb, like a yam, for lunch. – Alison Sweeney • I’d like to wear my old [cinnamon buns] hairstyle again – but with white hair. I think that would be funny. – Carrie Fisher • I’m getting fat … as I planned. Luckily, my gut is intentional. I’m actually preparing for a big role. Sure, it’s a cinnamon roll. – Jim Gaffigan • In football you need to have everything in your cake mix to make the cake taste right. One little bit of ingredient that Tony uses in his cake that gets talked about all the time is Rory’s throw. Call that cinnamon and he’s got a cinnamon flavoured cake. – Ian Holloway • In November, the smell of food is different. It is an orange smell. A squash and pumpkin smell. It tastes like cinnamon and can fill up a house in the morning, can pull everyone from bed in a fog. Food is better in November than any other time of the year. – Cynthia Rylant • Instead of doing cinnamon, nutmeg, and all those baking spices I’ll have one spice that’s for sweets, and that’s pumpkin pie spice. – Sandra Lee • It looked like the world was covered in a cobbler crust of brown sugar and cinnamon. – Sarah Addison Allen • I’ve been juicing lately, making different smoothies and such. It was interesting, and tough at first, but it’s been doing wonders for me. I’ve been leaning in up, shedding fat, burning fat and I’m feeling good, feeling clean. My favorite so far is some almond milk with a little cinnamon there. It’s good. I have that as a little night cap at the end of the day. – Brandon Spikes • My mother was good at reading books, making cinnamon biscuits, and coloring in a coloring book. Also she was a good eater of popcorn and knitter of sweaters with my initials right in them. She could sit really still. She knew how to believe in God and sing really loudly. When she sneezed our whole house rocked. My father was a great smoker and driver of vehicles..He could hold a full coffee cup while driving and never spill a drop, even going over bumps. He lost his temper faster than anyone. – Haven Kimmel • Oils of cinnamon and eucalyptus are as powerful against some microorganisms as conventional antibiotics, and are especially effective against flus. Sandalwood oil from Mysore, India, is not only a classic perfume oil but is also a traditional remedy for sore throats and laryngitis. Lavender oil, so often used in toilet waters and scented sachets, has a dramatic healing action on burns. – Robert Tisserand • Promises are lies wrapped in pretty ribbons -Cinnamon – Virginia C. Andrews • She serves me a piece of it a few minutes out of the oven. A little steam rises from the slits on top. Sugar and spice – cinnamon – burned into the crust. But she’s wearing these dark glasses in the kitchen at ten o’clock in the morning – everything nice – as she watches me break off a piece, bring it to my mouth, and blow on it. My daughter’s kitchen, in winter. I fork the pie in and tell myself to stay out of it. She says she loves him. No way could it be worse. – Raymond Carver • Soon to come in licorice, orange, cinnamon, and banana, but not strawberry, because I hate strawberries. – Terry Pratchett • Ten silver saxes, a bass with a bow The drummer relaxes and waits between shows For his cinnamon girl. – Neil Young • The jelly – the jam and the marmalade, And the cherry-and quince-‘preserves’ she made! And the sweet-sour pickles of peach and pear, With cinnamon in ’em, and all things rare! And the more we ate was the more to spare, Out to old Aunt Mary’s! Ah! – James Whitcomb Riley • The only fruit which even much living yields seems to be often only some trivial success,–the ability to do some slight thing better. We make conquest only of husks and shells for the most part,–at least apparently,–but sometimes these are cinnamon and spices, you know. – Henry David Thoreau • The secret of food lies in memory – of thinking and then knowing what the taste of cinnamon or steak is. – Jerry Saltz • There’s no time to be modest. Reason will not work here. Without warning, I kiss Kartik. His lips, pressed firmly against mine, are a surprise. They are warm, light as breath, firm as the give of a peach against my mouth. A scent like scorched cinnamon hangs in the air, but I’m not falling into any vision. It’s his smell in me. A smell that makes my stomach drop through my feet. A smell that pushes all thought out of my head and replaces it with an overpowering hunger for more. – Libba Bray • They take unbelievable pleasure in the hideous blast of the hunting horn and baying of the hounds. Dogs dung smells sweet as cinnamon to them. – Desiderius Erasmus • They would think she was savoring the taste (blueberries, cinnamon, cream-excellent), but she was actually savoring the whole morning, trying to catch it, pin it down, keep it safe before all those precious moments became yet another memory. – Liane Moriarty • This morning, Tegus welcomed me again with an arm clasp and cheek touch. I wasn’t startled this time, and I breathed in at his neck. How can I describe the scent of his skin? He smells something like cinnamon– brown and dry and sweet and warm. Ancestors, is it wrong for me to imagine laying my head on his chest and closing my eyes and breathing in his smell? – Shannon Hale • Tigers love pepper…they hate cinnamon. – Zach Galifianakis • Use what you have, use what the world gives you. Use the first day of fall: bright flame before winter’s deadness; harvest; orange, gold, amber; cool nights and the smell of fire. Our tree-lined streets are set ablaze, our kitchens filled with the smells of nostalgia: apples bubbling into sauce, roasting squash, cinnamon, nutmeg, cider, warmth itself. The leaves as they spark into wild color just before they die are the world’s oldest performance art, and everything we see is celebrating one last violently hued hurrah before the black and white silence of winter. – Shauna Niequist • We have fried catfish, country fried steak and cinnamon-roasted pork. We have collard greens, black-eyed peas, hush puppies, biscuits, sweet potato pie and lots of gravy. Most players love it, but we also have a baked catfish for players who are still looking to stay on the approved diet. – Mark Farner • What we feel most has no name but amber, archers, cinnamon, horses and birds. – Jack Gilbert • When a kid says “smell my hand,” it almost never smells like cinnamon. – Brian P. Cleary • You know, you still owe me pancakes. I think I could go for…apple cinnamon ones now. “ “Apple cinnamon? You sure are demanding.” “It’s all right. I think you’re man enough for it.” “Thetis, if I actually believed you had either apples or cinnamon in your kitchen, I’d make them for you right now.” I didn’t answer. I was pretty sure I had some year-old Apple Jacks, but that was about it. – Richelle Mead • You liked me.” I smiled. “You were smitten with me. You were speechless to behold my beauty. You had never met anyone so fascinating. You thought of me every waking minute. You dreamed about me. You couldn’t stand it. You couldn’t let such wonderfulness out of your sight. You had to follow me.” I turned to Cinnamon. He licked my nose. “Don’t give yourself so much credit. It was your rat I was after.” She laughed, and the desert sang. – Jerry Spinelli

[clickbank-storefront-bestselling]

jQuery(document).ready(function($) var data = action: 'polyxgo_products_search', type: 'Product', keywords: 'a', orderby: 'rand', order: 'DESC', template: '1', limit: '4', columns: '4', viewall:'Shop All', ; jQuery.post(spyr_params.ajaxurl,data, function(response) var obj = jQuery.parseJSON(response); jQuery('#thelovesof_a').html(obj); jQuery('#thelovesof_a img.swiper-lazy:not(.swiper-lazy-loaded)' ).each(function () var img = jQuery(this); img.attr("src",img.data('src')); img.addClass( 'swiper-lazy-loaded' ); img.removeAttr('data-src'); ); ); );

jQuery(document).ready(function($) var data = action: 'polyxgo_products_search', type: 'Product', keywords: 'e', orderby: 'rand', order: 'DESC', template: '1', limit: '4', columns: '4', viewall:'Shop All', ; jQuery.post(spyr_params.ajaxurl,data, function(response) var obj = jQuery.parseJSON(response); jQuery('#thelovesof_e').html(obj); jQuery('#thelovesof_e img.swiper-lazy:not(.swiper-lazy-loaded)' ).each(function () var img = jQuery(this); img.attr("src",img.data('src')); img.addClass( 'swiper-lazy-loaded' ); img.removeAttr('data-src'); ); ); );

jQuery(document).ready(function($) var data = action: 'polyxgo_products_search', type: 'Product', keywords: 'i', orderby: 'rand', order: 'DESC', template: '1', limit: '4', columns: '4', viewall:'Shop All', ; jQuery.post(spyr_params.ajaxurl,data, function(response) var obj = jQuery.parseJSON(response); jQuery('#thelovesof_i').html(obj); jQuery('#thelovesof_i img.swiper-lazy:not(.swiper-lazy-loaded)' ).each(function () var img = jQuery(this); img.attr("src",img.data('src')); img.addClass( 'swiper-lazy-loaded' ); img.removeAttr('data-src'); ); ); );

jQuery(document).ready(function($) var data = action: 'polyxgo_products_search', type: 'Product', keywords: 'o', orderby: 'rand', order: 'DESC', template: '1', limit: '4', columns: '4', viewall:'Shop All', ; jQuery.post(spyr_params.ajaxurl,data, function(response) var obj = jQuery.parseJSON(response); jQuery('#thelovesof_o').html(obj); jQuery('#thelovesof_o img.swiper-lazy:not(.swiper-lazy-loaded)' ).each(function () var img = jQuery(this); img.attr("src",img.data('src')); img.addClass( 'swiper-lazy-loaded' ); img.removeAttr('data-src'); ); ); );

jQuery(document).ready(function($) var data = action: 'polyxgo_products_search', type: 'Product', keywords: 'u', orderby: 'rand', order: 'DESC', template: '1', limit: '4', columns: '4', viewall:'Shop All', ; jQuery.post(spyr_params.ajaxurl,data, function(response) var obj = jQuery.parseJSON(response); jQuery('#thelovesof_u').html(obj); jQuery('#thelovesof_u img.swiper-lazy:not(.swiper-lazy-loaded)' ).each(function () var img = jQuery(this); img.attr("src",img.data('src')); img.addClass( 'swiper-lazy-loaded' ); img.removeAttr('data-src'); ); ); );

[dailyaudiobible]

11/12/2018 DAB Transcript

Ezekiel 24:1-26:21, Hebrews 11:1-16, Psalms 110:1-7, Proverbs 27:14

Today is the 12th day of November. Welcome to the Daily Audio Bible. I’m Brian. It is a pleasure and an honor and a joy to be here in your presence and all of us together in the presence of God to take the next step forward as we hear from His word. This week we’re reading from the Voice Translation. And we’ll go back into the book of Ezekiel, which is what we’re working our way through right now. Ezekiel chapter 24 verse 1 through 26 verse 21 today.

Commentary:

Okay. So, as we continue our journey through the book of Hebrews we came to a very famous passage of Scripture today but also very, very important territory because we began to discuss what is necessary to enter into and continue to be engaged in a personal relationship with God. And that component is faith. So, like, not to be anti-climatic because we’ve been talking about…like this is not the first time that we've encountered this concept in the New Testament or in the Bible, right? We’ve examined it from all kinds of directions as we move through the writings of the apostle Paul. But Hebrews gave us this really succinct and, like I said, famous definition of exactly what we’re talking about when we’re talking about faith in the Bible. Faith is the assurance of things you have hoped for, the absolute conviction that there are realities you have never seen. So, in other words, faith is what allows us to see a reality and begin to live into that reality even though it is not reached its fullness or completion. It gives substance to what is still incomplete or unseen. And if this is faith, which it is, then we have to admit that, as human beings, we’re equipped for this. We all have faith in things we cannot see. Like love. We can't see love but who among us would deny that it exists? Or tomorrow. Like suns gonna come up tomorrow. Like, we can't see that yet. We wouldn’t be able to say for a fact that's gonna happen, but we don't question whether that daylight will come to the earth in the morning. So, we’re a people of faith. Like, we’re constantly practicing faith every single day one way or another. So, but the point the writer of Hebrews was trying to make wasn’t whether or not faith existed. Then or now, few people would argue that there is a thing called faith. The point was that faith had always been part of the Hebrew story. It had always been the essential piece. It was something that preceded any law, rule, or ritual, or behavior. And, so, because of that, it must be a foundational thing to our existence with God. And that was a very important point for the writer of Hebrews. So, we began to be led down a corridor and we’ll continue down that corridor for a bit, like going into tomorrow and beyond. We just started walking down it today and it's been lovingly named the hall of faith, right? So, it was by faith that Able brought a more acceptable offering to God. It was by faith that Enoch was taken to heaven without dying. It was by faith that Noah built a large boat to save his family from the flood. It was my faith that Abraham obeyed when God called him to leave home and go somewhere that was promised but somewhere that he’d never been before. It was by faith that even Sarah, who was too old to have children, had a child who was Isaac, the son of promise. So, the hall of faith is gonna continue, and that’s what we’ll be reading tomorrow when we get to the New Testament, but we can already see that the writer of Hebrews was starting at the beginning of Genesis, like was starting at the beginning of the story and started working forward through the stories that are found in Hebrew scriptures. And the point was to reveal that faith had always been the activator. Like it was always the essential piece. And, so, why is this point being brought up? Because it will take faith…it would take faith to enter into a new covenantal relationship with God through Jesus. And it would take faith to hold onto that relationship because people were suffering a lot of marginalization and persecution. And, so, it was gonna take faith. And the point was, this isn't something new. It had always…faith was always required. So, the hall of faith that we’re walking down, this isn’t like the superhero list, right? We’re not just renaming people that did amazing things that we've already encountered in the Bible. These are not people who were exceptions. They’re people who are examples for all of us. Faith was the activator in their stories and we're not going to get anywhere without faith in our story. Or to quote the writer of Hebrews, “without faith no one can please God, because the one coming to God has to believe that He exists and that He rewards those who come seeking.” So, you know, this is like foundational stuff to the Christian faith to the point that we just kind of gloss over or very easily take for granted something that seems bedrock, has always been a part of what we've understood our faith to be. But let's take some time today to think about what exactly we have put our faith in because, like we said at the beginning of just talking today, we are a people of faith. We put our faith in all kinds of stuff, but slowing down enough to really ask ourselves functionally, what am I really putting my faith in? I mean, maybe you feel like your faith is just, you know, like paper thin, like you can see right through. Usually that's because we put our faith in an outcome, like we’re expecting. Like, we have faith in God but we’re expecting Him to do something on our behalf and it's something specific. And that's not wrong. Like, we’re all forever going to be in need of God's involvement in our lives. But when our faith is in an expectation, right? When it's in a specific outcome, then it's not in God, it’s in the outcome and what we expect God to do. And like, real, true, deep, abiding, honest, authentic faith, it will always take the long view that extends beyond what we may ever see in this lifetime. Like it hopes beyond our time that we get to reside on earth, beyond our mortality and it reaches for God alone. So, let’s invite the Holy Spirit as we consider the purpose of our faith, but also what it is we’ve put our faith in, where it is that our hope actually lies.

Prayer:

Father, we invite You into that. It seems trivial even, maybe simple at the outset. We’re here every day. We’re hearing from Your word. You’re speaking to us. So, it's sort of like, our faith is in You and You alone. And we declare this in our prayers all the time. However, giving us the invitation to really consider all of the different components and compartments of our lives, all of the different places that we’ve put our faith in a person, in an outcome, in a thing, in an eventuality, we need to be able to see and name those things because we want to please You. And without faith in You we will not be able to. And if that is disconnected, then all of the other things that we put our faith in, they are going to vanish and disappear from us. It is only our faith in You and You alone that will give us hope forever. So, come Holy Spirit we pray. Lead us into all truth. We ask in Jesus’ name. Amen.

Announcements:

dailyaudiobible.com is the website, its home base, its where you find out what’s going on around here. So, stay connected.

Always stay connected to the Prayer Wall and the issues that are going on in different people's lives. Maybe there's something you need prayer for. This is a great place to reach out. Stay connected on social media, places like DAB Friends and different DAB groups. You can find that all in the community section of dailyaudiobible.com.

If you want to partner with the Daily Audio Bible, you can do that at dailyaudiobible.com as well. There is a link. It’s on the homepage. Thank you, thank you for those of you who have clicked that link. If you’re using the Daily Audio Bible app, you can press the Give button in the upper right-hand corner or, if you prefer, the mailing address is PO Box 1996 Spring Hill Tennessee 37174.

And, as always, if you have a prayer request or comment, 877-942-4253 is the number to dial.

And that's it for today. I'm Brian I love you and I'll be waiting for you here tomorrow.

Community Prayer and Praise:

Hi, this is Terry from Southern California. Hi Daily Audio Bible family. I just wanted to lift up Heidi from Washington. And I just heard you pray for your son Ezra and how you’re…you know…you want us to stand in the gap for him and, you know, that he’s been going through a lot, but you also told us that, you know, he has 32 days of sobriety from his addiction. And, so, we just want to claim the promises over his life just like you did when you named him Ezra based upon Ezra chapter 7:10, that he will teach the statutes to those who want to come to know the Lord. And I believe in the valley right now, God will give a mountaintop experience with your son Ezra. So, we just want to stand in the gap with you, Heidi, and let you know that we are praying for you and I will continually lift up Ezra in my prayers. And family, I just want to thank you for your continual prayers for my son Josh. He’s 14, who has his own struggles with school but, you know, Josh did go to school four days straight this week and that’s a blessing and that’s a victory because that hasn’t happened in a while. So, I look forward to just sharing a praise report, you know, for Joshua’s success in school for his own __ and his anxiety. And I just thank you guys. __ California, today’s…I think it’s like November the 9th and it’s a beautiful day. So, I hope wherever you guys are at it’s a beautiful day as well. It always is because we bask in the love of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. So, have a blessed day family. Bye.

Hello, good morning Daily Audio Bible. This is Brave from New Jersey. I’ve been a longtime listener, first-time caller, I’m nervous. I’m calling to ask my brothers and sisters to pray for me as I’m trying to make some funds to pay for my daughter’s college fees coming up soon. I’m building a little house, so I can rent it and make some money to pay for her school but I’m living in a town that is completely hostile to the progress. They’re riddling me with fees and fines __. I’m spending all my living on my retirement on this place, so I can have it done but it is not happening. I need you to pray for me please brothers and sisters, that I can finish the place in time for my daughter to go to school in one year, to college, and so I shouldn’t have to borrow and to be living with debt. Please Lord help us I pray. Thank you, brothers and sisters. Thank you, Daily Audio Bible family. Thank you, Brian for helping and for what you do. Thank you, Jill. Thank you, family. Amen.

God, we pray for victims of sexual abuse. We pray for healing. We pray for deep comfort. We pray that You will restore what has been stolen and broken. While You do not alter history, You reveal Your love in the presence and the future where things hopelessly shattered in You can be redeemed. For the many millions who have been defiled in sexual abuse, show Yourself to be loving and able as You are willing to give back life and life abundant. Yes, there is great pain in the world, there is injustice, there is evil. We turn to You and cry out for help and healing. We cannot help but wonder why such horrible abuse happens, but we turn from why and ask instead, how. How now, will Your perfect goodness and love find expression in the shadow of such wickedness. God, You are good and loving and also all-powerful, yet You have risked giving humans the right to choose how we will live. Some choose evil. For those who are victims of others vile deeds we ask for Your grace and healing. For those who have suffered, come to them tenderly with overwhelming and powerful love. We join Jesus and borrow his words, be freed from Your suffering. God heal the victims of sexual abuse in Jesus’ name. Amen.

Hi family it’s Shannon from Texas and I wanted to call and give a praise report about Madison that I called in about. The Lord blessed immediately, as He always does, even if we don’t see it, He always does. My little Cherie…His little Cherie…you’re my little Cherie too…but you’re His little Cherie. I heard you and the Lord heard you and anyone else who prayed also, she immediately stopped talking to the boy that she was talking to and she’s gotten involved in…she’s been involved in…but she is now more involved…she’s going on a trip this weekend with young life, they call it wildlife for her age group. And she’s going on a trip with them. I’ve been giving her rides and things like that. And she went last night with me. A friend of mine passed away tragically. She went with me to the funeral home. And she’s just so sweet and hugged the family. And she just fits in everywhere she goes. And she’s just amazing and she’s doing better just much better and I think is amazing that she’s going to this church group. And just, kind of, keep praying because the main thing is just her slowing down when it comes to boys and just having some real connections and her mom getting some stability. And that’s hard where we live. There’s not a lot of places for women to work. And my dream is to provide that. I worked in social work for a while they hated my faith. They hated my faith. So, right now I don’t know where I’m going, what I’m doing, and I don’t have anything going and I know the Lord’s had a plan. So, pray for that me as well. And I love you all and I’m praying for all of you with the faith that it is finished, it is done, His will is perfect. Love you, love you.

Hello, everyone it’s Jay from Nashville Tennessee. It’s been quite some time since I called in, but I have been listening and I have been praying. I’m praying for the first-time caller, I think he said his name is Jim. He was calling to seek prayer and intercession for his dad who served his country and his family and is recovering from some surgery. So, I’d like to lift him up. Heavenly Father, in the name of Jesus Christ, lord God we love you so much and we praise you and we honor you and we bless your holy name today. God, we lift up this man’s father, we lift up his condition, we lift up surgery. We lift up the recovery to you God. You are in control of all things. You are the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. So, you are in this. You know about this. So, now we call upon you and your power and your grace and we intercede for this man. In the name of Jesus, Christ we pray. Amen. Sorry guys, I haven’t been calling in. I really don’t have an excuse. I literally have just been lazy. So, I’ll be calling in every day for the next 30 days. Alright…

[equitiesstocks]

Cinnamon Quotes

Official Website: Cinnamon Quotes

(adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push();

• A person of good intelligence and of sensitivity cannot exist in this society very long without having some anger about the inequality – and it’s not just a bleeding-heart, knee-jerk, liberal kind of a thing – it is just a normal human reaction to a nonsensical set of values where we have cinnamon flavored dental floss and there are people sleeping in the street. – George Carlin • Agent Jones switched to the big screen and a grainy video of MoMo sitting at his enormous desk, a swivel-hipped Elvis clock ticking behind his bewigged head. ‘Death to the capitalist pigs! Death to your cinnamon bun-smelling malls! Death to your power walking and automatic car windows and I’m With Stupid T-shirts! The Republic of ChaCha will never bend to your side-of-fries -drive -through-please-oh-would-you-like-ketchup-with-that corruption! MoMo B. ChaCha defies you and all you stand for, and one day, you will crumble into the sea and we will pick up the pieces and make them into sand art. – Libba Bray • Almond milk + cinnamon crunch = major key to success. – DJ Khaled • And Mocha’s berry, from Arabia pure, In small fine china cups, came in at last. Gold cups of filigree, made to secure the hand from burning, underneath them place. Cloves, cinnamon and saffron, too, were boiled Up with the coffee, which, I think, they spoiled. – Lord Byron • Anyone who gives you a cinnamon roll fresh out of the oven is a friend for life. – Daniel Handler • As a rule, I do not approve of messing around with coffee. No sugar, no milk, no chocolate, hazelnuts, cinnamon, no nothing…. Just drink it black, the way God does – Klay Thompson

jQuery(document).ready(function($) var data = action: 'polyxgo_products_search', type: 'Product', keywords: 'Cinnamon', orderby: 'rand', order: 'DESC', template: '1', limit: '68', columns: '4', viewall:'Shop All', ; jQuery.post(spyr_params.ajaxurl,data, function(response) var obj = jQuery.parseJSON(response); jQuery('#thelovesof_cinnamon').html(obj); jQuery('#thelovesof_cinnamon img.swiper-lazy:not(.swiper-lazy-loaded)' ).each(function () var img = jQuery(this); img.attr("src",img.data('src')); img.addClass( 'swiper-lazy-loaded' ); img.removeAttr('data-src'); ); ); ); • Cinnamon bites and kisses simultaneously. – Vanna Bonta • C’mon, Amy, cinnamon rolls are calling us.” Dan put a hand to his ear. “Do you hear? ‘Amy? Dan?'” he squeaked. “‘Come and get my sugary, sticky goodness! – Judy Blundell • Cotton balls is an example of something I would buy, but not want to have as a nickname. Cinnamon buns, on the other hand, is something I would buy and want to have as a nickname. ‘Are you Cinnamon Buns?’ ‘You bet your sweet ass I am.’ – Demetri Martin • Fantasy is silver and scarlet, indigo and azure, obsidian veined with gold and lapis lazuli. Reality is plywood and plastic, done up in mud brown and olive drab. Fantasy tastes of habaneros and honey, cinnamon and cloves, rare red meat and wines as sweet as summer. Reality is beans and tofu, and ashes at the end. – George R. R. Martin • For something warm, try adding cinnamon sticks and nutmeg to apple cider simmering on the stove. You’ll get the added benefit of making your home smell amazing. – Clinton Kelly • Have you tried the cinnamon things?” Poppet asks. “They’re rather new. What are they called, Widge?” “Fantastically delicious cinnamon things? – Erin Morgenstern • Her tiny hand gripped mine with a surprising warmth, and in a shocking wash of emotion, I felt everything I knew shift. The scent of cinnamon and baby powder hit me, and as my eyes widened, my heart melted, making room for her. – Kim Harrison • His smell—the scent of a demon, cinnamon incense, amber musk—wrapped around me, filled my lungs. I felt like I could breathe again, without every breath being tainted by the stench of dying cells. The smell of him seemed to coat my abused insides with peace, and flow down into the middle of my body to spread through my veins. I filled my lungs again. While I could, before what was undoubtedly a hallucination vanished. – Lilith Saintcrow • I actually put peanut butter on my bagel. I really like peanut butter and I like to ruin the bagel. You know what’s even crazier that I do sometimes? I do cinnamon raisin bagels with peanut butter. It is really, really out there. – Evan Peters • I always go to the lowest common denominator for that ingredient. So if I think squash, I try to think what it means to me — and if it doesn’t mean anything to me, I’m not gonna do well when I cook it. So [squash] means to me: fall, maple syrup, cinnamon, and things just come into your head so you can narrow the vortex and make it a bit smaller and you go with something because there’s no time. – Geoffrey Zakarian • I always make my favorite pancakes with milk, and I also add some fruit – like a banana or apple with some cinnamon sprinkled on top. I also sometimes put peanut butter on my pancakes! – Gabriela Isler • I can’t tell you enough about cinnamon. Cinnamon is an awesome spice to use and it goes great with something like apples in the morning or in a mixture of fruit or in your oatmeal or even in your cereal. – Emeril Lagasse • I don’t know if I’ll find the cinnamon girl. I think I already did, but I’m still singing, who knows. – Neil Young • I eat a huge breakfast every morning – it’s what I look forward to. I’ll do steel-cut oatmeal with blueberries and strawberries, an egg white scramble with mushrooms, zucchini, and onion, and a piece of cinnamon Ezekiel bread with almond butter. I could do that every single day. – Heather Mitts • I like cinnamon rolls, but I don’t always have time to make a pan. That’s why I wish they would sell cinnamon roll incense. After all I’d rather light a stick and have my roommate wake up with false hopes. – Mitch Hedberg • I love Christmas! I’m not religious, but I love the trappings of the season. I love the decorations, and the music, and Santa, and the festive food, and the cinnamon- and vanilla-infused aromas. – Jane Cleland • I love the scents of winter! For me, it’s all about the feeling you get when you smell pumpkin spice, cinnamon, nutmeg, gingerbread and spruce. – Taylor Swift • I realize that it’s like spices in the kitchen. I need that turmeric. I’m sorry, but cinnamon isn’t going to substitute . I feel that I can teach my listener about a new word they can use too. “Well, what words are part of my own community, even if I’m monolingual, that I’m not allowing myself to use in a public sphere?” – Sandra Cisneros • I really don’t think I need buns of steel. I’d be happy with buns of cinnamon. – Ellen DeGeneres • I was just taking out my trash and I had, like, 300 cans of Diet Coke. It was just like, ‘How did that happen?’ I don’t even remember buying them. I also like Cinnamon Toast Crunch. My addictions are pretty much the only things I consume. – Robert Pattinson • I wasn’t eating the right kinds of calories. I didn’t know about healthy carbs such as brown rice and lentils. Now I eat small meals throughout the day: oatmeal with cinnamon to start, fruit and yogurt as a snack, and vegetables or with chicken or tuna, and a healthy carb, like a yam, for lunch. – Alison Sweeney • I’d like to wear my old [cinnamon buns] hairstyle again – but with white hair. I think that would be funny. – Carrie Fisher • I’m getting fat … as I planned. Luckily, my gut is intentional. I’m actually preparing for a big role. Sure, it’s a cinnamon roll. – Jim Gaffigan • In football you need to have everything in your cake mix to make the cake taste right. One little bit of ingredient that Tony uses in his cake that gets talked about all the time is Rory’s throw. Call that cinnamon and he’s got a cinnamon flavoured cake. – Ian Holloway • In November, the smell of food is different. It is an orange smell. A squash and pumpkin smell. It tastes like cinnamon and can fill up a house in the morning, can pull everyone from bed in a fog. Food is better in November than any other time of the year. – Cynthia Rylant • Instead of doing cinnamon, nutmeg, and all those baking spices I’ll have one spice that’s for sweets, and that’s pumpkin pie spice. – Sandra Lee • It looked like the world was covered in a cobbler crust of brown sugar and cinnamon. – Sarah Addison Allen • I’ve been juicing lately, making different smoothies and such. It was interesting, and tough at first, but it’s been doing wonders for me. I’ve been leaning in up, shedding fat, burning fat and I’m feeling good, feeling clean. My favorite so far is some almond milk with a little cinnamon there. It’s good. I have that as a little night cap at the end of the day. – Brandon Spikes • My mother was good at reading books, making cinnamon biscuits, and coloring in a coloring book. Also she was a good eater of popcorn and knitter of sweaters with my initials right in them. She could sit really still. She knew how to believe in God and sing really loudly. When she sneezed our whole house rocked. My father was a great smoker and driver of vehicles..He could hold a full coffee cup while driving and never spill a drop, even going over bumps. He lost his temper faster than anyone. – Haven Kimmel • Oils of cinnamon and eucalyptus are as powerful against some microorganisms as conventional antibiotics, and are especially effective against flus. Sandalwood oil from Mysore, India, is not only a classic perfume oil but is also a traditional remedy for sore throats and laryngitis. Lavender oil, so often used in toilet waters and scented sachets, has a dramatic healing action on burns. – Robert Tisserand • Promises are lies wrapped in pretty ribbons -Cinnamon – Virginia C. Andrews • She serves me a piece of it a few minutes out of the oven. A little steam rises from the slits on top. Sugar and spice – cinnamon – burned into the crust. But she’s wearing these dark glasses in the kitchen at ten o’clock in the morning – everything nice – as she watches me break off a piece, bring it to my mouth, and blow on it. My daughter’s kitchen, in winter. I fork the pie in and tell myself to stay out of it. She says she loves him. No way could it be worse. – Raymond Carver • Soon to come in licorice, orange, cinnamon, and banana, but not strawberry, because I hate strawberries. – Terry Pratchett • Ten silver saxes, a bass with a bow The drummer relaxes and waits between shows For his cinnamon girl. – Neil Young • The jelly – the jam and the marmalade, And the cherry-and quince-‘preserves’ she made! And the sweet-sour pickles of peach and pear, With cinnamon in ’em, and all things rare! And the more we ate was the more to spare, Out to old Aunt Mary’s! Ah! – James Whitcomb Riley • The only fruit which even much living yields seems to be often only some trivial success,–the ability to do some slight thing better. We make conquest only of husks and shells for the most part,–at least apparently,–but sometimes these are cinnamon and spices, you know. – Henry David Thoreau • The secret of food lies in memory – of thinking and then knowing what the taste of cinnamon or steak is. – Jerry Saltz • There’s no time to be modest. Reason will not work here. Without warning, I kiss Kartik. His lips, pressed firmly against mine, are a surprise. They are warm, light as breath, firm as the give of a peach against my mouth. A scent like scorched cinnamon hangs in the air, but I’m not falling into any vision. It’s his smell in me. A smell that makes my stomach drop through my feet. A smell that pushes all thought out of my head and replaces it with an overpowering hunger for more. – Libba Bray • They take unbelievable pleasure in the hideous blast of the hunting horn and baying of the hounds. Dogs dung smells sweet as cinnamon to them. – Desiderius Erasmus • They would think she was savoring the taste (blueberries, cinnamon, cream-excellent), but she was actually savoring the whole morning, trying to catch it, pin it down, keep it safe before all those precious moments became yet another memory. – Liane Moriarty • This morning, Tegus welcomed me again with an arm clasp and cheek touch. I wasn’t startled this time, and I breathed in at his neck. How can I describe the scent of his skin? He smells something like cinnamon– brown and dry and sweet and warm. Ancestors, is it wrong for me to imagine laying my head on his chest and closing my eyes and breathing in his smell? – Shannon Hale • Tigers love pepper…they hate cinnamon. – Zach Galifianakis • Use what you have, use what the world gives you. Use the first day of fall: bright flame before winter’s deadness; harvest; orange, gold, amber; cool nights and the smell of fire. Our tree-lined streets are set ablaze, our kitchens filled with the smells of nostalgia: apples bubbling into sauce, roasting squash, cinnamon, nutmeg, cider, warmth itself. The leaves as they spark into wild color just before they die are the world’s oldest performance art, and everything we see is celebrating one last violently hued hurrah before the black and white silence of winter. – Shauna Niequist • We have fried catfish, country fried steak and cinnamon-roasted pork. We have collard greens, black-eyed peas, hush puppies, biscuits, sweet potato pie and lots of gravy. Most players love it, but we also have a baked catfish for players who are still looking to stay on the approved diet. – Mark Farner • What we feel most has no name but amber, archers, cinnamon, horses and birds. – Jack Gilbert • When a kid says “smell my hand,” it almost never smells like cinnamon. – Brian P. Cleary • You know, you still owe me pancakes. I think I could go for…apple cinnamon ones now. “ “Apple cinnamon? You sure are demanding.” “It’s all right. I think you’re man enough for it.” “Thetis, if I actually believed you had either apples or cinnamon in your kitchen, I’d make them for you right now.” I didn’t answer. I was pretty sure I had some year-old Apple Jacks, but that was about it. – Richelle Mead • You liked me.” I smiled. “You were smitten with me. You were speechless to behold my beauty. You had never met anyone so fascinating. You thought of me every waking minute. You dreamed about me. You couldn’t stand it. You couldn’t let such wonderfulness out of your sight. You had to follow me.” I turned to Cinnamon. He licked my nose. “Don’t give yourself so much credit. It was your rat I was after.” She laughed, and the desert sang. – Jerry Spinelli

[clickbank-storefront-bestselling]

jQuery(document).ready(function($) var data = action: 'polyxgo_products_search', type: 'Product', keywords: 'a', orderby: 'rand', order: 'DESC', template: '1', limit: '4', columns: '4', viewall:'Shop All', ; jQuery.post(spyr_params.ajaxurl,data, function(response) var obj = jQuery.parseJSON(response); jQuery('#thelovesof_a').html(obj); jQuery('#thelovesof_a img.swiper-lazy:not(.swiper-lazy-loaded)' ).each(function () var img = jQuery(this); img.attr("src",img.data('src')); img.addClass( 'swiper-lazy-loaded' ); img.removeAttr('data-src'); ); ); );

jQuery(document).ready(function($) var data = action: 'polyxgo_products_search', type: 'Product', keywords: 'e', orderby: 'rand', order: 'DESC', template: '1', limit: '4', columns: '4', viewall:'Shop All', ; jQuery.post(spyr_params.ajaxurl,data, function(response) var obj = jQuery.parseJSON(response); jQuery('#thelovesof_e').html(obj); jQuery('#thelovesof_e img.swiper-lazy:not(.swiper-lazy-loaded)' ).each(function () var img = jQuery(this); img.attr("src",img.data('src')); img.addClass( 'swiper-lazy-loaded' ); img.removeAttr('data-src'); ); ); );

jQuery(document).ready(function($) var data = action: 'polyxgo_products_search', type: 'Product', keywords: 'i', orderby: 'rand', order: 'DESC', template: '1', limit: '4', columns: '4', viewall:'Shop All', ; jQuery.post(spyr_params.ajaxurl,data, function(response) var obj = jQuery.parseJSON(response); jQuery('#thelovesof_i').html(obj); jQuery('#thelovesof_i img.swiper-lazy:not(.swiper-lazy-loaded)' ).each(function () var img = jQuery(this); img.attr("src",img.data('src')); img.addClass( 'swiper-lazy-loaded' ); img.removeAttr('data-src'); ); ); );

jQuery(document).ready(function($) var data = action: 'polyxgo_products_search', type: 'Product', keywords: 'o', orderby: 'rand', order: 'DESC', template: '1', limit: '4', columns: '4', viewall:'Shop All', ; jQuery.post(spyr_params.ajaxurl,data, function(response) var obj = jQuery.parseJSON(response); jQuery('#thelovesof_o').html(obj); jQuery('#thelovesof_o img.swiper-lazy:not(.swiper-lazy-loaded)' ).each(function () var img = jQuery(this); img.attr("src",img.data('src')); img.addClass( 'swiper-lazy-loaded' ); img.removeAttr('data-src'); ); ); );

jQuery(document).ready(function($) var data = action: 'polyxgo_products_search', type: 'Product', keywords: 'u', orderby: 'rand', order: 'DESC', template: '1', limit: '4', columns: '4', viewall:'Shop All', ; jQuery.post(spyr_params.ajaxurl,data, function(response) var obj = jQuery.parseJSON(response); jQuery('#thelovesof_u').html(obj); jQuery('#thelovesof_u img.swiper-lazy:not(.swiper-lazy-loaded)' ).each(function () var img = jQuery(this); img.attr("src",img.data('src')); img.addClass( 'swiper-lazy-loaded' ); img.removeAttr('data-src'); ); ); );

[pinkerhero]

church 8/20/17

Music:

Love Won't Let Me Down — Hillsong Young & Free

Love Is On Our Side — Capital Kings

Real Love — Hillsong Young and Free

Glorious Day — Passion

Overcome — Elevation Worship

No Wonder (Roar of the Rugged Cross) — River Valley Worship

Creating Your Future: Growing A Big Life

Create space to grow your dreams. Genesis 1:6-12 NLT Time margin. You’ve gotta create the space to make a plan. Emotional margin. Please do not try to function in someone’s disfunction. Financial margin. Committing resources to what you want to do.

Get the soil right so you can grow something significant. Genesis 1:9-10 NLT, Hebrews 10:25 NLT + Psalm 92:13 There is so much...capitalism...in these messages...

Plant your seeds if you want a harvest! Genesis 1:11-12 NLT, Joel 2:25a KJV The kind of things you want in your life take a season. They’re not immediate. God says in the Scripture, “I will restore to you the years that you lost.” He teaches in the principles that they can do it themselves. Jesus already came to your rescue. No one else is coming. Jesus has already saved you. He wants to do it through you. Seed faith is when you give something you have to get something you don’t have. 3 kinds of seeds in the Bible: A. Spiritual seed Isaiah 1:9 KJV Quit trying to be happy. If you will give your life to Christ, he’ll make you happy. Out of death comes new life. Don’t worry about being happy. Worry about being blessed. God will take you, break you, bless you, and grow you. Hurting means you’re so close. B. Financial seed Malachi 3:10-11 NLT We tithe, and then God blesses the other 90%. When you sow to God’s work, he will give in return. You cannot outgive God. *checks Adsense* “Balance $13.94″ One day. C. Investment seed Psalm 107:37 NLT “He will bless it if you trust him with it.” I can’t wait to tithe so “my crops are flourishing” will be true. “There are no victories at discount prices.”

Do not ignore the principle of sowing and reaping. Galatians 6:7 NLT The guarantee is not how successful you will be. The guarantee is that you will be successful.

I’ve been trying to follow this advice for a long time. Something I tell myself is, “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me to train myself to be physically capable of doing it.” God will strengthen and bless me, and I need to work hard and believe in what I can do with him. Finding a balance is hard, but I try to remember. uwu

“I really believe that we need to pray for our nation today.”

Now?! Not last week?!

“I’m not trying to get political.” [immediately gets political]

“You guys know I have a bias. I just think the media wants ratings. I just don’t think it’s prevalent as people make it out to be. The most segregated hour of the week in America is Sunday morning at 11:00 AM. We are not an all-white/ect. church. We are everything you can imagine all in the same house. Not everyone is ect. This is what Heaven’s gonna look like. There’s gonna be a lot of people that don’t look or think like you that loved Jesus. Be the church. I wanna pray for our officers who are obviously being attacked right now. I believe 99% of officers actually signed up to serve us. I believe in God’s authority, and I believe God has given us great men and women to protect us. They are the first to throw out bad officers, by the way. Let’s pray for our nation.”

The prayer was two and a half minutes long.

Bolded is vague acknowledgement of the white supremacists.

[excluding the extra God/Lord/Father/s, ect.] "-as your people. Not just as a church, but for our communities. There is real anger, real h*te, and real racism going on. It's just wrong and it breaks the heart of God. I know it does. I pray that you would just help us just to be your people this week, just to go out and instead of sharing our opinion may we hold our opinion back and share our love and share our encouragement. May we listen before we speak. May we slow down with our thoughts and our positions and focus instead on hearing someone else's hurt. Ministering to them, being there for them, praying for them, lifting them up. May we be encouragers first. We thank you for the privilege to be your church, to be your people, out in our communities supporting those who feel isolated and alone, hurt. I thank you that you've given us authority in our country that protects us. Thank you. I would not want to experience this nation without police officers, without a great military that protects us. I pray for your protection, your physical protection, over the church—more importantly, over the entire community. I pray for our nation. We know that there are mad men who want to fight us and want to battle us and want to wage war. We know that there's people inside our nation that want to wage war inside our nation. I pray that you would calm them, that you would change their hearts. I pray that you would just protect us. Thank you for the privilege we had to be your people today. Thank you for the reminder as we turn on the TV that you can't legislate love. It's gotta be through Jesus, and I pray that we would just simply be your people. Thank you for the privilege we have to give today, to the real only organization that truly has the hope for the world, the local church. I pray that you would cause your church everywhere to rise up, that your people would simply function like the church, because I know when we do that that there will be no way to bar the doors to keep people out if we'll simply love one another like your word says. Thank you for the privilege we can give today towards your house, towards your cause. In your name we pray, Amen."

God bless! ✿*,(*´◕ω◕`*)+✿.*

~ Tori. ♥

[15hoursinafield]

‘Lily?’

She heard a light tap on the toilet door following the question. Of all the people to find her crying in the bathroom of a posh event it had to be her boyfriend’s most snobby sister.

Lily sniffed slightly and took in a breath before replying ‘just a second’ half expecting Amanda to leave her alone. She did not. Instead this seemed to spur her on more.

‘I have makeup wipes for mascara tears’

By this point, Lily had accepted her fate, she’d have to embarrass herself royally in front of Amanda Jenks. She unlocked the toilet door and instead of looking straight at Amanda found her own reflection first. Black tears down her cheeks, half rubbed off foundation and her hair messily thrown down after defiantly pulling it out of its many pins.

‘I look like a fucking mess’

She thought Amanda would agree but she shook her head and took her hands leading her to sit down in the nearest chair and said sympathetically, ‘even I’ve looked worse than this, Thomas. This is nothing. If you really wanted to go all out and look awful at an event you’d have to get really drunk and embarrass your family by being sick on yourself.’

Lily let out a little laugh and she smiled softly, ‘has anyone ever done that here?’

‘Yes. I’m talking from experience.’

Amanda smiled at her then, the smile was warm and calming. A lot like her mothers. As much as she’d been warned that Amanda was the harshest member of the family she couldn’t help but feel at ease.

She watched her get wipes from her purse and wipe off the tear stains from her face carefully before throwing the tissue away and then joining her again kneeling in front of her place in the seat. Her hands on her knees looking up at her expectantly.

‘Come on then, out with it Thomas. I’m glad to see you haven’t actually ran from the building like I expected. This is actually quite good in your books.’

Lily winced slightly at the comment but she couldn’t argue against her logic. Especially since about five minutes prior to Amanda knocking on her toilet door she had contemplated a way to get out of the building without anyone seeing.

Unable to maintain eye contact she looked at her hands, wringing them nervously.

‘I really don’t belong here. I’m never gonna fit in. I feel ridiculous! How am I ever supposed to feel at ease at these things? I can’t adapt to this. This isn’t the fucking yule ball. I feel like pretty woman at best. This just is not me ... it’s not me! I can barely hold a conversation at a house party without three shots of liquid confidence, now I’m sober at an event with the stuffiest group of old rich people in England? I’d rather off myself.’

She got louder as the rant continued sounding more defiant than deflated than she had previously.

Amanda laughed, shaking her head slightly before speaking again ‘I wouldn’t go that far … however, this is all great news.’

Lily looked incredulous by this point, staring at her as if she was completely mad. ‘How is this great news?’

‘Because! You sound exactly like Hugo. I have listened to this rant from him for years. I could say it back to you line for line and I could argue back with you about it for hours as well, Lily … and that’s good because it means you’re right for him. He doesn’t want to be at these functions, he doesn’t enjoy them and he feels out of place. He’s never going to adapt either and he was raised in it. So, you are fine …  absolutely splendid. Alright? Stand up for me.’

Amanda took her hands standing up with her.

‘Look, I’m not saying this because I want to butter you up and be best chums with you. We are never going to be that close because you have more chance of getting a cat to befriend a dog than you do of me and Hugo getting along in our lifetime. But you don’t have to worry about not being this perfect girlfriend. You literally have no reason to be worrying about these kinds of things. You’re lovely as you are and he has had a lot of time to decide you’re not right for him and leave and he hasn’t because he doesn’t want to! He never shuts up about you, it’s irritating. I wish we could have one day where I didn’t hear about you and your brother but I don’t think it’s going to happen from now on ... I say that lovingly.’

She laughed softly, sorting out pieces of Lily’s hair for her as she talked.

‘You are just saying that though …’ Lily sighed heavily.

‘I’m not. Listen, I know what you’re like because I think we are alike. You like to present yourself as this hard ass, piece of work girl. Probably think of yourself as a liability. I get all that. I get it because I am a bitch, I know it. You know it. I’m a cold bitch and I loathe myself for it because I’m not as good as the rest of my family. I’m not what they deserve. Do you get where I’m coming from?’ Lily nodded, biting her lip. ‘But here is the thing … as much as we are both our bad parts, I think we both have hearts of gold. Hey? And listen, I asked my boyfriend if he wanted to leave me twice because I didn’t feel good enough for him and he wouldn’t let me go. Do you know why? The people that love us see the best parts of ourselves that aren’t visible to ourselves. It’s hard to believe them but I’m telling you that you have to try. Cut yourself some slack sometimes. See yourself through Hugo’s eyes, you know? And if that doesn’t work because lord knows I cannot see myself the way Jonah sees me, work on making yourself the person you want to be but I’m just warning you not to include being perfect in that because no one is.’

‘How can you say that? You’re from a family of perfect people!’

‘Wrong. My mum? Pettiest person on earth and she’s stubborn as anything. She’s brutal when she wants to be. Also, she is a complete snake. I promise you … just don’t tell her I said that. So, no one is perfect. Not even poised Rosalie Jenks. Just take a breather, have a minute to yourself and then you can walk back out there and save your awkward boyfriend from being at this thing alone.’

Lily took in a deep breath closing her eyes and then let it out slowly, opening her eyes to smile at Amanda.

‘Better?’

‘Thank you, Amanda.’

‘Don’t thank me. I can’t exactly leave you crying in the toilets, can I? Then I really would be a heartless bitch. I’ll give you a minute. I’m going to get myself another drink. See you out there, Thomas.’

‘See you …’