#is that haskell? i think

[flavia-draws]

thank you @sea-of-machines for sending me this cool picture of king crimson!

[clarissaweasley-10]

Here's your daily reminder that Kaz Brekker once told a five-year-old girl, he lives under her bed <3333

[tortoisesshells]

43.

[whosthatfunkyrat]

Actually Mitski is writing songs about Kanej from Kaz’s POV

[lilcathsmith]

Greg in every episode of CSI (241/328) • In A Dark, Dark House •

[gayarograce]

yknow, lambda calculus is something that, since i've found out about it, i wish i could actually wrap my head around, but try as i might i just can't quite fully understand using it

[auburnlaughter]

Plant Company for WIP Wednesday please

Thank you for the ask! Here are your sentences.

WIP Wednesday Plant Company (original story)

"Sir, do you want-"

But the question of whether Sorenson would prefer that Haskell also leave died on his lips as soon as he looked back at Sorenson and saw, not confusion or wild panic, but, well, it was still fear, but not panic. It was a quieter fear, gentler.

[applecidersstuff]

You know what makes Kaz a great boss? What makes him a better boss then both Pekka Rollins and Per Haskel?

He gets to know his crew and basically any people he’s working with. I know it’s basically an opposite of what he says about barrel gangs, but hear me out.

The main reason why Kaz was able to know that Big Bolliger was a traitor is because he knew that Bol was lazy. And knowing what he did in the "Crow club" it would be hard to know if he was lazy or just relaxed while on the job. Kaz knew that he was lazy - he took time to know the guy.

And also the thing that makes Kaz's plans good is that he keeps in mind all his crew's bad habits and vulnerabilities and plots around them. Its really easy to see that if you look at Jesper.

He keeps in mind that Jesper is late and that he can accidentally give up important info. We see that clearly in the beginning of the book. During the “set the wolf free” plan he made sure to tell Jesper the “wrong” time so that he would “be late” and free the animals at the right time. He knew Jesper would(or could) give up info by accident so he took precautions(saying this again: no one arranges an extra ship just to gather in front of it)

And we also have it in the end of CK.

I think both Inej and Jesper had been told the wrong time. Kaz knew that Dunyasha would be there, so he added some time for Inej to fight her. He talks with Jesper about kergud(I have no idea how to spell that, sorry) and also adds time for that fight. He might have actually putted the wyvil it Jespers pocket(as I do not remember Jes actually putting it there, or mb he just made sure it was there).

I mean, it would have been weird if there would be just the sound of one shot fired, but after the siren it would sound better.

When Kaz told Dregs that he won't be their father, he meant it, your father doesn't know you that well, but your sneaky annoying little sibling does.

[spider-stark]

A BOY'S FIRST PEST

Kaz Brekker x Reader

Summary - Kaz Brekker thinks Per Haskell's daughter is a (very lovely) pest

Warnings - fem!reader, traumatraumatrauma, the woes of troubled youth, light mentions of blood and death, these bitches trauma bonded yo, could deviate some from canon, based more on book!kaz than show, NOT EDITED WE DIE LIKE MEN

Word Count - 2.0k

!MINORS DNI!

// masterlist // send me your thoughts // comments & reblogs appreciated! //

Everyone knows Kaz Brekker put his own money into fixing up the Slat. 

He hired men to patch the leaky roof (though it still drips during a heavy rain) and put proper insulation in the walls (which keeps the house warm enough, even if it does nothing to muffle the noise of its occupants). He had all the doors fitted with working knobs (but easily picked locks) and ensured the kitchen was capable of making a warm meal (even if seriously doubted any of the Dregs knew how to cook). 

And while he would never admit it aloud, Kaz was also the one who made sure there were always clean linens in every room (albeit the cheapest Ketterdam has to offer) and spare clothes in every closet (sizes ranging from wafer-thin to barrel-chested). In keeping, he also takes it upon himself to keep the bathing room stocked with a steady supply of toiletries (because if someone uses his toothbrush again, he’s going to kill everyone in this place and then himself). 

Because of Kaz Brekker, the Slat was more than just a safe place to hole up. It was a haven, the closest thing many of the Dregs had to a home. 

But it did, of course, have one enduring problem. 

The pests.

Or, namely, the one pest—one that he could never quite exterminate (though the spider privy to the inner-workings of Kaz Brekker’s mind might argue the merit of replacing ‘could never’ with ‘would never’). 

Per Haskell’s very annoying (and very lovely) daughter. 

In the midst of Ketterdam’s hottest season, you find yourself lying sprawled on your back atop the dark sheets, clad in the skimpiest nightclothes you own: a matching set of black silk shorts and flowy, thin-strapped camisole. The air is thick and near stifling in the attic-bedroom, but you don’t mind it. You prefer being hot to cold, if only because the heavy weight of winter clothes makes you feel trapped, eliciting the urge to crawl straight from your skin. 

When the door finally swings open, you eagerly push up onto your elbows. 

Kaz doesn’t so much as spare a glance in your direction. He’s got one hand on his cane, the other shoving the door shut behind him as he limps toward his desk, guided by the bright moonlight spilling in from the muggy window. 

Your shoulders slump, huffing out a breath. ��Seriously? You’re not even gonna greet me?” 

With his back turned to you, Kaz removes his hat and places it on the desk. He doesn’t look at you. “You’re in my room.” 

“Yeah—so I was actually thinking something more along the lines of hello,” you drone, lips pursed. “Y’know, that thing normal people say when they see their friends.” 

“We’re not friends.” 

A hand flies to your chest, as if struck by his words. “Um, ouch? Rude. For your sake, I’m gonna pretend I didn’t hear that.” 

Kaz tugs off his signature gloves and tosses them next to his hat. “I can always repeat it,” he says, so impassive you can’t tell if it’s a joke. 

Knowing Kaz, you’re pretty sure it’s not. 

You push up the rest of the way, scooting down to sit cross-legged at the end of his bed. It’s so much nicer than yours—the sheets softer, the mattress plusher, the smell so familiar and warm. 

If it were up to you, you’d sleep in here every night. 

And most nights, that’s exactly what you do. 

“Would it kill you to be nice sometimes?” you ask. 

“Not usually, no.” Kaz faces you, his weight leaned back against the desk, his cane propped against it. “But we both know you’re a special case.” 

“Is that a compliment?” 

“Not at all.” 

Your bottom lip juts into a pout. “Has anyone ever told you you’re an asshole?” 

Aside from the subtlest lift of his brows, Kaz’s expression remains vague and disinterested. “Regularly,” he deadpans, looking the image of austere melancholy. 

Your laugh comes so sudden it sounds like a snort. “I should’ve guessed,” you nod, forever unphased by Kaz’s forbidding attitude. 

This is the way things have always been between you. Ever since a surly twelve year old marched head-high into your father’s office to see if the Dregs needed a new grunt, oblivious to the girl beaming up at him from a lonely corner, weaving colorful scraps of thread into bracelets for the friends you’d yet to make. 

Kaz Brekker is dark and foreboding while you’re bright and bubbly; he’s rude and standoffish while you’re sweet and flirtatious. Some may liken your relationship to oil and water, but you prefer thinking of it as a carefully crafted balance—a yin and yang sort of thing. 

Kaz, on the other hand, would simply say you’re a thorn in his side. 

Fortunately for yourself, you’re not an easily offended thorn. 

The rickety floorboards creak as Kaz starts around the desk. His bare fingers trail along the varnished edge for support. His limp is always at its worst by this time of night, so you’re not surprised to see the flicker of relief that slips over him when he finally sinks into the chair. 

“Have you ever considered that maybe you work too hard?” Your voice teeters on the edge of concern, tracing idle shapes against the sheets with your nails. 

His answer is curt, and contradictory to the purple smudges beneath his eyes. “No.” 

Fumbling with his cufflinks—simple, unadorned things—Kaz rolls his sleeves up to his elbows. Afterwards, he flips open the thick ledger laid before him, plucking up a pen and dipping it into an awaiting pot of ink. 

Kaz keeps track of the Dregs expenses in his head—a skill you’ve always found most impressive, since you can hardly do a simple equation without scratch paper. Still, he keeps the physical record for the sake of having something to point to in case someone’s ever stupid enough to claim Dirtyhands flubbed the numbers. 

As he works, boredom quickly becomes a chip on your shoulder. 

Your legs unfurl, bare feet stretching toward the floor as you slip off the edge of the bed. Every step is purposeful, traipsing toward him with a look that’s not so unlike a cat readying to toy with its favorite mouse. 

“Maybe we should take a holiday,” you suggest, your voice a soft trill. 

One part of you expects to be ignored, the other to be shot down. 

He lands somewhere in the middle. 

“And go where? His eyes remain focused on the ledger, dark brows drawn tight in concentration. You envision numbers flashing before him, adding and subtracting at the steady pass of the nib scratching against parchment. 

“I don’t know. Ravka, maybe?” 

“Ravka?” It’s like the word tastes sour on his tongue. “Why?” 

You stop just short of his desk, an answer instantly rapping at your mind. You quickly replace it with one that’s far less tragic. “I wouldn’t mind seeing Nikolai Lantsov with my own eyes,” you drawl. “Nina says he’s quite the looker, y’know.” 

Kaz sits up a little straighter, shoulders pinned with newfound tension. 

“Of course he is.” He seems to press the nib down harder, his disinterested tone bordering close to resentful. “He’s a prince—looking pretty is all they’re good for.” 

Your head tilts. “Well, he’s actually a king now, so…” 

There’s the briefest falter in the smooth motion of his jotting wrist. “I’m not taking you to Ravka so you can seduce the Lantsov bastard.” 

“And why not?” You reach for the tip of his cane, still propped against the desk, skimming a finger over the crow’s head. “You think I can’t do it?” 

The pen keeps on scratching, accented by the dull hum of the Slat’s perpetual motion—doors slamming, voices cackling. Your ego grows larger for every second Kaz stays silent, your satisfaction settling into a feline smirk. 

Simply, yet firmly, Kaz eventually maintains, “We’re not going to Ravka.” 

Your exhale is something over dramatic, laden with feigned disappointment as you huff, “Fine!” Kaz never looks up, continuing with the ledger. 

Abandoning the crow’s head, you swipe one of Kaz’s abandoned gloves off the desk, fiddling with the smooth leather. Still recovering from their civil war, you imagine Ravka isn’t an ideal travel spot right now, anyway. Not unless someone has a morbid desire to tour the sites where Saints met their often-grisly ends, that is… Besides, for all Nina’s praise of the Lantsov king, you’ve never actually had a thing for blondes. 

And yet— 

“I really would like to go someday.” Your voice is hardly a whisper. Your other answer—tragic and rapping—crawls up your throat in a hoarse admission, “My mother was Ravkan.” 

That persistent scratching finally comes to a sudden halt. 

For the first time since he entered the room, Kaz looks up. There’s not a hint of pity in his eyes, though they gleam with solemn understanding. Your lips thin, pressing his glove tight to your chest. 

In the winter of your fourteen birthday, you snuck into your father’s office and stole a full bottle of kvas. Dressed in clothes too light for the frigid weather, you sped up the crooked stairs to Kaz’s attic-bedroom, pleading until he begrudgingly agreed to join you on the moonlit roof. For a boy who claimed such an aversion to you, he was always doing things you asked—even if he’d griped the whole time. You both gagged after the first sip of hard liquor. After an hour or so, the full bottle had dwindled to just a drop, your tongues seeming to move with more freedom. 

Neither of you had been prepared for the way the carbonated joy in your chests fizzled to something stagnant. 

I don’t like being alone, you told him, fiddling with the frayed strings tied around your wrist, the friendship bracelets no one ever wanted. If I’m alone, it means I’m thinking, and if I’m thinking, it means my mother won’t stop dying. 

You told him of the endless montage in your head. How at six years old, a walk along the Stave in your favorite winter coat ended with getting crushed beneath the weight of your mother’s last act of devotion, shielded by a body crumpled and crimson, shorn in the crossfire of unexpected gang violence. When you fell silent, Kaz drained the last drop of kvas and told you about a coffee shop near the Exchange. About a sickboat and a boy named Jordie, about a frosty harbor and an impossible swim that left him unable to bear the touch of another’s skin. 

When neither of you had any soul left to bear, Kaz chucked the bottle off the roof. You don’t remember hearing it shatter, and maybe it never did. Maybe it hit some hapless pigeon and fractured his skull. Maybe it ceased to exist the moment it went over the edge. The bottle didn’t matter. Not to you. Not when Kaz Brekker reached for your wrist, leather-clad fingers gently tugging the bracelets off your wrist. 

Don’t make a thing of this, he told you, stuffing them in his pocket. You’re still a pest.

But it was a thing. A strange, beautiful thing—and both of you knew it. 

“Fine.” Kaz’s voice—the rasp of stone on stone—drags you back to the present. He sits the pen down beside the ledger, a strand of black hair swaying with the subtle shake of his head. “We’ll go to Ravka. You’ll seduce some sorry prince and live happily ever after in a gaudy palace. I’ll make my fortune snagging the Lantsov Emerald and use it to hire a proper bookkeeper. Deal?” 

Your lips twitch, still hugging his glove to your chest. “King,” you correct him. 

His eyes roll, but a flicker of something warm betrays his affection. “Pest,” he calls you, though it doesn’t sound like much of an insult. 

“I imagine the Grand Palace has fine exterminators,” you muse. 

“Then I suppose your marriage will be short-lived.” 

“Will you save me, then?” Your heart leaps with the question, how it slips from your tongue before you can grasp it. 

Kaz hesitates. Then—remarkably—smiles. 

“Maybe.”

a/n - you know what they say. a bottle of kvas is never just a bottle of kvas, amirite

(☞ ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)☞

anyways, i was procrastinating an essay and thought "lets write something with a somewhat ambiguous ending!" and voila, a boy's first pest is the product. now everyone say: lainie, go work on your original writing and stop writing so much fan fiction! (but i'm already thinking of a kaz smut drabble so) anyways, comments and reblogs much appreciated, i cry with joy every time someone actively interacts with my work so THANK YOU

[lady-inkyrius]

I need to do some more customising, so far basically all I've done is turn off window titles and mess around in the Kitty config, I should look into styling Firefox, though I'm a bit out of practice with CSS.

I still need to settle on a monospace font choice. I used to use Cascadia Code whenever there was code inline with a proportional font and JetBrains Mono whenever I was actually coding, but recently I've been trying out Fantasque Sans Mono (I'm using it in the screenshot). It has a nice vibe that helps it feel not just like a monospace font.

I'm too reliant on ligatures I think, I haven't found a font yet that has every ligature I want except for Twilio Sans Mono, but I find that ugly so I'm not using it. Like CC doesn't have >>= and =<<, JBM doesn't have arbitrary length - and = sequences, and FSM is also missing those as well as /=.

Messing around customising my terminal is fun. I'm very quickly getting used to doing everything with my keyboard, at least for stuff like programming that I can do entirely in the terminal now.

[hotvintagepoll]

Propaganda

Greta Garbo (Camille, Anna Karenina, Queen Christina)—Enigmatic and alluring and made me bisexual. The perfect example of the eroticism in silent films that literally transcends text. Could literally not change anything about her expression but you knew by looking at her eyes what she was thinking. She’s so gorgeous.

Audrey Hepburn (My Fair Lady, Sabrina, Roman Holiday)—Growing up, Audrey Hepburn desperately wanting to be a professional ballerina, but she was starved during WWII and couldn't pursue her dream due to the effects of malnourishment. After she was cast in Roman Holiday, she skyrocketed to fame, and appeared in classics like My Fair Lady and Breakfast at Tiffany's. She's gorgeous, and mixes humor and class in all of her performances. After the majority of her acting career came to close, she became a UNICEF ambassador.

This is round 5 of the tournament. All other polls in this bracket can be found here. Please reblog with further support of your beloved hot sexy vintage woman.

[additional propaganda submitted under the cut.]

Garbo:

A cold-ass Swedish WLW Sphinx. Had plans to murder Hitler that she never got around to. "She will remain always a child of vikings, moved about by a snowy dream."

First of all, she's on the money; that's how much of a treasure she is. She's beautiful in such a distinct way you need very few lines to draw her. (Drawing by Einar Nerman) She managed to be mesmerizing in both silent and sound films. She kissed a woman in Queen Christina (and probably several more in real life). She was super dry and really funny in Ninotchka. She got the hell out of Hollywood and stayed out, living for almost 50 years after her retirement.

Garbo is one of the many reasons why I'm gay. If you haven't seen Queen Christina please do, She is so gender in that film. Also her accent makes it sound like she's always talking in cursive and it's so hypnotic (or at least I think so).

She's a gay introvert, like all of us here on Tumblr.

Probably a lesbian, absolutely a mood when she retired

Mysterious and aloof, charismatic and enigmatic, with beautiful androgynous characteristics, Garbo is undoubtedly the most eccentric and unique Hollywood vintage star. Her aversion to fame and stardom makes her even more desirable to the audience, and her insane chemistry with the camera, an actress one of a kind! Her particularity and her oddity is what discerns her strongly from her hollywood co workers at the time, noone was like her and would never be like her. I think, to the utmost extent, that she deserves the title of the hottest vintage star, even though that would be an understatement of what she is!

SO gorgeous, her thick Swedish accent makes will turn your brain into pudding

Audrey Hepburn:

"She may be a wispy, thin little thing, but when you see that girl, you know you're really in the presence of something. In that league there's only ever been Garbo, and the other Hepburn, and maybe Bergman. It's a rare quality, but boy, do you know when you've found it." - Billy Wilder

Raised money for the resistance in nazi occupied Hungary. Became a humanitarian after retiring. Two very sexy things to do!

where to begin......... i wont her so bad. i literally dont know what to say.

My dude. The big doe eyes, the cheekbones, the voice. The flawless way she carried herself. She was never in a movie where she wasn't drop dead gorgeous. Oh, also the fact she raised funds against the Nazis doing BALLET and she won the Presidential Medal of Freedom for her humanitarian work.

"It’s as if she dropped out of the sky into the ’50s, half wood-nymph, half princess, and then disappeared in her golden coach, wearing her glass slippers and leaving no footprints." - Molly Haskell

"All I want for Christmas is to make another movie with Audrey Hepburn." - Cary Grant

I know people nowadays are probably sick of seeing her with all the beauty and fashion merch around that depicts her and/or Marilyn Monroe but she is considered a classic Hollywood beauty for a reason. Ironically in her day she was more of the alternative beauty when compared to many of her contemporaries. She always came off with such elegance and grace, and she was so charming. Apparently she was a delight to work with considering how many of her co-stars had wonderful things to say about her. Outside of her beauty and acting ability she was immensely kind. She helped raise funds for the Dutch resistance during WWII by putting on underground dance performances as well as volunteering at hospitals and other small things to help the resistance. During her Hollywood career and later years she worked with UNICEF a lot. Just an all around beautiful person both inside and out.

No one could wear clothes in this era like she could. She was every major designer's favorite star and as such her films are time capsules of high fashion at the time. But beyond that, she had such an elegance in her screen presence that belied a broad range of ability. From a naive princess, to a confused widow, to a loving and mischievous daughter, she could play it all.

Look at that woman's neck. Don't you want to bite it?

[anonymusbosch]

on wanting to do a million things

prompted by @bloodshack 's

i wanna learn SQL but i wanna learn haskell but i wanna learn statistics but i wanna start a degree in macroeconomics also sociology also library science but i wanna learn norwegian but i wanna learn mandarin but i wanna paint but i wanna do pottery but i wanna get better at woodworking but i wanna get better at cooking but i wanna bake one of those cakes that's just 11 crepes stacked on top of each other but i wanna watch more movies but i wanna listen to more podcast episodes but i need to rest but i need to exercise but i wanna play with my dog but i wanna go shopping but i need to go grocery shopping but i need to do the dishes but i need to do laundry but i need to buy a new x y and z but i need to save money but i wanna give all my money away to people who need it more but i wanna pivot my career to book editing but to do that i have to read more and i wanna read more nonfiction but i wanna read more novels but i wanna get better at meditating but i wanna volunteer but i wanna plan a party but i wanna go to law school. but what im gonna do is watch a dumbass youtube video and go to bed

I think I've been doing slightly better this year about Actually Doing Things. not great! but I do a lot and I've been "prototyping" ways to get closer to doing as much as is possible. and if I actually talk about it it's a bunch of very obvious statements but I'll try to make them a little more concrete

rule number one: experiment on yourself

there's no one approach that's right for everyone and there's not even one approach for me that works at all times. try things out. see what works. pay attention to what doesn't. try something else.

rule number two: ask what's stopping you and then take it seriously

example: I often want to do Everything in the evening at like 2 PM, but then get home and am tempted sorely by the couch, and then get stuck inertia'd and not doing much but being tired and kind of bored. why?

if I don't have plans, it's easy to leave work later than planned and hard to make myself do something by a specific time

i'm generally tiredish after work. 4 out of 5 times, that'll go away if I actually start Doing Something, but 1 out of 5 it's real and I will go hardcore sleepmode at 8 PM and just be Done

i use up a ton of my program management/executive function/Deciding Things brain at work and usually find it noticeably harder to string together "want to do Thing > make list of Things > decide on a Thing > do Thing" after I'm home. Even if I have a list of Things to Do, how does one decide! how does one start! and god forbid there's a Necessary thing. then it's all downhill

therefore, mitigations: have concrete time-specific plans in advance.

if I have an art class at 6:00 PM I need to leave work by 5:15 and NO LATER and I can't get sucked into "oh 10 more minutes to finish this" *one hour later*

that also means I have to have a fridge or freezer dinner ready and can't spend 45 minutes cooking "fuck it, what the hell did I put in the fridge, why don't we have soy sauce" evil meal that is not good

plans with friends: dinner! art night! music night! repair-your-clothes night! seeing a show! occasionally, Accountability Time where a friend comes over for We Are Doing Tasks with tea and snacks etc.

for some reason I'm way better about Actually Doing Things when the plan exists already. magically I overcome couch inertia even though I am the same amount of tired! and while I never learn the ability to decouch without plans I at least learn to make them

still working on:

a "prototype" for maybe next month is a weeklyish Study Session for a thing I want to learn about. I want to somehow make it employer-proof (I am accountable to some entity to being at place X at time Y) and haven't figured out a good way. Maybe I can leverage that the local library is open til 8 on wednesdays and somehow make it a Thing? maybe I'll try it!

oh god oh fuck the thing about plans is that if you want to have them you need to make them. christ. a lot of the time I can cover this with some combo of weekend planning + recurring events (things like weekly friend dinner/weekly class) + having cool friends who reach out proactively but it still requires active planning and it can fall thru the cracks

rule three: cool friends

they can take you to things

they can remind you that you can do whatever the fuck you please

i have a friend who is somehow Always doing cool classes and learning shit. and this reminds me that I can ... do that. and sometimes I do

you can take them to things!!

rule four: try to kill the anon hate in your head

obv this depends on your circumstance but sometimes it's worth it to me to look at constraints that "feel real" and check whether they're an active choice I made thoughtfully or, like, the specters of people I don't know judging my choices

time and money are obvious ones. recently was gently nudged towards looking at whether i could give myself more time to Do Things by cooking less. imaginary specters of judgmental twitterites: "it's illegal to spend money. if you get takeout you're the first up against the wall when the revoution comes. make all your lunches and dinners and hoard the money for Later. for Something. how dare you get lunch at the store. you bourgeois hoe. taking charity donations from the mouths of the poor cause you don't have your life together enough to cook artisanal bespoke dinners every night. fuck you." and obviously eating takeout 24/7 is not the answer, but realizing I was not making an active choice helped me try making the active choice instead. "how much do I actually want to balance cost, time, tastiness, and wastefulness of my food, given my amount of free time and my salary and the tradeoff against doing something else? can I approach it differently to do more quick cheap food + some takeout?" -> current prototype: substitute in 1 takeout dinner or restaurant-with-friends a week, 1 frozen type dinner, and then batch cook or sandwiches lunches w/ "permission" to get fast lunch at the store. we'll see how it goes!

i am really really bad at this and find it helpful to talk to other people who can help point out when I'm being haunted by ghosts about it.

rule five: what would it take? what's the next step?

this one i give a lot of credit to @adiantum-sporophyte in particular for, especially for prompting me with questions when I muse about the million-ideal-lives on car rides. what would it look like to do xyz? what's something I could do right now to move in that direction? what's the obstacle? like, actually ask the question and think through it. with a person talking to you! damn! maybe the obstacle to x is that I don't know if I'll like it or if I just like the idea of it. and I don't want to commit to x without knowing. Okay, so maybe an approach would be to find someone who does x and talk to them about how their life is, or maybe it's "spend 15 minutes looking up intro-to-x near me", or "actively schedule 1 instance of x", or something like that. Or maybe it's that I don't know what it takes to do x. Okay, how about on Tues after dinner Adiantum fixes a sweater at my apartment while I spend 20 min looking at prereqs for x. like, it's so basic to say "to do a thing, you could try figuring out how to do it" but I think the important thing here is the feedback/prompting to even recognize "hey, step back, if you don't know the next step then figuring out the next step is the next step"

rule six: habits

prototyping: exercise

I do a lot better when I exercise in the mornings. I do a lot better when I do PT exercises regularly. For a while I was doing PT with friend in the morning every morning before work (accountability! a friendly face to make it more pleasant!) but that didn't really solve - it's not the kind of exercise that makes me feel awake/active, it's like dumb little foot botherings. but: having the habit of morning exercise made it easier to swap out 2 of the 5 days for more intense exercise, and then to swap those 2 for a different more intense exercise when I needed a break. it's easier to build a low-effort version of the habit and then work in the higher-effort one than to just Decide to be the kind of person who gets up at ass o clock to do cardio or whatever

rule seven: set up the structure of your life to make it easy

this is also a "duh" thing but like. on so many levels it comes down to structure your life to make the choice more doable. this can be something like "i structure my life to make vegetarian cooking baseline and vegan cooking the majority by stocking the pantry with staples and spices from cuisines that work well that way" or "i chose an apartment that lets me commute by bike" or "i have my camping gear put away in a fashion that makes it easier to gather frequently and lowers the barrier to trips" or "i keep physical books around to prompt myself to read xyz" to "i don't use instagram or twitter or snapchat or facebook" to . idk.

and in terms of charitable giving: similar deal. I have an explicit budget at the beginning of the year (~10% of my before-tax income), I know in advance what charities I give to, and I know what timing I will use (basically, alerts for donation matching around specific fundraising times). Anything outside the Plan comes from my discretionary budget/fun money. That makes it less of a mental load (the choice is already made; I don't grapple with every donation request or every bleeding-heart trap because I have a very solid anchor on "I give to xyz, the money's set aside") and it's armor against impulsive-but-not-useful scrupulosity. I structure the rest of my spending/life to prioritize a set amount and it makes it easier to follow through

rule eight: if you can do it at work a tiny bit that counts for real life

(infrequently used)

"hi mr. manager I think it would be great if I could use enough SQL to make basic queries in the database so we don't have to go through the software team for common/basic questions. I'd like to take 1 hr on Friday to go through some basic tutorials and then 1 hr with Pat on Monday so he can walk me through an intro for our specific use case. I estimate this will help save the team a couple hours a week of waiting for answers from the other team." and then you have enough of a handle with baby's first SQL that you can add little bits and bobs as you exercise it. this is responsible for a medium amount of my knowledge of python and all 3 brain cells worth of SQL.

rule nine: life is an optimization problem

not in, like, "you need to optimize your skincare and career and exercise and social life and have everything all at once" that's not what optimization means. optimization is like, maximize something with respect to a set of constraints. i explicitly Do Not do skincare beyond "wash face" and "sunscreen" bc I want to optimize my life for like looking at weird plants in the mountains. explicitly choosing to put time and money elsewhere! can't have it all all at once. so fuck them pores. who give a shit. yeah i ate a lot of protein shakes instead of home cooked breakfasts this week bc i was prioritizing morning exercise. im looking at this beautiful bug and it doesn't know what fashion is or what my resume looks like. im holding a lizard. im not spending time on picking cool clothes or whatever bc i spent that time looking up lizard hotspots on purpose.

that's really long and probably mostly, like, not surprising? but i keep benefiting from ppl being like "hey have you considered Obvious Thing" framed very gently

[she-posts-nerdy-stuff]

A few interesting parallels in the SoC duology that I don’t think I’ve seen anyone talk about yet

(Analysis/discussion of these parallels/quotes may come later if anyone's interested)

“These creatures were made to be weapons” - Jarl Brum on Grisha, Six of Crows chapter 35

“He looked like what he truly was: a weapon” - Jesper Fahey on the Khergud, Crooked Kingdom chapter 36

“Welcome to the Hellshow” - Kaz to Nina, Six of Crows chapter 6

“Welcome to the Ice Court, Nina Zenik” - Matthias to Nina, Six of Crows chapter 34

“Is this a play?” - Alys Van Eck “Yes love, and you’re the star” - Jesper Fahey, Crooked Kingdom chapter 8 when Alys is taken captive

“What was this but a play Kaz had staged, with that poor sucker Kuwei as the star?” - Jesper Fahey on the auction plan, Crooked Kingdom chapter 36

“he looked like a priest come to preach to group of circus performers” - Inej on Kaz’s appearance in comparison to the rest of the Barrel, Six of Crows chapter 2

“started to preach” - Inej on Kaz leading a coup against Per Haskell, Crooked Kingdom chapter 27

“Whoever he had become, Matthias was not going to shoot someone unarmed. He'd not yet sunk so far” - Matthias Helvar, Six of Crows chapter 29

“I am unarmed” - Matthias Helvar, Crooked Kingdom chapter 38

"I didn't even know the rules of Makker's Wheel" - Jesper Fahey on his first night gambling in the Barrel, Six of Crows chapter ()

"He knew his guns better than he knew the rules of Makker's Wheel" - Jesper Fahey on the concept of aim and its relationship to his life and his zowa/Grisha abilities, Crooked Kingdom chapter 36

“a tiny voice inside him said he should offer to take the drug as well […] maybe he could have helped to draw the parem out of Nina’s system and set her free. But that was a hero’s voice and Jesper had long since stopped thinking he had the makings of a hero” - Jesper Fahey, Six of Crows chapter 44

“Matthias gave you the remaining parem, didn’t he?” “So?” “[…] I can’t let my father down again. I need the parem as a security measure” “No” “Why the hell not?” - Jesper and Kaz in discussion about the auction plan, Crooked Kingdom chapter 30

I'll probably be back to add more, feel free to add your own as well

[tortoisesshells]

(excellent tags via @terrorpenned)

[19burstraat]

ketterdam dashboard simulator 2 (electric boogaloo)

(first one here)

❌ urkerchfaveisproblematic follow

Who submitted Kaz Brekker. don't take the piss he's literally wanted every other Wednesday

🍃 squallertales follow

Wait what did Brekker do

🌊 boekcanaling

Girl what DIDN'T he do

🦁 dimelionsofficial follow

Ghezen's Day Piss Up starts TONIGHT at the Kaelish Prince! Come down before four bells and get ten kruge off your first drinks purchase and an extra spin on Makker's Wheel!

👤 dregsofficial

545.06.7.9

🦁 dimelionsofficial follow

HOW DID YOU GET PAST THE FUCKING VPN. FUCK YOU KAZ BREKKER. FUCK YOU SO MUCH. YOU DO THIS EVERY TIME. WE'RE NOT EVEN DOING ANYTHING TO YOU. WE'RE ALL JUST PEOPLE WITH JOBS. TRYING TO GET BY. MOST OF US NEVER EVEN SPOKE TO ROLLINS. THIS IS SO TWISTED. YOUR ACTUALLY WRONG IN THE HEAD. WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU. I ACTUALLY CAN'T DEAL WITH THIS ANYMORE. I'M SICK.

👤 dregsofficial

*you're

❓lidandstavessuggestions

#234: build mickey's dick smasher between east and west stave

🍷dregsconfessions

So I've been a dregs member for a long time (I'm in my 30s now) and back when I was a new grunt I was especially trolleyed at the Crow Club, and I ended up spilling like half my pint on the head of one of Haskell's feral little runners, yk one of the little kids?? I just kind of mopped him with my sleeve and said sorry and figured that it was the end of it... however it has occurred to me lately that it actually might have been Kaz. Honestly I never could tell the difference between all the kids, and I didn't look properly at him, but now I've been waking up in a cold sweat several times a week thinking about it. Is it time for me to retire from the gang life

#submisson #admin comment: lately all of these have just been ppl embarrassing themselves in front of kaz

🧇 stroopwafels

There's definitely blogs on here that are undercover advertising for the Dregs btw. I accuse that one that thirstposts abt Dirtyhands

🧤 dirtyhandsy follow

:( no I'm a Razorgull actually

🧇 stroopwafels

WHAT???????

🧤 dirtyhandsy follow

I have eyes :/

🧇 stroopwafels

You won't for much longer if your boss finds out omfg

🃏 makkerswheelies follow

you guys are cowards for not wanting to fuck Brekker. Out of my way ghezenboy I'm bout to get it

🃏 makkerswheelies follow

My wallet is Gone

💀 dregsundrained follow

Kaz Brekker isn't violent. Dirtyhands is. Get it right

🏵️ cillasfryup

Gonna rob a bank tomorrow and when the stadwatch come I'm gonna tell them it was my alter ego Countess Boochie Flagrante

🙏🏻 thumbofghezen follow

sooooo sick of seeing people say that the council of tides shouldn't have complete control over kerch shipping. they stop the island from sinking??? every day?? have some respect

⛲ sanktvladimirs

idk about you guys but I'd be popping the BIGGEST bottles if kerch started sinking

🏵️ cillasfryup

me and the girls when kerch starts sinking

🌊 boekcanaling

staff please let me reblog ads please please please please

💪🏻 lionsroar12 follow

guys you have 24 hours to unfollow sanktvladimirs not only are they impersonating and mocking real etherealki and real saints (they are NOT a member of the second army) they're a dregs member, and I bet they're a fucking ka/nej too

⛲ sanktvladimirs

@ dregsofficial

💪🏻 lionsroar12 follow

I DIDN'T MEAN IT LIKE THAT

💪🏻 lionsroar12 follow

WHO SENT ME AN ANON ASK WITH MY ADDRESS

🍷dregsundrained

guys I was looking at the wiki contributions who the fuck added a jesper fahey page to the dregs wiki... from inside the stadhall???

🥳 pearlhandledrevolvers

you know what. don't even worry about it

liked by dregsofficial

🍃 squallertales follow

the wraith was only seventeen when she started hunting slavers???? she should have been at the club

#DON'T crawl out of the woodwork and say 'oh the crow club-' #the REAL CLUB. for FUN

🎨 dekappelfan follow

🎨 dekappelfan follow

it's so nice to know no one agrees on this

[doctorbitchcrxft]

Criss Angel Is a Douchebag | Supernatural Series Rewrite | Dean Winchester x Fem!Reader

Pairing: Dean Winchester x Fem!Reader

Warnings: canon violence, canon gore

Word Count: 3440

Mobile Supernatural Series Rewrite Masterlist

Supernatural Series Rewrite Masterlist

Supernatural Series Rewrite Playlist

“I just need an honest-to-goodness case,” you said, sighing. You flopped back down onto the bed you shared with Dean. “Somehow, every time we think we’ve found one, there’s, like, some other-worldly moral that can be learned from it. Just give me a ghost. I’m beggin’ the world for a ghost.”

Dean chuckled from his seat at the table and turned your laptop around to face you. “How ‘bout this one?” he asked. 

You sat up and leaned forward to read the screen. “Mind Freak?” Dean chuckled. “Maybe so.”

“I’m in,” you shrugged and began tugging on your boots. “Where’s Sam?”

“Sulking somewhere, probably,” your partner replied. 

****

The three of you set off for Sioux City where a new kind of entertainer was taking over: sluttier versions of Criss Angel, quite possibly. Jeb Dexter was one of them, and he performed a mock-demon-exorcism in front of an audience and a camera crew.

“I can't believe people actually fall for that crap,” Dean snorted as you walked away from Jeb. 

“It's not all crap,” Sam replied. 

Dean rolled his eyes. “What part of that was not a steaming pile of bullshit?”

“Okay, that was crap,” the younger brother admitted, “but that's not all magicians. It takes skill.”

“Oh, right, right, I forgot. You were actually into this stuff, weren't you?” Dean taunted. “I mean, you had, you had, like a deck of cards and a wand.”

“Dude, I was thirteen. It was a phase.”

“Aw, Sam,” you cooed. “That’s adorable.”

“Shut up,” he mumbled jokingly, clearly embarrassed. 

“Just… it bugs me,” Dean continued. “Y’know, playing at demons and— and magic, when the real thing will kill you bloody.”

“Like a guy who drops dead of ten stab wounds with no holes in his shirt?” you chimed in, referring to the case you were here to work. It seemed like it’d be a simple witch hunt. 

Dean nodded. “That's what I'm talking about.”

****

You spoke to the assistant of the young magician you’d died, and he revealed he’d found a tarot card depicting the ten of swords in his boss’s stuff while he was packing. You had the assistant give you the tarot card before you were on your way. 

You turned it over in your hand; it was a standard Rider Waite card. You’d dabbled with the cards in as a teen while trying to escape your parents' extremist religion, and that would undoubtedly prove useful to you in this situation. “I mean, obviously,” you began as you walked up to the place where Jeb and his crew were filming: a magician’s convention. “The guy on the card got stabbed through the back. But there’s meanings to each of these cards. The swords traditionally represent trouble and problem solving. The ten of swords indicates a disaster of some sort, which…” you trailed off. 

Sam snorted. “You in some coven we don’t know about?”

You shook your head. “I saw The Craft one-too-many times.”

Dean walked over to two older men sitting near the film crew. The assistant had indicated Vernon Haskell and a man named Charlie as potential enemies. It made sense; they were older, more traditional magicians, and surely, they didn’t enjoy these kids encroaching on their territory. 

“You Vernon Haskell?” Dean asked, crouching behind the man. 

“Who’s asking?” the man replied, turning around. 

“Federal agent. Ulrich,” your partner said. “Looking into the death of Patrick Vance.”

You watched on as Jeb interviewed another older magician and got his name completely wrong. 

“What a douche,” you commented quietly. 

“Couldn't agree more,” Vernon said. 

You smiled lopsidedly, turning to him and pulling the ten of swords out. “You use cards in your act, right?”

Vernon scoffed. “My act? That was a long time ago. I haven't touched a deck in years, y’know.” He held up his shaking hands, indicating a neurodegenerative disease. 

“You know anybody who uses ‘em now?” you questioned.

“Well, there was a guy down on Bleeker Street.”

The other older man chimed in. “Oh, yeah. He— he peddles that kind of specialty stuff.”

Dean questioned, “Did he have a problem with Vance?”

Vernon nodded. “Matter of fact, Vance crossed him about a year ago. Probably cost him fifty grand in royalties.” He directed you toward where to find the young man whose name was apparently Chief. 

You and Dean walked down a darkened street lined with neon signs to the address Vernon had given you. 

“Wait, wait, wait,” you said. “Dean, I think this is the red-light district.”

“So what? Sex workers can be witches, too,” he shrugged. 

“No, no, I know,” you argued. “But I think our magician friends are trying to get us pegged.”

Dean snorted. “Look, let’s just go check it out, okay?”

“Oh-kay.” You sighed and followed behind him into the building. 

****

Around thirty minutes later, the two of you walked out again, and you were laughing hysterically. “I told you!” You wiped tears from your eyes and clutched your stomach. “ ‘You ain’t been had till you been had by the Chief’,” you mimicked the deep voice of the sex worker you’d run into. 

“Fine, fine, you were right,” Dean grumbled. “Let’s— Let’s just go find Sam and never talk about this again, huh?”

“Don’t lie, you liked it.” You slapped his ass, smirking mischievously. 

He wheeled around, giving you a challenging glare. While you continued to laugh, he slung an arm around your shoulders and pressed a kiss to the side of your head. “Shut up, asshole.”

****

You approached Vernon and Charlie with Sam and Dean hot on your heels. 

“The Chief, huh?” You quirked a brow and crossed your arms. 

“What's the matter? Chief not your type?” the other magician named Charlie smirked. 

Dean smirked back. “Y’know, I could have you both arrested for obstruction of justice.”

“How?” Vernon scoffed. “You’re no Fed.”

“We con people for a living, son. Takes more than a fake badge to get past us,”Charlie explained. 

Sam and Dean laughed a little awkwardly. You took the opportunity to step in. “You got us,” you said. “I’m, uh, looking for a gig as a showgirl. Thought by coming to the convention, I could get somebody interested in my… talents.” You looked down at your somewhat exposed breasts, knowing the role of the magician’s assistant in these circles was bordering on sex work. 

Vernon considered for a moment, eyeing you up and down a bit despite his best efforts not to be a complete ass. “I’m sure you’ll find someone.” 

Then, the man on stage pulled your attention away from your conversation. “Ladies and gentlemen,” the magician named Jay announced, “what you're about to witness is a feat so daring, So dangerous, even the great Houdini dared not attempt it. I give to you… The executioner!” He gave a straitjacket to an audience member to inspect. “Now, sir, as you can see, this jacket is the real article. Thank you, sir. You may take your seat. Now, I will have one minute— sixty seconds— to escape certain death. Let's see if I can do it.” The curtain fell on Jay, and you could see his silhouette as he tried to get out of his straitjacket with a noose wrapped around his neck.

As the clock ticked down, Dean whispered to you, “I don't think he's gonna make it.”

You kept your eyes glued to the silhouette, and when the clock struck zero, Jay appeared from behind the curtain completely unharmed. 

“That was amazing!” Dean cheered, clapping. “That was fuckin’ amazing!”

You furrowed your brow, standing next to Sam as he said, “That was not humanly possible.”

****

After the show, the three of you headed back to your motel room to regroup. 

“Looks like this guy Jay was a pretty big deal in the seventies,” Sam explained. 

“Which, in magician land, means what, exactly?” Dean asked. 

“Big enough to play Radio City Music Hall.”

“What got him stuck in their ‘Where are They Now?’ file?”

“He got old.”

You drew your lips together. “Okay, so, maybe he’s using real magic to make a comeback?” you suggested. 

Sam shrugged. “It's possible. Some kind of spell that works a death transference.”

“How does the tarot card mix into it?” Dean questioned. 

“You can use tarot for those kinds of spells,” you explained. “It’s heavy-duty magic. Almost like planting the tarot card is what lays the curse; the card is what carries the energy.”

Dean nodded, thinking for a moment. “Man, I hope I die before I get old. Whole thing seems brutal, don't it?”

“What, you don’t wanna hunt ghosts with me when we’re ninety?” you smirked, sitting down next to him on your bed.

He tossed an arm around you and pulled you to his side so the two of you were lounging against the headboard. “You’re great and all, but no.”

“You think we will?” Sam asked. 

“What?” you and Dean replied in unison. 

“Die before we get old,” Sam replied. 

“Haven’t you and I already done that?” Dean laughed. 

You nudged his ribs with your fist lightly. “Don’t remind me.”

“C’mon, Dean.” Sam rolled his eyes. “I mean, do you think we'll still be chasing demons when we're sixty?”

“No, I think we'll be dead for good,” he responded. 

His words cast a solemn shadow over the room. 

“What?” Dean said. “You wanna end up like— like Travis? Huh? Or Gordon, maybe?”

“There’s Bobby,” the younger brother suggested. 

“Oh, yeah, there's a poster child for growing old gracefully,” Dean snickered. 

“Maybe we'll be different, Dean.”

“What kind of Kool-Aid you drinking, man?” This conversation was clearly confusing Dean. “Sammy, it ends bloody or sad. That's just the life.”

As brutal as that was, it was true. 

Sam went silent, but only for a moment. “What if we could win?”

“ ‘Win’?” Dean scoffed. 

“If there was a way we could just…” the brunet paused to search for the words, “put an end to all of it.”

The older brother’s tone became serious. “Is there something going on you're not telling me?”

“No.”

“Sammy—”

“No. Look, I'm just saying— I just wish there was a way we could… go after the source. That's all. Cut the head off the snake,” he explained. 

“Well, the problem with the snake is that it has a thousand heads. Evil bitches just keep piling out of the Volkswagen.” Although dejected, Sam conceded, “Yeah. Guess you’re right.”

“Why don't you go see if you can track down Jay?” Dean suggested. “We’ll see what we can dig up on this tarot card.”

Sam nodded. As soon as he was out of the room, you and Dean sat up to look at each other. 

“Something’s definitely wrong, right?” Dean asked you. 

You nodded. “Yeah, definitely.” You felt your stomach drop, hoping to god he wasn’t planning on using his powers again. Your fear was maybe irrational especially considering he knew what you’d been asked to do; you hoped he wasn’t that stupid. 

Dean gave you a quick peck on the lips to pull you out of your thoughts. “Hey, c’mon. I’m sure he’s fine.”

Still a little zoned out, you nodded. 

****

Sure enough, Jeb had been found hanging from the ceiling with the Hanged Man card in his back pocket. Your theory about the cards acting as targets for energy transference seemed to be right on the money, and Jay had been crossed by both men in the days before their deaths.

“Up against the wall!” Dean commanded, having followed Jay to his hotel room.

“God, who are you? What do you want?” he asked, clearly frustrated.

“Now!” your partner commanded again. 

“We know what you did,” you told him, helping Dean pin the man to the wall. 

“You been working some real bad mojo to jump-start your act,” Dean continued. 

“What?” Jay scoffed. “I don't know what you're talking about.”

“Look, we know you put a spell on those tarot cards,” Sam said. 

“Messing with real magic?” Dean added. 

“ ‘Real magic’? Come on, there's no such thing as real magic,” Jay replied, struggling under you. 

“Oh, is that so?”

“Yeah, believe me. I've been around this stuff my whole life. It's all just— It's— It's illusions. It's tricks. It— It's all fake!”

“Jeb Dexter strung up,” Dean argued, “was that just an illusion?”

“What? Something happened to Jeb?” Jay seemed genuinely surprised. 

“He was found hanged in his room,” Sam replied, voice considerably less harsh. “Right after you slipped the noose last night.”

“I don't know what you're talking about. Please, just let me go.” “Something's not right,” you said. 

“Usually they're whipping some badass hoodoo at us by now,” Dean affirmed. 

The three of you tied Jay to a chair to keep him still so you could deliberate your next move. By the time you turned back around, though, Jay was gone. 

“We shoulda seen that coming,” you sighed. 

“Come on,” the brunet urged. “He couldn't have gotten that far.” 

You followed him out of the room, but there was no one in the hallway. The three of you headed down to the lobby to get more of a look around. 

Then, you saw the police at the door. 

“Oh, fuck, guys.” You nodded at the men looking around the lobby. 

“That's them!” Jay called as he appeared next to the police. “Those are the nut jobs that just broke into my room!”

****

Every encounter with the police was just starting to piss you off. You’d evaded them enough times to know this wasn’t going to be too much of an issue, but this was hindering your ability to do your job. Whoever was working with or for Jay now had even more of an opportunity to kill someone else. 

You bounced your leg up and down while you sat on the bench in the holding cell, a few feet away from where another detainee slept. Dean paced, and Sam sat beside you. None of you spoke, each too pissed off and consumed by your own thoughts to form words. 

Then, around midnight that night, the guard opened the cell. “Alright, Ulriches. You’re free to go.”

You exchanged a look with Dean, knowing something had probably happened to result in Jay dropping the charges. And thus, you met up with him in the hotel lobby. 

“We have to talk,” he told you when you arrived. He brought you into the hotel’s bar where he gave you the news that Charlie had been killed during his act that night. “I was just a kid when we first met,” he lamented. “All I knew was how to cheat at cards. Charlie got me out of more scrapes than I can count. Hell, I would’ve been dead by the age of twenty if it hadn't been for him.” He sighed heavily, then took a swig of his drink. “He was more than my friend. He was my brother.”

“I'm sorry, Jay,” Sam told him. 

“Look, I should have listened to you guys when you told me that my show was killing people.”

“Well, you weren't the one pulling the trigger,” Dean replied. 

He put his glass down on the bar. “Yeah, but someone did, and I want to find out who did this to Charlie. So I'll do whatever you guys say. Just tell me what to do.”

“Jay, whoever's doing this,” the younger Winchester began, “they like you. They're probably close to you. Did Charlie and Vernon get along?”

Jay looked almost offended. “No. No, it’s not Vernon.”

“He's the only one that makes sense,” Dean urged. 

“Charlie and Vernon were your family, Jay,” Sam added. 

“And now Charlie's gone.”

“Yeah, but… they butted heads sometimes, but Vernon could never do something like this,” Jay tried. 

“It doesn’t make complete sense to me, either,” you said, and all three men turned to you. “But he’s really the only option here. And real magic… it’s almost a drug. That kind of power can corrupt people in ways you may not even notice at first.”

Jay looked down at the granite in front of him. “You better be damn sure about this,” he finally said heavily. “Vernon's all I got left.”

“Well, let us go take a look around his room first,” you told the old man. “I mean, I’m assuming y’all have been on the road your whole life. Everything he owns will be in that room; including whatever mojo he’s working.”

Jay agreed and found a way to get Vernon downstairs. When he was gone, you began your search. 

“Guys, it’s just a bunch of old-timey magic crap,” you noted, dropping a few red balls back in the cups they belonged to. “No herbs, no candles, and no tarot cards.”

“I'll be damned,” Dean breathed out.

At your and Sam’s questioning looks, Dean held up a poster to you. “Look like anyone we know?”

****

You and the Winchesters crept into the theater with your guns drawn. On the stage, you saw a much younger version of Charlie talking to Jay and Vernon about how he’d gained his immortality. Apparently, P.T. Barnum had given him the grimoire that taught him everything he knew about magic.  

“And who else has to die so that we can live forever?” Jay argued.

“What's the price tag on immortality? This isn't right, Charlie; what you're doing. You know that. Somewhere, you know that.”

“I know I don't want to come back alone— to start all over, alone,” Charlie replied. 

“Jay,” Vernon said hesitantly, “we can be young again.”

“The three of us together— Vital and alive forever.”

“Not so fast!” Dean butted in, stepping forward into the light on the stage. “I ain't Guttenberg, and this ain't Cocoon.” He nodded at Charlie. “Immortality. That's a neat trick.”

“It's not a trick. It's magic.” A noose appeared behind Dean as Charlie spoke. 

“Dean, look out!” you screamed, but it was too late. 

The noose dropped around Dean’s neck, lifting him in the air. 

You and Sam immediately shot at Charlie, but he caught the bullet in his teeth. 

“Hey, bullet catch,” Charlie chuckled, “been working on that.”

“Get him!” Dean choked. 

“Let him go!” you shouted, rushing Charlie. You tackled him to the ground and slammed your fist into his face. He flipped you off him, taking out a knife and stabbing you through the stomach. Though, no pain ever came. 

Instead, Charlie began to choke on his own blood, clutching his abdomen. “Jay,” Charlie panted, “you picked these strangers over me?”

Jay couldn’t answer him, and you pushed yourself upright to go check on Dean. “You okay?” you asked, supporting his head in one hand so you could see his neck and inspect it for injuries. 

He grabbed the wrist holding his face. “Yeah. Yeah, I'm alright, sweetheart.”

You kissed his cheek and threw your arms around his neck while he held your waist.

****

When the dust had settled and Charlie had been taken to the morgue, you and the brothers met Jay in the hotel bar to say goodbye. 

“Hey, Jay,” Dean said. “We wanted to thank you for what you did.”

“I just killed my best friend, and you want to thank me?” Jay responded, voice nearly devoid of emotion. His face held a sorrow you’d never seen in him before. 

“Where's Vernon?” you asked. 

Jay pursed his lips. “Oh, he's gone. He said he didn't want to speak to me again after what I did to Charlie.”

“Well, he’s a shit friend, then,” you said matter-of-factly. “Charlie was never gonna give up killing. You did the right thing.”

Jay turned to face you. “Are you sure about that? You know, Charlie was like my brother. And now he's dead... because I did ‘the right thing.’ He offered me a gift, and I just threw it back in his face. So now, I have to spend the rest of my life old and alone. What's so right about that?” He got up from the bar, leaving you and your boys in contemplative silence. 

“Jay,” the bartender said, nodding to the pack of cards he’d left on the bar, “your cards.”

He took one last look at them before finally saying, “Throw them away.”

You watched as Jay left, heart bleeding for him. 

“Well, I don't know about you, but I could go for a beer,” Dean said, sitting down on a barstool. 

You laughed half-heartedly. “Me, too.”

“I'm gonna take a walk,” Sam told you and Dean. He was walking away before you or Dean could respond. 

You looked after him as he left, anxiety gripping your chest. Something in you told you he was up to no good. 

Series Rewrite Taglist: @polireader @brightlilith @atcamillanorrman @jrizzelle @insomnia-bookworm @procrastination20 @mrs-nesmith @djs8891 @tiggytaylor @staple-your-mouth @jesstherebel @rach5ive @strawberrykiwisdogog @bruhidkjustwannaread @mxltifxnd0m @sunshine-on-marz @big-ol-boat @mgchaser @capncrankle @chervbs @simpingdeadcharacters @nesnejwritings @stillhere197 @tearsforhan @take-it-on-the-run @iloveyou2mia @maxinehufflepuffprincess @ohgeehowdigethere @seninjakitey @berarenado @s0urw00lf @princessleahorgana @quarterhorse19 @isla-finke-blog @silverdoragon @karacaroldanvers @gayandfairycore @examishbookwyrm @star-yawnznn @real-sharena-h @fandomloverrr @metalmonki @onlyangel-444 @yu-winchester @benniwiththefanni @daisychaingirl @immagods @missmieux @yoongi-holland @littledebbieinabigworld