#it paces our seasons it gives us shade it gives us fruit

[peonyleaf]

my parents said they're cutting down or 20+ year old mango tree bc the neighbors are complaining. I'm gonna fuckingkillmyself

[tetrakys]

Eldarya A New Era - episodes 1 and 2

Let’s start with a brief recap and then my comments at the end.

Not much happens plot-wise, which makes sense since the first chapters are always about exposition and introducing the characters.

Episode 1: 

We wake up in the new Crystal room and are swiftly taken by Huang Hua to the infirmary, we are perfectly healthy and have a chance to meet one of our old friends. Since we have been revered as a deity for the past 7 year sin the Crystal, Huang Hua has to make an announcement to the whole HQ saying that we are back into the living world, then we can finally explore HQ, meet old and new friends, get a new outfit and later attend a party in our honour. This is pretty much the plot of the first episode. 

Episode 2:

In the second we have the chance of picking a Guard to belong to, Huang offered the Light one but Erika refuses because she doesn’t feel ready yet. We also get a new sword that Jamon has created for us and we can train a bit with him, afterwards we join a mission and go the forest. Once there we realise there is something wrong, as if some areas looked corrupted. We find a hurt companion and a very human shotgun bullet next to it and an evil-looking companion who attacks us causing us to end our very first mission at the infirmary, as usual. Once we are back on our feet we talk to Huang Hua about the bullet and realise that there is something she is hiding from us, then we help Ewe making a potion to save the companion. The companion got attached to us so we decide to adopt it.

Now a bit of info dump about the characters:

Huag Hua is the new head of the guard since Miiko went back to her family obligations. She is no longer the Phoenix apprentice although we don’t know why yet, she is in a romantic committed relationship with Ewelein who is still the head of the infirmary and member of the Light Guard. 

Aleja and Sonse got married and left, Colaja joined them and she and Jamon broke up since he stayed. He was sad for a bit but then got over it. Kero left when most people left no one knows where he is. Ezarel left with Twilda and Mary Anne to try to make a new life for themselves. Memoria disappeared and no one knows what happened to it and all the dragon spirits. Karuto is still he chef and he became much nicer in time, also is food much better after fruits and vegetables in Eldarya became edible. There is speculation about his relationship with Feng Zifu who is still very polite but much older looking, however nothing confirmed yet.

Huang Chu is the new head of the Absynth Guard, she looks and acts kinda strict and matter-of-factly but she is also surprisingly open-minded, she encourages Erika to think with her own head and never blindly accept anyone’s order not even her own. She doesn’t get along with Mathieu at all.

Koori is a kitsune member of the Absynth Guard, she is funny, provocative and flirty. She wants to become friend with Erika and even flirts a bit. We see her both flirting with and mercilessly teasing Mathieu, not sure if she’s actually hitting on him or playing him, but this seems to be her normal behaviour. 

Chrome is now the head of the Shadow Guard, he and Karenn are still together and while he is the official head it seems that she is his boss as usual so hierarchy is a bit blurry. The both became more mature in time, she is less into gossip and he went through a rough self-blaming patch, but he looks pretty happy right now, eating a lot and constantly making lame jokes, and she seems to have become a real fighter (everyone is recommending to never train with her).

Adalric is a sylph, Erika comments he kinda looks like a genie. He has constantly his head in the clouds forgetting all the most trivial tasks, he talks with the stars and the wind apparently.

Ophelia is this little girl we see for just a moment, we feel that she has the same aura as the Oracle, we hug her but she just smile and leaves. We are told she showed up after the White Sacrifice and no one actually knows anything about her, not even if she sleeps and eats and where. 

Mathieu is a human who stumbled in a mushroom cricle about one year ago, he was sort of a recluse with no friends nor family on Earth, only thinking about fantasy and adventure, so he is very happy to be in Eldarya and couldn’t care less about going back to Earth. To his dismay the test assigned him to the Absynth Guard and he’s constantly hoping to be reassigned to the Obsidian instead. He’s the happy-go-lucky type but seems to also have a certain depth that we will hopefully find out.

Nevra is now a member of the Light Guard and Huang Hua’s right hand (he basically got Leiftan’s old job). He looks more severe and it seems that the events of S1 hardened him. He is back to his slutty ways but in episode he admits frivolous relationships don’t bring him happiness. 

Leiftan got out of the Crystal with us but it took longer for him to wake up. He says that he needs to find himself and wants to put distance between him and everyone else, in fact he refuses to rejoin the Guard. When Erika asks him to train her aengel powers he refuses and says that he won’t ever touch a blade again and will never be responsible of further violence. Nevra can’t stand him at the moment because he thinks he is escaping his responsibilities. 

COMMENTS:

Since people liked the expression I’m going to repeat it again, let’s address the elephant in the room first. (Guys “elephant in the room” is a figure of speech, it’s not a real elephant lol).  No one mentioned who is the head of the Obsidian Guard, when Erika tries to ask one time the subject is swiftly changed and people seem to go out of their way to not go there. Everyone, including their grandparents, their cousins, neighbours and the cousins of their neighbours has figured out that the head of Obsidian is Lance, who is name dropped constantly. I know that there are some people who still like to live in denial, kudos to them. BV all but told me that Lance is coming in episode 3 before Christmas, the release pace is like MCL’s so I’m expecting episodes every second Wednesday of the month at this point, but we’ll see.

The situation with Nevra and Leiftan is heavy not gonna lie. I’ve only played the episode with Nevra so far and my heart broke in tiny pieces, but I want to savour the angst and enjoy the ride. I don’t blame either of the two, Leiftan went from traitor to saviour in a matter of what two days? He had not time to think about his choices and properly reflect on himself. I think it’s fair that the writing his giving him a bit of depth as a character now and not just using him for his abs and to kill and save people when needed. So yeah, I approve him going to therapy or whatever is going to do to achieve self-growth. 

Nevra is a bit trickier, he spent one year moping in front of the Crystal every day, then moved on simply out of survival, and he’s well aware that the life he has now brings him no joy so one would think he would jump into Erika’s arms immediately? He is probably still very much hurting about everything that happened and he still has a fight or flight reaction about everything regarding it, his subconscious reaction when he saw Erika must have been DANGERDANGER RUN. Sleep around is easier because he doesn’t care and can’t be hurt again. While I can understand this, I also think it’s pretty cowardly and I would’ve liked to have given the reaction to get mad, to demand him to spend time with us, because yes he hurt but we spent 7 freaking years in a coma and no time has passed for us, the day before we were swearing love to each other and now this coldness. And yes I could’ve chosen angrier options with him instead of being understanding, but then my LoM would’ve dropped. 

So what I think I’m trying to say is that I would like to have the option of getting mad without having devastating consequences on all the relationships. I know that the next episode is called Rage-something so I am hoping Erika will blow up. We are probably going to run into Lance, find out that he’s been forgiven and working with the Guard and go full violent mode. And hopefully she will get mad with the other guys as well. Homegirl needs to unleash since episode 13 AT LEAST.

Also, since Leiftan refused to train her, I’m expecting that Lance will at some point. Sweaty training sessions with a strict instructor who she kinda hates but also kinda thirst for... 😏😏😏 I have expectations now.

My general comment is that I like the writing so far, I see much improvement from the previous season although it’s too early to judge. I loved the shade thrown at Miiko and the Guard test, you can really tell the writer’s thoughts sometimes, he uses Mathieu to tell us what he thinks. 

The one think I didn’t like is that, while I can understand most of the choices and the events of these two episodes, I don’t understand how the writing can justify Erika not looking for Ezarel if she were on her route. No time has passed for her, anyone would go looking for their lover in a situation like this, not just “oh well, he’s gone”. I know he can’t be brought back, but give me a good, logical reason in game. (Also, I hope to never see him and Valkyon as secondary non-datable characters because I would die inside).

About the other characters, I like Koori and Huang Chu, I don’t like Adalric, just personal taste, he seems to be the type of person who would be into yoga and spiritualism and it’s just not me at all lol.

[tronnyboyo]

BLUE SEA  Chapter 4: Voices in the Night

Based off of “Delicious” from Pet Shop of Horrors

Rating: Mature

AU: Don Thousand’s Pet Shop

Word Count: 2564

Relationships: Hellshark/Disqualifyshipping (IV/Ryoga) and past Accidentshipping (IV/Rio)

Warnings: Manslaughter, dysfunctional relationships, brief mentions of sex, language, alcohol

Summary: Thomas brings Ryoga home from the pet shop and remembers the night of the accident.

   “There we are,” I said softly as I eased Ryoga into the pool. “Welcome back.” 

    As much as I had wanted to take Ryoga home right then and there, I knew that I was ill-prepared. He deserved the best. I couldn’t have transported the entire vase that he came in with me nor could I bear to leave him in his small traveling tank for long. Thus, I left him at the pet shop for a few days in order to prepare his new living quarters. Every day without him was hell, the longing eating up my stomach in sharp, desperate pangs. The day before I brought him home, his face had filled my every waking hour. 

      Even as I drove him here, my heart was filled with pain, seeing him in his cramped traveling quarters. Whenever I looked back at him, his eyes were filled with hurt and a slight frown tugged at his lips. 

   “Of course I’m not going to leave you in there like that! When we get back home, you’ll be amazed at what I did with our pool! It’s the perfect place for you!” I had fervently promised my husband. 

    I don’t know if he understood me, but I had continued to talk all the way home, hoping that he would recover at least a bit of his memories from before. Or, at least he would cheer up. It hurt to see his face twisted in pain like that. He looked so...vulnerable. Throughout the ride home, he had rotated between peeking his head out of the tank, arm resting on the sides to quietly lying down on the glass bottom, staring up at the ceiling, gills opening back and forth. After I took him out of the car, I promised him that he would never experience such discomfort again. 

   I intended to make certain of that promise. 

       Before the accident, we had decorated his room together. The walls were painted a dark shade of cornflower blue and were filled with his band posters. He had a window to let in the sunlight along with a sunroof in his bathroom. I had pulled his black curtains shut after the wedding, unable to bear the thought of sunlight fading out his possessions. I couldn’t bring myself to part with the clothes he had already put into his closet either. The mixture of jackets, band tees, jeans and the occasional leather jacket were still sitting there, most likely collecting dust. 

    When I redecorated the pool room, I had gone into Ryoga’s room for the first time in days. It still smelled of fresh paint. He still hadn’t properly spent a night in this bedroom. Not even a hint of his cologne wafted about. I supposed that it was a blessing in its own way. There weren’t as many memories here. Carefully, I removed a few of his posters and his clock. Photographs. Jewelry. His favorite retro stereo and accompanying CDs. I brought them down into the pool room and distributed his possessions everywhere. 

   Plish. Ryoga swam around his new quarters slowly, drinking in the sights. I had placed his favorite leather recliner by the poolside, next to his stereo. His posters and photographs were now framed and placed on the walls. The large window at the back and front of the pool room were framed with dark curtains, similar to the ones in his room. Next to the poolside, I had put a cabinet containing all of his accessories so that he could easily access his jewelry without having to crawl out. It was bolted to the floor in order to prevent any accidents. 

     Under the sun, I watched as his tail caught the sunlight. A smile filled my face. Throughout the year, sunlight changed in accordance with the seasons. Winter sunlight was soft and gentle, filling the world with what was necessary but not to excess. It made things look old, as if on the verge of fading. Spring sunlight was verdant and vivid, adding more color to the world. It served as the bridge between the bright colors of summer and the muted colors of winter. Summer sunlight was yellow and bright, giving everything under it a halo. It made memories shine with joy. And autumn sunlight...there was nothing like it. My favorite season had sunlight that was golden and rich. It dyed the world in the hues of nostalgia, warm and glowing. 

   I couldn’t wait to see Ryoga under the golden sunlight, especially surrounded by the hues of the garden. Red, orange and yellow would go well with his tail and complexion. His pictures under the autumn skies would be stunning. I also couldn’t wait to see him under the hues of spring, amidst the rejuvenating greenery of the garden. He had always looked so vivid against the greens of spring with his blue eyes, pale skin and violet locks. They were the colors of flowers. Perhaps that was why he loved spring the most. It was when he was most beautiful. 

   Who could blame him?

     Ryoga poked his head out of the water and rested his hand on the marbled border. He looked past me and out the window, now filled with late summer fruits. I followed his gaze and saw our fig tree with dark fruits splattered on the ground in mushy red piles. Underneath the tree in the humid summer heat, we had feasted on those sweet, soft fruits. It was always a running joke between us that the figs looked like a woman’s milky breasts, the white sap trickling out of the plucked tip in slow, sticky rivulets. Since the wedding, I couldn’t bear to look at them until now. 

    I looked back at Ryoga to find that he was already on the other side of the pool, looking up at the cabinet curiously. If only he could speak to me again. I’ve come to miss his jibes and relentless teasing. Walking over, I slowly opened the lowest cabinet to show him the array of accessories. The sparkling gems caught his attention and he curiously reached out for a necklace. 

   “I’ll help you put that on if you’d like,” I offered, coming closer. 

   At the sound of my voice, Ryoga disappeared into the waters and swam away. I tried not to take it too personally. After all, he had fallen three stories into frigid waters. Bzzt. 

    Oh.

     I clicked off my phone.

    “Time for lunch,” I announced as I walked over to the fridge. 

    I took three fish out of the fridge and turned around. Plish. Ryoga resurfaced, his eyes wide in anticipation as he saw the fish. For the first time since our wedding, a smile filled his face. My heart soared and I quickened my pace. He swam towards me and excitedly resurfaced, eyes sparkling with delight. I kneeled down and offered the fish to him. Deftly, he grabbed onto one of the fish and yanked it out of my hands, the scales brushing against my skin. He voraciously sank his teeth into the spine of the fish, sharp teeth ripping into the scales. I chuckled as he noisily ate. 

   “Still no charm and an overabundance of rudeness, huh?” I teased. 

    He ignored me and continued to eat. I put the two remaining fish by the side of the pool and cleaned my hands off with a nearby sanitizer. 

    “Let’s listen to some of your music,” I said as I walked over to his stereo. 

    I turned it on and selected one of his burned CDs. It was a lost art, according to him. Apparently, no one knew how to burn CDs anymore. I had never understood why he preferred CDs over our streaming technologies, but I always indulged him during holidays and birthdays. They were difficult to find, often sequestered in antique stores or sold in bundles of outdated technology. Pressing the play button, I then walked back to the jewelry cabinet to close it. The sounds of a soothing bassline started up as I looked into the cabinet. A silver ring caught my attention and I stiffened, quickly closing the compartment. 

     I walked back to the stereo to adjust the volume, prickles crawling up my spine. I watched Ryoga as he ate, the two silver rings on his fingers catching the light. The ring back in the cabinet had been Rio’s wedding gift to him. She had never gotten the chance to give it to him and it had arrived in the mail a few days after the accident. It had come in a plain box, nestled in white satin. “To: Ryoga, From: Rio,” was written on the inside of the lid in permanent marker. There had been no return address. 

   Unbidden, the contract resurfaced in my mind. Clause one: You must not show him to others. Even if it was his own sister? I should have asked for further clarification. But why shouldn’t Rio be allowed to know? If there was anyone that had grieved more than me, it was most definitely her. My hand crept to my pocket and towards my phone, yet it stilled just before I wrapped my fingers about it.    

        The order had been loud and clear. She never wanted to see me again after the wedding. My brows furrowed in contemplation. Surely, she would have wanted to know that Ryoga was alive though? Besides, it was the right thing to do. Then why couldn’t I do it?

     I saw her grief-filled expression under the moonlight as the sirens of the police and naval guard arrived. Her eyes had burned like fire that night, filled with our long and twisted history. First the fire. Then the awkward reconciliation. Stolen glances. Brief brushes of fingers. More intentional touching. Lighting-fast kisses before a duel. Her warm skin on mine, the cold metal of the hallways freezing me to the bone. The betrayal that filled her eyes when I proposed to her twin brother instead of her. 

    “It’s a publicity stunt,” I had said in a hushed voice. “Good for the press and for our careers.” 

     The pale moonlight gave her magenta eyes an otherworldly glow. It dyed her hair silver and her skin was milk white. The white dress she wore fluttered in the wind, the diaphanous fabric teasing me. She was an otherworldly creature of the light. I regarded her cold gaze there, forcing myself to move towards her despite the ice in my veins. Hesitantly, I reached out to her, afraid that she would shatter in my embrace. My shoulders heaved in relief when she didn’t disappear as I held her tight, the ocean breeze and the rocking of the ship melding with our heartbeats. 

    “I will always love you,” I promised. 

    Thunk. Both of us jumped at the sound. Quickly, I turned to see Ryoga, silhouetted against the bright interior of the ship. With the golden light behind him, his hair appeared black and his face was marred by long shadows. His navy blue suit had become a dark shroud and I could not see his eyes. Even the white flowers in his lapel looked gray in that moment. The shadow to Rio’s light. 

    “What are you doing with her?!” he shouted as he rushed towards me. 

    In the moonlight, his sapphire eyes shone with fury and hurt. Before I could answer, he grabbed my collar and shoved me against the deck railing. 

    “Ryoga!” gasped Rio. 

    “Stay out of this!” he snapped, his eyes drilling holes into me. “How long have you been doing this with her?!”

     His cheeks were flushed with red and his breath smelled of champagne as he pushed me once again. 

   “Did you just use me to get closer to my sister?!”

    His voice had broken at the last word, yet his face remained engulfed in rage. Roughly, he pushed me harder against the railing, my back teetering over the edge. The ocean beneath us was an inky black abyss. 

    “C-calm down…! Your s-sister was merely worried about you—about us!” I cried weakly. 

    Ryoga’s eyes narrowed, catching my lie instantaneously. But it was true. Almost everyone at the wedding knew that we fought regularly. Spats peppered our relationship, which was always followed by angry and passionate sex. Those were always the best, with his teeth sinking into my skin and my nails marking up his body. Just not this time. 

   “You fucker!” he screamed. “I trusted you! I knew something was off when Rio started coming to our matches more often! It was because of you!” 

  Being a high-profile prosecutor had left Rio with little free time. It must have hurt when Ryoga realized that she had made time out of her busy schedule not for him but for me. I looked at his face and noted that his lips were trembling. Despite the alcohol he had consumed, his eyes were filled with lucidity. 

    “Listen…!” I gasped as I teetered over the edge of the railing. “It was casual! We—”

    In an instant, Ryoga positioned me over the edge, the deck railing digging into my lower back. I saw the bright expanse of the stars before me, my blood rushing through my ears. Rio’s cry weakened his grip and I felt my instincts kick in. Quickly, I freed myself from Ryoga’s grip and pushed him away. I circled him and he rushed towards me. We struggled for a few moments as we exchanged blows, making our way down the empty deck. I narrowly avoided a kick and slammed Ryoga against the railing. Distantly, I heard Rio crying for help. 

   Still, Ryoga kept trying to punch and kick at me, even as a bruise was forming on his cheek. He swung towards my face and I roughly pushed him away, my muscles rippling with fury. Too late, I realized as I saw his body flip over the railing. It seemed to happen in slow motion. 

     The shine of his shoes against the moonlight. The way his curls flew in all directions of the wind. How his furious expression melted into shock and then fear. How his mouth opened up into a scream. His corsage, fluttering loose and scattering in the wind. 

    “Ryoga…!” I yelled, sticking out my hand. 

    It felt as if I was trapped in gelatin, my limbs refusing to move fast enough. All that lifting. All that training. And it couldn’t even save him. It only killed him. Our fingers briefly touched, briefly interlocking before pulling away. The coldness of his skin shocked me, as if he was already beneath the waves. Rio’s scream melded with her brother’s and mine. The once-peaceful starlit night seemed to be full of nothing but screams in that moment, piercing and endless. And then a small and distant ker-plash as Ryoga’s body sank beneath the waves. 

    I jolted awake with a gasp. 

     “It was an accident,” my manager said. “Plain and simple as that.”

    His voice echoed in my mind as I watched Ryoga swim, the fish long eaten. It wasn’t my fault. As Ryoga passed me by, he didn’t grace me with a single glance. I felt a twinge of relief as he passed me by indifferently. Perhaps this was a gift from heaven. A blank slate with Ryoga who, I knew now, was the love of my life. 

[muesliforbreakfast]

Pilgrim’s Trail

Sometimes I write... As y’all have seen. I’ve put two pieces up on HFY. A subreddit which I guess celebrates aspects of humanity. This is the first – It's based on an existential nightmare I had a few years ago and wrote about, but with a HFY flavour. Little bit of trivia... I gave the original writeup a conventional ending - this is much closer to the way the nightmare ended, but Ratel the Mercenary made some fucken lemonade.

Setting – Not really important, but if you insist... Picture a bastardized amalgamation of Kirill Eskov's version of Middle Earth, and Novigrad/Velen then you have the right idea.

- - - - - - - - - -

Years after his first quest he sits at the spring of the hawk under the white tree. He sharpens his silver sword, holding it across his thigh, as he watches the travellers on their journeys. A tall young woman in a weathered cloak approaches him.

"You look familiar to me, have we met?" she asks, with no other greeting.

"I have travelled far... it's possible."

"What is your name, if you will? I am a collector of stories, and I would have yours."

With a weary sigh, he replies "They just call me the Mercenary, call me that, if you like."

"Mercenary... How did you become a mercenary?"

He looks at her now and sees an elf, not a girl. She is only young in elf years.

- - - - - - - - - -

The caravan had stopped. He jumped off the cart to stretch, and admired the view of the mountain range, from the shade of the valley. Purple in the distance, it would take them another three days to reach it, and having reached it, the tunnel that would take them to the other side of the range. From there, it is another month until they reached the stronghold of the Assassin king known only as Tzerlag.

It was his first quest, and he was excited and apprehensive.

The command to walk the perimeter came from Brother Edmund, the heart and brains of this quest.

He took up his sword and began to walk the perimeter.

~ ~ ~

He had wanted to find his true love. "Eat the fruit of the white tree, and you shall find your true love." The book had said. His people had confirmed this decree, so he had sought the tree at the spring of the hawk, but the tree bore him no fruit. He had waited for three days, and on the fourth a wise man had said that an offering was necessary.

"But I have nothing, sir." He replied. The wise man had advised him to crusade. "Crusading will grant you a reward in this life." So he had walked the Pilgrims trail, to the first outpost. There he had waited for a group of crusaders, so he could begin his offering.

~ ~ ~

The very first group of crusaders to take the Pilgrim's trail had been the group that he had joined. According to the Master of the Guard, their mission was the most important one they had coming through there in years. A thief had stolen codex pages from the Assassin king Tzerlag, and to prevent continued skirmishes between the kingdoms, a group of crusaders were returning the codex pages that had been found.

He had been there when Brother Edmund had put the codex pages into a basket woven of cables, and he had been there when Brother Edmund and the Master of the Guard had discussed the route, and the dangers along the way. Their caravan numbered four hundred strong. Four hundred strong was more than enough, even for a mission of this importance.

~ ~ ~

The ambush had happened at the entrance to the tunnel through the ranges. The soldiers and crusaders had circled Brother Edmund's carriage, and they had all fought to the death.

Only he had survived.

While the battle had raged outside the carriage, he had smashed the lock on the cable basket with the pommel of his sword, and stuffed the five codex pages, wrapped in wax paper, up his gambeson sleeve. He had then tied a piece of cord around his wrist and sleeve to seal it, and then, outside, he had joined the melee again.

The bandits had outnumbered them almost two to one, and had quickly slaughtered all but the best fighters; the professional soldiers and seasoned men at arms. Under the weight of numbers, the best fighters would fall too. But not before he reached the entrance to the tunnel, his pursuers dead by his sword, and the sword of the four deceased comrades who had followed him.

The tunnel was unlit, and he had no torch, but he knew that it was dead straight with no branches, and so he stumbled into the darkness.

~ ~ ~

Torches in the darkness behind him warned him of his pursuers. They were too far to see him, so He took refuge in a crag in the rocks of the tunnel. As they passed, their quiet conversation made his blood run cold with fear.

The bandit Warlord, in his fury at having had the codex pages taken during the battle had ordered the wounded crusaders be piked to death where they lay. Meanwhile he had sent a dozen of his remaining men into the darkness of the tunnel, to reach the end and then hold the exit, as his main force scoured it thoroughly from behind. All this he had learned whilst following them through the tunnel. He had considered waiting for them to pass in his hiding place, but now was glad he had not.

~ ~ ~

The tunnel was long, and the scouts had set a fast pace for hours. When they stopped for a rest, they were exhausted.

So was he, but to rest was to die.

They made camp in the middle of the tunnel, and had posted two sentries for the night; one facing the entrance, and one on the other side facing the exit.

He had stealthily made his way past the first sentry, into the camp. He had killed both sentries and then killed the ten remaining men in their sleep. By his estimate, he would have six hours to make it to the other end of the tunnel. He hoped it would be enough.

~ ~ ~

Near the end of the tunnel he had encountered some traders. He looked like hell.

"Don't go that way." He had told them. When pressed for information he told them what he could without giving too much away. They had decided to take him to the stronghold of the Assassin king, and he had been picked up by Assassin scouts not four miles away from the tunnel.

The scouts had taken them all to the court of the Assassin king, and he had given the king the pages.

He had refused his reward.

- - - - - - - - - -

"Those were my first kills, my first crusade."

"Then you're Ratel... Ratel the Mercenary... The last time I heard this story you singlehandedly cutting through swathes of outlaws and delivered Tzerlag's daughter yourself."

"Hah. Don't let the truth get in the way of a good story. What happened was trial enough."

"The march through the desert, Seven years in the Eastern Marshes, The Marshal of Umber? Are those stories true?"

"It just depends on which version you've heard."

She pauses to think for a moment. He begins to sharpen his sword once more, and then speaks.

"I spoke to a man, a middle aged man, but scarred, withered to the bone by sorrow and hardship. He was gored by a boar, but killed it in return. It took him weeks to crawl to help. When he ran out of water, he drank out of muddy puddles and filthy holes. He ate raw fish when he could catch them. Insects and moss when he couldn't. When help found him he was weak and feverish; his recovery took months, his experience took years from his life. He's been tried far more than I. I've travelled and fought but I am paid, and well, for it. These passing peasants - I've seen and lived their lives, but briefly. Backbreaking labour for their feudal lords, and they receive just enough to scrape by in return."

"Losing everything but your waterskin, boots and a sword when you crossed the desert... Turning the tables on the Marshal of Umber and his hundred men as he tracked you through the forest... And they've suffered more?"

"The Marshal didn't even have twenty... Yes. My life is easy; I travel, I fight, I'm paid. Occasionally I am hurt, but I don't go hungry, I don't wake before the dawn and labour until after dusk, day in day out. This life is dangerous, but I know naught else. I will die before I'm forty; an early death is the price I will pay for never tilling the soil and toiling for every scrap of food I eat. If anything I am fortunate, aside from this."

The she-elf pauses to consider his words once more.

"Then I don't know how you humans do it. Live your lives I mean, day after day."

"I don't know how you elves came into this world. By all accounts you weren't here, and then you were. And the elements always bent to your will. It's not so for us; If we build a house from wood we cut down the trees for lumber. We carry the wood and saw it and nail it into a house. Whereas I've seen your treetop cities grown from the trees themselves."

"I still remember when my kind thought your kind were primitive brutes for doing so. Some still hold that we were bested because we became too civilised."

"Whereas our historians will tell you that your kind never needed steel until our kinds met in battle, which is why you never sought it, and didn't have it until you needed it."

"Please don't take offense! Your species is relentless, but that is admired by my kind!"

"Relentless... Did you know that our first hunters were persistence hunters?"

"I don't know what that means."

"Before we had steel, or fire, or even stone tools, we would chase our prey down. We would run them to death."

"Chase down... A deer?"

"That's right... You see they can run faster than us, but we can walk all day. We would chase just slowly enough that they could get away, but just fast enough that they were never out of sight. We would chase them until they were so exhausted that we could kill them with our hands. When we had nothing we still found a way. Now we have... Steel... And writing, and poetry. We've traveled the oceans. Maybe one day we will travel the skies. My ancestors survived a history of suffering because we were made to endure; the ability to suffer has been with us from the very beginning. No matter what it takes, no matter the cost."

[hyder33-blog1]

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breathers

 Characters/Pairings: Naminé/Riku

A/N: Written for the @khrarepairszine charity zine! I picked Naminé/Riku, I’ve had a soft spot for them since CoM. Take a look at the other contributors or pick up a copy. :)

Summary: Naminé had none of Sora’s laziness or Kairi’s relaxed attitude, and honestly, Riku would have left the islands years ago if she’d been around. Still, everyone needed a break, Nobodies included.

…

…

…

…

“Mmmmmm, mmmm, mmmmm,mmm.”

 A delicate humming filled the white house and Riku didn’t have to look to know where it was coming from. He’d recognize Naminé’s soft voice anywhere. Automatically, his feet followed a familiar path to her room. As he got closer, he heard the soft scratch of her crayons, the sharp flip of a page.

 Spotting her familiar silhouette, he stopped at the doorway. As usual, she was sitting at the table, her head bent as she drew scene after scene. The walls were filled with images, with memories, and Riku scanned the colourful pictures. There was the time he raced with Sora, making the raft with Kairi, sleeping under the stars. Other, unknown memories filled with mermaids and warriors and constellations he didn’t know.

 He never did have a chance to talk to Sora after all was said and done, to boast about adventures and swap tales. Quietly, so as not to disturb Naminé, Riku drifted from picture to picture. A boy with a monkey smirked mischievously in one. Another had a bear with his head caught in a honey pot. Riku’s fingers brushed against one of Kairi giving Sora the paopu fruit.

“I had to make sure that memory was returned,” Naminé said apologetically, slowly setting down her sketchpad.

 Resisting the urge to jump, Riku withdrew his hand. “It is an important one.”

 “Yeah.” Pushing her chair back, Naminé slipped off and joined him. Her sad eyes took in the scene and she smiled softly. “That fruit was the basis of everything.”

 “Everything?” Riku asked, cocking his head in confusion.

 “For our ‘friendship’.” She touched the paopu fruit lightly. Her fingers slowly slid off the picture and she turned around and pointed at a few other sketches. The golden fruit was prominent in each of them. “This fruit was important to you. Both of you. So I used that to insert myself.”

 Both of you. Riku didn’t have to ask what she meant by that. It was impossible to forget the sight of his death, of his body choking and gasping for its last breath. “There’s a story on my island, that if two people share one—”

 “Their destinies are intertwined,” Naminé completed. She chuckled at his surprised expression. “You have no idea how often you guys said that in his memories.”

 Riku flushed. Had they really talked about it that much? About this old wife’s tale, with no basis in reality? It was stupid, really. A thing that couldn’t be true in any way. A thing that he spent several years wishing for, a connection that was permanent. A connection that would stay. The dark part of his heart that Ansem had slipped into. “Really?”

 “Really,” she confirmed with a grin, smiling whole-heartedly for once. “You say it a lot.”

 “Not that often,” he disputed, crossing his arms and looking away. “Just to tease Sora with.”

 “Hmm…that may be so.” A serious expression slipped back onto her face and Riku felt a pang of regret. It had been rare enough that she laughed. “Still.” She grabbed his hand and squeezed it. “I’m sorry you didn’t get it.”

 Caught off guard, Riku stared at her. None of his wisecracks came to him, none of his taunts. He was utterly speechless. “I…”

 Naminé said nothing, just giving him a knowing look before letting go. She turned back to her table. “I have almost finished removing the altered memories.”

 Riku glanced at the picture one last time before following her. Shoving his hands into his pockets, he peered at her sketchbook. It was thin now, with only a few pages left. A testament to how hard she worked. “Do you take breaks?” he asked without thinking.

 “Huh?” Naminé blinked, staring at her notepad and then back at him. Confusion shone in her eyes and she cocked her head. “Breaks?”

 “Vacations? Rest? Time off?” Riku rolled his eyes as he clarified. “You’ve been in Sora’s memories, so you have to know what a break is. That’s all the slacker did.”

 “Yeah, of course I do! But…” Naminé’s skin flushed a bright red, and she nervously tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. “I just…I didn’t.”

 “After all that work?” Riku raised a brow. Gesturing with his head at all the pictures, he frowned. “No one should work that long without a break.”

 “Oh no, it’s okay. I’m fine.” She rubbed her wrist, her shoulders hunching till she looked even smaller than usual. “I don’t—I don’t need a break. It’s fine.”

 “Everyone needs a break.” Riku reached out and grabbed her hand. Yanking her behind him, he headed to the door. “Even you.”

 “No, I—” Naminé protested, digging in her heels. “I can’t, not after what I did.”

 “You’ve apologized enough for that,” Riku rebutted, firmly pulling her along. “Sora’s forgiven you. And even if my clone can’t, I’ve forgiven you. It’s enough.”

 “It isn’t,” she muttered softly.

 “…don’t you think I deserve it even less than you?” Riku asked, looking over his shoulder. When she didn’t say anything, he smirked. “Besides, Sora likes sleeping more than anything. He’ll be fine sleeping for a few extra hours.”

 She stared at him for a long moment before finally giving in. “There’s nowhere to go, the mansion doesn’t really have that much in it.”

 “Hmm, that’s true,” Riku muttered, scratching his chin. Aside from the basement, the mansion was fairly lightly furnished. Even the garden outside was barebones, and whatever little plants grew there had gone wild. “Then we can explore the city.”

 “The city?” Naminé shook her head. “I couldn’t possibly—”

 “It’s a break,” Riku cut her off wryly. Really, there was none of Sora’s or Kairi’s laziness in her. It was almost refreshing to see someone take things seriously for once. “Where were you when I was making that raft? I would have left the islands years ago.”

 Reaching the front door, he let go of her hand and opened it. Bright sunlight filtered through and he shaded his eyes as he stepped out. A soft breeze rustled his hair, a bird chirped nearby, and he had almost forgotten what spring was like. There hadn’t been much time during his journey to just enjoy the places he went to, the seasons the worlds experienced. Turning back, he held out his hand for Naminé. “You coming or do I have to drag you out?”

 “I…” Naminé hesitated, fiddling with her hands nervously as she stared at him. Biting her lip, she took a step outside. Her shoulders hunched, her body braced for some sort of reaction. For someone to drag her back in and put the sketchpad back into her hands.

 “You can leave the entrance, you know,” Riku encouraged gently, his hands still held out.

 “Y-yeah.” Emboldened when nothing happened, she grabbed his hand tightly and took another step. And then another. She squinted up at the sky, at the clouds that littered the blue expanse. “It’s…beautiful.”

 Riku shrugged. He’d seen better skies on his island. “I guess.”

 “I…” Naminé’s head darted left and right, taking in the tall grasses and wild roses that made up the front lawn. “I’d seen it all from his memories. And I think I might have come through here once. But…I didn’t get to see it myself before. Not really.”

 “Never?” Riku jerked his head to her, surprised.

 “Nobodies, we’re not really born like everyone else.” Naminé stared down at the grass, slipping a foot out of her sandals to touch it. Delighted by the ticklish sensation, she set her foot down on the squishy ground and wiggled her toes. “I kinda just came to be, at that castle. And then I was taken here, but that was through a warp gate.”

 “Huh.” Riku rubbed the back of his neck. They were more similar than he’d thought. “So your island was that castle, then.”

 “Hmm?” Naminé peered up at him curiously.

 He shook his head. “Nothing. Put your shoes back on, we’re going to town.”

 “Right. Town.” Naminé set her jaw determinedly. Pressing her foot one last time on the grass, she slipped her sandal back on. “Ready.”

 Riku resisted the urge to laugh at the image in front of him. She looked so determined, like she was off to fight a battle rather than just walk into a small town. But her hand was sweaty in his, her nails digging into his skin lightly, and maybe for her this was a fight. “Alright. Since this is your first time, I’ll guide you.”

 -x-

 “They have scents.” Naminé stared at the rose in her hand, twirling between her fingers. Raising it to her nose, she sniffed it again. “Actual scents.”

 “And thorns.” Gently, he pulled the flower away from her hand. Luckily, she had gripped the stem at the exact right spot to avoid the sharp defense system. Glancing at the house in front of them, he carefully pushed the branch back in place. “Let’s not invade someone’s garden.”

 Not paying him any heed, Naminé wandered to the house next door, to a creeping vine of morning glories. “This one smells so different!”

 “Did you hear me?” Riku groaned, staring down at the long line of houses ahead of them. Maybe he should have taken a different route into town. Not that it would have made much of a difference, there were going to be flowers no matter what path they took.

 Sniffing a peony, Naminé chirped, “This one too!”

 It was going to be a long walk.

 -x-

 A bird chirped. Naminé cupped her ears as they walked, listening to the sounds around her.  Riku watched her from the corner of his eye as she tried to identify the owners of different sounds: birds, dogs, other villagers. Her head craned left and right, and there was something endearing about how she pivoted at each new sound.

 “It’s so noisy,” she murmured, looking excited despite her words.

 “Compared to the mansion, sure,” he refuted, crossing his arms behind his head as he slowed his pace. “If you think this is loud, wait till you see a city.”

 -x-

 “Here.” Riku held out a popsicle, plopping the other one in his mouth. Immediately, a cold, sweet flavour hit his tongue, with a salty kick after.

 “For me?” Naminé awkwardly accepted, staring at the blue popsicle. The wooden handle was slightly slippery and she pinched it with two fingers, trying to save the rest of her hand from the sticky substance. “A popsicle?”

 “It’s the town’s specialty. Might as well try it.” Riku pulled his treat out of his mouth before he could get a brain freeze. “Take a lick, it’s pretty good.”

 “Alright.” Scrunching her face, Naminé hesitantly stuck out her tongue and licked it. She squeezed her eyes shut, considering the flavour, before opening them with surprise. “It’s sweet.”

 “And at a normal level.” Riku shuddered, remembering the frozen treats Sora and Kairi used to have. It was like having pure sugar dissolve on his tongue. “Though I could do without the salt.”

 “You just want to—” Naminé glanced at him and immediately covered her mouth. It couldn’t completely muffle the sound of her laughter and Riku glared at her.

 “What?”

 “Just…your tongue. And lips.” Naminé’s shoulders shook as she tried to compose herself. “It’s all blue.”

 -x-

 “It’s cold!” Naminé yelped, taking a step back. There weren’t many ways to access the shore in Twilight town; the lack of beaches and frosty waters deterred even the most adventures of visitors.

 Sitting on a rock, Riku raised a brow. “What did you think it was gonna be? Warm?”

 “A little.” Naminé shivered, her feet still in the water. The barest edges of the water. The tide lapped at her feet, tiny waves crashing down on her ankles, and she took yet another step back. Looking back at him, she frowned. “The waters in your home were pleasant.”

 “Yeah, because we lived in the tropics.” Riku rolled his eyes. Then again, Sora had never bothered to pay attention to any class, even geography, so maybe she wouldn’t know that.

 A more powerful wave charged up the shore, enveloping her feet, and she darted back even further. “I’m good for now.”

 “You sure?” Riku smirked, gesturing at the water. “You were only in it for a few minutes.”

 “No, definitely, definitely good.” Naminé broke into a run as another crash sounded behind her.

 -x-

 “I hear this has the best view of the sunset,” Riku explained, opening the door on the top of the clock tower. A soft breeze ruffled his hair and he shielded his eyes as the sun’s last rays hit him. “We’re on time at least.”

 Following him out, Naminé peered around him. “Ohhh.” Amazed, she pushed past him and hurried to the railing. Her mouth slack, she watched as the pink and orange hues bled into the blue sky, the sun heading down into the water. “Amazing!”

 “Yeah. I guess.” Riku had seen this sight more often than he cared to remember. It was strange to watch it alone, without Sora’s stupid remarks or Kairi’s sharp jabs.

 “I didn’t know it could be so beautiful,” Naminé breathed, her eyes fixed on the sun.

 Riku smiled. Right, he wasn’t alone. Not now. Leaning on the railing next to her, he glanced at Naminé. “It?”

 “The sky.” Naminé paused, then shook her head. “The world. Everything, really. I saw them in your memories, but…it’s something else to see them for yourself. I never knew such bright blue existed. Or such soft pinks. What else is the universe hiding?”

 “Underwater worlds, worlds ruled by animals,” Riku listed, ticking them off with his finger. “A lot, really. You’ll just have to visit more worlds. Take more breaks.”

 “Visit…” Naminé mused, lowering her eyes slightly. With a sad smile, she shook her head. “No, this is enough. More than enough.”

 “Why?” Riku frowned.

 “I can’t leave the manor like this again—I have too much to do.” She beamed at him, but it didn’t meet her eyes. “I got a lot of memories from this, it can tide me over.” When he opened his mouth to argue, she covered his lips with a finger, her expression stern. “No, really. Thank you. This is more than enough for someone like me.”

 Someone like me. He hated how much that sounded like a curse.

 -x-

 “Thanks for today.” Naminé stretched her arms behind her as she sauntered into her room. Glowing, she beamed brightly at him. “It was a lot of fun, having a break.”

 “Yeah, it’s not bad every once in a while.” Riku rested a hand on his hip, a smirk on his face. “Just don’t take it as often as Sora does.”

 “Maybe he wanted you to take more breaks.” Laughing, she glanced at one of the drawings on the wall. A picture of a boy sleeping on the sand, without a care in the world. “Or maybe he’s just lazy.”

 “The latter. Definitely the latter.” On the wall next to him, Riku spotted one of Sora’s terrible drawings. A picture of Sora’s and Kairi’s head, a paopu fruit passed from one to the other. It was strange. He felt so detached looking at it now. Yet when he’d first saw it, a tidal wave of rage had overcome him. Enough to destroy his world. Enough to destroy many worlds.

 At some point, the wave broke, the rage ebbing away. All that was left was a sense of fondness, of his two dense, idiotic friends and a scenario he should have seen eons ago. He glanced behind him. Naminé was humming again as she picked up her sketch pad. There was one more thing he could do for her.

 “Gimme a sheet.” Walking over to the table, Riku picked up a golden crayon. He rolled it in his hand; the colour was just right.

 “You’re going to draw?” Mystified, Naminé carefully tore out a page for him. “I thought you weren’t good at that.”

 Riku shot her a baleful glare. The downside of her combing through Sora’s memories—his past was an open book to her. Including all of his art classes. “I’m just not interested in it.”

 “That wasn’t what—”

 “I’m just not interested,” he repeated forcefully, grumpily glaring at her. It wasn’t a lie. He wasn’t good, so he wasn’t interested. There was no point in doing something that even Sora, the class idiot, got higher marks than him in. Spreading the sheet of paper, he stared at it for a long moment. Maybe this was a bad idea. Even a simple shape ended up distorted in his hands.

 “If you say so,” Naminé acquiesced, covering her mouth to hide her laughter.

 Riku peeked at her from the corner of his eyes. Shoulders shaking, eyes full of mirth, Naminé looked like an ordinary girl. Nothing like the sad Nobody he usually saw, counting down the days till she disappeared. Determined, he started drawing, straight confident lines into the shape of a star.

 “So, what are you drawing?” Naminé tried to peek over his shoulder, but he blocked her.

 “Just wait.” Biting his cheek, he glanced at her artwork on the walls. Yep. He was right. He was no good at this and he was definitely never doing it again. Finishing the piece, he instructed, “Hold out your hand.”

 Naminé cocked her head. “My hand?”

 “Just hold it out,” he ordered. When she held out her right hand, he placed the sheet on her hands.

 “What?” Naminé stared at it, realization dawning in her expression. “This is…”

 “You didn’t get one either, right?” Riku shrugged, looking away in embarrassment as she stared at him. “It might not be as good as yours, but even I can draw a paopu fruit.”

 “It’s not that. I…I can’t…” Naminé looked back at the paper, her hand still flat and rejecting it entirely. “I’m…I’m not real. I’ll go away.”

 She really wasn’t like any of his friends: softer, more awkward, more nervous. And completely unable to let herself be happy. “Didn’t I say I wouldn’t forget?” Riku reminded her. He reached out and squeezed her shoulder. Her bones felt fragile under his hand. “You’re real to me. You’re here.”

 Stricken, she shook her head. “But I….”

 He folded the paper and curled her hand over the hard edges. It crinkled at the touch. “And now you’ll always be real, because our destinies are intertwined.”

 She bit her lip before slowly nodding. Wiping a tear from her eyes, she chuckled. “You’re really bad at drawing.”

 “Oh, shut up.” Riku turned around, his ears burning hot. “Like I said, I’m just not interested in it.”

[tremble-and-shake]

Ficlet for “Church girl” anon

Like I said previously, this is just a short lead-up, nothing fancy. It’s NSFW but not really smut.  That dear anon asked me enough times (and kindly) that eventually dialogue for this started to come together in my head and I found it really hot. Still, I acknowledge that this is super cheesy and unbelievable.  Not knocking Christians or Catholics of anything (I grew up going under Catholic pretenses, but it just wasn’t for me and I got the fuck out). The storyline is just a classic, cliché turn on.

I’m calling it The Tempest of Lustful Shades after the vortex in the Second Circle of Hell in Dante’s Inferno. That’s where people go for lustful sins, and that’s where I feel like I’m going to end up writing this shit lmao  Anyway, maybe some of you will be there with me for enjoying it. I hope so. Thanks @starchild0985 for taking a peek and offering feedback <333

The Tempest of Lustful Shades

You were finishing up your undergraduate degree in Art History at St. Mary’s in London. The uni had a partnership with Tate Modern, the art gallery collective that Jimmy had recently loaned tapestries to for their Edward Burne-Jones exhibition.  And now, somehow, you were sitting in Jimmy’s parlor, sipping tea and chatting with him about your undergraduate thesis on the intersection between medievalism and Victorian ideals of womanhood in the Pre-Raphaelite movement.

“Above all else, Pre-Raphaelitism espoused naturalism, even when this risked showing ugliness. But that’s the true irony of it, isn’t it?” You nodded along, beaming at his words. “Look at what beauty they were able to create by embracing the fidelity of human appearance.”

It wasn’t too often you came across men who could carry on such a cerebral conversation on this topic while maintaining this level of passion.  It was even rarer to come across ones this attractive.  

“Let me refill your tea, love,” he said, placing his own cup down and taking the ceramic handle of the teapot.  Admiring the hand-painted Moroccan lattice, you wondered how lavish it must to have a home where everything within it, down to the teapot and silverware, was an authentic piece of history.

“So, what’s a young lady as brilliant, passionate, and beautiful as you are doing still single?”

Shifting your weight from one leg to the other, you stifled a timid laugh.

He sensed your uneasiness, offering a consolation in the soft lines that cradled his lips and eyes. “Too immersed in your studies at the moment, I presume.”

“That’s my priority, yes.” Engulfed in his warmth and this momentary comfort, you surprised yourself by opening to him. “But a lot of guys my age aren’t willing to, you know, wait for a Catholic girl.  Not even the ones at uni.”

Something flashed quickly in his eyes like a response to some subconscious trigger, and you realized what you had implied.

“No.  I didn’t mean, that’s not-” Your startled movements caused your tea to careen over the lip of the cup, sending you to your feet to escape the hot Darjeeling. “Ow, shit, that’s hot!”

He was on his feet beside you almost instantly, removing the cup and taking your hands inside his.  “Are you alright?”

“I’m so sorry. Jimmy, I got tea on the throw.”  You tried to pull away and daub the spill, but he wouldn’t let you.  

“Darling, don’t worry, it’s quite alright.  You’re not burned, are you?  How embarrassing to serve guests tea that’s scalding.”

“No, no, I’m fine.  It wasn’t that hot, it just startled me.”

“Let me get something to dry your blouse.”  

You cursed yourself for being so foolish, but silenced the self-berating in time for him to reenter the room, dinner napkin in hand.

“Here we are.” He began to blot along the hem your blouse, pulling the fabric off your skin. “May I?” You nodded, but it wasn't until you felt his fingers graze against your stomach that you realized what he was asking: to reach under your blouse in order absorb the stain from both sides of the fabric.

“Jimmy, I don’t know why I said that. TMI, I’m sorry.”  You're surprised by how soft his fingers feel against you. “But just so you know.. I’m- I’m not.”

“Not what, love?” He broke his focus from the stain.  When his eyes found yours, he seemed to genuinely be unsure of what you were saying.  

“A.. a virgin.” That look again: the calloused, wanton glazing of his eyes. But fleeting and nearly impossible to recall once it’s gone. “I mean, I’ve only done it once.  It was stupid, he was stupid.  But I've done my penance and have been forgiven.”

"Hmm, I think that should do it, yes?"

"W- well, yes," you proceeded shakily but found confidence through the verse. "As it says in the Bible, 'If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.'"

He took a step back and tugged down at the hem of your blouse. "I was talking about the Darjeeling, love. And you needn't offer an explanation, I'm not judging you in the least. Shall we go on?"

"I'm so embarrassed, I think maybe I better go. I talk too much when I'm nervous and I've already--"

"Don't be silly. My apologies if I've said or done anything to make you feel uncomfortable but it would be a shame for you to leave without seeing the artwork. Come," he motioned for you to follow him, his smile warm and inviting.

He lead you through the hall and into the study. You remained pace or two behind, trying to steady yourself in this whirlwind of lustful thoughts and conflicting emotions.

As you entered the room, you struggled to keep your focus on the awe-inspiring paintings. He saw this and  his dark brows became unsettled.

"It's just that I haven't felt this way before. Not even that first time,” your restless fingers searched for composure at the hem of your blouse. “I’ve never wanted someone so badly.”

His chin lifted and his gaze sharpened; he was eyeing you up as if assessing the honesty of your statement. “I see,” he lowered his chin slightly. “You’re here for academic research. I hardly think it’s appropriate. Do you?”

“Well, I guess not,” your gaze falls downward, disappointed.

“And what about your vow of abstinence? How do these thoughts make you feel?”

“Shameful,” you reply delicately. “Dirty.”

He smirked  “We haven’t even done anything dirty yet, love. Imagine how you’d feel afterward.”  Closing the space between you, he went on. “But it is the forbidden fruit that tastes the sweetest.”

“Let me taste it,” your tone was meek, but your hands spoke more strongly as they traipsed below his belt.

“Do you know what you’re getting yourself into?” His fingers lifted your chin firmly, forcing you to surrender into his eyes. They were the seductive pinnacle on a face so seasoned and sophisticated.

“You may no longer be a virgin in the eyes of God, but as far as I’m concerned you might as well be. I'm going to have to go gently with you."

You swallowed sharply. Nervous, but overruled by the strong ache growing between your thighs. You'd never been so wet that your panties actually became damp like this.

"But I assure you that you're going to feel filthy all the same.  Is that really what you want?" His fingertips skimmed your lips, finding a place to come to rest.  "Show me.” He tugged gently at your lips and you knew what he wanted, so you welcomed them in and sucked gently.

“Good girl.”  His smile brought a dramatic softness to his face. And yet somehow it still commanded a subservience you were eager to give. “You know you’re going to have to go to mass tomorrow to confess this dirty secret.  Then you’ll pray on the rosary for hours before you find absolution.” You nodded and moaned for him, still caressing two of his long fingers with your tongue.

“I wonder, how many Our Fathers or Acts of Contrition will you have to say in reparation for sucking the cock of a man old enough to be your father, or grandfather even?  Don’t answer with your mouth full, love. It’s poor manners.”   He removed his fingers and gently pressed on your shoulders, encouraging you to your knees.  

“I suppose you could just tell me next week when you come here again, no use in supposition. But I do know one thing: anytime you kneel again, you’ll be thinking of us. In the church pew, besides your bed for nightly prayers, wherever. And you’ll be wet when you do.”

[ask-de-writer]

NORE’S CHOICE : Origin of the Rom: MLP Fan Fiction : (Part 4 of 10)

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~~ ~~ ~~ ~~

NORE’S CHOICE

Part ONE of the Origins of the Rom

ORIGIN OF THE ROM SERIES in reading order.  (will be completed as the stories are posted in linked form)

Part One : NORE’S CHOICE, which starts HERE

Part Two : WELCOME TO EQUESTRIA! which starts HERE

Part Three : FAIR AND UN-FAIR, which starts HERE

Part Four : ON THE ROADS OF EQUESTRIA, which starts HERE

Part Five : THE FIRST ROM HEARTHWARMING,  which starts HERE

Part Six : SANDO’S LAKE, which starts HERE

Part Seven : A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE ROM, which starts HERE

by

De Writer (Glen Ten-Eyck)

29000 words

© 2015 by Glen Ten-Eyck

Cover art by @wind-the-mama-cat​

Writing begun 08/09/15

All rights reserved.  This document may not be copied or distributed on or to any medium or placed in any mass storage system except by the express written consent of the author.

TUMBLR EXEMPTION

Blog holding members of Tumblr.com may freely reblog this story provided that the title, author and copyright information remain intact, unaltered, and are displayed at the head of the story.

Fan art, stories, music, cosplay and other fan activity is actively encouraged.

~~ ~~ ~~ ~~

I put away the Orb of the Ages in its hidden place in time itself.  Now there was nothing left to betray old Marchhare.  I slept until somewhat before the dawn.

I pulled out of the abandoned farmstead and onto the Red Branch path.  I eyed the ruts, assorted muddy spots, stray sticks that could nail a wheel’s spokes and wondered again why the locals and the engineers put up with this mess as the way to get to so important a project as the Red Branch Dam.

Chuckling to myself at my own witticism, I 'hauled ass’ up the way, passing the dam itself.  I noted that it was nearly done.  Only a little left at the north end. That, and needing to settle for almost a year to let its own mass pack it more solidly before risking the massive load of water that it was going to hold back.  Water from it should open up an enormous amount of new farm land for feeding a hungry nation.

Past the dam, there was no real road at all.  That made going difficult indeed.  I thanked the mother of Celestia and Luna that I’d done it twice before this.  Made it easier to pick my way through the thickets.

I appreciated the shade and coolness under the giant old trees here.  These, I knew, were some of the biggest, oldest trees in Equestria.  It took me two whole days, pulling some at night, too, to reach the divide.

From that vantage point, I could see through some of the much smaller trees of this side of the Sunset Range.  Out there was bare rock, gravel, sand and clays.  I could see the shimmer of the heat on the surface of the desert.

Celestia’s Anvil.  Arguably the hottest driest desert on the world and it was what I had to go into. No profit this time.

I shook my head and muttered, “Lives are more important than gold.”  I pulled forward and onto the downgrade.  It was slow, tricky work to get that heavy cart load down safely to where the canyon floor widened out to a meadow with a spring flowing into a small pool, similar to several others that I’d passed.

What made this spring special was simple.  It was the last water before the desert.  I filled up all the water casks lining the sides of my wagon, easily increasing the load by a half.  No help for it though.  Not if I was going to try saving those horses.

And I was.  I leaned into it and pulled.

~~ ~~ ~~ ~~

Another utterly merciless day was paling the eastern sky, heralding a cloudless dawn.  Nore woke and lifted her head to see about her.  Rom was up.  Maina and Phapa were up.  Sando was up.  She stirred and got her legs under her.  Getting to her hooves was not as easy.  Her left hind leg was still giving her trouble since the fall in that well.  The tumble out on that loose gravel slope had not helped it.

To Nore’s surprise, it was Sando who helped her to her feet.

Sando offered, “If you will accept my help, Nore, I can show the others how to make you a harness that will support your leg.  You will have to have support, though. I will do that while my strength lasts.  If you will have me do it.”

She gave him a skeptical glance. “You seem far different from the Sando that we left behind.”

“I hope that I am.  I understand, now that it is likely too late, how bad I was.”  He shook his head, ears drooping.  “If there is any way at all to make it up to all of you, I want to do it.  I do not want to die reviled and hated.”

Nore’s eyes softened.  “If you can show the others how to do that harness, Sando, I will let you support me.  My leg hurts.”

Rom nodded to the others.  Sarel brought up the rope.  Sando began, “We need two loops about me here.  Hard knot them so that the knots won’t slip …”

It took only a little time. Nore, with her limp, setting the pace, they started to struggle up the canyon to the slide that Sando found the day before.

Hooves slipped as gravel slithered away from under them.  Sometimes it seemed that it took three strides up to gain one.  Those were the good times. Frustrating efforts finally got them all to the top.  The sun was not yet over the horizon of bleak stone and bare clay.  They set out while the relative cool still prevailed.

If not for the same sun that was killing them, they could have lost their way entirely.  

Rom observed, “The Dayhorse is leading us to the place where she wants us to die.”  Drawing a big breath and letting it out slowly, he added, “Best not to disappoint her, I guess.”

They struggled on.  Nore looked up at Sando in puzzlement.  “Why would it matter if you were reviled or in comfort when you die, Sando?  Is not dying simply an end?  An end to suffering or an end to pleasure, but only that, an end?”

Rom turned an ear to hear Sando’s reply.  So did most of the band, actually.  Sando’s reply surprised them all.

“That is a very fatalistic view, Nore.  If life is simply a space between not being and not being, then why struggle at all?

“Everything that lives strives to live on.  An injured spider in the ruin of a web will still try to make another web and live on.  So it is with us, too.  Ask yourself why?  Why struggle to live on if there is an end to struggles and pain within your easy reach.  All that you have to do is give up.”

Nore did think deeply as she plodded along, making the best pace that she could.  She realized suddenly that she was the injured spider, but, expecting to die herself, she was setting as swift a pace as she could, in the hope that the others would survive.

“Do you know what lies beyond this world, when we die, Sando?”

~~ ~~ ~~ ~~

I came out of the canyon from the Sunset Range and began to follow my old tracks.  Not a road by any stretch.  Just the way with fewest traps for the unwary.  My previous path avoided the sand and stuck to gravel and clay surfaces.

The wheels groaned and fought me, conspiring with the desert surface to hold back the wagon. I shook my head at the unforgiving gravels and baked clays, “I swear it was easier when I was not trying to save some poor horses.”

The harness bit harder through my sweat, as if to make up for the bugs that had, ages ago, abandoned Celestia’s Anvil.  I muttered, “I don’t blame them, either!  This is no place for a self respecting bug.”

I dragged and pulled anyway. “They are going to die if I don’t.  They might die anyway, but at least I will have tried!”

The sun slammed down harder, I was sure.  The Anvil was well named.

~~ ~~ ~~ ~~

Sando thought over Nore’s question carefully and returned one of his own.  “What do you think is there, Nore?”

“I don’t know.  Until it started looking like I may find out soon, I really did not care.”

Sando nodded.  “That is the way of most, Nore.  I feel that there is a place that will reward us for the way that we use the Gift of Life.  If we give it up or throw it away, well, I don’t know what might await us.

“If it is reward for carrying on and doing our best to the end of our lives, it must be a reward suited to horses like us.  

“That would be a pleasant, lake of pure water that never fails.  There would be trees that both shade us from the sun and heat of the day, and have good fruits that they bear in all seasons.  There must be fine grass that grows always in plenty and soft, comfortable, safe places to sleep.”

“It sounds lovely, Sando.  I wonder if there will be a Master there?  The idea of having no Master frightens me.  It is the worst part of this whole horrible time.  We are cast out.  We have no Master.”  She shuddered to dry sobs and leaned a little harder on the harness of ropes.  Sando, understanding too well what she felt, made no complaint, but bore her up more strongly.

The other mares of the trekking band did overhear.  Dappled Sarel whispered to brown Phapa, “I never really thought about it before.  My mother used to tell me tales of the Night Horse’s Garden of Dreams but even when I was small, I didn’t really believe them.

“What Sando just said actually made some sense.  I need to think about it.”

Malit overheard and agreed, “Funny, isn’t it?  We are out here, like to die, and along comes this amazing thought from somehorse that I would never have looked to say anything sensible.”

Rom nodded too.  “I see some shade there by that rock outcrop.  It won’t last but I want the rest of you to wait there.  I will be looking ahead for a better shade to wait out the day.”

Sando said, “No, Rom.  That should be my task.  You are our leader.  You are vital to the rest if they are to live at all.  Let me scout the way.”  He paused and then added, “Please.”

They watched Sando work his way up a hill to the south east of them.  As he was scanning the route from his vantage point, Nore noticed how gaunt he was.  Looking about, she sadly noticed that they all were.  Shaking her head, she muttered, “Starvation does that.”

It was not long before Sando returned, his steps dragging.  His sides heaving, he reported, “I found us a better place.  The hill there, becomes a scarp facing south.  There is one of these twisty canyons in it.  We can have good shade for the rest of the day in there.  Come, I will show you the way.”

~~ ~~ ~~ ~~

The Orb was showing me the best way to reach the band of lost and cast off slaves.  I grumbled at some of it.  Wagons need ground that is sound enough that wheels do not sink too deeply into it and free enough of obstructions like big stones and heavy brush to allow passage.  

As I detoured yet again through the desert night, I groused, “A straight way, please, Dear Luna!”

No answer but the return grumble of wheels on the small gravel that the wind left behind when it blew away the good soil.  It was five days of grueling labor.  I was pulling the last one in daylight.  Time was running out.

The worst place that I was aware of was just past.  No shade at all.  I suspect that if I could die, I would have, back there.  

The real chance for trouble lay not far ahead.  Another narrow canyon led out of the side of a ridge of the same ghastly mix of hard clay and small lumpy stones that was such a nightmare to pull the wagon over.  Up in there were the seven that I had come to try saving.

My big donkey ears could hear a little of their conversation.  One that sounded to be the filly said, “Sando, I don’t think I can go further.  My leg is healed.  I can’t stand now at all.  Tell me again of the Lake.”

A big soft voice answered her, “It has all good things for us.  The best of browse to eat.  Fruits born at all seasons from trees and bushes that give shade in perfect measure for us.

“A thing that I did forget to mention though.  There are instruments there to play for music and dancing.  We can dance, sing and play music whenever we wish.”

The filly’s voice answered, “I wish that the Master had not kept our lyres, flutes and drums.  I want to hear music again before I go to the Lake.”

The one named Sando was replying, “We all do, Nore … I hear something out on the desert!!  I am going to go see what it is!”

I made a show of passing to the south of where they were sheltering from the sun but where they had to see or hear me going by.

The big stallion came out of their shaded hideaway at the sound of my cart passing.  He called out in a weak voice, “Sir!  If you are this deep into the Anvil, you must have some water!  Can you spare a tiny bit?  We have a filly near to death.

“It is my fault that we are here.  Save her, if none of the rest of us, please?”

I paused in heaving against the harness to move the cart across the heat shimmering stones of the desert floor.  The gaze that I turned to him showed me a gaunt horse, fat gone, ribs standing out plainly, gut narrowed by starvation and thirst.

“I do have some water.  How many of you are there?  Have you any means to pay me for my water?”

His head had lifted until I mentioned payment.  His neck drooped.  The tips of his scraggly mane trailing in the dust.  “There are seven of us.  Two stallions, four mares and the filly.  I fear that there will soon be none.  We have no means to pay you.”

“Are you the band’s leader?”

“No, good donkey, Rom is our leader.  He is wise.  We are back in that steep sided canyon.  There is shade there, at least.”

Curiously, I asked, “You called me Sir and good donkey.  Why would you say that?”

He gave me a truly puzzled look. “You are Sir because you have not the headstall and bit of a slave. You are free.  I said good donkey because I hoped that a respectable trader like yourself might help us to save our filly, Nore Bel Morin.”

I nodded.  “I will shelter the balance of the day with you, if I am welcome to do so.  I will spare some water for your filly.

“You must help me to find a safe way for my cart to get to where you are waiting the evening.”

“Sir, I shall.  You will be welcome among us if you can aid Nore at all.”

True to his word, he helped me to get the cart safely to the canyon floor.  It was not easy but we managed it.

I was greeted by Rom Ina Callin, the leader of the band.  “Free Sir, would it be possible for you to spare anything at all for us?  Nore is in the most desperate need. If you cannot help the rest of us, of your mercy, help her.”  

I made a pretense of checking the filly out.  I already knew, through the Orb, what her condition was like. The filly, Nore, was pretty bad off indeed.  She was still conscious, able to swallow and speak though.

She gave me a trusting stare and asked, “Are you my guide to the Lake?  Am I going to die?”

I replied, “Not yet, Nore. Perhaps later.  Much later indeed, I hope.  For now, I have some water and some grain.  We will grind the grain into the water to give you both the drink and the nourishment that you need.”

Going to my cart, I saw that, though famished and thirsting near to death, none had touched it.  I opened a chest of the grain and, true to my promise, ground a ration of it with water from a cask.  One of the mares, a sorrel named Malit Ba Molin, took the ration and carefully fed Nore.  She stole no bite for herself.

I nodded as I thought to myself. “These are indeed worth saving.  They are the finest horses that I have ever seen.  Better than almost any ponies, too.”

I beckoned both Rom and Sando over to me.  In some perplexity, I asked, “What did Nore mean by 'guide to the Lake?’  Is it some sort of custom that I have not seen before?”

Sando hung his head and replied, “I spun her a tale to answer her question.  She asked what lies beyond death here in this deadly desert.

“The others heard me too.  It seems that she is clinging to that tale.  I told her and the others that a paradise awaited us but not if we gave up.  It is a wonderful Lake of pure water surrounded by the finest meadows of the best browse a horse could hope for.  There is shade from the sun provided by trees that bear always the best and tastiest fruits.  There we are free and labor only as we wish it, and not at the order of a Master.

“She seems to think that you are our guide to that better place.”

I nodded at that.  “I see.  I have only a few questions.

“Rom, do you know where you are in the Anvil of Celestia and do you know where you are going?”

Rom shook his head.  “We were cast out and, at the end, driven into the desert.  We had heard of you successfully crossing the Anvil and had no other hope but to reach the place that you came from.  Beyond that, we know nothing of where we are or are going.  I will not simply give up and die.  I am doing the best that I can to save any of us at all.”

“I see.  It is true that I am a merchant.  It is also true that I have a heart.  Life outweighs profit.  I have tested you, though it may not have been obvious.

“I simply left the wagon with its supplies where you could all see it.  None of you, though starving and suffering thirst, made any move to take any of the load.”

I sighed heavily, “I will forgo this trip’s profits to save you all if I can.  Tadast’s Wells is the nearest Gyptian town and it is seven days of hard wagon pulling from here.  My supplies cannot get you there.”

Sando hung his head and said, “We came from there.  We were driven into the desert because we found a well with water and through my foolishness the watch found it out. They will get a handsome reward for it.  To keep from sharing the reward, they will kill us.”

I shook my head sadly, “Such greed should not be.  I can try to get you all back to my land.  It will be a very close thing.  Some may die before we get there.  I hope not.  It is five days from here, at least that is how long it took me to get here.  I do not know how well the supplies will last.

“My land is a place called Equestria.  There are ponies living there.  They are smaller than you Gyptian horses.  They come in three sorts.  There are ones called Earth ponies.  They are like you but smaller and stouter of build.

“Another sort are called Unicorns.  They have a shortish horn in their forehead just above the eyes.  They can do magics with that horn.  Things can be lifted, held and moved by the power of their thoughts alone.  Like the Earth Ponies, they are not large.

“The third sort are called Pegassi.  They have wings and can fly.  They are able to move clouds and bring controlled rains.

“All three sorts have many pastel colors for their coats and manes.

“I do not know how they will welcome you, but getting you to Equestria is the best that I can do for you.”

Rom nodded gratefully.  “We will take our chances with your Equestrians.  You mentioned using your caravan’s load of food and water for the trip?”

I said sourly, “My hope for a profit, yes.  I said it before.  Lives are more important than profit.”

Rom pointed out, “The food and water are still yours.  Will you see to the rationing of them?  We are all terribly hungry.  I fear for fairness if any of us do it.”

I was about to answer when I felt a small muzzle touch my shoulder.  It was Nore.  She was staggering, but up.  She spoke softly, “Sir Guide to the Lake, thank you.  The mares said I should not be up yet but I wanted to say that.”

I put a hoof around her shoulders to steady her as I told her, “I hope that the Lake is far away for you.  Live long.  Be happy.  Let Paradise come in its own good time.

“I need to distribute rations for these fine horses in Rom’s band.  Will you help me?”

She gave me an adoring look and said, “I would be honored to help you, Sir.”

Malit, the sorrel mare who fed Nore, organized the others into a line to get both food and water. Sando and Rom had a disagreement about their place in the line.  They both wanted to be last.  

Sando whinnied, “It is my fault that we are here at all!  I should be last to get food or water!”

Rom retorted, “It was my decision to let you back with us.  As leader, it is my duty to see all others taken care of first!  That is the burden of the leader.”

Nore, helping me to break open a wrapped bale of clover top hay, saw the argument and called out, “Let the Master decide!  Marchhare is the only one of us who is a freeborn!  The supplies are his!”

The others all stopped cold and turned expectant heads to me.  I hope never to see that expression on the face of any horse or pony again.  They had agreed instantly with Nore and were giving themselves to me.  As slaves to a Master.  Me.

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[rohad93]

Magic and Monsters

A RWBY Witcher AU

Ruby grumbled to herself as her horse galloped down the road at a steady pace. She had expected the trip to the kingdom of Vale to be a rather pleasant one.  

It was the height of summer and while rather warm, not the same scorching it had been the year before.

So it wasn’t unreasonable to expect a pleasant trip.

However apparently Vale was experiencing an ungodly amount of off season storms.

She glanced up at the dark grey sky pouring rain down on her head, soaking her clothes and filling her boots.

She was, not for the first time since she’d set out for Vale, wishing she had stayed in Skellige. The jarls had plenty of work for her and were more than hospitable in her room and board, but she couldn’t ignore her sister’s letter asking her to go to Vale for a job that specifically needed a witcher.

She grumbled to herself as Zwei galloped through a large puddle,more like a small pond, splashing her up to the waist and covering her soggy boots with mud. Not that it made much difference, she’d been riding through the great storm for a day already.

There was no point in stopping now, even chilled to the bone as she was in the unusually cold rain. Vale’s castle was no more than and hour’s ride away, she would stop then and only then.

The rain drops stung at her face and hands like tiny needles, making her squint. The thoroughly soaked blood red hood that covered her head and shoulders offered no protection and simply weighed down on her tired body like lead, threatening to suffocate her.  

Her legs and behind were sore and stiff after so long in the saddle, no matter how comfortable it was made to be.

“Soon” She mumbled wearily to herself, cold and numb fingers rearranged their grip on the reins, trying to work some blood back into the stiff digits as she spurred on the gray and white gelding.

The storm didn’t strengthen , nor did it weaken in the remaining time it took to reach Vale’s royal residence. The downpour was steady and constant.

The pair of armored sentry’s saw her coming and halted her just beyond the castles dry walls, halberds pointed at the ready. She sighed as a river of rain water dribbled from the end of her nose.

“Identify yourself.” One demanded, holding a lantern up to shine across her face. He jerked as he caught sight of her cat like silver eyes and the pair of curved swords on her back.

“Ruby Rose of Patch, I’m a witcher.” She announced.    

“It’s the witcher the sorceress sent for.” The other guard mumbled to his comrade who nodded and hollered at the guards standing in the ramparts to lower the bridge.

“They’re awaiting your arrival inside, Mistress Witcher.” The guard with the lantern said. Ruby nodded, giving Zwei a nudge. He gave a snort and started forward, the wood planks creaked and groaned under his hooves as he trotted across the bridge into the courtyard.

With stiff legs she hauled herself out of the saddle and swung herself to the ground, boots squelching in the thick mud.

“I’ll take your horse to the stables, Miss.” another guard offered.

“Thanks, but I’d rather do it myself.” She insisted, holding tight to Zwei’s reigns as he pointed her in the direction of the stables.

Once under the cover of the stables she set about removing the sodden saddle and her gear. Zwei shook and stamped his hooves approvingly.

“I know, I’m just as soaked as you.” She spoke aloud to him while rubbing his snout. He snorted loudly.

Once he was set up in the stable she ventured back out into the rain, stepping quickly. Wanting nothing more than to get dry and have a hot meal. An older, portly servant with a thick white mustache was waiting for her just inside.

“This way please, Miss.” His robust voice made Ruby wince as it bounced off the high stone walls.

She followed him down a long stone corridor, passing several other bustling servants carrying laundry or trays.

Her eyes strayed up to the flickering candles that lit the hall and illuminated the many grandiose paintings and heraldry banners that dangled from the rafters, a crossed pair of axes in a laurel ring on a field of hunter green; the crest of Vale.

The servant stopped abruptly, she nearly tripped on her own feet in her hurry to stop before running into him.

“This will be your room for the duration of your stay, Miss. His majesty wishes for you to join him for dinner, everything you need has already been delivered, if you need anything don’t hesitate to call.” He informed.

“Thank you.” She nodded and he bowed briefly before turning and disappearing around the corner.  

She slipped inside and immediately noticed the claw footed tub full of still steaming water and couldn't undo the straps holding her swords and gear fast enough.

Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

Ruby hummed to herself as she inspected her reflection in the mirror. Being a monster hunter by trade she was not used to wearing dresses and fidgeted constantly with the bodice. It really wasn’t her color either. The ankle length material in the black and green colors of the kingdom.

She’d have to deal. It was always much easier to do what the royals wanted her to do in these situations.

She brushed a hand through her shoulder length hair, not much she could do with it. It was brushed and that would have to do. It was just nice to be warm and dry again for the first time in nearly two days. Hopefully the job would be worth it.

There was a sharp rapping on her door.

“Come in.”

The same servant from before stepped in.

“I’ve come to escort you to the dining hall, Miss.”  

“Lead the way.” she waved, following him out the door.

The walk to the dining room was quick and quiet. The mustached servant disappearing again once she was seated. A slew of servants were were setting the last platters on the table and moving out of the way.

The table was laden with more food than Ruby had seen in a long while. Roasted meats and glazed fruits and dishes she didn’t even recognize but made her mouth water all the same.  

She sat admiring all the food for a few minutes before the loud clicking of heels made her look up.

Two women had walked into the room.

Both were adorned in long elegant dresses and ethereally beautiful.

King Ozpin’s sorceress advisors.

One was tall and buxom with blonde hair pulled up into a neat bun. Her long flowing white and violet gown ended in ruffles at her feet and fit snugly around her waist. A row of shiny black buttons that held the sleeves closed from shoulder to wrist stood out in stark contrast against the white bodice. Sharp acid green eyes observed the room from behind a tiny pair of spectacles.

Although it was nearly impossible to guess at the age of sorceress’s the second woman just seemed younger than the blonde. She was small and delicate looking but her features were sharp and angular. Her sky blues eyes were only a scant few shades lighter than the sapphire dress that hugged every curve from her shoulder to her calves, not to mention the high off-center ponytail of long white hair that swung lazily with each step.

Her previously salivating mouth was now bone dry as those blue eyes were trained on her.

“Ruby Rose of Patch, I presume?” The blondes heels clicked pointedly as she walked up to the table. The other woman followed without a word,

Ruby quickly rose from the table and gave a haphazard bow.

“I am, lady…” Ruby paused and the seemingly elder of the two filled the empty space.

“Glynda Goodwitch.” She supplied and Ruby snorted internally at the appropriate name for a sorceress.

Quickly getting over her mirth, slitted silver eyes turned to the rooms yet unnamed occupant.

The other woman made a sound that Ruby thought perhaps was a sigh as she gave a perfect and polite curtsey.

“Weiss Schnee” was all she offered. Glynda took up the conversation again.

“We are King Ozpins advisors in all things arcane and magical.”  She said simply.

“Sorceress’s” Ruby said. Glynda gave a nod while Weiss’s face screwed up briefly as if she wished to comment but didn’t.

The two women came forward and sat at the two empty place settings and once they had settled Ruby ungracefully plopped back down onto her own cushioned chair. If Glynda noticed she made no indication but Weiss’s cold stare from across the table was almost palpable and Ruby straightened up, slightly.  

“Thank you for coming without delay, Miss. Rose. You came highly recommended by a colleague of ours.” Glynda told here, as she placed an emerald green napkin carefully in her lap. “ Miss Yang Xiao Long.”

“My sister.” Ruby nodded, her attention divided between the two sorceresses sitting in front of her and the steaming hot food on the table. “She wrote me and told me that you were in need of a witcher.”

“We believe so.” Glynda started. Ruby cocked a brow in silent question at the answer.

“Normally, his majesty spends the summer months in the northeast corner of the kingdom, in Beacon castle, however in the late spring some unsettling things began to happen in Beacon. Servants began to disappear without a trace.” She explained, looking at Ruby who nodded for her to go on.

“The last month, we found them, or the remains at least in the lower levels of the castle, piles of bones and half decayed corpses, some that looked as though they had been ripped apart  by fang or claw.” She paused, straightening her glasses before going on. “For some time servants had been whispering of ghastly noises coming from the castle’s lower regions but it’s ancient and thus to be expected. I wish it had been looked into much sooner.” Glynda’s mouth twisted.

“So you think a monster had moved into the bowls of Beacon castle.” Ruby surmised.

“What else could it be?” Weiss finally spoke heatedly. Glynda shot her a look and she pursed her lips but quieted.

“How many people have been killed?” Ruby asked, seemingly offhand as she filled her plate with food from the table. She was hungry and had had talks more gruesome than this one over meals, not that that ever made it any easier.

“Since the end of spring...thirty.” Glynda finally answered. Ruby’s head whipped up at that.

“That many and you’ve just now contacted a witcher?” Ruby blinked in shock. It usually only took two or three people disappearing before she was contacted for jobs.

“Until we found the remains there was no proof that a monster was the cause. There was never any signs of a struggle or blood. Simply empty chambers in the morning.” Weiss spoke up.

Ruby pursed her lips in thought and the sorceress’s could see it in her slitted silver eyes.  

“Monsters don't sneak into bedrooms at night and take their prey somewhere else to kill and eat.” Ruby stated flatly.

Glynda pushed her spectacles up her nose, glancing sideways at Weiss before emerald eyes were focused back on her.

“We agree, which is why if you accept the job for the monster of Beacon, Weiss shall accompany you, so we may get to the...root of the problem.” her poison green eyes flashed in what Ruby could only describe as barely restrained fury.

She glanced at the other sorceress, they were handy to have around for sure but Weiss didn’t seem to be the friendliest sorceress she’d ever met.(That would be her sister for certain.)

“Alright…before I agree to anything let’s talk about my pay.” She said before stabbing a piece of juicy roast on her plate and shoving it in her mouth. It took all she had not to moan in delight.

“Of course, we can not expect you to risk your life for nothing.” Glynda nodded. “The king has assured me that if you slay the beast and or beasts that plague Beacon you will be rewarded, however he wishes me to let you know that if you are able to help Weiss apprehend the true threat you will be rewarded with by a sum that only a king could afford.” She said easily as she served herself from a plate laden with summer vegetables.

Ruby chewed thoughtfully as she went over the proposal in her head. The monsters might not have been the main problem here but there were monsters nonetheless and thus it was witchers work, regardless of the human element at work.

She swallowed her current mouthful and nodded.

“I’ll take the job.” She agreed before shoving another bite into her mouth.

“Excellent” A small, pleased smile formed on Glynda’s lips. “It is imperative you get to beacon as quick as you can.”

“I’ll leave at dawn.” Ruby nodded, glancing over another forkful and her future companion.

Weiss’s frown remained firmly in place as she speared morsels on her fork and Ruby sighed internally, usually she was ecstatic for company on the road but this didn’t seem like it would be at all like the times she traveled with Yang.      

She happened to catch the other woman’s gaze and pale brows furrowed between her eyes. Not so much a glare per say but an...unfriendly assessing?

She looked away from the enchantress’s cold stare to look at the hot food piled up on her plate and sighed under her breath.   

Great, she thought.

[bulbspoon9-blog]

Produce Spotlight: The Ultimate Guide to Kale

Kale has taken over the superfood spotlight over the past few years. Curious what all the hype is about? How does kale grow, anyway? And why should you put kale in juices or smoothies? Does kale cause bloating? Or does kale make you lose weight? Dive in to the Ultimate Guide to Kale below for answers to these questions and more. Bonus: countless delectable recipes at the bottom. Enjoy!

Kale Origin and Growing Information

Where did kale come from?

This leafy green was first cultivated in the eastern Mediterranean and Asia Minor around 2000 B.C. It is thought to have developed as a descendant from curly-leaved cabbage varieties that already existed. It then made its way to Europe during the Middle Ages, where it mutated to develop a “head”. This kale most closely resembles the kale we know and love today.

How does kale grow the best?

Kale is a cold weather crop, meaning it grows best in the spring or fall. It can also tolerate frost, which extends the growing season for fresh greens. Kale plants actually prefer the cooler temperatures, as the heat makes their leaves taste bitter. These plants prefer full sun, but will also tolerate partial shade. The more sun they get, the stockier their leaves will be. They are also relatively low maintenance to grow. Set them 18-24 inches apart in your garden and keep them moist, but not overwatered, and you should be ready to harvest in 6-8 weeks!

When should I plant my kale outside?

Kale plants prefer the cold and even light frosts. For this reason, avoid peak summer sun with these greens. Set plants out 3 to 5 weeks before the last frost in spring or 6 to 8 weeks before the first frost of fall.

Can kale grow in the winter? Can in survive a frost?

As mentioned above, kale survives and prefers frosty weather. Though the plant cannot survive in the main part of winter, it can be planted in early spring. Also, it will survive well into the late fall and early winter if planted near the end of a typical growing season.

Cooking and Preparing Kale

Can kale go bad?

Unfortunately, like most fresh produce, kale can go bad. Overtime, if left neglected, the water-rich kale leaves will start to leak out and get soggy or slimy. Additionally, rotten kale can take on a sulfuric smell. If your kale bunch smells or feels off, it’s probably time to compost it. However, to extend your kale’s life in the fridge, wrap the stems in a damp paper towel and keep in a loose plastic bag.

Which kale is most bitter? Least bitter?

Curly kale, especially those in darker colors like purple, is the bitterest variety of the plant. Their deep, earthy flavors are great for stews and stir-fries. On the other hand, Tuscan kale varieties have flat leaves and are the least bitter tasting. Some varieties of Tuscan kale have a nuttiness that can almost taste sweet. The most bitter kale will taste is when it is raw, so try cooking to mellow the flavors. If you find the taste is still too bitter for your liking, soak in cold water prior to cooking and add a pinch of salt.

How do you make kale chips?

Choose your favorite variety of kale (curly leaves are the most popular for chips). Remove the ribs and cut the remaining leaves into 1½-inch pieces. Lay in one thin, even layer on a baking sheet. Toss with olive oil and sprinkle with salt. Bake in the over at 275 degrees for about 20 minutes, or until the leaves are crispy but not burnt. Let cool to preference and serve as finger food. Check out this garlic almond kale chip recipe for inspiration. Bonus: kale chips pair well with fun aioli!

Which kale is best for salads?

Tuscan kale is the least bitter variety of the plant. This makes it the friendliest for salads or raw consumption. Also, baby kale is smaller, softer and less bitter. It also makes a great option for salads or a garnish. However, any type of kale can be used for salad or eaten raw. If using a tougher variety, massage your kale to soften and release some of the bitterness.

Nutrition of Kale

Which kale is healthiest?

Like any other vegetable, the nutritional differences between the different kinds of kale a pretty small. All types of kale are very nutrient-dense, meaning they have a lot of nutrients for very few calories, and benefit your health. The slight differences in kale’s nutrient profile can be recognized by bitterness and color. The more bitter varieties of kale are slightly more nutrient dense than the milder types. Also, kale that comes in darker colors contains different phytochemicals, which are nutrients that show themselves through the colors of our foods. Intuitively, darker plants have marginally more phytonutrients than lighter plants. However, any type of kale you prefer is a health-promoting food to add to your routine.

Why should I put kale in juice or smoothies?

Green smoothies are all the rage with health-conscious eaters. Why is that? Believe it or not, the aesthetic is only part of the appeal. Adding kale to juice or a smoothie barely affects the texture and is almost unnoticeable in the taste. However, kale adds a variety of nutrients and vitamins that aren’t present in fruits. Also, if you add kale to a smoothie, it adds a bunch of digestion-promoting fiber. Unfortunately, if you are juicing your kale, you lose the fiber. Try this vanilla green protein smoothie recipe or this green mountain smoothie recipe to get your feet wet!

Can kale give you gas or bloating?

Kale is in the cruciferous vegetable family. These veggies contain a naturally occurring sugar called raffinose. Raffinose cannot be digested until bacteria in your gut ferment it, which can release gas into your intestines and cause some bloating. However, the more often you eat cruciferous vegetables (other examples include broccoli, cabbage and brussels sprouts), the better your gut gets at digesting them and the less discomfort you will experience. Cooking vegetables can start softening some of the fiber, which also makes it easier to digest.

On the flip side, will kale make you poop?

Kale contains a lot of fiber, about 1.5 grams per cup or about 6% of your daily fiber needs. Eating plenty of fiber can help you stay regular and keeps your digestive system running spick and span. However, introducing fiber to quickly can result in constipation, so pace yourself when adding these leafy greens. Some bloating or gas when trying a new vegetable is normal. However, eating kale, raw or cooked, should not result in diarrhea or any major stomach discomfort.

Does kale make you lose weight?

Kale is nutrient-dense, meaning it has a lot of nutrition packed in to very few calories. It also has a high water and fiber content, meaning it takes up a lot of space in your stomach. For these two reasons, swapping out something less nutrient-dense and more calorie-dense with kale can reduce your total calorie intake, make you feel more full and promote weight loss. However, just adding kale will not likely be enough to make you lose weight on its own. Regular exercise and a balanced diet, which can include kale, is the best method for sustainable weight loss.

Kale Recipes

balsamic kale with cranberries

overnight kale caesar

maple, potato and sausage breakfast skillet with kale

festive kale slaw with raspberries and almonds

garlic almond kale chips

potato and kale soup with andouille

4 ingredient kale cheddar soup

kale salad with blueberries, manchego and pumpkin seed clusters

brown rice kale risotto with cheddar

gluten free walnut and kale quinoa stuffing

kale salad with roasted delicata squash, chevre, dried cranberries and spiced pecans

stovetop healthy mac and cheese with kale

kale with cider vinegar

garlic rosemary steaks with kale walnut pesto

kale and beet green galette with feta

citrus kale salad

kale feta bread

green apple kale

struggling with weeknight meals?

My free ebook, The Best Weeknight Dinners, includes 15 of my family’s favorites — recipes and meals we go back to over and over again. It includes simple entrees you can make start to finish in 20 to 40 minutes. And all are made with simple to follow instructions and easy to find ingredients.

Thanks for signing up! Just check your inbox to confirm your subscription, and then look for a welcome letter from me, including a link to download your free ebook. Every week you’ll receive ideas and inspiration on how to incorporate more fabulous healthy seasonal recipes into your life!

Source: https://www.healthyseasonalrecipes.com/produce-spotlight-the-ultimate-guide-to-kale/

[paradoxically-deranged-poet]

He Who Wanders

I missed the scorching wind of Andalusia. How it pours sunlight onto your face, toying with eyelashes, flattening dry sand against cheeks and milling around hair. I missed the smell of the valley and that ripening softness of Muscat fluff glistening in the afternoon breeze.

From up here, I can see the house where I grew up. I see white chapels tucked into grape orchards like pawns scattered on a chess board. I can see patches of asphalt on El Jardinito Road hailing from the old town through dappled rocks, then waning behind the horizon with erratic headlights of beat-up trucks cruising along.

One of the pit stops along Ed Jardinito, where truck drivers stop to relieve themselves, marks the starting point to this wavy trail. All covered in blotches of spindly grass stalks and flaxen sand, the trail is barely noticeable at first. Truth is, no one even cares to notice it. Why would truckers taking a blitz-leak care to check on a mucky trail leading to God knows where? But I do. This is how I got up here, to the top of this hill, where I am standing now. I’ve climbed all the way up here, so I can finally end it all – all these years of vagrancy and fugue, exile and fear. This is where it’s all going to come to an end.

But for now, I am enjoying the view of the valley unfolding below. I am sipping the air of what could be my final memories.

He will show up soon. He always does. Like a shadow, he’s been following me right on my footsteps, always there, behind me. And there he is!

His limping figure appears behind the sharp bend off El Jardinito. He looks up and he sees me, then stops for a moment to catch his breath and leans on his cane, as if assessing the remaining trajectory for this final stretch, then resumes his walk. Or should I say, “resumes his agonizing trudging”. Years of endless chase took a toll on his body. No wonder. How long has he been chasing me? Ten, twenty, thirty years?

He is slow. Methodically slow. But for once, I will not run. I will wait. Right here, behind this rock. I will finally come face to face with him. This sharp Swiss knife blade I am holding in my hand will soon lance right through his neck bone. Yes, that’s what I am going to do.

This ends here, at the dead end of this sandy trail atop the hill overlooking the valley with its white chapels and Muscat orchards.

Funny. After all these years, I still don’t know the real name of my chaser. I always called him what master Borges called him

“He who wanders”.

He who wanders, listen. I will kill you.

* * * * * *

Borges. The Borges. I idolized him when I was in college. Many did, but I was different. It was 1961. I was an average lazy learner at the Universidad Laboral de Córdoba, floating around from one semester to another with barely passable grades. I had very few friends and almost no interests. One can say that I had an early form of an identity crisis.

Besides chugging Anisado, my only other passion was Literature. Latin American Literature. Borges and Neruda were at the forefront. One could only imagine my excitement when I saw a pamphlet hanging on the wall of the Literature faculty.

Spaces were limited. But who cared? It was the man himself, Jorge Luis Borges, coming to give us a lecture followed by an open panel of questions. Like a maniac, I rushed to the auditorium hours before the lecture. I was the first in line and when the doors opened, I got the front row seat. The auditorium was packed with drooling chins of young self-proclaimed prodigies, awaiting the arrival of the great one.

And there he was, the blind Lord of Literature, walking upright onto the stage with a cane and his loyal assistant right by his side. Standing ovation. He nodded and made a “thank you, please be seated” gesture.

Then he began. The lecture was dedicated to Spanish writers, I cannot distinctly recall if it was Cervantes or De Vega. It truly made no difference. Somehow, I managed to sit through his entire lecture, which lasted over three hours, and remember nothing. He talked slowly and methodically, pouring honey into our ears like Segovia’s guitar, with his absent eyesight affixed on the ceiling.

And then it happened. Something that caught me completely off guard.

Before closing the day, Borges was about to take questions from the audience. Of course, I raised my hand and so did about hundreds of other students. One of Borges’ assistants whispered something into his ear, which made him smile.

“It is an honor for me to be in front of an audience of young people, but our time is not infinite,” he said with blind eyes still pinned on the far corner of the hall. “For that reason, I will randomly pick questions from five of you.”

I have never won any prizes or lotteries in my life. When I played poker or blackjack, I lost far more than I won. I knew my limitations and that turned me into an average apathetic person, rarely trying to outdo oneself. And so, sitting still with little ambition – I got used to that.

Until that moment. When I saw Borges pointing his finger in my direction, that came as nothing short of a shock.

“Me?”

“Yes, young man. Senor Borges picked you. Step forward and introduce yourself,” said his assistant.

I did not know what to ask. So, I quietly mumbled my full name.

“Fernandez Augustin Navaro”

Borges shifted his gray-shaded pupils in my direction as if reacting to a sudden buzzing of a fruit fly.

“Fernandez Augustin Navaro. Navaro. Haven’t I met you once before, young man?” he asked.

“No, senor Borges. I never had the honor.”

“But you will. We will meet again, Senor Navaro. You and I will meet again. But for right now, what is your question?”

The rest of the day was foggy. I don’t even remember what question I asked, it must have been about him winning the Prix International, not sure. And maybe not important. No, not important at all.

The greatest writer in the history of mankind called me by name and then that bizarre unreal thing he said about us meeting again. When?

* * * * * *

Nine years later. In 1970.

And there I was – a somewhat-promising journalist in one of London’s somewhat-scandalous tabloid newspapers. Every week my name was featured on the second page alongside with celebrity chronicles and vile rumors. My paycheck was decent enough for a small studio flat by Manchester Square. After years of having been pent-up by directionless studies, you could say I became something more than an average. Or at least that is what I believed.

That day (it was early October, arguably the best season in London) began as usual. I ate my chic breakfast consisting of two scrambled eggs, ham, toast, and dark roast coffee at Barrymore’s Diner and was ready for a pleasant walk to the office. It was shortly after 8 am, and I was in no hurry.

Report Ad My route was the same as it was every day: pass the square, right turn on George Street, left turn on Thayer, another right on Marylebone. My thoughts that morning were all preoccupied with the piece I was working on, so I was slowly making my way through the square when something caught my eye. Or rather, someone. At first, I did not pay much attention to him, no more than I did to anybody else who idled at the square that morning. Hippy rascals with soiled hair playing guitar on every corner was a common theme in those days, and London town was certainly no exception. So here was another one of those misunderstood love proclaimers, sitting right behind the gated area of the square. Striped worn out jacket, heavy cap, sandals with clots of woolen socks sticking out. A common hippy bum as anyone may have thought. I thought so too except this one had something that made my intestines churn. I didn’t know what it was, but once I saw him, I felt the irresistible urge to instantly walk away and never see him again.

The way he looked at me, that gloomy frown that made me think of a line from Oscar Wilde, “that fellow’s got to swing.” There certainly was something outer worldly about that “fellow.”

His eyes, as if carved from a rock below his forehead were mercilessly drilling thousands of tiny holes through me. I added pace. As I turned back one last time, I noticed him slowly walking towards me. Past the gates of the square, onto the street, paying no attention to screeching tires of honking cars. Walking right towards me.

He’s just a bum. No, he is not.

Just another one of those unwashed hippies. No, no, run run run!

George Street was empty like in post-war bombed quarters. I could hear my brisk footsteps. Or was it the drubbing of my aorta against the chest? He was catching up.

Run? Don’t be silly. Yes, run. First slowly as if you’re trying to not show your chaser that you’re scared. No, not scared, more like in a hurry.

Why am I running? I can take him out with one punch.

But it really wasn’t about that. It was my first experience of that feeling, which I can only describe as some sort of primordial sense of fear. Panic. Dread. Unexplained sense of looming doom arching above you like a dark figure with a scythe.

I ran. I ran faster than my feet could move. As I turned the corner on Thayer, I paused and looked back, fearing to see him right behind. Scrambled eggs, toast, and dark roast coffee were about to make their way back up through my esophagus.

Wiping the sweat off my palms onto my pants, I bent forward in a protective position and looked around. Empty windows of George Street were checking me out like a toddler witnessing parent in a cowardly act.

Whoever that man was that incensed me into this uncontrollable panic, he was now gone. Shame on you, Fernandez Augustin, I repeated to myself while making futile attempts to enthrall palpitation to subside. Shame on you. I mumbled repeating that word. Mumbling turned into whistling that song by “Magic Lanterns”. Shame, shame. I whistled, acting calm and self-composed. I sang without knowing words only to convert my mind to something else. I sang so others wouldn’t notice me shaking.

I climbed the stairs of my office building. Three at a time. Third floor. The familiar smell of typography oils calmed me down. Safe heaven. Shame on you, Fernandez Augustin Navaro.

* * * * * *

Even now I question myself whether my journey to madness began on that day or was it underway for many years. Madness that creeps in and recedes in tidal waves. Is that how it usually happens?

All I know is that an hour later I was laughing at my little moment of weaknesses.

Preposterous and rubbish, my thick Andalusian twang spoke to me. The idea of being fully checked out by a specialist did cross my mind, and I immediately thought of Doctor Patel in Camden Town. He’d give me a comfortable medical diagnosis like a panic attack and prescribe some white pills, I thought.

Little did I know that the day had more surprises in store. The unnerving script development continued in a more eerie fashion when my boss marched to my desk with a pack of printed paper.

No, Navaro you are not going to see Doctor Patel in Camden Town who will make a judgment call on your insanity. Instead, you are going to do an article on Jorge Luis Borges’ new book. He is making his presentation today at London Public Library and blah, blah, blah.

I forgot about the panic attack. The thrill of seeing Master Borges again, nine years later, was surreal. Moments later I was sitting in a cab on my way to the London Public Library, scribbling all possible questions I should be asking him. El Informe de Brodie? Other books? Forget it! I knew very well what I would ask.

I paid the cab and galloped up the marble stairs leading to the hallway, where the Master was about to hold his new book presentation. I elbowed myself through the crowd of journalists to occupy the coveted front-row spot. Quick inventory check: wallet, j-sack along with the omnipresent Swiss knife. Seconds ticked leisurely on my wristwatch. Four more minutes.

Forget this morning’s sickness. Forget Dr. Patel. Collect yourself, Fernandez Augustin

* * * * * *

“Navaro! That’s your last name, isn’t it?”

“Yes. Yes, Senor Borges. But how do you..?”

“Nine years ago, in Cordoba. I told you we would meet again. Do you remember?”

I nodded rapidly completely forgetting he couldn’t see me. Stupid.

“Perhaps,” continued Borges, “it would be more prudent for us to speak privately after the conference. I invite you to have coffee with me. You like Colombian coffee, Mr. Navaro? I shall see you precisely at 6 o’clock at the address that my assistant will provide.”

His blind eyes were still affixed at the top far corner of the hallway, far above all the congested sharp-penciled critics and arduous followers of his divine writing. The attention was now all on me, as revealed by hundreds of photo flashes from behind. I thought of all the explaining that I would have to do tomorrow. How does Borges know you? Are you friends? You were raised in Cordova, are you his illegitimate son?

Back then I did not know.

Answers came later.

* * * * * *

Memory is a tricky animal. As I gaze over the valley and satiate my lungs with familiar smells, I cannot think of anything specific. Vague and elusive memories of my childhood home. And these orchards, these white chapels and the old town itself – nothing but an incomprehensible sensation somewhere down there, below the chest cage.

I close my eyes and let the sun twirl around with tinted specks of mosaic light. I am trying to focus without looking. Alas, nothing comes to mind. I’ve been robbed of my memory. You!

I cast my eyes at the trail again. He is closing in. It’s hard for him to walk upward, and yet I see that determination in his eyes, in his tight grip of that wobbly walking stick, in the way he periodically stops to catch his breath and eyeball the remaining distance. I am not going anywhere. Five? Ten more minutes? Come and take me, old man. If you can.

I almost see his facial expression under the heavily pronounced frontal lobe. It’s a grin. It’s an expression that says, “We shall see.”

* * * * * *

Once I read an interview in “The Morning Times”. In it, Borges was portrayed as extremely humble and minimalistic. His house was depicted as a perfectly organized space with easy access to everything. Books on the shelves (judging from the admiration of the columnist, there were lots of them) were organized by theme and by title. Dictionaries and encyclopedias were grouped together on the same rack, so he could find them easily.

In another article, dated 1966, I read that when Borges travels, and those travels were quite extensive, he carries a whole rack of books along, some of which may not even be read.

When I entered his hotel room, that very book-rack was the first thing that caught my eye. I stood perplexed at the multitude of titles, most unknown to me, when I heard the door swing wide open, and there he was entering through the doorway with a leisurely swinging cane.

“Ah, Senor Navaro, how kind of you to visit this old man!”

I took a step towards him and produced some gibberish like “pleasure is all but mine”. He half-smiled and pointed his hand to the chair.

“I know you will quite enjoy the taste of Colombian dark roast.”

Borges sat down and leaned slightly backwards, without releasing his cane.

“Do you know the biggest advantage of being blind?” he asked and answered immediately. “Blind don’t need light, so my utility bills are way lower.”

He laughed at his own joke only to be interrupted by his assistant carrying a tray of aromatic coffee poured in two small porcelain cups. Amazing how the very idea of drinking coffee instantly changes your mood before you even take your first sip.

As I was readying to go on a pre-scripted monologue of expressing my gratitude and honor, Borges jumped right into the action.

“I will get right to it, Senor Navaro. About you being here and about me remembering you. I know you have many questions. I will attempt to answer some. Some, but not all. When you leave this hotel, there will still be some questions that you will have to find answers to. On your own.”

He gently picked his cup of coffee and with hand somewhat shaking, took an artistic sip. Yes, I had questions. So many that my brain membranes were buzzing in bewilderment and disbelief. Here I was, sitting in the room with one of the greatest writers, who happened to mysteriously know my name and

“Have you by any chance read my ‘The Book of Imaginary Beings?’” asked Borges.

I have. Many times. I read it in Spanish, when it just came out. Very recently I bought the English translation in some shabby bookstore off Oxford Circus. I read that book far too many times, but never in its entirety, mostly starting on a random page. Just as Borges had intended it to be consumed by his readers.

“You see, Senor Navaro, that book was, and perhaps still is, a never-ending work in progress as human imagination has no boundaries. I have included what I had researched over ten years ago, then recently expanded and republished with more figments of collective human imagination. But the book is merely a small subset. In a way, the book writes itself. In some form, it’s a labyrinth, an endless one, a living one, where every corridor and every room is never the same. What I had always wanted is the book to reflect the labyrinth in our collective subconsciousness, the force that drives our minds to craft. For that reason, all the creatures in my book are strictly fictional. Mythical. Am I not boring you?”

“Not at all. I understand, Senor Borges.”

He nodded and wiped a coffee grind off his nose.

“That book, as its title implies, is all about imaginary beings. Tales, legends, folklore. But one thing that no one knows is that I had originally intended this book to include one more being. A being that goes by its Latin name Quietus Est. It appeared and disappeared across many cultures, sometimes centuries apart. Very little is known of it, but what I found was indeed astonishing. First, this being is physically no different than an ordinary human. You may say, it is human in many ways. As I studied this entity, I became more and more agitated. I could not stop. Like a madman, I was trying to learn more and more, but very soon the excitement turned into another feeling. Fear.”

“Fear of what, Senor Borges?”

Borges eyesight shifted from the corner of the room straight on me, as if he could perfectly see me.

“Fear of what I had uncovered. That Quietus Est is not a myth at all.”

He attempted to take another sip, but his hands started shaking, so he had to put the cup down, spilling some of it on the saucer and around the table.

“Pardon me, young man, I am trying to maintain composure. But you have not tried the coffee”, he said wiping his mouth and forehead with a knitted handkerchief.

I raised the small cup and took a sip, disregarding the aromatic fumes of Colombian beans drifting down my internal gorges.

“Pardon me sir, but you are saying that the imaginary being called Quietus Est was not imaginary. Is that why you decided not to include him in your book of imaginary beings?”

“Only in part. Fear came from the realization of what it would mean for mankind to know about its existence. You see

it’s no secret that we are all well aware of our eventual demise. We all die. But imagine what would happen if we all stared right into the face of death every single day of our lives and knew the time that was left for us in this world. Death not as a vague concept portrayed by middle-aged artists, not as a folklore tale of a grim reaper. But as a real living entity that stalks you and walks around showing you a ticking clock counting down minutes and seconds. Getting closer to you with every second, trying to grab your hand. Running from death is worse than death itself.”

He took a deep breath and closed his eyes.

“But I shall talk no more. Allow me to give you my scribbles from years ago. These are unedited in their raw format, so please pardon the poor language. It’s right there, in the drawer. You will find a folder with a yellow piece of paper. Read it aloud, while my ripe old body attempts to catch a breath.”

I opened the drawer, as he instructed, and found a yellow piece of cursive handwritings carved in Spanish with some Latin phrases. The scribbles were short, less than a page long with marks and scratches, but most of this was very much decipherable. He must have written this himself half-blind, I thought. What caused him to do that and not dictate to his assistant? I unfolded the paper and began reading.

Quietus Est

It is said that one shall not know about its own ways and times of demise. The imminent passing is only felt by those that are either terminally ill, and even so, they don’t possess the knowledge of when and where, or by death row inmates awaiting the exact day and time of their execution. Lack of such knowledge coerces us to exist. Sumerians believed in a certain deity (the word “deity” was scratched and replaced with “demon of death embodied in human flesh and bones”, which again was scratched and replaced with “entity”), whose sole role was to stalk its victims and inform them of how much time they have left to live. Per the ancient “Book of Dead”, which was discovered as a set of clay tablets, typically buried in corpses, only those that are “luminous” can see the deity (again crossed out twice, replaced with “demon”, then with “entity”). The “luminous” ones are thought to be either people with high spiritual powers or vice versa, the cursed ones, condemned by priests. The reference briefly reappears in some Egyptian manuscripts, but in later writings is replaced by Anubis or – in rare occurrences – by Horus. The writings again depict this unnamed being as an eternal human who never sleeps, but always wanders. What’s strange is that neither Sumerians nor Egyptians ever gave the entity a discrete name. However, the latter rare findings during Dark Ages refer to him as Quietus Est. The only depiction of Quietus Est was that of an ordinary human standing next to a sun clock, which was used to measure the time that the chosen one had left to live. From time to time Quietus Est stalks the chosen one and, when cornered, moves hands of the clock forward to shorten the lifetime. If the chosen one cannot escape, then his time eventually runs out.

The very last reference was found in

“Enough, Mr. Navaro. You understand the idea. Now on to the main question. Why are you here?”

He drew closer, and a dull shadow from a lamp cut right through his elongated forehead.

“Quietus Est is an eternal wanderer who is always with us, the timekeeper who sits at the edge of the stage with a ticking watch on his wrist. The greatest gift given to mankind is its inability to see him. When I lost sight, I thought blindness was a blessing in disguise. But one does not require eyes to see the wanderer. What eyes cannot see, ears can hear and skin can feel. I hear him. I feel him. You are here, Mr. Navaro because you and I are the luminous ones…”

Borges paused and asked me with a trembling voice: “Mr. Navaro, you saw him too, didn’t you?”

Cold shivers that have been accumulating in my lower back rushed up my spinal cord in millions of explosions. Nausea formed a massive ball of air in my throat, and for a moment I struggled to breathe. Desperately trying to cease the thumping inside, I pushed words out.

“I saw him today.”

* * * * * *

How do you get used to the notion of being a passerby on this Earth? Ordinary humans do not have to get used to that. We have that built-in protection layer, that safety cork in our brain membranes that separates the realization of being mortal from flooding down upon us. It allows us to breathe the air. It lets us exhibit this extraordinary, yet sacred carelessness. The mental block that denies the laws of life on a primitive emotional level even for the keenest scholars. The indecipherable Tetragrammaton is shown to us in every step we take, in every cup of Colombian coffee we sip, in every word of wisdom that we collect from books. Every second we bypass the sinister tick-tock and hear the name of the God being whispered into our ears. And yet we, humans, turn around and whistle “Shame Shame”, deceiving our own self-cognizance. And that, as Senor Borges called it, is the true blessing. Those who possess the name of the divine being are doomed. Knowledge is madness. Knowledge is nonexistent. Knowledge of death is worse than death.

We sat in his hotel room until early morning, the two luminous and doomed souls. Our casual exchange of words was amplified by the ticking of the clock. It was dawn when I noticed Borges nodding in his sleep. His left hand was still resting on the cane and his pupils were shuffling behind shut eyelids.

Borges was dreaming.

So must have I.

As I was exiting the foyer of the hotel, I hid behind the column and looked around the street. It was empty. Bleak light of street lamps drew strange crossbeams on pavements. Early October leaves were gyring in closed circles like witches around the fire.

I was looking around, hoping to not see him.

He wasn’t there. But he was. I felt his presence not very far from me.

* * * * * *

Muscat orchards – they resonate inside like echoes of a guitar string heard from a deep alcove, but nothing particular comes to mind. I am trying to shift focus from one object to another, but my nomad memory is lost in endless labyrinths. You took my memories away from me, didn’t you?

Wait, mortal. Wait five more minutes, and you will know the answer, I hear in my brain. He is talking to me now. I can see how the long uphill walk is wearing him out. But what are pain and tiredness when you’re crossing the finish line?

As Borges warned me, “Do not ever come close to him. Do not look him straight in the eyes. He will always be near. His watch will be ticking. If he attempts to catch on, run. But he will forever follow. In a way, he will be like a shadow of you.”

And I ran. And he wandered. I evaded. He followed.

He came too close to me in my hotel room on the second day after my long night in Borges’ quarters. The fool in me still thought that escaping from him would be as easy as moving into a new flat. Or checking into a hotel. So I did just that. It was some shabby hotel minutes from my work where I decided to spend a few nights just to think things through.

That evening, and I remember every minute of it, was my first face to face encounter with him. My room, B6, was on the basement level. As I stumbled through the dark hotel corridor, trying to find the key to my room, I felt his presence, but my ignorant foolishness dismissed all mental warnings and turned the keys. As the door hinge squeaked, I took my first step into the hotel room. A street-level window was casting two thick yellow streaks of light on the floor carpet. I smelled dust and spider webs.

He was in my room. Sitting on the edge of the bed with a rope in his hand. A thin white blanket was covering his head like a shroud around a statue. I stood in a stupor like a paralyzed insect. An avalanche of sweat gushed from every pore of my body. With hand twisted behind my back, I was feverishly trying to twist the doorknob. He got up from the bed with a groan. He took a step towards me.

Hand too sweaty to turn the knob. Open it. Open!

He grabbed my wrist.

Open! Run!

The stretched corridor of the hotel basement flashed like random shots of a silent movie. Run! B5. B2. B1. Run! Staircase. Up! Exit! Run!

“Your time is coming, Fernandez Augustin Navaro!” a whisper crawled into my ears. “Coming, coming!” hissed the wind.

I ran until my legs gave in. I fell down somewhere in the outskirts of the town, passing out in an alley amidst rubbish until sunup.

My madness has begun.

In the days following my first face-to-face encounter with Quietus Est, I’ve moved out of my London flat. I had some savings, enough to tramp town to town, continent to continent, doing temp jobs here and there, sometimes sleeping on streets. He was right behind me.

Even if I didn’t see him for a month, I knew he would soon catch on. It would be only a matter of time for him to pop up somewhere

on the opposite side of the street, in the next car over on the subway, or madly prying through shutters of windows in the house across.

My attempts to speak to Borges were futile. How does the blind master live with this curse, I wondered. How does he manage to evade his sinister follower?

I had questions. Far more than I had anticipated. But Senor Borges was already on the other side of the globe. I wrote him letters. He never replied. I tried calling hotels where he stayed. Unavailable.

The books that he wrote, I bought all of them in attempts to find hidden meanings. What if he had secret messages for me inside his writings? The Book of Sand, Dr. Brodie’s Report

I even searched his earlier writings, analyzed every word. Pointless. Futile.

Until 1983. “Shakespeare’s Memory.” His final book, as it turned out to be.

I was somewhere in Eastern Europe when I bought the book. Immediately I began my scrupulous study. Letter by letter, page by page, analyzing every space and every punctuation sign.

And that’s when I found it. The answer.

The answer was the story itself. The story that did not require much study or decryption. All I had to do was read it. I knew I had to come face to face with Quietus Est like Borges did, but not before having to go through the life of an exile. That’s what Borges had intended me to do. Such was his final and only message to me embodied within his last story. A story written for the public, but intended for my eyes only.

The story was that the protagonist receives memories of Shakespeare. Memories that overwhelm him, overpowering his own. He forgets modern day cars and engines, instead remembering faces and names from some distant past, memories he has never known. Memories that belonged to another man.

“In a way, he will be like a shadow of you,” Borges told me that night. Slowly but surely, my shadow was becoming me. That’s why I can only vaguely remember you, my childhood home. Him or me, no more running. It ends here.

* * * * * *

Few more minutes, I say to myself as I look at the watch. There he is. He is out of breath. Beaten, tired and bent by the weight of his own arid body. One last push, old man, and we will meet.

I am hiding behind the rock. His footsteps on gravel and sand, I can tell them from any other footsteps in the world. His breathing, wheezing and crackling. I am counting to five.

He knows where I am, but he is too tired to take that last step. Let me take that step for you.

I am staring at his face, wrinkled like leaves of an ancient scroll.

“Time’s up, Quietus Est,” I am telling him.

He is not fighting back, and my Swiss blade finds a comfy spot below his Adam’s apple. I am going to finish him now.

Popping sounds are coming out from his flabby throat. What are you trying to tell me, old man? Let me hear your last words. I am easing the pressure to let him talk. But the sounds that come out not words, but laughter.

“You, you are confused,” he says. “You’ve got it all wrong. Let me, let me help you understand.”

I am letting him sit up. He is coughing blood. One wrong move and he’s dead. He wipes the blood off his lips and nods in understanding.

“All my life I have followed you,” he begins slowly. “It’s a miracle I have come this far and lived this long. Ever since I left Cordoba, I was a ticking time bomb. I was diagnosed as suicidal. Doctor after doctor, therapies, specialists, prescription, yoga – I have tried them all. Some helped for a while, and the disease subsided, but then trolled back with a new stronger wave. It’s this disease that nests here” – and he points to his head – “forcing me to look for a way to end my own life. It all began in London, on that morning when I was sitting on the bench in the middle of that square, feeling the disease gnawing on my brain. My first attempt was in that hotel, room B6. I sat on the bed in that dark room for hours with a rope in my hand and a blanket over my head. Death opened the door and stood above me in the darkness of the room. Oh, how I wanted my pain to end! But it was not meant to be. Not then, not there. I had to live on. Ever since that day, it was a cat and a mouse game between us. I chased death, and death would always slip away. Until now.”

He pauses, rubbing his flabby neck, then points his finger down the valley and continues: “I was born in that house. I remember every moment of my childhood. My parents, my toys, my school. I remember playing hide and seek with my cousins in Muscat gardens and dosing off to Sunday clergy in that white chapel. I remember Eastern rugs being washed on the street and the smell of grapes. My name is Fernandez August Navaro. And you, you have no true name, but they call you Quietus Est. The one who wanders.”

Filaments of scorching infernos have been ignited all over me. The fire sets off inside my eyelids, spreading over to all facial pores and trickling down my body.

“Lies! Imbecile lies!” I roar.

“Look at me,” he says, “I am an old man. And you? Still young and strong as you will always be. You have not aged. Now think more. What do you remember of your childhood? Shakespearean memories of random sounds and smells are all you have gained from me. Master Borges knew who you were. He cracked you, and then he tricked you. He made you think you were me. That was his way of evading you – by not revealing you the truth until his final breath, final book, final story. You are the one who wanders. And those memories you have – those are my memories. And now that I have told you who you really are, you must finally finish me.”

I have heard enough of his fibs. I am throwing my knife away. I shall not require any blades to finish him. With hands clenched around his thin neck, I am strangling him. I hear him squeal as the grip tightens. I feel the crackling of neck bones between my thumbs. I see him gulping the air in warm convulsions. He looks peaceful.

I sit on his chest and watch his last breath picked up by the wind, carried down the valley to the gardens, passing by the white chapel and the house where he grew up.

The scorching wind of Andalusia is pouring sunlight onto his face, toying with eyelashes, pounding on cheeks and gyring through hair. He must have missed the smell of the valley and the ripening softness of Muscat fluff glistening in the air.

I am rewinding my wristwatch and walking downhill along the wavy trail, my thumbs still sore from killing.

I am taking small step sideways. Once I reach El Jardinito Road, I will hop on the first bus, and from there I will travel west. Or north. Destination will never matter.

Anywhere is where the roads take me.

[thehikingviking]

Chinchontepec (San Vicente Volcano) from San Francisco Agua Agria

The morning after climbing the three volcanoes of Ilamatepec, Cerro Verde and Izalco, Zach and I had an early alarm set to climb Chinchontepec, also known as Volcán de San Vicente. I had little idea what to expect with regards to mileage and elevation gain, since Nahuat Tours could not give me any information aside from the fact that it would be easier than the previous day. These details are typically left to the local guides, who each have their own preferred way to reach the top. For this particular hike, our local guide was Oscar, who we picked up in Guadalupe. We continued together to San Francisco Agua Agria, which was a quaint little town at the bottom of the volcano. Our guide was ready to start from the city center, but we asked if we could drive a little further, to which he said yes. We hopped back into the truck and followed a cobblestone road into the forest up the mountain. Just beyond town we passed Infiernillo del Volcan Chinchontepec where fumaroles still permeate from the volcanic vents.

We were able to slowly drive 2 miles and 1,200 vertical feet to a fence marked private property. Erick parked the car here and we continued on food.

The ex-president of El Salvador, Alfredo Cristiani, apparently owns half of the mountain, and somewhere along its slopes lies an abode where he takes all his mistresses.

The road led to a plantation full of banana trees and coffee plants.

The area was called Plantation “El Zapote.” A zapote, or sapote, is an orange fruit that tastes like a mix between a fig and an avocado. Here we found the farmhand and a few dogs. Oscar went to chat with him, but he seemed to have little interest in our endeavors.

A personal stash of coffee beans were left out in the sun to dry, which is a key part in the bean preparation process.

The road led beyond the farm so we continued up the cobblestone road. I was really impressed with the road, considering that this area gets a lot of rainfall. We have a lot of dirt (and even paved) roads in the states that are always at risk of being eroded or washed out. Perhaps these problems could be mitigated if someone took the time to build our roads the right way. Thousands of years later, Rome’s cobblestone roads still remain.

The road ended at a cement structure covered with a beautiful flowers. The local workers use this shelter during harvest season for several months out of the year.

We took a break underneath the shade of the structure, taking in the views of El Boqueron, El Picacho and Volcán de Guazapa to the northwest.

We didn’t linger for too long because there were some big wasp-like bugs flying around. We picked up a trail behind the structure and followed this through the dense brush.

It became very hot and humid, and I found myself ducking underneath overhanging branches often.

-Coffee Beans

After a kilometer we emerged on a road above. A nice breeze cooled me off, while we waited for Erick, the slowest of our group, to catch up. 

Chinchontepec was the site of the worst aviation accident in the country’s history. Aviateca Flight 901 crashed into the volcano in August of 1995, killing all 65 passengers on board. I have tightly gripped my arm rest on several flights into Central America, due to pockets of warm air causing turbulence while being eye level with several giant volcanoes outside of my airplane window. I can totally see how such an accident could have occurred. Once Erick joined us, we waited a few more minutes for him to catch his breath, then continued up the road.

At some point along the road, Erick decided to turn around, so our pace improved.

Sections of the road were littered with avocados. The avocados grown in higher elevations are said to be smaller. I’ve had plenty of them on my trip so far, so I didn’t bother taking a bite out of one laying on the ground.

We took a right at a nondescript section of the road and picked up a good trail. This section of the hike was shaded and cooler, hence more enjoyable.

We followed nice switchbacks all the way to the crater. This was unlike many other craters I’ve visited because the vegetation was so thick that I couldn’t even see to the other side.

We took a right following the trail steeply up the rim of the crater, although it never really felt like I was on the rim. By this point I was feeling pretty fatigued, but I only had a few hundred feet remaining.

-Acorns

We broke out of the trees for the first time in a while, and I could sense we were close.

-El Crater

Prior to reaching the summit, we reached a fence displaying a clear message; No Trespassing, Military Zone.

There was no one around, so our local guide simply began whistling. After 5 minutes of whistling, no one so much as peered over our way. I was skeptical that they could even hear us, but Oscar remained confident and steadfast. I wondered if we could simply hop the fence and walk to the top without anyone noticing; it would only take me 10 seconds to reach the top. Finally two young military men appeared and walked the use trail along the inside of the fence to our location. Oscar showed his official tourism badge attached to his lanyard and asked them if we could proceed to the top, but they first had to ask their commanding officer. As one of them turned around, we all noticed the huge machine gun strapped to his back, and suddenly I was glad that I didn't cross the fence without permission. He came back about 5 minutes later stating that he would let us proceed to the top this time, but next time Oscar would need to get permission 15 days in advance. He also said that we were not allowed to take photos of the summit facility. We said gracias many times then walked the final few meters to the summit, which was fitted with a concrete helicopter pad.

To the west was the second teat of Chinchontepec, which translates to the mountain of the two breasts.

To the northwest were Lago de Ilopango, El Boqueron, El Picacho and Volcán de Guazapa.

To the east was Chaparrastique, also known as Volcán de San Miguel. I respected the military's wishes and photographed this through the summit towers, which to me looked like any ordinary radio facility.

I felt a big sense of relief making it up this peak. I struggled to finish my leftover pupusas because they were so darn dry and I was trying to conserve my water.

Once we were done eating, we began our walk back down the volcano.

I felt invigorated, so I set a quick pace on our descent.

I thought the sign stating "No Sacar Parasitas" was peculiar.

The gringo in me thought this meant don't take parasites, however in this scenario the sign is referring to orchids and/or moss. Some orchids are parasitic, relying on fungi in their roots. Many Salvadorans also take fungi and moss from nature for their nativity scenes around Christmas. I am not fully sure if this sign is trying to dissuade people from taking the moss or the orchids, or maybe both, but it hopefully will curtail negative long term environmental impacts.

-Castor Bean

-Guava

It took us only an hour to descend back to the fence. I think our guides were surprised how fast I could move when I really wanted to.

We found Erick napping in the truck. He told us how he missed the turnoff and found himself alone on the cobblestone road with El Cadejo, a cryptic dog creature that is either there to help you or there to kill you.

We drove back down to San Francisco Agua Agria where I bought a lukewarm Coke. I was proud to do my part by stimulating the local economy. Since the hike went quickly, I was able to get back to El Zonte early enough to catch some waves with my beautiful wife.

[funkaliciousfrog]

I’m bored, so I’m temporarily turning into a seasonal anime blog for a single extremely long post. 

I’m checking out more new anime than usual this season, and I’ve been in the mood to write lately. So, I thought it’d be fun to record my expectations for each show and my impressions of their first episodes. Even if no one but me ever reads it. 

Joran the Princess of Snow and Blood

That one show I’m watching partially just cause Aoi Shouta is there. I’m interested to see if he can pull off a female character who dresses as a man, which as he put it himself is the “gyakku-pattern” compared to his usual roles. Tbh watching shows just cause Shouta is in them hasn’t worked out super great for me in the past (I didn’t really like 2.43 or Kimi to Boku, and Hamefura was just alright), so we’ll see what happens here. It’s an anime original so who knows how the story will end up. But going off the trailer, at the very least we’ll get some cool aesthetics and sick fight animation.

I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that the plot of this show is gonna involve some politics, since it takes place in an alternate 1930s where the reign of the Tokugawa shogunate hasn’t ended yet. Yeah, you might need to skim a Wikipedia article or two on Japanese history for this one. The main characters are assassins, working undercover for the shogunate and fighting some group of superpowered shapeshifting animal people. The protagonist works in a bookshop by day and lives with her very young sister who does all the housework. She also has some kind of crow-related powers that haven’t been explained yet. In fact, there’s a lot of things about the setting that were only touched upon and I guess will be elaborated on later. 

The character designs and background art are very nice, but something feels off with the actual animation. Things move in weird stiff ways, some of the special effects are kinda ugly, and the fight scenes in particular are disjointed at points. Although I think that disjointedness came more from the storyboarding than the animation itself? I can’t say for sure since I’m not one of those sakuga expert people. But, I can still tell the production value here isn’t quite as high as it appeared from the PV. The premise has potential, but as the story unfolds we’ll see if it’s good enough to carry the less than stellar animation. 

And as for Shouta, all he really got to do this episode was be dapper and talk in cryptic insect-themed metaphors. Oh, and randomly pull out a lightsaber, since I guess they have those in this show? I’m mostly curious to see how the people who don’t pay any attention to voice actors will react when his character’s actual gender is revealed. 

Mashiro no Oto

Hibike Euphonium was one of my first anime and remains one of my faves. So,  I’m always interested in shows about classical music and/or playing instruments. The manga has won multiple awards so it should be a good story, and hopefully this adaptation is just as good. As another show about a traditional Japanese instrument, the Kono Oto Tomare comparisons will be inevitable. But honestly, I’d be happy just learn some stuff about the shamisen cause I think it's cool. 

This was quite the whirlwind first episode. Our main character Setsu has been playing shamisen with his grandpa since he was a little kid. But, turns out his grandpa is displeased with his grandson’s sound, so he makes it his dying wish that Setsu stop playing shamisen. Once his grandpa does die, Setsu feels distraught, impulsively gets on a bus to Tokyo, ends up living with a random gravure idol for a week, picks fights with her no-good wanna-be rockstar boyfriend, at the very end a SWAT team shows up... it’s a lot. 

And I don’t really know how it will proceed from here either. After speeding through this escapade in Tokyo, I think (or hope) that the pace will settle down starting next week. And going off the poster we’ll eventually end up in a high school shamisen club, somehow.

I really enjoyed the bits and pieces of shamisen music in this episode, it just sounds so cool! I hope to eventually get more specific information about the instrument and its repertoire. All I really want from these shows about extremely specific topics is to be educated! They also played either the OP or ED at the end, and it sounded pretty neat. Unlike Kono Oto Tomare they actually put the instrument of question into the song, which I appreciate (though I still like all the Kono Oto OPs and EDs). 

The art in the PV didn’t seem like anything that special, but the episode itself actually looked very nice in the important moments. I especially liked the snowy background art from the beginning. They also took an interesting direction with the character designs: everyone is drawn with very thin lines and most of the time without cel shading. Sometimes it looks like an aesthetic choice, and other times it just looks kinda cheap. The animation itself is nothing crazy, but at least from my uneducated perspective the shamisen playing looks pretty believable. 

After 2.43's Fukui-ben from last season, I guess this show will be my new source of Japanese regional dialects. Apparently Setsu’s accent is so strong that the girl he’s staying with asks him if he’s a foreigner, which I thought was funny. They don’t mention where he’s from, but he and his family use the same “-be” ending as the main character from the Great Pretender. Which isn’t helpful cause I can’t remember where he was from either. But anyway, for some reason it just amuses me every time someone says “dabe”. 

(A footnote about Setsu’s accent: I’ve done a bit of research, or rather literally just typed “be” into jisho.com, which I can’t believe actually worked, and it seems to be some type of Touhoku dialect. His voice actor, Nobunaga Shimazaki, is from that area so I guess that checks out? Although according to the Wikipedia page it’s used as a generic rural accent in media, so maybe they don’t care about the specific region as long as he sounds like a country boy.)

Farewell, My Dear Cramer

Finally, an all-girls sports anime! There are a few out there already, but I haven’t seen any of them yet (except maybe Chihayafuru, which has a mixed gender cast but an awesome female lead). As far as I’ve read, most have mixed reviews and tend to lean into other genres and/or have a lot of fanservice. So, I’d really like this show to be the female version of a straightforward realistic sports show like Haikyuu that is missing from all our lives. But it looks like it might be a drama about sports instead, which potentially could be just as good. It did come from the Your Lie in April mangaka after all, if you couldn’t tell from the weird lips. Besides that, the art in the trailer looks really nice. 

So apparently soccer, especially women’s soccer, is an unpopular sport in Japan? The protagonist Nozomi thinks she’s too good for girl’s soccer after playing with the boys for all of middle school, but is convinced to join the girl’s team in high school anyway. Then we meet a couple of her new teammates who were similar prodigies in middle school, and jump right into a scrimmage between the first and second years? 

It’s kind of a weird first episode. While it does technically establish the setting and characters, after the first few minutes it kind of feels like we’ve just been thrown into the mix of things. There’s also a noticeable lack of music in a lot of scenes which makes it feel even weirder.

The character designs are less of a problem than I thought they’d be, although the lips and sometimes the eyes still do look a bit strange. The simple, almost graphic quality is actually kind of interesting. It’s also very refreshing to see a variety of female characters that just look and act like normal high schoolers. They’re really just here to play soccer, not to be sexy or cute or really attractive to the viewer in any way. 

Although we do get some nice soccer playing in the ED, the animation in the episode itself definitely isn’t at Haikyuu levels or anything. They avoid actually animating a lot of the action with speed-line backgrounds and barely-moving shots where only the hair and clothes flap in the wind. 

Nozomi has the same voice actress as Kaede from Gal and Dino, and her performance there was one of my favorite parts of that show so I’m looking forward to more from her. Aoi Yuki and Tomoyo Kurosawa, definitely a couple of notable names, also show up in this episode. 

Fruits Basket Final

More Fruits Basket, lets gooo! Second season was awesome so I have high expectations. I’ve already been slightly spoiled on a few things about the ending, but I’m still looking forward to seeing the specifics of the mystery of the Soma family curse wraps up. 

We pick up right where we left off last season with Kureno dropping the ~big reveal~ about Akito’s gender on Tohru. Turns out she’s a girl, but raised as a boy by her mother from birth for yet unknown reasons. Then he talks more about her parents: her dad Akira seems to be dead (yet another mysterious white-haired Akira Ishida character for the books), and her relationship with her mother Ren is messy to say the least. 

Finally, best girl Saki shows up and saves the day! She brings Tohru back to her house, and along with Arisa gives her the reality check we’ve all been waiting for: she is going to burn herself out if she keeps on putting others’ needs before her own. 

Interestingly, even though she seems to be a pretty bad mom, Ren is in the right here about the unhealthy relationship between Akito and the zodiacs. Is she really being kept inside because of physical and mental illness, or is that just Akito’s excuse for locking her mother away? I suspect it’s the latter. Akito loves a good power trip, and if Ren were allowed to talk to the zodiacs she could possibly undermine the hold Akito maintains over them. It could also be a combination of both reasons, so I’ll just have to wait and see.

The OP is awesome! The photo backgrounds incorporate the 2D characters well and it just looks very nice. The song’s R&B-ish sound also stood out instantly from the pop ballads Fruits Basket usually gives us. Once it comes out on Spotify, I will be adding it to my playlist along with Chime and Eden. Btw, if you haven’t heard the full version of Eden I recommend you check it out cause it really goes some places you don’t even get to hear in the TV-sized version.

On a side note, this show has some real fashionistas. Rin, Haruhatsu, Saki, and this episode Arisa have great outfits. That cropped shearling jacket with the skinny scarf? 👌 It’s also adorable how Saki and her little goth brother coordinate their looks. I will never forget that time they casually rolled up to an okonomiyaki restaurant rocking black opera gloves. 

Zombieland Saga Revenge

More Zombieland Saga! The best part of the first season imo was the comedy, but I’m guessing we’ll get more into the mystery/drama part of the show here: more information about Kotaro and his motives/methods, Tae’s identity, etc. We’ll see how it goes. I’m also hoping for more bops like Adabana Necromancy and Saga Jihen. 

Oh how I missed this show’s manic energy...

Since the end of the last season, it seems Kotaro got overzealous and booked an arena for a concert that only sold 300 tickets, putting the group into a whole bunch of debt. So now the girls are all working part-time to pay it off, and they’re not nice jobs either: factory worker, farmhand, construction worker... milk-deliverer? Do they even have those in Japan? Now there’s some #commentary on showbiz. 

As for Kotaro, the whole thing has left him in such a haggard state that he’s managed to grow his hair down to his collar bones in a month flat. Now he spends his days bar hopping and rambling even less coherently than usual (although Mamoru Miyano is clearly having as much fun as ever). Franchuchu are left to prepare all by themselves for their anniversary concert at the tiny venue where they made their debut. But, they decide they’ll use it as a chance to sing the unperformed encore song from the arena concert for Kotaro, thinking it might relight his spark. 

We do get a drop of new information about the plot: turns out there’s a strict deadline on the Zombieland Saga Project, which is the real reason why Kotaro so upset. Maybe whatever necromancy he used on the girls will wear off after a certain amount of time and turn them back into corpses? The bartender at his favorite spot is apparently in on the whole zombie thing, and he’s the one who finally snaps Kotaro out of it. He sprints over to the anniversary concert and literally starts throwing hands with the unreceptive metalhead audience. To finish out the episode we get a glorious slow motion brawl sequence as Franchuchu sing the encore song. 

I don’t know if that encore will be the OP or ED, or if it’s just a insert song. It was alright I guess. To be honest I liked Iron Frill’s songs more than Franchuchu’s in the first season, and I feel like that will continue to be the case this season. I’m excited to see the new OP tho, even if it’ll be hard to beat the iconic Adabana Necromancy. And on a vaguely related note, it was cool to see the real Zombieland Saga ost album, Franchuchu The Best pop up in the episode.

Pretty Boy Detective Club

This one has people intrigued because it’s written by the author of the Monogatari series (which I haven’t seen yet) and animated by Shaft. There’s also the extremely Ouran-esque setup, with Maaya Sakamoto even voicing the cross-dressing main girl. Also I just think the title is funny. Honestly I don’t really know what to expect from this one besides the usual Shaft aesthetic, so we’ll see what happens. 

Mayumi wears glasses to keep attention away from her pretty eyes, but while stargazing on the roof she gets caught without them by Ayumu Murase in a detective hat. He ropes her into the Pretty Boy Detective Club, a shady secret organization at her middle school. We enter the clubroom and meet the members, a bunch of over-the-top eccentric tropey characters that wouldn’t be found in any non-anime middle school in a million years. Shoutout to that one guy in the hot pants. Then Mayumi reveals that she’s been looking for a star she saw once on a family vacation, and the boys decide to take up her case. 

I knew I was really in for something when I was hit with musings about Voltaire right out of the gate. Although from what I’ve heard about the Monogatari series, this kind of ~intellectual~ monologuing is totally on brand. And I don’t know if anyone else picked up on the subtle hints they were dropping in those monologues, but I sense that, maybe, perhaps, beauty is going to be a theme in this show...? Maybe it’s going to be some kind of #meta #commentary on pretty boys anime? That could be interesting, although there’s also a chance they’ll just play it straight. They even have an idol-anime-esque ED sung by the the main cast, so honestly it could go either way. 

As expected from Shaft, the visuals are all on point. I love both celestial and geometric imagery so this show’s aesthetic feels made just for me. The shifts in art style are also pretty neat. As for the character designs, my favorite part is probably the snazzy school uniform with the galaxy printed ties and striped pants and skirts. Although Murase’s character momentarily sprouted one of those flesh-fangs that I HATE they look so NASTY. 

I has a pretty fun time with this episode, it was just so absurdly Anime. I liked hot pants guy and his poses (tho I don’t love that he’s 12), and delinquent guy who was just tired of everyone else’s nonsense and casually ate food off the ground. They were at the beach too, so it probably got all sandy? And when this popped up I died laughing; truly words to take to heart.  

(A footnote about the ED: I thought I had spotted an Elements Garden member in the songwriting credits, and then of course I had to find out if they actually made it or not. The lyrics were written by RUCCA, who isn’t actually in the group but collaborates with them frequently according to the Google Translated version of his Japanese Wikipedia page. He’s written for quite a few Elements Garden produced Aoi Shouta songs, which is where I recognized his name from. The composer is Masatoma Ohta, who as far as I can find isn’t associated with Elements Garden but did a pretty good job emulating their sound. Both of them have done a lot of work for seiyuu, idols, and seiyuu-idols, so I guess that’s why I instantly understood what this song was going for lol.)

[boltcutterss]

We Are 3unshine Lyrics Rough Translation

01 You Are Sunshine (verse1: Abby) Hello baby, don't give up on losing So incredible the life you'll believe in Millions of people you're facing and missing Will you still get me a right way for chasing (verse2: Cindy) Hello lady, touch up eyes with gleaming Don't care the pretty lies you keep on telling Running wild in the night I'll go growing We won't stop dancing in the fling

(pre-chorus)(ACD) Hey, you're my sunshine (Dora) Starlight streaming down from the night sky we go by (ACD) Hey, Shine in my life (Dora) Farewell the past time with all my might

(chorus)(Abby) Twinkle twinkle, Spreading your love to the face you gaze at but get no way to trace. Getting rid of the haze, don't caught up in the maze. Glance around the world that covered by our grace. (Cindy) Twinkle twinkle, making the flaming fire blazed lighting up the sight can't be tamed. On the road you can pace, mistakes you don't be blamed. I'll live in the world that without any shades (Dora) Every second of every day Be grateful for poetries you make All the nights and the days (AC) With you the life won't be same

(verse2: Cindy) (Pre chorus+Chorus) Merry Christmas *4 (Pre chorus+Chorus)

02 I Wanna Be Your Girlfriend (verse1: Abby) The playground of wee hours where the night still dimmed all the light where your shadow made my heart beat I cannot calm down You are the mood staying into my heart (verse2: Cindy) how do i live through these sweet feelings messing me up in the classroom and down the playground I caught your shadow and felt your breath Which could never get out of my mind

(pre-chorus)(Dora) Young hearts need some fantasy dreams Young bloods can love with no fear (ACD) Let's be friends But what I want is more than just being friends I want to go with you forever

(chorus1: Abby) I imagine your breath in my dreams Your back makes me fascinated In this life always come the rain and storms I'll go with you (chorus2: Cindy) Maybe it is a mysterious attraction Can't stop me from loving you Love is just like white chocolate One bite, so sweet

(verse2: Cindy) (pre-chorus) (chorus1: Dora) (chorus2: ACD)

03 Hushing Youth Passing Away (chorus)(ACD) Please don't tell him those words you wanna say Sometimes silence can replace the answer Whispers in the diary The diary is like melting in candy

Please don't tell him "let's fall in love" Keep it for now and let it grow with you A love letter in my pocket I never had the nerve to hand it to him

(Abby) The story goes back to two years ago Met him in the adolescent rainy season The girl blushed uncontrollably But the boy pretended to be blind about it (Cindy) Two years later He finally sat in front of her Feelings hidden in spats but Read them on my little notes for you (Dora) Maybe cause we were too young to deal with the things between us Some of them were always unpredictable So I just tried to figure it out on my mind

(chorus)

(Cindy) Recently the phone bill exceeded the budget Get used to chatting with him on the phone The cat slept and I stayed up until midnight chattinging about some nonsense stories (Abby) Summer for autumn to understand each other I wrote you into the chord Deliberately sang it to you how come my face also turn red (AC) Day after day time galloped by We were spending less time together On the last day of the countdown Those words finally remained unsaid

(chorus)

(Dora)Please don't tell him (Cindy)Saying let's fall in love (Abby)Keep it for now, just keep it (ACD) Don't forget to make a call when you get older Hello from the other side by a high-spirited him You'd be glad that you didn't tell him Or our friendship would end up branching off When love was in bud, our dreams were growing up When we were young, the diary was full of flowers Bicycle around the night wind singing your favorite dream Lalala Lalala Just let him go Lalala Lalala Just let him go Lalala Lalala Just let him go Lalala Lalala Just let him go Lalala...

04 Domi

(Dora)Domi (ACD)Look@me Fantasy Look@me (Abby)Uha come on (ACD)put your left hand up(Fantasy) (Abby)Uha come on (ACD)Then follow your right hand up (Dora)Ya

(ACD)From left to right Open it up, don't huddle Count down with me one two three (Cindy)oh are u ready (ACD)This is the moment What you're so nervous for? Make a change, only in this way can quench my thirst (Cindy)How you feeling now

(Cindy) Now is the time to restart, it's really no time to end Don't be shy Don't regret, oh (Dora)Fly with me to the new dimension (Abby)Follow your heart and go ahead bravely (ACD)go ahead, go to Domi Domi Doauw

(ACD)Domi (Abby)Yo (ACD)Domi (Cindy)Come on (ACD)Domi (Abby)Yep (ACD)Domi (Cindy)That's right

(ACD) Gimme ya gimme ya gimme sunshine Gimme sunshine oh hoo Gimme ya gimme ya gimme sunshine Gimme sunshine oh hoo

(Cindy) Now is the time to restart, it's really no time to end Don't be shy Don't regret, oh (Dora)Fly with me to the new dimension (Abby)Follow your heart and go ahead bravely (ACD)go ahead, go to Domi Domi Doauw

(ACD)Domi (Abby)Yo (ACD)Domi (Cindy)Come on (ACD)Domi (Abby)Yep (ACD)Domi (Cindy)That's right

JaJaJaLa JaJaJaLaLaLaLa JaJaJaJaJaLa JaJaLaJaLa *4

(Cindy) Now is the time to restart, it's really no time to end Don't be shy Don't regret, oh (Dora)Fly with me to the new dimension (Abby)Follow your heart and go ahead bravely (ACD)go ahead, go to Domi Domi Doauw

(ACD)Domi (Abby)Yo (ACD)Domi (Cindy)Come on (ACD)Domi (Abby)Yep (ACD)Domi (Cindy)That's right

(ACD)From left to right Open it up, don't huddle Count down with me one two three (Cindy)oh are u ready (ACD)This is the moment What you're so nervous for? Make a change, only in this way can quench my thirst (Cindy)How you feeling now

(ACD)From left to right Open it up, don't huddle Count down with me one two three (Cindy)oh are u ready (ACD)This is the moment What you're so nervous for? Make a change, only in this way can quench my thirst (Cindy)How you feeling now

(Dora)Domi Do Mi Ni

05 Big Sister

(Cindy) You are already powerless I've got you under my thumb All you got to do is behave, can't you? (Abby) Even if I've taken millions of measures Just to make sure you're safe Don't hate my nagging mouth

(AC)Come to play my game oh baby do not be afraid (Cindy)The rule is to follow my lead (AC)Come to play my game oh baby it will be so great Because... (Dora)I am your big sister! 

(Abby) Don't apologize like a lamb and pretend to be considerate Don't say goodbye like a shooting star across the night Because...I am your big sister! 

(ACD)Call me big sis, call me big sis, call me big sis Call me big sis, call me big sis, call me big sis (Cindy)I am your big sis, call me big sis (ACD)Yas sis! Yas sis! (ACD)Call me big sis, call me big sis, call me big sis Call me big sis, call me big sis, call me big sis (Dora)I'm your very big sister and don't tell me what to do

(Cindy) Even if you use PUA to hook up a little sister I have been used to the storm to destroy you (Abby) It's not forbidding you to change Just worried that you might be cheated You should learn more from me

(AC)Come to play my game oh baby do not be afraid (Cindy)The rule is to follow my lead (AC)Come to play my game oh baby it will be so great Because... (Dora)I am your big sister! 

(Abby) Don't apologize like a lamb and pretend to be considerate Don't say goodbye like a shooting star across the night Because...I am your big sister! 

(ACD)Call me big sis, call me big sis, call me big sis Call me big sis, call me big sis, call me big sis (Cindy)I am your big sis, call me big sis (ACD)Yas sis! Yas sis! (ACD)Call me big sis, call me big sis, call me big sis Call me big sis, call me big sis, call me big sis (Dora)I'm your very big sister and don't tell me what to do

(ACD)Call me big sis Call me big sis, call me big sis Call me big sis, call me big sis, call me big sis 3unshine just comes with power Come and support your sister No boy can't dump 3unshine just comes with power Come and support your sister No boy has to worship

06 Yelling Yelling

(Dora)Auw (Cindy)Uh huh (Abby)You know I don't wanna know (ACD)ja ja ja ja la ja la la(ACD) Made Up Of Magic Yelling Yelling Appreciate your own style Yelling Yelling Put the bad mood away Yelling Yelling Beautiful physical body you and me

(Dora)hey oops, look he has abs (Abby)Handsome and decent, never deliberately mystifying (Cindy)Could be a captivator who makes us keep fascinating and staring anytime, anywhere (ACD)Work harder, my own style can also be in their focus You can come right close to me and I will make myself feel sexy

(Abby)Self-discipline keeps me from indulging (Cindy)Confidence makes my aura unmatched (Dora)Keep your chin up and don't be afraid to be too humble (ACD)Don't be the dust that falling in love

(Abby)Lose weight, sharp my body, build up muscle and then line my schedule (Cindy)My diet references calories (Dora)Early to bed and early to rise, still don't forget (ACD)Hit'em with a healthier lifestyle

(ACD) once slander had vilified me but now they're all collapse at the first blow(never take'em in my eyes) All the abuse and gossip I've almost forgotten Don't doubt yourself, be yourself

(ACD) Made Up Of Magic Yelling Yelling Appreciate your own style Yelling Yelling Put the bad mood away Yelling Yelling Beautiful physical body you and me

07 BALA

(Abby) Just keep the melody simple Just make the lyrics more popular Music is supposed to be this direct (Cindy) it's not ashamed that we make it pop Feeling good is all that matters you're still a rush-toward-street guy, right? (Abby) OK, well. Don't be silly again. When it's time to give up, you should let go. (Cindy) Well, OK. Stop pushing for new songs No matter how amount of singing, no one could really get me (AC) It shouldn't be too complicated in life Just keep our random life as long as we're alive Don't believe what Chicken Soul says like blah blah blah blah blah Play video games if you like If you want some fruit, go eat it I could eat eight guava in one bite (Dora) all friends here, Hello! I'm Dora from 3unshine Please follow me and wave your hands Get ready? Dance!

(Dora) I am a proud princess I make myself so headstrong I am the only queen of my life Have a temper when I get angry Never pretend to be reserved when I'm happy I am Lady D who never want to be tutored Oh my oh my! I'm tone-deaf Had to cover it with autotune Alright, alright! To conclude, Only a life full of negative energy can be a positive energy one. (AC) It shouldn't be too complicated in life Just keep our random life as long as we're alive Don't believe what Chicken Soul says like blah blah blah blah blah Play video games if you like If you want some fruit, go eat it I could eat eight guava in one bite (ACD) Slow down your life a little bit more What should come will come, don't be afraid of it Laziness is not necessarily a bad word sometimes Please stay where it's cool Why always expose yourself to the sun After the youth don't be obsessed with "hard work pays off" such naive lies.

BABABA BALABA BABABA BALABA BABALABA BALABALA BALABALABALABALA

08 Bubble Raising (Abby solo)

She was young and blind Sleep well never diet Lazily wakeup in midnight Its tripping time Push the window Cotton flow in sky Blove and violet Dress on cloud of voice Star is brightness Love is misty fear Did u realize Did u realize what i said Push the window Cotton flow in sky Blove and violet Dress on cloud of voice Star is brightness Love is misty fear Did u realize Did u realize what i said 1.2.3.4 Bubble carry me raising right 5.6.7.8 Play this song all the time u can u can taste u can u can smell u can u can touch u can u can see 1.2.3.4 Bubble carry me raising right 5.6.7.8 Play this song all the time u can u can taste u can u can smell u can u can touch u can u can see

09 The Incorrect Aesthetics (Cindy solo)

(verse) What's real and what's fake What's good and evil, right and wrong, the ugly beauty It's all clear to me

No matter what you think or do or say Deliberately put her down Hurt her too much

You think you see things that others don't You think they're all assholes Why can't you see the problems that were so obvious

(chorus) Stop! Talking that, shutting up. People's preference for things is most easily affected by the frequency of exposure Talking that, shutting up I don't wanna wanna hear ya just Please consciously correct your incorrect aesthetic beauty! beauty! beauty! the incorrect aesthetics

(verse+chorus)

No RIP No RIP Not forgetting the day when I am queen C You know me but I don't know her They all try and diss me But there ain't nothing in it Attention, a new generation of sunshine we created Look, I'm fabulous, I'm fabulous, I'm fabulous

(chorus)

10 A Quadratic Girl (Dora solo)

The sky seems to be flat I've never changed my clothes I am a little girl in a cartoon I'm looking at you across the screen You have the deepest eyes and look silly when you laugh

I want to tell you I kind of like you But once I cross dimensions, I'd become transparent The cartoon always has an ending Then I'll never see you again I'll sing "I love you" at the ending song

I live in a quadratic world Desserts here have very little taste I have never tasted sweetness I want to meet you in reality And feel the temperature of your hand To find out how warmth feels

I want to tell you I kind of like you But once I cross dimensions, I'd become transparent The cartoon always has an ending Then I'll never see you again I'll sing "I love you" at the ending song

I want to tell you I kind of like you But once I cross dimensions, I'd become transparent The cartoon always has an ending Then I'll never see you again I'll sing "I love you" at the ending song

The cartoon always has an ending Then I'll never see you again I'll sing "I love you" at the ending songI want to tell you I kind of like you

11 3unshine Is Born

(verse1) (ACD)Don't care how you look (Abby)Baby (ACD)It's just how you feel, (Cindy)Oh yeah (ACD) No bouquet for the bad shit and cliché for the new bitch Visions are so icy To see your heart clearly (verse2: Abby) Come on and do it, baby You've gotta make it real, oh yeah Don't mind the game that you're in and what kind of man you've been It's bullshit You don't like me, but I'm still me, now you got it

(pre-chorus)(ACD) Can't stop, fall in love Out of the scam that you trust World sucks, but we get up We're gonna be our own star Get up, never give up Let the music make me so hot so hot Cuz I'm so hot

(chorus) (ACD)We pump you up (Abby)Abby pump you up (Cindy)Cindy pump you up (Dora)Dora pump you up (ACD)3unshine pump you up

(verse1) (verse2: Cindy) (pre-chorus) (chorus)

(Abby)Nothing is the must so you don't need to get with all the pressure people give you who got you crazy, oh no (Cindy)So get you off the bad and mad world with all your might to be the good girl who get all the shit away, oh yes (Dora) Who do you think you are Don't care who do you think you are Just love yourself and be yourself, ok？

(ACD) Don't stop, make me hot Just let me be your diva Sunshine sisterhood It can fight back all the dark Get up, never give up We are 3unshine Yas I'm so hot so hot Cuz I'm so hot

(Chorus)

12 Thank U

(Dora) Nobody likes you I wanna Thank U Nobody likes you (Abby) What if no one hears me sing What if the way forward is a mistake what do I do? what do I do? What if no one watches me dancing What if they were questioning where I was going How helpless would I be? (AC) Once a few times I even gave up to insist on the dream Had a few times that I want to shout hard (Abby)But I'm glad to have you with me all the time

(Cindy)I said (Abby)Thank u thank u for giving me glowing energy (Cindy)I wanna thank U baby (Abby)thank u thank u for making me shining (Cindy)I wanna thank U baby (Abby)thank u thank u It's all your warmth (Cindy)I wanna thank U baby (Abby)Let the sun shine so bright, I wanna thank U

(Dora) I wanna thank U I wanna thank U

(Cindy) What if no one hears me sing What if the way forward is a mistake what do I do? what do I do? What if no one watches me dancing What if they were questioning where I was going How helpless would I be? (AC) Once a few times I even gave up to insist on the dream Had a few times that I want to shout hard (Cindy)But I'm glad to have you with me all the time

(Abby)I said (Cindy)Thank u thank u for giving me glowing energy (Abby)I wanna thank U baby (Cindy)thank u thank u for making me shining (Abby)I wanna thank U baby (Cindy)thank u thank u It's all your warmth (Abby)I wanna thank U baby (Cindy)Let the sun shine so bright, I wanna thank U

(Dora) I wanna thank U I wanna thank U

(ACD) Sunshine In my life Close your eyes Feel my mind Sunshine In my life Close your eyes Feel my mind

(Dora) I wanna thank U I wanna thank U

(Abby) What if no one hears me sing (Cindy) What if no one watches me dancing (Dora) Then we just act like there's someone here!

13 Little Magic Dragon

(ACD)

3-3unshine, 3-3unshine, 3-3unshine

We Are Sunshine

3-3unshine, 3-3unshine, 3-3unshine

We Are Sunshine

3-3unshine, 3-3unshine, 3-3unshine

We Are Sunshine

3-3unshine, 3-3unshine, 3-3unshine

We Are Sunshine

(ACD)

I have horns on my head

I have a tail on the back

No one ever knows

How many secrets I actually have

I have horns on my head

I have a tail on the back

No one ever knows

How many secrets I actually have

(ACD)I am a little magic dragon

(Abby)magic dragon, magic dragon

(ACD)I have lots of little mysterious secrets

(Abby)secrets, secrets

(ACD)I do have a lot of secrets

never ever tell you

never ever tell you

never ever tell you

(ACD)

3-3unshine, 3-3unshine, 3-3unshine

We Are Sunshine

3-3unshine, 3-3unshine, 3-3unshine

We Are Sunshine

3-3unshine, 3-3unshine, 3-3unshine

We Are Sunshine

3-3unshine, 3-3unshine, 3-3unshine

We Are Sunshine

(Abby)

I have horns on my head

I have a tail on the back

No one ever knows

How many secrets I actually have

(Cindy)

I have horns on my head

I have a tail on the back

No one ever knows

How many secrets I actually have

(Dora)I am a little magic dragon

(AC)magic dragon, magic dragon

(Dora)I have lots of little mysterious secrets

(AC)secrets, secrets

(ACD)I do have a lot of secrets

never ever tell you

never ever tell you

(Dora)never ever tell you

(Abby)Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhh

(Cindy)Whoaaaaaaaaaaaaa

(Dora)Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhh

(Dora)

I am a little magic dragon

I have lots of little mysterious secrets

I am a little magic dragon

I have lots of little mysterious secrets

(ACD)I do have a lot of secrets

never ever tell you

never ever tell you

never ever tell you

(ACD)I am a little magic dragon

(Abby)magic dragon, magic dragon

(ACD)I have lots of little mysterious secrets

(Abby)secrets, secrets

(ACD)I am a little magic dragon

(Abby)magic dragon, magic dragon

(ACD)I have lots of little mysterious secrets

(Abby)secrets, secrets

(ACD)I do have a lot of secrets

never ever tell you

never ever tell you

never ever tell you

never ever tell you

[brainfoodgp]

Summer 2018

“To the artist there is never anything ugly in nature.” 

-Auguste Rodin-

Is summer really almost over? Where did it go? I feel like I blinked and it was gone. Maybe because the intensity of the heat equaled the intensity of my never ending and fast paced schedule. Don’t worry I took some time out to enjoy my birthday, get out in the garden, and get some quality reading in. Which brings me to my new favorite cookbook featured in What I’m Reading. I think it might just become one of your favorites as well, if you love cooking as much as I do.

I firmly believe with the devastatingly atrocious environment that America has become. That for our own mental health and well-being it is paramount for our own self-care to log off social media and tune out the incessant 24 hour news cycle once in a while. I took the entire month of July off and I’m much healthier and happier for having done it. Therefore, I am giving all of you a much needed break from our Notes from the Resistance for this summer issue. I will be back with our second annual Resist Through Giving in our fall issue listing my 5 favorite charities to give to for 2018.

Debuting in this summer edition of The Seeds for Wellness Journal is a new section simply titled Community. I am so fortunate to attend some amazing Peer Advocacy events and trainings, such as the 12th Annual Conference for NYC Working Peer Specialists that I attended in July, as I go about working to get the Todd Petriscak Memorial Garden built. And the one thing I love about the peer mental health community are the friendships, camaraderie and unity that I experience at each and every outing. This occasional section will feature some of the community events that I attend and give you an inside look at what I experienced. This month I share an amazing event I attended in June.

Of course as always in this issue I’ve featured another mouthwatering recipe that I love to make in my own kitchen. Our phenomenal guest writer for The BFGP Feature this month is Hillary Lindsey, Managing Director of BioCities and Brain Food Garden Project’s new fiscal sponsor and partner. And you can learn even more about Hillary as she will also be one of our first guests on the new BFGP podcast The Candor Report, more on that in this jam pack issue as well.

So cop a squat in the park, soak up these last dog days of summer under a cool shade tree, and read on… 

The BFGP Feature:

Resilient bodies

BioCities and Brain Food Garden Project Planting Seeds For Wellness Together

by Hillary Lindsay

A new partnership is growing this season between Brain Food Garden Project and BioCities, a nonprofit focused on building innovative linkages between humans and regenerative ecosystems to create healthy communities and resilient cities. The chosen medium of BioCities, founded by Kathleen Bakewell, is urban gardens used to foster highly functioning, productive ecologies based on a reciprocal relationship between humanity and the natural world. The connection between BFGP and BioCities, therefore, has been an organic bond. By the end of this year, BioCities will become the fiscal sponsor for BFGP as well as a collaborator in the mission of using urban gardens as wellness tools.

As stated by BioCities, urban populations are the most disconnected from the natural world, a world that we need to survive and thrive. The concept of Biophilia, as defined by Edward O. Wilson, is the "urge to affiliate with other forms of life" (Wilson, 1984). It is an innate need that all humans possess and a need that is often not met. A division between humanity and nature has been scientifically proven to decrease our physical and mental wellbeing and degrade the environment as a whole. If we are to evolve in our changing climate, this division must be rectified.

More than just communing with nature, getting your hands in the dirt and watching something grow that you planted has a profound impact on the body and the brain. In a study by Dr. Chris Lowry at Bristol University, research has shown that contact with the healthy bacteria in soil improves the immune system and promotes the release of serotonin, aiding both cancer patients and patients with depression (Lowry et all, 2007). Time in the dirt is exactly what the doctor ordered! Then to see the tomato seed you planted start to grow and bear fruit, and then to see that fruit ripen and to take a bite of that sweet tomato, brings a deep sense of accomplishment and gratitude for nature. In fact, GRATITUDE is at the foundation of BFGP’s principles:

Giving Thanks

Refreshing the Spirit

Appreciating Little Things

Thinking Positively

Identifying Goodness

Treasuring Each Moment

Uniting in Kindness

Delighting in Laughter

Expressing Joy

It is this reverence for both nature and human life that brought me to gardening and a path in wellness. I always had a love of nature and its bounty. I grew up in an Italian-American home, in the woods of Sterling Forest, where food was at the center of family life. My mother has a beautiful garden with fresh herbs, greens, tomatoes and flowers. At an early age, I was exposed to the life cycles of plants and getting my hands dirty in the soil. I definitely ate dirt a number of times as a kid…and my immune system’s not bad! In school, I studied food, agriculture, and sustainability at Connecticut College, at the Earth Institute of Columbia University, and then in graduate school at the Slow Food affiliated University of Gastronomic Sciences in Italy. The Italians live a life so full of gratitude for the simple joys, primarily food, that they can serve as an inspiration for us all. La dolce vita indeed! When I returned from Italy, I founded The Green Onion, an agricultural community center in the organic Black Dirt farms of the Hudson Valley. The Green Onion focused on connecting local producers and consumers through markets, events, and education. When I decided that I needed to close The Green Onion, I was battling both depression and anxiety. It was at this moment that I turned to deepen my practice in yoga, holistic healing, and wellness. I became a certified yoga instructor and  built up my knowledge of plant medicine and Ayurvedic theory. Thanks to both plants and yoga, I developed the wellness tools I needed to manage my mental and physical health. Now, as the Director of Operations for BioCities, I plan to combine all my experience to further the mission of the nonprofit. I’m thrilled to partner up with Sean Brennan of BFGP and work together on using gardens to promote resilient bodies and positive change.

Reference links:

For Harvard Education Click Here

For Science Direct Click Here 

For More on BioCities Click Here

What I’m Reading:

When I’m having a bad day, all I need to do is pick up a book and thumb through its pages and read a favorite passage or two. One of my favorite types of books to do this with are really wonderful cookbooks. Looking at the beautiful pictures of food and reading recipes always pulls me out of my funk and propels me into the kitchen to cook, also an important mood booster for me. These days flipping through cookbooks has taken on additional meaning as I worked this summer to start writing the text for 33 Delicious Recipes for the Brain a cookbook Brain Food Garden Project is producing with our partners Chef Annette Tomei and photographer Diana Bekatoros.

One of my most favorite recent cookbooks I’ve been turning to for inspiration is Chef Sam Kass’s new cookbook Eat a Little Better: Great Flavor, Good Health, Better World. This beautifully illustrated book is part guide for healthier eating, part memoir of his time as one of First Lady Michelle Obama’s senior advisor for nutrition policy. Chef Kass also assisted in helping build the first White House kitchen garden since First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt’s Victory Garden. Most important this is a book of simple beautifully executed recipes. Such as slow roasted salmon or shaved zucchini salad that will have your mouth watering as you prepare them in your kitchen. This is a must have edition to every cookbook lover’s collection.

Community:

The Dangerous Gifts Annual Party

The 2nd Annual Institute for the Development of Human Arts (IDHA) Dangerous Gifts party was an outstanding Success. Held at East Village Access at 242 East 2nd Street in Manhattan on Saturday June 16th from 12pm to 8pm the event asked the question What are our dangerous gifts? And each of the visual artists, writers and musical performances all highlighted the intrinsic power of our communities unique and powerful vision.

The event started off with IDHA co-founder Sascha Altman DuBrul stating, “If you take one thing away from today is that you will walk away with having met someone new.” He went on to continue his rousing speech by saying, “I’m tired of hearing the word recovery, I’m over it! I want to start hearing the word transformation.”

The event was a partial fundraiser for one of the phenomenal visual artists whose work was on display at the event Issa Ibrahim who is currently wrongly incarcerated. The money raised will go to aiding in gaining his release. Ibrahim called in with a beautiful performance of his song Institutionalized and inspired all in attendance with his thoughtful words, “ This is a place, much like the world we are living in today, where empathy is in short supply.” He concluded by saying, “I don’t have the words for the outpouring of support I’ve received, it is humbling.”

In between musical and spoken word performances two workshops were offered one given by DuBrul on Transformative Mutual Aid Practices (T-MAPS). A guide for navigating challenging times, returning to what you care about, and communicating with the important people in your life. And another lead by Tauno Biltsted on “Fire Keeping” asking the question, “How do we keep our fires burning when things are really hard?” Many attending said that this powerful circle was one of their favorite parts of the entire day. All participating were completely present with each other and one participant Sarah Q stated, “That it feels like we are magically levitating over a black hole of despair.” The event concluded with an outstanding performance by Eden and John’s East River String Band. A real sense of community permeated the day and many new and beautiful friendships were formed.

IDHA also announced a comprehensive course series coming in the Fall called Experience Transforms Practice: A Course on Liberatory Mental Health Care. To learn more about this and to join the IDHA mailing list got to IDHA-NYC.org by Cicking Here and to learn more about artist Issa Ibrahim go to issaibrahim.com by Clicking Here

Introducing The Candor Report Podcast 

On August 17th cohost Sharon Simon and I will walk into the studio at the world famous The Comic Strip and record our first podcast! This project has been in development for over two years and one of the most important aspects in making it happen was for me to find the perfect partner. That happened a little over a year ago now with my introduction to comedian and fellow mental health peer advocate Sharon Simon. Read on to learn more about the podcast, my cohost and our first guests. Our debut episode, Merging Grassroots Forces: Mental Health & Food Justice will premiere Monday September 3rd on the Brain Food Garden Project website Click Here and SoundCloud Click Here.

The Candor Report started as a Brain Food Garden Project social media hashtag #CandorSavesLives in 2015 as a means for peers living with mental health concerns to bust stigma and share their wellness tools and mental health stories with each other. This informational podcast will create an honest dialogue intersecting the Mental Health and Food Justice communities. Promoting a peer centric view on how gardening and making healthier food choices advance transformational healing. The program starts with the “Digging Deep“ segment where the hosts break down the mental health and Food Justice hot topics of the day. During the second segment of each show, ”Candid Chat,” the hosts interview a guest who are experts in their fields, ranging from Mental Health Peer Advocates, Mental Health/Horticultural Therapists, Chefs, to Food Justice Advocates, Farmers and Urban Gardeners, Politicians, Thought Leaders, Neuroscientists and more. Each show concludes with the hosts asking the guest(s) of the day a random selection of rapid fire questions from our “Candor Questionnaire,” our homage to the famous Proust Questionnaire.

First Guests:

Celia Brown

The first Mental Health Peer Specialist in NYS in 1990. Celia is now the New York City coordinator for the Office of Mental Health Office of Consumer Affairs. She is the founder of the NYC Working Peer Conference held every July at NYU’s Kimmel Center. A historian of mental health and human rights and activist. Celia is also one of the founding members of the modern day peer advocacy movement.

Hillary Lindsay

A master's graduate of the Slow Food affiliated University of Gastronomic Sciences in Italy and founder of The Green Onion Collective, an agricultural community center in the organic Black Dirt farms of Chester in New York's Hudson Valley focused on connecting local producers and consumers. Hillary, is currently the Executive Director of Operations for BioCities a not for profit that’s mission is to build innovative linkages between humans and regenerative ecosystems to create livable, resilient cities through developing projects, research and education.

Co-Hosts:

Sharon Simon

Comedian, Producer, Vegan, Mental Health Peer Advocate, Wedding Officiant, Animal Activist, Thriving with Borderline Personality Disorder

Sean Brennan

Founder/Executive Director Brain Food Garden Project, Omnivore, Mental Health Peer Advocate, Food Policy Wonk, Queer Urban Farmer, Food Justice Crusader, Thriving with Manic Depression

Healthy & Delicious Recipes:

Tomatoes are at their peak and nothing makes me happier than a simple tomato, cucumber and onion salad at the end of a hot day. This corn and tomato salad is another one of my favorites. A perfect way for you to stretch the Farmer’s market corn you just grilled into another delicious meal. This is also perfect to throw together last minute for a few lunch guests you’ve invited over. You can even grill or broil a couple boneless chicken breasts, slice them thin and add or serve on the side. Enjoy!

Summer Corn & Tomato Salad

Ingredients: (two servings)

2 ears of corn taken off the cob with a knife

2 cups cut up tomatoes (use those heirlooms while they are abundant)

1 tablespoon fresh basil

1 whole shallot (thinly sliced)

2 tablespoons Extra Virgin Olive Oil

1 tablespoon Red Wine vinegar

1 pinch sea salt & pepper

1 cup Parmesan shavings (optional)

Preparation:

(1)     Combine corn, tomatoes and basil in a medium bowl

(2)     In a small skillet over medium heat, sauté shallot with 1 half teaspoon of olive oil for 3-4 minutes until shallot is softened and just starting to brown. Transfer shallot to bowl with other ingredients

(3)     In a separate small bowl, whisk together remaining olive oil and red wine vinegar. Pour dressing over salad, season with salt and pepper to taste add cup of Parmesan and toss to combine.

[ozsaill]

Guna Yala (San Blas) practicalities for cruisers

Guna Yala, Kuna Yala, San Blas: an evolution of names for the archipelago that stretches from Panama’s border at Colombia very nearly to the canal zone. Officially “Guna” (the better linguistic match than Kuna) since 2011, the region’s active effort to preserve indigenous culture and traditions creates a draw for many visitors. Here’s what I think is important to know for cruisers in our wake to plan their visit.

Orientation

There is a meaningful divide between “Western” and “Eastern” regions that is worth considering in planning. The personality split begins where boats coming from the canal zone would bend SE if continuing towards Colombia.

Western San Blas is most accessible to canal/Colon. It is peppered with cays and atolls that drift further from the mainland: picture-postcard tropical islands surrounded by swimmable clear water. Guna communities are clustered on islands nearer to the mangrove-lined mainland shore.

Western communities were a mix of those which followed traditional practices and those which had abandoned it. Basic provisioning (fruit, vegetables, meat, staples) is available, including some dugouts that venture to sell to cruising boats, nearly all cruising boats of which seem to remain in this area.

By contrast, the eastern San Blas is more sparsely populated by Guna and cruisers (we saw only one other cruising boat). Boats carrying cargo arrive from Colombia; as a dejected couple of travelers told us in the eastern port of Obaldia, there’s no road out. You can fly, or you can join a backpacker boat, either at some expense.

Here the water was murkier; this may have been seasonal, but we were there in the dry season when you’d least expect the effect of river runoff. Peak trade winds chopped the water, and together these factors made eyeball navigation difficult. Between water quality and presumed crocodile hazard, swimming was off the menu.

Rules to respect

Visitors are welcomed, but this is Guna land – Guna rules – and between our guest status and indigenous people’s willful choice to separate from modern norms, important to respect. Here’s a snapshot reference for to what the Guna feel are important for visitors to know and avoid: there’s more in the Bauhaus guide.

Guna Yala regulations, as sourced from the Kuna Yala Cruisers Facebook group

I had to restrain my usual snap-happy self, as many Guna are reluctant to be photographed. Always ask first: “¿puedo tomar foto?” to know if it’s OK. In some (so picturesque!) communities, there’s no photography allowed at all. I wish I could paint the pictures in my head. And Guna women, in mola blouses, red and yellow head scarf, gold septum rings and necklaces, and bands of beading on their legs and arms… they are stunning and tempting subjects. But – no, unless permission is clearly given.

Ask permission

Besides asking permission for photos: you’re effectively asking permission to anchor, and expected to pay for the privilege. Be a good guest. If you are anchored off an island with a community and aren’t approached by anyone, go ashore and ask for the saila (village leader) to pay up. It’s the right thing to do! The morning after we arrived, a poor Guna became quite irate with us because he thought we were trying to skip out on paying (we were getting ready to depart). When we finally found the receipt we’d been given the night before to show him, he was mollified and paddled off, but the reaction made me think – he’d been taken advantage of before.

Anchoring fees are pretty consistent in eastern Guna Yala. We paid $10 at almost every stop. In the west it was a little different; sometimes we were asked for an anchoring fee (even at uninhabited islands, if they were part of the purview of a nearby community), sometimes it was a cost-per-person ($2) for going on the beach. In either case it was good for a month. If you’re zipping through, they can add up!

Guna Yala anchoring receipts, on top of Bauhaus’ book

Arrive with cash

US dollars are the currency used in Guna Yala. There are no ATMs, there are no credit cards accepted (there are no roads, or power grid, so…). One family arrived recently and had to borrow money from other boats in order to complete clearance formalities! Kind of shocking planning… granted, it’s unusual.

Bring small bills. If you’ve negotiated a couple of lobster for $10 but only have a $20, there’s probably no change; you’ll be buying more lobster or having none. Small tiendas on Guna islands might make change, but not the dugout on your hip.

Is there trading? No. Well, not really. I wondered, before we got there. But this is not so much a “remote” place as one which has chosen to set itself apart… there is access to Stuff, if people want, and that requires cash. So the bartering that was central to some other corners of the world where we have cruised where Stuff is enough, here it was all about cold hard cash. That said, when I came up short on a mola I wanted to buy, the woman selling it was willing to take a handful of instant coffee packets in lieu of about $10 difference I was trying to make up!

Sailing dugouts are the primary mode of transport, east and western Guna Yala

Provision up

General guidance for Guna Yala is to bring whatever you need, and don’t count on buying anything. That’s a little extreme, as there were small shops on occasional communities. It is limited, so good to plan ahead as have a modicum of flexibility. We actually ran out of toilet paper: PROVISIONING FAIL! Times when it’s good to have friends nearby that will sling you a package of TP!

Veggie stand at a shop on Nargana with a posse of cruisers: pretty typical! SV Aseka and Utopia

In the eastern San Blas. where we were offered coconuts, plantains, locally grown fruit or small fish from passing dugouts. On more populated islands there are probably stores; we were only in little islands, and the one store I saw had little more than rice, dried beans, boxed cereal (?), and canned meat.

In the west, boats visit outer reef anchorages specifically to sell produce and meat to cruisers

Honestly, even with the TP fiasco, we’d have been fine. It was available at small shops in Guna communities, along with a surprising variety of other goods. We’re used to adapting our diet to fit what’s available locally, and it wouldn’t have been much adapting to make it work with what we were able to source in San Blas.

Watch for crocs!

Crocodiles are a very real problem in San Blas – this coastline is theirs, not ours, and they do foray out. Risk exists not just in the murky waters near shore but the gin-clear reefs offshore. Yes, both. Even on the islands away from mangroves and murk, dogs have been taken off beaches and a snorkeling cruiser was attacked (and survived, but not without a helicopter ride to the hospital in Panama City) in 2017. What can you do? Find out through the cruiser’s coconut telegraph (radio nets, Facebook groups, deck-to-dinghy chats) if and where they’ve been spotted, and consider whether you want to get in the water or not. I wouldn’t forgo swimming, I’d just swim with some information.

I didn’t realize

We’d be so disconnected! Cruisers reported “there’s internet here,” and I just believed it. Well, there is, in some parts of western Guna Yala. We found none in the much larger eastern region. The Iridium GO kept us connected, but at a text-only basis. (You can post pictures to a Facebook profile from the GO, but not to a Facebook page…to my chagrin).

Plastic garbage. There is an appalling amount of garbage, some floating in the water, much of it just drifted up on the beach. It’s far, far too much to do anything about. At least those were the only crocs we saw while in Guna Yala.

Crocs of San Blas

Liveaboard community. Gringos have been living aboard (is it really cruising when the western bay where all these boats hang out is only 35 miles wide?) in San Blas for years. There’s a nice collection of some really helpful folks. There’s the inevitable dose of jaded old-timers who seem to have forgotten they are guests and have a skewed view of their “rights.” Whatever. On balance they the driving reason behind this curious distinction between the western and eastern portions of San Blas.

  Instant coffee is a hit. Who knew! I’ve been working through a hoard of individual serving packets which are very convenient on night watch. When someone stops by, unless they’re a flyby offer to sell fish, visitors are invited into the cockpit to sit in the shade and have a drink. We don’t have sodas on board so it was water or coffee and… well I served a lot of coffee! It would be a great gift item to make nice with the local sahila or a Guna family that you meet.

Next time

If (when? I hope when!) we revisit, I’d plan differently. Mainly, we’d extend our stay, and skew heavily towards eastern Guna Yala. We found the frontier nature of it far more interesting. There was minimal tourism; people had more time; they weren’t only interested in us as potential transactions. Exactly the kind of place we love to sink into and understand better.

Second, I’d extend the stays in individual anchorages, instead of moving on after a night our two (an unfortunate pace driven by necessity at the time). This is a fascinating region, and when you skip through as quickly as we did – you don’t have the opportunity to really connect and understand much of what makes it special. It takes time we couldn’t give to gain that permission and trust.

Fishermen cooperate for the morning catch

Helpful resources

The Panama Cruising Guide by Eric Bauhaus is an invaluable reference; there’s really not a substitute. The chapter on San Blas opens with an illuminating discussion of Guna history and culture, along with guidance for how to be sensitive to it as a visitor. For details about the islands, it’s the best, and the author has surveyed the region extensively: his charts are the best reference for a coastline which was mostly “unsurveyed” or insufficient for use in our (new!) Navionics charts. They aren’t infallible, but what chart is? We don’t always pick up cruising guides, but I cannot imagine cruising Guna Yala without this one (thank you MM!).

Bauhaus’ chartlets, digitized. Some helpful person turned chartlets in the Bauhaus guide into KAP files you can overlay on your charts (we used OpenCPN for this). Particularly in the eastern territory, murky water hampers visual piloting. Know that Google Earth / satellite imagery isn’t high enough resolution to be useful in many areas, particularly the east. Readily passed between boats on memory sticks, they are invaluable. They are also the intellectual property of Eric Bauhaus! If you acquire and use them, figure out how to pay him. I emailed him, but he never replied… just buy the book, which you can pick up in Linton or Shelter Bay Marina if you didn’t plan ahead.

San Blas Cruisers on Facebook This helpful group is administered by long-term San Blas cruiser/liveaboards who strive to keep information flowing and on point.

Radio. San Blas cruisers have a morning mobile maritime net. It’s a long time since we’ve been regulars on the SSB, but this was very useful for sharing information in an area too spread out for VHF. The 8 meg frequency is posted in the Facebook group. On VHF, 72 is standard hailing for cruisers here.

Totem and crew are in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico… playing catch up on notes & info to share with the community and cruisers in our wake. In case you missed the memo, just because we completed a circumnavigation doesn’t mean we’re done cruising! More adventures ahead.

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