#it's just everyone being excited and roi being negative | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

gordonwilliamsweb · 3 years

Text

If You Are Vaccinated, You Can Dance the Night Away

Marissa Castrigno was walking through downtown Wilmington, North Carolina, when she spotted the sign in the window of one of her favorite dance clubs. After months of being shuttered by the pandemic, Ibiza Nightclub was reopening April 30, it announced.

This story also ran on Raleigh News & Observer. It can be republished for free.

Thrilled, Castrigno immediately made plans with friends to be there.

About 50 miles north in Jacksonville, Kennedy Swift learned of Ibiza’s reopening on social media. He, too, decided to attend with friends.

But on the night of April 30, the two groups were in for a surprise — one they would react to in starkly different ways.

In addition to IDs, they learned, they’d need to show covid-19 vaccination cards for entry. The club was letting in only people who had had at least one shot.

“I was shocked,” said Swift, 21. He learned of the policy a few hours before the reopening, when the club posted it on its Facebook page.

He and his friends had to cancel their plans, since none of them was vaccinated.

“I’m not against [Ibiza] exercising their rights as a business,” Swift said. “I just think it’s foolish. … This will discourage a lot of former patrons from returning to the club.”

On the other hand, Castrigno and her friends, most of whom had been fully vaccinated since early April, felt the policy made their return to nightlife even better.

“There was raw excitement about going out to a place and feeling safe,” said Castrigno, 28.

Similar conversations are playing out across the country as vaccination rates increase and bars, clubs and other businesses navigate how to reopen. The concept of vaccine passports — which allow people who have been inoculated against covid and are at lower risk of contracting or spreading the disease to participate in certain activities — has been floated for clubs, cruise ships and other spaces where large groups gather in close quarters. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s recent announcement that vaccinated people can safely gather indoors and outdoors without masks has reignited the idea. Yet these passports remain highly controversial and their implementation is largely piecemeal. Many private businesses are making their own decisions, and governments in different parts of the country are adopting varying stances.

In New York, for instance, Gov. Andrew Cuomo announced in early May that places where proof of vaccination or a negative covid test are required can operate at a greater capacity. Some nightclubs there have implemented policies similar to Ibiza’s. In Florida, however, Gov. Ron DeSantis recently signed a law prohibiting businesses, schools and government offices from requiring proof of vaccination, with fines of up to $5,000 per incident.

For Ibiza Nightclub in southeastern North Carolina — a political battleground state — the vaccine card requirement is proving to be a lightning rod. The club’s Facebook post announcing the policy had sparked 70 comments as of mid-May, and posts across other platforms echoed different sides of the issue.

“I am thrilled to see a personal business putting the health and safety forward in order to keep their business running,” one comment read.

Others took a markedly different tone: “This is pretty dumb!”

“Discrimination, expect lawsuits,” read another.

The Honor Code

Last week, after the CDC said vaccinated adults could largely live their lives mask-free, Raleigh restaurant owner Hisine McNeill felt a troubling pang of déjà vu. He owns Alpha Dawgs, a sandwich shop in southeast Raleigh, and said small businesses like his carried the burden of mask enforcement for much of the pandemic. Now, he said, they’re tasked with trusting adults who say they’ve been vaccinated. He isn’t ready to do that.

“I don’t have the luxury of taking chances on an honor code,” McNeill said. “If I have an outbreak because someone didn’t wear a mask and have to close down, who’s going to help keep me open?”

McNeill opened Alpha Dawgs in 2018 and, like most restaurateurs, he said, struggled through the pandemic, professionally and personally. He said he has lost friends and family members and doesn’t believe the pandemic is over.

“I know people personally in the ICU still recovering from [covid],” McNeill said. “I don’t need any more examples about how serious this is.”

So McNeill posted a new requirement on the restaurant’s Facebook page. He asked everyone to continue wearing masks unless they were prepared to show him a vaccine card.

“To whom it may concern,” McNeill wrote. “If you decide to come into my establishment claiming that you are fully vaccinated, I WILL ASK TO SEE YOUR CARD. If you don’t want to provide it then you will have to wear a mask in my store. And if you still don’t want to comply with either then I have the right to deny service. Thank you for your cooperation.”

The day after he posted that statement, North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper eased most covid-related restrictions in the state, including its mask mandate. The Alpha Dawgs post stirred some online debate over masks and vaccinations and led to a few responses, including one from the Raleigh Republican Club.

“Should you be in the area…,” it read. “Eat somewhere else….”

McNeill felt the Raleigh Republican Club was calling for a boycott. Afterward, he noticed multiple one-star reviews pop up on Google, not from people who had been to the restaurant, but people accusing McNeill of discrimination.

“This is not political for me, this is a personal belief,” McNeill said. “I have an 85-year-old grandmother I see every other week. I’m going to make sure she’s protected.”

Raleigh Republican Club board member Guy Smith said the group’s post was written collectively, but he didn’t see it as a call for a boycott.

“Our philosophical position is it’s his business, the owner can choose to do what they choose to do within the confines of the individual business,” Smith said. “Our philosophical position is, to demand someone to demonstrate they’re vaccinated with a card, we think that’s out of bounds.”

Smith said the group also condemns writing bogus reviews of a business.

McNeill said Alpha Dawgs’ business has not suffered from the online dust-up.

“I haven’t had any problems,” McNeill said. “Only the online harassment.”

The Nightclub Expected Opposition

Charles Smith, general manager of the club, said he knew the policy would garner backlash, but “we’ve always put the health and safety of both staff and our patrons, and their families, first.”

Since opening as a gay bar in 2001, Ibiza has been a pillar of the LGBTQ community in Wilmington. Although its clientele has expanded over time, it’s still known for drag shows on Friday nights.

Last year, the club shut down March 12, about a week before Gov. Cooper ordered all North Carolina bars and restaurants to stop dine-in service. Ibiza remained shuttered for 14 months, using the time to renovate, Smith said, and leaning on federal and state assistance for small businesses.

When it came to reopening, he said, “the question was: How do we provide the absolute safest experience alongside the nightlife experience we’ve been known for?”

It wouldn’t be easy. Nightclubs are a perfect cocktail of covid risks: lots of people socializing and dancing in close quarters. Alcohol lowering inhibitions. Music forcing people to speak louder, releasing more droplets into the air.

“The concept of social distancing in a nightclub is an oxymoron,” Smith said. And the club’s staff didn’t want to be “the police of nightlife,” trying to separate people on the dance floor, he added.

The safest option, it seemed, was to require people to be vaccinated.

The club waited till all adults in the state were eligible for vaccines before reopening.

Now Ibiza requires patrons to present their vaccine cards or photos of the cards for entry. On reopening night, the club asked customers to wear masks and limited its capacity to 50%, per an executive order from the governor. But as of May 14, the state lifted its capacity restrictions and masking requirements.

Castrigno, who’d been looking forward to that night for weeks since she saw the sign in the club’s window, said it was “the most jubilant I’d ever seen Ibiza.” Several performers put on a drag show. Customers took turns dancing on poles. Some people wore masks with rhinestones to match their outfits, she said.

She wasn’t surprised that many people took the vaccine requirement in stride. “Queer people are well versed in the risks of public health crisis and protecting the community,” she said, referring to the AIDS crisis, which devastated the community in the ’80s and ’90s.

For James Colucci, who has been a customer since 2016, supporting Ibiza’s vaccine policy is about protecting the club’s employees. Some of them have “spearheaded the [LGBTQ] movement, so we can get together and have events like this,” he said.

But others say the policy is discriminatory and injects the nightclub into people’s personal health care decisions.

Joey Askew, a 37-year-old from Greenville, wrote on Ibiza’s Facebook page, “I’ll never go back to this club until they lift this mandate!!”

In an interview with KHN, Askew said he’s not ready to get the vaccine because there haven’t been lifetime studies of recipients to determine long-term side effects. He’s willing to wear a mask and maintain physical distance, but a vaccine requirement goes too far.

“A mask is something I can buy from anywhere and take off whenever I choose,” he said. “But I can’t take a vaccine out. It’s a permanent choice that [the club] is involving themselves in, and it’s not their place.”

In between the people condemning the club’s policy and those applauding it are many who are conflicted.

Mark Russell, 29, is a nurse in Washington, D.C., who cares for covid patients and contracted covid last year. He plans on visiting Ibiza Nightclub in late May while attending a small wedding in North Carolina where everyone will be vaccinated.

The club’s policy makes him feel safer, Russell said. But he also worries about its effect on people of color, who in many places have faced barriers to vaccination.

“It’s a battle in my own brain, thinking those two things,” Russell said.

For Heidi Martek, 55, the policy raised a personal question. “What about those who can’t get the vaccine?” she wrote on Ibiza’s Facebook page.

She has an autoimmune disease, making her body hypersensitive to any vaccine, Martek said, even the flu shot.

But when commenters on Facebook suggested she sue the club, Martek pushed back. The club is facing difficult choices, she told KHN, and there’s no right answer.

“Whether I can go in or not, I support them,” said Martek, who’s been a patron at Ibiza for six years.

She wants the club to survive the pandemic, unlike other establishments that have closed in the past year.

“It’s not like Wilmington is overwhelmed with LGBTQ clubs,” Martek said. “Ibiza is really important.”

News & Observer reporter Drew Jackson contributed to this story.

KHN (Kaiser Health News) is a national newsroom that produces in-depth journalism about health issues. Together with Policy Analysis and Polling, KHN is one of the three major operating programs at KFF (Kaiser Family Foundation). KFF is an endowed nonprofit organization providing information on health issues to the nation.

USE OUR CONTENT

This story can be republished for free (details).

If You Are Vaccinated, You Can Dance the Night Away published first on https://nootropicspowdersupplier.tumblr.com/

2 notes · View notes

dotaccountant · 4 years

Text

(LOVIE SIMONE, 23, FEMALE, SHE/HER) ⮕ Hey, isn’t that [DOROTHEA “DOT” HARTLEY]? I heard that they were a part of the crew. According to the wiki it says they’re the [ACCOUNTANT] of the group. Avid fans say that they’re [PRAGMATIC], but that they can also be [MOODY]. Maybe that’s because they’re a [CAPRICORN]. This gossip forum says they joined the group because [SHE NEEDS THE MONEY]. I wonder if that’s true. I also heard they [DO NOT] believe in ghosts. I wonder if their time in arcane inc will change that. (peyton, 23, est.)

mun info.

hey girly! just wanted to let you know i literally cannot handle this right now :)

uhh okay!! my name is peyton, i’m 23, i’m a college senior, i’m a libra, i’ve been rping for [redacted] years. i managed to escape for like two years until quarantine hit so here i am, like a dog going back to its’ vomit. i’m an illiterate roman roy enthusiast lesbian who is just excited to be here. my discord is ilyinichna#9370 (not me outing myself as a russian lit nerd. disgusting). please feel free to add me!!!

some cheeky stats.

full name: dorothea eloise hartley nicknames: dot by the crew, dottie exclusively by her mother, lame ass nerd by me birthdate: december 31st, 1997 occupation: accountant for arcane inc. nationality: american

orientation: bisexual moral alignment: lawful good myers-briggs: infp temperament: melancholic

about.

it snowed the day dot was born, her mother would say fondly as she reminisced of better times for the two. edna hartley always made it a point to say no matter what she was conceived out of love and for awhile, dot believed that. her parents met when her mother was touring europe and she fell for a charming french aspiring writer, louis, who said all of the right things. not long after their summer romance, edna found out she was pregnant and at first louis was thrilled. he proposed on the spot. edna had dreams of becoming a stage actress so the two flew out to a shoebox apartment in new york to start their little family.

except edna never got her big break and louis never even started the next great novel and the bills were piling up. they were getting money from edna’s family, but louis’s pride wouldn’t accept it any longer. he took two jobs while edna stayed home with baby dot.

she loved dot and dot herself never doubted it, but she was certainly not ready to be a mother. she was immature and treated her only daughter more like a best friend than her child. taking care of a child all day with no escape took a strain on edna and eventually took a strain on her marriage. what started as harsh whispers would soon turn into screaming matches that dot could hear through the thin walls. it was that way for years and dot looked at her parents differently. she had resentment for her father and the feeling was mutual, he blamed them for the fact he never achieved his dream. the older dot grew she soon was the one taking care of edna, who some days couldn’t even get out of bed.

dot comes home from school at fifteen to see her and edna’s bags packed. she says the two of them are going to california and dot goes with her without any hesitation. a new start was what they needed, they could look out for each other.

except it wasn’t. edna and dot both work odd jobs to make ends meet and when dot isn’t at school she’s accompanying her mother to auditions that she doesn’t get called back for. she scores a few commercials which is enough to keep them afloat for a brief amount of time. much of dot’s teen years are spent apartment hopping, couch surfing, and sleeping in motels throughout LA. if she was younger she might have been charmed by their vagabond lifestyle, but dot knew they couldn’t live that way forever.

if anything, dot learned a lot about how money worked when she was young. she always had a knack for numbers and after crunching the numbers to figure out if you could pay your electric bill for the month really gives you an advantage. she learned how to budget because no one else was going to.

she’s working a job doing data entry when she first hears of arcane inc. one of her coworkers wouldn’t stop talking about them. dot isn’t interested as she’s never though much about the supernatural, chalking up companies like arcane to exploit people’s fears. no thanks. her mother believed in spirits enough for the both of them. (besides if karma was real, she would’ve seen a check from louis for the book deal he got over a year ago).

dot does go down a rabbit hole though when she realizes just how big of a following aracane has. people will really believe anything. the moment she sees that they’re hiring, she sees it as an opportunity. a company with millions of followers has to give their employees a reasonable salary. she didn’t have any real work experience outside of her office job but she was damn good with numbers and she was already used to traveling.

she’s been at arcane inc. for about a year now and still doesn’t really get what all the hype is about but that doesn’t matter. dot makes enough to send money to edna and she’s even started to put money aside to go to college. dot’s never been one to dream big, look at what it did to her parents, so she’s planned out every step without reaching out too far for the stars.

headcanons.

yeah her mom’s a failed theater actress but dot has a really secret love for musicals. you won’t find her ever talking about it though and if anyone found out she’d kill them. not joking don’t text.

her social media presence is little to none. not that she thinks she’s above it but she’s just genuinely bad at keeping up and she doesn’t love being in front of a camera. (her instagram posts are all blurry with bad filters and weird angles, bless her heart).

she’s probably the most stubborn person you will ever meet. i blame it on her being an earth sign i’m just saying a ghost could be right in front of her and she’d go and?

dot’s a really good listener (years of practice) and will take secrets to the grave but she’s pretty bad at giving advice. she doesn’t really know what to do when someone starts crying except give them an awkward pat.

her intuition is pretty good though. she’s good at reading situations she just doesn’t know how to react sometimes.

tw abuse: so while her father was never physically abusive, there was an incident from when she was twelve. he had been drinking and dot got out of bed to get water from the kitchen. he yells at her, as he often did, and throws an empty beer bottle at her. she threw up her arms to defend herself and there are still a few scars from the glass shards.

the way to her heart? anything peppermint which i know is arguably the worst dessert flavor but she can’t get enough of it.

tends to chew on things when she’s working. no pen cap is safe. she usually has candies on her so she has something to munch on.

connection ideas.

i prefer chemistry over anything else!! these are just some ideas to get the ball rolling. (also i am so bad at coming up with connections.)

friends. i mean....yeah jsfdkljfd. as basic as that is she just never had many of those growing up! dot’s kept a few people close but for the first time in her life she’s out of reach from her mother so it’s a good chance to socialize.

more specifically? a best friend. in the same vein but dot would really put this person above everyone else. she’s really loyal and it’d be nice to have such a close bond with someone.

a childhood friend or two too!! she’s moved around quite a bit but she stayed in new york (and she considers when she first moved to la still part of her childhood) for quite a bit, definitely long enough to make a connection!

someone she’s pulling out of trouble maybe. while dot’s not a maternal figure (leave that to the nurturer) she does have a compulsive need to help people out. it’s very frustrating but she can’t stop.

negative nancy. she can be so pessimistic and annoying so she’d appreciate having someone she could just vent to.

exes. it has to be a past relationship because dot is not a hook up person like AT ALL, but she’s human and she likes companionship (sometimes).

honestly whatever you can think of! cousins, pen pals, unrequited crush (either way), friend crush, enemies, people she avoids, shared interest buddies, good/bad influence!

#( *about. )#( *ooc. )#arcaneintro

4 notes · View notes

f4liveblogarchives · 4 years

Text

Fantastic Four Vol 1 #182

Wed Aug 21 2019 [11:24 PM] Wack'd: Strap in because we've got seven straight issues of Len Wein [11:24 PM] Bocaj: The LenWeinening [11:26 PM] Wack'd: So when last we saw our heroes Counter-Reed, who is Reed from Counter-Earth, had stranded Reed, who is Counter-Reed from Earth, in the Negative Zone, and then Annihilus was like "hey we need to team up" so he and Reed teamed up against the Mad Thinker who is some kind of green lion now [11:26 PM] Wack'd: Also Sue is on to Counter-Reed so she and Alicia have teamed up to find a plan to counter Counter-Reed [11:27 PM] Wack'd: Also according to the letters page, which I neglected to mention, the Editor-in-Chief door with all the names crossed out? A real thing that hung on Archie Goodwin's door for a while. The more you knoooooooow [11:28 PM] Wack'd: Anyway Ben, Tigra, Thundra, Impossible Man, and Johnny come back with the hot robot from last issue and try to get Counter-Reed to figure out who's behind it [11:29 PM] maxwellelvis: That's "hot" as in wanted or possibly stolen [11:29 PM] maxwellelvis: they don't, like, find the robot physically attractive. [11:29 PM] Wack'd: No, that's "hot" as in "generates a fuckton of heat" [11:29 PM] maxwellelvis: Ahh [11:29 PM] Umbramatic: why not both [11:29 PM] Bocaj: Por que no- dammit [11:29 PM] Umbramatic: or all three [11:29 PM] Wack'd: But also it might've been stolen because last issue the government was demanding to hold onto it, so [11:30 PM] Wack'd: Anyway Counter-Reed covers for his inadequacies by ordering Thundra, Greer (trying to use given names), and Impy to go double-check the bank for clues. As they leave Greer is like "hey, did anyone else notice we don't work for him, what the fuck is going on" [11:31 PM] Wack'd: She also had suspected Counter-Reed is not Reed but is in fact Counter-Reed [11:31 PM] Wack'd: God I hate imposter plots [11:31 PM] Bocaj: This is a lot smarter than people tend to be in imposter plots [11:31 PM] Bocaj: Like three people already onto him [11:31 PM] Wack'd: True [11:32 PM] Wack'd: Anyway Counter-Reed then tells Johnny and Ben that actually he's positive the robot came from the Negative Zone and they should go check it out [11:33 PM] Wack'd: In what I think is the biggest sign Roy Thomas' attempt to rehabilitate Reed has gone horribly wrong, Ben immediately leaps to the conclusion Counter-Reed shooed out Thundra and Greer because he's a patriarchal git [11:33 PM] Wack'd: And didn't want to send them on a dangerous mission [11:34 PM] Wack'd: To Ben's credit, he's also noticed Counter-Reed incessantly watching the Negative Zone monitor, but thinks it's because he wants to rescue his doppleganger because he's such a nice guy [11:34 PM] KarkatTheDalek: Does Ben this that’s good or bad? [11:34 PM] Wack'd: He does not make a judgement call, only acknowledges it as a known facet of Reed's character [11:34 PM] KarkatTheDalek: Ah [11:34 PM] KarkatTheDalek: Neutral Guy Ben Grimm [11:35 PM] Wack'd: Anyway Agatha also kidnapped Franklin recently. Remember that? We have like fifteen plots going on right now [11:36 PM] Bocaj: I do remember [11:36 PM] Wack'd: So apparently Agatha needs Franklin's powers to deal with something otherworldly invading her home [11:36 PM] Bocaj: Sure [11:37 PM] Wack'd: Anyway Franklin is like "I won't let anyone hurt you, Auntie Agatha" which is usually the part where the adult would say something patronizing about how brave they're being [11:37 PM] Wack'd: But Agatha is like "yes, obviously, that's the entire reason you're here" [11:38 PM] Bocaj: Agatha Harkness has always been patronizing but in a different way [11:38 PM] Bocaj: She's older than everyone and knows everyone is dumber than she is [11:38 PM] maxwellelvis: In the same way Animated Madame Webb is [11:38 PM] Bocaj: Also sometimes she's a ghost. And everybody knows ghosts are jerks [11:38 PM] Wack'd: ONLY. TOONAMI.

[11:39 PM] maxwellelvis: You thought that sounded like a soundbyte they'd grab for one of those rad promos, eh? [11:39 PM] Bocaj: They had that one about not being intimidated that played all the time [11:39 PM] Bocaj: I don't even remember what show it was from [11:39 PM] Wack'd: The joke is "we won't be intimidated by criminal threats" from the Fleischer Superman cartoons [11:39 PM] maxwellelvis: Ahh [11:39 PM] Wack'd: That soundbyte far outlived those cartoons, duration-on-Toonami-wise [11:40 PM] Wack'd: Anyway Agatha tries to do a magic battle with these shadowy figures but one of them has a gun that when fired locks Agatha's hands in heavy metal gauntlets [11:41 PM] Wack'd: And by the time Sue and Agatha arrive to collect Franklin, whoever these shadowy figures are teleport away with Agatha and Franklin [11:41 PM] Wack'd: They kidnapped a kidnapping [11:41 PM] Wack'd: Some kind of kidnap turducken [11:41 PM] Bocaj: Guns that shoot handcuffs? [11:41 PM] Bocaj: Ridiculous [11:41 PM] Bocaj: Only arrows can shoot handcuffs [11:41 PM] Wack'd: Not just handcuffs, they're like--I really should screencap this [11:41 PM] Wack'd:

[11:42 PM] maxwellelvis: He has a MAGIC GUN! [11:42 PM] Wack'd: Where'd he purchase that [11:42 PM] maxwellelvis: (Where'd he - dammit [11:42 PM] Wack'd: Meanwhile! Ben and Johnny finally catch up with the rest of the plot [11:43 PM] Wack'd: See, back in issue 51, Reed designed a thing that was basically just a rope attached to a belt to tether folks to the...Positive Zone?...while they were in the Negative Zone [11:43 PM] Wack'd: But he nearly got stranded, decided they were too dangerous, and replaced them with a more Kirbyish full-body rig [11:44 PM] Wack'd: Ben and Johnny are well inside the Negative Zone by the time they realize haha, whoops! Reed strapped them into the early version [11:44 PM] maxwellelvis: "Roy's not the only one who can pull out ancient continuity, I'll show him!" -- Len Wein, probably [11:45 PM] Wack'd: So yeah, Ben and Johnny are about to turn back around and kick Counter-Reed's ass, but by miraculous coincidence, just as they figure out the plot, they find Reed and Annihilus [11:46 PM] Wack'd: Mad Thinker must've been thrilled when he found out he could possess a monster in the Negative Zone with his exact facial hair

[11:46 PM] Wack'd: I wonder if that's true for all Negative Zone beings. Maybe that's why Reed has a beard now [11:47 PM] maxwellelvis: You know, Kiko wasn't anywhere near as tall as his old man, technically speaking. [11:47 PM] maxwellelvis: I wonder if Ben's throwing that out there because Dino DeLaurentiis' King Kong had come out in the previous year. [11:48 PM] Wack'd: Probably [11:48 PM] maxwellelvis: Also, yes, "Kiko" is the name of the Son of Kong. [11:48 PM] Wack'd: So Reed, Johnny, Ben, and Annihilus beat a hasty retreat, and Ben and Johnny are like "hm, our Reed would never team up with Annihilus, maybe we were wrong" [11:48 PM] Wack'd: And then it turns out their tether cables have been cut [11:48 PM] Wack'd: Which settles the issue [11:50 PM] Wack'd: OKAY SO [11:50 PM] Wack'd: You wanna talk ancient continuity? [11:50 PM] Wack'd: This giant beast is not, in fact, a native of the Negative Zone, but one of Mad Thinker's robots that got chucked in there back in #69 and got mutated or something [11:51 PM] Wack'd: ...why did I think Mad Thinker had a beard?

[11:51 PM] Wack'd: Dude still dresses like a high school track coach, I remembered that much right [11:51 PM] Bocaj: He might look less ridiculous with a beard [11:51 PM] Wack'd: He might! [11:51 PM] Bocaj: His hair sure is a decision he made [11:51 PM] Bocaj: And continues to make [11:51 PM] maxwellelvis: He's still built like a high school track coach, too. [11:53 PM] Wack'd: I enjoy the fact that back when Buscema and Buckler were revising everyone's hair styles Mad Thinker wasn't around and so now he's stuck like this [11:54 PM] Wack'd: Back in...I'm just gonna keep calling it the Positive Zone until someone objects [11:54 PM] Wack'd: Back in the Positive Zone Sue tells Reed that their son has been double-abducted [11:54 PM] Wack'd: And he takes a long. Long time to figure out how he should react to that. [11:54 PM] Wack'd: So now the gig is officially up. Sue's worst fears are confirmed [11:55 PM] Wack'd: So Counter-Reed goes into Brute mode because now he has no choice but to kick Sue's ass [11:55 PM] Wack'd: He also calls her "the weakest member of the Fantastic Four" and you know whenever anyone says that with a straight face, and are not written by Stan Lee, a major ass-kicking is about to happen [11:56 PM] Bocaj: Look, Lincoln had a mom [11:56 PM] Bocaj: and therefore now slavery is illegal [11:56 PM] Wack'd: Right, yes [11:56 PM] Wack'd: ...oh goddammit [11:56 PM] Wack'd: So instead Counter-Reed kicks Sue's ass thoroughly and tosses her out the top-story window of the Baxter [11:56 PM] Bocaj: 😐 [11:57 PM] Wack'd: I forgot this was "Cripple the B****" Wein we were dealing with for a moment [11:57 PM] Bocaj: OH SHIT [11:57 PM] Bocaj: THATS WHERE I KNOW THE NAME FROM?? [11:57 PM] Wack'd: Yeeeeeeeeeeep [11:59 PM] Wack'd: In the letters page: someone tries to puzzle out what Ben is made of ("I miss when everyone assumed it was 'orange rocks'," moans Thomas); and apparently Len Wein plans to explain why there's not a much greater mass of cosmic-ray-powered superbeings now that space travel is business as usual [12:00 AM] Wack'd: Oh! And an ad for Ms Marvel's first ongoing. Exciting! [12:01 AM] Wack'd: Somehow I can't imagine Kamala Khan being hyped to wear this

[12:01 AM] Bocaj: Love Kamala [12:01 AM] Bocaj: Ew they changed her costume [12:02 AM] Bocaj: I took too long to type and now my joke misunderstanding your words is belated to oblivion [12:02 AM] Bocaj: "Never before has a FIGHTING FEMALE cpatured the imagination of the reading public so DRAMATICALLY" [12:02 AM] Bocaj: why are you like this, comics

#1977 #Len Wein #Jim Shooter #Bill Mantlo #Archie Goodwin #Sal Buscema #The Main Book

3 notes · View notes

zukalations · 5 years

Text

Sparkling TIME: Miya Rurika and Ichijou Azusa

Sparkling TIME was a long-running Kageki talk feature which includes a photoshoot (designed by the participants) and talk between classmates. Miya’s and Ichijou’s was published in the February 2017 issue.

@chemicalperfume kindly assisted me with this translation.

(As always, we encourage you to purchase the magazine to see all of the photos in their original quality)

Sparkling TIME - Miya Yurika (Moon Troupe) and Ichijou Azusa (Star Troupe)

Ichijou: When we were in Star Troupe together, we would have photoshoots together a lot, so they would call us ‘Azururi’, right.

Miya: I feel like we just spread that around so much that other people started doing it (laughs).

Ichijou: We forced it to happen (laughs). But after we ended up in different troupes, of course we had less chances to meet and that was really a shame, so when I was able to do another photoshoot with Miya-chan I was really happy. This is the first time since ‘RISING STAR GUIDE 2012’, isn’t it.

Miya: Right. At that time, we got really excited about the photoshoot, but today the feeling is a little different. It’s like a ‘morning sun’ feeling (laughs).

Ichijou: We’re in separate troupes, going down our own paths, and it would be nice if people see us now that we’ve grown up.

~~~~~~

Miya: Last year, I was able to be in Kurenai-san’s dinner show* in Tokyo only, and it was so much fun. Even though in Takarazuka I was just a cardboard stand-up figure (laughs).

Ichijou: (laughs) In rehearsals it was like we’d gone back in time, and it made me so happy.

Miya: Even though it was my first time in ages participating in a Star Troupe rehearsal, everything from back then came back to life in a flash and it felt like I’d been there the whole time. Especially with Shiiran (Ichijou), since we were together in the Music School, and were struggling through things together ever since we were ken-1.

Ichijou: We were always doing such dumb things, weren’t we (laughs).

Miya: The second we saw an opportunity we’d start goofing off (laughs).

Ichijou: Yeah. Star Troupe was strict, but times when we could hang out with a classmate like that helped us get through it, I think.

Miya: ‘Hang out’ you call it, but we’d just go off somewhere we thought the senior actresses wouldn’t turn up and play things like color tag or ‘otokoyaku red light green light’.

Ichijou: I’m sure it’d be just as fun if we did it again now (laughs).

Miya: I think we developed such a deep relationship because of things like that.

Ichijou: Right.

Miya: Currently we’ve both increased in seniority, so how is it? Shiiran is really enthusiastic and sports-minded, so you’re good at guiding the junior actresses, aren’t you.

Ichijou: I guess so…

Miya: Because they even call you ‘Guts’.

Ichijou: I do think that since I had all of those experiences that I treasure myself, if I see a girl with a lot of guts, or a girl with that kind of attitude, I want to teach them more and more.

Miya: When I was a junior actress, and a senior actress would say just a couple words to me without thinking anything of it, it would make me so happy, so I can still remember what they said to me even now, you know.

Ichijou: Right, I can too.

Miya: Therefore, if I see a girl who’s also pushing herself to do her best, or a girl who’s steadily putting in a lot of work, I feel like I ought to say something to her. When I went to Moon Troupe, I realized that Star Troupe’s ability to work as a whole was really strong. Everyone would share the same feelings and push forward together, that kind of thing.

Ichijou: Yeah, yeah. In Star Troupe, we’re stronger as a group than as individuals. But in Moon Troupe, each and every person does their homework and they're all incredibly good at making their individuality blossom.

Miya: Right, right. It was totally different, so I was really startled. I realized how much I had been helped by the strength of everyone else in the group up until then, so it was like coming to Moon Troupe really gave me a push, and I felt like I had to work harder in order to not cause trouble for everyone else around me. But on the other hand, since I had come from Star Troupe, there were also times when I wanted to convey to everyone how impressive it was when we all worked together as one. I think it’s great that I was able to experience both of those things. Has anything changed for you, Shiiran?

Ichijou: Let me see. I’ve sometimes thought ‘is it fine for Ichijou Azusa to just be ‘Guts’ and energy’, or as there have been more cool otokoyaku around lately I’ve wondered whether it’s a bit lame to just go on ‘Guts’...

Miya: When did you start to think that?

Ichijou: A few years after graduating from shinjin kouen performances. But then once when an OG came to see a show, she told me ‘Has something changed about your characterization? You don’t seem to have much energy.’ So then I realized ‘When I try to be cool it looks that way, maybe I shouldn’t be doing that’. Therefore, I’m not embarrassed about enthusiastically going for it, and I feel I should be ‘Guts’ since that’s the only way I can be. When I realized that, I was able to be a lot more relaxed about performing onstage, and right now I feel like I want to be the kind of performer where people say ‘When you look at Ichijou-san, you really feel like you’re watching Star Troupe’.

Miya: I see. In my case, although they say ‘10 years to otokoyaku’, when it came to that time for me, I felt like I couldn’t really do anything, and I didn’t know what to do with my characterization, so I really had a negative image of myself. In my first couple years [after the 10-year point], no matter how much I rehearsed it didn’t feel like there was any growth to show for it, and as my seniority increased I started to get really scared. But after having a wide variety of experiences, I realized that what I had been doing up until now to make myself look larger, since I’m on the smaller side, had actually been working in the reverse to make me appear smaller. I’m not like Shiiran, but it’s true that being how I am naturally will let my personality come through more. Like at this point, wouldn’t it just be pointless if I decided to change into a super zealous type (laughs).

Ichijou: That’s right (laughs).

Miya: Before, even when an audience member would tell me ‘I like this about Miya-san’, I would think ‘but why, though’ and I couldn’t understand it. But now I’ve started to think that if these things are my good points to an objective viewer, then I should recognize that about myself when I’m performing. And so I’ve started to relax and think ‘it’s fine to be like this’.

Ichijou: And when you can think like that you aren’t scared any more.

Miya: Yeah. And then, Shiiran did this too, but recently I played a female role**, well, a witch, but that’s still a woman (laughs). At that time, I realized that men and women both have the same kind of heart, and while their manner of expressing things may be different, they are moved by their heart.

Ichijou: I thought that too, when I played Mme. Montespan in Le Roi Soleil.

Miya: When I returned to male roles I realized that I had become way more relaxed about performing, so I felt like playing a female role had really helped me grow. I don’t know what kind of roles I’m going to encounter from now on, but right now I think that I’d like to keep a flexible heart and enjoy letting myself be changed, and that it’s good if things change as I perform each role.

Ichijou: In Om Shanti Om it was my first time playing an old person, so I was happy to be able to challenge myself that way. It’s really true that no matter what the character is, they all have the same heart.

Miya: Yeah.

Ichijou: Also, what I’ve been thinking currently is that there are still so many people who don’t know about Takarazuka, so it’s my dream to have even one more person come to see a show while I am still here. Maybe that’s too much.

Miya: No, not at all.

Ichijou: Therefore, I’ve been trying to tell all sorts of people ‘Please come and see a show’.

Miya: That’s wonderful.

* Stella Rossa

** Morgaine in Le Roi Arthur

#takarazuka #article translation #mag: kageki #sienne: ichijo azusa #sienne: miya rurika #troupe: hoshi #troupe: tsuki

29 notes · View notes

alternativewinxcontinuity · 5 years

Text

Winx Alt Con season 3

Previously: Season 01, Season 02, Week 20

Week 21: Eps 301-303, 305-306, (/5**) Warning for: semi graphic violence and resulting injuries.

Bloom tries to spend a day on the beach not long into her break, but finds herself being escorted away by a truancy officer, until her parents can arrive and back up Bloom's claim of being on vacation.

Bloom tries not to be smug as the officer hands back her 'vacation pass' in lieu of an apology. It takes another two hours for Bloom to fill out some paperwork and be issued a 'Special Dispensation' card by the truancy office, so it doesn't happen again.

Through out the week, Bloom finds herself feeling out of place in her hometown, with the others her age being in school, and with her bridges with Selina burned, Bloom has no one to hang out with.

Vanessa sits Bloom down for a chat one evening, and asks if she's doing okay. Bloom admits how she's feeling, and Vanessa sympathises.

Bloom has been through so many changes so fast over the last few months, moving in different directions to her Earth friends/acquaintances, it's understandable that's she'd feel out of sync.

Mike returns from work in time to join in on the hug-and-support fest.

Bloom spends the rest of the week alternating between hanging out with her mum at the flower shop, hanging out with her dad around the fire station, and flying out to different areas around Gardenia to draw.

With her bags packed for the trip, and stowed in her carry space ('literally the best magical ability ever mum, I'm like a video game hero, I have an inventory!...kind of.') Bloom, Kiko and Lockette wait for Stella, who arrives 'fashionably early', much to Bloom's relief.

With a quick goodbye to her parents, the group sets off for Magix.

At the docks once more, the small group waits for Aisha, who shows up in Anne-Marine, with the rest of the Winx and pixies in tow.

('we decided it was silly for them to pay for transport when we have it in three styles.' (referring to the Ring of Solaria, Anne-Marine, and The Sparx.))

The group decide arriving on Solaria in Anne-Marine would be way more stylish than Stella leading a group teleport, so Bloom and Stella leave their stuff on the boat while the girls head out to find Stella a new Dress, since none of her old ones will do. (The girls suspect Stella has something in reserve, because no way would she leave a dress for such an important event until the last second.)

After a quick bite to eat, the pixies and Kiko decide to wait for the Winx on Anne-Marine, while the girls hit several shops. Unfortunately none of the dresses really speak to Stella; when Bloom reminds her of the cannibalism they performed to make Bloom's welcome back dress several months prior, Stella agrees that if she can't find something in the next three stores, she might just do that.

As they shop, Stella gives her friends the do's and don'ts of the event.

It's to celebrate the Solar Eclipse, which happens once every few decades. While in the Eclipsing Hall, Stella and her mother will perform a ritual dance to ensure the harmony of the celestial bodies.

While in the Eclipsing Hall, no magic of non-celestial varieties is allowed.

Stella confesses that while the ritual is partly just a tradition, it does involve some actual magic balancing, and any incompatible magics could throw it off, and result in bad times for Solaria's climate.

Since Stella will be wearing a ritual gown for the ceremony, she needs a dress for before and after the ritual. She manages to get her hands on a gorgeous pink dress, but after locating a daring red number in one of the online store catalogues, she arrives at the only store to stock it on Magix to find out the red dress has already been bought.

Pouting, the girls make their way to a food parlour for a meal before they head off to Solaria. As they slide into their booth to wait on their order, Musa finally snaps, and demands to know what's wrong with Bloom.

Confused, Bloom says 'nothing?' but Aisha makes an 'uh' sound like she wants to correct her, and wipes her hand over her mouth, like the action is supposed to mean something to Bloom.

Bloom continues to be confused, so Flora tells Bloom the fire fairy has been doing it all day, wiping her mouth like she's trying to get rid of a bad taste.

Tecna jumps in with an estimate of the frequency of wipes, and points at Bloom like her point had just been made.

Startled, Bloom realises she's half way through wiping her mouth. Stella says she thought Bloom had eaten something earlier and hadn't wanted to complain.

Bloom denies it was the food, and tries to figure it out. Slowly, she admits there is a bad taste in the back of her mouth, like when you bite your tongue and swallow some blood, but it feels more... rotten somehow.

She can't say for sure when it started, but she's sure it isn't food related. Not sure what do do, the girls let the matter be, and try to enjoy their meal.

On the way back to the docks, Aisha stumbles a bit, frowning as she experiences sudden sympathy-cramps. Before the girls can ask what's wrong, Aisha's remote alarm for the Anne-Marine starts going off.

The girls race for the yacht, but as they pass along Magix' ocean-side boulevard, Aisha notices the ocean is pulling back way too far from the shore.

The people in the water have noticed as well.

Aisha conveys the danger to the Winx, and the group transform and fly out to help the swimmers stuck in the ocean. Using every trick they know for relocating people in a hurry, the group manages to get everyone they can see to safety just before the tide turns, and an enormous wall of water comes straight for the shore.

Together the Winx create a shield to stop the wave, extending it as far as they can to protect as much of the city as they can. Luckily for them, they don't have to do it alone. While they were pulling off their rescue, someone had called for help, and several dozen fairies, witches and wizards add their power to the shield wall, covering enough of the coastline to protect the city.

As the waves peters off, the authorities begin trying to figure out what happened, and one of the local law enforcement officers recognises the Winx from the concert several weeks prior.

She makes her way over to the girls, who are discussing the wave, when the officer (politely) interrupts, Aisha explains (for the second time,) that the wave was caused by a magical upset in the Ocean Gates. The fairy princess tells the officer about the alert her ship had sent her just before the event, and how the physical wave was a response to a magical shock wave from Andros, and Aisha knows the officer is just doing her job, but Aisha has to go now.

The officer lets them leave, and heads off to report what she's learned.

Meanwhile, the Winx fly for Anne-Marine as fast as they can, and mere moments after touching down on the ship's deck, they're transitioning into Androssian waters.

The air is heavy with a negative aura when they emerge onto the seas of Andros, Aisha has brought them to a bay just off the coastline where the Palace on Land sits.

On the horizon they can see the origin point of the malevolent emanations. Aisha identifies the epicentre as the Tidal Gate, the Gate which connects not just every Ocean Gate throughout the Magical Dimension, but also connects Andros to the Infinite Ocean.

Lockette tells the others that something about the Tidal Gate's portal is very, very off, and asks to get closer to the Gate so she can figure out what's going on.

As they close in on the Gate, the group sees several smaller vessels in the water, people fighting what look like mutated mermaids. With Aisha driving, the rest of the Winx and pixies trade off shielding Anne-Marine and lending aid to the royal guards, who seem to be losing the fight against the strange merfolk.

One of the guards, a young man barely older than the Winx, tells the girls what happened after they bring him on board. Shortly before the shock wave, the Tidal Gate spasmed, the portal partially activated and evil flowed out. They'd received only brief messages from the Palace under Water, and then lost contact with the merfolk.

They'd immediately sent out several vessels to investigate and lend aid, and... well, the Winx had seen what was left. The girls are at an impasse, they have to see what they can do to stop the portal, and they have to see if they can help any survivors.

The young guard kneels before Aisha, giving his rank, name (it's Roy) and his driver's classification, which basically means, he can drive Anne-Marine to the survivors, freeing up Aisha to help with whatever they decide.

Before they can split up, Tecna gifts Bloom and Stella with cross shaped bracelets that span almost half of their forearms. The others show they've already been given theirs, and Tecna tells the duo that they're a new communication system Tecna built, one of several projects she'd done since the end of semester. (Kiko gets one as well, which makes him very excited, he shows it off to Lockette, who isn't jealous, because Digit has just remembered to hand out the pixies' comm devices which she'd been working on.)

The group decides to send Aisha (for her familiarity with the Tidal Gate), Tecna and Musa (for their ability to scan and interpret the data), Bloom (as Lockette's Bonded), and Lockette (as the Pixie of Portals) to investigate the Gate, while Stella, Flora and the rest of the pixies do what they can for whomever they can. (Kiko volunteers to stay with Roy, in case the guy turns out to be shifty... and also so he can use Kiko's communications bracelet.)

As the investigation team gets closer to the portal, Bloom gags, the foul aftertaste that's been sitting faintly in the back of her throat suddenly multiplying. She coughs and spits and tells the others to ignore it, and focus on their mission.

The Tidal Gate has begun pulsing with a visible, sickly glow. Each pulse sending small shock waves of magic into the area, which makes going forward more difficult than it should be. When they finally make it to the rocky platform that hosts the Gate, they land reluctantly. Tecna's first step is to release a swarm of her scanner bugs, a new upgraded version she'd spent some of her vacation working on.

Information floods in from the little machines, and Tecna tries to interpret the data while Aisha and Lockette work on feeling out the energies around the Gate.

Musa doesn't lend her help with the probing, because she and Bloom find themselves trying to fend of mutant merfolk while their friends work.

Musa and Bloom fight side by side as the others do their best to figure out the problem. But then Bloom drops, retching and clawing like she needs to be sick, like the world around her is sick, and she needs to get it away from her.

The Tidal Gate explodes with energy, sending the team flying. The water doesn't catch them softly, they hit the waves hard, air knocked from their lungs. Aisha recovers quickly, trying not to choke on the water, tainted by the evil energy flowing from the now completely open portal. On her forearm her communication bracelet starts jabbering. Stella's frantic voice comes through as Aisha swims for her friends.

She casts 'Under Water Breath' on them as soon as she gets close enough, but Bloom needs help to rise back up to the surface, writhing as she goes.

The group ascends above the ocean's waves, a distance away from the Tidal Gate. On the isle of the Gate, a group of four emerge. Of the group, three are familiar young women, the Trix.

The fourth is a man who makes Bloom's instincts scream 'abomination!'

She wants to set him on fire, to burn him to ashes, to get as far away from him as she can, and never have to feel his presence ever again.

He looks at her, not at them, not at her group, but at her. She can feel it when their eyes meet, and she is filled with a primal revulsion for his existence, but he...

There is a desire and a need in his gaze and she does not understand it, knows only that she was less afraid facing Darkar, the Embodiment of the Original Evil.

'We need to run,' she tries to tell the others, but her voice is lost in the communication devices' audio, of Stella trying to get them to tell her why several of their 'survivors' just mutated, of Roy's voice calling out to 'Ophir', of Flora and the pixies and even Kiko trying to organise themselves and those who are still saved.

Aisha takes charge, telling Tecna and Musa to get Bloom and Lockette out of there. The Fairy of Water and Ocean Waves reaches out with her magic, pulling at the sea below her, willing her power to push through the contamination. The water obeys, if somewhat reluctantly, pulling free of itself, raising up into an enormous wave which crashes down on the four occupants of the islet.

When the water subsides, Aisha can see the Trix sprawled against the few small outcroppings on the isle, but there's no sign of the man.

Until suddenly there is.

His grin is feral and manic, and there is a dangerous rage in his eyes, she barely has anytime to realise he's there, let alone react, before he's backhanding her across the face with an arm wreathed in sickly fire.

The cold of the ocean does nothing to stop the sting of the burns, the salt in the briny water doing nothing but driving the pain deeper in. Aisha can't breathe, can't see through the pain, can barely hear, but there's arms encircling her and a familiarity to the voice by her ear that she can't quite make out, someone is pulling her through the waters and away from the Gate.

Valtor grins as the fairies retreat, his gaze drifting to the direction she had gone. With her brilliant flame hair, and her warm glowing magic.

Before he can track her down however, his mothers call to him, they need aid, so he turns away from her, for now.

His mothers are weak, but he will take care of them, because he owes them his existence, and now his freedom.

And because they will help him find her, his beautiful blossoming Daphne.

Aisha is in only slightly less pain when she is hauled up and out of the water, though words are easier to make out, voices are easier to recognise. The voice and hands of the one who takes her from the one in the ocean are unfamiliar completely. Warm and male, but she can hear the rest of the Winx, and is passed to them quickly, the man who'd lifted her saying something else, saying 'you highness,' and for a second Aisha thinks he's talking to her, but is too distracted by the soft (almost scented) healing magic of Flora on her face.

There's a feminine voice, a splash of water, and the slide of scales over the ship's deck.

Aisha tries not to startle when she realises her cousin, Tressa, had been the one to swim her through the water, had brought her to Anne-Marine, and now sat with them as Roy (it must have been Roy still driving) turned the boat towards the Palace on Land.

Tressa tries not to panic as she watches the flower fairy fail to heal the damage done to Aisha's face, tries not to panic as she tries to explain to the people with them that her mother, Queen Ligea, is trapped in one of the cave systems, protecting some of the thus far unturned merfolk with her powers.

Her brother Tritannus had been turned, she didn't know where Nereus or her father were, but her mother and the survivors need help.

Bloom may have been shivering and out of it, but the others weren't, and while they were focused on Aisha and the Trix and their new ally and they mess they'd made, they weren't blind to Stella's sudden, if mild, displays of prolonged disgust.

Musa asked about it quietly as Roy drove Anne-Marine back to shore, Bloom carried between Musa and Tecna as they, Stella, and the pixies flew escort above the boat. But Stella had no answer, just a sudden sense of mild revulsion when the Tidal Gate had broken open.

Tecna fixes Bloom with a wondering stare before looking at the blonde fairy, and asks if Stella thinks the unease and foul taste Bloom had experienced, her current state, and Stella's sudden feelings, were possibly connected.

Stella gets the feeling it might be, but can't say why, and demands an explanation for Bloom's current state.

After hearing about the strange man, Stella asks if he might be the source of the evil that's corrupting every living thing around the Tidal Gate.

Tecna checks the feed from her bugs, and says that yes, there is a very good chance.

Roy feels very out of his depth as he steers Anne-Marine into the harbour. The pleasure yacht is filled with as many Androssian soldiers as they could find, including a few merfolk hanging onto ropes(vines) attached to the sides, courtesy of Flora.

The flower fairy is moving between survivors, doling out healing magic, and Roy tries not to be distracted from his task of navigating, but both princesses are huddled together by the railing, and Aisha's eyes look bad.

His vigilance pays off, and he manages to dodge the boat around a sudden attack from below. His friend, who'd shown up unexpectedly during the rescue mission, casts some shielding which ensures they don't lose anyone as the vessel swerves.

Roy gives his friend an appreciative thanks, calling him once again by his hard earned sidhe name, Ophir. Because if Roy uses his friend's birth name right now, it will be harder to objectify the situation, harder to hold onto his calm.

He has to be the ensign assigned to drive the princesses and the survivors right now, because if he's not, he won't make it to the docks, and there are too many people counting on him right now.

Aisha's parents are pissed when they see the state she's in, but between trying to organise another offensive, and organising room for the refugees and survivors, they don't have time to personally track down anyone remotely responsible for their daughter's current state. This is good for the Winx, since 'Aisha didn't get involved in this sort of life threatening trouble before she met them.'

The Winx, Kiko and their pixies find a quiet spot to figure out what to do, they stay near the ocean's edge so they can include Tressa, who gives them as much detail as she can about the location of her mother.

The group starts trying to put a plan together, but they keep breaking into squabbles.

Aisha can't go, she can't even see (“I don't need my eyes to see in the oceans of Andros, it's my home, and my element!”), Tressa only has limited training, and won't be much help in a fight (“Screw you! This is my mother, I'm going!”), and the rest of the Winx...

(“Look, we have no way of knowing how long we'll be underwater, or how much fighting we'll have to do, there's a good chance you girls won't be able to hold the 'Under Water Breath' enchantment for as long as you need it. You'll become a liability, you aren't water fae, you'll drown!”/ “Yeah, it's not like you girls have Harmonix forms.”/ “Have... what now?”)

Tressa looks at Aisha, confused the other girls don't seem to know what Harmonix is, but Aisha can't see her. With a huff, Aisha explains the Form of Water, an Environmental Form which the fairies (and some wizards) of Andros often obtain on top of their normal forms (first form, Charmix, Enchantix) in order to help them commune better with their element.

Aisha also admits she hasn't obtained it yet, since it's a supplementary form, it is considered to be part of Androssian Cultural Traditions, and Aisha hasn't yet reached that stage.

The Harmonix can, of course be obtained whenever a fairy wants, regardless of their home world, but it has Cultural Significance on Andros.

This brings up the question of how the girls go about obtaining Harmonix. Aisha gives a pained sigh before telling them: they need to create a Bond with a selkie from their home world.

Bloom quickly realises what this means: she can't help, Domino is a dead world and Earth has no magic. Aisha gives a small nod, and confirms that, while on break, she'd looked up the Ocean Gate for Earth, and found it had been sealed tight just prior to the disappearance of Earth's fairies. The Gate was locked under a Quarantine protocol, which meant only those who locked it, or someone from the Infinite Ocean, could unlock it.

Before they can get caught up in the idea of obtaining their Harmonix, Amore reminds Stella that she needs to be back on Solaria in just a couple of hours, for the balancing ceremony of the Eclipse. Stella startles, realising how late it is, she wavers, her loyalty to Aisha versus the good of her people.

It is an obvious choice, but it does give her pause, just long enough for Aisha to tell the other princess to leave, that one planet in trouble is more than enough, they do not need two.

The pixies suggest taking Bloom as well, which the rest of the group agrees with, even Tressa, who doesn't know the whole story. Bloom agrees with a small spark of self annoyance, because even if she didn't feel inexplicably like trash thanks to her proximity to the man with the Trix, she can't obtain a Harmonix to help out.

Stella offers to teleport the others to their home worlds to find some selkies, but the group agrees taking Anne-Marine would be their best bet, since they'll need to be on the ocean anyway.

Reluctantly, Bloom and Stella leave, their pixies and Kiko volunteering to stay behind to do what they can to help on Andros.

The rest of the group begins to plan, first they need to figure out where each gate is on their planets, then they need to learn how to drive Anne-Marine since Aisha is currently not in any shape to do it herself.

A pair of male voices interrupts them before they can get too far with their plans. Roy and Ophir are making their way over, the wizard carrying a medical kit in his arms. When they reach the girls Ophir politely informs Aisha he's brought her a healing salve to help with her injuries, cutting her off before she can argue, to tell her that everyone else has already been seen to.

With no reason to fight except pride, Aisha allows the wizard to tend to her wounds. While the group get back to their mission, only for Ophir to interrupt again, giving them what he knows about the locations for the Ocean Gates of other worlds. (He'd researched them for one of his magical studies a year or so ago.) Tressa pipes in with her knowledge of the local selkies' whereabouts, in case Aisha wants to obtain hers while they're at it.

Ophir tenses, before delving into his pockets for something, he finally brings out a small, scrunched up piece of thin plastic wrap, warning Aisha before he enchants it firmly over her eyes to protect the salve he's just finished applying from any water that she's definitely going to get on it.

Roy naturally volunteers himself to drive the girls to their home worlds.

Destinations and transport set, the girls give themselves just an hour to obtain their Harmonix, and meet up.

Stella and Bloom arrive in a courtyard that's filled with hustle and bustle, a voice calls out to Stella, who realises she's left her new pink dress on Andros. Before she has any time to make a fuss over it, a ginger haired girl their age is jogging up to the duo, weaving through the crowd.

Stella recognises the girl, and as soon as she gets close, introduces Bloom to Nova. Bloom realises is the same Nova that Stella mentioned some weeks ago when talking about the survivors from Domino.

Nova has a brief moment of 'oh my gosh my grandma talks about your family, your highness I'm honoured,' then seeing Bloom's embarrassment over the acknowledgement of her royal birthright, changes the topic.

Solaria has been trying to find out where a magically charged tidal wave came from, the second in just a few hours. Stella tells Nova they have to speak with the king, because they know where the waves have been coming from, and Nova leads the way. (she's been helping out with the preparations for the ritual and knows exactly where king Radius should be.)

On Zenith, Tecna is wished good luck by her friends, wraps herself in the 'Under Water Breath' spell, and dives.

She powers through the water as best she can, the water's drag pulling on her wings as she makes her way towards what should be the village of the selkies of Zenith.

Over head, Roy steers Anne-Marine towards Melody.

She arrives at a grotto which she recognises from Aisha and Ophir's descriptions, it is basically a door mat for the selkies, and Tecna must announce her intentions and let the selkies decide whether or not to speak with her.

“I am Tecna, Fairy of Technology, Child of Zenith. I come to seek a Selkie Bond, to gain the power of Harmonix so I may lend my aid on Andros.”

Tecna waits, and amongst the coral and weeds, she sees movement, made by what must be dozens of small, pixie sized bodies.

Finally, a small, seal like creature swims forwards, and Tecna lets it come to her, lets it judge her.

If she is not accepted, she will find another way to help her friend.

The small seal swims close, skimming against Tecna's Wings, not quite close enough to touch, barrelling gracefully past her hip. Tecna gasps, streams of colour, the colours of her wings and suit, trail after the creature, which swims to a stop before Tecna, within arms reach.

The trailing colours catch up and encase the little being, wrapping it tightly in what becomes a luminous cocoon. When it burst, the being is transformed, its front flippers have been replaced with arms, its body far more fish like. A thin veil of translucent purple hangs from beneath a bright green shell-hat.

The being giggles, “I am Lithia.” And just like that, Tecna feels the Bond snap into place, like she had when she'd met Digit. The Ocean seems to sing around her as a new power swells up inside her.

She feels it burst forth, her sense of the water opening up like an unzipped computer file, spilling out around her.

Musa doesn't wait for the boat to leave, diving into the open ocean not far from her home on Melody. The sound of Anne-Marine cuts through the water behind her, but she ignores it for her goal: the selkie city of Melody.

Or rather, the audience area.

It is like an amphitheatre made of coral, and Musa wishes she had the time to admire it more thoroughly. Instead she calls out her name and purpose, and waits.

And waits.

She thinks she hears whispers through the branches and bulbs of coral, but no one emerges. Not sure what else to do, Musa closes her eyes and begins to sing.

She doesn't use words, no instruments. She vocalises, letting the music of her voice carry her feelings and hope.

She feels a stirring in the water around her, and opens her eyes in time to see a cocoon of colour light burst, revealing a selkie in red, blue, veil like 'hair floating around its shoulders.

“I am Sonna, I like your music.”

The Bond and power hit her like a crescendo, and Musa lets it sweep her away.

Flora is tempted to call out to her sister, to reach for the younger fairy across the bond they share, to seek comfort as she dives. But Miele is young yet, and this is Flora's task, so she will not share her burden, will not lay the knowledge of the problems on Andros on her family's shoulders.

Flora feels a subtle burst of encouragement through her Bond with Chatta, far apart though they are, and Flora smiles, her nerves steeled. She will do this, she can do this.

She isn't as familiar with the plants of the ocean, but they call to her all the same, welcoming as she makes her way closer and closer to her destination. When she arrives, the plants tell her the selkies are watching her, waiting, so she shares her identity, her reasons for her presence, and then she waits.

She can feel Chatta, so she doesn't give into the fear that she will be turned away, she waits patiently, and is rewarded. The little being that swims around her doesn't look the way she expected, not at first. As the lights swarm the being, and change its form, Flora feels the Bond blossoming between them, like new roots reaching through the soil to join her.

Pink and green and smiling, Desiryee introduces themself.

Herself.

Aisha hides her face in Ophir's back as they ride across the waves on a small craft, what Bloom would have called a magical jet-ski. His long plait flicks against her, buffeted by the wind, just like her own hair.

They would have swum, but the selkie village is too far for them with their inherent land dwelling features, compared to Tressa who swims beside them easily, Aisha and Ophir would never have kept up, and queen Ligea is running out of time.

Teredor doesn't want his daughter to go into such danger, doesn't want any of his family to have to face such a malicious evil. Niobe hadn't talked him into letting their daughter go, as they'd both discovered in recent weeks, there was no 'letting her' about their daughter. That didn't mean they weren't afraid for her, and yes, perhaps they'd been somewhat overprotective of her, but she was their only child and... Teredor had almost lost Niobe before either of them had even had a chance to know Aisha.

One day, he hoped their child would get understand their fears, as she watched her own child run off into adventures. At least she had Tressa and that Ophir boy with her, that at least brought him some comfort as he rallied the guards and began overseeing partial evacuations.

His wife, resplendent in her Harmonix form, flitting about, protecting them from the new enemies in the seas.

As much as it pained him and Niobe, they had to see to their people, and the survivors first.

With any luck, they'd be fortified enough to send a rescue party for Ligea and her people before Aisha was finished at the selkie village.

Tressa alerts them as they reached the waters above the selkie's meeting place, and Ophir stops their craft. He lets Aisha lower herself into the water, having already realised how prickly the fairy was about being seen as helpless, then follows her down.

The trio head down and down to the sea floor, and in the deep, deep gloom, Ophir has to enact an enchantment to help him see. The two girls share a quick snort of amusement, the wizard who'd come to 'protect' them being less at ease in their surroundings.

Ophir takes it in strides, commenting that he already knew he was just there to look pretty, to which Aisha replies '...nah, I don't see it,' about his 'good-looks'. Tressa laughs, before muffling her response, and Aisha tells her to go ahead. If Aisha can't mentally distance herself from what happened, she feels like she'll go mad, and she doesn't have the time right now.

While the atmosphere has turned sombre, the group tries to keep up their spirits as they descend, and soon enough, they're on the sea floor.

Tressa calls out to any selkies who might be lurking nearby, but after a moment, nothing happens. Tressa suggests they might be gone, fled or hiding from the evil leaking from the Tidal Gate, but Aisha responds with what her senses tell her.

They are surrounded.

Ophir tries a diplomatic approach, explaining the situation, and one of the selkies swims forward. The selkie tells them that they are aware of the troubles by the Gates, but wants to know why three children of Andros would seek the Harmonix Bond at such a time. It is Aisha who answers, telling the selkies that given the strength of the enemy, they could use all the tricks up their sleeves that they could get.

They might be able to rescue the queen as they are, but two of them are of the surface, and even children of Andros , they'd run out of breath or magic sooner or later.

Tressa pleads, confesses to running away, and saying even if the selkies aren't willing to create a Harmonix bond, maybe there was something they could do to help.

The selkie, who the trio is certain is some kind of elder, shakes their head sadly, and admits that several selkies near the epicentre had been converted as well. The evil which contaminates the waters is made of corruption.

And Unquenchable Fire.

Three young selkies, unbonded, and uncharacterised, swim forwards, investigating the trio. Aisha can't see, so she doesn't get to watch as the selkies stream glowing colours behind them. Won't have any idea her new partner, Lemmy, has taken the pale blue of Tressa's scales, and the purple hues of Ophir's clothes, rather than any of Aisha's greens, until she is told, or her sight restored.

Shanti, Tressa's new companion, has taken the darker of Aisha's greens for her hair, while Ophir's Tashy used the lighter green to marble with Tressa's blues.

The power around the trio shimmers, and three new Harmonix transformations are manifested.

Bloom and Nova are helping Stella pin her hair into place when Bloom realises she feels like she needs to be sick. Stella pales when her friend tells her, and demands to know if it's the same kind of sick as she'd felt on Andros. Judging by the faint foul taste at the back of her own throat, Stella already knows the answer.

Her ceremonial garb and adornment already meets the basic standards, so the trio head out in search of king Radius, or the head of the guards.

They find the head of the guards before they find Stella's father, and tell him there is an intruder in the castle. Bloom hands over a quick sketch she'd made of the man from Andros, and the guard promises to put out the word for everyone to be on the lookout for the stranger.

Stella thanks the guard with brittle manners, and takes her friends to the ceremonial chamber, grumbling the entire way. She'd told her father of the attack on Andros, and he'd promised top send a few men to help. Less than he'd originally wanted after Cassandra, one of the ladies of the court, had stepped in, commenting on how the problems of Andros were not the problems of Solaria.

The woman had manipulated the conversation, until Stella's demands to send help had sounded unreasonable, like she was being a selfish child.

Thankfully Stella's mother, queen Luna, had been in the palace for the ceremony, and had agreed to send two dozen of her best soldiers. Given that the Luna's people were lesser in population than the people of Radius' kingdom, Luna had offered quite a lot of her forces.

But then, her people were more involved with the study of direct tidal forces than his.

Luna is also more emotionally intuitive than her former husband, which is why she notices something amiss when the trio enter the ceremonial chamber.

They quickly tell her about what they've been sensing, and she makes sure all her guards are informed as well.

Before Stella has to leave Bloom and Nova in the viewing area, she slips her Ring to Bloom, as a 'just in case', since non-celestial magic isn't allowed to be used in the chamber for actual magical reasons, and not just as a die-hard-courtesy.

The king arrives soon after, and the last of the participants file in.

As the ceiling opens to reveal a perfect view of the sun and moon, Bloom realises that king Radius isn't compulsively stroking his beard, he's making the same mouth wiping motion that she had on Magix, that Stella had begun doing when the man from Andros had arrived on the same world.

Distracted by the realisation, she almost misses Lady Cassandra's hand resting in a claw grip on the king's other arm.

For a second as Cassandra turns, Bloom thinks she sees something glowing on the woman's neck, but she chalks it up to a trick of the light, even though her insides quiver in terror.

A gong is struck, its sound reverberating throughout the chamber, and the ritual ceremony begins.

By the time the Androsian trio return to the meeting point, Roy is steering Anne-Marine back into dock, three Harmonix bearing Winx on board.

Roy wants to poke fun at his friend, in his sleeveless jacket shirt, with its midriff baring cut at the front, and its long train at the back, the low slung, painted on pants with their surprisingly utilitarian ribbons. ('No one should look that good in that outfit, curse you and your sexy abs.')

With the group back together, they don't waste anymore time, while Roy and Kiko depart to help the Palace on Land with its defences, the rest of the group follow Tressa to her mother.

The group goes deep, and Aisha tries not to be annoyed that the others have formed a guard around her, with her eyesight gone, she is compensating with her innate water sense, dialled way up by the Harmonix, she can 'see' more than ever before, certainly more than the others can.

(Being annoyed helps, keeps the fear at arms length, lets her focus enough to do her job as the Fairy of Waves, because she's blind, and the healers and poultice managed to stop the pain, but no one will tell her the exact level of damage the cursed flame did, and that just makes it worse if she lets herself think about it.)

The closer they get to the Tidal Gate, the more oppressive the water feels, like it's saturated with an ambient maliciousness. The group does its best to ignore it, even as they begin having to dart coral to outcrop to evade the mutated merfolk.

The further down they go, the more merfolk, and the worse the mutation. Beneath the mutation and magical corruption though, they are still the people of Andros, and so the group does its best to capture them, or chase them away rather than... more deadly options.

Near the bottom of the trench, they spot a light (except for Aisha who merely senses the radiant waves of the magic,) but it is almost completely blocked by a swarming mass of mutant merfolk. A quick battle plan and the group dives in, Tecna and Musa disorient the masses while Aisha, Flora and Ophir work on restraining them. Between the morphix, the fairy assisted seaweeds and magical ropes, they manage to get a large percentage plastered to the walls of the trench, enough that Queen Ligea and her survivors hidden in the nearby cavern would stand a chance if they began to flee, which they do, directed by Tressa as she uses her new Harmonix boosted powers to shield them as they make their way to the surface.

Ligea lets her daughter lead, preparing to take up position as rear guard, to make sure her people's retreat is defended.

The rescue team knew going in that they would have to be selective in their purpose, they can defend the survivors against attack, or they can defend themselves as they retrieve some of the mutated. The choice was and is clear cut, and they pull back from the fight to protect the survivors.

None of them are expecting the Kraken, a normally grumpy but nonviolent creature, to lash out. It too shows signs of magical corruption, and one of its attacks slams several mutant merfolk against trench wall, where they sink, no longer moving. A second strike manages to catch Ligea in her tail, sending her spinning into a rocky outcropping. Her staff knocked from her hand, floats off into the deeper waters, finding purchase in one of the cracks of the trench floor.

Tressa, who had turned at the sound of the Kraken's wail, screams at the sight of her mother being struck down. She wants to swim the her side, but the survivors are still under attack, groups of the captured mutants have begun to free themselves, and the survivors have to be taken to safety.

With a shriek of frustration, Tressa redoubles her efforts to save her people, even though it tears her heart to pieces, because she knows it is what her mother would want, for their people to be safe, no matter the personal cost.

Closer to the sea floor, Aisha manages to get to Ligea's side before the Kraken can deliver a second devastating blow to the barely hanging on queen. With the sheer number of bodies moving around her, it has gotten a little difficult for Aisha to keep track of everyone and everything, so as she shields the queen she calls out 'Ophir! Sceptre!' and hopes he's close enough to hear her. As much as she'd like to believe the Winx would get it, she hadn't gotten around to explaining the well known (on Andros) properties of the Coral Sceptre her aunt wields.

A few seconds later, Ophir calls out to her, his voice close, and he joins her inside the shield. He hands the sceptre to her, and takes over, maintaining the shield.

The Coral Sceptre has been the weapon of the Queens Beneath the Waves since before memory, an artefact of great power, it had the ability to heal almost any illness or injury, but like the ocean, its power waxed and waned, ebbed and flowed. In this moment, after protecting so many from such corrupting magic for so long, it had only enough power for one perfect healing spell.

The things unsaid by the healers concerning her eyes passed through Aisha's head in a flash, the fate of the mutants, her people, everything that had happened in the last few hours, she let it all go.

In this moment, she knew what she had the power to do, and she knew what she was prepared to let go. In that moment, Aisha felt that she truly understood what it was to be a Guardian Fairy, knowing what you are prepared to lose, and to make a choice that was never a choice at all.

As Aisha turned the sceptre on Ligea and let its healing energies encompass the downed queen, she felt a spark of energy simmering through her body, racing along the veins in her wings, and finally coalescing into a weight around her neck, which felt both lighter than air, and yet impossibly heavy with responsibility.

She doesn't see Ophir close his eyes against the blinding light that encompasses her, or the light around Ligea glow even stronger as the power of the healing spell is multiplied.

Ligea is healed, and the trio bolt from the sea floor, racing after the survivors, the catch up quickly enough, and join Tressa and the Winx in covering the group from any mutants that try to follow them.

By the time the group reaches the safety of the bay by the Palace On Land, they are free from followers.

The Solarian ceremony is breath taking, and Bloom watches in awe as her friend dances with her mother and several other women, light spilling from their fingers and trailing in their footsteps. They sing in a language that Bloom doesn't understand, confused that the Universal Translation Spell isn't working, she does her best to follow along, and thinks she maybe gets hints of the story.

She'd lean over and ask Nova, but she doesn't want to risk spoiling the ritual, so she stays quiet, idly playing with the Ring Stella had given her for safe keeping.

Something in the room seems to swell, and Bloom feels a little light headed as the tempo changes slightly, like a build up is coming.

Stella begins twirling through the other dancers, and they begin to follow, like they are being drawn after her as she leads the spinning women in a curving pattern around the room, slowly winding her way towards a raised dais at the room's centre, beneath a central sky light.

As Stella ascends, the other women take up places around her, Luna and a woman Bloom doesn't know twirl together in a tight circle around Stella, just beyond the reach of her hair, splayed outwards in the air by the force of her movements.

Bloom knows something big is about to happen, is supposed to happen, but what follows is not what she expected, and most definitely not what was supposed to happen.

Bloom is too focused on her radiant friend to notice the twist of magic lashing out until it is too late.

Stella yelps, her song cut short as she stumbles from the dais, knocking down her mother and the other woman as she falls. The women below them barely manage to get out of the way as the trio roll to the floor. Stella crying out in pain.

Bloom isn't connected with celestial magic the way her friend is, or even like Nova is, but even she can feel the sudden twist in the air, something foul, something wrong. The light from the sky above disappears, and there is a faint rumble from somewhere far away, but Bloom is focused on getting to Stella, Nova at her side helping her push through the other watchers and over the short barricades that separate the viewers from the ceremonial section of the floor.

As they finally draw close to Stella, they realise she has been cursed somehow, her body shorter and wider than before, her skin green and slimy, her golden hair a rough sandy bush.

Several of her ceremonial garments have torn, but the pieces made from metal that linked together cut into her skin, an ugly milky blue leaking from the wounds they've caused.

King Radius appears beside them, lady Cassandra at his side, her hand claw-like on his shoulder. He looks at Stella with disgust and horror, no sign of recognition in his eyes, only a strange purple-pink sheen across his irises.

Cassandra whispers into his ear, loud enough for those nearby to hear. 'That thing has taken Stella, it has corrupted the ritual and doomed our world.'

The king calls his guards to 'arrest the beast', the guards seem confused, and reluctant as they move forwards, and Luna stands between them and her daughter, summoning a magical barrier that gleams like moonlight. She berates the guards, and her ex-husband, tries to make them understand that someone else has cursed the princess, that the 'beast' is her daughter.

There is something manic in Radius's gaze when he declares that Luna must also be a beast in disguise, and she is also to be arrested.

There is a bright flash of light, and a loud clap of thunder, and rain begins to pour from the heavy clouds above, a tremor begins to worm its way through the ground. The bystanders begin to cry out in fear, and Cassandra steps forwards, motioning for a girl with long, oily black hair to join her.

Bloom and Nova help a dazed Stella to her feet as Cassandra and the girl begin to pound away at Luna's shield with their own magic. Something about their magic makes Bloom want to wretch.

Stella and Nova move to aid the queen with their magic, to give themselves time to figure things out, but only Nova's magic joins Luna's, Stella unable to draw even the slightest hint of her powers to the surface.

Bloom shivers in revulsion as something begins spilling through the air, the guards no longer divided, begin attacking the small group in earnest.

Luna turns and tells her daughter to escape, because there is clearly something afoot, and someone is targeting Stella. Stella refuses at first, but her mother tells her that staying wouldn't help anything. Stella tries to refuse a second time, saying she has no way to escape, they're surrounded and she can't use magic.

Bloom interrupts her this time, saying that Stella might not have her magic, but Bloom still does. Luna cuts in to remind her that any non-celestial magic used in this chamber will further destabilise the world. Bloom holds up her clenched hand so Luna can see the Ring around her finger, and tells the queen that she has celestial magic.

Nova smirks for a second before asking if Bloom can get them all out, but Bloom's frown lets her know that the red-head can't. Nova focuses more power into the shield and tell her to get Stella out of there.

Bloom flinches before putting a hand on Nova's shoulder and leaning close.

'We'll be back for you both.'

Slipping the ring from her finger, Bloom summons the Ring's staff form and pulls Stella close. Holding the other girl in a tight embrace, Bloom can feel Stella trembling.

She reaches out with her magic, seeking a safe place, and a worn path of sympathetic magic calls to her. Bloom sparks the magic the way Stella had shown her just a week ago, and it pulls both of them away in a flash of light.

Left behind beneath the shield, Luna tells Nova to get closer to her. The queen has a trick left to try, but the safe zone is going to be so slight, that she didn't dare try it while there was three of them to keep safe.

Nova transforms at the queen's behest, and Luna wraps herself around the young fairy, pulling her into an embrace like she would her own daughter. A silent shock wave explodes through the room, followed by an almost tangible wave of light.

When it dissipates, both fairies are gone.

Cassandra screeches furiously at the guards, demanding a search immediately. She is backed up by Radius, and the guards begin to organise.

In the air above, once Luna finishes telling her pilot to move their ship to a new, secret rendezvous spot, the pair of fleeing fairies discuss their plans. Luna plans to return to her Kingdom on Solaria's moon Celeste, she wants Nova to go with her, but Nova refuses.

The younger fairy claims to know the palace inside and out, having been friends with Stella for years. Something is clearly going on in the court, and they need to keep up on what is going on, who ever is responsible might think to block Luna's scrying abilities, but they can't block someone who is actually there.

The air crackles with lightening, causing both fairies to wince.

Realising they can't spend forever debating things, Luna reluctantly agrees to leave Nova behind to spy on the Court, and heads home to contact her daughter.

It is deep in the night when Stella and Bloom appear on the shores of Lake Roccaluce. Returning to the world they'd begun this most recent mission made both girls startle when they realised how little time had passed since Stella had shown up on Earth to pick up Bloom.

The realisation that so much had happened in less than a day, broke the tenuous thread holding both girls together, and they slide to the ground, crying. They've been shoving down all the panic and confusion and fear they'd been feeling on Andros, and in the Ceremonial Chamber on Solaria, and now they couldn't, all of it bubbling to the surface.

When Daphne appears moments later, they are still crying, and the ghostly fae is very concerned, she does her best to calm the girls enough for them to tell her what had happened.

When Bloom describes the strange man from Andros, Daphne stills, horror clear on her masked face.

'Valtor,' she whispers, repulsed and terrified. As the night slowly creeps towards morning, Daphne tells the girls of the wizard who had been responsible for not just the first Siege of Domino, but (she's certain though she has no proof) the loss of several of her Circle members in the years prior to it.

A wizard who had felt so wrong in the fabric of reality, that Daphne couldn't stand to be in the same room as him, but who had been obsessed with her.

A wizard from nowhere who claimed to be the son of the Ancestral Witches, and yet somehow wielded a single, corrupted spark of the Dragon Flame.

#winx #winx club #Winx Alt Con #Winx Alternative Continuity #Winx Alt Con season 03 #Win Alt Cn Week 21

8 notes · View notes

sole-cuore-amore-e-droga · 5 years

Text

Tel Aviv 2019: Straight outta France to Eurovision with king of controversy

youtube

T’was a good decision for the French televisions to make Destination Eurovision a thing for yet another year. Sure, I only end up having heard of only 1 name per year beforehand (Nassi from 2018 and Florina from 2019, additionally hearing music from one other act from each year but forgetting their names soon after!), but that doesn’t stop everyone else for me from showcasing their best. Heck, I have listened to quite a lot out of some of my Destination 2018 favourites and I have never had any idea who they were! (They were Masoe and Max Cinnamon, je suis absolutely NOT désolée.)

And honestly I found this year extremely much more better to care about. For the previous edition I ended up not caring for like 5 or more songs, because I spent more of my investment in the finalists. This year I pretty much cared about way many more songs, even those that I didn’t wound up liking THAT much. Seemone for example, AKA “the only best possible choice for France from those that don’t need to have big followship numbers to have fans for the song, unlike Bilal tsk tsk”. I can’t say I was 100% mesmerized with her song, but I do remember her more than June the Girl, which was quite a fan fave but also a disaster from 2018. Oh sorry, I mean, June the Who?

And of course Destination 2019 paved the way for some more exciting plot twists and turns, for example, two of the bigger fan favourites fizzling out in the semis (and I already lowkey discussed them on my other segment, Fanwank Assimilation), and another two lowkey favourites crashing and burning live (one of them sounding like she was drunk and scared, another one being less energetic than her song requires). What did that give out at the end? Why, nothing but a homosexual French-Morrocan social media starlet Bilal Hassani of course. Let’s go ahead and review his entry.

My first impression of this song turned me off a little because of how... poppy bland it sounded. Nothing against Madame Monsieur’s co-crafting (they did make a song I liked for last year’s Eurovision), it’s just that I think that I’m a person that’s looking more into pop songs with expectations full of excitement, but then getting something average at the end. The English lines in this are ‘reasonatable’(?) with though - it’s a self-empowerement against haters, telling to oneself that they’re the “king” (yes Bilal may be wearing wigs a lot but for the last time - HE DOES NOT IDENTIFY AS A SHE) and that they “can see [their] kingdom”.

Though it grew on me overtime, to the very point I couldn’t see anyone taking his way, not even Seemone, not even any other darkhorse of the comp. No. My organism was fully adapted to the fact Bilal will win, so I ended up there lowkey supporting his win, even if I wanted someone else deep inside. (Same for A Dal 2019 but my inner systems refused to bring myself to Joci possibly winning an A Dal again, though they saw it being a likely endgame... just in a different light of events, but more on the Hungarian writeup, buckle up for that one because there’ll be buckets of everything for that one! >:) ) That and Bilal was kind of a runaway choice considering France is huge and the jury in there can’t do shit if the televoting is valuated in stronger numbers than in Melodifestivalen (I mean, look at how many points did he get??? His telescore beat the televote’s runner-up’s one by 87 points!), so if he has that many fans in a big enough country then of course they were gonna flock to him massively, and ain’t no Eurofan can’t object against the French televote numbers like these. Though they might seem too big because last year Madame Monsieur won with 118 as opposed to the artist’s of a song’s they have co-written with him for this DESC 150. And the televote gap between the 1st and the 2nd was much more humble - 29.

Maybe it has had to do it with the fact that it has a pretty damn alright pop melody that doesn’t sound specifically written for an ESC NF (unlike most of stuff that’s been done by Ylva & Linda and the like)? Maybe it has got to do with the golden hands of both Madame Monsieur members (pretty sure it might have just been Jean-Karl) touching upon this track (and some randomer whose name I don’t remember rn and I don’t want to? idk)? Maybe it’s the state of Bilal’s studio voice capabilities that carry this across for me nicely enough? Maybe it’s the persona? Somehow I don’t think I know but I’ll probably choose the first option. This is listenable, yes. Flows through like a normal pop song would. Maybe would have needed some polishing in some places (for that exists an up-and-coming revamp that will only be revealed on rehearsals (youhou Moldova 2014), but actually I only think that it will impact the song in a way that it will now be in F minor rather than F sharp minor?? So that Bilal could avoid being one of those kind of people that did sth like this:

RETWEET IF YOU CAN HEAR THIS PICTURE

Anyways. For all that it is, I savour it, it’s pretty decent, it stands out with its message if you know what it is (a kiss-off of the haters that once doubted this “roi”), I kind of like the way it’s being sung (and that vocal variation at 1:21) and some of the lyrics are not that bad actually, and for the matter of fact, I’d DIE for a possibility to create a song like this at best; I don’t quite know if it can do as well as his fanbase imagines, but I really hope it at least doesn’t do France dirty for choosing its up-and-coming-ish social media icon over the NF acts that I’ll be going off about a little later and brings a savourable result! I cannot remove my like for this song now that the deed is done, period. And I really hope that someday all this outrageousness over Bilal in a bad way will be stopped because poor 19 year old, let him be whatever sexuality he wants to be as of now, let him have his fans, let him wear those wigs, and keep those upcoming TV series about a terrorist man with an intent to blow up Eurovision in Israel (or something like that) at bay. Not to mention, these nasty caricatures. I definitely did not like seeing them. I legit feel like we’re almost talking about Lithuanian situation and what do my country’s citizens think about gay rights and all that (spoiler alert: they’re not friendly towards them). Stop it, get some help.

Oh and I know this is essentially 2,5-ish months late now but can I adress something real quick before finishing off this review and moving down to my chance-o-meters and all? Pretty please?

To all the Nightcore lyric videos of “Roi” that did this and would still do this:

Please consider looking back at the official lyric video for “Roi”, where it says:

and thank me in advance.

Not can’t, can. No wonder he’s a “roi”, ffs. What would be a king who cannot see his kingdom now? I’m sorry but this is just lowkey absurd, ngl.

Anyway:

Approval factor: As of the time I’m finishing this, I sort of approve it for now. The big dilemma though is to where do I rank this big boy - do I think it deserves to go higher than UK or lower? Do I drown it in the bottom 3 just because I had a rather negative first impression for it? God knows. For now though I’ll aprove it and carry on, dreading for the revamp obliterating some of the song’s charm that I had for it, just like maybe for Spain.

Follow-up factor: I think it is quite of a stepdown, considering last year a lot of guys publicly ADORED “Mercy”, and Madame Monsieur didn’t even need to have a huge social media following just to get that far as to win Destination! Bilal, however, did, and most people didn’t even fancy his self-empowerement ‘anthem’. And so did I at first, and eventhough I kind of like it as of now, I still prefer “Mercy” big time. France for the kings of controversial song topics and controversial entrants!

Big 5 factor: at the end of the day, you cannot change the fact that most of the Bilal fans are definitely centered in France (and maybe in some outskirts in Belgium as well) and not around Europe, especially the first time viewers, boo. So Bilal’s memorability levels in there from a Big 5 country will be questionable, unless his massive-ass French fandom decides to mass-emigrate for a week, get some foreign Simcards and start spamming votes for their idol - that’s a guaranteed televote for a guaranteed low jury vote, and if high any-votes are any indicators for where things are heading (like for Poland 2016 for instance), then Bilal will finish decently, but without any high-votes, he’ll be stuck in a low-low, maybe somewhere in the bottom 10. Sorry if you’re reading this, any remaining Bilal fans on Tumblr... you better get ready for your mass emigration for a week then?

NATIONAL FINAL BONUS

Destination’s memes are still glorious to look at, even if it feels like it’s been years since them, considering my social media timeline does not have all that many of them remaining, BUT we still got some highlights from them saved and I can’t wait to freshen up the minds of the mutuals that seemed to have forgotten them. As well as some note-worthy NF songs that the others won’t get the chance to see because only one can represent France and Bilal can’t stand in for any other ones but himself, cuz he is he, and you know he’ll always be. Let’s go:

• Silvàn Areg, probably the biggest underdog-turned-overdog-overnight act of them all out there. Back when his song was still “Le petit Nicolas” (it was changed to “Allez leur dire” thanks to copyright turmoil with some book’s publisher - no it wasn’t about Le petit prince, there ARE Le petit Nicolas stories in there), I don’t think anyone really saw THAT much potential in this song to stand out, maybe except a few select others? I mean who’d even DARE to support this upbeat guitar French-like tune that... has cartooney visuals on stage and that way wows the viewing audience??? NO WAY!!! Yeah these visuals made me truly forget this was one of the songs that didn’t come out in full release yet (as of DESC 2019, only 3 songs weren’t released in full yet, along with The Divaz and Doutson (the latter dragged his kid on stage for his performance BTW, maybe that kid liked Silvàn’s stage illustrations despite maybe not seeing them the way they were supposed to be viewed?) and enjoy the king of popup-book visuals taking it away. So much so I ended up rooting for both visuals AND the song during the final as well (and the final had the colouring book painted!). Don’t you love it when your fave has an impeccable staging AND can nail their performance as well? I sure do... Click to find out his performance serve. I stan men who can sometimes rap out of nowhere when necessary and unexpected.

• Looking for typical French chansons/ballads that make you think of how longsome and melancholic (with a hint of happiness) can things be? Look no further than aforementioned Seemone and her alive-father-ballad, “Tous les deux”. If you’re not here for all this French zany, you can sit back and relax with hearing this piano delight with Adele-ish vocals on top and the paternal gratitude intertwined in the lyrics... well duh, if the constant repetition of “PAPAAAAAA” in the bridge doesn’t give it away for you, an unassumer, then idk what does. Noir, compelling, heart-wrenching, stunning, solid and all that it is. For all the ballad lovers out there. Hope her father’s proud of her achievements (for what did she do is to take the Eurofans by storm against this inevitable Bilal-ness with her feelings-over-fireworks and her strenght to carry out this beauty without crying... in the NF final at least, making International juries side with her more than Bilal, for whom we firstly thought it was over until 150 televotes, even getting the Bjorkdaddy on her side in the semis... only to never win the televoting as hoped to (Bilal was in a different semi so another man won over the girl, while in the final Seemone was 3rd and voted just under another experienced artists and Bilal obviously) and just remain the jury darling) and will hold this song up to himself dearly. We love supportive and thankful children <3

youtube

• This 25 year old chanteuse/violinist Gabriella Laberge, hailing all the way from Canada but with a passionate love to France probably ever since performing in La voix (je t'aime nuit et jour), I mean, The Voice France 2016, dived head-first into the social interraction game, with being all-round positive with her supporters, retweeting their stuff, liking their posts, being in groupchats... she did all she could. And the international jury still let her flop big time. Probably they were too underwhelmed at how engaging her entry, “On cherche encore (Never Get Enough)”, was on the big stage, with Gabriella out there, rocking her yellow pantsuit and dancing on top of a rectangle with other cello-or-contra-bass player madames inside of it and stairs to get on top of that rectangle besides the rectangle. Oh and playing the piano at the beginning. Were they afraid she was gonna fall off the rectangle with her musical ‘gun’ the next time? Was it the show opening that startled her chances (as people are afraid that the same will happen to Srbuk in Eurovision 2019)? I don’t know, but for one that I know is the fact that the poor woman was robbed to the core for all the friendliness she radiated. And the violin lady realness she delivered. Here’s now hoping her strong friendship ties with Olivier Dion will persuade him to fly to France from Canada next for a Destination Eurovision adventure, then? (tbh he’s pretty decent!)

• UH-OH! GIVE A LITTLE RESPECT for The Divaz! Seen by me as a little bit of those girlies that will definitely be drowned in the results because of their... aura and decision of paying a tribute to the late Aretha Franklin, I was shooketh to the core when I saw them NAIL “La voix d’Aretha”... the passion, the drive, the energy, the sass, the style, the dresses, THEM VOCALS! Needless to say I got incredibly sold and even more so happy I was interested in hearing that song all along beforehand, so much I think I tried skipping our own NF over just to see these gurls S-L-A-Y! Hopefully this ain’t the last of them together, they’re a true cool bunch. Happy to see that the international juries saw something in them!

• Emmanuel Moire... now, his song “La promesse” is even more so boring sounding imo and would do less of an impression if people didn’t know the message of it, but the message (and his status in the French music skies), boy does it shine. He sings about making a promise to stay true to himself and not be afraid to admit that his heart beats... FOR A MAN! And where is the Eurofan community that denounces a ballad unless it’s gay?? Some happen to still denounce gay ballads too, but only if it comes to NFs apparently :F I applaud for this song existing tbh as I find it nice myself. Such a shame the man couldn’t really sell his song THAT strong enough though, as I couldn’t help but crack a smile at hearing his falsettos go terribly off, but still feeling sorry for the guy. His staging (that has two men playing around, further going for his song’s memo) and the fact that he beat Seemone in televoting due to his bigger status than the rest of the most other DESC participants this year (save for Chimène Badi which has a status as big as his?). And this one moment that made me feel like I’m looking at Malena Ernman’s true form:

• So how about these few other bedazzling NF flops in a little bit of blitz summary, seemingly as the paragraphs here are already going out of hand? Sure! Allow me to introduce y’all to the shy French Mélovin named Ugo who was tryna get to the spotlight all by himself with a song about... crushing I think (he’s fantasizing of meeting a gal in some interesting interesting ways), but tanked majorly live due to being nervous and letting the pre-recorded backings overwhelm him majorly. Then comes the other up-and-coming chanteuse Florina which I also talked about in the fanwank flops section (though I published it right after Spain’s NF because I had enough of THAT rattling around my drafts... and same goes for the rest of my 2019 reviews!) but I’ll put up a mention for her because I undercooked my thoughts for her. “In the Shadow” - studio god-tier that sadly reeked of “Chandelier” heavily and another NF underperformance that grew condescencing during the rehearsal-snippets period that maybe made people keep their hopes up during it just like for Rykka’s, Jana Burčeska’s and Sennek’s odd pre-party performances. Who knows if Michela would have followed them suit if she was allowed to attend all the pre-parties despite “rehearsals”! In the end we still got a lackluster performance and a total 0 point score from the international juries. Wow. I hope that didn’t scar her for life. Also worth a mention are Battista Acquaviva, the Basque-singing goddess that had some sort of a potential but heavily crushed it by sounding weak and a bit drunk even (or even similar to this) on her own performance + adding some Roman-esque shirtless hunks for no reason (sweetie if they didn’t work for Anggun then what’s the point saving your live with them? Unless you can mask it up like Demy, just leave), and the other studio fave that tanked that was Tracy de Sá who served a French-Spanish (!! that’s where the title came from, you really thought the song was gonna b called “Par ici” noooo) summer bop with her rapping skills on fleek and her desire for “whiskey cocktails rum rum rum” as a cherry on this delightful cocktail has also got really grinded down by her live performance where she was barely even enthusiastic to live up to her own song and maybe have needed some of those liquors she offered on the song to make it sound better. But hey, at least from Tracy we got 1) studio version leak drama that obviously affected the poor sis so hard she raged about it on Instagram a bit; 2) slapping track about parties n stuff for our own summer 2019; 3) her own little version of that notorious song which wouldn’t probably be remembered so fondly in the memedom if not for some mother’s pasta dish; 4) the light tunnel she emerged from at the beginning of the song during her performance, which in reality is just the NF arena exit tunnel; 5) this meme:

Yeah well, good luck at your hairbuns and your hoop-de-hoop ‘rings trying to save you this time

• I was also gonna add this interesting phenomena of “hot violinist guy” because of course I remember this hype being set up for some dudes (especially for THAT violinist. I remember almost everyone suddenly crushing on him but I couldn’t care enough to buy it because lol!) even without their song coming out to public - yes I’m talking of Lautner who obviously also tanked during their live performance of this song but the international juries loved the shit out of it (same for aforementioned Ugo... and mind you I wrote them down as sure NQs after seeing their carcrash performances live! To think they would have almost MADE it thanks to them and SHATTER my predictions???) and their bromance probably lived on... for another 15 minutes

And the ‘drunken auntie’ of someone’s that sang a rather underrated catchy spring-esque sunflowery song but completely ruined it by her awkward jumping around in red suit on stage, PhilipElise, but that’d require me to brief my thoughts upon like nearly all of the damn roster of the irrelevants, so it’s best if I forget all the rest and move on!

• Not to mention, Bilal himself is a highlight. On an occasion he’s such a mood, as demonstrated on this first biggest ESC 2019 NF season meme down here:

And keep in mind, that wasn’t the final. But for the final this happened, which is still as amusing as the first:

Epic hairspin! Laura Rizzotto wishes she remembered this technique just in time to engage some more audience so that they could at least pull her out of the NQ zone.

• Who cannot forget the occasional thought of Garou, the NF’s host, singing. This year he was one of the final’s interval acts, and his choice to sing was because of honouring a Frenchman who passed away not so long before the DESC broadcast. Truly the dedication <3

youtube

• One of those NF cases that had people rallying up against Eurovision being in Tel Aviv and withdrawing the broadcasters from it by their own force because “well fuck you, our feelings and sentiments towards Palestine are more important than this schlager-ridden shitshow musicfest!!” lolno. Some protesters came on stage sometime after Netta’s guest performance during Semifinal 2, and both Garou and the security guards did their best and hardest to chase them away, but some still got on shot because reasons. This is ridiculous (as much as it was when it was found out that some people in Spain were waiting outside RTVE’s headquarters before the OT 2019 ESC Gala just to make THEIR move) and thankfully it didn’t follow on many more NFs to come.

youtube

• oh and also the neon cube argh

Feels like a way larger post than I intended to, and this review is waaaaay long overdue, so at least I tried reminding you of the memes, didn’t I? Anyway, I wish Bilal for all the best in Tel Aviv! xx

#eurovision 2019 #tel aviv 2019 reviews #france 2019 #bilal hassani #roi #france

3 notes · View notes

udnursingsa2019 · 6 years

Text

Final Blog

As I sit on the plane at 4AM eating my Aero bar (a South African delicacy), tiny moments of the last five weeks keep popping into my head. I think about entering JFK airport feeling nauseous and anxious about leaving the country for so long, seeing familiar faces but not having a clue if I would become close friends with any of them. I think about arriving to the Team House at Noordhoek and being greeted with Jeremy’s speech — he told us we could not save Africa but if we could make a difference in one person’s life, we are doing something worthwhile. I think about being apprehensive for the first clinic day expecting to feel a little lost, until I realized the sisters are some of the kindest people ever and are so willing to teach/ask for help at the same time. I think about the look of pure joy on a group of teenage girls’ faces after some peers and I taught sex/relationship-education at school — they’d always had the questions but never had the opportunity to talk to someone to get the answers, and seeing that we made some of that difference makes my heart warm. And I think about the town Soweto, and a celebration between two different cultures as we sat in a circle with local adults and had a productive conversation about the effects of apartheid and global politics, and afterwards we had a dance party. It’s that “connected” feeling that makes me think we have been making positive impacts on the people we’ve met because the people of South Africa have absolutely touched our hearts forever. Many of them live by the phrase “Ubuntu” which means “I am because we are” — they learned it from the animals who work together as packs — I think that just shows the full circle of how Africa is the one of the best places on earth.

Our last night was difficult but cathartic and necessary. After our last delicious safari dinner we all went around in a circle and stated our roses (our favorite parts of the trip), our thorns (least favorite) and our buds (what we can grow from). Many of the roses included the community days where we bonded with people of all ages and helped out in schools or kitchens/workshops, such as the reusable pads training day where we got to work together with so many women. Others mentioned the Soweto township day or their best experience in clinical (like when Carly V. and Sara delivered a baby and placenta!), and some mentioned their favorite excursions like skydiving. Thorns were when things got emotional — sometimes it’d be something funny like treacherously hiking Table Mountain or getting a stomach bug, but others rightfully wanted to let out emotions about something they’d seen in clinical that they wish they could’ve done more for, such as the group that experienced the death of a preterm baby born at home who probably would have lived if the clinic had the appropriate resources. Other thorns included the guilt we feel when we realize how privileged many of our lives are, and the overwhelming lack of knowing what to do in response when we see how many people need help. I believe this trip made many of us second-guess our career choices and what we want to make of our lives; for certain this trip has inspired lots of us to give back more and if we can’t go back to Africa and help the people there, there are ways we can help at home. Many of us turned our thorns into buds because lots of the bad things we experience are ways to make us grow. But lots of us also mentioned for buds the friends we have made and just the beauty of the world and all the people in it, as we have seen the strength in the people of South Africa as well as the strength in each other. I have made lots of new friendships that I have no doubt will last throughout our last semester and post-graduation. Though we’re a group with a bunch of different personality traits, we bring out the best in each other and have such a fun dynamic that never gets old — I can’t count the amount of long car rides and late nights (even though we would wake up at the crack of dawn almost every day) spent talking and laughing for hours on end with my new friends. It really is so special to have these meaningful bonds during our last year as nursing students, because we need each other!

There are many people worthy of “thank you’s” and I will start with ourselves, because we were the ones who decided to apply to go to South Africa and had the courage to actually go through with it, and for me it was the best decision I’ve ever made. Thank you to my peers for making this trip so meaningful and unforgettable, through all the laughs and tears. I really am so proud of everyone for making this the best experience possible and constantly lifting each other up. And I’d also like to thank my parents and all the other parents who allowed us to go on the trip (we know it wasn’t easy) and helped out with some expenses.

I’d like to give a shout-out to our drivers, Roy and Sibusisu, who turned out to be more than drivers — they became friends. We will miss Roy’s sarcastic sense of humor and charm, and we’ll miss Sibu’s quiet, sweet presence. They are two of the most hardworking men and seriously deserve a medal for boundlessly dealing with 30 21-year-old girls!

Rowan and Bari have also been blessings to us — we wouldn’t have survived the trip if it weren’t for their constant direction, reliability and support. Rowan made sure everything went smoothly at all times and was in a tough position to be TA as a senior; we give her lots of credit for all she could help us with through her L&D/cultural knowledge and experience. Bari has been an inspiration to all of us, as she’s lived, worked and volunteered in South Africa before and we can see first-hand how wonderful of a human being she is/has become through her experiences. So thank you guys!

Lisa — thank you for making this trip happen and for being willing to take so many of us — I know it’s not easy to lug 30 students to another continent. I give you so much praise for making this trip happen year after year, building upon what you’ve learned from past trips but always introducing new ideas. You have always been someone we can look up to and this trip further proved how you truly inspire us to be the people/nurses that we want to be — not what a structured nursing program/basic American society tells us to be. You’ve taught us to follow our guts and our dreams and that life is too short to only do one kind of job in a place we don’t feel we’re thriving. You also have successfully spread the word about Mother Nature and natural childbirth — I would trust any of us to teach about or facilitate a physiologic birth and it’s all thanks to you.

And last but not least, thank you to Jeremy. When I met Jeremy, I had heard good things and he seemed nice and cool and funny, but I didn’t really think anything would come of him being there besides being our tour guide. But he was so much more than that. He became a close friend to many of us. He worked towards making this trip a life-changing, monumental experience for everyone. If it wasn’t for him, we wouldn’t be able to dig deeper and work to find the meaningful takeaways behind all the experiences we’ve had. He encouraged the group to really spend time together and support each other, because he knew we’d need it. He was a shoulder to cry on when we had a hard day, and a person to run to when we had a funny story because his laugh can just make our day. His life story and his presence are so uplifting that he’s touched each and every one of us and has inspired us all to be ourselves, make good choices that build our ultimate destiny, and cut out all negativity. Thank you for making us all better people, Jer. We truly will never forget you and can’t wait for you to come to the U.S. one day.

Now we’re all exhausted with puffy eyes from crying either last night or at the airport saying bye to Jeremy, but we’re excited to see our families.....and not quite ready to go to school in just a few days. Luckily we have a whole group of us to lift one another up during this period of post-study-abroad depression, but after a few weeks our lives will probably return to normal. So we must continue for weeks, months, years down the road to remember what it felt like to be in Africa, reflect upon the connections we built, and never forget the lessons we learned. We’re back in America, but Africa has never left us.

- Annie Sienrukos <3

2 notes · View notes

jaybirdxarsenal · 6 years

Text

A Series of Fortunate Events (Jason Todd x Reader)

Words: 1.6k. Masterlist

Warnings: cursing, short reader, car accident

Permanent tag: @jasonsredhoodie, @fangirlnova, @thelittlestsnart (If you want to be tagged don’t hesitate to tell me)

New city, new people. Gotham was a new experience to you and even though everyone told you how to not take that internship because there are really big chances for you to get kidnapped, raped, tortured and of course, killed; you didn't wanted to waste one hell of an opportunity. You thought in destiny and if it's written to die, you can die anywhere, even in the most peaceful place on Earth, not necessarily in Gotham.

As a person, you were a little bit clumsy. A little bit more. All you wanted to do was to finish college and have a nice job that is pretty good paid. You never dreamed of being a millionaire or having a prince as a boyfriend, only because your insecurities never let you.

The entire plane ride you tried to take a nap, but it was impossible because a child was screaming his lungs out that he wants to meet his hero, Batman. When someone told him that it might never happen he cried the whole road.''I'm struggling with anxiety and depression, I should be the one screaming.'' You thought.

Your plane finally landed in Gotham, after a few hours of pure torture that made reconsider having any children. You couldn't be more tired, but still very excited. You were supposed to stay in Gotham's University campus and you had no clue where the hell is that. You had the map on your phone as every human being who owns a phone, but it was impossible to hold your phone in your hand. You were good at multitasking, but you had a suitcase in one hand, a backpack, some books you bought from the airport in the other hand.

With a huge smile on your face you couldn't be more excited for this new experience. People in Gotham seemed very sad in your opinion, and even the city itself gave you a negative vibe. But you knew that even this city must have a bright side, just like everything does.

As your mother taught you since you were little, you were sure to watch out for cars even though the lights show green. You tried to look on Google Maps on your phone while holding the books under your armpit, while crossing the street. Yeah, you're smart, but not that smart apparently.

Out of nowhere, a black SUV came out of nowhere and you didn't even had the time to process what was happening. You felt pain in your right arm and you tried your best to get up from the ground as the impact with the car wasn't really strong, but it was strong enough to let a bruise on you.

''Of my fucking God, are you fucking kidding me?'' You heard a masculine voice. ''I fucking hit a deer, Roy.'' Jason said as he got out of the car. ''Shit! It's not a deer, it's a fucking girl! Fuck! Are you okay?'' The owner of the car, you assumed, asked.

''I'm okay. I'm fine.'' You said trying to fix your hair.

''I didn't even saw her, okay?! She is small. I'll call you later, bye!'' He hung up on his friend, Roy, as you tried to pick up your books but the pain in your arm didn't allowed you to do that.

''I'm so sorry! I swear I didn't saw you.'' He picked up your books and handed them to you.

''My arm hurts pretty bad, I can't hold it.'' You explained.

''Shit, shit! Right! I'm sorry! Let's go to the hospital to check that arm. I hope it's not bad.''

''It's okay, I won't sue you.'' You said, thinking that it doesn't hurt that bad so it's probably just a bruise. Plus, he came to check on you, he didn't just ran away like some would do.

''Oh, well, then I think can leave. It was nice meeting you!'' He joked.

''Yet. I won't sue you yet.'' You winked at him and he gave you a smirk. Look at you! He just hit you with his car and you're flirting with him.

He took your stuffs in the back of his car and helped you get into the car as well. You couldn't help but notice that he was hella good looking and for a moment you thought that even though you got hit by a car, at least it was a God driving it. You really are a positive person.

''I really didn't saw you. You're pretty small.'' He said once again, with his bright blue eyes fixed on you. You looked at your brand new books (that weren't looking as new as they were half an hour ago) when you bought them, avoiding eye contact.

''Well, you're pretty much a giant with a giant car, even if I was tall it would be impossible to see me.'' He laughed, making your round cheeks rosy.

The entire road to the hospital you talked about books mostly, you never thought that a guy who is so intimidating and handsome reads so many books. He is actually really smart and you like the same type of books. Jason didn't wanted to reveal more than his name and his love for books about himself, but for you it was enough. At least for now.

At the hospital he sat by your side the hole time. He listened carefully to the doctor as he took care of your arm, that was going to be just fine in about two or three weeks. He paid for the medication and consult and offered to drive you to campus, so no car would hit you again.

''It was a pleasure meeting you, [Y/N]! Even though it would've been nicer to meet you under less painful circumstances.'' He said as you got close to the campus.

''It was a pleasure as well. It's okay, don't worry! It's gonna heal soon and after all, we are in Gotham.'' You said, but it was totally different from what you were really thinking. ''You can hit me anytime with your car if that means I get to spend time with you and stare at your perfect face when you're not looking.''

''Yeah, but I still feel a little awful.''

''I'm going to be just fine. At least I can still write with my other hand.''

''You're a positive person, aren't you?''

''I'm trying. I was negative before and I still am sometimes, but in my entire life negativity only pushed me back. So yeah, I'm trying to be positive.''

''That's really good. I'd like to be positive.''

''And why aren't you?''

''I've been through a lot.''

''I understand. But that doesn't mean you can't be positive. I guess it depends on the people you have around you as well. Look at me, positive with no friends. Not like I had friends before or something.'' He chuckled at your words.

''You're funny! Do you mind giving me your number? I just want to check on you until your arm heals.''

Accidentally, your eyes met his. ''Could you be less intimidating?'' You spoke before thinking.

''What?'' He replied confused.

''Well...I...I can give you my n-number. If you want!'' You tried to not show the fact that you were dying inside and you wanted to get hit by a train this time, only to forget how stupid you can be.

''That would be great!'' He laughed.

You typed down your number in his phone before he stopped the car.

''Take care of you, Jason!''

''You too. Bye!''

''Bye!''

You really regretted stepping out of the car and saying goodbye. Yes, he had your number, but maybe he asked for it only because he wanted to be polite, not because he has any desire in calling or texting you. You really liked Jason and even though you knew that he is too good looking for you, he has a lot of best friend potential and you wouldn't mind for him to be only your friend.

All you wanted to do was for time to stop in that car, so you can spend more time with him. You felt deep inside that you two understood each other in a weird way. Jason Todd was like an enigma that you wanted really bad to solve. You wanted to know more about him, to get to know him better.

When you got into your room you tried to stop thinking about him by doing anything else. You didn't had any roommate so that was the best thing that could've happened to you (except for getting hit by a car and meeting the love of your life). You started to organize your things but you weren't even halfway when you got bored. You laid in the bed doing what you're best at. Making scenarios that will never happen. In less than 5 minutes you already had two beautiful children with Jason.

When your phone vibrated on the bed your heart began beating faster, hoping that the reason is the one and only Jason Todd. You were a little bit scared to check your phone, you were scared that it wasn't him. But it was.

''I hope no car hit you on your way to your room.''

You laughed and you typed hundreds of words and deleted them, trying to find the best sentence to answer him. ''Should I ask him how he's doing?'' You asked yourself. ''Yeah. He'll ask me how I am doing and then we'll talk more.''

''Haha, no. But tomorrow is another day, so maybe then a car will hit me again. How are you?''

''No way! That job it's already taken by me. I'm good, how are you?''

''Told ya.'' You said to yourself.

''I'm a little hungry, I have to find a place to eat.''

''Well, good for you that I know the best place to eat in Gotham.''

#jason todd #jason todd x reader #jason todd x y/n #jason todd x you #red hood #y/n #you #fanfiction #imagine #bad jokes #shy reader #red hood x reader #red hood x y/n #red hood x you #jaybirdxarsenal

219 notes · View notes

artificialqueens · 6 years

Text

Is Grey a Color? [Biadore]

In a world filled with color, most people were black and white from birth. The only way to see color permanently was to touch your soulmate. There were a few cases in the world where someone was seeing color from the start, but it was rare. There were also people on the opposite side of the specter. About 1:100 000 was born without a soulmate, and about 1:10 000 000 were born with a soulmate who didn’t reciprocate it.

Every newborn was given a pair of glasses with special abilities, making them able to see color while they wore them. This was so that they could learn the colors from an early age. You had the choice of purchasing new pairs until you were 20 years old, when you would get free glasses that was supposed to fit for the rest of your life. Demented people who had forgotten that their partner had died, was usually given permanent lenses, as the suicidal rate used to be high amongst the people losing their colors.

And if you had told Roy Haylock that he had a soulmate, he would have laughed you in the face. He was too much of a cold-hearted person to have a soulmate. Who would want to be with him anyway? He was just a drag queen who was an insult comedian. Even though sexuality was a thing, it did happen that your soulmate was of opposite gender than which you were attracted to. This was usually quite a problem, as those soulmates often chose to remove their soulbonds.

Roy didn’t really have a preference, so he supposed he would be fine no matter what happened. If he even had one.

“Why am I thinking so much about fucking soulmates?” he murmured to himself as he packed his bags. He removed his glasses for a moment, and wiped his forehead. It just didn’t make sense; it wasn’t something he was used to thinking about. This was going to be one his most important weeks of his life, he didn’t have time for thinking about soulmates.

He put on his glasses again and looked inside his bags and trunks again. Everything had to be perfect before he went to RuPaul’s Drag Race and show everyone who Bianca was and show off her ability to win the whole fucking thing.

He zipped everything shut and walked to his car, driving to the location he was sent. He checked into the hotel, they told him that he would be escorted by someone to the location, and that everyone left at different times so that they wouldn’t accidentally meet the other queens.

With a sigh he went to bed, setting the alarm clock so that he would be ready for the next day. After going into some of his best drag, he went down to the reception to see a man waiting for him. He checked the clock on the wall, sighing with relief when he realized that he was on time for once.

She went into the werk room, grinning and posing. “Well, well, well,” he started with a slight smirk. “I hope your bitches are ready!” When she got no response, she took of her colored sunglasses to see that she was the first one. “Am I the first one…? Great.”

Bianca was not ecstatic to be the first one, at least hoping that she would be second or third. It was so awkward to be alone in the werk room. She put on her glasses again briefly to see all of the colors in the room. She made slight notice of the mess at one of the table, wondering what the hell had happened. She brushed it off and decided to try and be funny as she walked to a seat. “Drag queen who’s early – that never fucking happens,” she said, pressing her lips together. As she passed the messy table, she made a comment about how it looked like a party.

All of the greetings went well, and Bianca was a bit relieved that she didn’t see color after touching anyone. It was easy to recognize which queens who could see color, as they didn’t show up with glasses as they walked in. Almost everyone used glasses as they came to new places, and this was no exception. However, it was prohibited to touch new people without your glasses, just in case you met your soulmate.

The only people with color were Joslyn and Magnolia. Bianca was quite happy that she had no chance of bonding with them, as she found them quite annoying. It didn’t help that Magnolia had a nose contoured so much that she could flip pages with it.

When RuPaul announced that they were not the first seven girls to arrive, Bianca was a bit stunned, however determined to not let it affect her. She knew she was good enough to stay, especially if it was a sewing challenge.

Luckily for her it was, and on top of it all, she even got one of the boxes she wanted. It actually went so well that she won the first challenge. Magnolia ended up being the one to go home, and Bianca honestly wasn’t that sad to see her leave. One less bitch to beat. Bitches.

They walked back into the werk room, chatting with each other. That was when they noticed that they weren’t the only ones. The other queens were there too. “Oh, fuck,” Bianca thought. “Look at these whores,” she said, noticing how the other girls glared slightly at them after her comment.

She greeted most of the queens, intentionally avoiding the crazy bitch with the green hair. Laganja or some fucking shit like that. She also avoided her best friend, not keen on getting to know either of them.

“So,” Courtney looked at them. “Are any of you color?” She smiled at the other girls, who all shook their heads.

“Any of you?” a queen with dark hair and zebra stripes asked. When Joslyn nodded, she squealed. “Ooh, how exciting!”

“Yeah, but I still wear glasses, simply because I am nearsighted. It sometimes is a disadvantage. Most people assume that I’m not bonded, but these don’t even have color abilities,” Joslyn sighed.

The next challenge went as expected, Bianca knew she was quite strong theatrically when it came to humor. However, in the silver lounge, she became one of the topics when Adore said to the whole group that she wouldn’t want to work with Bianca.

“You wouldn’t work with me?” Bianca asked with a slight frown, for some reason disappointed. She didn’t even like the girl, so why the fuck would she care that she wouldn’t work with her?

“No I wouldn’t. Like, the energy that I get from you is very, like, fierce competition, like,” Adore started saying before Bianca interrupted her.

“Oh, isn’t that what we’re here for?” she said seriously, but after noticing how the other queens reacted she played it off as a joke.

Adore kept on telling her why she wouldn’t work with her, and Bianca just rolled her eyes.

“Oh, I, well… What’s your name again?” Bianca asked, trying to hold back a smile. The comment obviously affected the young queen.

Luckily they didn’t have to sit there much longer, as RuPaul called for them to come back. Noticing that Adore was in the bottom three, Bianca smirked for herself. The only thing that would make it better was if the other girl lip-synced for her life. Or even better - went home.

When they went back to the werk room and some of the girls from the other group started doing crazy shit, Bianca noticed that she really despised most of them. Mostly Gia, Adore and Laganja. They were annoying as hell, and Bianca couldn’t wait for them to go home.

Being fishy or unpolished was not going to win this competition. Neither was putting on a mask and being annoying as hell. Fortunately, she didn’t have to work with neither Adore nor Laganja in the Rusical. She was stuck with Gia, but she would manage. Luckily she was with both Courtney and BenDeLaCreme, who both killed it on stage. Bianca was safe, and she supposed that was good enough, seeing that she wasn’t a singer.

Seeing Adore being one of the top three girls together with Dela and Courtney kind of annoyed her. At least she was critiqued for not cinching her waist, which was satisfying. This was the second week in a row where she was called out for being unpolished.

Snatch game turned out to be quite the turning point for Bianca, both positively and negatively. Adore was actually quite talented, while Laganja got progressively more on her nerves the whole week. At first when she was seated next to Adore, she got quite annoyed. Didn’t Ru see that they weren’t friends?

However, pretty much everything changed drastically for Bianca. They started joking with each other, and Adore was pretty funny, much to her surprise. After the challenge they walked together into the werk room, still laughing and playing around with each other. Bianca smiled at her. “You did really, really good,” she admitted. “You’re actually quite a fun person.”

Adore grinned at her and pulled her into a hug, and Bianca gasped once they touched. She hadn’t even realized that they hadn’t touched previously, but she certainly did now. When she pulled away, she saw Adore’s green eyes, and she swallowed. Adore was her soulmate. Then she started frowning, Adore didn’t act any different. Was it possible that she was one of those who got a soulmate who didn’t reciprocate? Bianca felt really disappointed but smiled at her.

“So,” she had to ask, just to be sure. “What do you think about the whole soulmate thing?”

“Well, it’s no big deal,” Adore shrugged. “I’m fine with black and white vision. Don’t need colors all the time after all. You?”

Bianca sighed. “I think it’s a bunch of bullshit,” she said. “Especially for those who has soulmates who doesn’t reciprocate.” Adore was quite oblivious, so of course she didn’t catch on to what Bianca was implying. She got out of drag wordlessly, still endlessly disappointed. Even though she didn’t even want a soulmate.

During the rest of the day and night, Roy couldn’t stop thinking about Adore. He wondered what her real name was. She was one of the only queens that he hadn’t even bothered to learn the name of. He couldn’t sleep, feeling a pull in his chest. Roy needed to touch Adore, and he wanted to keep him to himself. It absolutely killed him to know that Adore didn’t feel the same way.

As to not reveal that he could see colors to the others, he wore a pair of fake glasses the next day. The color glasses weren’t good to use on top of already colored vision, as it dulled the colors majorly. He walked into the werk room with the others, still thinking about Adore.

Roy heard Adore talking about something like ‘hog body’, and he knew that he had to help him. He had an extra cincher after all. When Adore walked past, he called for him.

“Adore!” he called.

“Yes, baby?” Adore walked over to his desk, and Roy felt butterflies all over his body at the term.

“If you don’t want to get yelled at by Michelle, because didn’t she say last time that you needed to be cinched?” he asked.

“Yeah,” Adore said, running his tongue along his upper lip. Roy couldn’t look away, and tried to convince himself that that wasn’t arousing at all.

“I, and don’t tell anybody that I’m being kind,” he said. “But I have another cincher if you want me to lace you in it.” He finished the sentence with a small chuckle.

“I’m down,” Adore smiled, and Roy felt like grinning. He got to touch him again.

“Okay, we’ll do it,” he said hastily, as to not reveal that he was absolutely head over heels attracted to the boy.

Roy removed his hat and his glasses, breathing up onto his face. Interacting with Adore made him giddy and nervous, and he noticed that he was sort of stressing. Not even noticing that he forgot to put on his glasses again, he started doing everything that had to be done to transform himself into Bianca.

“Bianca!” Courtney called from across the room, making Bianca turn her head to face her. “Why didn’t you tell us that you’re colored? Are you trying to keep it a secret?”

Bianca frowned and looked confused for a moment. How did they know? Then she realized that she had done her whole look without glasses. She chuckled nervously. “It’s complicated,” Bianca said. “I’ve been wearing glasses to correct… uhm… my farsightedness. I just don’t think that it’s anyone’s business if I’m bonded or not.”

She hoped that no one could see through her lies, noticing that some of the girls gave her sympathetic looks. They had probably all concluded that her soulmate didn’t want her, but that Bianca didn’t consent to removing the bond. Which was sort of true, except for the fact that her soulmate didn’t even know she was her soulmate.

“Bianca, could you cinch me now?” Adore asked, and Bianca was relieved that the other queens looked away and steered away from the topic of Bianca’s lost soulmate. When Adore came over to her desk, she noticed sadness in her eyes.

“Yeah, of course,” Bianca said, worrying about Adore. Why was she sad? “Come on, let’s go to the bathroom.”

They walked over to the bathroom together, and Adore looked at Bianca with a hurt expression. “Why didn’t you tell me that you have a soulmate?” she murmured. Bianca felt bad, but told her another lie. “Because I don’t care for my soulmate. I just want to keep my colors.”

“Oh,” Adore smiled slightly. “So, you’re single? I think I might have a friend who would be a good match for you.”

Bianca faked a laugh. “Single and happy,” she said. “So, no thank you.” That was probably the biggest lie she had told so far. Single? Yes. Happy single? Fuck no. She wanted Adore to push her against the wall and kiss him, and to run her hands all over her body. She didn’t just want it; she needed Adore’s touch.

She cleared her throat and stepped behind her to help her with the lacing. She made sure to take as long as she could without compromising their time to get done with their looks. Every caress, every touch, made Bianca fall for her further. “What’s your boy name? I’ve never caught it,” he blushed.

Adore laughed the most adorable laugh ever. “Danny,” she said with a smile. “You’re Rich or Ron or something, right?”

Bianca chuckled. “Almost. Roy,” she winked at her through the mirror before tightening the cincher further and finishing up. “We’re done. Just come over if you need help with anything else. I just need my wig and shoes, and then I’m ready, so I have a bit of time.”

Adore smiled gratefully. “Thanks, Bea,” she said, making Bianca smile in amusement. Bea? That was a first. They walked out of there, Bianca feeling happier than she had in a long time. Then she realized something; Adore would make her lose her focus.

The runway went great, and both her and Adore were part of the top three together with Dela, who won. The judges commented on Adore’s cinched waist, and Bianca felt pride gather up in her chest.

In the untucked lounge, Bianca ran into some drama with Laganja as always. This time Laganja accused Bianca of coming for her during snatch game, and Bianca was getting seriously tired of her bullshit. This time, Adore supported Bianca while Gia supported Laganja. The drama was real, and the new best friends Gia and Laganja ended up having to lip sync, and Gia went home.

Bianca didn’t talk anymore to Adore that day, and she seriously wondered where her room was. It was almost worth breaking the rules just to see her and talk to her.

The next day, Roy didn’t even bother with glasses at all. His secret was out. Ironically, this was the day with the reading challenge, and Roy was excited. At least until he realized that he had to read Danny. Fuck.

Roy did okay with the others, not the best he had done, but it was okay. However, reading Danny was impossible. He was perfect in every way possible, and he didn’t want to hurt him. Eventually he decided to play on the fact that Danny wasn’t the brightest, but even that insult was very, very weak.

Danny’s reading of Laganja was one of the best Roy had heard all day, and he grinned at him. He honestly wanted Danny to win, but Darienne’s win was expected, even though Roy was quite irritated at him for insulting Danny and calling him dumb.

Darienne got to pick his team for a rap song, and when Roy realized that he was going to be with Danny, he lit up. The more he had to work with him, the more excuses he had to touch him. Roy struggled a bit with the dancing, especially since he was pretty sure that that wasn’t a 90’s hip hop dance.

Danny complained about it, and Roy stared at him. Did Danny just stand up to Laganja? He smiled to himself, proud of his soulmate. When RuPaul eventually visited them, he stopped to talk to Roy.

“So, Bianca,” he said. “I noticed that you’re not wearing glasses. What is this? Are you colored?” RuPaul chuckled and looked at him. Roy sighed with a small chuckle.

“Yeah, but I’m not really into the whole soulmate thing,” he lied. “So I didn’t think it was important. No one’s business, really.”

The challenge went well, and Bianca was one of the top 3, while Adore won the whole challenge. Bianca applauded her enthusiastically, grinning widely. Adore was adorable, but seeing her like what she looked like in the video was hot. So hot that Bianca had to restrain herself.

She loved seeing her happy too. Those full lips breaking into a wide grin, lighting up. The way her eyes were sparkling, and how she almost couldn’t keep still. Bianca felt the pull he normally felt get tighter and tighter until it became unbearable. Then it was black.

When she woke up, she noticed RuPaul and a doctor standing above her. She felt such an intense pain that she couldn’t even talk. When she thought more about it, she remembered reading about one of the side effects of unreciprocated colors. Newly bonded people should touch each other as much as possible the first month or two. Going two days without touching could be dangerous enough, but she hadn’t touched Adore once in a week or so.

As another wave of pain hit her, she gasped loudly, clutching her chest. This was unbearable, and suddenly she understood why colors with unreciprocated soulmates committed suicide. She didn’t want to live with such pain as she felt right now.

The next thing she knew, she was lifted onto a stretcher and taken to their first aid room. “No,” she tried to scream. The further away she got from Adore, the pain just got worse. No words left her mouth, and she just sobbed as the pain worsened and she was on the verge of blacking out again.

She could hear the doctor talking to RuPaul and some of the crew. They weren’t allowed to film this, but they did have more information than RuPaul. Ru joined nevertheless, trying to show that he cared for his contestants.

“Is she bonded?” the doctor asked the crew, who nodded. “Who is it?”

“We have no idea, she’s very secretive about it,” Ru said, looking at Bianca who was trying to lessen the pain, but she only got gradually worse.

“It’s most likely unreciprocated,” the doctor muttered. “Probably to someone here, unless this has happened earlier.”

“It’s Adore,” one of the crewmembers said, and Bianca panicked. They knew? They were going to tell her, and her life was going to be ruined.

“Uhm, okay,” Ru hesitated. “I guess you don’t want her to know?” he looked down at Bianca, who shook her head frantically. “Okay. Bring in Adore, Courtney, Darienne and one more of the unbonded queens.”

Another of the crewmembers nodded and ran to the lounge. Bianca couldn’t move, hyperventilating and clutching her chest and lungs. Fuck. She needed to get this cincher off. She tried to communicate that to Ru, knowing that she most likely failed. Luckily, the doctor concluded that she should take off as much of her clothes as possible.

Once the dress and corset was gone, the breathing was easier, but the pain was still as bad. Then suddenly, she felt it slowly fade away as someone stepped into the room. Adore, she thought to herself - Adore is here.

She noticed Darienne, Courtney and Dela there as well, but they didn’t matter. No one mattered but Adore. She could finally breathe normally, but the pain was there.

“Maybe you could give Bianca a hug,” RuPaul told the other queens, obviously trying to make Adore touch her without telling them directly. Courtney was first, and Bianca could feel slow tears running down the Australian’s cheek. She appreciated it, but Courtney wasn’t the one she needed.

Both Darienne and Dela hugged her first, and Bianca could only look over at Adore, waiting for her to hug her tight.

Adore was crying as she hugged Bianca. “You fucking scared me, you bitch,” she sobbed, and Bianca felt her own pain go away, but she could feel Adore’s. “Don’t you fucking dare do that again, Grandma. Who knows, maybe next time you’ll die from a heart attack due to old age.”

Bianca turned to glare at her. “Shut the fuck up, bitch,” she said, her voice hoarse and raspy. The doctor handed her a glass of water, smiling softly. Bianca smiled gratefully, and then hugged Adore back.

“You’ve already become one of my best friends, Bea,” Adore sniffled. “Please don’t leave me. Please don’t send her home, Ru…”

RuPaul smiled at them. “I think it will be okay,” she said. “You’re not going home, Bianca.”

Bianca let out a relieved breath. She hadn’t even thought of that. If she were this ill, she would be sent home if it weren’t for Adore. That meant that if Adore went home, Bianca would have to tap out.

After a couple of hours, when all of the queens were out of drag but hanging out in the werk room just to have a bit of fun, one of the crewmembers and editors, named Jamie called Bianca to come over. Roy frowned but did as they said.

“What’s happening?” he asked, and Jamie looked at him. “Something from the untucked lounge, and the main stage.”

Roy knew where this was going. It was the fainting, and probably the other queens talking about it afterwards. “Can I see?” he asked. “I want to know how bad it looks.”

Jamie nodded, leading Roy to the editing room where all the footage was stored. First he showed the video from the main stage.

It showed Adore winning the challenge, and Bianca standing next to her and looking really proud until the smile faltered. Roy remembered the pain attacking her at that moment vividly and felt sorry for Bianca, even though they were the same person. He continued to watch the screen, when suddenly Bianca fell to the ground, without a warning. He saw Adore gasp out of shock and kneeling down next to her.

“Bianca?” Adore called out, panicking slightly. She tried to check if she was conscious as all of the other queens gathered around Bianca. Roy sighed at the screen. It was nice that they cared, but were they fucking morons? Didn’t they know that fainted people needed room to breathe? God, he hated feeling vulnerable. He wasn’t a vulnerable person, and neither was Bianca.

He noticed Santino Rice walking down onto the stage and ushering all of the people away, asking Michelle to call the medics. RuPaul hurried down to the stage. Then it showed the whole scene with Bianca waking up and being lifted onto a stretcher.

RuPaul told the girls to go into the lounge while he followed Bianca. The girls all looked at each other worriedly, but did as Ru said.

The cut ended there, and then Jamie showed him a recording from the untucked lounge.

“What. The. Fuck,” Joslyn said as they walked into the room, everyone just sitting down with somber looks on their faces.

“Am I the only one who thinks she did that for attention?” Laganja said, looking at the others. “You don’t look like that when you faint, she was totally overdramatizing it. I know, because I fainted last week, but none of you noticed, so I didn’t make a spectacle out of it.”

“Can you stop thinking about yourself for two fucking minutes?” Adore snapped. “One of us probably has to go to the hospital!”

Roy could see tears rolling down Adore’s cheek, and his heart broke for her.

“Guys,” Courtney spoke up. “Is it possible that her bond is unreciprocated? I mean, it would explain why she didn’t want us to know. It would explain the fainting too. If it’s a bond formed right before she got her, she has gone two months without her soulmate.”

“Isn’t two months a bit long? She should have fainted a long time ago if that was the case,” Trinity said. “But maybe it has happened before too.”

“What if it’s one of us?” Dela gasped. This started a loud conversation between the girls, while Adore sat in the corner looking upset and afraid. After a while of loud conversation and conspiracy theories about Bianca’s soulmate, a crewmember Roy didn’t know the name of went to get the girls that were in Bianca’s room.

“Do you want this to air?” Jamie asked, and Roy felt his throat go dry.

“Only the fainting. I can talk about it the cause of it on the reunion, or perhaps the one-on-one dinner with Ru,” he sighed. “I have to tell Adore before she sees it on TV, and I don’t know if I can…”

Jamie nodded, understanding completely. “That’s fine. Go back to the other queens. Just say that I wanted to make sure you had enough water or something.”

Roy rolled his eyes – as if he wouldn’t make up a much better lie himself. “Yeah, thank you for hearing with me first. I appreciate it. Don’t tell anyone I went soft on you now, though,” he winked at Jamie.

Jamie laughed as Roy left, walking back to the other queens who stared at him curiously.

“Take a picture, it will last longer,” he snapped.

“What did they want?” Darienne asked him, and Roy smirked.

“They just made sure that America’s next drag superstar was okay, how else would I get the crown?” Roy said sweetly, making Laganja roll her eyes and most of the others laughed.

“Oh, and by the way, if you have questions about my soulmate ask them to my face instead of making conspiracy theories.”

“Do you know who it is?” Joslyn asked, to which Roy shook his head. It was a lie, but he had to say it.

“Is it unreciprocated?” Courtney asked. Roy nodded. “As far as I know. Any more questions?”

“Do you think it’s any of us?” Courtney looked at him, to which Roy just shrugged. “Maybe.”

Danny looked up at him with big eyes, and Roy smiled softly at him.

“It’s me,” Danny said, making Roy’s eyes widen. “I don’t have the colors, but I feel it. I felt it when you fainted; I felt your pain. It was horrible, and I couldn’t understand what the fuck was happening.”

“Oh my God,” Courtney squealed. “Do we have soulmates here? That’s so cute!”

Roy looked over at her with a glare. “Really cute, yeah. A moment that’s supposed to be intimate and romantic is going to be viewed by the whole world. It’s not cute; it’s fucking dangerous. Especially when your soulmate is colorless and had no idea any of this was happening!”

He knew that he was being unfair, but he wanted this moment with Danny to himself. “Fuck this, I’m going to bed.”

He started walking to his hotel room, tears threatening to spill from his eyes.

“Roy!” he heard a voice from behind him, and he turned around to see Danny there.

“What do you want, Danny?” he sighed, looking at the boy. He knew he looked annoyed, but he was exhausted.

Danny ran over to him, grabbed his face and kissed him, pulling him closer. “Fucking idiot,” he murmured. “You should have fucking told me. Fuck. I’ve had this fucking crush on you since snatch game, and you let me believe you had a soulmate!”

Roy chuckled slightly, kissing him again. When he pulled away, he looked into his gorgeous, green eyes. “Because I was afraid that you wouldn’t want me. You didn’t colorbond, so obviously you weren’t into an old bitch like me. It’s 14 years between us…”

“Shut up grandma,” Danny laughed. “I fucking want you. So bitch, kiss me again before I’m the one to faint.”

Roy rolled his eyes. “You’re not getting a kiss for calling me grandma, bitch!”

“I’ve never realized how brown your eyes actually are,” Danny murmured absentmindedly, tracing his face. “It’s much better without the glasses.”

Roy thought he could die from happiness. “You see colors?”

-Falling Snowflake (This could be multichaptered if anyone wants that)

#bianca del rio #adore delano #biadore #soulmate au #angst #kinda fluff #falling snowflake #is grey a color #rpdr fanfiction #canon compliant #on set fic

183 notes · View notes