#john snow project

[pandemic-info]

In the second in a series of personal perspectives, the John Snow Project talks to [a successful, active early-thirties professional] based in California, who developed Long COVID after his third SARS-CoV-2 infection.

Perspective: I Did Everything Right and Things Still Went Wrong - John Snow Project

NOTE: “did everything right” in this headline is not in terms of what COVID-informed people know and do, but rather the average person who follows CDC & govt. guidelines: the “vax and relax” approach.

Excerpts:

—

Salvatore was Covid cautious and followed public health advice from the outset, including with regard to the vaccines.

“I completed my first vaccine series in May 2021 with two doses of Pfizer. Believing I was protected, I lived normally and was infected in September 2021. I had a known exposure and lost my sense of smell and taste. I was sick for about a day and went to bed early that night, but I didn’t even take time off work. I went back to my remote duties the next day and felt fine after a few days. I had my third Pfizer vaccine in March 2022, and was infected for a second time in September 2022 and for a third time in January 2023.”

Salvatore wasn’t initially concerned about his subsequent infections.

“I tested positive on a Cue at-home test for the second and third infections. Both infections were even milder than the first, maybe because I took Paxlovid. Within a week of the second infection, I developed heart palpitations, which were not initially linked to Long COVID. After the third infection, I began to develop many more Long COVID symptoms, and was diagnosed with the condition.”

Looking back, Salvatore had experienced persistent symptoms since his first infection, and developed new ones with each subsequent infection.

“I was aware of Long COVID since I had persistent loss of taste and smell going back to my first infection, but I never really considered it to be Long COVID, as it did not have a major effect on my life. The third infection is really what tipped me into Long COVID. Since then, I've had intermittent chest pain, heart palpitations, various neurological issues (face numbness, buzzing in the feet), joint pain, anxiety, issues with my vision, fatigue, complete alcohol and caffeine intolerance. I alternate between good weeks and bad weeks, with the bad weeks slowly becoming less severe. Some symptoms have totally resolved, while new ones occasionally emerge (the neurological symptoms did not arise until 3-4 months after my third infection). Although I have been able to keep my job and parent my daughter, this year has been one of the worst of my life. Where previously I was having fun on the weekends, for the last 8 months, I have basically spent my weekends laying on the couch and trying to recover. This year, I had two vacations planned, but cancelled them both because of how bad I've felt. My wife and I have delayed having another child because of my health. Even if I do recover fully, I have read so many stories of people relapsing back into Long COVID, that I am afraid I will never be fully healthy. For that reason, we may not have any more children because of Long COVID.”

Salvatore emailed Dr Bob Wachter, after the noted physician said booster vaccinations or infections will protect people from Long COVID. Dr Wachter posted on Twitter that boosters or infections “will protect you from severe infection & Long Covid – I give them 1 year of credit in this regard.”

Salvatore asked Dr Wachter to delete his erroneous tweet, saying, “Just reading it has caused me immense anguish knowing that someone might believe you and wind up in a similar situation [to me]. I hope you can appreciate how someone could reasonably hold you responsible for their Long COVID in the future.”

We asked Salvatore how the medical profession has responded to his Long COVID.

“Most doctors have believed me, but none have offered any substantive treatments. For example, my cardiologist at UCSF ended our last appointment by encouraging me to take CBD oil, telling me he hoped I would get better. The CBD oil seems to help a little bit, but I haven't gotten better despite his hopes. An ER doctor I saw after my face went numb was kind and caring, but described me and people like me as a "science experiment" that no one really knows how to help. Primary Care Providers have been hit or miss. Once I brought in a document with my list of symptoms to a new Primary Care Provider. He ignored it, then suggested the only explanation was that I was suffering from HIV. I have no risk factors for HIV. Once when I was feeling really bad, I visited urgent care. When I told the doctor that I had caught Covid three times, he implied that it was my fault, and told me not to catch Covid again, as if I hadn’t tried, or could somehow wave a magic wand to prevent it in the future.”

—

[ Comment: The PCP’s explanation is unsurprising. It’s been said repeatedly that Long COVID is similar to HIV and AIDS — the latter can also start as a “mild” or asymptomatic HIV infection and becomes much worse later on. LC affects the body / immune system and presents in some similar ways.

“If they are not treated, almost all people infected with HIV will develop AIDS (Stage 3). Some people develop AIDS within a few years of infection. Others remain completely healthy after 10 or even 20 years (called long-term nonprogressors).“ - Penn Medicine ]

—

CONTD.

Salvatore isn’t alone in his experiences of Long COVID but wishes more people would pay attention to the risks.

“My friends and family have been broadly supportive. It might be because I have several family members and friends who also have Long COVID, or who had it in the past and recovered. I don't think my experience has actually influenced anyone else's behavior, except my wife, who masks diligently because of me. When I talk about Long COVID, people who were already behaving in a COVID-cautious manner see it as validating, while those who weren't react with a sort of hopeless indifference. Long COVID isn’t rare. It affects many people who catch Covid even if they caught Covid before. Even if they are young and healthy. Even if they are vaccinated or not vaccinated.”

Salvatore has a message for people who don’t think about the risks of Long COVID.

“You probably won't develop Long COVID after your Covid infection, but there's a good chance that you might. The only way to avoid Long COVID is to avoid catching Covid. The vaccines and Paxlovid seem to help but aren't a panacea. If you get Long COVID, it will probably be somewhat mild, but it also could be so severe that it will derail your life entirely. Doctors will not be able to help you -- there are no cures or even approved treatments.”

Salvatore is concerned about the failure of governments to respond to the danger of Long COVID.

“Government officials that downplay or ignore the risk of Long COVID are directly responsible for the suffering of millions of people. Even if there's nothing to be done about it, at least telling people the truth would give them a chance to make a decision about the amount of risk they're willing to take. Be honest with the public about Long COVID: stop downplaying it.”

He is also concerned about the systemic risk Long COVID poses to social and economic wellbeing.

“Long COVID is the biggest, most mispriced risk facing the United States. Based on the latest studies, it's entirely possible that as many as one-third of Americans could be struggling with Long COVID in just a few years. Many of these people may be too sick to work, which poses a huge risk for the economy, and may already be manifesting in the form of the persistent labor shortage. As the number of people with Long COVID grows, health care and disability systems will come under even more strain. Long COVID should be treated as seriously as the initial COVID outbreak.”

[nowstomorrow]

The issue we face is we may not know the full extent of harm until it is too late to remedy it, and in the context of a virus that has infected most of the global population, including children, and continues to circulate and reinfect, this would seem to be an unacceptable risk. Governments, particularly those in high income countries, need to take the lead and engage in an urgent effort to develop treatments that target any persistent viral reservoirs in the body, concurrent with research efforts into developing a better understanding of Long COVID and the roles of viral persistence and immune dysfunction in the condition. We cannot risk waiting for a complete understanding before beginning urgent efforts to clear any viral reservoirs that may exist.

In light of the accumulating evidence, we propose a new paradigm for COVID-19:

COVID-19 is a disease that has an acute and chronic phase. Both phases can be asymptomatic or symptomatic, and the severity and nature of symptoms in either phase depends on the host immune response, viral inoculum and location of infection. In the chronic phase, commonly known as Long COVID, many more people than those who exhibit symptoms of Long COVID, or perhaps everyone who has been infected by COVID-19, is on the same spectrum of T cell activation and may share as yet undiscovered characteristics of viral persistence or immune dysfunction, regardless of whether they experience Long COVID symptoms or not, and the experience of those symptoms, which may be associated with further immune perturbation on reinfection, may be related to the location and/or quantity of viral RNA/protein/replicating virus in persistent reservoirs.

[yeoldenews]

A Guide to Historically Accurate Regency-Era Names

I recently received a message from a historical romance writer asking if I knew any good resources for finding historically accurate Regency-era names for their characters.

Not knowing any off the top of my head, I dug around online a bit and found there really isn’t much out there. The vast majority of search results were Buzzfeed-style listicles which range from accurate-adjacent to really, really, really bad.

I did find a few blog posts with fairly decent name lists, but noticed that even these have very little indication as to each name’s relative popularity as those statistical breakdowns really don't exist.

I began writing up a response with this information, but then I (being a research addict who was currently snowed in after a blizzard) thought hey - if there aren’t any good resources out there why not make one myself?

As I lacked any compiled data to work from, I had to do my own data wrangling on this project. Due to this fact, I limited the scope to what I thought would be the most useful for writers who focus on this era, namely - people of a marriageable age living in the wealthiest areas of London.

So with this in mind - I went through period records and compiled the names of 25,000 couples who were married in the City of Westminster (which includes Mayfair, St. James and Hyde Park) between 1804 to 1821.

So let’s see what all that data tells us…

To begin - I think it’s hard for us in the modern world with our wide and varied abundance of first names to conceive of just how POPULAR popular names of the past were.

If you were to take a modern sample of 25-year-old (born in 1998) American women, the most common name would be Emily with 1.35% of the total population. If you were to add the next four most popular names (Hannah, Samantha, Sarah and Ashley) these top five names would bring you to 5.5% of the total population. (source: Social Security Administration)

If you were to do the same survey in Regency London - the most common name would be Mary with 19.2% of the population. Add the next four most popular names (Elizabeth, Ann, Sarah and Jane) and with just 5 names you would have covered 62% of all women.

To hit 62% of the population in the modern survey it would take the top 400 names.

The top five Regency men’s names (John, William, Thomas, James and George) have nearly identical statistics as the women’s names.

I struggled for the better part of a week with how to present my findings, as a big list in alphabetical order really fails to get across the popularity factor and also isn’t the most tumblr-compatible format. And then my YouTube homepage recommended a random video of someone ranking all the books they’d read last year - and so I present…

The Regency Name Popularity Tier List

The Tiers

S+ - 10% of the population or greater. There is no modern equivalent to this level of popularity. 52% of the population had one of these 7 names.

S - 2-10%. There is still no modern equivalent to this level of popularity. Names in this percentage range in the past have included Mary and William in the 1880s and Jennifer in the late 1970s (topped out at 4%).

A - 1-2%. The top five modern names usually fall in this range. Kids with these names would probably include their last initial in class to avoid confusion. (1998 examples: Emily, Sarah, Ashley, Michael, Christopher, Brandon.)

B - .3-1%. Very common names. Would fall in the top 50 modern names. You would most likely know at least 1 person with these names. (1998 examples: Jessica, Megan, Allison, Justin, Ryan, Eric)

C - .17-.3%. Common names. Would fall in the modern top 100. You would probably know someone with these names, or at least know of them. (1998 examples: Chloe, Grace, Vanessa, Sean, Spencer, Seth)

D - .06-.17%. Less common names. In the modern top 250. You may not personally know someone with these names, but you’re aware of them. (1998 examples: Faith, Cassidy, Summer, Griffin, Dustin, Colby)

E - .02-.06%. Uncommon names. You’re aware these are names, but they are not common. Unusual enough they may be remarked upon. (1998 examples: Calista, Skye, Precious, Fabian, Justice, Lorenzo)

F - .01-.02%. Rare names. You may have heard of these names, but you probably don’t know anyone with one. Extremely unusual, and would likely be remarked upon. (1998 examples: Emerald, Lourdes, Serenity, Dario, Tavian, Adonis)

G - Very rare names. There are only a handful of people with these names in the entire country. You’ve never met anyone with this name.

H - Virtually non-existent. Names that theoretically could have existed in the Regency period (their original source pre-dates the early 19th century) but I found fewer than five (and often no) period examples of them being used in Regency England. (Example names taken from romance novels and online Regency name lists.)

Just to once again reinforce how POPULAR popular names were before we get to the tier lists - statistically, in a ballroom of 100 people in Regency London: 80 would have names from tiers S+/S. An additional 15 people would have names from tiers A/B and C. 4 of the remaining 5 would have names from D/E. Only one would have a name from below tier E.

Women's Names

S+ Mary, Elizabeth, Ann, Sarah      

S - Jane, Mary Ann+, Hannah, Susannah, Margaret, Catherine, Martha, Charlotte, Maria

A - Frances, Harriet, Sophia, Eleanor, Rebecca

B - Alice, Amelia, Bridget~, Caroline, Eliza, Esther, Isabella, Louisa, Lucy, Lydia, Phoebe, Rachel, Susan

C - Ellen, Fanny*, Grace, Henrietta, Hester, Jemima, Matilda, Priscilla

D - Abigail, Agnes, Amy, Augusta, Barbara, Betsy*, Betty*, Cecilia, Christiana, Clarissa, Deborah, Diana, Dinah, Dorothy, Emily, Emma, Georgiana, Helen, Janet^, Joanna, Johanna, Judith, Julia, Kezia, Kitty*, Letitia, Nancy*, Ruth, Winifred>

E - Arabella, Celia, Charity, Clara, Cordelia, Dorcas, Eve, Georgina, Honor, Honora, Jennet^, Jessie*^, Joan, Joyce, Juliana, Juliet, Lavinia, Leah, Margery, Marian, Marianne, Marie, Mercy, Miriam, Naomi, Patience, Penelope, Philadelphia, Phillis, Prudence, Rhoda, Rosanna, Rose, Rosetta, Rosina, Sabina, Selina, Sylvia, Theodosia, Theresa

F - (selected) Alicia, Bethia, Euphemia, Frederica, Helena, Leonora, Mariana, Millicent, Mirah, Olivia, Philippa, Rosamund, Sybella, Tabitha, Temperance, Theophila, Thomasin, Tryphena, Ursula, Virtue, Wilhelmina

G - (selected) Adelaide, Alethia, Angelina, Cassandra, Cherry, Constance, Delilah, Dorinda, Drusilla, Eva, Happy, Jessica, Josephine, Laura, Minerva, Octavia, Parthenia, Theodora, Violet, Zipporah

H - Alberta, Alexandra, Amber, Ashley, Calliope, Calpurnia, Chloe, Cressida, Cynthia, Daisy, Daphne, Elaine, Eloise, Estella, Lilian, Lilias, Francesca, Gabriella, Genevieve, Gwendoline, Hermione, Hyacinth, Inez, Iris, Kathleen, Madeline, Maude, Melody, Portia, Seabright, Seraphina, Sienna, Verity

Men's Names

S+ John, William, Thomas

S - James, George, Joseph, Richard, Robert, Charles, Henry, Edward, Samuel

A - Benjamin, (Mother’s/Grandmother’s maiden name used as first name)#

B - Alexander^, Andrew, Daniel, David>, Edmund, Francis, Frederick, Isaac, Matthew, Michael, Patrick~, Peter, Philip, Stephen, Timothy

C - Abraham, Anthony, Christopher, Hugh>, Jeremiah, Jonathan, Nathaniel, Walter

D - Adam, Arthur, Bartholomew, Cornelius, Dennis, Evan>, Jacob, Job, Josiah, Joshua, Lawrence, Lewis, Luke, Mark, Martin, Moses, Nicholas, Owen>, Paul, Ralph, Simon

E - Aaron, Alfred, Allen, Ambrose, Amos, Archibald, Augustin, Augustus, Barnard, Barney, Bernard, Bryan, Caleb, Christian, Clement, Colin, Duncan^, Ebenezer, Edwin, Emanuel, Felix, Gabriel, Gerard, Gilbert, Giles, Griffith, Harry*, Herbert, Humphrey, Israel, Jabez, Jesse, Joel, Jonas, Lancelot, Matthias, Maurice, Miles, Oliver, Rees, Reuben, Roger, Rowland, Solomon, Theophilus, Valentine, Zachariah

F - (selected) Abel, Barnabus, Benedict, Connor, Elijah, Ernest, Gideon, Godfrey, Gregory, Hector, Horace, Horatio, Isaiah, Jasper, Levi, Marmaduke, Noah, Percival, Shadrach, Vincent

G - (selected) Albion, Darius, Christmas, Cleophas, Enoch, Ethelbert, Gavin, Griffin, Hercules, Hugo, Innocent, Justin, Maximilian, Methuselah, Peregrine, Phineas, Roland, Sebastian, Sylvester, Theodore, Titus, Zephaniah

H - Albinus, Americus, Cassian, Dominic, Eric, Milo, Rollo, Trevor, Tristan, Waldo, Xavier

# Men were sometimes given a family surname (most often their mother's or grandmother's maiden name) as their first name - the most famous example of this being Fitzwilliam Darcy. If you were to combine all surname-based first names as a single 'name' this is where the practice would rank.

*Rank as a given name, not a nickname

+If you count Mary Ann as a separate name from Mary - Mary would remain in S+ even without the Mary Anns included

~Primarily used by people of Irish descent

^Primarily used by people of Scottish descent

>Primarily used by people of Welsh descent

I was going to continue on and write about why Regency-era first names were so uniform, discuss historically accurate surnames, nicknames, and include a little guide to finding 'unique' names that are still historically accurate - but this post is already very, very long, so that will have to wait for a later date.

If anyone has any questions/comments/clarifications in the meantime feel free to message me.

Methodology notes: All data is from marriage records covering six parishes in the City of Westminster between 1804 and 1821. The total sample size was 50,950 individuals.

I chose marriage records rather than births/baptisms as I wanted to focus on individuals who were adults during the Regency era rather than newborns. I think many people make the mistake when researching historical names by using baby name data for the year their story takes place rather than 20 to 30 years prior, and I wanted to avoid that. If you are writing a story that takes place in 1930 you don’t want to research the top names for 1930, you need to be looking at 1910 or earlier if you are naming adult characters.

I combined (for my own sanity) names that are pronounced identically but have minor spelling differences: i.e. the data for Catherine also includes Catharines and Katherines, Susannah includes Susannas, Phoebe includes Phebes, etc.

The compound 'Mother's/Grandmother's maiden name used as first name' designation is an educated guesstimate based on what I recognized as known surnames, as I do not hate myself enough to go through 25,000+ individuals and confirm their mother's maiden names. So if the tally includes any individuals who just happened to be named Fitzroy/Hastings/Townsend/etc. because their parents liked the sound of it and not due to any familial relations - my bad.

I did a small comparative survey of 5,000 individuals in several rural communities in Rutland and Staffordshire (chosen because they had the cleanest data I could find and I was lazy) to see if there were any significant differences between urban and rural naming practices and found the results to be very similar. The most noticeable difference I observed was that the S+ tier names were even MORE popular in rural areas than in London. In Rutland between 1810 and 1820 Elizabeths comprised 21.4% of all brides vs. 15.3% in the London survey. All other S+ names also saw increases of between 1% and 6%. I also observed that the rural communities I surveyed saw a small, but noticeable and fairly consistent, increase in the use of names with Biblical origins.

Sources of the records I used for my survey: 

Ancestry.com. England & Wales Marriages, 1538-1988 [database on-line].

Ancestry.com. Westminster, London, England, Church of England Marriages and Banns, 1754-1935 [database on-line].

[soweirdondisney]

Titles Being Removed from Disney+ and Hulu

Deadline has listed what will be removed from Hulu and Disney+. As of Friday May 26th these will no longer be available:

(in alphabetical order)

A Spark Story [Disney+]

Be Our Chef [Disney+]

Best in Dough [Hulu]

Best in Snow [Hulu]

Big Shot [Disney+]

Black Beauty [Disney+]

Cheaper by the Dozen remake [Disney+]

Clouds [Disney+]

Diary of a Future President [Disney+]

Disney Fairy Tale Weddings [Disney+]

Dollface [Hulu]

Earth to Ned [Disney+]

Encore! [Disney+]

Everything’s Trash [Hulu]

Foodtastic [Disney+]

Howard [Disney+]

It’s a Dog’s Life with Bill Farmer [Disney+]

Just Beyond [Disney+]

Little Demon [FX/Hulu]

Love in the Time of Corona [Hulu]

Maggie [Hulu]

Magic Camp [Disney+]

Marvel’s MPower [Disney+]

Marvel’s Project Hero [Disney]

Marvel’s Voices Rising: The Music of Wakanda Forever [Disney+]

Pistol [FX/Hulu]

Rosaline [Disney+]

Stargirl [Disney+]

Stuntman [Disney+]

The Hot Zone [Nat Geo/Hulu]

The Making Of Willow [Disney+]

The Mighty Ducks: Game Changers [Disney+]

The Mysterious Benedict Society [Disney+]

The One and Only Ivan [Disney+]

The Premise [Hulu]

The Quest [Hulu]

The World According to Jeff Goldblum [Disney+]

Timmy Failure [Disney+]

Turner & Hooch [Disney+]

Weird but True! [Disney+]

Willow [Disney+]

Wolfgang [Disney+]

Y: The Last Man [FX/Hulu]

So Weird and DCOMs are safe for now. The list is primarily focused on short-lived series, specials, and movies that went direct to streaming.

According to John Bickerstaff, whose production of Willow is on the list, this is Disney’s way to get out of paying residuals in the middle of the WGA Strike that began May 2, 2023 and is still ongoing.

[eahostudiogallery]

community

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Kasamatsu Shiro - Fujiyoshida

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Philippe Charles Jacquet

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Raoul Hynckes - Belgian street

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Jan Beutener - The Neighbours

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Georgia O'Keeffe - Barn with Snow

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Francis Davison ~ House (Essex)

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Gabrielle Garland

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Frederick Childe Hassam - Girl in a Doorway, 1883

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Z.Z. Wei - Blue Barn Shadows

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Kaoru Yamada - Familiar Landscapes

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Renato Guttuso - Tetti di Alcamo, 1976

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Chris Hytha - from Philadelphia Rowhomes

Opensea NFT project

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John Kasyn

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Albert Jacques Franck - Behind Spadina Ave

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Piet Mondrian - Farmhouse with wash on the line

:

[floralcyanide]

⊱ 𝑆𝑡𝑎𝑦 𝐺𝑜𝑙𝑑 ― 𝐶𝑜𝑟𝑖𝑜𝑙𝑎𝑛𝑢𝑠 𝑆𝑛𝑜𝑤 ⊰

[ ᴀ ʜᴜɴɢᴇʀ ɢᴀᴍᴇs ᴀʟᴛᴇʀɴᴀᴛɪᴠᴇ ᴜɴɪᴠᴇʀsᴇ ғᴀɴғɪᴄᴛɪᴏɴ ]

1960s ᴜs ᴘʀᴇsɪᴅᴇɴᴛᴀʟ ᴄᴀɴᴅɪᴅᴀᴛᴇ!ᴄᴏʀɪᴏʟᴀɴᴜs sɴᴏᴡ x ғᴇᴍ!ʀᴇᴀᴅᴇʀ

𝑐ℎ𝑎𝑝𝑡𝑒𝑟 𝑓𝑖𝑣𝑒 (ℎ𝑒𝑎𝑑𝑐𝑎𝑛𝑜𝑛𝑠): 𝑒𝑛𝑑𝑙𝑒𝑠𝑠 𝑠𝑢𝑚𝑚𝑒𝑟

౨ৎ 18+ ʀᴇᴀᴅᴇʀs ᴏɴʟʏ !

⊹ summary: a run down of the events after new year's eve. ⊹ pairing: young!coriolanus snow / fem!reader ⊹ warnings: innuendo, the insinuation of smoking, mentions of alcohol ⊹ word count: 1139 ⊹ author’s note: sorry for the wait, but I decided to make the rest of the series headcanons instead of actual chapters. it is quite exhausting to write sometimes, and there's so much to this series that I'd rather do it this way. thanks for all of your support. this is my favorite series I've written so far. (:

౨ৎ divider credit: @cafekitsune

౨ৎ sᴇʀɪᴇs ᴛᴀɢʟɪsᴛ | sᴇʀɪᴇs sᴏᴜɴᴅᴛʀᴀᴄᴋ | sᴇʀɪᴇs ᴍᴀsᴛᴇʀʟɪsᴛ

౨ৎ this fic has been cross posted to ao3.

ᴅᴏ ɴᴏᴛ ᴄᴏᴘʏ, ʀᴇᴘʀᴏᴅᴜᴄᴇ, ᴏʀ ᴄʟᴀɪᴍ ᴍʏ ᴡᴏʀᴋ ᴀs ʏᴏᴜʀs ᴏɴ ᴛᴜᴍʙʟʀ, ᴀᴏ3, ᴡᴀᴛᴛᴘᴀᴅ, ᴏʀ ᴀɴʏ ᴡᴇʙsɪᴛᴇ. ʏᴏᴜ ᴅᴏ ɴᴏᴛ ʜᴀᴠᴇ ᴘᴇʀᴍɪssɪᴏɴ ᴛᴏ ᴜsᴇ ᴍʏ ᴡᴏʀᴋs ɪɴ ᴀɪ ɢᴇɴᴇʀᴀᴛᴏʀs ᴏʀ ᴀɴʏᴛʜɪɴɢ ᴛᴏ ᴅᴏ ᴡɪᴛʜ ᴀʀᴛɪғɪᴄɪᴀʟ ɪɴᴛᴇʟʟɪɢᴇɴᴄᴇ. ʏᴏᴜ ᴍᴀʏ ɴᴏᴛ ᴜsᴇ ᴍʏ ᴡᴏʀᴋs ᴛᴏ sᴇʟʟ ғᴏʀ ᴀs ʏᴏᴜʀ ᴏᴡɴ ᴄʀᴇᴀᴛɪᴏɴ.

❝A man does what he must—in spite of personal consequences, in spite of obstacles and dangers and pressures - and that is the basis of all human morality.❞ ― John F. Kennedy

✲ Coriolanus is leading in the polls so far for the 1964 election, but there’s a problem. He has yet to marry, and this is peculiar to many hesitant voters. Jack and Bobby both talk to him about this when they all gather in Coriolanus’ office to discuss their next steps.

✲ “I think the girl studying Jack would be a great contender,” Bobby suggests.

✲ Jack laughs incredulously at his brother, “I am not going to send off my student to marry a politician when she has so much ahead of her.”

✲ Coriolanus shuffles uncomfortably. The two of you have been secretly seeing each other here and there since that past New Year’s Eve, and it’s now the middle of April. The thought of just popping the question to you has crossed his mind, but he didn’t want to ruin the good things going for you. 

✲ Other problems more dangerous than marriage plague Coriolanus. The Women’s Revolution, the movement for Women’s rights, has reached new heights in their tension with the government. Coriolanus has been questioned about it by journalists and citizens alike. He firmly stands by his goal of women’s equal rights being passed into law.

✲ Jack offers Coriolanus the chance to come back to the Compound in the summer to finish up campaign strategies and kick back for a while. Little does Coriolanus know that Jack offered for you to return as well to finish up your dissertation. He wants to test Bobby’s theory of you and Coriolanus being together. Hopefully, you can finish up your project before Coriolanus makes a move.

✲ You arrive at the Compound, much to John Jr. and Caroline’s delight, as they run down the front stairs to you. You clamber out of the car, and the Secret Service removes your luggage. The kids cling to your legs as you laugh down at them. You glance up to see Coriolanus at the top of the stairs, and you do a double take.

✲ “Why didn’t you tell me you were coming here?” you ask, a grin growing on your face. It had been about a month since you’d seen Coriolanus. “It was a last-minute decision,” he shrugs. 

✲ That first day, you, Jack, Coriolanus, and Jackie go out on the boat and have a few drinks. You all catch up, and Jackie gives you knowing looks the whole time. You and Coriolanus avoid the elephant in the room regarding you two.

✲ The evening creeps up, and you and Coriolanus sneak to the fire pit after dinner. “Have I told you about my vice president?” “No, not yet. What’s he like?” “His name is Sejanus Plinth, I think you two would get along very well.”

✲ After you and Coriolanus discuss Sejanus, he asks a question after a moment of silence. “Have you ever tried the shit that Jack smokes?” “Not really, but it smells peculiar,” you say, “Why?” “You seriously don’t know what it is?” Coriolanus chuckles. “Well, it can’t be tobacco, so,” you trail off, realizing what the substance is, “Oh. I see.” Coriolanus laughs at you again before pulling a joint out of his pocket, “Wanna smoke some?”

✲ Coriolanus sneaks into your room that night just to sleep in the same bed as you.

✲ You and Coriolanus become prone to sneaking and doing daring things. One night, after everyone has gone to bed, Coriolanus drags you to the garage, where the two of you take Jack’s convertible out for a spin. Without the Secret Service. Coriolanus drives down a back road alongside the coast, where your arms are thrown into the air as the wind gusts past your hair. Coriolanus looks over at you, knowing then and there he needs to marry you. There’s no one else, and there never would be. 

✲ Coriolanus takes you out on a beautiful date in Boston at the fanciest restaurant in the city, which was suggested by Jack and Jackie. 

✲ When you get to the bottom of your champagne glass, something hits your lips. You jump in surprise and slide it out of the glass when you pull it away from you. It’s a stunning diamond ring, the gem itself huge. The band is a simple white gold, and you look up at Coriolanus, who has now moved to kneel before you. 

✲ “I know this is quite sudden and out of nowhere, but there’s no one else like you. And I don’t think I can go on without you being mine forever,” Coriolanus has his hand on your knee, a hand out so he can place the ring on your finger, “Say yes, and I’ll give you everything you could possibly want.” “I think I have everything I could possibly want right in front of me, Coryo.” “So, you’ll marry me, darling?” “Yes, Coryo. I will definitely marry you!”

✲ The next day, it’s splattered all over the press that presidential candidate Coriolanus Snow is engaged to be married to little old you, the student under President John F. Kennedy. Bobby is beside himself, and Jackie hugs you, whispering in your ear how she knew you two would end up together.

✲ It’s now the middle of summer, and the wedding day is coming soon. You decided to get married on the beach outside the compound where you and Coriolanus met. The entire Kennedy family is invited, and your friends from university, as well as a few of Coriolanus’ friends, are invited. You finally meet Tigris, Coriolanus’ cousin who raised him, at the bridal shower. She tells stories upon stories about the blonde boy getting into trouble, which you enjoy thoroughly. 

✲ You and Coriolanus marry in late June of 1964 in a beautiful ceremony, where Jack walks you down the aisle. He says it’s the biggest honor he’s ever received. Not even his Purple Heart could compare. 

✲ Your honeymoon is spent in Boston in a luxury hotel near downtown. For the whole week, the two of you hardly leave the bedroom. 

✲ When the two of you are back from the honeymoon, Jackie proposes a day on the beach for the whole family. You both sit by the sea while the kids play and the guys play some football. Coriolanus isn’t a major fan of sports, so he stays with the kids.

✲ Both of you watch as Coriolanus plays with Caroline, John Jr., and Bobby Jr. in the shallows, splashing back at them when they throw water at him. “Have you thought about kids yet?” Jackie asks suddenly. You open your mouth but close it back, unsure of how to answer, “I- we haven’t really… discussed it yet, I guess.” Jackie hums, nodding, “It would look great for the campaign, besides, the sooner, the better. Voters love a great love story.”

[moeitsu]

♡The Tie Which Linked My Soul To Thee♡

(Arthur Morgan x OC) Masterlist

Hey cowboys!

Below is where you'll find all the chapters to my Red Dead Redemption fanfic, I will keep it updated as I continue to post more chapters. But in the meantime, I wanted to make things a little more organized and easier for you to navigate.

Whether you just started reading, or if you've been keeping up with the story since the beginning. I want to thank you! This started as a little side project to keep me busy during my down time at work, but it's turned into something I'm really passionate and proud of! So thank you for all the support <3

!!Please be aware this fic is explicit. As it contains blood/violence, as well as other adult themes!!

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->-> Ao3 

->-> Wattpad

Summary: Kate McCanon, a young widow from the north, meets outlaw Arthur Morgan. When the two cross paths she discovers a complex man wrestling with his own sense of right and wrong. As their unlikely bond deepens, Kate becomes determined to guide Arthur towards a brighter path, even as tensions rise within his gang led by the enigmatic Dutch van der Linde. With danger lurking at every turn, Kate must navigate treacherous territory to protect those she holds dear, all while finding love in the most unexpected of places.

Story Tags: Widowed, Original Character(s), High-Honor!Arthur Morgan, Arthur Morgan Does Not Have Tuberculosis, Arthur Morgan Deserves Happiness, Chubby!Arthur Morgan, Canon Divergence, Mutual Pining, Slow Build, Eventual Smut, Eventual Sex, Eventual Romance, Emotional Sex, Fluff and Angst, Hurt/Comfort, Touch-Starved, Sexual Tension, Friends to Lovers, Child Loss, Infant Death, Trauma, Canon-Typical Violence, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Slow Burn, Torture, Blood and Violence, Survivor Guilt, Aftermath of Torture, Caretaking, Injury Recovery, Period-Typical Racism, Anxiety, Self-Hatred, Night Terrors, Emotional Constipation, Self-Doubt, Men Crying, Bathing/Washing, Sweet/Hot, Romantic Angst, Romantic Fluff

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Ch 1 - The Years Creep Slowly By Kate becomes entangled in a heist with two strangers, Hosea and Arthur, forging an unexpected bond amidst their criminal endeavor. Ch 2 - The Snow Is On The Grass Again A fisher of men and A strange encounter. Ch 3 - The Suns Low Down The Sky Welcome to Horseshoe Overlook Ch 4 - The Frost Gleams Where The Flowers Have Been It's time to collect a debt. Ch 5 - My Heart Beats On As Warmly Now A well deserved hunt with Charles, met with an unexpected surprise back at camp... Ch 6 - As When The Summer Days Were Nigh The battle begins, and the past is revealed. Ch 7 - The Sun Can Never Dip So Low Kate is not immune to the dangers of the land. No matter how much she loved it, the land will never love her back. Ch 8 - Or Down Affections Cloudless Sky A blissful sunny day after a long hard night. Ch 9 - A Hundred Months Have Passed Kate and Arthur share a tender moment in the quiet of the night. Ch 10 - Since Last I Held That Hand In Mine The Course of True Love and other Revelations Ch 11 - And Felt The Pulse Beat Fast Arthur and Hosea share meaningful conversation after a night of advertising some moonshine. Meanwhile Kate finds herself involved in a dubious mission with John and the boys. She patches up Arthur as the day ends with an air of unspoken desire. Ch 12 - Though Mine Beat Faster Far Than Thine - Part 1 Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called sons of God in a world that is ugly with violence and hate. Ch 13 - Though Mine Beat Faster Far Than Thine - Part 2 Arthur’s life is ebbing out like the tide. Kate must work quickly and diligently to reverse the cruel hands of fate. She is aided by the help of an unexpected ally. Ch 14 - A Hundred Months ‘Twas Flowery May As Kate navigates Arthur’s recovery, she discovers that true strength lies within her trusted companions, finding relief in their unwavering support during the trials of his healing journey. Ch 15 - When Up The Hilly Slope We Climbed Arthur struggles to adjust to his new disabilities. Meanwhile Kate finds a job outside of camp for them, providing a few days respite and some much needed alone time. Arthur finally reveals his feelings. Ch 16 - The Past Is The Eternal Past Kate and Arthur welcome a new life into the world. The scene brings back tender memories of Arthur's past, he finally finds the courage to open up to her about his family.

━━━━━༻❁༺━━━━━ If you're interested in reading about my OC, I linked the Kate McCanon Lore here :) As well as her Face and Voice Claim here <3 About me!

[une-femme-de-lettres]

Festive Spirit

Pairing: Ghost x Reader (mutual pining only) Word count: 3880 Warnings: none, just pure fluff Summary: The Task Force 141 is forced to lay low after a particularly demanding mission. There’s no going home for the Holidays this year but you want to give your boys some of the festive spirit of the season. Note: I just love them so fucking much!! And I’m a sucker for domestic fluff so there you go! Link to Masterlist

“Hey…” Your voice is quiet as you enter the small kitchen where Price is busy filling a mug with hot water. Your eyes dart to the window above the counter top, soft white light is projecting onto the ceiling of the rundown apartment you are currently staying in. It snowed again last night.

“Slept in today, Shells?” he asks with a smile, handing you the mug he just filled and completed with a bag of tea and three sugar cubes. You smile back and take the object, enjoying the feeling of warmth seeping through your fingers.

“Just had a rough night,” you say, making your way to sit at the table, grabbing a spoon while passing by the counter. “That’s all,” you finish in a smile. You’ve not been spending the calmest nights lately, memories of your latest mission still running around your mind, keeping you awake and alert at all times. This added to the fact that at least two of your teammates have been keeping the whole place filled with their snoring every night. Speaking of which…

“Where is everyone?” you ask curiously, watching Price sit at the table, on the chair opposite from you, with a light grunt.

“They went out for a run,” he says, making you huff. In that weather? So it is true that 141 members have a death wish…

“You stayed?” you ask Price matter-of-factly, your spoon clinking against the walls of your mug as you calmly stir the sugar into your hot beverage.

“We need to stick together as much as we can, just in case, while we’re laying low,” he explained, making you nod slowly.

“Right,” you reply, still rubbing the sleep out of your eyes. “How long until we can return to base?”

“Not for some time, unfortunately,” he sighs, looking at you with a sorry expression. He lets out a breathy chuckle. “I’m gonna have to spend another Holiday season stuck in a safe house with a bunch of riled up guys.”

“Yeah,” you laugh in turn. Truth is, having to spend this time of year with your colleagues was not the best case scenario, but they were somewhat like a family to you still. So might as well enjoy the turn of events and make the most of it. Especially considering what you have gone through these past few days.

“Well, about that,” you start, your voice slightly quieter as if you feared some of your teammates might still be in the next room, able to hear your conversation. “I wanted to talk to you,” you say, watching Price sit a little closer to the table, attentively listening to you.

You proceed to explain to him what you have in mind. You want to celebrate the holidays in some way, and the best thing you’ve found would be buying a small gift for everyone along with a few decorations to bring the festive spirit into your temporary habitation. A nice home-cooked meal would be nice too, but that is definitely a plus, if you manage. Progressively, you see his face light up with a warm smile, making his eyes squint ever so slightly. Wrinkles appear around them.

“That’s…” he starts, contemplating your proposition, “I’ve not even thought about it, that’s very thoughtful of you,” he says and you have to keep yourself from smiling too much. Your heart beats faster at the prospect of carrying out your little plan.

“Well, you know this mission’s been rough on all of us so…” you explain, a few images projecting inside your mind. You try to cut them out, looking over at him. He gets up slowly, approaching you as you take a sip of your beverage.

“You finish your tea and pack what you need, I’m gonna get the car ready, yeah?” he says, cocking an eyebrow. You smile.

“Thanks John.”

“S’ nothing,” he replies, chuckling and patting the top of your head before exiting the kitchen, leaving you to figure out more details about your plan.

The location of your safe house is a rather small city. But it has a pretty extensive retail park at the edge of town with a large range of mainly chain stores. Perfect for what you have to do.

The place is bustling with activity, with people getting ready to celebrate Christmas Eve tonight. People buying last minute gifts. People gathering supplies for the five course meal they’re about to feed their families. And people simply shopping or wandering around town just to kill some time before tonight.

You visit a pound shop first. You have a pretty good idea of what you’ll be able to find for your teammates around here. But you still ask Price for advice, just in case. He knows them better than you do after all. You also take the time to gather a few decorations to cheer up your space, garlands, a comically small Christmas tree and a few ornaments. Price follows you closely, offering to carry the stuff you collect along the way. You don’t have that many things so you dismiss his help with a grateful word.

Still unable to think of anything else but your job for a day, you also take advantage of your little adventure to stock up on a few supplies in other stores. Mainly food but also various consumables and material that you could use in intervention, just in case you have to get back on the field immediately.

By now, a couple of hours have passed and Price suggests you get lunch somewhere. You stop at a chain fast-food restaurant. It would definitely be better for discretion to eat in the car or grab take out to eat home but you still have a few things to grab here after lunch and Price is not about to let you freeze to death in the middle of a parking lot. You take a seat in a small booth in a corner of the restaurant and quietly eat your meal.

You start a nice little conversation with Price that ends up with him talking about a few of his past Holiday experiences. He talks to you about how he had to spend Christmas Eve at Credenhill with the boys one year. And how Soap had forced Ghost to put up decorations in the base’s common room with him then. He even managed to get Ghost to wear one of those Santa hats, over the mask, of course, for maximum effect. He then stops for a second and wonders. You look at him curiously and he smiles, preparing his question for you.

“What’s the best Christmas present you ever got?” he asks, amused at the memories forming in his own mind. You chuckle, your eyes darting to the food in front of you as you think about it.

“I was ten, I got my first camera,” you finally say excitedly, still trying to gather up the few memories you had of that time. “It was one of those Polaroid camera things,” you explain, mimicking the object with your hands.

He can’t keep his eyes away from you, you’re talking about it with a bewildered expression on your face. It warms his heart.

“I took that thing everywhere, everything I saw I would photograph,” you sigh. “And I would hoard the pictures in my room, some weren’t even legible but I just wanted to keep them all,” you finish with a chuckle and a shrug.

“You’re a photographer,” he says matter-of-factly, leaning back in his seat. He tries to hide a fact that he is delighted to learn more things about you. Or even just to hear you speak so openly, especially when you’ve been so quiet and reserved lately.

“Well I kind of stopped with the years, and with work…” you explain with a sad smile. Price moves the conversation to another light topic and you keep conversing quietly until you’re both done eating.

Your search then continues in other stores. At some point, Price leaves your side to get to another store, designating the car you came in as your rally point. It’ll give you time to go to your last destination. You still needed to get a gift for your Captain.

Once you’re both back at the vehicle, you ask him for one last stop at the Tesco store nearby. You still want to get some sort of meal ready for Christmas Eve but the kitchen in your safe house won’t exactly allow for extensive cooking. You end up settling for a bunch of frozen pizzas that you’ll be able to cook in the small oven there. Good enough…

Of course by the time you’re back, the boys have returned from their little training session but you manage to sneak what you’ve bought inside without raising suspicion. You pretend to have a mild headache to retreat inside your room for the next hours. Price, your partner in crime, plays along and checks up on you from time to time, making sure to also keep the others busy so they don’t question your absence too much.

Price’s whole ‘We forgot to get a few things this morning, boys…’ spiel seems to have worked as he manages to make your teammates leave the safe house long enough at the beginning of the evening for you to put up the decorations and start the pizzas. You quickly decorate the main space as you don’t know how long they’ll take to come back from their supply run.

You place the small pre-decorated tree in the centre of the coffee table in front of the couch. You surround it with the wrapped gifts and you see Price smile at you from the corner of your eyes.

“Is one of those for me?” he asks with a chuckle. You stand up from your kneeling position on the floor and get back to hanging the tinsel garlands on the wall with tape.

“Don’t you dare peeking, Price,” you threaten and he laughs it off.

As the clock is ticking, you only feel your heart beating faster and faster, making you slightly out of breath. You can’t help picturing the events of the night ahead and you often have to snap out of your reverie to focus on your current tasks.

You know your teammates are returning when you hear their heavy footsteps in the stairwell outside the apartment. You jump up to wait by the front door impatiently. Price looks at you from inside the kitchen, his heart already melting at the sight.

Soap is the first to enter the apartment, shoulders and head covered in a light dusting of snow. You smile at him as his eyes widen with at sight before him.

“Steamin’ Jesus, Lass… what’s all this?” he mumbles under his breath.

The others soon follow. Ghost stays behind for a moment, closing and locking up the door. Gaz takes a moment to look around at the decorations, a smile tugging at the corner of his lips.

“You did all that?” He asks and you shrug.

“Might have gotten someone’s help…” you say with a mischievous smile and a quick look back at Price. Gaz gives a knowing look and nod in the older man’s direction.

Your eyes are on Ghost, then. He looks in slight awe before your desire to have them spend joyful Holidays in your small safe house. But a very light shade of sorrow tints his gaze. You feel your heart sink inside your chest ever so slightly.

“Happy Christmas, boys…” you mumble, your throat unable to let out louder words.

Soap hugs you tightly and thanks you sincerely. The gesture puts joy in his heart in that time when he can’t be with his own family. Gaz does too, before his gaze meets the coffee table and the presents laid on it. He laughs, you really went all out.

You join Price in the kitchen while Soap, Ghost and Gaz get rid of their snow-covered outerwear and put away the supplies they just bought. You notice from your spot inside the small room that Soap has found the red and white Santa hat you got earlier. He excitedly puts it on his head, before the disapproving looks of his teammates, especially Ghost’s. But he doesn’t care because he can see how it makes you smile, and that’s all that matters to him.

The cheap pizzas start smelling really good and you can’t stop smiling in anticipation. Price teases you for it but you know from the look in his eyes he’s currently the happiest man on Earth.

You end up all sitting around the small coffee table, either on the floor or on the couch. You suggest Price sits on the couch - it’s better for his hips - and he curses at your insolence. The pizzas join your little reunion and you start eating eagerly.

Some anecdotes about past Christmas experiences are exchanged just like earlier today when you had lunch with Price. Soap tells you about his own side of the story and even Ghost joins into the conversation. He looks way more excited than earlier but he can’t help adverting his gaze every time your eyes meet him, making him pause for a second before speaking again.

After your meal, you quickly debate opening the gifts in the morning as is tradition, but you end up settling for unwrapping them tonight. No one says it, but everyone knows why.

Price is the first to get his present. You insist on giving it to him first as he was the one that helped you make this day truly count. You can see his face turning a very light shade of red when you hand him the gift from your spot on the floor. He can’t help but smile.

He smiles even wider, if it were even possible, when he takes a black woollen beanie hat out of the box. The wool is soft against his fingers and the colour is a deep shade, discreet and elegant.

“Just in case you want to get rid of that old bucket hat…” you say under your breath, suppressing a laugh. Soap chuckles and, for a split second, you’re sure you can hear Ghost let out a small laugh too. Maybe your senses are playing tricks on you.

“Oh come on, it’s not that bad!!” Price replies, looking slightly offended. Gaz raises an eyebrow and cocks his head.

“It’s pretty bloody ugly, mate…” Soap says with a dramatic squint in Prices direction.

Price still thanks you warmly, even after your little show of humour. Soap’s gift comes next. You hand it to him from across the table and he eagerly takes it, unwrapping it quickly. You didn’t know Soap that well so you asked Price for what to get him. Your heart beats faster as he opens it, you hope he’ll find it nice.

He unwraps a small dog plush toy. A German Shepherd with a small keychain so he can keep it on his equipment, you thought. The animal looks cute, with big blue eyes, it reminded you of him a little when you got it.

“I was told you really like dogs,” you explain shyly. Price starts laughing silently and Soap looks up at him with an angry look.

“Oh that’s funny now,” he says sarcastically with a nod. Your expression falters as you get it. Soap hates dogs - they scare him shitless, in fact.

You feel played and frown at Price. But suddenly your eyes are wide and on Ghost again as he laughs along with Price. He looks over at Soap who’s sitting beside him, thinking for a second. You can see his eyes fill with a mischief you’ve rarely witnessed on him. It suits him.

“Maybe you’d prefer half of it?” he asks Soap. The sergeant’s shoulders drop again.

“Come on, L.t…” he says under his breath, making Ghost and Price laugh harder. Your eyes remain on Ghost for a moment, his eyes slightly squinting with the smile hidden under his mask. He looks happy, he looks… cute?

With this, Soap moves to sit beside you and give you another hug as a thank you. He whispers in your ear that he absolutely love the small toy, no matter what the others might say. Your heart flutters inside your chest.

After Soap’s comes Gaz’s present. You hand it to him like you did for the others and he smiles gently. He looks around at his teammates while opening it, curious of what little trick you had in mind for him. He takes a second to read the cover of the book he just unwrapped.

“10 subtle ways to prove your superiors wrong without getting fired,” he says, you smile when he looks at you. “Nice one, Kid,” he says with a chuckle. You know of his aversion for blindly following orders and respecting stupid regulations. Doesn’t really sits right with him, does it?

“Is this directed towards me?” Price asks tentatively, casting a suspicious look towards you.

“Nah, it’s for higher up, Captain,” Gaz responds, winking at you.

You’re glad he gets it. This is a stupid gift, you know it. But again, every one of them is some kind of joke. And they wouldn’t have liked it any other way.

Ghost’s turn finally comes. You can’t help but feel a little shier handing the present to him. You try to look at him in the eyes. He looks back.

“Ghost, here’s yours,” you say quietly and he nods.

“Thanks.” His voice comes out colder than he would’ve liked. You swallow a small lump in your throat.

Inside the package is a pair of black socks with a white skeleton feet print on them. They match his gloves and his mask. You tilt your head slightly.

“To keep you warm,” you add quietly as you see his eyes going from the socks to you, widening ever so slightly. You swear you can see his cheekbones raise slightly under his mask.

A heavy silence stretches between you all. This one’s meant as a joke too, but it’s way more than that to him. And the words you just let out are proof that you care more for him than you actually realize. You notice that only now that you spoke them.

“They were leftover from the Halloween section…” Price’s playful voice breaks the silence and you turn to him, trying to silence him with a gesture of your hand.

“Shhhhh, stop!” you exclaim, extending your arm to try and hit him in the shin before turning to Ghost again. “Don’t listen to him,” you say, pointing at Price.

“It’s true though,” Price continues, making the others laugh. Of course they were on clearance after Halloween season was over but you don’t want that fact to make this gift seem any less thoughtful. Ghost doesn’t see it that way. He speaks to you sincerely.

“Thank you, Shells,” he says with an amused voice, making you pause for a second. “For everything you did today,” he continues, putting the socks down on the table with the discarded wrapping. You feel the urge to look down but your eyes move around instead, looking at each and every one of your teammates.

When you finally turn to Soap, who’s still sitting beside you, his eyes are curious.

“You don’t have a present, Lass?” he asks and it dawns on you only now. You were so caught up in getting them their gifts, you didn’t even think of getting one for yourself.

“I guess my present is… this,” you assure them with a smile, gesturing towards the whole space you sitting in. Price chuckles at your enthusiasm but shakes his head. He knew that would happen. He knows you all too well.

He slowly takes a small box out from behind him on the couch and nudges at your elbow with it. You look surprised when you look back at him.

“There ya go, Kid,” he says with a gentle smile, “picked it out while you were on your own,” he explains with a shrug. Of course he did…

You open the box slowly and discover a small Polaroid camera. The others look curiously at it and back at Price. You can’t keep your eyes off of your gift, memories coming back to you instantly.

“They still make those?!” you ask excitedly, feeling the pang of nostalgia inside your heart. You can’t help smiling goofily, your limbs trembling slightly with the rush of emotions. You stand up and move towards Price. “Thank you so much,” you whisper as you hug him tightly.

“S’ nothing,” he responds, letting you go so you can explore the small object. Gestures come to you naturally, muscle memory kicking in quickly. Load the film - tweak the exposition - activate the flash - press the shutter button. You want to try it so bad.

One idea comes to your mind, then. You look over at everyone from where you’re standing. You would want this moment to last forever, but it won’t. And the closest thing you can’t think of is this.

“I want to take a picture of us,” you say, looking at Ghost. ‘There’s no picture?’ ‘Never…’  “If you’re all okay with it,” you say hesitantly hugging the camera close to you. You can see Ghost’s eyes moving to you. They’re gentle.

“Hell yeah,” Soap says, standing from his spot on the floor.

“I’m in.”

“Sure…”

Gaz and Price talk in turn. Your eyes are still on Ghost. He looks at his teammates fondly and nods.

“Why not?” You feel your heart grow lighter inside your chest and smile excitedly.

You take your seat in the middle of the couch, between Gaz and Price. Soap rapidly moves to the armrest, sitting on it awkwardly and leaning towards Price to make sure he’s in the shot. He pulls the Santa hat down onto his head slightly and smiles.

Price wraps his arm around your ribcage to pull you closer and Gaz motions Ghost closer. Ghost mirrors Soap position, only he doesn’t lean in as much. He tries to look over at the camera lens as you extend your arm as far as you can. You press the small red button. The flash practically blinds you and you can’t help laughing.

The film rolls out of the camera and you take it out, looking at it for a moment and leaving it aside to cure. While it does, you start another animated conversation with the others and you attempt to take more pictures of you and Soap, or Price and Gaz... Soap insists that you take one of him with his gift, you happily oblige. The apartment gets filled with laughter, loud voices and colourful curse words. The first picture you’ve taken still sits on the small table behind you, colours slowly getting brighter.

And when the picture is finally legible on the white film, you will be able to see how Ghost doesn’t in fact look at the lens and instead watches you intently from the corner of his eyes. And you will be able to tell just how gentle his eyes really are when he is looking at you - only you.

Taglist : @stressyanddepressyfoodservice @fatedeniedhope @cabreezer0117 (I probably need to redo that taglist cause I don't think it's up to date, sorry if I missed anyone...)

[97keanu]

Please can you write something to do with young John and the ballerina kinda like a continuation for the smoking fic

Ah yes, the infamous shotgunning the cigarette fic… I have gotten a lot of requests for that one, and have tried a few times now to actually sit down and write for it, but haven’t had any luck in producing something that I thought was worthy of posting. I have been working on a bigger project for my writing, but seeing this ask today inspired me to finally come up with something to further this idea. I will link the original fic here as well if anyone would like to read that one first, but you don’t need to in order to read this one! Thank you for sending this ask in today, and believing in my writing enough to want to read more, it means the world to me <3

Premise: It’s been days since you last saw Jardani, and all you’re left with is the taste of his lips on yours, and the smoke of his cigarette in your lungs. That and the memories you two made together here in this place of shadows and secrets. You reflect tonight as you lean out your window of your room, a cigarette loose in your hand.

Tags/CW: young!john wick, ballerina!reader, smoking, yearning, love that blossoms where it should not grow, aching, melancholy, a unspoken connection, drabble 1.1k words.

It doesn’t taste the same, not without his softness breathing the smoke into your lungs, breathing life into your body that aches for more than this. The want inside you doesn’t burn anymore, not when he’s gone. It smolders.

You feel like a fire that was left out in the cold too long with no one to stoke it, and he’s only been gone a week. You knew that when you and Jardani shared that moment, you may never see him again. That he was on his way to getting out of this place, that he had become what The Director always wanted from him. A weapon. A tool. A dog that bites on command.

He would make her a lot of money, this much you knew.

Still, you sit against the window sill of your little crummy room, the walls here having seen more girls than you can imagine in it’s time, seeing them come here innocent, then turned into cold blooded killers like a stone overworked until smooth. The smoke from your cigarette thinly rises to the sky, the cold still chilling you to the bone, no one here to share that experience with. You remember when you first came here, first begun your trek into this underground world, ferried here as some forgotten child on the street. You met Jardani soon after, his stay having started when he was much younger than you, you were somehow lucky to begin your training at fifteen in comparison. Now, at eighteen, you wonder what your life could have been like without all this, without him…

Back then, everyone seemed like an enemy. You couldn’t trust any of the other ballerinas, they would take your spot as soon as you gave them the chance. When you were assigned to a new ballet The Director was producing, you wondered who your ballet partner would be this time. When a tall, lanky boy walked in, ordered to practice with you, you had no idea what to think of him at first.

He walked with poise, but his eyes didn’t seem to meet anyone’s. That was until, they met yours. You couldn’t help your heart thumping at that contact, of the thought of actually being seen after hiding yourself away for so long, trying not to give too much attention to anyone in fear that they would give too much attention to you. And yet, here he was, looking at you, really looking, observing you with those puppy dog eyes of his. Later you would realize those eyes had grown into that of a wolf, primed and ready to strike in a moments notice, but for now, he was still young, still figuring it all out.

He had figured out one thing then, which was that he didn’t wish to dance with anyone else after you.

When you two moved together, it was as if you anticipated each others next movements. You felt light as a the brush of cold snow on warm cheeks, barely there at all in his arms. Neither of you knew what that really meant back then, you didn’t ever really even speak to each other.

No, Jardani was the silent type, he always was. And you didn’t try to crack that shell of his, not by poking and prodding him with questions the way the other ballerinas may have tried. Everyone knew Jardani was one of the most skilled here, they wanted to know him better, wanted to know their competition. But you were never competing with him, you let him guide you when and where he wanted on his own terms, and he gave you the same. An alliance without a word said about it. It was as easy as breathing.

Soon enough, a year or two had passed that way, The Director obviously knowing that you two were made to be together on stage, and allowing you to mostly work together there. What you thought she didn’t know about, was when you left the small warmth of your room at night, traveling down the icy fire escape to the boy with sharp eyes waiting for you down below. You wonder now if that was why she sent him away. Was his work getting sloppy from thoughts of you filling his head? No, you could never kid yourself into thinking that, you never wanted to think about how he felt about you, it was safer to not think of what you had at all as being anything more than what it was.

An escape.

And escape you did. Into dark alleys where you said little, but shared the taste of each other’s breath. Finding something warm to cling to that just felt natural, easy, real.

Jardani never needed to tell you how he felt, his hands and eyes showed you, his lips caressed you, his teeth have tasted your flesh and you thought perhaps he may never let go. Now you wonder if he wanted to release you from between his teeth, and there is no way to find the answer in his eyes.

You take a long drag from your cigarette for a moment, holding it in, nowhere to alleviate this heaviness in your chest, not even when it billows out from your chest into the dark sky above.

God, would you ever even see him again?

Your stomach churned at the thought that maybe it wasn’t enough. All that training, all those years of pain and misery for nothing, for Jardani to walk out into that big world out there and get himself killed on his first mission…

You know that some of the others come back often, to talk with The Director about new work, but you also know that there are empty rooms that haven’t been filled since their owners went off for their first taste of blood, never to return.

“Please,” you whisper into the night air, the wind stealing your voice. “Let me see him again, I don’t care how, I don’t care when, but let me see him again…”

You feel as if you’re emptying your heart and soul into a cold, uncaring abyss that makes no promises. And yet, it helps ease the tension in your knuckles as you grip the window sill.

You sleep tonight wondering if he can feel your heart ache a million miles away.

Taglist: @emacarrigton @sunnythebunny7 @worldsgreatestsinner @discoscoob @nwheregirl @slutforsoliderboy @sebastianstanisahotmf @iovesia @brooxie3 @generalkenobee @desolatewrath

Feel free to ask to be added/removed from taglist!

[callofdudes]

I have another HC to share with you! Ghost and Soap in the many timelines in the multiverse have lots of Deja vus together. They both always feel like they have met somewhere before and whenever they say something familiar, they pause, and stare. They don’t know why they stood still for that, but they did and both would get a flash of being in the same place but a different time. Never to be able to explain it but they both just feel like this is where they need to be. :D

I know this has been sitting in my inbox for a while, but I feel now is a good time to bring it up.

Simon and Johnny know each other. Well, they did.

Ghost knew John. Out in the snowy plains where they huddled under the branches of a naked tree, breaths of cold air mingling among the fallen snow.

They whisper softly and mutter about the harsh conditions as they talk over their strategies. It's hard to talk strategies and think about the enemy when you're freezing to death and the only warm body next to you is each other.

They know each other. They know each other's smells. Crashed in the same bed after a long mission, not necessarily romantic or anything else, just two men two need rest and the closest body to them while cooped up in a safehouse.

John and Simon know each other wherever they go. Everything they find themselves they always... Know.

Simon was shot, the remains of his body melted into the uniform he wore and his dog tags barely showing the name of an honored fallen soldier.

John kissed that same man's forehead, promising his brother in arms he'd avenge his death. And he did. So he thought.

John was killed. That was it...

Simon and John know each other.

Simon knows John though he's scared to watch him. Simon sits in the corner of the school yard at recess, watching that cute boy laugh and kick around the courtyard football with his friends.

He hides deeper in his sweater hoodie as he watches John. There's just... Something about him. A weird familiarity. He couldn't call it comfortable because truly he didn't know what that was yet.

But John was different. No one noticed Simon, he tried to hide. But John did.

Piercing blue eyes recognizing him as they were assigned for school projects. Staring into each other's eyes John recognized something in the lidded soft brown gaze that was shaded under the big hoodie.

They knew each other. It was something strange. Back at their age you might call it soulmates. Hell, they even stole a kiss or two behind the school building with racing hearts unsure of what this was for them.

Simon was scared, scared of everyone, but not of John. John made something turn in him, a familiarity he couldn't place. Among the wretches of a horrible school life John made him feel different. Like he was known.

John and Simon always know each other.

Whether it's that sweaty photo of football star goalie in the newspaper as Simon works his boring job that makes his insides tighten and his brain hurt. He recognizes the lad, though the familiarity must just be the popularity he's gotten in recent months.

They always know.

Even when it's that stubborn man with a charming smile serving up latte's while his eyes clearly watch the tall man sat at the corner table mulling over writing on his computer. Having order two cups of tea and written seven chapters of the man behind the counter. They're enamored with each other in every universe. In every scenario.

I'm the grocery store aisle when they meet gazes while cliquely going for the last bag of saltine crackers on the shelf.

Looking from deep brown to electric sea blue and seeing something deep. Knowing. Familiarity however much surface level it may be, they know.

John knows Simon, when he gently hits his lieutenant's arm, telling him he'll be waiting for him. Because it's comforting, it's natural. Whatever it is he's just like this with Lt.

Simon rolls his eyes because it feels good, something about this touch is different. Makes him feel different. It'll always be different. But he let's it slide because... Well he isn't sure why.

Johnny is shot and killed... Simon goes after Makarov alone to avenge the bond he had with his fallen brother. So, so much more than that. He dies fighting for his soulmate.

Even waking up, looking up through lidded eyes to the man smiling down at him. Having grown his hair down, a soft hand stroking his shoulder.

"You awake eh' Simon?"

Simon hums, taking John's hand and placing it against his cheek, leaning into it. John smiles softly, cupping his head and kissing his forehead, pulling him closer. Simon wraps his arms around him.

Johnny has always been that one. There's just something unexplainable. No matter what happens or what decisions they make, the universe will make sure they are with each other.

Because they aren't truly whole alone, and no matter where they come from or where they go, they'll need each other.

Whether it be walking out the days of school and stealing kisses behind the school building. Or that stupid goalie winking at the giant reporter, patting his bicep and taking the mic, telling him he'd give him the private scoop over coffee.

Whether it's Johnny making the move to bring the tired author another cup of coffee, giving him a gentle smile and telling him he's got him covered.

Whether it's simply handing over the last box to the random stranger with the weird mohawk and joking about both their diets being shit, sharing shopping lists and chuckling as they're both headed to get instant noodles.

Or whether it's simply after a long, fulfilling career in any of these, laying down into retirement and content to spend the rest of their lives in each other's arms, at each other's side. Because that's where they're to be.

They're Johnny and Simon.

Sergeant and Lieutenant.

Brothers, lovers, whatever it may be. There's always a way that they end up together...

[pandemic-info]

Watch "Will we choose to prevent Covid deaths?" on YouTube

It's a bit cheesy, but true. Numbers are even worse elsewhere outside of AU, and yet... They choose to do nothing.

[nowstomorrow]

We are in the worst global health crisis of our lifetimes. So why are we ignoring it?

As governments around the world surrender to COVID-19, people everywhere are told the virus is mild and the air is safe to breathe. We think they should know the truth.

~ We fight against deadly misinformation

~ We highlight corruption and incompetence

~ We promote empirical truth over convenient fantasies

[onlycosmere]

OUTSIDE by Brandon Sanderson

Snow is falling. So I look up.

The world mystifies when you stare up through falling snow. Even standing still, you can soar. Even alone, you are surrounded. Even mundane, you find magic. I’ve spent my life chasing the fantastical, yet everything I’ve ever imagined can be casually matched by someone tilting their head up. The soft. Settling. Aspiration.

Of snow on an otherwise ordinary day.

When I was eighteen, I moved from Nebraska to Utah. Here, snow is fleeting, embarrassed to be an obstruction. But in Nebraska, snow squats. It claims land, builds empires. You fight it all winter, carving pathways, reconquering your sidewalks. The cold digs inside, frosting your bones with a chill that lingers, even after you return to warmth.

I often think of those snowy days, now that I live in a desert. But each year my memories are a little less fresh. We build our lives with layer upon layers of years, like falling snow. And like the new snow, most experiences melt away. In interviews, I’ve been asked to recount my most frightening experience. I struggle to answer because it’s the lost memories that scare me—the unnerving knowledge that I’ve forgotten the majority of moments that made me who I am. Those dribbled away when I wasn’t looking and joined the spring runoff of life.

Fortunately, some experiences do remain. In one, I’m fourteen, and it’s a cold night in Nebraska. My best friend at the time was a boy we’ll call John. Though we went to different schools, he was one of the only other Mormon kids around, so our parents often had us play together. When you’re very young, it’s proximity—not shared interests—that makes friends. This often changes as you age. By fourteen, John had found his way to basketball, parties, and popularity. I had not.

On that day, after a youth activity, another friend suggested we leave to go have some fun. I don’t remember where. Strange, that I’ve lost what this was about, though the rest of the scene is etched into the glacial part of my brain. One of us was old enough to drive, so we headed out to their car.

Five seats. Six teens. They’d already counted.

Without a word to me, the others climbed in. John gave me one hesitant look, then settled into the front passenger seat and closed the door. They left me on the curb. The car vanished, taillights flaring in the night like lit cigarettes.

The memory settled in for the long winter. That night. Watching. Remembering John’s face, which was so strikingly conflicted. Half ashamed. Half resigned.

I was no stranger to being outside. It happens when you’re one of three Mormon kids in a large school. You’ll be at a birthday party, and the wine coolers will come out. Everyone stands there worrying you’ll judge them—while you just want them to stop staring. But you leave anyway, because you know they’ll enjoy themselves more if you and your unusual morals aren’t there to loom.

It should have been different that night though, watching John and the others drive away. They were in my church group—ostensibly, my tribe. They’d still left me outside.

This event shocked me in how dramatic it was, as I wasn’t generally bullied. I tended to be adept at social settings. People generally liked me. At the same time, there was something I’d begun to notice. Something distancing about me.

It happens still. It isn’t that people shun me or don’t want me around; indeed, they seem to appreciate me. When I join a group, I generally end up leading it in some way, and I never sense resentment to this fact. But I also have an air around me. Some writer friends call me the “adult in the room.” I tend to attack projects too aggressively, tend to be the one who steps in and gets things done—even when they don’t need to be done immediately, and when everyone else would rather relax.

This comes, in part, from a certain…oddity about me that started in my young teens, around the time that John drove off. As my friends grew hit puberty, they became more emotional. The opposite happened to me. Instead of experiencing the wild mood swings of adolescence, my emotions calcified. I started waking up each day feeling roughly the same as the day before. Without variation.

Around me, people felt passion, and agony, and hatred, and ecstasy. They loved, and hated, and argued, and screamed, and kissed, and seemed to explode every day with a pressurized confetti of unsettling emotions.

While I was just me. Not euphoric, not miserable. Just…normal. All the time.

Often, it genuinely seems like I exist outside of human experience. It’s not sociopathy. I’m quite empathetic—in fact, empathy is one of the ways that I can feel stronger emotions. I’m not autistic. I don’t have a single hallmark of that notable brand of neurodivergence. It’s also not what is called alexithymia, which is a condition where someone doesn’t feel emotions (or can’t describe them).

I care about people, and I feel. I’m not empty or apathetic. My emotions are simply muted and hover in a narrow band. If human experience ranges between a morose one and an ecstatic ten, I’m almost always a seven. Every day. All day. My emotional “needle” tends to be very hard to budge—and when it does move, the change is not aggressive. When others would be livid or weeping, I feel a sense of discomfort and disquiet.

My emotions do go a little further than this on occasion, maybe once a year. It takes something incredible—such as being deeply betrayed by someone I trusted.

I’m not looking for sympathy; I don’t want to be fixed. I appreciate this aspect of my makeup—and it’s part of what makes me so consistent at writing. When everyone else is in crisis, I’ll just steam along. At the same time, when everyone else is elated by some good news…I’ll just steam along, unable to feel the heights of the joy they feel.

It makes people uncomfortable sometimes. Makes them think I’m judging them. While I’m absolutely not, I do try to be careful how I talk about my condition. Not as something to fear. Something, instead, I’m proud of—not because it makes me better than anyone else, but because it’s me. I like being me.

My neurodivergence came up in a recent interview I did. The interviewer latched onto the fact that I don’t feel pain like others do. (More accurately, some mild pains don’t cause in me the same response they do others.) I asked the interviewer not to mention it in his article, as I felt the tone to our discussion was wrong. I worry about my oddity changing the way people think of me, as I don’t want to be seen as an emotionless zombie. So I try to speak of it with nuance.

As the interviewer ignored my request, I thought I’d talk about it here. Profile myself for you—because this aspect of who I am has deep ties to another happening from my teenage years. In this, I want to answer a big question for you, the one everyone wonders about. The key to understanding Brandon Sanderson.

Why do I write?

Why do I write so much?

Why do I write so much fantasy?

Let me tell you about the first day, that beautiful day, when I found myself inside.

It was when I opened a fantasy novel. I was an isolated kid whose emotions were doing something bizarre. Even John leaving had left me feeling…disturbed more than angry. Alone, and outside. Then I opened a book where I found emotion.

In that story about dragons, and wonder, and people trying impossible things, I found myself. I felt a variety of powerful emotions through the characters—emotions that I remembered from when I’d been younger.

I hadn’t tried reading fiction in a long while, so I was blindsided by this perfect book. The experience transformed me, quick as a boy tilting his head back, looking up, and finding a new world.

When I read or write from the eyes of other people, I legitimately feel what they do. There’s magic to any kind of story, yes—but for me, it is transformative. I live those lives. For a brief time, I remember exactly what passion, and agony, and hatred, and ecstasy feel like. My emotions mold to the story, and I cry sometimes. I legitimately cry. I haven’t done that outside of a story in three decades.

Stories bring me inside.

My second published novel is called Mistborn. It’s about a world where ash falls like snow, and I can linger, looking up through it via a character’s eyes. Near the beginning of Mistborn, the teenage protagonist finds herself standing outside a room. It is full of light and laughter and warmth. But she knows, she knows she doesn’t belong inside that room.

She’s wrong.

Nearer the end of the book, I linger on as similar scene—only now, she’s sitting with the others. Light and laughter. Warmth. Mistborn was the first novel I wrote after getting the call offering me a book deal. Finally—after slaving over a dozen unpublished manuscripts—I knew I was going to be a professional writer. With that knowledge, I wrote Mistborn, the book about a girl who learns to come inside.

While writing Mistborn, I changed. Now that I’d made it inside of publishing—now that I’d joined those authors I’d loved for so long—why would I keep writing? I needed a new goal, and I discovered it that year.

So let me tell you why I write. It isn’t about worldbuilding; that’s a mistake everyone makes about me. Assuming I write because of worldbuilding is like assuming someone makes cars because they love cup holders. It’s also not because I’m Mormon, as some profiles bizarrely conclude. My faith and cultural heritage are both important to me, but if I were any other religion, that aspect of me would rightly be a footnote—not a headline.

I don’t write for plot twists, or dragons, or clever turns of phrase—though I enjoy all of these. I write because stories bring people inside. And I sincerely, genuinely believe that is what the world needs.

Lately, I’ve seen a resurgence of something that genuinely disquiets me: an attempt by some members of our community to hold others outside. Science fiction and fantasy is forever gatekeeping what constitutes good or worthy stories. Like my old friend John, who sought cooler friends, we renounce anything accessible—part of our perpetual (and largely fruitless) plea for legitimacy with the literary establishment.

Thing is, I can’t really get mad when someone does this, because I’ve done it myself in the past. The unfortunate truth is that we all probably have at times. The moment a group finds cohesion—discovering the warmth and peace of being inside—we decide there aren’t enough seats, so we start muscling and pushing. Readers who came in because of the latest popular teen novel? Outside. Fans of the film version of a story, instead of the book version? Outside. People who don’t look the same as the supposedly conventional fan? I suspect they know this struggle far better than I do.

To use a thematic metaphor, it’s like we’re dragons on our hoard of gold, jealously keeping watch, worrying that if anyone new enters, their presence will somehow dilute our enjoyment. The irony is that there is infinite space inside, and if we open the way, we’ll find many of these newcomers are the very treasure we’re seeking.

Fantasy, out of all genres, should embrace the different, even if it doesn’t match our specific taste. This is the genre where anything can happen—and should, therefore, be the most open genre. Only fantasy offers me the full range of emotion. The wonder of exploration. The magnificent highs of epic scope and the miserable lows of cataclysmic terror. In writing it, I can learn. Monomaniacal, I hunt experiences of people different from myself, then explore them in prose until I feel—in some small part—what they do.

This is why I write. To understand. To make people feel seen. I type away, hoping some lonely reader out there, left on a curb, will pick up one of my books. And in so doing learn that even if there is no place for them elsewhere, I will make one for them between these pages.

Those who interview me seem to have trouble understanding this fundamental part of who I am: that writing for me isn’t so much about performance as it is about exploration and elevation. I love prose both literary and commercial. And I think I write great prose. I’ve slaved over my style, practicing for decades, honing it for crisp clarity. My prose is usually intended to convey ideas, theme, and character, then get out of the way—because this is how I strive to bring everyone inside.

That said, I know my goal is impossible. Occasional strolls through the outside are part of being human, and I can’t eliminate that. And even I have to admit that there are lessons to be learned on those lonely paths. For example, contrast is the only way to appraise growth. Emotional alien I may be, but that very alienation has motivated me to understand. I value the connections I’ve made so much more for that struggle.

Moreover, I find that occasionally looking in through a window at everyone else gives a person a more complete perspective. Inside, things can get messy, and a streak of color finds it hard to comprehend the painting. I’m a better writer because of my time spent looking in. I don’t know that I could have written Mistborn if I hadn’t been left on that curb.

This isn’t to discount the pain of those who have been forced outside. Nor is it an advocacy for extended periods spent in the cold. I also don’t know if I could have written Mistborn if the wonderful people of the science fiction and fantasy community (including many of the friends I now work with) hadn’t latched on to me in college and—at times—forcibly pulled me inside to be with them. Beyond that, as I’ve grown older, I’ve found people like Emily, who love me in spite of (and partially because of) my quirks. Blessedly, because of this, my times outside have been increasingly brief.

My goal here is merely to point out (as I’ve had occasion to remember recently) that beautiful moments do accompany the isolation. You can only watch the snow fall when you’re outside. Only then can you look up and experience that mystifying world, where fragments of the sky drift past and lift you toward the heavens.

I’m forty-seven now, enjoying desert snowfalls in early April. The man I am is separated by distance and time from that boy who stood on the curb, and I’ve forgotten most of the steps that led between the two. I still don’t feel strong emotions outside of stories—but I did tell an interviewer lately that I sometimes cry when writing scenes in my books. They just aren’t the scenes that I thought he’d expect.

I don’t necessarily cry when characters die, or when they marry, or even when they find victory. I cry when it works. When it all comes together, and in a beautiful shimmering burst of humanity, I feel what it is to be that character. At those times, I remember what I learned twenty years ago writing Mistborn. That there’s a reason I do this. And even if I’ve lost more memories than I retain, each of them had a point, because they collectively brought me here.

So when you find yourself in the cold, know that sometimes, there’s a purpose to it. Trust me; I’ve been there. I might be there right now. Feeling the cold on my cheeks—but these days, no longer in my bones. Knowing that this will pass, and that it might be for my good. Most of all, looking up so I can appreciate it. The still. Solemn. Perspective.

Of one who stands outside.

[mosthomoeroticenemies]

The Contestants

Cherik (Professor X/Magneto) - X-Men

Fuffy (Faith Lehane/Buffy Summers) - Buffy the Vampire Slayer

Megop (Optimus Prime/Megatron) - Transformers

Curtwen (Curt Mega/Owen Carvour) - Spies are Forever

Thoschei (The Doctor/The Master) - Doctor Who

Perryshmirtz (Perry the Platypus/Dr. Heinz Doofenshmirtz) - Phineas and Ferb

Catradora (Adora/Catra) - She-Ra and the Princesses of Power

Soukoku (Osamu Dazai/Chuuya Nakahara) - Bungo Stray Dogs

c!TnTDuo (c!Quackity/c!Wilbur Soot) - Dream SMP

Spy/Supervillain - Genghis Khan by Miike Snow

Batman/Joker - Lego Batman

Wrightworth (Phoenix Wright/Miles Edgeworth) - Ace Attorney

Batjokes (Batman/Joker) - Batman

Lawlight (L/Light Yagami) - Death Note

Bowiugi (Bowser/Luigi) - Mario

Stanarrator (Narrator/Stanley) - The Stanley Parable

Kidlaw (Eustass Kid/Trafalgar Law) - One Piece

Shuake (Goro Akechi/Akira Kurusu) - Persona 5

Cuttletavio (Craig Cuttlefish/DJ Octavio) - Splatoon

Gethan (Rupert Giles/Ethan Rayne) - Buffy the Vampire Slayer

Zosan (Roronoa Zoro/Sanji) - One Piece

ChellDOS (Chell/GLaDOS) - Portal

Jesus Christ/Judas Iscariot - The New Testament

Gwensuzie (Gwen Cooper/Suzie Costello) - Torchwood

Krisnix (Phoenix Wright/Kristoph Gavin) - Ace Attorney

Griffguts (Guts/Griffith) - Berserk

Hannigram (Will Graham/Hannibal Lecter) - Hannibal

Ghiralink (Ghirahim/Link) - Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword

Valvert (Javert/Jean Valjean) - Les Miserables

Abestache (Detective Abe Lincoln/Wilford Warfstache) - Markiplier Cinematic Universe

Sasunaru (Naruto/Sasuke) - Naruto

Jedediah/Octavius - Night at the Museum

Nami/Kalifa - One Piece

Gabv1el (V1/Gabriel) - Ultrakill

Kazumaji (Kazuma Kiryu/Goro Majima) - Yakuza

Zukka (Zuko/Sokka) - Avatar: The Last Airbender

Ineffable Husbands (Aziraphale/Crowley) - Good Omens

Billford (Bill Cipher/Stanford Pines) - Gravity Falls

Evelyn Deavor/Elastigirl - Incredibles 2

Jennifer Check/Needy Lesnicki - Jennifer’s Body

Kigo (Kim Possible/Shego) - Kim Possible

Sportarobbie (Sportacus/Robbie Rotten) - Lazy Town

Swan Queen (Emma Swan/Regina Mills) - Once Upon a Time

Hardenshipping (Magma Leader Maxie/Aqua Leader Archie) -Pokemon OmegaRuby and AlphaSapphire

Westley/Inigo Montoya - Princess Bride

Sonadow (Sonic/Shadow) - Sonic the Hedgehog

Plabs (Plankton/Mr. Krabs) - SpongeBob SquarePants

Kylux (General Armitage Hux/Kylo Ren) - Star Wars

Johnchurch (Merle Highchurch/John Hunger) - The Adventure Zone: Balance

Basigan (Professor Ratigan/Basil of Baker Street) - The Great Mouse Detective

LonelyEyes (Elias Buchard/Peter Lukas) - The Magnus Archives

Johnjack (Jack Harkness/John Hart) - Torchwood

Blicy (Bloom/Icy) - Winx Club

Riddlebat (Batman/The Riddler) - Batman comics

Shin Soukoku (Atsushi Nakajima/Ryuunosuke Akutagawa) - Bungo Stray Dogs

Snowbaz (Baz Pitch/Simon Snow) - Carry On

Komahina (Nagito Komaeda/Hajime Hinata) - Danganronpa

Wonder Woman/Cheetah - DC

Spamvil (Jevil/Spamton) - Deltarune

Rk1000 (Connor/Markus) - Detroit: Become Human

John McClane/Hans Gruber - Die Hard

Fenders (Fenris/Anders) - Dragon Age 2

Vegekaka (Goku/Vegeta) - Dragon Ball Z

Rapple (Apple White/Raven Queen) - Ever After High

Billdip (Bill Cipher/Dipper Pines) - Gravity Falls

Radiostatic (Vox/Alastor) - Hazbin Hotel

Sirdust (Angel Dust/Sir Pretious) - Hazbin Hotel

Fengqing (Feng Xin/Mu Qing) - Heaven Official’s Blessing

Blitzer (Blitzø/Striker) - Helluva Boss

Martha May Whovier/Betty Lou Who - How the Grinch Stole Christmas

ZaDr (Zim/Dib) - Invader Zim

Sarumi (Fushimi Saruhiko/Yata Misaki) - K Project

Metadede (King Dedede/Meta Knight) - Kirby

Gandalf/Sauron - Lord of the Rings

Island Husbands (Ben Linus/John Locke) - Lost

Metromind (Megamind/Metro Man) - Megamind

Sherliam (Sherlock Holmes/William James Moriarty) - Moriarty the Patriot

Bujeet (Buford/Bajeet) - Phineas and Ferb

Grovyle/Dusknoir - Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers of Time, Darkness, and Sky

Shassie (Shawn Spencer/Carlton “Lassie” Lassiter) - Psych

Rayaari (Raya/Namaari) - Raya and the Last Dragon

Tycutio (Mercutio/Tybalt) - Romeo and Juliet

Sherliam (Sherlock Holmes/James Moriarty) - Sherlock

Obikin (Anakin Skywalker/Obi-Wan Kenobi) - Star Wars

Obimaul (Obi-Wan Kenobi/Darth Maul) - Star Wars

Oncelax (The Onceler/The Lorax) - The Lorax

Owen Harper/Mark Lynch - Torchwood

Lord Hater/Wander - Wander Over Yonder

Gelphie (Elphaba/Galinda) - Wicked

Cruellanita (Cruella de Vil/Anita) - 101 Dalmations

Angelo Lagusa/Nero Vanetti - 91 Days

Discotrain (The Conductor/DJ Grooves) - A Hat in Time

Klapollo (Klavier Gavin/Apollo Justice) - Ace Attorney

Wrightdot (Godot/Phoenix Wright) - Ace Attorney

Kaneda/Tetsuo - Akira

Sydney Bristow/Lauren Reed - Alias

Ellen Ripley/The Xenomorph - Alien

Zadison (Zoe Benson/Madison Montgomery) - American Horror Story: Coven

Sterling Archer/Barry Dylan - Archer

Y’all (The Poll Takers)/Me (The Poll Maker) - askeletonwar

Just Walk Out!/Papyrus - askeletonwar

Londo Mollari/G’kar - Babylon 5

Rampage/Depth Charge - Beast Wars: Transformers

Pinariz (Riz/Pina) - Beastars

Kunieda Aoi/Hildegarde - Beezlebub

Sebagrell (Grell/Sebastian) - Black Butler

Gus Fring/Walter White - Breaking Bad

Spangel (Spike/Angel) - Buffy the Vampire Slayer

Spuffy (Spike/Buffy) - Buffy the Vampire Slayer

Winteriron (Tony Stark/The Winter Soldier) - Captain America: Civil War

Stucky (Steve Rogers/Bucky Barnes) - Captain America: The Winter Soldier

Carulia (Carmen Sandiego/Julia Argent) - Carmen Sandiego

Macavity/Munkustrap - Cats (1998)

Caius Marcius Coriolanus/Tullus Aufidius - Coriolanus

Dean Pelton/Dean Spreck - Community

Shadowghast (Caleb Widogast/Essek Thelyss) - Critical Role

Blumentrio (Caleb Widogast/Eadwulf Grieve/Astrid Becke) -Critical Role

Theopin (Lapin Cadbury/Sir Theobald Gumbar) - D20: A Crown of Candy

Hero/Villain - dannyphantom.exe

Clex (Superman/Lex Luthor) - DC

Babsquinn (Batgirl/Harley Quinn) - DC

Seavil (Jevil/Seam) - Deltarune

Rengoku Kyoujurou/Akaza - Demon Slayer

Mal/Uma - Descendants

Reed800 (Connor/Gavin Reed) - Detroit: Become Human

Ryokira (Akira/Ryo) - Devilman

Maxwil (Maxwell/Wilson) - Don't Starve

Nikki/Mackenzie - Dork Diaries

Gell/Frisky - Dot X

Dr. Horrible/Captain Hammer - Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog

Count Dracula/Jonathan Harker - Dracula

Joan Watson/Jamie Moriarty - Elementary

Zerxus Ilerez/Asmodeus - Exandria Unlimited: Calamity

Gratsu (Natsu Dragneel/Gray Fullbuster) - Fairy Tail

Gary/John - Faith

Peter Griffin/The Chicken - Family Guy

John Crichton/Scorpius - Farscape

Emiya Archer/Cu Chulainn - Fate Stay Night

Angeal Hewley/Genesis Rhapsodos/Sephiroth - Final Fantasy VII

Cidnero (Nero tol Scaeva/Cid Garlond) - Final Fantasy XIV

Willry (Henry Emily/William Afton) - Five Nights at Freddy’s

Victor Frankenstein/The Monster - Frankenstein

Cure Peach/Eas - Fresh Pretty Cure!

Haikaveh (Alhaitham/Kaveh) - Genshin Impact

Sugio (Sugimoto/Ogata) - Golden Kamuy

Nygmobblepot (Edward Nygma/Oswald Cobblepot) - Gotham

Mabifica (Mabel Pines/Pacifica Northwest) - Gravity Falls

Kagehina (Hinata/Kageyama) - Haikyuu!

[blueiskewl]

Scottish Coin Hoard Could be Linked to 1692's Glencoe Massacre

Coins found under a fireplace may have been hidden there by a victim of the infamous Massacre of Glencoe, according to archaeologists.

Almost 40 members of Clan MacDonald of Glencoe were killed in February 1692 after soldiers were ordered to attack them.

A student discovered the money at the site of a house linked to the clan's chief.

Lucy Ankers was on her first dig when she made the find.

The 36 coins were inside a pot which had a small round pebble as a lid and had been placed beneath a hearth stone slab in the fireplace.

The discovery was made in August during an excavation at the site of the ruined house, led by archaeologists from the University of Glasgow.

The property was associated with clan chief Alasdair Ruadh "MacIain" MacDonald of Glencoe.

He was among the estimated 38 people killed in the massacre.

Ms Ankers said: "As a first experience of a dig, Glencoe was amazing.

"The two weeks I spent digging solidified that I want to pursue a career within archaeology."

She added: "I wasn't expecting such an exciting find as one of my firsts, and I don't think I will ever beat the feeling of seeing the coins peeking out of the dirt in the pot."

The MacDonalds were targeted because of their support for the exiled King James VII of Scotland and II of England.

The clan backed the restoration of the Stuart dynasty to the British throne and had taken part in the first Jacobite Rising of 1689.

Historians say they were late delivering an oath of allegiance to the Protestant King William III, and had been branded as rebels by the Secretary of Scotland, Sir John Dalrymple.

In late January 1692, about 120 soldiers from the Earl of Argyll's Regiment of Foot arrived in Glencoe from Invergarry led by Capt Robert Campbell of Glen Lyon.

The troops were billeted with members of the clan, before turning on their hosts on 13 February.

Some people tried to escape in a snow blizzard to nearby glens, including Gleann Leac-na-muidhe, where the coin hoard was found.

The University of Glasgow has suggested a number of reasons why the money could be connected to the massacre.

None of the coins were minted after the 1680s, which has led archaeologists to suggest they were most likely deposited under the fireplace either just before or during the killings for safekeeping.

The archaeologists also said whoever buried the coins did not return for them, possibly indicating they were among the victims of the massacre.

The coins are dated from the late 1500s through to the 1680s, and include pieces from the reigns of Elizabeth I, James VI and I, Charles I, the Cromwellian Commonwealth, and Charles II.

There were also coins from France and the Spanish Netherlands, as well as one coin which appears to have originated in the Papal States.

Dr Michael Given, a co-director of the archaeological project in Glencoe, said: "These exciting finds give us a rare glimpse of a single, dramatic event.

"Here's what seems an ordinary rural house, but it has a grand fireplace, impressive floor slabs, and exotic pottery imported from the Netherlands and Germany.

"And they've gathered up an amazing collection of coins in a little pot and buried them under the fireplace.

"It's a real privilege, as archaeologists, to hold in our hands these objects that were so much part of people's lives in the past."

University of Glasgow excavations director Edward Stewart added: "The excavation of MacIain's Summerhouse allows us to better understand the importance of these uplands to local elites.

"The scale of this structure and the wealth of artefacts uncovered within suggest this was a place where the MacDonald chiefs could entertain with feasting, gambling, hunting and libations.

"The discovery of this coin hoard within the structure adds an exciting dimension to this story.

"However, ordinary and everyday finds within this structure such as spindle whorls for making thread, a pitch fork and a dress pin, speak to the everyday lives of those who lived here, worked the land and minded the cattle."

[angstbabyjae]

Nona the Ninth Chapter 32 Brief(er than usual) Analysis

Spoilers, of course.

It’s both devastating and hilarious how both Ianthe and Gideon immediately stop their bickering and drop to their knees worried about Harrow’s body when Nona’s starts exploding blood. At the end of the day they’re so whipped for Harrow. Gideon breaks my heart so much this book.

At first I thought the “slim brown hand” cupping Nona’s face was Paul’s (as key word here is “slim” and I don’t think Gideon’s hands would be slim) but on second read it is probably meant to be Gideon’s as there’s a colon between the hand touching her face and “Keep it together. Wherever you are, idiot, I know you can hear me. Keep it together…” which is undoubtedly Gideon.

When Nona drifts back into consciousness to Gideon saying “Take it. Take it from anywhere. Take all of it.” she’s clearly talking about her blood. She would drain herself dry of blood in an instant for Harrow. Gideon is the first one to offer herself to be killed (again) for the thanergy blast, because of course she is.

This part of the last chapter before the epilogue is also where we find out how Harrow got that dent in her lips. I hadn’t caught this at all the first time and had to find out from seeing people talk about it without understanding where it had come from. It’s very Snow White of little Harrow lol. The kiss plus the “teardrop on the hand” (little Harrow must hand cried on her too, I can envision her bending down to her frozen hand to kiss that too and a tear rolling down onto it) is what made the link between her and Alecto happen.

The dreams Alecto states she recognizes Harrow from in the epilogue must be her point of view of Harrow’s hallucinations of her in HTN (and of her finding her as a child, since she seems to know about that). I’m unsure if this includes Harrow’s hallucinations of her following her opening the tomb as a child, those could have been just Harrow’s scitzophrenia like her other hallucinations (of nooses and the like) have been. I say this because those hallucinations had black eyes like hers while the ones in HTN have her yellow eyes and actually speak and know things only the real Alecto would know. It’s very possible her childhood hallucinations of her were also due to their connection but I don’t think the real Alecto was seeing through that one’s eyes in her dream like she presumably does later on.

Moving on, Gideon’s “you could have lived for her” speech to Crux is the most obvious piece of projection of all time. It doesn’t even make sense to be her actually referring to Crux. She’s talking to herself while appearing to talk to him.

I adore Gideon’s relationship with Aiglamene in this book, she’s so fast to stop Aiglamene from even proposing they sacrifice her. She also stops her because she’s set on killing Crux now, but it’s also because she loves her.

Wild that Gideon had John, Wake, Pyrrha, potentially G1deon if he could have been around to know about her, and Aiglamene as either parents or potential parent-figures (regardless of how shit) and yet she grew up considering herself an orphan. It’s raining parents. Hallelujah.

Enough has been said about the part where she kills Crux in this fandom so I won’t rag on about it but god is it depressing.

At the end of the chapter Ianthe starts following her and is most likely the person who howls “No! No— no!” from the shore. I touch on what Nona/Alecto says about Anastasia’s bones being in the tomb in my previous analysis of the epilogue.

That’s all for now! Bye!