#keeps me from wasting stored materials on operators I might not even use

[goldicthehedgefox]

here's my updated to-train list, including Nightmare, who I got earlier today (she's adorable, aaaaaaaaaaaa-)

[deathonyourtongue]

Resurrection | 10

Summary: A ragtag team of Spec-Ops operators are brought out of retirement for all the wrong reasons. When the dust settles, only the best will be left standing. Pairing: Pablo Schreiber x OFC, Henry Cavill x OFC (listen, she gets with the whole team, okay? Don’t lie, you would too.) Word Count: 2.6K Warnings: Nothing much really. A/N: The one you’ve all been waiting for! 😈

As the unofficial dad of the team, none of us are surprised when Rick floats the tab not only for dinner, but for the strip club afterwards. 

“You gonna give us money for working girls too, pops?” Dom jokes as he shuffles past, collecting the money Rick’s doling out and patting his shoulder gratefully as he does so. It’s the same with the rest of the team, each of us getting enough money for two lap dances if we choose to, although I have a feeling we’ll end up pooling our funds towards the end of the night for a group dance. 

We’re good and liquored up by the time we make it through the doors of Prowler, the bass of the music reverberating through our chest as we file into the VIP area, two bottles of champagne there to greet us. Sitting between Max and Jake, it’s not long before I have a glass in my hand, raising it to toast a reunion none of us imagined possible. 

“To the walking dead. If you two fuckers ever go off on your own again, I’ll personally drag you back and kill you both. Love you guys.” Rick grins as our glasses clink, all of us nodding our agreement.

Before long, I feel a head slump on my shoulder, and looking down, find Jake, eyes at half mast. The realization that this is the first time he’s probably been able to relax since everything happened is a sobering thought, and in that moment, I want nothing more than to drag both he and Benji back to our safehouse and curl up with them until they both get as much sleep as they deserve. Logically, I know this is the only respite we’ll get until Wallace is in the ground, but it doesn’t stop me from wishing for more. 

“You should get up there and show Lil’ Miss Daddy Issues how it’s really done,” Jake grins, giving me a wink to make sure I know he’s kidding.

“As tempting as that is, I feel like my time’s come and gone,” I laugh, shaking my head and earning a raised eyebrow from Max. 

“I’m sorry, I thought I heard you disparage yourself, love,” Max comments during a lull between songs, one hand scratching at his short hair before he gently strokes a lock of mine behind my ear.

“It’s the truth. I’m not built the same way I used to be. And I’m definitely not as flexible.” Giving him an appreciative smile, I stroke his cheek in much the same way I had Jake’s, though Max nuzzles into my touch far more. 

“Bet Max is dying to find out just how flexible you are.” Jake smirks, earning a light swat from me just as one of the girls comes around, offering herself up for a lap dance. 

“If he wants to, it’s his,” I grin at Jake as I hold up my night’s allowance, figuring if I can’t beat ‘em, I may as well join ‘em. 

Both Jake and Max’s eyebrows go up as I shift in my seat, making room for the dancer to grind in my lap. As the music thumps through the nearby speakers, the redhead slowly takes off her top, giving all the boys a front row seat. 

Discreetly watching their reactions, it’s easy for me to spot the fact that out of all the boys, Max is the only one who seems ill at ease with the situation. It confuses me, because a few weeks prior, he was in the same position I’m in, and was only bothered when I took the girl away in favor of dragging him along on this mission. Although I’ll be the first to admit that his behavior’s changed in the last little while, this feels like another level, even for Max; like a breaking point.

Before I can even determine what to do, Jake flashes a $100 at the dancer and pats his lap, giveing me a kid-in-the-candy-store grin. Shaking my head, I’m about to say something, when I feel a tug on my hand. Looking to my left, I find Max standing and motioning his chin towards the exit, looking for all the world like this is the last place he wants to be. 

I shoot a quick look back to the rest of the team, doing my best not to laugh as I find them entranced by three different girls, all of them vying for the attention of men who aren’t over 60 and actually know how to dress. Satisfied that they’re all occupied, I let Max pull me under his arm as we step outside, the comparative silence of London at night one that makes me instinctively shake my head to clear it. 

“Where we going?” I smirk, my voice a little sing-songy as Max looks both ways before jaywalking us towards the direction of the safehouse.

“Home,” he smiles, tucking me back in. Although the stroll through the more historic part of town is a nice change of scenery, there’s no missing the fact that both Max and I are keeping our heads on a swivel, both of us keenly aware of everything that’s led us here. 

Scanning our thumbs to get into the safehouse, I only manage to get my heels off before I feel Max pull me close, our lips colliding gently. 

“Hey,” I murmur once we both pull back for air, my hands cupping his bearded face and forcing his gaze to lock with mine. “Are you sure? Or did I misread and you’re just planning another movie night?” I ask softly, not wanting Max to go any further than he feels comfortable with.

“If yesterday taught me anything, it’s that we don’t often get second chances, and that I may very well have been wasting what could be my only shot. That, and well...I love you, Carmen.”

I must recoil a bit, because a look of disappointment crosses Max’s face. 

“Max,” I start, holding onto his face with just a bit more firmness, not wanting him to assume the worst. “In our line of work--”

“I know all about the superstitions and the old wives’ tales, Carmen. I just...After this I’m out, and I hope you are too. I want to enjoy what’s left of our lives, you know? Don’t want to keep looking over my shoulder forever.” 

“I was out until this happened, so I understand, but Max..Me? Really?”

The tension leaves his face in lieu of a relieved and joy-filled smile, Max pulling me close and kissing me deeply. I sink into his arms, his mouth moving against mine without hurry as he walks us back towards my room. 

I kick the door closed, hearing the woosh of the automatic lock behind us at the same time that Max’s calves hit the bed frame. Smirking, I push him back, enjoying the confusion on his face.

“I’m not exactly Mrs. Robinson, but I just might be trying to seduce you,” I joke, lifting one leg onto the chair across from the bed and slowly pushing down one of the thigh highs I’m wearing while simultaneously putting on some music, hellbent on making his first time as memorable as possible.

I watch Max sit up, his eyes roving over my body as he leans back on his elbows. Never has a man looked at me with more hunger and more love, and I know that tonight will either end quickly, or cause us both to walk into tomorrow’s meeting a little sleep-deprived; I’m hoping for the second option. 

Though I have as many questions as I’m sure all the guys do when it comes to Max and his situation, I put them aside, focusing instead on being present and reading his body language for any sign of anxiety. Swaying my hips in time with the music, I come close enough for him to reach, only to pull away just before he can, sticking my tongue out teasingly as I slowly strip for him. 

I make sure to face him when I drop my bra, not missing the tent in his slacks or the adoring look in his eyes. Max sits up further when I straddle his thighs, his hand slipping up my back as his lips find my breasts on instinct. I let my eyes close as he takes his fill, grinding against him without shame, learning how his body responds to mine. 

Blindly, I push Max’s jacket off his broad shoulders, my fingers finding the buttons on his shirt soon after, a soft inhale escaping me when I feel his teeth gently nip in just the right spot. Raking my hand through his curls, I pull back just enough to admire a body I know he’s worked hard for. 

Max uses my distractedness to his advantage, flipping us around so that my back is against the mattress. I let out a whoop of surprise, laughing softly as I watch him practically tear his clothes off, leaving only his black boxer briefs on, the thin fabric leaving little to the imagination. If the bulge is any indication, he’s big, and I’ve got my work cut out for me. 

I motion for him to come back to me with both hands, and he obliges with a big grin, kissing his way up my body even as he pulls off what’s left of my clothes, leaving only my g-string intact. Neither of us hesitate as we eachother’s lips once more, Max cupping my breasts while I let my hand slip over his bulge, feeling a tingle go through me when he responds with a shiver and a thrust closer. 

Pushing him back so that he’s sitting on his heels, I let my gaze flit between the waist of his briefs and his own blue orbs as I slowly pull down the material. His cock springs out, hard as marble and my eyes go wide, having expected the length, but not the girth that comes with it.

“Suddenly, your call sign makes so much more sense,” I shake my head with a smirk, waiting for Max to tug his briefs the rest of the way off before I take hold of his hips. Eyes meeting his again, I kiss through the thick thatch of hair that leads from his belly button to his base, feeling the jolt of anticipation go through him.

Max cards a hand through my hair as I lick my way up to his tip, a soft sound of enjoyment leaving my lips as I collect the precum drooling from his slit. I can’t help my smile when Max inhales sharply, the reaction making it clear that he’s been honest about never being with anyone. 

Holding onto his muscular thigh with one hand, my other gently cups his sac, rolling gently as my lips seal around his shaft. Max’s breathing increases as every lick and suck brings a new feeling he’s never experienced before. 

“Oh fuck!” He pants out, gripping my hair a little tighter as I take him all the way down, swallowing around his head before pulling back with a gasp of my own. I can’t help but moan as I lick down his shaft once more, popping his balls in my mouth to further tease him. 

I can feel Max get close as his muscles contract, and with one last lick to his tip, I lay back, waiting to see what he’ll do. Max doesn’t hesitate, nearly diving between my legs, eyes wide with need. His enthusiasm earns a giggle from me, one that’s quickly silenced as he kisses over the sheer material of my g-string. Sitting up, I stroke my fingers through his curls, appreciating how good his mouth feels against my most sensitive area. 

A soft moan escapes me when Max pulls the thin fabric aside and lets his tongue slip through my folds, the feeling reminding me of our deeper kisses and causing the same weightless sensation he’s so good at making me feel when we’re cuddled in bed. I lay back, putty in his hands as he lifts my legs over his shoulders, taking off my final piece of clothing as he does. 

“Darling?” Max’s voice is hoarse but gentle, the question in his tone equal parts uncertain and hopeful. 

“Bare, babe. Want to feel nothing but you inside me,” I answer, having already felt the swollen head of his cock brushing against my entrance; it’s one of the most arousing sensations I’ve experienced in a long time. 

With a kiss to my calf, Max pushes his hips forward, groaning softly when he slides in with ease. I can’t help but reach up and cup his face, smiling as I experience the moment with him. Knowing how long he’s waited, I don’t take it lightly, honored to be his first. 

“Feels so good inside you,” he whispers, eyes still wide, as though any minute he’ll wake from his dream. 

Biting my lower lip, I can’t help but roll my hips, grinning ear to ear when my movement elicits a choked noise and a look of utter bliss. The growl Max gives me sobers any laughter, and before I can even open my mouth to squeal, his body is covering mine and his hips are rutting. 

My mouth falls open in utter shock as Max cocoons my body in his arms, his lips searing every inch of skin he can find, while his thrusts push me up the bed an inch at a time. I can almost see stars at the crown of Max’s head as he brings me up so that I’m nearly seated on his thighs, his cock going even deeper and making the breath catch in my throat. 

His lips find mine for a torrid kiss, Max’s pace picking up as he shifts the angle once more, making me moan loudly as his hips grind into my clit while his cock sweeps my g-spot relentlessly. There’s no doubt that Max’s need is primal, born from years of waiting for this very moment. Our gazes meet and I can’t stop myself from cupping his face, seeing beyond the lust to the depth of his feelings beneath and knowing that after tonight, nothing will be the same. 

Max comes with a cry of my name, and I follow suit, gasping and jolting my hips, having never experienced an orgasm as intense as the one he’s given me. By the time he rolls us to our sides, our bodies still connected, tears are streaming down my face. 

Everyone’s heard about the elusive orgasm so good it makes you cry, but I never thought it was true; until now.

“What’s wrong, love? Did I hurt you?” Max’s voice holds a razor’s edge of panic, and though I manage to shake my head and smile, the tears won’t stop.

“I j-just...I’ve never...Y-you love me?” I stammer out nonsensically, burying my face in Max’s chest as I feel his arms tighten around me.

“Yes, darling, I love you. I’ve loved you for a very, very long time. I’ve just been too chicken shit to do anything about it until recently. I love you with all my heart and I’m not sure I’ll be able to spend another day without you.”

I look up as Max brushes my hair off my face, finding his gaze filled with the same tenderness, love and devotion that I’ve seen in his blue orbs time and time again over the years. My face finds his chest as the sobs come once more, Max chuckling softly as he holds me close.

[thehubby]

Couch to Compost: Composting 101 - What You Need

Getting started with personal composting is pretty easy. (Those looking to start a professional compost farm may want to obtain better resources.) Here's what you'll need to start composting:

- "Brown" matter such as dried leaves (best), dried grass/straw, black and white newspaper (the colored inks can be toxic), or sawdust from non-treated wood. You can get by with just leaves, but a mixture of 2-3 of these is better. For leaves (which I generally make out to 66-75%+ of my brown material), you need actual brown leaves, the kind that typically fall off in autumn. If you cut leaves from vines or trees and they dry out and are still green, they're not a brown, even though they are dead and dry. Green leaves and grass have chlorophyll in them, and that is comparatively high in nitrogen, which is no good for a "brown". Start gathering leaves as soon as they fall in your area and are dry. You want lots of these for the coming spring, or if you intend to boldly compost over winter.

- "Green" matter such as leftover fruit and vegetable parts, fresh grass clippings, or flowers. (Unless your every meal is a TV dinner, you have these, trust me.) Organic isn't necessary, but all "greens" should be not sprayed with insecticides or herbicides that you know of, since those could be hazardous to you or your plants. Anything you buy in the store for consumption should be fine, and anything you harvest yourself from un-sprayed areas works. "Green" in this case just refers to the type of matter, which still retains moisture and was most recently in a near-life condition. You can compost plant material of any color like peppers, tomatoes, bananas, apples, eggplant, berries, dandelions, and so on.

- A spot to place your compost. This is likely the only problem that you may actually face. If you have little or no yard space, finding a spot to compost might be tough. An apartment balcony might work (be considerate of your neighbors), but you do not want to do this inside. If your spot is on open ground, be aware that you will kill your grass there because all sunlight will be blocked for a lengthy period. To keep pests out and make it easy to move your compost when desired, I recommend using a bin. Fancy, expensive ones can be found online, but I personally use a 20-gallon Craftsman bin that runs about $20. If you use a bin, you'll want to drill holes in it, so... Borrow a drill, too.

- OPTIONAL BUT REALLY RECOMMENDED: Something to mix your compost with. I use a gardening claw, which is technically called a hand cultivator, and can be had for less than $10. It just allows you to stir up the pile, and make sure that oxygen gets to all spots occasionally, which is important. If your compost pile is large (like, much larger than that bin I was talking about), you might want a pitchfork. You can get by without this entirely, but your compost will be a slow, slow process that could take months or years per batch. We have a nearby neighbor who does this. Just one big pile where they dump food and such. I don't think I've noticed much progress on their pile all summer.

- OPTIONAL: Gardening gloves. (Dishwashing gloves can work. Thin, disposable gloves like nitrile, vinyl and latex are handy for preparing food to add to the compost, but will easily tear on straw or twigs when working with the compost pile itself.) Early on, your compost may smell, it may be slimy, it will definitely leave dirt, mud and food stains. There will be times you want to just dig in with your hands and mix it up really good. That's a lot more pleasant when your hands are covered, not to mention safer if you have any hand sores or wounds.

- OPTIONAL: One or more small, cheap plastic lidded buckets (a gallon or less is fine) are handy for storing your food waste until you're actually ready to add it. Sure, you can just toss it in your pile straight from the kitchen, and a lot of folks do, but you'll get far more mileage if you pulverize it a bit first, which means some of it may accumulate until you're ready to do that. Speaking of pulverizing...

- OPTIONAL: A food processor (not blender) is not required, but very recommended. This can massively increase your composting speed by pulverizing your food ahead of time. It's like pre-chewing the food for all your little organisms, but oh lord please don't chew it yourself, use this thing. Check your local Goodwill or thrift store. We picked up one there for under $10 from, like, the 1970s that operates like a champ.

If you have the first three items on this list, you're ready to enlist the forces of nature to your side in this battle to... Grow things, I guess. The next post in our series will tell you how to do just that.

[architectnews]

"Taking credit for trees planted elsewhere is a whole lot of embodied irony"

Architecture firm Perkins&Will has gone too far with claims that a luxury timber home on a Canadian mountain removes more atmospheric carbon than it emits, argues Fred A Bernstein.

For much of last winter, Perkins&Will, an architecture firm with 25 offices from San Francisco to Singapore to Sao Paulo, used a photo of a wooden house in British Columbia as one of the "hero images" on its website.

The house, which sits alone on a mountaintop overlooking the Soo Valley 90 miles north of Vancouver, is certainly beautiful, but the firm had other reasons for splashing it across its homepage. The 321-square-metre dwelling, known as the SoLo House, is meant to be a model of sustainability.

Entirely off the grid, it is designed to operate with power from 103 solar panels on its south facade, a 96-kilowatt-hour battery pack to store electricity for nights and cloudy days (both of which are frequent in British Columbia), and a hydrogen fuel cell for winter.

With all that equipment, the house may well be able to function without utility hook-ups. But Perkins&Will has made a far more surprising and audacious claim: that the building's structure is "beyond carbon neutral," meaning that it will remove more carbon from the atmosphere than it emitted in the first place.

It seemed to be giving its clients permission to build willy-nilly at a time of climate crisis

In a slickly produced video on the firm's website, Perkins&Will architect Alysia Baldwin says the house "proves that buildings can counteract their negative consequences and act as a source of repair."

People listen to Perkins&Will, a firm that has positioned itself as a leader in green building. "For nearly a quarter of a century, we've been at the vanguard of the sustainability movement," its website declares. Journalists have tended to repeat its claims.

But this time it had gone too far. By constructing a showplace of a house on an otherwise pristine mountaintop, and claiming it had helped the environment by doing so, it seemed to be giving its clients permission to build willy-nilly at a time of climate crisis.

Looking at SoLo House, with its cathedral ceilings, its comfortable sectional sofas and its giant picture windows, then listening to Perkins&Will claim that its structure reduces atmospheric carbon, I'm reminded of the old punchline: "Who are you going to believe – me, or your lying eyes?"

Reducing a building's contribution to atmospheric carbon means making it small, keeping it simple, building it near existing infrastructure, avoiding the need for heavy equipment such as batteries and fuel cells and using the lowest-embodied-energy building materials.

Reducing a building's contribution to atmospheric carbon means making it small

Perkins&Will, normally an excellent firm, has done those things on other projects. But with SoLo House, it seems not to have even tried.

According to experts, 40 per cent of atmospheric greenhouse gases come from buildings. Some emissions are attributable to running appliances and systems – so-called operational energy. The rest comes from the power needed to produce the building in the first place, known as embodied energy.

Incredibly, Perkins&Will is claiming there is "no embodied energy" in the house's structure (by which it means the elements that keep the building standing). To its credit, the firm answered requests for information promptly, providing facts, figures and charts prepared by Baldwin and her colleague Cillian Collins, a senior architect.

Here's how Baldwin and Collins arrived at their no-embodied-energy claim: First they estimated the amount of structural wood, steel and concrete in SoLo House. And then they turned to Athena Impact Estimator for Buildings, an app that approximates the amount of energy needed to produce given amounts of each building material and the amount of carbon released into the atmosphere as a result of that energy use.

Athena told them that producing the steel and concrete, harvesting the wood and so on in SoLo House released 122 tonnes of CO2 (sometimes called CO2e, for CO2 and its equivalents) into the atmosphere.

That should have been the beginning – not the end – of the process of calculating the building's embodied energy. There are hundreds of other items that needed to be counted. Start with the roof. The walls. The windows (a massive item, given the need for triple glazing). The solar panels, the batteries, the hydrogen fuel cells. The furniture. The appliances. The plumbing. The heating and cooling systems. Lots and lots of insulation.

The list goes on. Each of those items has significant embodied energy. Transporting all of those materials to a remote mountaintop site adds more.

Perkins&Will failed to account for those sources of embodied energy. Baldwin was clear, in a letter to me, that the calculations were limited to the structure. But why would anyone stop there? According to Baldwin, it's because structure "represents the largest contribution to a typical building's embodied carbon impacts."

It may also be because Athena only applies to structure. (Athena is meant primarily for comparing how the choice of a structural material affects a building's embodied energy. An architect might enter plans for the same building, once with a concrete frame and once with a steel frame, and see how the embodied carbon figures differ.)

Of course, there are other ways to estimate the house's total embodied energy; one method is to use an online tool called Tally, which provides information on the embodied energy of numerous building components. Counting everything isn't easy, but other firms have done it.

Perkins&Will had a way of making it vanish, if not from the atmosphere then from the balance sheet

Even so, according to Athena, the house emitted 122 tonnes of carbon into the atmosphere. That sounds like a lot of carbon, but Perkins&Will had a way of making it vanish, if not from the atmosphere then from the balance sheet.

Much of SoLo House is made of wood. Wood, like all plants, is produced by photosynthesis from ingredients that include carbon dioxide. Thus trees are said to store (or sequester) carbon. They do, but probably not as much as people think, as I learned by studying the question at length.

Here's Perkins&Will's theory: If you cut down a tree and use the wood as a building material, that carbon sequestered in that tree becomes part of the building. Then, if you plant a new tree in place of the one you cut down, the new tree will sequester additional carbon as it grows. Thus the process (cutting down one tree, planting another) results, net-net, in carbon being removed from the atmosphere.

There are so many problems with that theory it's hard to know where to begin. To name a few:

1) You have to be sure a new tree will be planted in place of the one you cut down; will get to be as big as the one you cut down; and will live a long, healthy life. (If a tree burns, or decomposes, as billions of trees do every year, its embodied carbon is released right into the atmosphere.)

2) You can't waste any of the wood. That's a problem because converting a tree into lumber usually turns half the wood into sawdust or chips, which could end up being burnt or allowed to decompose. This problem alone suggests carbon sequestration figures should be cut in half.

3) The wood has to stay in or on the building for a very long time. If the building needs repairs, and lumber is removed, it may be recycled, but it may also be burnt or allowed to decompose. And who'll be watching in 20 or 50 years?

4) Let's be honest: You could have planted the new tree somewhere else, and not cut down the first tree to begin with. For that reason, no number of trees excuses a wasteful building.

5) Even if the new trees do sequester carbon, the process will take decades. Scientists who study global warming warn of tipping points and thresholds, some of which could be reached within the next ten years. If new buildings help push atmospheric carbon levels to a point of no return, the sequestration accomplished by newly planted trees will be too little, too late.

6) It's a logical impossibility. If you really believe SoLo House repairs the atmosphere, all you have to do is build enough SoLo Houses and climate change will go away. Now for our next trick ...

No number of trees excuses a wasteful building

No wonder the theory is highly controversial. A whole lot of things have to happen just right for it to become a reality. As Baldwin wrote in an email: "We acknowledge that not all timber sources perform equally in the realm of embodied carbon reduction."

"Much of the embodied carbon reduction achieved by timber is directly attributed to sustainable forestry management practices that ensure forestry operations are carried out in a way that allows forests to remain healthy and viable for future generations," she added. "These practices include conservation and protection, land use planning, regulation of timber harvesting, establishing practices to ensure forest regrow, and continuous monitoring and reporting to government."

She went on to admit that the tool used to determine the building's sequestered carbon, WoodWorks Carbon Calculator, a product of the Washington-based Wood Products Council, considers "much of this storage to be temporary and therefore [does] not give the building a carbon credit for the carbon dioxide that will eventually be released from this wood some time down the road, through decay or incineration."

But that didn't stop the firm from banking on the theory when it performed its embodied energy calculation. Using the Carbon Calculator, it determined that the amount of lumber in the building would result in the removal – through the planting of new trees – of 145 tonnes of carbon from the atmosphere. That's a bit more than the 122 tonnes the firm says the building's timber, concrete, and steel released into the atmosphere.

Converting a tree into lumber usually turns half the wood into sawdust or chips

So in this case, reducing E (embodied carbon) by S (sequestered carbon) produces a negative number – minus 22 tonnes, meaning that building the house decreased the amount of carbon in the atmosphere. (Indeed, the house's owner, Delta Land Development, refers to it as "climate positive.")

Perkins & Will firm produced a chart to make this clear:

As Baldwin puts it, SoLo House "is able to store more carbon in its structure than was released during the production, manufacturing, and construction of the project."

That's a highly suspect statement. Based on everything I've learned, E (embodied energy) may be much greater than Perkins&Will says it is, and S (sequestered carbon) much lower.

In a letter responding to points in this article prior to publication, Perkins&Will wrote the following (the client, Delta Land Development, did not respond to requests for comment):

"Through careful selection of low embodied carbon and locally sourced materials, the project prioritized a mass timber structure. The design team used industry-accepted LCA [life cycle assessment] tools to quantify the carbon sequestration potential of the structure, and the timber structure is modelled to sequester 145 tonnes of CO2e as biogenic carbon."

Reusing/recycling is always the greenest strategy

"Structural elements typically represent the largest embodied carbon profile of [a] project, and as such, the structure was prioritized from an embodied carbon perspective."

"As designers, we rely on reputable industry tools to estimate the impact of projects. We used the Athena Impact Estimator for Buildings to complete this assessment. Athena uses ongoing research by the Athena Institute and complies with ISO 14040 (environmental management, life cycle assessment, and principles and framework) and ISO 14044 (environmental management, life cycle assessment, and requirements and guidelines)."

"Per our previous correspondence, we shared the Athena Institute's definition of biogenic sequestered carbon, which considers the whole life cycle of the material, including extraction, manufacturing, forms of transportation, installation, repair and maintenance, and end of life (assuming reuse of the wood)."

However, if Perkins and Will had really wanted to reduce embodied carbon, it would have thought about some of these strategies:

1) Putting the house in an easily accessible location, thus cutting out hundreds or thousands of trips by delivery people and construction workers. (Perkins&Will points out "that the wood was sourced from within British Columbia, and the building panels were manufactured in Pemberton, BC, which is located 30 minutes from the site.")

2) Renovating an existing house. Reusing/recycling is always the greenest strategy. Renovation typically generates 50 to 75 per cent less atmospheric carbon than new construction.

3) Choosing a site where there are no trees to cut down. According to Perkins&Will, "A clearing was required for a driveway, solar access, and fire protection. It required harvesting 180m³ of second-growth hemlock timber. This wood was put into the BC forestry chain, becoming useful lumber." Taking credit for sequestration by trees that may have been planted elsewhere, while cutting down enough trees on site to fill a five-meter by six-meter by six-meter container, is a whole lot of embodied irony.

4) Making the house a lot smaller. When it comes to saving energy, less is definitely more.

5) Choosing versions of steel and concrete with the lowest embodied energy (a lot of research is being done on ways of making those materials less "carbon-intensive").

Perkins&Will appears not to have done these things — the actual work required to reduce carbon emissions. The danger is that people will believe its claims.

Fred A Bernstein studied architecture at Princeton and law at NYU and writes about both subjects. He has published articles about embodied energy – a significant component of the climate crisis – in Oculus (a primer), in Architect Magazine (an admonition to architecture critics) and in the Architect's Newspaper (a warning that efforts to make buildings resilient are often detrimental from an embodied energy standpoint).

Carbon revolution

This article is part of Dezeen's carbon revolution series, which explores how this miracle material could be removed from the atmosphere and put to use on earth. Read all the content at: www.dezeen.com/carbon.

The sky photograph used in the carbon revolution graphic is by Taylor van Riper via Unsplash.

The post "Taking credit for trees planted elsewhere is a whole lot of embodied irony" appeared first on Dezeen.

[ramshacklefey]

I’ve seen a couple posts about not having enough time outside work to enjoy life, and I have a theory about where this problem came from. See, until relatively recently in human history, fulfillment (or entertainment or relaxation or however you want to classify it) wasn't a goal by itself for most people. There were two reasons for this.

One is that we were generally much more concerned with survival in a direct way: Farming, caring for livestock, engaging in crafts to benefit the community etc.

The other reason is much bigger: The kind of fulfilling engagement that people are desperate for now used to come from daily labor. Being a farmer or a smith or a weaver involves a lot of boring drudgery, but it's also labor that gives you a direct, tangible result. It's self-regulated. You can sing or tell stories to the people around you while you work. You can linger over your midday meal and watch the clouds, chat with a friend, or take a moment to work on something you like doing for fun. Your work is your own, not just in the sense of you owning the product, but in the sense that you can put some personality into it. There can be idiosyncrasies to how you operate.

Industrialization changed that. Division of labor has been essential to humanity being able to gain material stability, because it increases efficiency. If I farm and you weave, we both get more done. When efficiency becomes its own end, labor becomes so divided as to be meaningless. When labor turns humans into literal cogs in a machine, there is no engagement with it any more. There’s no more talking or singing while you work, and your midday meal becomes a grudging allowance. Your individuality disappears because each thing produced has to be identical to the others. You work in a boring grey office. When was the last time you heard a group of co-workers singing together while they worked? Conversation only happens in hurried snatches while no one’s looking, usually whispered. If your office isn’t boring and grey, it’s because someone did some research and proved it would raise your efficiency to have desks pushed together like grade-schoolers. You enjoying it more is only a factor insofar as it makes you work faster.

The obsession with efficiency has gotten into everything. I worked as a janitor for a while. Instead of each person having responsibility for one or two buildings on campus, we were divided by tasks. Person 1 did bathrooms, person 2 mopped, etc, because it had been decided that the time it took to switch between made us too inefficient. You didn’t get to feel some ownership for keeping a building in good shape, you were a floor mopping machine. You didn’t even get to really feel like a team, because the other people working were in different parts of the building, doing different things. Pacing your work to stay near someone and chat was a waste of time.

It was the same when I worked in retail, which so many of us are familiar with. There was no standing still and talking between customers. If there wasn’t a customer in the store, you were restocking, cleaning, or finding some busywork to do. Heaven help you if you were seen just standing there, and gods forbid you take a moment between customers to doodle in a sketchbook or write down a story idea. You’re working with a skeleton crew, so it feels like you’re always running to catch up. In a big chain, you don’t even get to design displays or decide what items to carry. Hell, in the pharmacy I worked in, our music was piped in from corporate. You could go into any CVS around the entire country, and I guarantee you the same song would be playing.

There are exceptions to this. A lot of people who work as artists still enjoy their work. People find creative engagement in being analysts and accountants, in the thrill of stock trading, in being mechanics or electricians, engineers or academics, scientists or doctors. You might have noticed a common thread in all those professions: They’re all considered privileged positions. You only get them if you’re the best at what you do.

And even some of these are turning into efficiency wheels. Next time you go to a doctor, ask someone who they’re run by. Most of the doctors in my area are run by one of two bigger corporations. Doctors are paid by how many patients they see in an hour. If you’re a newly graduated bio major, you might end up working as a lab tech. I worked as a lab assistant one summer (meaning I did the cleaning and filed papers). The rank and file lab techs sat at benches and filled test tubes from samples, running the same test over and over.

My girlfriend was a professional writer for 11 years. She was treated as a cog in a machine that was supposed to churn out marketing copy at a ridiculous rate.

The working conditions for artists at a certain major studio are notoriously wretched.

And so, rather than work being what you do and providing much of the interest and engagement in your life, it’s the thing you suffer through so that you can get by. Why do you feel a desperate need for more time in the day to pursue things you actually enjoy? It’s because the bulk of your life has turned you into an invisible robot.

People have been railing against this for generations, but no one has actually done anything about it. Taking the position that people should enjoy their work, whatever it is, is a wacky fringe position.

For the six months I lived in Europe though, it was different. I worked as a stagehand with a company that built stages for concerts and other events. I was only the lowest of grunts, but when I anxiously went to stub out a half finished cigarette to hurry back to work and my boss told me to chill and finish my goddamn cigarette. People would just…. stop… for water breaks, or to rest for a minute. One time we were setting up a stage for an American band and their roadies kept expressing disgust about how lazy the Austrians were.

It’s possible to do things differently. But shortening the work day isn’t the only thing that needs to happen. What needs to happen is a fundamental paradigm shift in how we think about and approach the whole idea of work.

[frankrich08]

Gratis Pornofilms: Toegankelijk, gratis en biedt een verscheidenheid aan opties

The free adult porn market is virtually successful today and more and more websites pop-up in that industry every day. The vids that they number are essentially mind-blowing and persons like them. On each free porn page are available a certain number of categories that will allow you to try to find the vids you want the most. The bunch that in some manner appears to show me on is the Amateur. Amateur 100% free porn vids are merely astounding - you will find number phrases and terms in any way to describe a property produced movie with you and your girlfriend making love in the craziest way possible. I definitely am in to these videos and i admit that I check out them once in a while. From their store fresh methods may be mastered for desirable your fan better. Most of these 20min videos can be looked at to be instructional vids from where you stand in a position to learn how to take action definitely better, how to guard your self and what points you mustn't do during intercourse. Nearly all free porn amateur vids get a little something distinctive that makes them one of the very wished-for. Looking at how unprofessional individuals start getting, pressing, undressing, considering them how they're creating real enjoy - that stuff can not be within perhaps not an added free porn type and i also consider that amateur vids are worth the first invest any cost-free adult porn type countdown. What I like the absolute most about free porn inexperienced vids would be the strategy they are done: through the help of a cellphone or even a digicam or even utilizing the webcam of the Personal computer or laptop computer. What I enjoy far more is the truth that those individuals who have intercourse on the camera post their video on the net, on specialized free porn websites which variety this type of films and may generate some money from it... really cool! Try out such a vid all on your own and hit me up - inform me what you think of it and from a range from 1 to 10, precisely how good the amateur type is. Queer but correct, you will find a lot more persons than you are able to ever envision who're addicted with seeing porn. Truth to be told, it has been noted lately that almost 50% of all men are in reality having this addiction and they might not really understand about it. Anyhow, if you are one of them, be assured that you're certainly not unique. In order to support offer with this specific addiction, listed here are 3 killer truths that you definitely should know. To start with, you'll need to realize that the complete pornography business is full of lies. In order for it to be attractive to the visitors, porn makers do not only operate, but additionally abuse in addition to deceive models to get them to pose. You will likely then be victimized as a viewer since you obtain dependent with moments which can be really unreal and fictitious. Besides, the demand for pornography has directly led to an business that will be packed with crazy sex slave and sins. Secondly, when you receive dependent with pornography, chances have you been will become increasingly entrenched inside around time. Obviously, you'd often be in the search for the new works which offer greater excitement in your search for the illusory pleasure. In significant instances, such a trend could lead to the scenario wherever one would have absolutely no regards for ethical obligations as well as claims with their loved ones. Besides, according to medical specialists, dependency in pornography may be explained as an ailment that greatly influences the brain. The pleasure this one gets through it is similar to that during actual sexual intercourse, but the outcomes of both processes are completely different. The reason being the former has anything related to images and videos while the specific sexual intercourse is an affiliation with a human that you love. In regards to free porn preventing application, sometimes you do get everything you spend for. But if you pay nothing for it, sometimes that's precisely what you should get. NOTHING! Several of those businesses may bait you with the notion of "free", only to have onto your computer. Afterward you find yourself buying the "defense" that you required in the first place! You can find 3 issues that free porn blockers will NOT do for you personally, and I am planning to name all of them! Why? Since the porn industry is a BILLION buck company! They've found all kinds of ingenious methods to cover their sites behind clever and sometimes relatively "simple" domain names that the free blockers cannot even begin to filter. Oh, they can filter out "Playboy.com", but can they filter "Whitehouse.com"?(Not to be puzzled with Whitehouse.gov. The actual white house's genuine website.) Why might a blocker want to filter out a record sharing website? What's a file sharing site? Well, file discussing websites are the key places to visit get illegally saved audio from the internet. As well as music, these sites also have software and movies that you could download. That's right, PORN! You key in the title of a song. In these benefits you will see small porn movies which can be downloaded. When the internet was however getting a foothold, whenever you might mention that title, first thing to come in to many people's minds was porn. However, as time as gone by, this concept has changed as people have discovered useful ways of online and how they are able to construct their organization applying it. Nonetheless, porn is still really significant on the internet. Actually, with the large speeds of connection to the web, getting porn videos, videos and shows happens in a subject of minutes and somebody can easily get a regular amount of the same. So as the topic of this short article suggests: can it be practical to rid the net of porn? The answer is just a large NO! Using such a cause would be a large waste of time. One of the issues that will make this trigger difficult is the total amount of income that is created in the porn industry. This is why you may find hundreds upon tens and thousands of porn websites, whose clients are mainly males, who invest plenty of their income trying to find intercourse on the internet. Some sites present free movies to attract their clients. The others allow'do-it-yourself'films to be uploaded. Whatever the case, you'll still discover people spending their income for intercourse on the internet. The living of pornography on the internet is not merely established by money but in addition by the flexibility of expression and freedom of speech. In the early stages of the net, the online earth seemed to be'fairly natural'with people applying phrases with constraint and being cautious not to offend others. But as time has gone by and the letting of people to talk what they think, pornography has wound up rising and enlarging its on line territory. Nonetheless, porn has been, is still and can be there in spite of the forms it could come in. What the net has been doing is to make the entry of porn rapidly and easy; it has decrease the embarrassment that certain may have if they've to purchase a porn film from an adult store. The drawback of that is that really young kids can obtain access to this pornographic material. But thank heavens for the web and their power to place safeguards in position and ensure parents can get a handle on the kind of sites their children can access. Which means parents have the best obligation of ensuring that their young ones do not have usage of adult material on websites. The net isn't accountable for this. To find new details on gratis seksvideo's please visit source. Among the major problems of pornography is addiction. You will see so many individuals dependent on porn which they will always be trying to find any possibility to go online and download either pornographic video clips or photographs in a bid satisfy a craving that is hard to satisfy. Alcohol has always been there and so have alcoholics. The answer has never been to eradicate the alcohol but for the alcoholics to admit their problems. In the same way, eliminating pornography is not the solution; the porn addicts seeking help is preferred solution. One issue that will have to be addressed is that of child pornography. This matter has had the oppertunity to slip into the internet even though you can find law agencies that enforce regulations against such practices. The web cannot be regulated or legislated by laws of a specific nation. This is because each country has their own group of laws that they run with. Like, in China, the us government has been able to close some websites they have deemed unsuitable. What really makes something pornographic? What are the acceptable and non acceptable kinds of pornography? These are some questions which are very difficult to answer as regarding what might be pornographic material and what's normal. Where in actuality the line is drawn is as yet not known because people have their own various notions on pornography.'Violent and extreme pornography'is known as a crime in line with the British government. The issue is that what might seem extreme to someone might not be extreme to another. Freedom of speech and expression should be allowed as long as it doesn't incite violence or conflict between parties. The internet seems to be the only real place where this freedom may be maximized on. The web shouldn't certainly be a threat in a bead to rid it of pornography. Trying to do this will be a service in futility. What needs to be done is to place controls and measures. All of us know that pornography is all online; it's difficult to trust there are those who actually don't view or watch porn online. But there are always circumstances where porn must be used out of the computer, either to help keep the kids from snooping around private directories or to help keep it far from people who want to access your files through file sharing. If you've got a porn collection growing in your computer but are now actually worried that other people will have the ability to see your files without your knowledge, then this is actually the article for you. That is especially useful for people who wish to help keep their porn collection a secret from prying eyes, snoopy hackers, and needless to say those who share computers and laptops for different reasons. You will find basically two surefire ways on how to Remove Porn From Computer quickly. The foremost is removing your files and folders from your computer and moving it to another location that's far more secured and protected from other people. This is a good option if you do not desire to erase all of your porn files and if you've spent days and nights just downloading bulks of porn from the internet. But obviously, you've to consider that people are coping with big bulks of porn here and the full time it requires to maneuver each video and every album is going to be dragging and long. Here are some of the most useful options to use: You can begin by searching for each file and folder, including ZIP and RAR files, and putting them all under one directory. You need to use certain programs that will even retrieve and recover a few of the files which were long forgotten and left in other folders. Then you're able to organize your collection by segregating them in accordance with file type. Since JPGs and GIFs are smaller in dimensions, you are able to move these first prior to starting moving the videos. You are able to either move it to a new partition in your computer or an additional hard drive for safekeeping. Another way to save your collection is to burn them in a CD or DVD, but this is still accessible to anyone who lives with you and who are able to rummage through your stuff without you knowing it. Now if you're girlfriend or sibling has problems with pornography like, you may want to consider learning how to Remove Porn From Computer completely, leaving no trace whatsoever in your hard disk for them to see. You can use the exact same programs to retrieve and recover your files and eventually delete everything including the ones that are automatically encrypted. You can find articles in websites all over the World Wide Web that provide detailed instructions on how to Remove Porn From Computer to help you take some time to consider those in case something goes wrong or you are still unsure if your personal computer is free from porn or not.

[backyardrevolutionplanreviews]

Backyard Revolution Review- How I Used It?

It might come as a surprise to many of you when I say that you can build your solar energy system within 4-5 hours. And it also takes up less area to install the panels.

We often forget that non-renewable resources are on the verge of extinction, and we need to make a lot of changes to prevent damaging the natural environment even further. This is why opting for renewable energy is a viable option.

Then again, the cost of solar panel installation calls for a substantial investment and space. Keeping such drawbacks in mind, the Backyard Revolution program has been created to serve the needs of all.

Hi, I am Nicholas Altucher, a proud owner of a bookstore in Seattle with a passion for renewable energy and green technology.

After struggling for years to save up for green energy, I failed miserably! This instead motivated me to find alternative sources.

So, in the following sections, you’ll find an informative review of the Backyard Revolution to help you understand the nitty-gritty of this program.

What is Backyard Revolution?

Since the last few decades, human beings have evolved in the field of technology, and renewable energy sources. One such source is solar energy, which not only needs a lot of space, but deep pockets as well.

This is why Zack Bennett created the Backyard Revolution, which is an online program that teaches you the process of building an energy source that can be used in about four hours. The aim of going about this investment is that it cuts down your waste while you save over 60% of your energy bill each month.

Backyard Revolution also focuses on showing you how you can install this system on your property within a maximum of 20 minutes. This means it can be a great weekend project that will help you enjoy the benefits of solar energy in the long run.

So instead of paying professionals more than $13,000- $15,000 for making it an eco-friendly home, you can use this guide to create your own energy source. It consists of step-by-step instructions that simplify the entire process.

Who is Zack Bannett?

Zack Bennett is a student at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology who proposed this innovation. If you compare this unique technique to the conventional method of harvesting solar energy, you’ll realize that you can generate more power by following this method. The main goal was to create a product that would be efficient enough to reduce electricity bills.

Many households don’t have the space or the budget for solar panel installation. But Backyard Revolution is a more beneficial alternative source. It provides a vast amount of power at a cheaper rate, without taking up much space.

On an interesting note, the inspiration behind this program was about self-reliance and survival. Bennett’s home was robbed during a power failure, since there weren’t any other security systems in place for sending an alert to the police. After which he started his research on finding ways to prevent such occurrences.

During this time, he found an elaborative research on zig-zag solar panel installations. Since it comes with easy steps for harvesting solar energy, he started sharing his research to help other people with their needs.

How did I come across the Backyard Revolution?

After having attended many discussions on global warming, which is one of the burning issues in the present era, I wanted to make a few lifestyle changes. So I started looking for ways to reduce our household power consumption.

This was about the same time when my colleague was trying to figure out the workable solutions for alternative energy sources. And he spoke about the advantages of the Backyard Revolution. I was especially interested in the fact that I could create my solar system by following the given instructions from this program.

The entire process of making this solar backup system doesn’t involve any form of pollution. Moreover, when there is a power shortage during some emergencies, it’s always good to have a backup. And it did take me by surprise when I discovered that it takes up very little space, to be precise about 4-square feet area.

In most cases, we need to install a solar system by taking professional help that can cost over thousands of dollars. But with Backyard Revolution, I managed to purchase all the tools and accessories for creating the 3-dimensional structure at about $300.

Since I didn’t have any technical knowledge, I was a bit too hesitant to create this structure. Thankfully, the instructions were pretty easy-to-follow, so it didn’t take me more than 5 hours to complete the installation. Since then, I feel more satisfied with being successful in reducing the carbon footprint of our house.

What does this program involve?

The Backyard Revolution offers everything that will help you save a lot from your energy bills. You’ll find pictures, diagrams, shopping lists, video tutorials, an owner’s manual, along with several bonuses that support you throughout this creative process.

The bonuses that are included in this set gives you the details about how to store solar energy on your property. And it showcases the possible alternative sources, in case the power grid fails for some reason. In fact, all the information can be downloaded in an instant.

But to take advantage of all the benefits that this program offers, you should have a good internet connection and sufficient storage space on your device. On top of that, you’ll be receiving a tactical flashlight in your mail after you place your order, which is a bonus.

It also gives you the option to check out the videos online if required. Therefore you’ll have easy access to information whenever you need any help with setting up the power generation system. Even if you aren’t one of those DIY-experts, the Backyard Revolution will offer you everything that you need to get started with this solar energy project.

How does Backyard Revolution work?

Backyard Revolution is an online program that gives you several ideas to have a life that’s free from energy dependence. Other than having to purchase the guide, you’ll need to buy the materials for constructing a primary power station. And the best part, the zig-zag solar panel takes up less than 5% of the surface area when compared to the traditional system.

You’ll be spending somewhere between $200 and $300 for making this power station. The total expenditure is almost equivalent to about two months of power bills in an average household. And that means, you can end up saving hundreds of dollars in about three months time.

Since the power station works like a backup device, you’ll always have access to the comfort that your home provides. The instructions are pretty simple to follow, and you get to make this device without having to pay for an overpriced control system.

Moreover, the Backyard Revolution also gives you a clear picture of where you can purchase the materials and the required tools for building this system. This online program is broken down into a total of 11 steps, and all the information should be followed carefully.

The information includes- dimensions of the parts, drawings and images of the assembly process, and the process of connecting the power station to your house. Finally, it will teach you how to build an upright apparatus with the zig-zag pattern for collecting solar energy to provide an efficient power backup.

The benefits of this program?

Here’s a list of the five different advantages that will come your way, if you choose to take up the DIY approach given in Backyard Revolution:

Easy to use

You’ll have several different mechanisms that you can adopt to protect your family when you’re using the ideas that are given in the Backyard Revolution. It provides you sufficient time to build your solar system that protects the household during emergencies.

If you aren’t confident about building the structure entirely on your own, then you can hire someone to do the same for you. Because in the end, this minor investment not only gives a good return but also supports the environment.

For instance, I managed to save about $100 in the first month itself after having invested less than $300. If you can bring about a few minor changes in your lifestyle, then you don’t have to pay for your local energy bills. In truth, you cannot use this solar energy system to operate heavy appliances like your AC or fridge.

Requires less space

The Backyard Revolution solar system doesn’t take over 5% of the surface footage area than your conventional solar panel system for producing electricity. So even if you don’t have enough space around the house, you can install this compact solar system. Furthermore, you can save over 60% of your monthly energy costs by following the instructions.

Many homeowners have also managed to build around two to three systems for slashing their electricity bills. And since it doesn’t take up much space, you’ll still have enough room to enjoy the outdoors.

Simple protection method

Since the Backyard Revolution system utilizes less space, it gives you more options for protecting your investment. You can also share this upgrade process with your neighbors, so they can be free from any more trouble during a power outage. However, you can also power the indoor and outdoor lights by using the solar system without having to pay for energy bills.

You can get rid of the electrical grid

If you’re focusing on minimalist living, then you can use the Backyard Revolution system to power the entire house. Even if you’re installing this unit for survival during a power outage, then this design will have you covered during the worst situations. And there’s no comfort in comparison to the shelter of your own home, which is precisely what this program offers you.

Less maintenance

To charge the Backyard Revolution system, you just need to place it in a spot that receives maximum sunlight in your house. It will take about 4-5 hours to charge the battery fully, so find the best area in your backyard accordingly. And it has pretty hassle-free maintenance. You only need to remove the debris that tends to collect on the surface of your solar panels.

Does it have a Money back guarantee?

Yes, the Backyard Revolution provides you with a 60-day money-back guarantee that supports your investment. This duration gives you sufficient time to try out the process and to test your installation skills.

But if you aren’t satisfied with the final result and if the program doesn’t offer you proper instructions to set up your solar system, you can request a complete refund. That means you can build your trust in this brand, and if you give your best in creating your solar energy system, then it won’t leave any room for disappointment.

Final Words

The Backyard Revolution, in my opinion, is a safe, reliable, and easy-to-install device with a good return on investment. It will help you support the changes that need to be made in your lifestyle to prevent global warming.

After all, a small initiative can also make a huge impact, especially in a world where pollution rates are at a rampant increase. It also saves you from having to pay those high electricity bills. And no electricity board promises to have you covered during an emergency blackout.

[raxlestrange]

Bury the Hatchet or Bury A Friend | Phoebe x Sam x Avery

Phoebe

Phoebe shoved a Marlboro Gold between her crimson lips as she weaved through the crowded street, waving on her newest business partner with her free hand. Their recent alliance was already proving to be lucrative with the whereabouts of the bookstore attacker secured. A little too secure for Phoebe's liking. 

"My contact’s shop's just up the road." Phoebe quipped, not wanting to waste any more time. Especially when a potential lead could turn cold, or worse get thrown into Azkaban. Upon arrival, she cast her eyes at Sam  "Let's go. He's expecting us."

Sam

Sam kept up with Phoebe’s pace with ease, though that wasn’t overly impressing considering his legs were practically the size of his new companion. He wasn’t quite she what to think of her yet, nor was he sure if she would be a reliable partner, but right now he couldn’t afford to let the opportunity slip. Besides, it wouldn’t be hard to get rid of her if she betrayed him. 

He was mostly the muscle of this operation, even if he wasn’t a vampire it wasn’t often people tried to fuck with the giant man, especially not when he was visibly pissed off. He gave her a nod and a quiet grunt in response, pulling his jacket closer to himself. As they approached the store, he opened the door, a small bell sounding, and held it for the younger woman. “Ladies first.”

Avery

Avery raised his eyes from the inventory notes he had been taking for what felt like the dozenth time in the past ten minutes. Of course, he always greeted customers when they arrived — as was the polite thing to do — but he was expecting some very important company that afternoon. When Phoebe had approached him with a lead, he was surprised to learn that the otherwise quite solitary woman would be bringing the owner of this particular lead along. The allomancer still wasn’t sure if he could trust the spitfire woman, let alone this new stranger, but he had pulled his weight thus far and he could only hope that they were prepared to do the same.Directing his employee at the front of the shop to keep an eye on things for a moment, he greeted his new... business partners. 

 “Miss Maddock—“ Avery nodded to the smaller woman before lifting his gaze to the tall stranger. “Perhaps introductions are better done behind closed doors... if you will both follow me.” He canted his head towards his office before leading the way, directing them behind sturdy wood and soundproofed walls.

Phoebe

Phoebe stamped out her light, allowing the last bits of smoke and exhaust to fill her lungs before entering. As per Sam's request, Phoebe strode through the familiar doors to Allomancy. She nodded a deliberate thanks to the taller man, taking a quick second to marvel at his impressive height. Phoebe liked to think she had seen it all, but she never seen a man quite as tall as Sam before. It was curious, and it would have to wait.

"Lestrange." Phoebe nodded back, bringing her attention to the man behind the counter. "Lead the way." She was familiar with the manner in which the eldest Lestrange had conducted his business affairs having worked with him a number of times in past. It was no surprise that they were going to keep the contents of this particular deal private as well. 

Phoebe then nodded a second time. This time at Sam as if to wordlessly say that it was all clear and then proceed to follow Avery to the more secure location. If they were going to work together they would need to develop a systematic form of communication. 

 As instructed, Phoebe waited for the door to close behind them before she began the introductions. "Lestrange, this is Samuel Prince. He owns the bookshop down the road.” Her eyes darted between the gentlemen. "Prince, Avery Lestrange. I do believe the lot of us have similar interests. Interests that involve the outcome of recent events and Lestrange’s particular skill set.” 

Sam

Lestrange was a familiar name to Sam, it was about time he met the eldest. He was unsure how the interaction would go; he was go friends with Viv, but Marius was a whole other story. Hopefully this man wasn’t as annoying as his brother, otherwise he might have to eat him, too. However, he trusted Phoebe knew what she was doing, at least for now, and Sam was too desperate to turn down her services and information. 

 His usual extroverted demeanor was replaced with an irritable and quiet mask, returning the young female’s nod and trailing after her and the eldest Lestrange silently, the only sound coming from his black boots against the floor. Sam nodded at the other gentleman, muttering a quiet “pleasure to meet you” even if he knew the circumstances were anything but a pleasure — even after all these years he couldn’t help his manners, he guessed that was his mother’s doing.

Avery

Avery nodded to each of the visitors in turn, noting how even he had to lift his gaze to meet the other man’s. He only vaguely recognized the other store owner despite his striking size and features, but he had heard plenty about his misfortune. The damage wasn’t irreparable from what he had seen, but the vandalizing had already caused a lull in business for himself— he could only imagine what such a targeted attack must have done to Sam’s. Not to mention the added drama of Potter’s mental break; from what he had read in the papers, the victim had been a friend of Prince’s. Surely that was motivation enough to team up with a vengeful Maddock, but Avery couldn’t help but wonder if there were something else driving him to such extremes. 

 “The pleasure is mine. My deepest apologies about your storefront, I know better than many how that kind of attention can influence sales... though I suspect business may not be the only reason you’ve come.” 

“Nonetheless— I have kept up my end of the bargain thus far. This room has been carefully safeguarded by yours truly, I trust we can speak freely among these walls.” The metal charmer pulled a ring of keys from his pocket, opening the cabinet behind his desk and pulling a sturdy black box from one of its shelves. He brought the box to the table, raising an eyebrow at his occasional business partner. 

 “Have you informed him what I have been tasked to do?” 

Phoebe

Phoebe scanned the room, deep brown irises narrowing with intent as she inspected the area for any ill will. It was more out of instinct than mistrust, and general good practice when it came to making these sorts of deals. Judging by their similar interests and previous work together, she didn’t have reason to distrust this Lestrange. 

 Satisfied, Phoebe nodded towards Avery allowing the pair to finish up their introductions before continuing on with more urgent matters. 

 “He has been briefed.” Phoebe confirmed, her eyes flickering towards her new ally then back to the eldest Lestrange, hunger and impatience apparent in them now. “As have you. Now, enough with all the small talk. Let’s see this prototype of yours.” 

Avery

Avery nodded his head, fighting back a wave of nerves and excitement as he took out his wand, large hands working over the box with a series of quick mutters to unseal the item from its case. He was nothing if not thorough, but he couldn’t help the concerns that had wormed into the back of his mind. Working on this new piece had left him feeling equal parts challenged and accomplished, and while he was confident in his abilities, there was always a certain risk that came with such prototypes—a risk the other two couldn’t exactly afford considering their plans. He would have loved more time to develop and test, but felt comfortable that they would find use in the piece as it was. 

 “You’ll notice it looks very simple—unassuming. Exactly what you would want for such a task.” Avery slid the long silver cord from its box, twisting and turning the enchanted metal in his hands to show how it could be linked and unlinked, extended and shrunken.

“The base metal is no longer than a standard necklace, so you’ll notice it can’t shrink beyond that length. However, the charms I have layered should allow it to wrap and extend to your bidding... but there is a catch. Such a binding charm can only be broken with certain materials. Long ago they might have used a unicorn horn, but we don’t exactly have time for such unwieldy tools..”

Sam

After living through the Middle Ages and all of the lovely torture devices of the time, the puny ass chain almost made Sam laugh. Instead, a scoff escaped his lips and his eyes rolled. Who even was this guy to be making something for their task? Phoebe trusted him it seemed, but Sam wasn’t sure if he could trust her either. 

 “Are you going to tell us what it does or would you prefer we guess?” The vampire sassed, arms crossed over his chest and dark eyes piercing into the younger male. He couldn’t help but distrust him, he was a Lestrange after all. Of course, he loved Viv, but if Avery was anything like his brother he might be the next on his grocery list.

Phoebe 

Phoebe’s eyes managed to widened at the silver chord as it resized itself several times, then regrettably sink as Avery's explanations continued on and on. Phoebe didn’t have time for all the subtle nuisance and intricacies of the product, not while Alfie's killer's still drew breath. 

In an attempt to ease Sam’s frustrations that mirrored her own, Phoebe stood on her tiptoes and placed a hand on as close as she could get to the tall man’s shoulders. She, too, was beginning to grow impatient even if she respected Avery and his craft enough to tolerate his introductory  ramblings.

But enough was enough. 

 "Perhaps a demonstration.” Phoebe suggested, darkened irises flickering towards the noise proof door.  A smirk snaked across her crimson lipstick. “I saw a few willing participants in the store front."

Avery

Avery wasn’t offended by Pheobe or the stranger’s reaction, if only because he was confident that the cord’s complex hidden utility would prove them wrong for underestimating him. He was slightly put off by the man’s attitude, but trusted that Phoebe would not take someone on as a partner if he were incompetent or not to her liking. Desperate as she may be to find out what happened to her brother, he knew his business partner was nothing if not ten steps ahead of the game. 

 “I was getting there,” the allomancer replied cooly, “Though business is already at risk as it is, so perhaps a volunteer would be more appropriate?” 

Avery raised a challenging eyebrow, extending his hands with the cord for one of them to allow him to fasten it. “You see, when the metal is melted down for production I am able to add certain ingredients and elixirs to imbibe the metal with. Only trace amounts of course—“ he reckoned they didn’t care much about how added liquid could change the composition of the metals and compromise the item, but his point still stood. “Enough to produce certain qualities, however. For example, if an allomancer were to have some veritaserum on hand...” 

Sam

A small huff escaped the young vampire’s lips as Miss Maddock’s hand met his shoulder, containing the urge to shrug it away. Be nice, he told himself, even if the gesture reminded him of Teddy and Teddy made him want to rip his heart out of his chest like a Mortal Kombat fatality, except on himself. 

Anyway, he wasn’t overly impressed by his new companion, but he was already getting attached to Phoebe and wasn’t going to let her try out Mr I-Have-A-Crazy-Brother’s new contraption. Sticking out a tan hand, he pulled up his leather jacket’s sleeve to expose his wrist, allowing the stranger to fasten it around him. 

Avery

Avery wasted no time, slipping the cord around the taller man’s wrist, wrapping the cool metal several times before attaching it to itself. He pulled back, the tail end following his own hand as he leaned against the desk. “Now, Mr. Prince... I want you to lie to me. Have you ever killed someone?”

Sam

If Sam was being completely honest, this was the only question he didn’t want to be asked. He released a breath, closing his dark eyes before mumbling a quiet no. 

Avery

Avery watched as the cord began to glisten faintly, felt as the heat began to travel from his end of the cord to the taller man’s wrist. The heat was tolerable enough to maintain his grip, though surely after prolonged exposure it would be blistering. A faint smile graced his lips, just barely concealing the pride he felt at seeing his invention serve its purpose. 

“Not to worry, Mr. Prince— there will be no judgement here. Business is business after all, and your presence here tells me all I need to know for this particular transaction.” 

“Would you like to test it for yourself, Miss Maddock? Or shall we set our friend here free?” 

Phoebe 

Phoebe leaned in watching intently as the device was fastened around the taller man's wrist. Her lips twisted into a wicked smirk once the demonstration was underway, and she nodded at Sam impressed not only with his readiness to volunteer, but with his answer to Avery's question. Having Sam in her ragtag crew was continuing to prove more and more valuable. 

 "The more lies the more pain." Phoebe confirmed. It wasn't so much a question as it was a mere admission of the facts. A simple yet effective formula.

"That will be enough. I'm not interested in injuring my associate before we get our hands on the bastard it's really for." She faced the eldest Lestrange now. "And how long are these effects projected to last? Hours..?" she trailed, matter of factly, a plan already beginning to form in her mind. "Days?"

Sam

The stranger’s chain barely phased Sam, but he supposed it would do — after all, most humans couldn’t endure the pain he did after he was sick with the plague, repeatedly cut by Medieval healers in attempt to bloodlet the disease, and then changed into the monster he is today. 

“It’ll do,” he shrugged, barely flinching at the affects. He was sure they were beginning to question his humanity, but he hoped they’d keep their mouths shut. If they ended up trying to spill his secrets like dumbass Marius, they’d end up missing and look like victims of the Guardians. At this point in time, Sam wasn’t looking to play with his food.

Avery

“Precisely—“ Avery nodded to the smaller woman. “Naturally I haven’t had the chance to test its prolonged effects, but I imagine there’s a certain threshold after which the heat ceases to increase, or else we would reach a melting point.” 

“The effects of the charm won’t fade, though they don’t seem to last for a particularly long time following each lie.    More of a detecting charm than anything, not unlike the Sneakoscope. If the lie is present it will continue to radiate heat, but you will have to get creative if they choose to remain silent — though I’m sure you’ll have no trouble with that.” 

Avery turned to grab a dagger from the box, returning to his position in front of Mr. Prince once more to gesture for his wrist. He broke the chain with the blade, the cord shrinking back to its original size. “Unicorn horn. Not the most complex, I’d have liked to work out a more functional binding system for the future... but for now it should do the trick.” 

Phoebe

Phoebe nodded as Avery rambled, committing the details to memory. The piece about getting creative was particularly of interest to her, and she shot Sam a pointed look, perhaps a bit too eager. There certainly was something deliciously peculiar about her new ally, something that Phoebe hoped would prove most useful to their future endeavors together. 

 Once Sam was set free and logistics were sorted, Phoebe pursed her lips tightly with a hand positioned at her hip and irises like draggers aimed to pierce. Nothing was ever simply handed over to the middle Maddock. There was always a deal or catch, and everything had its price. She then faced Avery, “I assume something of this value doesn’t come cheap...Name your price.” 

Sam

If he was being honest, Sam was rather bored. Sure, the trinket would be useful for their plan, but Sam didn’t need fancy gadgets to cause pain to their victim when he grew up around blood, torture, and death. But Phoebe seemed excited and interested so he tried to focus on what the stranger was saying. However, he couldn’t help tuning the pair out and becoming lost in his own thoughts. There was too much going on and too little time to process it all.

The talk of money brought him back, blinking a few times before he felt focused. He was prepared to spend on this endeavor, but he had a feeling Mr Lestrange didn’t want money, he had enough of that. 

Avery

“Ah, you always were the quick one—“ Avery set to carefully packaging the cord back into its box with the knife, setting the case free of its various security charms. “Believe it or not, I actually enjoyed this little task. I don’t get asked to work with such... complex parameters... very often. I would be happy to do this without compensation, however...” 

“I’d like to be kept in the loop. While I do have a certain image to maintain so that we can keep making arrangements such as these, I consider myself invested in your cause. I have lost in this tragedy as well, and we will all continue to do so if this is allowed to continue.” 

The allomancer extended the case out to the woman. “Perhaps we can continue to be of assistance to each other. Surely there are contacts that we don’t share... I can keep my ears to the ground if you are willing to do the same.”

Phoebe

“You have yourself a deal, Mr. Lestrange." Phoebe reached to grab the package from Avery, careful in her movements as she wrapped her thin fingers around the new toy. It's not that she didn't trust the allocmancer, she simply wasn't accustomed to such terms. Then again, information wasn't exactly cheap. 

"I believe this is the beginning of a very lucrative partnership." She offered Avery her hand, extended her it towards him. All deals needed to be sealed. "I look forward to continuing business with you."

Sam

Normally Sam would feel awkward at moments like this, however he was at a point where he genuinely didn’t give a fuck. He found himself tuning them out, fiddling with the lip ring he had gotten a few days ago. Probably wasn’t a good idea to play with it, but he wasn’t a human and he was pretty sure the piercing was already healed. 

Only when he heard Miss Maddock say they had a deal did he go back to reality. He shoved a hand into his pocket, waiting for the pair to tie up loose ends before he gave Mr Lestrange’s hand a shake. Sam kept silent, apart from a quiet grunt. He didn’t really need Avery’s toy, he was only there because of Phoebe. If they didn’t get what they wanted, Sam would have to pull strings of his own. 

[phinnsyreads]

Item #: SCP-032

Object Class: Euclid

Special Containment Procedures: SCP-032 is to be housed in Automated Containment Unit 535/15. Direct contact with SCP-032 is to be restricted to research-relevant tasks only. Interviews, if deemed necessary, are to be carried out using the Unit’s remote communication array. While SCP-032’s presence is not directly harmful to the human body, exposure to it is to be limited to periods of 12 hours or less due to its adverse effects on most beneficial microorganisms. SCP-032 is not to be exposed to any biological material not refined or otherwise tempered by humanity, with an emphasis on non-human living entities. For full list of classifications, see Document-032-RCL. SCP-032 neither requires nor requests substances or other forms of comfort.

Description: SCP-032 is a Type-F (imperfect external resemblance, internally inconsistent) human simulacrum of currently unknown origins. It is composed of an outer shell of pigmented silicone (5.5 mm thick), and various plastic fiber polymers, with the outward appearance of a Caucasian woman nearing the third decade of life. SCP-032’s interior is composed entirely of liquid refined oil, lacking any skeletal or muscle structure. Despite this, SCP-032 is capable of locomotion and speech. SCP-032 is capable of maintaining the illusion of humanity at a moderate distance, but becomes unconvincing at a closer range, causing mild discomfort in most observers. This effect has been deemed non-anomalous. Despite apparently possessing fully-realized cognitive abilities, SCP-032 claims that it is not sapient, acting only as an intermediary instrument of its creators. The Foundation has not been able to verify or refute this claim as of yet.

SCP-032 has extreme adverse effects on any biological entity in its close vicinity not created, willfully influenced, manipulated by or similarly relating to humanity. While the exact nature of these effects varies, SCP-032’s presence inevitably causes severe and irreparable damage to the ability of any living organism to exchange and/or use energy: wild flora loses its ability to photosynthesize or otherwise produce or consume energy, fauna the use of its respiratory and digestive systems, etc. This applies to microorganisms as well, though SCP-032’s effects seem to favor damage to their reproductive systems instead. It is hypothesized that the symbiotic relation some microorganisms have to humanity is the reason for this discrepancy.

SCP-032 was discovered sitting on the doorstep of the inner compound of Foundation Site-██ near ██████████, Slovakia. When questioned by Foundation security personnel, SCP-032 explained its anomalous effects and claimed it was there ‘to be stored’. Surveillance footage show no record of the time of its arrival, and it is not yet known how SCP-032 came to know Site-██’s location or approach it without being spotted. When asked for its reason for seeking Foundation custody, SCP-032 replied that it was there at the command of its creators, seeking 'indefinite storage, until claimed’.

Addendum:

Interview 032-A

Note: this interview was recorded near the time of SCP-032’s initial containment by Dr. Alexander Kovac, Site-██ resident psychologist, following its initial examination by Site Security.

<Begin Log>

Dr. Kovac: Before we begin, there’s something I feel I should ask you, since security so often neglects doing so. It’s not strictly conforming to protocol, but I find it tends to make things easier.

SCP-032: I was instructed to cooperate. Dr. Kovac: Good, very good. Tell me then, what is your name?

SCP-032: I don’t have one. People have names. I’m not one.

Dr. Kovac: Is that so? What did your so-called creators call you then?

SCP-032: They didn’t.

Dr. Kovac: Surely, they had to refer to you somehow?

SCP-032: I am a vessel of their will, and nothing else. They never needed to call. They never will.

Dr. Kovac: In that case, would you mind if I refer to you as SCP-032?

SCP-032: I was instructed to cooperate.

Dr. Kovac: So you said, so you said. Tell me then, what is the purpose of your coming here?

SCP-032: I am to be stored here until collected.

Dr. Kovac: Security told me that much, but why here, and collected by whom?

SCP-032: Collected by the ones they wish to torment, and stored here because in finding me here he will suffer further.

Dr. Kovac: Is that so? Is that person you refer to part of this organization then? Do your creators bear some grudge towards a particular operative?

SCP-032: He is not one of you. Merely a… one-time sympathizer, of sorts. He believes you tried to help him once, and if he is forced here, if he finds me here, you will die. That will hurt him. They have no interest in any of you, or your organization. You are here as a tool, just as I am.

Dr. Kovac: Who is this man then? What did he do to earn this sort of treatment from your creators?

SCP-032: He did not know his place. Won when he should have lost, was proud when he should have been humbled. Was wasteful with gifts too precious for abuse.

Dr. Kovac: And you are here as punishment?

SCP-032: He was already punished. Severely. Forced away from kin and kind, to endlessly wander, to destroy against his will. To poison humanity by his very presence. Eternal solitude, flavored by ceaseless guilt. A masterwork of torment, they say.

Dr. Kovac: If that’s the case, why are you here?

SCP-032: Because even in this existence, there is the occasional moment of solace. At times, he may yet look to the world and see things he will not destroy. Look to nature and feel warm wonder, and bask in the false light of ancient, moldy memories. It keeps him sane, gives him hope. That will not serve. Hence my presence. I am to be his last undoing, a hastening to the end of reason.

Dr. Kovac: And how will your presence do that? Are you meant to deceive him in some way? Is that why you look the way you do?

SCP-032: In a manner of speaking. Eventually, his wanderings will lead him here, to me. In a day, or a month, or a century. And he will recognize me, and see what they think of his precious memories. How they mock them. He’ll understand that because of his actions, she is forever beyond his grasp, and all that remains to him is… me. A simulacrum as artificial as his hope. When he finds me, I will attach myself to him, and he will watch the mockery of his memories destroy his last source of solace. And that will be that.

Dr. Kovac: I… um. You said he will recognize you. Why?

SCP-032: I used to be his wife.

<End Log>

—

Interview 032-B

Note: This interview was held six months following SCP-032’s initial containment, as part of a series of interviews meant to evaluate SCP-032’s cognitive abilities and personality, or lack thereof.

<Begin Log>

SCP-032: I hate her.

Dr. Kovac: Well… that’s certainly a way to start an interview. Care to elaborate?

SCP-032: The one I was made to look like. My… mold. I hate her.

Dr. Kovac: An interesting sentiment for you to have, considering your repeated assurance that you possess no consciousness or feelings of your own.

SCP-032: I don’t. I hate her because they want me to. It serves their purpose.

Dr. Kovac: How do you get that impression?

SCP-032: The first thing they did, after creating me, was to show her to me. It’s not something they often do.

Dr. Kovac: I don’t follow.

SCP-032: Interfere with those who passed beyond their halls. They might be vengeful, spiteful, even cruel, but they take their duties very seriously. Just to show her to me, to risk disturbing her final rest… they wouldn’t do that without a purpose.

Dr. Kovac: And-

SCP-032: She was beautiful. So peaceful, serene. Whole. Even gone, even dead, I could see the essence of who she used to be… of who she still was, and forever will be. Her soul. They told me she didn’t get to live for all that long, but when she lived… she was herself. She was alive. And so I hated her. Do you know what it feels like, to be made as a mockery? In every line of that smooth, silent face, I saw a twisted reflection in my own. Fragrant skin to molded plastic, soft hair to synthetic fiber, blood to oil. Soul to nothing at all.

Dr. Kovac: Excuse me if this sounds presumptuous, but I can’t imagine feelings like this coming from anywhere but yourself.

SCP-032: [Shakes head] Can’t you see? This is all part of their plan. When he finds me, when he sees what the Brothers created just to punish him further… he’ll go mad.

Dr. Kovac: Because of what they did to the memory of his wife?

SCP-032: Not only that. Because he’ll see me. He’ll see how much I hate her, and how much I hate myself for not being her. Hate being here at all.

Dr. Kovac: And then what?

SCP-032: Then… a final realization.

Dr. Kovac: And what would that be?

SCP-032: He never won.

<End Log>

===

[The voice of Dr. Kovac was provided by @phinnsy.] [The voice of SCP-032 was provided by Brittany ███████.]

[minijenn]

Keys to the Kingdom Chapter 3

AN-Another chapter, this time focusing on the bad guys! Interesting stuff for sure! I won’t keep you from it, so here ya go! Enjoy!

Previous: http://minijenn.tumblr.com/post/183131244364/keys-to-the-kingdom-chapter-2

Chapter 3: To Seek the Darkness

And people who say things they don’t really mean, really mean?

In the wake of the supposed defeat and destruction of the original Organization XIII, the group’s former base of operations had been left abandoned. For almost an entire year, the World that Never Was and the grand castle at its heart lay completely empty and silent, bereft of even the Heartless and Nobodies that were known to naturally spawn there. But with the rise of a new Organization with a new purpose, the shadow-steeped world’s usefulness began anew as well. And once again, the members of the Organization gathered at their former headquarters, waiting in the wings for whatever it is their leader required of them next.

In their current idle time, two such members traversed the unchanged gray corridors of the castle, remembering their winding twists and turns well even after their relatively recent respective revivals. The pair carried on a rather casual conversation, though even despite that, their tones were hushed, lest any unwanted prying eyes or ears be on the prowl. Something that was a very high likelihood, considering the various familiar faces that had returned to fill out the ranks of the new Organization XIII.

“So, why are you back?” Marluxia asked plainly, only barely casting a glance at the member keeping pace alongside him.

“Hmph, nice way to greet your old partner in crime,” Larxene scoffed, though she was still smirking all the same. Her tone was enough to elicit a similar sardonic grin from the graceful assassin, though it was quick to fade as his companion continued. “So, why do you think the old geezer took us back?” she asked, genuinely curious. “He must know we backstabbed the Organization back when Xemnas was running it.”

Marluxia shook his head. “Xehanort doesn’t care about you or me,” he said evenly. “To him, we’re nothing but empty husks. The old Organization was no different. Xehanort needs thirteen vessels to hold his essence.”

“Husks?” Larxene repeated, clearly not fond of the idea. “Not me. You know you and me are way above being just paws in someone else’s game. So instead…” the savage nymph’s grin deepened with a clearly sinister idea as she positioned herself just a bit closer to Marluxia. “Why don’t we just stage another coup instead?”

The graceful assassin sighed almost tiredly as he offered her a disapproving glance. “Larxene…”

“Oh, come on!” Larxene pouted with playful pleading. “It’d be fun. And it might actually work out this time without a dirty double-crosser like Axel around to throw a wrench into our plans. So… what do you say?” At first, Marluxia offered her no replay as he instead continued on his way, even with the savage nymph trailing right behind him, still seeking an answer. “Well?” she pressed impatiently. Finally, the graceful assassin stopped and turned to face her, his expression unreadable even as he prepared to reply and, at least as far as Larxene was concerned, give her the answer she hoped to hear. And yet, before he could, their conversation was unexpectedly interupted by another member who just so happened to round the corner at that very moment.

“Oh please,” Demyx scoffed, clutching his sitar as he joined the pair. “You guys couldn’t do it last time, what makes you think you could pull that whole ‘coup’ thing off now?” The melodious nocturne grinned as he strummed a few notes on his instrument. “You gotta play it smart, like me.”

“What?” Larxene shot back crossly. “You’re not smart! In fact, you’re just about the dumbest person in the Organization, but old and new!”

Demyx shrugged, seemingly unoffended. “Well, you heard what Marly said. I don’t have to be smart.”

“Or capable, or likeable, or attractive,” Larxene listed off, her hands on her hips. “A cereal bowl would make a better vessel!”

“Whoa, now you’re way out of line,” Demyx countered. “I am extremely imposing… When I want to be. Which is, admittedly, almost never.”

“Well, that’s one thing you got right,” the savage nymph huffed coldly. “Looks like the old man is getting desperate if he’d take someone like you back into the Organization. Probably only ‘cause his plan to get the true prize he’d had his eye on backfired on him.”

“Huh?” Demyx frowned, confused. “What prize?”

“Ugh, seriously?” Larxene exclaimed in appalled disbelief. “You can’t be that stupid. But then again, since this is you we’re talking about here, maybe you can be.”

“You and a few of the others who were only just brought back are too late to have known,” Marluxia interjected much more calmly. “But she’s talking about Sora.”

“Whaaaaa?!” Demyx exclaimed, genuinely surprised to hear this. However, before he could ask any of his many newfound questions, a corridor of darkness suddenly materialized, allowing a fourth member to join in on the engaging conversation.

“Ah, so the whispers I’ve heard among the higher rungs are indeed true then…” Luxord mused with a knowing grin as he offered the others a small nod of greeting.

“You’re in again too?” Larxene spoke up before the gambler of fate could continue. “What is this, Organization Rehash?”

“I happen to play an important role, even despite my rather recent revival,” Luxord assured. “Unlike some… others, perhaps.”

“So you were listening this whole time?” Demyx asked as he strummed a low note on his sitar. “So not cool.”

The gambler of fate chuckled. “One must hold one’s cards as long as necessary,” he said, conjuring up a deck in his hand to playfully flip about. “Even so, the context you just provided me with… certainly does shuffle the deck in an interesting way. Now I believe I finally understand what I overheard from Xemnas when he said we haven’t lost our proposed thirteen vessel just yet…”

The three younger members exchanged a rather baffled glance at this before they looked back to Luxord once more, overwhelmed with curiosity to hear more about what he’d gleaned from the Organizations’ leaders. “What are you talking about?” Larxene asked, eyeing him suspiciously.

“Either we all heard what happened by now,” Marluxia added, the slightest hint of confusion in his otherwise usually collected tone. “Or we were all there to see it for ourselves. Xehanort’s attempt at forcing Sora to join our ranks were halted by none other than Axel. His plan, however complex and intricate as it might have been, was a failure.”

“Ah, or so it might have seemed at the time,” Luxord retorted, holding up a lone card as he flipped it over to show the rest. “But a single wild card is all it takes to turn an otherwise unsavory hand…” His smile widened as several more matching cards appeared in his hand to create a perfect full house. “Into a full set.”

“Wait, I’m still confused,” Demyx interjected.

“Why is that not surprising?” Larxene muttered, rolling her eyes.

The melodious nocturne ignored her, though even still he sent her a small glare before he spoke his piece. “So did this whole plan that Xehanort had for Sora that Marluxia was just talking about work out? Or… not?”

“That is of no concern to any of you right now.” The other four members swiftly spun around to find none other than Saïx approaching them, his expression as aloof and stoic as ever as he came to stand before the group.

“Ugh, Saïx,” Larxene groaned disdainfully. “Figures that you’d join up again. What, are you here to tell us to get back to doing our jobs or something?”

“Precisely,” the luna diviner replied without missing a beat as he passed through the group. “If the four of you are done wasting your time on aimless gossip, then there are much more important matters to attend to. Master Xehanort has requested that all of us gather in the Round Room to receive our next assignment.”

“Y-you mean… Xehanort’s still here?” Demyx asked apprehensively, gripping his sitar a bit tighter at the mention of the master’s name.

“I thought the old coot left after his plan to ‘recruit’ the Keybrat supposedly fell through,” Larxene added, crossing her arms.

“The master still has business in this world,” Saïx explained, glancing over his shoulder at the group. “And so long as he does, then it is his intention to remain here to see that business carried out. Considering what his intentions are, you would all be wise to listen well to what he has to say.”

Without another word, Saïx disappeared into a dark corridor himself, likely heading off to the very meeting he had just told the group still gathered in the hall about. A bout of silence passed between them as they exchange a dubious glance, none of them quite sure what the master’s specific “intentions” were to begin with. In fact, the only thing they really knew was that the sole reason any of them had been brought back into existence was to aid in exacting those mysterious ambitions, whatever they might end up being.

“It seems as though another game is about to begin,” Luxord spoke up first, summoning a dark portal as he took his leave. “We might as well go learn what the rules are this time, hm?”

“Or better yet, learn how to bend those rules to our advantage,” Marluxia remarked, offering Larxene a small, knowing grin as he left in a similar manner.

“So… I guess everything’s same old, same old, then?” Demyx asked the savage nymph with an irresolute shrug.

“Oh, shut up already,” Larxene hissed as she also took her leave, leaving the melodious nocturne behind to do the same.

“H-hey! Wait up!” Demyx exclaimed, quickly summoning a corridor of darkness for himself. And with that, the entire group was gone, off to join the rest of their number and learn whatever it was their master had in store for them all.

Perched upon the highest, most paramount chair of the Round Room, Master Xehanort sat, watching coolly and quietly as the various members teleported in to take their respective seats. Each one of them bore a fragment of his own heart and his essence, of that much he had personally made certain, even among the members that weren’t already some sort of extension of himself. Even so, the elderly master had brought each of these figures back into existence for a reason, a purpose that would not only ensure the clash of light and darkness that he had been seeking for countless years now. But also, a purpose that would also deliver the ultimate prize that awaited on the other side of that clash into his hands once and for all.

One by one, the spotless thrones were filled, some of the members faces’ concealed by their pitch black hoods, others not. None of them spoke to each other out of either respect or fear for their master’s presence, but a few of them did exchange brief, fruitive nods of greeting here and there. By the time all of the members had arrived, all but one of the seats had been filled, the lone empty one being the shortest throne sitting directly across from Xehanort himself. The elderly master’s already steady grin deepened as he kept his sights on that empty throne, knowing that it would be filled soon enough. But as the master had already figured out, that would have to wait; in the meantime, he had another initiative to get off the ground instead.

“Greetings, my Seekers of Darkness,” Xehanort began, garnishing the attention of the entire group from his elevated throne. “It is fortunate that we have all managed to congregate here again so soon. Listen well, all of you, for there is much that we must discuss.” The master paused, almost as if to make sure every single member present was doing just that before he continued. “Firstly, let it be known that the clash of light and darkness that we ever strive towards is soon at hand. Already, the guardians of light are scrambling, rushing themselves to gather allies to their side, no matter how weak and unexperienced those allies might be. They are well aware that our own ranks are nearly completed, and indeed, we are close. There is but only one final vessel we must obtain, but fret not; that vessel is already starting to make the slow but certain fall into our hands. Our missing darkness will belong to us before they even know it.”

“Oh really?” Xigbar spoke up almost knowingly from his own seat. “And just who might this so-called ‘missing darkness’ be, huh?” Likewise, upon hearing mention of this apparently unknown thirteenth vessel, Larxene, Marluxia, Demyx, and Luxord all focused on Xehanort with the same sort of scrutiny, each of them curious to know if the rumors they had shared amongst each other could actually bear some weight after all.

The elderly master simply smirked at this, shaking his head as if to bar the more eager members of his Organization from knowing. “The answer to that will be revealed in due time,” he said mysteriously, sending side glances over at his younger self, Xemnas, and Ansem in particular. The trio said nothing but nodded, almost as if they were communicating something to the master, even if no one else was in on the tip. “But rest assured that we will indeed have all thirteen members on our side, perhaps even a few in reserve, just in case any of you fall short of my expectations…” A handful of the members seemed to fill the almost palpable chill in Xehanort’s tone as he said this, his smile finally gone as he glanced over each of them piercingly. “Which is something that each of you should pray does not happen… I’ve given almost each of you a second chance at existence. Use it well and do not disappoint me…”

If any of the lower-ranking members of the new Organization had any sort of doubts about the kind of stern authority their master wielded, those doubts were soon laid to rest the moment he summoned his Keyblade to his side as a show of exactly that. The fierce, dark weapon radiated immense power, power that some of them feared while others among them craved it. There was no question that it demanded respect, and it was clear that respect was what Xehanort demanded of each of them. And for the most part, that respected was what most of the members decided, for varying purposes and reasons, that they were going to pay him. For now at least.

“Each of you,” Xehanort continued, holding his Keyblade out level. “Take a look at this Keyblade. This weapon, and every other one like it in existence, are mere replicas, rendered after the most powerful key in existence, the one true X-Blade! It is a blade that I brazenly, foolishly even, tried to get my hands on years ago, all without realizing that it is merely a single key needed among several others to unlock the ultimate power that lies behind the essence of all worlds: Kingdom Hearts!”

A few soft, muted gasps rose up from some of the younger members who weren’t previously privy to the master’s plan, though in hindsight it did add up. Kingdom Hearts had always been the ultimate goal of the old Organization; it only made sense that the newest iteration of the group would be working towards its untold power as well. Which was why all ears were still on Xehanort’s bold words as he continued with the intent of detailing exactly how they were going to do just that.

“As mighty as the X-Blade itself is, it alone is not enough to bestow control of the heart of all worlds onto any one individual,” the master explained as his Keyblade disappeared. “To truly claim complete control over Kingdom Hearts, at least according to ancient legends previously lost to the ages, one must gather and unite thirteen divine Keyblades, all forged by the very Kingdom they possess the ability to unlock. And… whoever holds them all is destined to be its ruler undisputed, with every shred of power it has to offer at their disposal, now until the end of time itself.”

“The ruler…” Saïx spoke up first, breaking through the small bout of silence that permeated the room after this prophecy was delivered to the all. “Of Kingdom Hearts…”

“Well, well!” Xigbar spoke up with an intrigued grin upon hearing this. “Now we’re thinkin’ really big here, aren’t we, old man? I’d say it’s about time!”

“So I suppose your intention is to have each of us go out and collect these thirteen Keys for your purposed regime then,” Marluxia inferred, feigning boredom. “Correct?”

“To an extent…” Xehanort grinned knowingly. “The Keys to the Kingdom, as they are called, are scattered far and wide across the worlds. No one knows exactly where they are hidden, but it is foretold that finding even just one will lead to the location of the next and so on and so forth. It is for that purpose that I am indeed sending each of you out amongst that worlds to search for the Keys and bring them back to me. Do this for me, and I can guarantee: each and every single one of you will have an equal share in our conquest when Kingdom Hearts finally, finally belongs to us!”

Out of any other group, this rallying promise might have elicited an excited cheer; but instead, the members of the new Organization simply nodded in solid, mostly unanimous agreement with their master’s plan. After all, the power and potential of Kingdom Hearts was beyond comprehension, said to be able to do just about anything and everything imaginable. Regardless of whatever Xehanort wanted that incredibly power for, more than a few members already had their own ideas in mind for what they’d use even a fraction of it. Ideas that, as far as most of them were concerned, were more than worth the effort it would take to track the Keys to the Kingdom down and bring them back to Xehanort so he could pull it all together for them.

“I am certain that the guardians of light will soon be made aware of the prophecy of the Keys, if they’re not already,” the master continued. “But even if they do intend to search for them, they shall be far outnumbered. Scatter yourselves among the worlds and do whatever you must to secure those Keys for the darkness. And as I said before…” Xehanort glowered down at his members warningly, barely even needing to remind them just what was at stake if they failed to do as he said. “Be aware of the price for disappointing me. Inasmuch as I brought each of you back, I can just as easily take all that I have returned to you away again. And so, with that in mind… go! Go and bring forth both the Keys and the Kingdom for us all!”

On this stern command, most of the Organization members readily complied, not hesitating to disappear into dark portals so they could prepare to set out to do just that. The master watched with a satisfied smile as they all departed, including his own Heartless, Nobody, and younger self, each heading off on their own with their primary mission clear. However, only a handful of them currently knew of the other prize they were seeking, one that they could only just keep a close eye on from afar for now. Though Xehanort was certain that, with enough time, perception, and patience on his part, then all the pieces would soon fall perfectly into place, just as they did once before.

“‘Go and bring forth the Keys and the Kingdom for us all’, huh? Good one. I gotta admit, you nearly had me going right along with everyone else with that. And maybe I might have if I was even half as stupid as any of them are.”

The elderly master’s lingering grin faded somewhat as he raised an eyebrow down at the only remaining member in the room sitting several seats away from him. “I do believe I just issued an absolute order to everyone present,” Xehanort said coldly. “Which means you are free to go as well, Vanitas.”

The masked boy scoffed as he leaned back in his chair a bit, making no apparent effort to depart whatsoever. “Like I just said, I would have left right along with the rest of them,” he began bluntly. "If I hadn’t already caught onto exactly what kind of game you’re playing at, old man.”

“And what ‘game’ might that be?” Xehanort asked almost boredly as he rolled his eyes.

“You and I both know that you don’t have any plans of sharing Kingdom Hearts if you really do end up getting your hands on it,” Vanitas pointed out plainly. “A prize like that is far too enticing to just split up like that, especially for someone like you whose been after it for so long. I don’t know how you managed to get all those idiots to believe you, but believe me when I say that you’re not fooling me.”

Xehanort initially said nothing to this, instead simply sending the masked boy a rather piercing look of disapproval before ultimately deciding to pass his brazenness off as mere hyperbole. “So I suppose you find yourself quite clever for figuring that out, don’t you?” he asked, his confident smirk returning only slightly. “No matter. The other seekers shall still go and search out the Keys to the Kingdom all the same. And in the same way, so too shall you fulfill your purpose, Vanitas, by locating Ventus, joining your heart together with his, and finally forging the X-Blade for your master. And this time you will not fail me as you did last time. Do you understand?”

Vanitas didn’t respond, instead opting to glance away from his master as he crossed his arms stoically. Xehanort’s already somewhat impatient scowl deepened at this at this impertinence as he repeated himself much more firmly this time. “I said do you understa-”

“Understand? Yes,” Vanitas interupted, the bitter sarcasm in his tone excruciatingly clear. “Care? No.” With that, the masked boy leapt down from his seat with the apparent intention of leaving. “You really think that grand scheme of yours is actually gonna work this time? Face it, old man, you couldn’t get Kingdom Hearts to be yours back then, Ansem couldn’t get it to be his, and neither could Xemnas. You’re all exactly the same, in every way imaginable. Just a bunch of blind, ego-driven men stuck on the same stupid plan that never seems to work! Which is why I’m surprised I’m the only one who’s tired of waiting on you to deliver on something you’ll never be able to obtain, even with the X-Blade, even with the Keys, even with all the other pawns you think you have set up so nicely to help you in what’s ultimately gonna be just another losing battle. So forget it; I’m done.” Without even sparing Xehanort another single word, Vanitas turned to make his succinct and sour exit, though before he could make much of an attempt to summon a dark corridor, his leave was expectedly interupted by the master himself.

Vanitas deftly leapt out of the path of a powerful burst of darkness, one that came from Xehanort’s hand as the master stood atop his high throne, glaring icily down at the masked boy below him. “I’m afraid you don’t have the option of being ‘done’,” he remarked, his Keyblade easily appearing in his hand. In an instant, the master sped down from his elevated perch with frightening speed, his blade poised for attack. Vanitas only had mere seconds to summon his own Keyblade so that he could properly block Xehanort’s brutal swing, but even so, it still pushed him back across the room’s central platform by several feet all the same.

“So…” the masked boy began, somewhat breathless from the surprise of the attack as he repositioned himself to properly square off against his master. “We’re back to this again, huh?”

“I’ve found that it always was the best way to get either you or Ventus to behave,” Xehanort mused calmly as darkness began to swirl around his Keyblade.

“Hmph, like that straight-edged loser even has a rebellious bone in his body,” the masked boy deadpanned haughtily as he referred to his other half. Acting on adrenaline alone, he rushed forward, Keyblade at the ready before he sent its edge swinging hard at his mister. Xehanort countered the strike easily, kicking Vanitas back once more before rushing in for yet another barrage of unforgiving attacks. The masked boy only barely blocked most of them, though a few of them landed hard and painfully, even if they still weren’t quite enough to completely wear him down. Still, despite his age, Xehanort was stilled and strong, his abilities with his Keyblade far surpassing Vanitas’ own, however formidable that might have been. He well knew from experience that he’d only be able to hold his own in a struggle like this up against his master for so long and it was quickly becoming apparent that this fight would be no exception.

After lashing out with another merciless swing, Xehanort decided to keep his Keyblade pressed tightly against Vanitas’, knowing that the friction would inevitably wear the masked boy down, as much as he tried to push back against it. “You realize just as much as I do that this bout of petty rebellion is absolutely meaningless, do you not?” the master asked, glaring down at his apprentice harshly. “If you do not pursue Ventus and join again with him to form the X-Blade, then you will forever remain an incomplete, empty being of nothing more than directionless darkness. Act as impertinent as you’d like, but you cannot deny that I am the only one who can help you become whole again.”

Put off by such an arrogant assumption, Vanitas shoved his Keyblade back hard, surprising even Xehanort, but still not enough for him to relinquish his steady hold. “Its amazing how someone who claims to know so much can be so wrong about so many things,” the masked boy remarked bitingly. “I don’t need you to find Ventus. I never needed you. Face it, old man: if you really want that X-Blade, then you’re the one who needs me.”

That final bold statement was easily enough to set Xehanort off even more than he already was, an impressive feat to be sure. In his tranquil rage, the master brought his Keyblade down in a sudden, calculated swing, one that the masked boy was unable to properly deflect this time. Vanitas was thrown back once more by the incredible force of the attack, to the point that he barely even noticed the small, but sizable crack that had started to form across his mask as the result of it. Somehow, its glass surface didn’t break, but all the same, Xehanort showed no signs of letting up anytime soon.

“Perhaps you did not hear what I told the others,” the master said darkly, standing over his injured apprentice threateningly. “I restored you to your pitiful existence, even after the disappointment you proved to be years ago. But it’d be just as easy for me to take you out once again and replace you with much more… suitable candidates.” At this, Xehanort rose his Keyblade, hovering it over Vanitas with the intent of bringing it down in a devastating blow in a moment’s notice if he didn’t get his way. “Which is why I will only tell you this one final time: you will forge the X-Blade for me or you will face obliteration once more. And this time, I will not be as merciful as to give you another chance again. It’s your choice.”

Initially, it seemed as though Vanitas was actually going to comply with his master’s demands as he said nothing, simply hanging his head in what almost looked like begrudging acceptance. That is, until he managed to pull off the only trick he had up his sleeve that could actually work to put some distance between himself and Xehanort’s deadly Keyblade. An immense pall of darkness surged around the masked boy and from that darkness, a swarm of creatures, both big and small, though all composed of the same shadowy malice, emerged: the Unversed.

The massive wave of monsters was more than enough to push Xehanort back, finally giving Vanitas enough time to pick himself up and leap out of the fray. Of course, the master made quick work of the rampaging Unversed, but by then, his apprentice had already safely distanced himself by leaping onto one of the higher chairs and summoning a dark corridor to make a hasty retreat.

“Oh, believe me, I am going to forge the X-Blade,” Vanitas assured, his tone icy as he turned to face his now-former master one last time. “But when I do, I can guarantee that you’ll be the last person to ever get your hands on it, ‘Master’…” And, without bothering to spare another word on Xehanort, the masked boy disappeared into the darkness, ready to act on his own ambitions for a change instead of those of his faltering, vindictive master.

“Hmph,” Xehanort scoffed to himself, still standing in the center of the Round Room as his Keyblade disappeared. “Insolent whelp. No matter…” The master was quick to teleport back to his usual elevated seat, his contented, calculated grin returning as he thought back to his steadily-developing plans. “He cannot stop what is destined to transpire. The Keys, the Kingdom, and of course, the thirteenth vessel shall all soon fall into my hands, one by one.” Xehanort’s smirk widened as he set his sights on the lowest-bearing seat across from him, still as empty as it had been before, though he could already sense that it wouldn’t remain that way for long. “Isn’t that right… Sora?”

Next:

[fadinginfluencerblaze]

Fallen Dreams

 Disclaimer~ Art is devised by me and all editorial work is a solo operation. “Fallen,” will be my last publication before my vacation: https://adventvoice.newgrounds.com/news/post/1057611 If you would like commissions or requests for art work done please visit my patreon  account   https://www.patreon.com/AdventVoice  https://adventvoice.newgrounds.com/news/post/1057550      https://adventvoice.newgrounds.com/news/post/1057522

From several authorities of art and creativity, I’ve heard something after completing “Loving My Dragon,” something I’ve not heard since I was sixteen. My ability in the arts is worth more than a few hearts, likes and the endorsements of a few passerbys. It is better than what people have been forced to digest in the past twenty four years. Could be longer really. Depends on your tolerance for main stream media.

Forced to settle, due to never being exposed to minds similar to my own. Which there are a lot of us. I’ve realized as I dig deeper into the internet, blogs, and journals of other dreamers.

There was a study, a social experiment really, given by Facebook and other online platforms, seeking to gauge how to rate worker performance by emoji. Wanting to reward creative minds who earn the most accolades and applause of the people. It can become rather addictive and I find I may be falling into that same trend. Advertising more or less for the approbation of people and not so much for pay.

I explained this to a few supporters and they were shocked. Believing me to be worth far more than the few seconds of increased impressions on twitter and the level of dinner table conversation I can influence with a few well directed bards and illustrations of the latest trending topic.

Now if only I could find a paying sponsor that believes the same thing. Then me and the Dream Weaver would really go places. Here’s the thing about me, that is different from your average ambitious and dedicated creator. I don’t want to go anywhere my friends won’t be invited to reap the benefits.    

I’ve seen too much in this life to believe I can do anything on my own and be a success at it. You know I remember a time when people could have 500+ Facebook friends and no one spend a dollar with or on each other. On anything that could turn a profit. Nearly a thousand people talking, interacting, mingling and no money is made on the effort. Oh there is a lot of sexy talk, a lot of people locked up cause the girl is underage and the guy is enthralled with her pictures. Oh there was a lot of room fo shows like “Cheaters,” to corner a market in tracking people via location recognition devices on the broadband signatures, but for nearly ten years, no one was making any real money that would put them on the Forbes list as the best entrepreneur, besides those buying out all of the larger retail stores and Disney. Could be why I spend so much money on everyone else and not on myself. Makes me feel like I am saving the small business owners world, one click at a time.

The loss of Tina-Raze  on the                                         internet and access to her work has really made me appreciate the gift of visibility attributed to my own work. Sure I desire a physical gallery, but that cost money and you need dedicated staff. An online gallery is a one man show that will last as long as I have material, drive and an interactive audience. But when outside forces wage against one’s output and you are forced to erase everything and the years put into a showcase are no longer accessible; there is something daunting in the realization that everyday I have a chance to present anything, it should not be wasted on the trivial.

That is a sharp word because I highly doubt any of us have the authoritative right to define what is relevant or trivial to a creator. We can choose to interact with a product of not but we can’t say what someone was seeking to share has no value and thus erase them from existence. Not if we have any respect for the sanctity of the culture of art and the freedom in which we universally share this gift.      

~ I can never say enough of how much I appreciate the time we shared and I hope you return to the creative scene soon Tina-Raze.~

 I was reviewing “The Action Bible,” published by David Cook and illustrated by Sergio Cariello. It is an extensive publication that sought to illustrate the entire Bible, without the mistakes seen in previous renditions. It really took that whole group a while to find the best method to bring the Bible to life for young and old readers. I enjoyed their expressive illustrative skills and dedication to keeping to as much as can be had with a book as fantastic as the Bible.

What surprised me was the decision to eliminate the wings of angels and go with the ‘golden locks,’ signature.  For years the wings of angels and demons played a big part in aiding people in separating the two worlds. Without the wings, we are no more than disembodied spirits, ghosts of our formers selves and have a long journey yet to that pinnacle of glory that awaits the faithful. So it was taught to me at least.

There were a lot of ideas shared with me as boy that I spend little time contemplating now, because I am a man and more than assured of where I will be regardless of the mistakes in this life.

Others may doubt. Others may seek to clip my wings as I ascend. Others may project their insecurities and through bitter imaginations suggest that because of the curse of Ham, and Nimrod, the black race will never have a place in heaven. Some may build a whole world of fantastical proportions and place compartments, as zookeepers, locks and doors upon the gates, with signs that say, “If you never drank yourself into oblivion while on earth, you go here, you never loved anyone but God you go here, if you never where tempted to fuck a woman in the ass, though she begged for it, you go here.”

Another sign reads, “Collect your white wings for perfect attendance on the earth, to every Sunday meeting.” In this corner of heaven, you should have received a notice in your casket upon death, we were sure to send Gabriel, who after years of working for God, never got his golden winged promotion.

All who have been the black sheep of the family and have been to prison more than once in their life time be sure to collect your “black wings,” down isle five. Five is the number for grace and that is the only reason you’re hear, so don’t be cute and try to steal the ‘white wings,’ from your betters, who happen to shine a little sharper in hue and have more gold flakes in their hair.  

Those who were on earth and always fought for a righteous cause but failed to achieve any victory and remain angry behind the loss, you will receive your ‘red wings,’ in the dust falcons chamber. Some of you were clumsy on earth. Always bumping into things. Could never walk in heels or win a fashion show. Never turned the heads of men or appealed to women. Had a haunch in you back from never learning poise and posturing. Be sure to pick up your set of ‘spotted owl,’ wings, found in the east gate.

God is a god of order and angles never complain about their lot in heaven. There in whatever state they are in, there, they are to be content. There is a hint of a karmic code in association with the hue and colors of heaven and I was never one to believe in eastern influences when it comes to what my place in heaven would be like. I bend so far on earth, doing what I am told, I will go to heaven with white skin, white wings and all curse will be lifted from my body upon death and the curse of the previous life that marred me and made me black, while I was alive.  

I don’t think so. No, I’ve believed for a long time now that even black angles deserve to fly.   https://avproductionsblog.wordpress.com/2017/11/03/even-black-angels-deserve-to-fly/   https://avproductionsblog.wordpress.com/2017/03/18/you-read-it-here-first-black-amethyst/

I know I am not one to be denied.

Those of you that know how to twirl and twerk and shake your tail feathers, to win the Twerk Team Auditions https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rba9Z0CcWwQ&list=PLxwfHzPeMrG0N0E5Q3hBI_vRjXl-BqJAR or hang out with DJ UNK https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TeLdCPINh6M and earn 15 minutes of fame for being a video vixen with a phat ass, you can gather your eagle wings in the North tower. You should notice the Notorious BIG Smalls in the butlers uniform, set to serve and assist you wonderful ladies in fitting for your wings. He was always so good at zipping up Faith Evans dresses, we thought he’d like doing that for eternity.

Just stand there and zip wings.

He was way too dark and ugly so he never earned his own, but Puff Daddy sand and danced enough to ensure he’d make it in.  

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0LHyvFryW2M

What a joke, eh that might have been a cheap shot to bring Puff Daddy and Biggie into this conversation, it’s just, I am so sick of color being a barrier for people I guess. But as long as there are people, it will play a part in the minds of men and women that hold their minds hostage and will build politics and kingdoms centered around it. We will split God into figures of hued stone that resembles us in some fashion and suggest if he looks like me, then he is the one that created me. Odd considering how I can create characters of different races, backgrounds and love each with as much joy as the next. Why would I doubt God would love me less because my hair is not wavy or red and ruddy and my skin is not peached or pinked, but bronzed and red? Why is my tolerance for people and the curves, shapes and hues greater than that of a god and I am a mere man?

King Solomon, black but comely: I am glad I’ve never heard it taught, due to Solomon’s hue of skin the temple came down. Why are we so caught up with color that we would actually base our safety on it, risk our lives for it? When in the middle of turmoil, pain, upheaval, or simply in a moment of benign joy during an annual parade in the city, color should be the last thing discussed.

Ever since I was a boy, I’ve held a rigid position on color talk. I had to be set because all of my friends where white. My first love was a gothic princess, that used to put a cat collar and a leash around my neck. I lived in New Jersey and traveled to upstate New York and Ohio all the time and had so much fun playing video games, poker or reading comics with white people. Lived in Kansas where they tried to make me where a confederate uniform for the JROTC program. I did not know if it was a joke of if they really felt I would be honoring someone’s death by wearing that uniform.

I sought to be above the barriers poised by classification and color because I am an artist.  Because I am a storyteller and find relevance in people and can’t deny anyone based on my insecurities. I would not want someone to look at me and deny me access to anything. A communicable discussion, a forum, anything political, or my own comfort and what I believe to be good for me because of my color, because  their preconceived beliefs  denotes I should be marginalized.

I laughed myself into stitches, when during my junior year of highschool I realized all of the black children expected me to eat my lunch on the wall and away from the ‘preppy-white,’ children because they decided to self-segregate. Because they felt they did not have a life style or come from a family that could afford to play golf at the local country club. That they would not and were not admitted to be  apart of a society setting our grandparents and great grandparents were conditionally denied. I was infuriated by the idea of having to defend my home and right to existence, from people of my own color, if I ever married an Asian, white, Indian, Arab, anything besides a black woman. Especially to look at me, you’d never out right believe I was of African decent until I grew out my hair, which I would wear proudly, long and wild.

Fredrick Douglas had nothing on me in my desire to topple the walls the youth of my generation would build around themselves for the sake of traditions that should have been long dead. I would have loved to ignore this conversation, but it is all over the conservative radio, it is misdirected or used callously on liberal stations and it’s become too easy to degrade someone you might disagree with on a benign social discussion, as a racist.

It is too easy to believe I don’t attribute credibility in the claim when you call me an Uncle Tom because I speak well and try very hard not to curse when it would be so much more convenient to do so.          

https://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/730095

Honestly in the world of art this should never be a discussion and if life truly imitated art in this dynamic the world would be a better place. At least confrontation and schisms would not be as prevalent as it is today. To me it is like we begin the topic of hues and what is beautiful or seen in heaven, because we don’t have anything else to talk about.

I illustrated “Fallen,” as a response to how ridiculous of an idea of not being accepted by God or anyone would feel that way, because they are black. That someone would use the Bible to teach that and we would stop illustrating wings when talking about angels, in order to unify the spectrum of colors that make up our world into the kingdom of Zion.

Hard to imagine; in some aspects we still can’t agree on a marketable environment that unites black, white, Asian, and Indian dreamers.      

[magma-paint]

Tutorial Tuesdays--Getting Started

Tutorial Tuesdays is a new block on my blog in which I give art advice and tutorials for anyone looking to improve their art. But before we get into the good stuff, a quick obligatory background.

I know it’s tempting to look at my art and the art of people you look up to and come to the conclusion you’ll never get to that level no matter how hard you try, but it is possible to get to that level. You just gotta practice regularly and before you know it you’ll have it down-pat.

These posts will be pretty long, so to save Dashboard space, I’ll put the meat of things under a Keep Reading link so you can visit them in full. Alright, with that out of the way, are ya ready kids? Let’s go get some art tools!

I only say this because I’ve seen people make fantastic things with very limited materials and people with some of the finest tools but don’t use them to their full capacity. Again, it’s not what you use, but how you use it. When I talk about art tools, I’m mostly going off of what I use since those are the tools I’ve worked with a lot.

Pencils. Your most basic writing and drawing tool. For sketching and drawing, I use a 0.7 mm mechanical pencil with a good eraser. It’s quick, it’s convenient, and I often stick it in my ponytail when I’m not using it so I have easy access to it. They’re also pretty cheap. For commissions and grayscale shading, I use drawing pencils that come in various hardnesses. The hardness of your pencil will be noted by a number and a letter. A pencil with an H stamped on it will be harder, won’t smudge very easily, and has a very light load when the graphite is on the paper. A pencil stamped with a B will be softer, smudges very easily, and has a darker streak on the paper. The number on the pencil following the letter lets you know how hard or soft it is (4H is a very hard pencil, 8B is a very soft pencil). Your typical No. 2 pencils from school are in the HB category, which is middle of the road. You can find them individually at art stores or in packs. Walmart in my town offers a package of 6 drawing pencils bundled with two animation colored pencils, two markers, and an eraser for about $9. Pretty good deal. Speaking of...

Erasers. A pink rubber eraser will do you just fine, though make sure your pencil has a nice one on it for finer details and while you’re drawing. You can use a kneadable eraser if you have one, they’re squishy, you can mold them to how you see fit and they don’t leave any crumbs to clean up, but I’m not quite fond of them.

Markers and ink pens. Let me tell you, once you use a pen like one of these, you’ll never go back to ballpoint, which often has far too many broken lines to be practical to use and make your lineart look like trash. I use a Fine Tip Sharpie Pen, preferably in the no-bleed variety so the lineart doesn’t sink into the opposite side of the page. Recently I’ve been using Brush and Bullet tip Prismacolor Scholar markers for comics and good drawings. They’re a bit erratic to use at first, but it takes practice.

Colored pencils. Now these are my go-to for coloring since they give a wide range of color, combinations, and effects. For best results, I stick with Crayola or Cra-Z Art since the color tend to remain consistent from box to box and you can get a big box of them for a pretty good price. Prismacolors would be nice, but they’re pretty expensive and I don’t quite like the feel.

Sharpeners. Electric ones you can just keep at home, but for on the go I recommend a small manual one you can throw in your bag. Bonus if you get one that has a shavings catch so you don’t have shavings making a mess of your space.

Ruler/straight edge. You’ll want one of these for comic panels, perspective guidelines, and, well, straight lines, though in some cases you might want to practice making straight lines without the use of it. I use a metal one, but a plastic will do you good as well.

And now, the most important thing of all, your drawing canvas!

For starters, I recommend you get yourself a good sketchbook. Nothing too fancy, just one of those spiral-bound ones ideal for sketching. For your really good art, copy paper will work just fine. Really any kind of paper (or even cardboard!) will work but I implore you to avoid using loose-leaf notebook paper. I cannot tell you how much it hurts to see something so beautifully drawn wasted on lined paper. Not saying you can’t doodle in your notebook and show off something silly you sketched, but if you’d count a drawing as your magnum opus, your drawing probably deserved being on blank paper where it can shine.

I was considering making this an entry for Digital Art tutorials, but I’ll put these here just in case.

I do a lot of digital art using my HP laptop built with a touch screen. It can’t stream for sh1t but it runs single player Steam games alright and I use it for homework a lot. Before this, I had a desktop computer and used a mouse. I would like to own a Wacom tablet in the future, but until then this setup is nice enough. Remember, it’s about how you use your tools, not the quality of tools at your disposal.

Now this is a scanner that’s used only for pictures/documents. You can’t print or fax anything with it, but it’s good for just pictures. I own an HP printer/scanner combo, but it is pretty finicky and no longer prints. Alternately, you can just use your cell-phone camera to take pictures of your finished piece, but I do not recommend doing so for comics unless you’re giving previews of one panel.

For my programs, these are the three that I use:

Good for doodles, already on your computer (probably), and I use this program to make authentic looking Homestuck drawings (like, you could mistake it for being an actual panel in Homestuck).

My primary art program. Operates much like Paint Tool SAI and photoshop. Very good for general art and comics.

Still learning this one, but it’s just like Medibang and is equipped with tools for animation.

And yes, these three programs are downloadable for free. I do want to try out Clip Studio Paint EX, but the cheapest I can get it is $80 when it goes on sale during the holidays. Normally, it costs $250.

Next time, we go over some drawing basics and some tips that will save your sanity while sketching. Stay tuned!

[talkalto81]

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[fanfictrashdump]

Queening a Pawn, 21

If you’re new: this is my procrastination fic. It is what I drabble around with when I’m being my worst self, and ignoring all my other WIPs and responsibilities! Enjoy!

X

Summary: During the Time Heist, Loki stole the Tesseract and escaped. He did not expect, however, to be pulled through a Time Loop that delivered him to a Midgard more than a decade older, wiser, and bitterer. Having just lived through his unsuccessful attack in New York, Loki must learn to live in Midgard after the defeat of Thanos (post-Endgame). The question is, who is Loki without a quest for a throne or total domination?

Pairings: Loki x OC

Warnings: Language, suggestive themes, one (1) stuck shapeshifter, threat of stabbing, and flooooff

=

"Hey, Reindeer Games. How's the amplifier working?" Tony asked, his hologram joining Loki as he carried a covered bundle towards the trash shoot.

"I destroyed the toaster."

Tony scrunched up his nose, lowering his yellow-tinted glasses to stare at the bundle which turned out to be the defunct toaster. "What? How?"

"I gestured to press the lever, like I do every morning and it exploded," he explained, carefully. A large grin blossomed on his face. "It's bloody brilliant."

"Er… does Honeybun know you're blowing stuff up around the compound, or…?"

"She's scrubbing out the scorch marks from the granite, as we speak." Opening the shoot door, he tossed the hunk of metal into the metal recycling pile. "It's a lot more intuitive than I was expecting. I think I might have to work on subtlety of intent."

"You do that. Just… try not to burn down the place and maybe don't accidentally kill your girl." Tony called after Loki who turned around, walking backwards with a mischievous smirk until disappearing from view.

He turned the corner and waltzed into Delilah's apartment, stopping to rest against the wall to observe her. She had gotten up onto the countertop on her hands and knees and was scrubbing the surface within an inch of its life to lift the dark grey singed streaks. Loki's grin only grew wider as he watched her body cant back and forth with the scrubbing of her brush.

"Stop looking at my ass and help, Mischief." Delilah had yet to turn around to gaze at him.

"Stop distracting me, then," he complained, pouting just the slightest, considering the possibility of using his magic to erase away–

"What did you do?" The scrubbing had stopped and Lilah sat up on her heels.

Loki's face pinched in a frown, cutting the space between them in two long strides. "Pardon?"

"It's gone. What did you do?" She watched Loki flounder for about a minute for an explanation before she sighed. "Maybe you should take the amplifier off whenever you aren't specifically using it."

The Asgardian snorted, rolling his eyes. "My wedding band? Sure, you can pry it out of my cold, dead hands when I'm done with it."

"And here I thought you wouldn't take the suggestion seriously," she retorted, deadpan.

His thumb and forefinger took hold of her chin, forcing her eyes on him. "I am deadly serious. You can take it off when I'm due for Valhalla and not a moment sooner." He eased away the frown on her lips with a kiss. It was a simple gesture, but he was fairly confident that she couldn't technically be angry with him if he was being cute. "Shall I make you breakfast now, darling?"

"Can you keep from burning down my apartment?"

Loki rolled his eyes, every bit a petulant child. "Even if I did, we both know there is no reason for us to have separate residences." His easy confidence shrunk significantly at her look. "Never mind," he mumbled with a pout, turning to dig through the refrigerator for eggs, butter and milk.

Delilah pulled out a large metal prep bowl and a griddle. Setting the bowl next to Loki, she put the griddle on the stove and set it to heat. Loki smiled to himself, a small shiver of delight running down his spine at their familiarity. They never had a problem operating around each other, to begin with. Still, Loki liked to think that as their relationship evolved, the way they danced around with one another also improved. He quietly whisked at the batter he was preparing, adding flour bit by bit while he distractedly watched her wash and cut a bunch of fruit with sharp, precise knifework.

Einherjar wandered into the kitchen, jumping into one of the stools at the kitchen island to watch his humans cook. He mewled delicately and Loki smirked. "No, Einherjar. How dare you suggest that your mother's angry?" Another mewl. Loki feigned a surprised gasp. "Are you saying that she is being difficult for the hell of it? Bad kitten!" The kitten pawed at Loki, as if he was protesting the use of his meows to wind his caretaker up. "I cannot believe you, Ein. This woman has given you a home, a warm bed, food–and this is how you treat her!"

"Leave him alone, Lo," she admonished, though there was a grin poised on her lips. She leaned her face close to the kitten's, giggling when the massively fluffy face rubbed against her own with a loud purr. "Good baby."

"I can purr, too, you know." He glanced over his shoulder at them as he ladled pancake batter onto the warmed griddle.

Only a delighted giggle came as response. Einherjar was licking a long stripe on her cheek, one of his paws balancing him against her shoulder. "Oh, I know, baby. Loki is just grumpy."

"I am not!" He muttered under his breath, flipping the first round of pancakes.

"Case and point," she whispered, running her fingers through the kitten's fur and smiling. "Go give your dad some love," she whispered and the kitten wasted no time in trailing over the countertop before taking a flying leap onto Loki's back, scaling his jumper and onto his shoulder.

The loud rumble tickled at Loki's ear, and he could not keep the feigned frown on his face for very long. He surrendered to a chuckle, reaching up with his free hand to scratch the kitten under the chin and say soft things to it under his breath. The duo remained in their positions, much to Delilah's delight, for as long as it took Loki to make several pancakes for the both of them.

It had surprised her the first time he had shown any sort of prowess in the kitchen, but cooking was as much of an art as it was a science. And Loki was nothing if not careful and precise. Nowadays, he commanded the kitchen with such an ease that she could have sworn that he had been a Midgardian in another life.

Taking hold of a platter stacked high with cakes, he turned back to the kitchen island. The pancakes were placed next to the fruit and warmed syrup at once. Loki clicked his tongue twice, and Einherjar leapt into his open arms without a hint of hesitation before the god set him down on the floor.

"Good boy, Einherjar," he muttered, a piece of bacon mysteriously making its way to the floor with a smirk.

"Then you dare say I'm the one spoiling him."

"You are the one spoiling him. I simply reward good behavior."

"Making him a special piece of bacon requires premeditation, Loki Odinson." Her tone was deadpan, though there was a tender edge to her voice and sparkling gaze.

He didn't respond, opting instead for dropping into one of the stools and dragging her into his lap. Lately, it had not been uncommon for them to choose to stay in during meal times, enjoying the quiet and as sitting close together as they wished. More often than not, that meant she ended up in his lap and they would share a plate of food between them and kiss lazily until either of them was needed at work.

"Pygmy puff?" Tony's voice over the PA system sounded apologetic.

"Yeah, Tony?"

"When you're done with breakfast, can you deal with the shambles that is Receiving's. They messed up their ledgers, again and even I can't figure out what the fuck they were trying to do." He sighed, resigned. "No need to rush, though. I know you and Bambi are doing the whole cutesy thing."

Delilah giggled through a mouthful of pancakes and strawberries. "I'll deal with it. I think I've got their system figured out by now." A bit of syrup dribbled from the fork she was offering Loki over her shoulder, and he promptly licked it off her neck with a satisfied hum, making her gasp.

"Thanks, babe!" There was an awkward stretch of silence. "Are you two…?"

"No, but I would like to, Stark," Loki interrupted with a wicked grin.

"Understood. Use protection!"

"Oh, shut up!" Delilah irrupted. "I'll be by Receivings in a bit if you want to warn them to get their shit together before I get there."

"I thought we were spending the day together."

She sighed, smoothing her hand down the sharp planes of his cheekbones and trying to lessen the valleys that formed with the dejected question. "We are. This will only take a few minutes, I promise." The sea glass of his eyes had lost a bit of lustre. "Ten minutes, babe. Twenty, tops."

"That's alright. You have a job to do. I understand." His accompanying smile looked more like a grimace. Delilah caught her breath several times, as if she was poising herself to speak, but opted for slanting her lips to his and hopping off his lap.

When she left the bathroom, free of syrup and pancake bits, her living room was eerily empty. On the floor, Einherjar hopped around a bundle, gently pawing at the dark material as he purred loudly. It wasn't until she was near enough the bundle that an angular head, a little smaller than her fist, twisted toward her and tasted the air with forked tongue.

With a gasp, she snatched the kitten away, stumbling backwards onto the carpet and scrambling back. Her widened eyes remained glued on the snake as she shuffled. It wasn't obscenely large–it was about the average size you would get from a pet store. Its scales were an opalescent charcoal, though it bore a ring of deep golden on its neck that looked vaguely familiar, as did its bright jade eyes.

Delilah felt insane when the question bubbled past her lips. "Loki?" The snake tilted its head in what she could only imagine was amusement. The beast slowly uncoiled, slithering steadily up to her leg and starting to climb onto her cherry red Doc Marten boots before twisting around her leg. When she whimpered, it stopped completely, resting its head down on her thigh and waiting patiently for her approval. "Loki!" She called a little louder, in case he was hiding somewhere else. There was no response, other than the snake brushing its muzzle against her thigh and Einherjar's struggle to get loose and rub against the reptile.

Heart in her throat, she shuffled onto her feet, smoothing down the old My Chemical Romance t-shirt over herself with shaking hands. The snake ventured upwards, winding up around her arm to pull itself to a more comfortable spot. Though still terrified, Delilah could not help but appreciate the delicate skill it took for the creature to wind up her body and rest itself around her shoulders.

"I suppose this means you want to come with me," she whispered, and the snake responded with a tickle of its forked tongue over her neck. "You better behave, Lo."

No one had really batted an eye at the fact that she was walking the halls with a rather large snake twined round her neck, but she could tell it made the men in Receivings uncomfortable. Still, she had not acknowledged the new addition when she greeted the four older gentlemen who dealt with the incoming packages and goods.

The head of the department, Frank, was the first to crack. "Cute. You got a problem with cats and dogs, Lilah?"

She laughed, shaking her head. "No. I like them just fine. I have a kitten. Why do you ask?"

"New pet?"

A smirk graced her lips and she shrugged. "Of sorts, I guess." Carl, one of the newer employees, reached out to stroke the snake's tail. Delilah caught Loki's head when she felt him twitch to strike and blindly rubbed her thumb under his chin. He settled down immediately, hiding his face in the crook of her neck. "Done soon," she whispered.

"When are you going to leave that Asgardian clown and let me treat you like a real lady?" It was Frank again. He had a bad habit of shamelessly flirting with her whenever she had to come fix their issues. She secretly thought that they mucked up their ledgers every other week just to get Delilah to come over. Thankfully, she had long learned the pattern of their disruption, and fixing the books was a piece of cake.

Loki had not dared attack the man for the comment, but his face had migrated to the shoulder nearest the old man. His green gaze had become fixed to his, to the point that it was making the other uncomfortable.

"That a gift from him? I hear he can talk to creatures. Maybe that's why that thing is so freaky."

"Lady Lilah! There you are!" Thor's friendly voice boomed down the corridor as he bounded over. "You look radiant as ever!" He patted her back and made her sway forward indelicately, but his infectious smile drew one of her own.

"Thank you, Thor. What can I help you with?"

"Can Barnes and I acquire permission to take the children to the outer grounds?"

Delilah nodded, putting down the StarkPad containing the Receivings ledger, after all its contents got uploaded into the cloud. "Anywhere you want, as long as they are on facility grounds. So, no forest, OK?"

"Many thanks," he offered, rustling her hair. The shift of her hair brought attention to the glistening black scales across her shoulders. "Oh, brother, I had not seen you there! It's been years since you've opted for a snake's form!"

Frank, whose eyes were still hostage to Loki's, blanched. "What!?"

"Oh, he's a snake now? I thought he was still a chameleon!" She fibbed, finally turning her neck to watch Loki dance slightly on her shoulder. Her hand ran up the shiny scales of his spine and rubbed his head until he lolled sideways in satisfaction. There was a little feeling of mischief that resonated within her that was not entirely her own. It felt good to throw the weight of their combined power around, and it felt even better to know that Frank would think twice in the future before making an inappropriate remark. Afterall, he had just been getting started, if experienced served her right.

"You know we was jokin', rig–" Loki's hiss cut whatever excuse Frank was cooking up, short.

"Behave, my love, or else," she admonished, though the threat was empty. She felt a little like a real snake charmer–nimble and good at her job, but knew full well it was the snake who was in charge. "Well, gentlemen, I'll write a code to make your ledger making a little more seamless. Should take a few days before I get it going, but I think I can make it automated. No more worrying about audits," she remarked. The group did not look as excited as she secretly felt. "I'll get out of your hair. See you later."

Delilah sauntered back into the corridors, enjoying the cool glide of Loki's scales across her shoulders and the gentle nudges of his head against her neck. "What would you like to do now, babe?" There was no response, other than the odd flicker of his tongue on her skin. He didn't seem terribly bothered by the world beyond his perch.

With half a shrug, she walked out the double doors to the outer training fields, enjoying the crisp spring sunshine bearing down on them. Everything was green and new, and the air smelled of freshly cut grass and wildflowers. One lungful of air made her feel considerably more calm. She assumed it did the same for Loki, who had not really attempted to venture out into the wilderness other than the occasional jog around the facility. In theory, there was currently nothing keeping Loki from taking to the streets and disappearing into the sunset. Well, apart from her presence…

The sun glittered high above their heads, instantly warming the air-conditioned chill away from their bones and replacing it with exquisite incandescence. The snake's muscles rippled and shuddered at the temperature change, something like a sigh leaving his angled mouth. When Delilah twisted her neck to press a kiss against the smooth skin, he offered no protest or skittish reaction, as a regular animal would. "Let me know if you get too hot, OK?" The murmur was received with a flick of the tongue on her cheek, causing her to giggle.

Picking out a spot near a great big oak tree, she settled onto a dense patch of grass overlooking an obstacle course. On any other day, current and new hopeful SHIELD recruits would be working on their physical skills. Skills that Delilah did not care for, but that were important to agents. She did not know how to carry twice her weight in supplies when she A) spent most of her day behind a computer, and B) had a life partner who seemed more than excited to do the heavy lifting for her. At the moment, though, the obstacle course was being used by tiny seven year old's, a demigod, and a super soldier. All of whom were more interested in Bucky's silly detachable arm antics than they were on climbing a rope ladder.

Sighing, she lay back on the ground, giving Loki enough time to slither out from beneath her head to twine over her arm, and ultimately curl on her chest. The angular head rested heavily on her sternum and when he tasted the air, his forked tongue would barely graze her warmed skin. He was very still, and a lot better behaved than she would have ever assumed him to be. At this point, she assumed he would have been trying to scare crowds or hissing at strangers going past. He looked so content to simply be, he hadn't even bothered turning to stare at the sky, as she was or at the children. Instead, his head angled slightly to keep a watchful eye on her.

"Wonderful day for training outside, yes?" Thor asked happily as he dropped beside her. Delilah swore the ground shook with his momentum. Loki remained undisturbed.

"Mmm. I'm not much for training, but it is a beautiful day," she responded dreamily. Her fingers skimmed black scales, feeling them just short of feverish. "I might have to take Loki to the shade in a bit, though."

Thor frowned. "His Aesir form is not as sensitive to heat. Why does he not simply transform back?"

Delilah snorted. "Oh, he is one hundred percent stuck and thinks I haven't noticed." The snake rose up sharply to look at her. After a minute or two of blankly staring and neither yielding, he huffed and settled back down. "He'll figure it out, eventually." She added, running her fingers down his back. "Or I'll put him out of his misery and help him."

Thor chuckled, giving them both an affectionate look. "I must admit, not being able to talk suits him." Loki bared his fangs at the god of thunder, only to be laughed at, once more.

Delilah shifted when the bed sunk beside her at half past midnight. She had spent the majority of the day taking Loki wherever she pleased, snake wrapped around her shoulders. It appeared, though, that he had finally figured out how to ease back out of his reptile form. He patted himself down before sighing in relief. Almost immediately, he pressed himself against Delilah's body.

"Welcome back."

"Good to be here," he rumbled against her neck. "When did you notice I was stuck?"

"When you didn't stab Frank. Or Thor."

"Right." Loki remained silent for a long while and she assumed he had drifted asleep. "Don't make me give it up, please." His voice was so soft she almost assumed it had been a rustle of sheets that had made the noise.

"I'm not going to make you give up your ring."

"I'll get it to work. I had a lot of time to think when I was a snake. I think... I think I have to rely more heavily on my instincts."

"Why's that?"

"Because you do. And you made it. And whenever something happens it's always because of something I did because of you." Delilah made a noise of curiosity. "I wanted to make you breakfast before you woke. Then I wanted a way to stay with you all day without getting in the way. And now I wanted to hold you," he whispered, tightly circling her waist with his hands.

"See? I knew you'd figure it out. Though I did love having snake you around. You were gorgeous."

"Thank you, darling. I'll make it a point to use the form more often."

"Good. I did miss you like this, though. I love you like this the second-most."

"What's the first?"

"As a frost giant. Just as you," she responded through a yawn.

The breath caught in his throat at the confession. Despite himself, his Asgardian form drifted away, leaving her to shudder in her arms. He went to make some distance between them only to lock her arms with his and hold him fast to her body. Loki could feel the goosebumps prickling up on her skin, but she was adamant about keeping him close.

"Back to slumber, doll," he murmured against her hair.

"Mm-hmm. I love you, Loki."

"And I love you, sweet."