#northern lights explained

[sbijon24]

🔥 Unveiling The Secrets Of Northern Lights! Discover Finland And Norway's Dream Destinations!

[renzeifeng]

last post 30th december 2021…..

[rostam-z]

Milky Way + Northern lights. I cannot explain how rare this phenomenon is, blue Aurora together with the Milky way above your head! All this at that 60th parallel. This shot is taken 12th of August 2024. Blue Aurora, one of the most unusual and rare colours that you can get in aurora. As we see in the past events of this year, 2024, the blue and blue purple appear when storms are really really strong. Not confirmed in geo locations of Aurora Oval, but definitely confirmed at just above the 60th parallel, in other words, Stocholm area! Visual proof is here and in prevBlue Aurora, one of the most unusual and rare colours that you can get in aurora. As we see in the past events of this year, 2024, the blue and blue purple appear when storms are really really strong. Not confirmed in geo locations of Aurora Oval, but definitely confirmed at just above the 60th parallel, in other words, Stocholm area! Visual proof is here and in prev#fujixnordicious posts. Pure blue, Aurora mostly appear at 120 km. Also known as the second, most rarest aurora. #NorthernLights #northernlightsstockholm #Norrtäljekommun #Norrtälje #SwedishLandscape #Landscape #SlowPhotography #LandscapePhotography #SlowPhotography #NorrskenSverige #Norrsken #Northern_Lights #NorrskensFoto #aurorareach #AurorOfTheDay #WorldAurora #IG_AuroraBorealis #FujixSweden #FujixNordic

[gtzgoblin]

Keep seeing the old "oh look at me, I've seen the northern lights" meme (on other social media admittedly, not here, here's pretty well adjusted (didya think I'd ever be saying that?)) and can't help but wonder why people just can't be happy that other people are getting joy out of something...?

[todays-xkcd]

If we can get a brood of 13-year cicadas going, we might have a chance at making this happen before the oceans evaporate under the expanding sun.

Celestial Event [Explained]

Transcript Under the Cut

Approximate frequency in my area Active northern lights: 20 days per solar cycle A naked-eye "Great Comet": 2 months every 50 years Total eclipse: once every 350 years Clear skies: 50% of the time 17-year cicada emergence: 2 months every 17 years

opening bracket

20 days over 11 years multiplied by

2 months over 50 years multiplied by

1 over 350 years multiplied by

one half multiplied by

2 months over 17 years

closing bracket to the power of -1

equals 4.3 billion years

[Caption below the panel:] Every 4 billion years or so, my neighborhood gets to see a really spectacular show.

[pathologicalreid]

litmus test | s.r.

in which Spencer needs your expertise to help solve a murder, but crime fighting is most decidedly not for you

who? spencer reid x chemist!reader category: flangst (like. the end is a little angsty and it has case details) content warnings: typical cm violence, science talk, fem!reader, reader is not built for crime, morgan being an older brother, some fun banter!! death by firework is crazy lmao word count: 1.68k a/n: this is one of my favorite fluff pieces i've written in agessss i missed chemist!reader so much i learn so many things when i'm writing her. this was a request! i hope you like it as much as i do!!

“Do you have a second?” Spencer asks, his voice slightly choppy over the phone. Between his ancient phone and being inside concrete police precincts, some disconnect was bound to happen.

Saving your document to your computer, you rest the lab phone between your shoulder and ear, “If you’re asking me if I have any corrosive chemicals in my hands, the answer is no.”

He chuckles lightly, “I never know with you.”

You roll your eyes in response, even if he can’t see you, “It was one time and I needed a new phone case anyway.”

“You fused the plastic of your phone case to the material of your phone,” he retorts far too quickly for your liking.

“Yes,” you acquiesce, “but I know the exact chemical reaction that caused that phenomenon.” You cross your legs one over the other, maintaining your balance on your lab stool as you speak to Spencer over the phone.

He gave a light hum in response, “Speaking of chemical reactions – I need your help.”

Your eyebrows shot up in surprise, “You’re asking me for help in chemistry?” There really was a first time for everything, you suppose.

Spencer was more than capable of navigating a lab on his own, even so, he admits, “You have more applied practice than I do.”

Pursing your lips, you nod to yourself, “Fair enough. What’s stumping you, Dr. Reid?” Your inquiry, while innocent enough, garners a wolf whistle from your graduate assistant.

“There’s something burning a hole in these bones, and I’m not sure what would be causing it to happen this fast,” he explains, giving you minor background information on how long the bones were out and if the medical examiner had treated them with something.

You clear your throat, frowning at the notes you had scrawled down in front of you, “Burning or corroding?” What was seemingly a meaningless distinction would actually allow you to filter through approximately half of the possibilities.

“Corroding,” he corrects himself, “My mistake.”

Crossing off some of your notes, you purse your lips at the new possibilities, “No worries. Did you try flushing it out with water?”

You hear papers flipping on his end of the call before you get a response, “That would destroy evidence.”

“Well,” you raise your eyebrows, “It sounds like your evidence is destroying itself.”

“Baby,” Spencer says in a no-nonsense tone reserved for when he was deep in a case. You could’ve sworn you heard Morgan in the background of the call mocking him for the pet name.

Turning back to your notes, you sigh, “Yeah, yeah, all work and no play. Was the body buried?”

“Partially,” his reply intrigues you, “I can have Garcia send you the crime scene photos if you think it’ll help.”

Wrinkling your nose at the thought, you made an unsure sound, “Right, because nothing says lunchtime like getting up close and personal with a homicide victim.”

“What lunchtime? It’s three pm in D.C. right now,” he caught you, a slight chiding tone in his words.

Ignoring his questions, you ask more of your own, “Was the body near water? Did they test the pH of the soil and water?”

There were more papers flipping, likely someone presenting the results of those tests to him, “Yeah, the soil was a five-point two and the water was a seven-point eight,” he listed off for you.

While your knowledge of the pH of the soil in Iowa was limited, you did know that those levels were pretty on par for the northern Mississippi River. “O-kay,” you say, extending your vowels, “and they didn’t find anything else on the scene that points to corrosive materials. Hydrofluoric acid?” You posit, “No, you know what – maybe you should send me those files. My work email is encrypted, you can give it to Penelope.”

He speaks to someone else in the room with him and you resist the urge to ask him if he’s enjoying Iowa, “It’s sent,” he confirms with you.

Pulling up your email only takes a moment, and once you get over the initial shock of seeing a dead body on your computer screen, you lift your lab glasses to the top of your head in order to get a better look. “I mean,” you think for a moment, “those look like alkali burns to me. I’ve never seen them on bones before, but you should do a litmus test to check either way.”

“So, we rinse it with water?” He asks, seeking instruction from you in a way that makes you feel oddly powerful.

Your eyes widen, “No, no, no. If it’s a metal compound then it’ll be covered in a mineral oil, so rinsing it with water would actually make the burn worse.”

Pausing for a moment, you consider the possibility that Spencer didn’t have the luxury of time – he was trying to solve a murder, not do experiments in a lab.

“Alkali burns can be serious, it all depends on what caused them, and most are helped by rinsing with water. So, unless you have the time to test for metal compounds, I’d go ahead and rinse it. You might want to brush the damage to the bones with a dry brush first. If there’s lime on the bones it’ll foam, which not only will corrode the bones even further but it might release a toxic gas,” you have no idea how the corrosion would interact with bone marrow, but something tell you that you don’t want to know

“Wait a minute,” Derek interjects, being included in the conversation now that Spencer put the call on speaker, “I thought things like alkaline water were good for you.”

You scoff instinctively, “Oh, there’s no definitive evidence that shows alkaline water as having any real health benefits. Especially not the benefits that the internet says it has.” Straightening up in your stool, you continue, “In fact, there is evidence from the NIH that says drinking alkaline water could cause kidney damage. There’s a particular-“

“My bad,” he interjects, effectively stopping your rambling before it really took off, “I forgot whose girlfriend I was talking to.”

Groaning at your new vexation, you huff, “Oh, fuck off, Derek. Go kick down a door.”

Spencer quickly switches the phone back, “Thank you, angel.”

Squinting at the photos that were still on your laptop screen, a crude, disturbing thought came to mind, “You know, sparklers can cause alkali burns. It might be something to consider because of the diameter of the burns.”

Your boyfriend was silent on his end of the call for so long that you had to check and make sure the call hadn't dropped. “Did you say sparklers?”

“Yep,” you confirm, “like the ones you can get everywhere this time of year.”

He says something to Morgan, placing his hand over the receiver so you can’t hear, “There’s only one spot in this town, though. I’ve gotta go, see you soon.”

“Stay safe, please! I prefer your bones unburned,” you rattle off into the phone before it clicks, placing the phone back on the stand and deleting the crime scene photos from your inbox.

The front door to the apartment opens and shuts quietly, with Spencer under the assumption that you already went to bed, he was surprised to find you on the couch, nursing a cup of tea. “Hey, baby,” he chirps, unusually peppy for this time of night.

“Hey,” you say half-heartedly, threading your fingers through the handle of the mug.

Your somber tone gets Spencer’s attention, “What’s wrong?”

The slight panic in his voice causes your eyes to snap up to his, “Nothing,” you murmur. “It’s just… the woman who was in those pictures. There- the burns on her bones, they were signs of torture, weren’t they?”

You’d been thinking about the burns ever since Spencer showed them to you, “Yes,” he answers with a reciprocating softness, sitting down next to you on the couch. “The medical examiner concluded that she was burned antemortem.”

That woman had been burned alive by fireworks, sparklers had seared their way through skin and muscle until it finally met her bones. You blink a few tears from your eyes at the thought, “I like my lab, Spence.”

The confusion on his face was palpable, “I know you do.”

“I like my minimal human interaction and my chemicals, and I like knowing why certain things cause certain reactions. I like it when things make sense.” You take a deep, shaky breath, “Killing someone. Torturing someone with fireworks. That just doesn’t make sense to me.”

You had no interest in hearing the excuses that the killer had provided. You had no interest in hearing the psychological breakdown of that woman’s killer. Spencer knows that, “The photos got to you?”

Taking a sip from your mug, you nod solemnly, “I can’t stop thinking about the way it must have felt. Oh, the smell must have been horrible. That poor woman.” In theory, it was a ridiculous notion, killing someone with fireworks seemed neither probable nor possible. Yet here you are.

“But we got the person who killed her,” Spencer reassures you, resting his hand gently on your knee. “We couldn’t have done it without you,” he adds.

Your face warms at his compliment, “I wish I could have helped before she was killed.” You were grateful that Spencer hadn’t passed on any personal information about the woman, it was easier for you if you kept things in separate storage files in your mind.

Spencer hums, reaching out and sweeping a strand of hair behind your ear, “There’s always going to be another one. I’m sorry about the photos, I should’ve made sure Garcia only sent the necessary ones.”

Nodding absentmindedly, you look at him thoughtfully, “This will pass, but for tonight I just feel bad for the victim.”

“I can have Penelope share some of her favorite baby animal videos, if you’d like,” he offers softly, resting his head on your shoulder.

In return, you give him a small smile, “Well, I suppose it really can’t hurt.”

[thealtoduck]

Being a waterbender living in the Earth Kingdom and meeting Team Avatar…

Sokka x Male Waterbender!Reader

Warnings: None

Summary: While stocking up on supplies in a small village, team avatar finds a waterbender in an unlikely place…

——

Sokka’s pov:

Appa landed deep in the forest and Aang, Katara and Sokka started setting up camp for the night. Katara prepared their dinner as Aang and Sokka set up the tent and fed Appa and Momo.

”We’ll need to go to that village and stock up on more food we’re almost out, there’s barely enough for the three of us” Katara told the other two. ”There was a farm on the outskirts of town, I could go see if they have anything we could take” Sokka suggested.

”Sokka, you can’t just steal food, it’s for the towns people” Aang told him. ”Oh please, you saw how big the fields were, what’s a couple of vegetables? There will be plenty left, plus we need this food to get to the Northern Water Tribe so you can learn waterbending to save the world, I’m sure they’d want us to have their food” Sokka said standing up.

”I’ll be back soon” he said grabbing a small basket, walking in the direction of the farm. Once he reached it he stumbled over the fence on to the fields. Using a dagger to cut free a couple of vegetables and put them in the basket.

All of a sudden out of nowhere a blast of water knocked Sokka to the the ground making him drop the food basket. ”Katara?!” Sokka yelled but when he looked up he didn’t see Katara.

He was met with a pretty boy his own age with y/h/c hair and y/c/s skin, in a set of light jade green robes, that had water lilies embroided on them. He looked mad.

”What are you doing?” he asked in a dangerous tone. ”I-I-” Sokka tried but his voice got caught in his throat, he didn’t know what was more shocking that he found a waterbender in the northern parts of the Earth Kingdom or that he found him really attractive.

The boys face turned from stern annoyance, to a studying look as he looked Sokka up and down. ”Are-Are you from the Water Tribe?” the boy asked curiously. ”Yes” Sokka answered. ”Wow… I’ve never met anyone apart from mom from the Water Tribe…” the boy uttered.

”Are you from the North or South?” he asked. ”Southern Water Tribe” he answered more relaxed now that the look on you face wasn’t dripping with venom. Sokka then found some more courage to say ”Look, I’m sorry for stealing your crops, me, my sister and my friend are traveling and we’re almost completely out of food, if you want I can pay you for all this”.

The boy considered for a moment and then said ”Come with me, grab the basket”. Sokka did as told and followed the boy as he led him towards the farmer’s house, the two stopped outside and said ”Wait here”. As he went inside.

A few minutes later the boy came back out and put something in Sokka’s basket. A loaf of bread, some herbs, and a bottle of fruit juice. ”There you go, should make a nice meal” the boy said.

Sokka got confused but the boy spoke up again saying ”You know, me and my family like to house travelers when they pass through and it’s gonna get cold tonight, so if you need a place to sleep tonight just knock, okay?”.

Sokka was stunned, a couple of minutes ago he had just tried to steal from this family and now he was being offered a place to spend the night. ”Thank you” he found himself saying warmly. ”No worries” the boy said turning back towards the house.

”I’m Sokka” Sokka blurted not wanting the interaction to end just yet. The boy turned to him with a smile. ”I’m Y/n, hope to see you later, Sokka” he said and rentered the house.

”Wow” Sokka uttered quietly turning around making his way back to Katara and Aang. As they cooked the food they’d been given he explained eagerly to them about the boy. ”Are you sure he’s a waterbender and that he didn’t just throw a bucket of water at you?” Katare asked skeptical that there’d be a waterbender in this town.

”Yeah, he said his Mother was from the Water Tribe” Sokka insisted. Aang wrapped himself in a blanket. ”Maybe we should take him up on the offer, it’s starting to get chilly out here” Aang recommeded. Sokka agreed eagerly and Katara seemed curious about the idea of meeting another water bender.

Your pov:

There was a knock on the door and you went to open, being met with Sokka followed by another boy, a girl and a lemur. ”Glad you could make it, come in my mom just made some tea” you said and were introduced to Aang and Katara. And of course the lemur Momo.

You helped them get Appa in to the barn and they joined you inside. You sat down around the table as your mother served tea to you and your guests. ”Y/n? Sokka told us your a water bender, is that true?” Katara asked.

”Yeah, I am” you said showing her by lifting the tea out of your cup, before putting it back in. ”I’m not that good though, I don’t get much practice since the fire nation is always snooping around” you explained.

”Good enough to knock Sokka of his feet” Aang commented. ”It was a suprise attack!” Sokka defended himself making you, Aang and Katara laugh.

You conversed with the three for well over an hour, they had so many stories, Aang being the Avatar, how he met Sokka and Katara, them running from the Fire Nation multiple times. They’d had quite the long journey.

Your Father and Aang ended up in the barn as Aang wanted to see the farm animals, your Mother and Katara sat and discussed the Water Tribe. Leaving only you and Sokka…

”Would you like to see where you’ll be staying?” you asked him. ”Yeah, sure” he said. You led him to the guest room and told him ”This is the guest room, hope you’ll find it comfortable, if you need anything my room is right across”.

”If you don’t mind, I think I’m gonna get ready for bed” you said yawning and turned to your room but Sokka grabbed your hand and you turned back around. ”Thank you, for doing so much for us, it means a lot” Sokka said with a grateful smile.

”Anything for our fellow Water Tribe folk and the Avatar, Of course” you told him. You then said ”Goodnight” and opened the door to your room. ”Goodnight” Sokka said as you then disappeared in to your room.

He wanted to find a way to repay your kindness.

Next morning when you woke up you helped your mother in the kitchen with the breakfast. When you brought out the servings of food to the others you saw your father was eagerly conversing with Sokka.

Your father then spoke up and asked ”Y/n? Could you please show Aang and Katara around the village?”. ”Don’t you need me around the farm?” you questioned. Your father shook his head and said ”No, Sokka offered to do your work for today so you’d be able to take the day off and relax”.

”Oh! Well then I’d be honored to show you the village” you said with a smile and a small bow.

Once breakfast was finished you waited for Aang and Katara so you could leave for the village. You saw Sokka prepare for the days work at the farm.

”Thank you for taking over my work” you told him gratefully. ”It’s the least i could do after everything you and your family has done for us” Sokka said. You smiled as you looked in to Sokka’s eyes, it was like it only now dawned on you how handsome he was.

”You’re so pretty” Sokka uttered, catching you off guard making you think you’d heard him wrong. ”What?” you questioned. ”I-I mean… your robes are so pretty, you know, such a nice color and what are those? Water lilies? So nicely detailed” Sokka blabbed gesturing to the embroidered flowers on the bottom of your robes.

”Uhm… Thanks” you said still a bit stunned at the interaction.

Soon Katara and Aang arrived and you made your way to the village. You showed them around the different market stands, as they filled their baskets with food and supplies for their travels.

You even bought some treats that you snacked on in the middle of the town square, watching people at work and as they greeted they interacted with each other.

But soon the peace was broken as Fire Nation soldiers entered the village, Aang and Katara were quick to grab you and pull you in to an alley between two houses.

The leader of the Fire Nation soldiers moved to the front ”Where is the Avatar?! We’ve gotten word that last time he was spotted he was heading in the direction of this village”. The crowd stood silent.

”Well then if you don’t want to talk, then maybe we’ll have to show you what happens when you hold the truth from the Fire Nation” the leader said and his soldiers surrounded one of the market stands.

You could see Aang and Katara readying themselves for battle but you held up your hand to them and said ”Don’t”. Before you could explain the Fire Nation soldiers set the market stand a blaze.

Katara and Aang started running out of the alley but you grabbed them and pulled them both back. ”Don’t! We need to get you two back to the farm”.

”But they’ll destroy your village” Aang pleaded. ”No, they’re only trying to scare information out of us, they don’t know you were actually here” you told them and they gave you a questioning look.

”They’ll only want to destroy us if they knew you guys were here and we’ve been hiding it from them, but if they think you were never here then they’ll leave us alone” you explained.

You turned back to look at the leader of the soldiers as he told the crowd ”Tonight, after the assigned curfew we’ll search your houses and if we find a single sign the Avatar was here your village will suffer the wrath of the Fire Nation”. He then turned his back and he and his soldiers left the village.

You turned to Katara and Aang and said ”Go back to the farm, get Sokka and hide in the barn, we’ll have to figure out a way to smuggle you out without the Fire Nation seeing you” you said.

You then walked out to the village square and water bended some of the water out of a fountain to help put out the market stand.

When you got back to the farm you went in to the barn where the Avatar and his friends were waiting as instructed. ”Were everybody in village, alright?” Aang asked. ”Yes, they’re fine just a bit shaken” you told him.

”But we need to figure out how to get you guys out of here before the Fire Nation comes back” you stated. There was a moment of silence before Sokka said ”I have a plan”.

His plan was that when it turned dark he and the others would sneak deep in to forest with Appa, before taking off so that you and your family would not be found out with hiding them from the Fire Nation.

”Can I do anything to help?” you asked them. Sokka looked at you with a grateful smile and said ”You’ve already done more than enough for us, you should make sure to stay inside so you’re not seen, to keep you safe” he explained.

”Alright. It’s been really nice meeting you all. Good luck on your journey. I hope I’ll see you again sometime” you said giving them a polite bow, you then left them and made your way back to the house.

As the sun started to set you grew more and more worried the trio, what if they were caught by the Fire Nation, what would happen to them…

Once it was finally dark outside your heart was pounding all through dinner with your parents. You couldn’t take it anymore and as soon as you finished your dinner you went back to your room.

Only to almost scream when you opened the door, finding Sokka climbing through your window. ”Sokka?! What are you doing here?” you panicked. ”Don’t worry, we’re just about to leave, I just quickly wanted to stop by and talk to you” he said.

”About what?” you asked. ”I just needed to thank you again for what you’ve done for us and I wish I had more time to get to know you better cause you seem great” Sokka confessed taking your hand in his. You smiled.

”I wish we had more time too” you said making Sokka smile brightly too. ”Well then, why don’t you come with us, you can learn Waterbending with Aang and Katara up in the Northern Water Tribe too?” Sokka suggested impulsively.

”Sokka, I can’t, I’m needed here with my family and my village, at least for now” you told him, he looked down disappointment.

You then decided on impulse ”But I tell you what, when you guys are done up in the Northern Water Tribe and start traveling the Earth Kingdom, I’d love to join you guys, if you’ll have me”. Sokka frown then turned in to a small smile and he said ”It’s a deal”.

”You should get going now, the Fire Nation will be here soon” you told him. ”Right” Sokka remembered and turned back to climb out of your window. ”Oh and Sokka, one last thing” you said making him turn around. ”Yeah?” he asked and was answered as you placed a kiss on his cheek.

”Stay safe” you added. ”You too” he said planting a kiss on your cheek. He then climbed out of the window and ran off towards Aang and Katara who were trying to stealthily lead Appa in to the woods, hard as it might be. ”How’d it go?” Aang asked. To which Sokka could only reply ”He’s amazing”.

[wileys-russo]

Please could you write something with reader trying to teach alexia english😩

PSA: I don’t speak Spanish so I sincerely apologise for any mistakes

second languages II a.putellas

"hola! ale?" you called out as you let yourself into your girlfriends apartment, bending down to scoop up nala who came hurtling at you from the sofa. "hola!" you heard the blonde call out from her bedroom as you cooed at the small ball of fluff in your arms and kicked off your shoes, sliding them to sit neatly beside your girlfriends.

you couldn't help but chuckle as you entered the bedroom to see alexia's eyes trained on the large tv on her wall, watching barcelonas last match with real madrid. a notebook and pen sat nestled in her lap, the girl clearly taking notes before their upcoming rival game this weekend.

"nadie puede decir que no estás dedicada bonita." (no one can ever say you are not dedicated) you laughed, placing nala down and shaking your head. "para ser el mejor tienes que saber todo sobre tu oponente. hola hermosa." (to be the best you have to know everything about your opponent. hi beautiful) your girlfriend shrugged, moving her notebook away and opening her arms expectantly.

"y por eso eres la mejor?" (and that is why you are the best?) you laughed, placing your keys and phone down on her desk. "si es por eso que soy la mejor." (yes, that is why i am the best) the catalan grinned as you collapsed on top of her, your arms wrapping around one another in a tight hug.

"No es que me queje al verte. pero pensé que tenías trabajo esta tarde?" (not that i am complaining to see you. but i thought you had jobs this afternoon?) alexia questioned curiously as you moved a few loose strands of hair out of her face.

"a few clients cancelled so it freed up my afternoon." you explained with a happy smile, honestly not all that bothered if it meant you got to spend more time with her.

"veo. bueno, al juego todavía le queda la mitad." (i see. well the game still has one half to go) your girlfriend smiled as you sighed, knowing her well enough that there would be very little you could say to pry her away from her match studies.

"i'm gonna go make some food then." you chuckled, pecking her lips and moving to stand but her arms stayed locked around you. "o podrías quedarte y mirar conmigo mi vida." (or you could stay and watch with me) alexia grinned, wiggling her eyebrows making you laugh.

"haré algo de comida y luego volveré y miraré. okay?" (i will make some food then come back and watch) you bargained, the blonde humming and letting you up. "si, okay."

"and don't forget, we're practicing your english later." you reminded causing the older girl to groan loudly in contempt. "ale! you promised." you warned at her response, the blonde flopping backwards and sighing.

"de repente me siento muy mal bebe. podría perder mi voz." (suddenly i am feeling very sick baby. i might lose my voice) the taller girl faked a cough causing you to narrow your eyes at her in a glare.

"alexia you are the one who asked me to help you be more confident in your english. so that you can speak easier with my family!" you warned her sternly, the midfielder whining like a child throwing a tantrum as she kicked her feet and dragged her hands down her face.

bit by the travel bug you decided to spend a summer interning in barcelona around a year and a half ago, you already knew spanish from studying it in school and so when the opportunity came up from one of your old teachers for a photography internship abroad, you'd have been stupid to say no.

that was how you'd met alexia, a few months in you'd been sent to assist on a shoot for the new fc barcelona kit drop.

you'd caught the older girls eyes right away the moment you'd first spoke, alexia finding endless amusement in the way your thick northern accent came through in your spanish.

so with some light teasing throughout the shoot you were surprised when she'd asked if you wanted to grab dinner afterward, claiming that you'd not had a proper barcelona experience until you'd eaten at some of the best places it had to offer which alexia was glad to show you.

and the rest was a story you'd probably tell your grandkids one day.

"o podrías ayudar a tu familia a mejorar su español?" (or you could help your family work on their spanish) your girlfriend suggested with an innocent smile, which promptly dropped as you only continued to wordlessly glare at her.

"fine!" alexia huffed, throwing her hands up in defeat before crossing them over her chest, pouting up at you. "that's not going to work ale. go back to your game!" you nodded to the tv, turning around and heading toward the kitchen.

~

"cual es tu horario para mañana bonita?" (whats your schedule for tomorrow) your girlfriend asked with a stretch, joining you in the kitchen from her bedroom. "hermosa?" she called out again when you didn't answer.

"in english." you turned to her with a smile, leaning against the counter as you took a bite from your sandwich. "qué?" alexia frowned as you pulled yourself to sit on the counter. "english lessons ale. i will only respond when you speak in english!" you explained with a shrug, continuing to eat your sandwich.

"mierda. uh, what are your....jobs tomorrow?" the older girl managed to get out as you nodded encouragingly. "i have a shoot at two and another at five." you answered, your girlfriends understanding of english was fine as was yours of spanish, but it was her diction that she was often insecure about.

"what time is training tomorrow?" you asked, leaning over to place your empty plate in the sink. "training is at ten." alexia answered with a little more ease and you smiled.

"okay so now lets practice like you're talking with my family." you started, jumping down from the counter and moving to the living room, both you and alexia taking a seat on the sofa.

"how have you been?" "good." "okay, they're going to want to know more than that baby. what about football? speak about that." "okay. we have been training for the..." you watched as the blonde struggled to find the right words, huffing in frustration.

"champions league?" "si. sorry, yes. champions league. barcelona lost last time, we do not want that to happen again so we train hard, we try to win all our games." "good! see, you can do it ale." you nudged the older girl with your foot, sending her a soft smile of encouragement. "you will have to help me with your father." alexia chuckled as you agreed, your dads accent easily the thickest of your families with how fast he spoke alexia often struggled to understand what he was saying.

"your accent when you speak english is very cute baby." you grinned, watching on victoriously as a small blush coated the girls cheeks, a welcome change from her often sharp demeanor.

"ojalá pudiera decir lo mismo de tu nena española." (wish i could say the same about your spanish) the taller girl sent you a smile, hands tugging at your top to pull you closer to her. "hey!" you frowned in offence at the comment as you now sat practically in her lap, her long legs reclined down the sofa.

"should i say in english too?" alexia teased as you smacked her chest with a small pout.

"there are some things you like better when i say in spanish baby girl, no?" alexias tone shifted as her eyes roamed your features with a slightly darker gaze. your face heated up at what you knew she was insinuating, her hands gently sliding up and down your bare thighs.

"...maybe some things sound better in spanish."

[vibingandsimping]

I always feel so awkward/flustered requesting things, but the bg3 brain rot is so real. Could I ask for specifically Gale’s, and/or also anyone else of your choice (if you want obvs), like reaction to a virgin!Tav, like never had more than a peck on the hand or cheek inexperienced? I’m just absolutely feral over a shy, never been kissed Tav and companions~~~

Tav is just like me, fr. I appreciate you pushing your comfort zone and asking. Never feel ashamed to request something on my blog. <3

I liked this idea so will count it towards my second follower goal special. Funny how both of them ended up being Gale requests, honestly. Attempted to keep it gender neutral.

Word count: Around 2,000

Forewarnings: Tooth-rotting fluff, partial loss of virginity, oral (receiving), undergarment stealing, porn with little plot.

Gale, himself, had been quite inexperienced before Mystra. He just had himself so deeply rooted in his books and studies he thought the time was… wasted. It wasn’t that he couldn’t seek a partner, no, he just didn’t fare the effort. Mystra sought him out and how in the hells could he turn a literal goddess down? That relationship burned and crashed. Honestly, he was thankful for it now. He met you. You struck him like no other. You were more than Mystra. So when feelings reciprocated? Gale was elated.

He judged on your nerve that you either found him stunning, or, you lacked experience. He thought the latter. Whenever he held your hand and gazed into your eyes you seemed to shake. It was cute. His palm cupping your cheek and you’d flush so deeply he’d fear you suddenly fell ill. Often times, you’d break it off before things escalated beyond a hand holding or a gentlemanly kiss. Gale didn’t take to it harshly, at first. He yearned for your skin, your lips, your touch. He tried to make that clear in his language. Hands reaching for you more often, bodies closing the distance. He’d never push too far, though. Gale’s shame would be immense if he scared you.

Some gentle probing finally pulled some truth from you, one evening. You were a virgin. Never even having been kissed before. He wasn’t sure whether to comfort you or take a primal hunger in the idea of being your first. Lips and body, hopefully. He brushed it off initially, saying that he’d tend to your needs when you were ready. His words lingering in the air as he made it apparent that he craved you. Lusted and loved, in every sense. You nearly combusted and stammered. Gods, you were going to be his ruin. Mystra, forgive him but he believed you more enchanting than she ever was.

The first time he tasted your lips was under the guise of moonlight. Northern lights dancing in the sky as the moment you shared tender. You relaxed in the privacy and comfort of him. He bore his heart to you that night. Explaining his fears- his worries and his longing. It was shocking to see you make the first move, your hand cupping his face this time. You drew him in and he closed the distance. He swore he was flying when he pressed against the plush of your lips. Moving in and out, feeling the breath of each other dance along skin. His hand reached out and rested on your knee. You covered it with your own, grasping it in your hold. Fingers interlocked and he took the initiative to deepen the moment. His tongue flicked against your lips and the whimper that followed made him shiver.

As soon as it happened, he pulled away with a pant. Doe-brown eyes searching your expression as his mind raced. “I apologize if I am taking things too far or too fast. Your beauty strikes me and all I wish is for this moment to last an eternity.” You laugh, squeezing his hand reassuringly. Then, you shake your head and draw him in closer. “No, it’s okay. I think i’m ready. I want you, Gale.” His nostrils flare at the words and he steels himself, watching you intently. Nerve trickled in your voice but there was no outward hesitancy in your desires. He sits for a moment and soaks everything in. The satisfaction and sight of you presenting yourself to him. Vulnerable and so willing. He trailed his free hand to your shoulder and gently pushed you onto the grass. Intertwined hand next to your head as he claims your lips once more.

You could only lay and enjoy the sensation he was giving you. His fingers tickling down your shoulder to your chest. He was more than happy to lead you in this dance of pleasure. It would pave a path into many nights where you could enjoy each other. He’d be able to forget what it was like imagining your flesh. His tongue parted your lips and licked at your own tongue. You exhaled a sharp breath through your nostrils, sloppily trying to reciprocate. He smirked a little and continued to guide you as his hand lowered to where your sleep-shirt rested at your hips. His fingers were a little cold from the air as he slipped underneath it to feel your stomach. Gale parted from your lips to your jaw, continuing his love there down to your neck. Arousal from the touch of another was strange- but definitely not unwelcome. Gods, no, it’s so welcome. Your thighs clenched as he kissed over a particularly sensitive spot of your neck. Seemingly noticing your shift, he nibbles and sucks on it. The sensation causes you to gasp and writhe underneath him.

His palm presses flat on your stomach, using his strength to keep you still. Once he finds enough satisfaction after leaving a hickey, his lips trail down to your shoulder. A final kiss is left and he lifts himself to meet your gaze. His lips are wet and a tad swollen as his lids are halved. The sight made your loins tingle. It spoke all lust and admiration. He took such pleasure in watching and feeling you succumb to his touch. He nods downward at you, gesturing to your shirt and you nod in return. With the confirmation, he slips your shirt over your head and soaks the sight of you topless in. You can feel him shake a little as he hovers over your body. He lowers himself and slides downward to plant kisses against your collarbone. They follow to the middle of your ribs until he’s level with your nipples. He looks upwards through his eyebrows as he wraps his lips around one. You keen- arching your back as he suckles while his fingers tend to the neglected.

You hardly notice when his lips meet your lower stomach. Reaching to your pelvis as he slowly works your pants down your legs. You help him by shimmying your hips- and he groans in satisfaction when the skin is revealed. His hands contact your thighs and hold you down while he continues kissing along your pelvis- tickling the undergarments you wore. Your breath hitched and fingers twitched at the grass underneath you. Torn between admiring the sky or him as he worked your body so beautifully. A nibble caught your daze and you whimpered. He parted and cherished in the kisses and little marks he’d left. “Love,” he whispered and you craned your neck to look at him, “It is not too late to stop. I won’t force this upon you.” Admittedly, you paused for a moment and stared at him. Smiling and reaching out, his face was cupped in your hand. “No. I want this.” He visibly perked.

“Then, may I?” His fingers slipped under the waistband and tugged. You nodded with a twinkle of amusement. The cold air on your sensitive flesh made you hiss- but he was quick. Fingers and tongue meeting with little hesitance. You jerked at the sensation and he simply hummed, easing you down. It seemed he waited a moment for you to adjust before working his magic (pun intended). His tongue licked and worked you in circles while his fingers explored the flesh around. Your thighs, your rear- anything he could touch. He was keen to listen to your whimpers and observe your movements. He’d stop when you’d flinch and he’d continue when you moaned. Quite honestly, the coil in your stomach twisted and wound faster than you’d anticipate. He collected the mix of your arousal and his saliva onto his fingers. They circled your entrance and gently prodded, allowing you time to recognize his desire through the haze that was pleasure. It didn’t come easy when he started to push them in- no, you tensed and cried out. Gale continued working your sex while his spare hand caressed your flesh comfortingly. Once he was past the first ring- everything began to slowly ease.

His eyes watched you carefully as he slowly began to explore the inside of you. You were thankful for how patient he was being. Stopping whenever it seemed to overwhelm you and continuing when the stillness became unbearable. It was a few minutes before you could finally find a deeper pleasure in the touch rather than the discomfort or pain. He hummed approvingly against your sensitive parts- and you whined. His fingers were relatively thick but mostly long. They searched inside you until your body writhed as he brushed against a spot that made your eyelids flutter. It was over after that, he didn’t miss a heartbeat adjusting his tune to increasing the intensity of his mouth and tongue while abusing it with his fingers. You couldn’t contain the depraved sounds you made after that. Gripping at whatever you could; settling on his hair with tight white knuckles. Breaths were shallow as everything came to a crescendo and- crashed. It crashed hard. You were a writhing mess under him as a strangled cry cut from your throat.

Gale happily licked and cleaned up any mess you made as he worked you through your orgasm. Thighs clenching and unclenching around his head as he milked you of all you’re worth. He pulled away when the brink of overstimulation set in, wiping at his face with a grin-eating smirk. You lay like a fish out of water, riding the high and twitching with aftershocks. The man curled up beside you and cooed comfortingly in your ear while you recovered. You could feel his erection press into your skin through his robe but he paid no mind. He laid with you for however long until you could breathe and think with some sort of clarity. Recognizing that, he spoke. “Beautiful, truly beautiful. I have craved to see that for ages now. Yet, nothing my imagination could supply would have compared to it.” He laughed softly while you melted at the sound. “Do you need some… erm-“ You gestured towards the mass against your leg. He blinked, looked downward and smiled bashfully. “No,” he claimed and you blinked in shock. “I wore you out thoroughly with that. I will be fine- there are opportunities ahead. It will make it all the sweeter. Besides, I want you to cry my name out next time.” He shushed any rebuttal you had with a kiss. Soft yet passionate- with the aftertaste of you on his lips.

He grabbed your discarded garments and began to wipe the rest of the mess from between your thighs. You flinched and shivered at the touch of the highly-alert flesh. He kissed your ear tenderly to reassure you before curling the fabric into a ball and pocketing it. You gave him a pointed look- questioning. “Keepsake.” He muttered with a blush. A shiver ran down your spine at the perversion of the act. Yet, it made you feel so desired all the same. “Do you need anything? Food or water?” His eagerness to confirm your comfort made your chest swell. You shook your head and claimed you only wanted to relax with him. Gale visibly softened at that, almost awestruck. He assisted you back into your clothing and fixed your sex-messed hair. The night was still after that. Wrapped in his arms as his breath washed over you from the proximity. His fingers danced along your skin and traced unknown shapes. Everything felt as close to perfect as you’ve gotten in… a long while. You knew you couldn’t stay there the entire night. It just felt right to enjoy the rest of the moment with him til you had to return. Return to the madness that was your current life.

For now, you could forget the tadpole. You could forget anything that wasn’t the feeling of his warm body pressed to yours and the afterglow of everything that occurred.

[thepastisalreadywritten]

With the addition of Saturn, the James Webb Space Telescope has finally captured all four of our Solar System's giant worlds.

JWST's observations of the ringed planet, taken on 25 June 2023, have been cleaned up and processed, giving us a spectacular view of Saturn's glorious rings, shining golden in the darkness.

By contrast, the disk of Saturn is quite dark in the new image, lacking its characteristic bands of cloud, appearing a relatively featureless dim brown.

This is because of the wavelengths in which JWST sees the Universe – near- and mid-infrared.

These wavelengths of light are usually invisible to the naked human eye, but they can reveal a lot.

For example, thermal emission – associated with heat – is dominated by infrared wavelengths.

When you're trying to learn about what's going on inside a planet wrapped in thick, opaque clouds, studying its temperature is a valuable way to go about it.

Some elements and chemical processes emit infrared light, too. Seeing the planets of the Solar System in wavelengths outside the narrow range admitted by our vision can tell us a lot more about what they have going on.

Saturn

As we saw last week, when we clapped eyes on the raw JWST Saturn images, the observations involved filters that dimmed the light of the planet, while allowing light from the rings and moons to shine brightly.

This is so a team led by planetary scientist Leigh Fletcher of the University of Leicester in the UK can study the rings and moons of Saturn in more detail.

They hope to identify new ring structures and, potentially, even new moons orbiting the gas giant.

The image above shows three of Saturn's moons, Dione, Enceladus and Tethys, to the left of the planet.

Although dim, the disk of the planet also reveals information about Saturn's seasonal changes.

The northern hemisphere is reaching the end of its 7-year summer, but the polar region is dark. An unknown aerosol process could be responsible.

Meanwhile, the atmosphere around the edges of the disk appears bright, which could be the result of methane fluorescence, or the glow of trihydrogen, or both. Further analysis could tell us which.

Jupiter

Jupiter was the first of the giant planets to get the JWST treatment, with images dropping in August of last year – and boy howdy were they stunning.

The spectacular detail seen in the planet's turbulent clouds and storms was perhaps not entirely surprising.

However, we also got treated to some rarely seen features: the permanent aurorae that shimmer at Jupiter's poles, invisible in optical wavelengths, and Jupiter's tenuous rings.

We also saw two of the planet's smaller, lesser-known moons, Amalthea and Adrastea, with fuzzy blobs of distant galaxies in the background.

"This one image sums up the science of our Jupiter system program, which studies the dynamics and chemistry of Jupiter itself, its rings, and its satellite system," said astronomer Thierry Fouchet of Paris Observatory in France, who co-led the observations.

Neptune

Observations of Neptune arrived in the latter half of September 2022.

Because Neptune is so very far away, it tends to get a little neglected; you're probably used to seeing, if anything, the images taken by Voyager 2 when it flew past in 1989.

JWST's observations gave us, for the first time in more than 30 years, a new look at the ice giant's dainty rings – and the first ever in infrared.

It also revealed seven of Neptune's 14 known moons, and bright spots in its atmosphere.

Most of those are storm activity, but if you look closely, you'll see a bright band circling the planet's equator.

This had never been seen before and could be, scientists say, a signature of Neptune's global atmospheric circulation.

Uranus

Uranus is also pretty far away, but it's also a huge weirdo. Although very similar to Neptune, the two planets are slightly different hues, which is something of a mystery.

Uranus is also tipped sideways, which is challenging to explain too.

JWST's observations, released in April 2023, aren't solving these conundrums.

However, they have revealed 11 of the 13 structures of the incredible Uranian ring system and an unexplained atmospheric brightening over the planet's polar cap.

JWST has a lot to say about the early Universe; but it's opening up space science close to home, too.

As its first year of operations comes to an end, we can't help but speculate what new wonders will be to come in the years ahead.

Top: Jupiter - Neptune / Bottom: Uranus - Saturn

Credit: NASA

[concerningwolves]

Tips and troubleshooting for scene breaks & transitions

First, understand the terminology:

A scene is essentially a small section of your larger piece where specific characters perform actions in a specific place, but the definition can be a little loose. A new scene happens when the focus changes to new characters, a new place, a new conflict/event, or any combination thereof. If you strictly follow this definition, the first chapter and a half of Northern Lights by Philip Pullman counts as one scene: It takes place mostly within a single room (save for showing us how Lyra gets into that room as the scene’s introduction), and explores the interactions between one set of characters. It ends when the focus of the narrative “cuts” to some different characters partway through chapter two.

A scene break is mostly a formatting term. It visually indicates a break in the narrative flow. This is often represented by an extra blank space between lines, or by fancier options like an asterisk(s), an asterism (⁂) or special characters or symbols. Sometimes, writers use both – there is an extra blank space between paragraphs in the first scene of Northern Lights because the narration is interrupted by Lyra falling asleep, but the actual scene break where the focus jumps to new characters in a new setting is indicated by three asterisks.

A transition is the “connective tissue”, so to speak, that connects the next scene to the one before it. This can include explaining how characters got from point A to B, indicating the passage of time, or establishing a new setting, or a mixture of these. Some transition methods are simple, little more than a phrase or sentence like “Work was unusually quiet that afternoon”; others require a paragraph or two.

And now for the advice:

In your first or early drafts:

Move on → Seriously. Hit enter twice for your double line break or use an end-of-scene style or put in your three asterisks or other fancy scene divider. Start writing your new scene on the new line. If you want to you can come back and fix it later in other drafts/revisions, but if the scene transition is stopping you from writing, move on to the next scene.

Square brackets (the writers’ beloved) → You probably know the square brackets trick, but if you don’t, it’s where you stick something that’ll require more thought inside square brackets, like [TOWN NAME], and then move on to the actual writing; the square brackets (or another character/punctuation that you don’t use otherwise) are then easy to find later with your word processor’s find tool. Put in [scene break]/[scene transition] or  summarise anything that you envision happening “off page” between scenes. Fix it later.

Okay, so now you’ve come back to the scene breaks at a later stage of drafting or revisions, and you’re not happy with them. Consider...

Move on – now with a little extra padding → Have you come back to a scene break from an earlier draft to find it still feels too sudden? You probably need a simple phrase or a sentence that will help readers to reorientate themselves to a new place or time, or to turn their attention to some new characters. A quick “Later that day...” or “After a week of travelling...” or “They arrived at grandma’s house without any further mishaps.” can often smooth the path for you.

Backfill it! → Establish what is currently happening or focus in on the new characters in the first sentence or two, then quickly summarise how events reached that point. Pullman opens the second scene of Northern Lights by telling us that “The Master the Librarian were old friends and allies…” (focuses on the new characters), and then briefly explains that after the events of the previous scene, they strolled down to the Master’s study to have a drink and sit by the fire, as they often do after something difficult has happened (links to the previous scene + tells readers important information about the characters). This takes about two sentences before he jumps straight into the scene’s current events.

Does the transition between scenes still feel too jarring? Is there information missing? Then the next points may help:

Montage it! → Not every event or series of events in a story needs its own clearly defined scene separated by a scene break. It is perfectly acceptable to summarise stuff – think of this like a montage. Different montages show different things, but they all serve as a way to pack events into a small amount of time. In The Two Towers you get that sequence of Gimli, Legolas and Aragorn running across the fields of Rohan in pursuit of Merry and Pippin. In writing, that might look something like “For hours they moved across the planes, never dropping below a swift jog as they chased the ever-cooling trail. From time to time, Aragorn would stop and study the tracks in the earth and then rise, looking more grim than ever, and the pursuit began anew […and so on].” (I realise there’s actually an example of this in the book but I don’t have the text to hand, so I made my own)

To expand on that example: the “montage” approach is more appropriate here than a simple scene break with some backfilling because it, a) demonstrates the loyalty of the fellowship to one another, b) gives a sense of the weariness and monotony of the passing time, which reinforces how determined the characters are, and c) highlights their different roles and strengths, e.g., reminds the audience of Aragorn’s skills gained from being a Ranger. You just wouldn’t get the same impact from an abrupt scene break with a little padding or backfilling.

Still stuck? Then try…

Look back → If you’re struggling to move onto the next scene and none of the above help, the problem might be because of something in the previous scene(s). For me, this is maybe like eight times out of ten a logistical problem (e.g., “How to get characters from point A to point B?” / “is the Plot-Relevant Item in the right place?”) that can be solved by tweaking the events that came before.

Add a new scene → Are you finding that you need to add a lot of backfilling or padding to link your scene with the previous? Does too much happen to be compressed into a montage-style transition? Are there certain off-page events that might actually be important or helpful to show on page? Then try adding in a new scene between the two that you want to connect.  

(Chapter) break it up → Either rearrange the way that scenes are broken up across chapters, or just add a new chapter break instead of a scene break. If nothing else, getting that scene onto a fresh page (literally and metaphorically) can help you look at things in different way.

And if all else fails, try turning the writing off then on again. Or talking to a rubber duck.

[werewolfetone]

ME: so, castlereagh, having explained the last 200 years of history to you, what do you think? are you still a unionist? has learning of the modern state of northern ireland made you reconsider your "political delinquency" at all, or has your mind not changed?

ROBERT STEWART, VISCOUNT CASTLEREAGH, WHOSE GHOST I HAVE SUMMONED AFTER BREAKING INTO MOUNT STEWART AFTER HOURS: pray, permit me to humbly aſk you to return to the ſubject of man's lunar travels. how was this accompliſhed?

ME: focus. as a volunteer yourself, to what extent do you agree with lord carson's UVF's claims of being descended from the irish volunteers?

VISCOUNT CASTLEREAGH: I beſeech you. has the light of Providence truly now allowed for travel as far as the moon? the moon in the fucking ſky?

[hardly-an-escape]

what's in a name? | Dream/Hob | 9300 words | rated E

this is my submission for @designtheendless's 3K commission giveaway: a Dreamling fic based on their fanart above!

tags: alternate universe - human, photographer Hob Gadling, artist Dream of the Endless | Morpheus, model Dream of the Endless | Morpheus, strangers to lovers, snowed in, only one bed, light dom/sub, oral sex, face fucking, anal fingering, anal sex, anonymous sex, Dream of the Endless is a horny little weasel, and Hob is no less of a horny little weasel, brief Princess Bride references, alcohol consumption, impulsive decision making, callous disregard for the geography of northern California, they go from 0-60 because they’re both nuts, neither of them are in a great place but they do make each other better rather than worse

Hob is on an ill-fated road trip through California. He’s making his way slowly down the coast toward Los Angeles when, trapped by a snowstorm in a small town near Mount Shasta, he meets a mysterious stranger in a diner. They share a night of anonymous passion – but when the sun rises, Hob finds that he can’t just leave the stranger behind…

this story developed partially from Picture Perfect, one of my Fluffbruary 2024 fills. I also incorporated some of designtheendless's other suggested image prompts, so do make sure you check their original post! and thank you so much for extending the deadline, it meant I had time to get my CHBB fic submitted before pivoting to finish this... and even so I'm still barely getting it done in time just because of who I am as a person :D

Hob leans forward over the steering wheel, brows furrowed as he peers through the driving snow at the street ahead. The windshield wipers are going like mad; he’s seen a plow or two out, but they seem to barely be making a dent, so traffic has slowed to a crawl. Which is, frankly, for the best, since the weather is bad enough that only a true nutter would be out in it at all.

Well… nobody’s ever accused Hob of being sane.

His GPS instructs him to take the next right and informs him that his destination will then be on his right. He can just make out the neon sign through the thick flakes: Townhouse Motel. “Vacancy,” it says below the old-timey script, blinking on and off. In the distance, the sun is just beginning to settle behind some mountains that he’s sure would be beautiful if they weren’t hidden behind such inclement weather.

He pulls in the driveway. The lot is nearly empty, so he parks right next to the office door and jams his winter cap on his head before hurrying through the flurries.

The bored teenager behind the front desk barely looks up from the reality show playing on her tablet as she runs Hob’s credit card and gives him his door key – an actual, physical key. Room 1389. He decides it’s not worth it to ask why the room number has four digits when the motel has maybe a dozen rooms total.

He does ask if there’s somewhere nearby to get a bite to eat and a drink.

“There’s a diner across the street and down a block,” the teenager says, “but they don’t serve booze.” Then, finally looking up, perhaps seeing the bags under his eyes and his generally downtrodden demeanor, she relents. “There’s a liquor store about two blocks past that. You can bring stuff back to your room, I guess. It’s not like anybody is going to ask questions around here.”

That, Hob thinks as he heads back outside and moves his rental car a little closer to his door, is obvious. There’s a general air of neglect clinging to the motel, and indeed to the whole street, from what he can see: the buildings are a little more weatherbeaten than can be plausibly explained by a cute vintage aesthetic, and at least one storefront seems to be permanently boarded up. The recession has clearly hit Northern California just as hard as it has the rest of the United States.

What a time to be playing tourist. What a time to be – well, he won’t think about that right now.

His room is clean, at least. Someone, at some point in time, has made a half-hearted attempt to decorate it with a seaside theme. The bedlinens are various shades of blue, rather than your typical beigey-white. There’s an unfortunate painting of a mermaid hanging over the outdated television, and a slightly less unfortunate painting of a lighthouse above the bed. The bathroom wallpaper has little seashells on it.

Hob leaves his camera bag on the desk and his duffel on the end of the bed, grabs his wallet, turns his collar up against the cold, and heads back out into the snowy evening.

The diner is, as promised, only a short walk down the street, but Hob is shivering by the time he gets there. The wind cuts right through him – silly British man that he is, he thought California would be warm, even in winter. He hadn’t really reckoned with unpredictable mountain weather, or with the cold front that was chasing him down through the southern end of the Cascades. The weatherman on the radio had been calling it “freakish.”

A little bell tinkles merrily when he pushes open the door. A waitress calls out a greeting, tells him to sit wherever he likes and she’ll be right with him. There’s only one other person in the diner, a slender man dressed all in black who is hunched over a cup of coffee at the counter. He glances up and immediately back down as Hob stomps the snow off his boots and takes an empty booth far enough away from the front door that he won’t feel the rush of cold air if anyone else comes in.

The waitress bustles over, bringing him a cup of coffee without even asking. Hob wraps his fingers around it gratefully. He doesn’t normally drink coffee this late, but it’s been the kind of day that calls for it: so cold, so uncomfortable and distressing, that the sturdy ceramic mug is exactly what he wants. The bitter note of slightly burnt coffee is tempered by the cheap, artificially flavored vanilla creamer he only ever uses at this kind of greasy spoon diner. He breathes deep and feels something inside him start to thaw.

When the waitress comes back with a menu, he warms up even more. She is middle-aged and comfortable, nice and no-nonsense, the sort of person with an indeterminate American accent who could have come from anywhere: Illinois, or Florida, or five minutes down the road. She recommends the olive burger with fries, and a side of fried pickles, because they’re the best in the county, and then her excitement simply bubbles over.

“I’m just so darn tickled to have two Brits here in the same night!” she enthuses. “Oh gosh, is that okay? Can I call you Brits or is that rude?”

“No, no, it’s fine!” Hob laughs. “Two of us, eh? That is a coincidence.”

“I know, right? Okay hon, lemme just get your order in and I’ll be back to warm up your coffee in a sec.”

She bustles away again, and Hob looks curiously at the man at the counter. He must have heard her comment, but he hasn’t turned around, or indeed acknowledged Hob in any way since he came in. He shrugs mentally and turns away to look out the window at the thickly swirling snow. It’s dark enough now that streetlights have come on, casting cones of light in which the flakes dance like a very slow sodium-tinted tornado.

He wishes he had a book. Or a crossword puzzle, or one of those packets of crayons they give to kids at restaurants. Something to keep his hands occupied and his mind off of everything that was threatening to consume it, off of the last few days, off of her –

Then the man from the counter slides into the booth across from him.

“Hello,” Hob says.

“Hello,” the stranger says. His voice is surprisingly deep and resonant, coming from his slim frame, and he looks to be in his late twenties, perhaps a few years younger than Hob. He is very pale. His dark hair is sticking up rather wildly and his eyes are a cold, clear blue that reminds Hob of the way the sky had looked this morning, before the clouds had descended.

“Who are you, then? Aside from a fellow Brit?” asks Hob.

“No one of consequence.” He’s lugging around a small backpack, which now rests on the bench beside him.

“I must know,” Hob says in a very bad Inigo Montoya accent.

“Get used to disappointment,” the stranger says with a smirk, and Hob laughs.

“Oh, we’re going to get along just fine,” he says, holding his hand out across the table. “My name’s Hob, yes that’s my real name, and yes, it is a long story.”

The stranger shakes his hand briefly. His palm is warm from cupping his coffee cup, but the tips of his fingers are cold. “Pleased to meet you, Hob.”

“And do you have a name, stranger?”

“I do. Several, in fact.”

“Any of them for public consumption?”

The stranger shrugs. “Will you forgive me if I maintain a certain level of mystery?”

Hob shrugs too. “That’s your lookout, mate. No skin off my nose.”

They chat. About the weather, and how odd it is, and how different to England. About books – the stranger appears to be a voracious reader, and Hob had loaded up an old iPod with audiobooks in preparation for a lot of driving, which sparks a lively debate on the merits of printed books vs reading aloud. In the midst of this, Hob’s food arrives, and he is derailed momentarily from the conversation by an overwhelming need to unhinge his jaw and stuff as many chips into his gob as humanly possible. The stranger watches in amusement.

“Hungry?” he asks.

“Yeah,” Hob says, muffled by his burger. “Been driving pretty much all day and I didn’t really want to stop, so…”

He’s suddenly self-conscious, very aware that the man sitting across from him is slender and willowy and dressed all in black, and that he himself is very much… not that. Dressed for comfort and warmth in slightly baggy jeans and a flannel shirt and his puffy jacket balled up on the bench beside him. But the stranger seems unbothered, simply smiling slightly and snagging a fried pickle off the plate between them, which Hob had invited him to share moments after it had arrived.

They are good; crispy and salty and uniquely American. Hob is certainly prepared to believe they’re the best in the county.

“So are you staying here in town, or is that shrouded in mystery as well?” he asks, once he’s slowed down a bit.

“I’ve been staying in a cabin up the mountain, a little way out of town. With my family.” He said the word family as though it is faintly dirty. “One of my siblings thought it would be good for us to get away together. But I have found it… trying.”

“Up the mountain, eh? Are you going to be able to get back in this?”

Hob tips his head toward the window. It is very dark now, and the snow is falling more thickly and wildly than ever. A crease appears between the stranger’s eyebrows.

“To be honest, I had not thought that far ahead.”

“Do you have much experience driving in the snow?”

To Hob’s surprise, the stranger actually blushes, just a gentle stain of pink across his cheekbones. “I… walked.”

“You walked?”

The waitress, stopping by the table to warm up their coffees, echos Hob’s surprise.

“Oh, honey,” she says. “In this? How are you fixing to get home?”

“I was planning to walk back,” the stranger says with some asperity. “But I admit I was not anticipating this kind of weather.”

“Let me check on the roads for you,” the waitress says kindly. “Which cabin did you say you’re at? My brother-in-law lives up that way, I’ll give him a call. I’m sure we can find you a ride.”

She goes back behind the counter and picks up the phone.

“I’m happy to give you a ride,” Hob says quietly. “If she thinks it’s safe.”

“You do not have to do that.”

“‘S okay. I want to.”

“Bill? It’s Jan. I have a question for you,” says the waitress.

Hob realizes, suddenly and with some surprise, that it is quite true, that he is not just being polite: he does want to help this mysterious stranger, who talks like a 19th-century Byronic hero and dresses like a college goth. His stomach is doing the tiniest little swoop every time they make eye contact, and he doesn’t want it to stop.

The waitress calls over to him.

“You got four wheel drive, hon?”

Hob thinks about the little Honda Civic in the motel parking lot. Thinks about mountain roads and snow. Shakes his head no.

Scraps of the waitress’s conversation float across the diner and Hob takes another bite of his burger.

“– well they’re foreign, Bill, they don’t –”

He snickers just a little; can’t help himself, really, because the waitress is just so kind and helpful and also clearly more than a little bit befuddled by their presence in her diner. These two Brits, total strangers, so unalike one another – and yet here they are, sharing a booth and a plate of fried pickles, five thousand miles and change away from home. He exchanges a look of camaraderie with the stranger and eats some more chips. They’re good too.

“– and tomorrow? What’s the overnight –”

After another minute or two the waitress thanks her brother-in-law and hangs up the phone. Her face is serious when she comes back to their table.

“Well, boys,” she says, “I don’t think anyone is going anywhere tonight. Bill says it’s pretty bad up there, and only getting worse. The plows aren’t even going out yet on account of the snow’s still coming down so hard, it doesn’t make sense to try and clear anything. You going to be able to find a place to stay?” she asks the stranger.

He looks at Hob. “Did you mention a motel?”

“Yeah, the Townhouse?” Hob says, and the waitress nods along. “I don’t know for sure if there are rooms available, but it didn’t look like the parking was full.”

“Probably not, this time of year,” interjects the waitress. “It’s a fine place, and Paulie can certainly use the business. I’ll bring your checks by in a minute, guys.”

She leaves them again. Her sensible sneakers squeak against the floor tiles as she walks.

“Thank you again for your offer of a ride,” the stranger says quietly. “That was very kind of you.”

“Course. I’m just sorry you won’t be able to get home tonight,” Hob says.

“It is my own fault. I should not have behaved so impulsively. But my siblings…” The man frowns. “As I said, they can be difficult. I would have done something regrettable, had I remained in the house.”

Hob waves a hand. “Ah, it happens to the best of us. Especially around family. You should hear some of the fights I’ve had with my sister, we can scream the paint off the walls when we get going.”

“Indeed,” the man says darkly.

“I’m glad you did come to town, though. It’s been kind of nice,” Hob says tentatively. “Having someone to talk to tonight.”

“Indeed,” his stranger repeats. But this time one corner of his mouth lifts in a tiny smile. “It seems to have worked out in my favor.”

Hob smiles back. “So, are you really not going to tell me your name?”

“Where’s the fun in that?”

“Fun, eh?” Hob glances down at his own hands, folded on the table, back at the stranger. “Is that what this is?”

The stranger smirks. He leans forward and plucks another fried pickle from the plate. He opens his mouth, sticking out his tongue just a little bit farther than necessary to pop the slice into his mouth. He chews, and smirks some more, and gives Hob an unmistakable up-and-down appraising glance, and underneath the table he presses one ankle against Hob’s instep.

Oh. Hob feels a surprising but not unfamiliar spike of arousal in his gut. So that’s where this is heading – has been heading, since he pushed open the door and the stranger had glanced up at him. Had he blushed, when his eyes met Hob’s? Or is he applying more detail to that brief interaction after the fact, now that he thinks he knows what his stranger is thinking?

And when had the man become his stranger?

“I see,” he says, and presses back against the bony ankle under the table.

Ten minutes later, they’ve settled their bills – his stranger had apparently eaten a club sandwich before Hob had arrived, and he’s weirdly relieved that the man has consumed something more substantial than coffee this evening – and are gearing up to head back into the cold. Hob is zipping up his coat when he realizes the other man appears to have only a thick black hoodie and a knit beanie (also black, of course). He glances out the window, where it’s still snowing pretty hard, and raises an eyebrow.

“You going to be okay in just that?”

“You said it is only a couple of blocks? I will be fine. I tend not to feel the cold. And,” he adds defensively, “when I originally walked down the weather was not quite so… inclement.”

“If you say so,” Hob says as he opens the door. The waitress calls out a good night and he waves to her over his stranger’s shoulder. Wonders, just for a moment, what she thinks of the fact that they’re leaving together, or if she will ever think of them again at all. They step out into the snowy evening. “The girl at the motel said there’s a liquor store down the street. Mind detouring there? I was thinking of picking up some whiskey, or something. Something to keep a man warm.”

The man chuckles and they head down the street. It’s not until they’re away from the diner windows that he takes Hob by the elbow and gently draws him just outside the circle of a street lamp.

“Surely,” he says, voice low, stepping into Hob’s space, “there are many ways for a man to… keep warm.”

And he kisses him.

His lips are warm and dry, a little chapped. It’s a simple kiss, a chaste one, just their lips touching and the barest pressure of the stranger’s belly and chest pressed against Hob’s, swathed in layers of winter gear. It lasts for a heartbeat, two, and then the man steps back with a hum of satisfaction.

“Oh?” says Hob, giddily. “It’s like that, is it?”

“Obviously,” responds his stranger.

“Well, I don’t know, mate,” says Hob as they make their way down the street. He resists the urge to link their arms together. “Maybe you play footsie with every guy you meet in random diners in Northern California.”

“Perhaps.”

The liquor store is a brief respite from the wind and the snow. Hob selects a mid-range bottle of whiskey and they trudge back to his motel room. The snowflakes and the streetlights and the swirling wind make everything feel more than a little bit surreal, like something out of a dream or a fairy tale. The two of them could be adventurers, explorers, wading through an arctic wasteland in search of shelter. The mountain looms behind them, dark and mysterious, like a great castle or some monstrous beast.

“Do you mind if I take a shower?” asks his stranger, kicking off his boots dropping his backpack by the desk. “I’m afraid I did get rather sweaty, hiking down earlier. I wouldn’t mind cleaning up.” His gaze, beneath his long eyelashes, feels heavy and significant.

“Go right ahead.” Hob gestures toward the bathroom. “I’m just going to nip down to the lobby and get a bit of ice.” He retrieves the ice bucket from the desk, brushing close to his stranger as he does. The brief contact jolts him back to the real world. They’re not in the arctic waste; this handsome, ethereal man is here, in his motel room. He is pulling off his somewhat sodden hoodie and draping it over the back of the chair, and sniffing dubiously at the sweater he wears underneath it. He is real.

Hob waits until he hears the shower turn on to slip out the door.

Although he has his moments of cluelessness, Hob is not a stupid man. He knows where this is going. He recognizes the signs, the coy little dance they’ve been doing around each other for the past two hours, and no, he’s not a stupid man, but if he were a better one he might be able to resist the temptation of falling into bed with a beautiful stranger who won’t even share his name.

But there’s something about this man. Hob wants him. Already can’t resist him. Wants to wrap him up and keep him warm and kiss his collarbones and, yes, wants to fuck him, wants to feel him shudder and moan and wants to watch his cheeks flush and his head fall back in ecstasy. He hasn’t felt like this for a long, long time, and now it’s come out of nowhere to slam into him and hook into his gut, this wanting.

He throws a few scoops of ice from the machine in the motel lobby into the bucket and goes back to the room.

He’s kicked off his boots, unwrapped one of the shitty plastic cups, and poured himself a couple fingers of whiskey by the time he hears the shower shut off. There’s the usual shuffling noise of towels, a brief blast of the cheap hair dryer mounted to the wall. Then the door opens and the stranger emerges, and Hob is slammed from the real world right back into a surreal dream.

The man is even more beautiful without his clothes on: Hob would compare him to an elf or a fairy prince, but he’s too busy choking slightly on the spit that’s suddenly flooding his mouth at the sight of long, slim limbs, a narrow waist, and a temptingly well-defined Adonis belt that disappears under the cheap motel towel wound around his hips.

There’s a long moment of silent eye contact. Hob’s leaning up against the desk, cup cradled in one hand. His face heats as he watches his stranger’s eyes travel slowly down the length of his body and back up, pursing his lips slightly. His mouth is very pink, with the kind of full bottom lip that’s made for nibbling on, and the rest of his skin is as pale and smooth as… well, as snow, with just a touch of redness from the heat of the shower spreading across his chest.

Hob downs half of his whiskey without even thinking about it. He can’t look away. He can’t think, can’t even blink. He’s afraid that if he does, this vision will disappear and it’ll just be him, alone, a saddish man alone in a motel room with a bottle of booze and a bag of expensive camera equipment, and then who knows what will happen?

His stranger gives him one of those tiny half-smiles, suggestive, not quite a leer, and stalks across the room toward him.

He widens his legs and his stranger steps in to stand between his feet. He takes Hob’s drink out of his hand and tosses back the last swallow of whiskey before setting the plastic cup aside. Then he hooks one finger into the collar of Hob’s flannel shirt and pulls him into a kiss. His mouth is a study in contrasts: warm from the whiskey and cool from the ice, soft tongue and sharp teeth. They sink briefly, gently, into Hob’s bottom lip, and Hob pulls the man close against his chest and returns the favor.

The kiss is turning wet and messy when the man pulls back far enough to start fumbling with Hob’s shirt buttons. He’s pulled the tails of the shirt out of Hob’s jeans and has it about halfway unbuttoned when a phone starts ringing.

It’s not the room phone – it’s coming from a pocket of the man’s backpack.

“Ignore it,” he mumbles into Hob’s neck. “We are busy.”

The phone rings three times; four times. The stranger has finished with Hob’s shirt and is pulling the tee beneath it out of the waistband of his jeans by the time it finally stops.

His fingers are toying with Hob’s belt buckle and ghosting over the seam of his fly when it rings again.

The stranger groans audibly.

“Do you think,” Hob says with the carefully deliberate cadence of the very turned on, “that your family might be worried about you?”

“I do not care,” his stranger grumbles, and sinks gracefully to his knees.

Eventually the phone stops ringing again.

He’s worked Hob’s belt and fly open and is nuzzling into the opening of his jeans, nosing at the base of Hob’s cock through his underwear and Hob is panting, his stranger’s hot breath so close to where Hob wants him most – when the phone rings a third time.

“Oh, for fuck’s sake,” snarls the stranger, and stands.

He fishes a slightly battered-looking BlackBerry out of an outside pocket of his backpack and stabs at the call answer button.

“What.”

He turns away, so all Hob can see is the furious, stiff line of his stranger’s back. He can’t hear the other half of the conversation, and he doesn’t think he wants to; every fibre of the man’s body radiates anger and discomfort and perhaps a little bit of shame. Hob adjusts himself discreetly, rezips his jeans, and tiptoes over to sit down on the edge of the bed.

“Obviously I am alive. I am fine.” A pause. “I took a walk.” Another pause. “Yes. Yes, I know what time it is. No, I am assured that the roads were too bad to make it back to the cabin. I am in a motel room in…” He looks over to Hob. “What is the name of this place?”

Hob supplies the name of the motel, and that of the town as well, just for good measure. The man relays the information into the phone. There is another long pause.

“That is none of your business. Shut up. You have no idea what you’re talking about. And if you speak to me like that again I will hang up the phone.”

There is another, longer pause, during which the stranger’s face grows progressively redder. He is very deliberately not looking at Hob.

“No. I said no. I will arrange for my own transportation in the morning. I –”

The person on the other end of the phone must say something truly outrageous, because his strangers eyes bug out in a way that looks almost uncomfortable.

“Do the entirety of the known universe a favor and crawl back into whatever slime hole you emerged from and leave me alone,” he hisses. “Goodbye.”

Hob can’t quite muffle a snort at this crowning line. Siblings.

His stranger hangs up the phone with a vicious jab of a button and slams it down on the desk; then seems to reconsider, retrieves it, and shuts it off entirely before throwing it into his backpack. He sighs, a surprisingly tired sound.

“I will have another drink, if you don’t mind,” he says. “And then I would like it very much if you would fuck me. Please.”

Hob’s cock, which had been feeling distinctly neglected, gives a twitch.

“I think that can be arranged,” he says. “Are you –”

The stranger waves a dismissive hand. “I am quite sober enough to have sex with you. And I could easily afford my own room, if that’s a concern. I am here because I want to be.”

“Glad to hear it, but that actually isn’t what I was going to ask,” Hob says mildly.

“Oh,” the man says. A faint blush rises on his cheekbones. He scoops up the whiskey bottle and uncorks it, taking an unceremonious swig. The towel hangs dangerously low around his hips. “What were you going to ask?”

His stranger pauses with the whiskey bottle against his lips. Hob watches the long line of his neck work once, twice, as he swallows, and figures he may as well put his cards on the table.

“I was going to ask if latex condoms are okay. For when I fuck you into the mattress in a minute here.”

The man clears his throat. “Oh,” he says again. “Yes. Latex is fine.”

“Good. Anything you don’t like? Hard boundaries?”

He pauses. “I do not enjoy being choked. Or having my hands restrained in any way. But I like… I like it a little bit rough. It feels good. To be used.”

Hob leans back on one elbow. “Is that what you want me to do? Use you?”

“Yes.”

The word drops into the quiet room like a handful of snow might drop off a tree branch – soft and muffled and sending the same delicious shiver down Hob’s spine.

“I can do that.” Oh, yes. Hob can use this beautiful man, if he is offering himself up to be used. “C’mere, then.”

His stranger walks slowly across the room to where Hob is half-reclining on the bed, feet still planted on the floor. He kneels between Hob’s legs and runs his hands slowly up and down his thighs from knee to hip. “And you?” he asks. “Your boundaries?”

Hob considers. “I’m with you on choking, not a fan,” he says. “I’m not big on pain, generally, but I can give it to other people, if they need it.”

“Alright.” His hands are still rubbing up and down Hob’s thighs, a slow, hypnotizing rhythm. When he speaks again his voice is thick. “Would you consider the preliminary negotiations to be concluded now?”

“Don’t you have anything better to do with your mouth than spout off like a horny nineteenth century robber baron?” Hob counters.

His stranger smiles, a proper smile that crinkles the corners of his blue eyes, and unzips the fly of Hob’s jeans.

In short order he’s pulled them open and pushed Hob’s boxers down just enough that he can get his cock out. He’s not quite hard, not yet, but he gets there quickly between his stranger’s gentle, surprisingly soft hands and the way he immediately buries his nose in Hob’s pubic hair and breathes deeply as he looks up through his eyelashes.

Then he opens his mouth, and wraps his tongue around the head of Hob’s cock, and Hob’s brain makes a noise like radio static.

Oh, he is good at this. Unfairly good. Supernaturally good. He teases Hob for long, long minutes, working up and down his shaft with light touches of just his lips and tongue, ducking down now and then to mouth gently at his balls, until Hob is twitching and swearing and straining, perched on the edge of the bed. When he finally has mercy and takes Hob’s cock fully into his mouth, it is barely a relief. He is so wet, so hot, and he sinks down on Hob with no resistance, no trace of a gag reflex. Before he can stop himself, Hob’s hips jerk forward that final fraction, and suddenly his stranger’s nose is brushing his pubic bone and his throat is contracting around the head of Hob’s cock.

He’s expecting the man to pull back, to splutter in indignation, but instead he makes an encouraging noise and squeezes Hob’s thigh before folding his hands almost primly in his lap.

“Fuck,” Hob mutters. He makes an experimental shallow thrust into the tight, wet heat of his stranger’s mouth. “Really?”

His stranger can’t nod, not with Hob’s prick in his mouth, but he moans. Hob feels it vibrate all along the length of his shaft and has to stifle a whimper of his own. He sinks one hand into the soft riot of the man’s hair, still a little damp from the shower, and cradles the back of his skull. The bone feels sweet and finely formed in his hand.

“You want me to fuck your pretty face?” he asks, soft and just a tiny bit mean. “Yeah? That’s what your mouth is good for, isn’t it?”

He thrusts again, in and out, and the stranger’s eyes roll back a little in his head, so he does it again, and again. Soon he really is fucking his face, not too hard but deep, fingers tightening in his stranger’s hair as his eyes fall nearly shut, narrowing to crystalline blue crescents.

Hob pulls back briefly to let his stranger breathe. Runs his thumb along his bottom lip, dripping with spit, before he pushes back in. He doesn’t stop until he can feel the first tendrils of orgasm beckoning to him; but as tempting as it is to keep going, to empty himself into this perfect mouth, he’s made a promise. And Hob is a man of his word, so he pulls the man off his cock by the scruff of his neck. He makes an obscene noise as he goes, and another thing string of saliva dribbles from his puffy mouth. His eyes are slightly glassy as he looks up at Hob.

“Get up on the bed, baby,” Hob orders gently.

When the man stands up the towel is just barely clinging to his narrow hips, and his erection is stiff and straining against the terrycloth. He’s so hard, Hob thinks wonderingly, just from having Hob’s cock in his mouth for a few minutes, and his own prick throbs in sympathy.

“Hands and knees,” Hob says, and the man crawls up on the bed. The towel falls away as he goes, languid but obedient, so that he’s entirely naked when Hob positions himself behind him. The contrast between Hob’s clothes and the other man’s nudity is delicious – Hob’s rough denim against the man’s soft thighs, Hob’s hairy wrists poking out from worn flannel as he runs his fingernails along sharply elegant shoulder blades.

He allows himself one long, gentle caress, from the nape of his stranger’s neck down to the shallow dimples in the small of his back, before he grabs at the man’s buttocks and unceremoniously spreads him open.

His hole looks surprisingly loose and relaxed already. Hob runs the pad of one thumb over it.

“Were you prepping yourself in the shower?” he asks, delighted. He presses gently and the furl of muscle gives, just a little, pink and fluttering.

“Hng,” says his stranger, shuddering. “Yes. I thought – I thought about your hands. Oh. I liked the thought that you were just outside the door. While I had my fingers inside myself.”

“Impatient little minx,” Hob says fondly. He kisses one of the lovely knobs of his stranger’s spine and pinches his backside for good measure before pulling away. “Stay here.”

He has to dig down to the bottom of his duffel bag in order to find the box of condoms and the little travel sized bottle of lube. He’d felt a little self-conscious when he’d packed them back in his flat in London – like he was presuming something – but then again he had been preparing for a supposedly romantic road trip with his girlfriend.

He’s glad, now, that he has them.

His stranger has remained on his knees, pitched forward to rest on his elbows, face pressed into a pillow and cock hanging heavy between his legs.

“Good boy,” Hob praises, and runs his hand along the man’s flank. “Beautiful. Oh, darling, I’m going to make you feel so good. And then you’re going to make me feel so good, aren’t you? You already have,” Hob coos, drizzling lube directly onto his arsehole. “And I know you’re going to keep being a good boy for me, aren’t you?”

Before the man can answer, Hob slips a finger inside him, right up to the first knuckle. He’s rewarded with a whimper and the feeling of his stranger pushing back against him, silently begging for more.

And then not so silently. “More,” moans the stranger. “Fuck. More, please.”

Hob strokes his finger in and out, petting the velvet inside his stranger.

“Don’t worry,” he says. “You’ll get more.”

He tries to spend as much time torturing his stranger with his fingers as his stranger had spent torturing him with his mouth, but by the second finger he finds his resolve dissolving like so many snowflakes on warm skin. The man is making such wanton sounds, and his knees skid wider and wider on the slippery motel bedspread, opening him inexorably to Hob’s hungry eyes and questing hands.

“Oh. Oh,” he says. “Oh, yes, fuck,” he moans. No more well-crafted phrases or erudite words; the only thing dropping from that perfect mouth are noises, guttural and breathy by turns, only half-muffled by the pillow his face is smashed into.

“Please,” he begs, “please, in me, I – please, I need –”

Hob obliges.

He’s pretty sure he’s never been harder in his life as he shoves his jeans down around his thighs and rolls the condom on. He has to do it one-handed, clumsily, because some frantic corner of his brain is convinced that if he lets go of the stranger’s hip then the man will disappear, between one blink and the next, and this whole night will turn out to have been some snowblind fever dream.

But his stranger stays where Hob has put him, desperate and writhing, begging for Hob’s cock, and when he finally pins the man down to the mattress and pushes into him, that first hard thrust is enough to silence both of them.

The room is utterly still for a heartbeat, and then another, and then one more, until Hob pulls out in order to thrust in again and his stranger wails and then Hob is fucking into him in earnest, fucking him hard, until the sound of their skin slapping together almost drowns out the sounds his stranger is making beneath him.

Almost.

His stranger moans and pants, and Hob answers him, thrust for thrust and moan for moan, Yes and Ah and Christ and Fuck, fuck me, use me, yes. He grips his stranger by the hips, so hard that his fingers leave little white divots behind when he shifts his grip, so hard that he worries he might leave bruises, and still the man pushes back against him and begs for more.

He comes, when he finally comes, untouched, rutting gracelessly against the mattress. Hob stills, grits his teeth, not wanting to overwhelm the other man as he seizes in pleasure, but his stranger continues to move against him, if anything even more desperate, even in the throes of orgasm.

“Don’t stop,” he gasps, “don’t, oh God, fuck me through it, don’t stop –”

So Hob hauls him up and pushes him down, one hand on his waist and one shoving his chest down into the mattress as the man’s hands scrabble at the sheets and he sobs and Hob pistons into him until he empties himself, until his prick is oversensitive and his stranger is twitching around and beneath him, and the room is finally quiet.

Then Hob takes the condom off, knots it and tosses it towards the wastebasket. He rolls them both away from the wet spot with only middling success, but he’s too tired to care. He shucks the rest of his clothes off. He is boneless and spent, and his stranger is inserting himself relentlessly into Hob’s personal space. They lie there for a long, long moment, sweaty and panting, until their breathing starts to even out and the desperate closeness has receded into normal cuddling. Hob presses a kiss to his stranger’s sweaty temple and marvels at his luck.

“I realize I neglected to ask you why you find yourself in Northern California,” his stranger says, tucked against Hob’s side, voice drowsy and hoarse. “Do you care to share?”

“It’s a long story,” Hob says. “I was – well, I am – on a road trip. With my, ah. With my girlfriend. Well. Ex-girlfriend, now. Actually.”

His stranger tenses slightly, and Hob doesn’t blame him; he knows how it must sound. “It sounds like there is a story there?” the man says, almost tentative.

“Yeah, we… we came over together, about two weeks ago. We flew into Seattle, were planning this whole big trip, right down the coast and all the way to Los Angeles. See the redwoods, do some wine tastings, the whole bit. I’m a photographer, I was thinking I could turn the whole trip into a photo essay, maybe even a book.” He sighs. “Then she heard about this yoga retreat, ashram sort of place. Bit culty, I don’t really go in for all that, but she absolutely had to check it out, so we did. Two days later, out of the blue, she tells me our chakras are misaligned and gives me the boot. Turns out Guru Todd Thingummy, who ran the retreat center, was very aligned with her chakras. As well as other, less… metaphysical things.”

There’s a sound from the vicinity of Hob’s armpit that he realizes with delight is a snort. The snort blossoms into a chuckle, and then his stranger is laughing, a frankly horrible honking sort of laugh, shaking in Hob’s arms with it, and Hob laughs along.

“I’m sorry,” his stranger gasps. “I shouldn’t – I shouldn’t laugh at you. It’s just… Guru Todd.”

“I know!” Hob snickers. “You can picture him, right? White boy dreadlocks and a fucking… shell necklace. Utter tosser.”

“I feel like I’ve probably met someone almost exactly like him, truly.” Eventually his stranger’s horrible laugh subsides. He shifts against Hob, playing idly with his chest hair, curling it around one finger. “In a way, I am also escaping a recent ex. She was the first person I dated after some… difficult experiences I had about a year ago. But in the end I was far more invested in the relationship than she, and she became. Uncomfortable. With my ardor.”

“She’s a bloody idiot then,” Hob says automatically, and his stranger looks up, startled.

“Do you think so?”

Hob briefly considers backpedaling. Don’t come off like a madman, he thinks to himself. Not when he’s finally talking to you. But there’s no hope for him. “Well, yeah. I mean, I’d say your ardor is my favorite thing about you so far.” He lets one hand drift down and gives his stranger’s arse a cheeky squeeze, and is rewarded with a squeak and another snort.

“You are kind to say so,” the man says, and interrupts himself with a yawn.

“It’s true. I… I’m really glad I met you,” Hob says honestly. Too honestly. He can’t help himself; the man is just so beautiful, mouth kissed red and limbs loose, fucked out and soft everywhere he’d been hard and prickly before.

Hob still doesn’t know his name.

“I’m glad I met you, too,” the man says softly.

Hob snuggles them both down into the lumpy motel pillows and pulls the blanket up firmly around their shoulders. The wind blows outside, he reaches up to switch off the lamp, and they fall asleep.

He wakes in the night and stumbles to the bathroom to take a piss. When he comes back, his stranger has starfished out and is taking up a full two-thirds of the bed, sleeping like a stone. Hob manages to reinsert himself into the remaining third and then simply lies there for a long few minutes, looking at the other man.

The skies must have cleared, at least a little, because there’s a few strips of moonlight filtering through the blinds. The pale light turns his stranger into marble, a work of art; he practically glows against the blue sheets. Hob’s fingers itch for his camera.

“You’re going to fuck me up,” he whispers. “I’m going to wake up next to you and never want to leave, and it’s going to fuck me up so bad.”

The sleeping man does not respond, of course; doesn’t even stir. Hob lies there, and gazes at him, until he slips back into sleep himself.

When he wakes again it’s fully morning. The sun is that peculiar thin shade of blue that you get on very cold mornings, but when Hob peeks out the window, the sky is clear and the snowplows have clearly been out making the rounds. He tries to tamp down a sudden feeling of disappointment.

He gets a drink of water, and when he returns to bed his stranger is stirring. First one blue eye opens, then the other.

“Morning,” Hob says.

The man hums and stretches luxuriously, rolling from his belly to his back. The sheets fall down around his hips, revealing one elegant hipbone and a tempting glimpse of dark curls. His pale skin practically glows against the blue sheets in the morning light.

“Enjoying the view?” his stranger asks, and his voice is rough with sleep and slightly hoarse.

“You could say that,” Hob says. He puts one knee on the bed, reaches out to run a hand lightly down the long, lean line of the man’s thigh. “God, you’re… you are so beautiful.”

“Come here to me,” the man says, beckoning to Hob.

Hob ducks his head and kisses up the ladder of the man’s ribs, takes one pert nipple gently between his teeth.

“Can I take your picture?” he says suddenly. “Not in a creepy way. I can even keep your face out of it if you like, I just… there’s something about you, in this light.”

“I don’t mind,” the man says.

Hob’s heart leaps.

A few minutes later, he’s gotten his camera out and adjusted. The room is so quiet, so still, that each click of the shutter sounds almost sacrilegious. He shoots in black and white. He thinks the sheets will show dark, almost black, and the man’s skin will show light and luminous against them. His stranger poses like a dream, languid and biddable, moving here and there on the bed, wherever Hob arranges him.

“You’ve done this before,” Hob accuses. He’s kneeling above the other man, shooting straight down, and his stranger has one arm thrown over his face so only one eye is visible. “Posed, I mean. You know how to move for a camera.”

“I have,” the stranger admits. “Mostly for life drawing classes, though I imagine the principle is more or less the same.”

“Incredible. Are you an artist, then?”

“I suppose.”

Hob tugs the sheet a little lower, so that it’s just barely covering the stranger’s prick, which has plumped up a little – whether from the attention of Hob himself or of the camera, he’s not sure, but it’s one of the sexiest things Hob’s ever seen. The neat patch of dark hair blending into the dark sheet. The gentle swell beneath it. His mouth waters.

“You suppose?”

“I find it difficult to call myself an artist. To claim that title. But I make art. If that is the same thing.”

“Hmm. I reckon so.”

Hob pulls the sheet another fraction of an inch lower. He can feel himself getting distracted. The itch he’d felt to photograph the beautiful stranger, now mostly satisfied, has transformed into an altogether different kind of impulse. He takes one more shot, barely paying attention to the framing. Catches himself licking his lips.

“Hob.”

“Yeah?”

“Put the camera down.”

He hastens to obey.

He’d pulled his boxers back on at some point last night, but they do little to hide his arousal as he slides under the sheets and slots himself in behind his stranger, rubbing his nose in the riotous bedhead and kissing his neck as the man tilts his head to one side to give him better access.

“I like how you say my name,” Hob murmurs. He grinds against his stranger’s narrow arse and reaches around to make a loose fist around his hardening cock. “You’re really not going to tell me yours, are you?”

“Mine?”

“Your name.”

“I –” The man’s breath hitches as Hob tightens his grip, stroking slowly up and down. “I haven’t – decided yet.”

“Well,” Hob says against the smooth skin between his ear and his shoulder. “Let me know what you decide.”

They writhe together under the sheets for a few minutes, until they’re both fully hard, until Hob’s chest is slightly tacky with sweat where it’s rubbing against the stranger’s sharp shoulder blades. He’s grunting, underwear pulled down, making quick little thrusts in the crease of the other man’s thigh, sticky and warm and so good.

“Fuck me again,” his stranger says. “Please.”

“Don’t be a madman,” Hob chides. “You’ll be so sore.”

But he doesn’t say no. And he slides a finger between the man’s arse cheeks and pets over his hole, still a little loose from the night before.

The stranger twists his neck around to look Hob in the eye. “I don’t care. I want you,” he says. “I want to feel it.”

And Hob tries his best to be a good person, he really does, but when confronted with this bald-faced desire he is only, after all, a man. So he mumbles Fuck, okay, yeah, okay against his stranger’s shoulder, and tears himself away to retrieve the lube and a condom. He fingers him open, as slowly and as carefully as he can bring himself to do it, and rolls the condom on, and he fucks him again. Face to face, this time; one knee hooked over his elbow, and long arms clinging to him like a drowning man, and panting, open-mouthed kisses that are as much simply breathing the other’s breath as they are real kisses.

The stranger comes first, his beautiful face screwed up in ecstasy, and Hob follows him over the edge mere seconds later.

The other man falls back into a doze almost immediately, drifting off as soon as Hob has disposed of the condom and wiped them down with a handful of tissues, but Hob is buzzing with too much energy to lie back down. He cleans himself up, splashing water on his face and brushing his teeth quickly, before dressing quietly and creeping down to the motel lobby to look for breakfast.

There’s a coffee machine, a few muffins – prepackaged, not fresh – and a rather sad fruit bowl with some mealy-looking apples. He assembles what he can and shoves some creamers and sugar packets in his jacket pocket. He asks the bored teenager at the front desk (a different one than the night before, although bearing a distinct family resemblance) about the weather report, and learns that although it’s supposed to stay cold, no more precipitation is in the forecast. Then he goes back to the room.

His stranger stirs again at the rush of cold air when Hob lets himself back into the room.

“I come bearing provisions,” he says, setting the coffees on the bedside table and dropping the rest of his meager bounty in the man’s lap.

“Foraging for our survival?” he asks dryly.

“Something like that. It’s slim pickings out there, I’m afraid. But hey –” he picks up a muffin and wiggles it “– chocolate chip!”

His stranger snorts and mutters something about being spoiled.

Hob is very careful not to say anything about how he’d like to spoil this man very much, actually, for the foreseeable future and possibly beyond that, because Hob has so longed for someone to care for, and because this man so obviously needs it. Hob eats his muffin, and very carefully does not say anything reckless or emotional.

They finish their motel snacks, and drink their coffees (Hob’s with a little creamer and one sugar; the stranger’s with no cream and an absurd amount of sugar). And eventually Hob broaches the subject that’s obviously hovering between them.

“So,” he says. “What do you want to do now? I’m still up to give you a ride to your cabin, if that’s what you want. The roads are supposed to be cleared by now.”

“I suppose I should,” the stranger says, fiddling with his styrofoam cup, not meeting Hob’s eyes. “I did tell my sibling that I would return in the morning.”

“Okay.” Hob clears his throat. “Alright then. Whenever you’re ready.”

It takes them another hour to leave the room. Hob showers, and then his stranger decides he needs to rinse off as well, and then there’s a frustrating search for car keys that turn out to have been kicked or dropped halfway under a bedside table at some point the night before.

Then the stranger stops Hob in the doorway with a hand on his elbow and kisses him, long and slow and wordless, before they step out into the brilliant snowy sparkle of the late morning.

The drive is very quiet. The stranger directs Hob out of town and along a rather steep road that winds up the thickly forested mountainside. It’s certainly not a road that Hob would have wanted to drive in last night’s weather, and even with clear skies and plowed roads he takes it slow, acutely aware of the grip of the rental car’s tires on the snowy highway.

Only one time does the stranger wince and shift uncomfortably when Hob cannot avoid a bump in the road. Hob smiles, and swallows his smile, and deliberately wrenches his mind away from the vivid memories of just why his stranger might be wincing and shifting uncomfortably in his seat.

His stranger is silent, except for when he briefly tells Hob when and where to turn. The farther they drive up the mountain, the stiffer he becomes, until he’s gripping the seat with white knuckles and his mouth is one firm line.

Hob doesn’t think it’s the wintry roads that are making him so tense.

They pull over, eventually, at the base of a long driveway. Through the trees Hob can see a large house – not really a cabin by any stretch of the imagination, but built of logs, and with a wisp of woodsmoke floating up from a picturesque brick chimney. They both gaze up at it through the trees. Hob puts the car in park but doesn’t turn it off.

“Well, here we are,” he says.

“Indeed,” his stranger says, and his voice sounds tense and slightly strangled. “Thank you.”

“Of course.”

Hob waits for him to open the door and walk away.

The man does not move.

A minute stretches by, and another, and another, and still his stranger has not opened the car door.

Hob dares to hope.

“Come with me,” he says suddenly.

His stranger looks up, startled.

“I mean it. Come with me. Go get your stuff and we’ll just. Drive away. Go down the coast, find somewhere it’s actually warm. Or don’t even get your stuff,” he adds hurriedly, aware that his voice is sounding increasingly unhinged. “Say the word and I’ll just turn the car around. We’ll go. Anywhere you want, just… come with me.”

The man looks at Hob with an unreadable expression for a long moment. “You know nothing about me,” he says finally.

“I know I like you. A lot,” Hob says. “I know last night was one of the best nights I’ve had in a long time, maybe one of the best nights of my whole life. I know I’d regret it if I didn’t at least ask. So, I’m asking. Come with me.”

“I haven’t even told you my name,” says his stranger. “I could be a serial killer.”

“You could be, yeah. But I don’t think you are. I think… I think you just want someone to want you.” Hob reaches across the gear shift and briefly touches his stranger on the cheek. The man’s eyes flutter closed and Hob doesn’t think he’s imagining the way he leans ever-so-slightly into the gentle touch before he looks down. “I want you.”

There’s another long silence, punctuated only by an occasional call from the chickadees flitting through the trees.

“My name is Morpheus,” he says to his hands, clenched in his lap. “But some people call me Dream. People – people close to me. Call me Dream.”

Hob smiles. “Can I call you Dream, then?”

Dream nods. “Let’s go,” he says. Hob’s smile widens.

“Want to get anything from inside?” he asks.

“No. I think not,” Dream says. All of a sudden it’s like the tight strings of his body are loosened: he leans back in his seat, crosses his ankles, looking relaxed for the first time since they’d gotten out of bed. He lolls his head to one side and peeks at Hob and his face looks fey and happy in the afternoon light. “I believe I have everything I need for now.”

Happiness wells up in Hob’s chest, a rushing feeling like a mountain spring swollen by melting snow. He puts the car in gear and reaches over to take Dream’s hand.

“Right then,” he says. “Let’s go.”

Read on AO3 >>>

[felassan]

"also, on the broadest line around the edge, you can see those symbols again. I’m thinking now that these 6 symbols represent the 6 factions we can choose from for Rook to belong to."

not only that, but the factions of 6 out of our 7 companions, Harding/the Inquisition aside. from some of the things they've said lately (tho at the moment I can't remember specifically where), it sounds like we will encounter each faction in the game too and that they each play a role in the story. in the center is the Veilguard logo itself; it's like representatives from these 6 factions came together to form Voltron The Veilguard. :> about the symbols btw:

The Warden symbol is closer style-wise to this new seemingly updated or northern Warden[?] symbol than it is to previous game/southern Warden[?] symbology (two). shape of the wing, stylization etc. it being 'half' like that gives it the impression of a shield/heraldic beasts.

The Veil Jumper symbol looks to be a halla. it makes me nostalgic for Clan Sabrae heraldry :') makes sense for a faction based in Arlathan and interested in ancient elvhen ruins.

The Shadow Dragons (Tevene faction) have a snake. dragons are all around in Tevinter imagery, a country where they are a symbol of divine power. Another kind of 'worm'/wyrm also kicks around in Tevinter iconography; snakes. in the Imperium heraldry, a serpentine dragon faces off against a snake (opposition..). (side ramble - As a group the Shadow Dragons are a resistance group, they oppose slavery, corrupt rulers and the worst aspects of Tevinter society. Their name makes them seem like 'a different kind of dragon' - an alternative way for the 'dragon' Tevinter is to be, a different future it could have. a different kind of dragon than the dominant ruling one, but one that is currently still overshadowed. it also carries the implication of them working in the shadows and carrying out operations under the radar - this is contrast to the Lucerni, a faction in the Magisterium whose goal is to redeem and restore Tevinter. They're more like a political party, they operate more in public. "lucerna" is Latin for lantern. light, and shadow. Maybe the Shadow Dragons are basically the stealthy/secret operational arm of the Lucerni? like a left and right hand. end side ramble) Snakes crop up in Neve's design (her leg, her hat). I keep thinking about the snake in the Imperium heraldry. with their symbol, it's like the Shadow Dragons are saying they're fighting for a Tevinter.. without the 'dragon' part. in which.. the dragon is a metaphor for the bad stuff? corruption etc? Snakes also carry the symbolism of stealth and slyness, which again fits with the 'shadow' stuff. Would a dragon be able to see a lowly snake coming...? probably not :> I also can't help but think of the imagery of snakes that's to do with healing and medicine. like they wanna de-corrupt Tevinter, heal it of its rot. ALSO. the other thing thing is The Viper from Minrathous Shadows. well, look at that. The Shadow Dragons' symbol is a snake. "We are the Tevinter you forgot". And what do they want? "Everything". maybe The Viper is the founder of the Shadow Dragons? the story mentions they have a contact, a lady who is lightning-smart (Neve?). in the accompanying art-piece, the dealer's silhouette and other aspects of their design are snake-like, recalling Neve and what seems to be 'Shadow Dragon Rook's clothes.

The Lords of Fortune have a cephalopod. (it reminds me of House Greyjoy). makes sense for a faction with ships, dominion over the coasts of Rivain, a pirate-y aesthetic and originating from a nation almost entirely surrounded by sea. maybe this explains the cephalopod that was portrayed 'on' Rivain in the trailer from a few months ago? like maybe it was supposed to represent the Lords of Fortune, their presence in Rivain, and their storyline.

The Mourn Watcher one is just so cool. it's at once both a humanoid skull (you can see the two eyes and the teeth), recalling the symbol for the broader Mortalitasi itself, and a beetle. it makes me think of stuff like scarab beetles and deathwatch beetles, both of which have lots of cool symbolism/lore and cultural meanings irl on stuff like life and death, the cycle, decomposition etc. beetles are also culturally important in Nevarra, where they are prized. lots of households keep them in cages for good luck, and encrusted beetle wings are part of Nevarran decor.

The Crow one is obviously like looking down at a corvid in flight. its head is the top triangular part, but this shape is also known to be worn by Crows as a mask/disguise, and from that perspective the pointy part at the bottom gives the wearer a beaked appearance, masquerade-ball style. the Crows are always watching :>

[halcyone-of-the-sea]

CAKE FOR A DEAD MAN (I)

NAVIGATION || RAVISHING ALLURE MASTERLIST || NEXT: CHAPTER II

PAIRING: Nikto x F!Reader (Soulmate AU)

WORDCOUNT: 4.6k

WARNINGS: Angst, problems with food & image, mentions of stalking, unwanted gifts, death, violence, gore, blood, etc. (Series 18+)

*I do not give others permission to translate and/or re-publish my works on this or any other platform*

Color, as most would say, is one of the best aspects of sight. It allows such a myriad of emotions to be expressed—even felt. Red reminds us of passion; navy for elegance and a certain mystique. Not only seen but processed on such a deeper level. Refractions of light that explode into the retina, rod and cone cells that send signals to the brain to help detect that phenomenon like a gift of evolution. 

But when you can’t see any of that—color—who’s to explain what the red of the roses actually looks like above a deep shade of gray? That navy blue looks even darker, too. Closer to black. Light purple becomes the same hue as the curtains your mother hangs on the windows, but you can’t tell if that’s really purple or not. How can it be anything other than slate? People tell you it is…at least, those who’ve already met their partners. Their soulmates. 

But there’s little hope for you on that front, really.

You wave to the photographer, calling out a broken Russian goodbye as he smiles warmly at you, nodding his head in your direction before watching you walk out of the studio room’s doors. A large gaggle of other finely-clad women surrounds you on the way to the changing rooms. 

Even with three-and-a-half years of living in this northern country, your mastery of the native language starts and ends with simple pleasantries.

The modeling agency was packed today and you still had so much to do. You stuff down your internal list of scheduled fittings, meetings, and more booked photoshoots that extend into the chilled evening of Yekaterinburg, Russia. There was just so little time. 

Gray hallways and white overhead lights meet your eyes between blinks, potted plants boring and drab. If you could see the shades in between the leaves you’d know you would find them beautiful, but like this…well, they’re just sad.

You shake your head and shuffle to the back of the group, throwing tiny smiles to the kind, and stunning, women who you’ve had little real conversation with. One kisses you on the cheek and pats your shoulder, and you laugh brightly before pulling to the rear, face heating.

“The bastard is finally dead!” The familiar voice causes you to freeze with one heeled foot in the air—fingers picking at the strap of your silk dress absentmindedly before it, too, stills. They were always forcing you into silk with feathered accent pieces of intricate detail. Like a bird, or, Seraph, more precisely. 

Blinking in surprise, you turn around just in time to lock onto the drained shades that make up Alyona Arkadyevna Solovyova before she grips your shoulders harshly. 

Her collarbone-length hair swishes heavily, but it’s not as violent as the smile on her sharp face. 

“Finally, little Солнышко! This is perfect news. The bastard is dead!” Alyona’s English is very good, and of course, it would be—when she was younger she dreamed of being an English teacher. That was before she realized she was just about the most attractive woman of her generation. The harsh Russian accent still bleeds through.

You laugh and grip her long, pale, arms; seeing her in a blouse and pencil skirt as you tilt your head, asking, “Christ, Alyona, give me a warning next time. If I rip anything I’m in deep shit.” 

“Gah,” Your friend waves a hand and releases you, tiny eyes creasing, “forget about that—did you not hear me the first time? My father, Seraph, listen to me! He is finally dead! It happened just this morning but I only got word ten minutes ago.” She laughs, throwing her hands up, and you hide your amused exasperation, limbs tired but it won’t stop you from appreciating your friend’s enthusiasm. Alyona squeals, “A train hit him!”

You cringe internally, face pulling taunt. “Oh,” your chest sputters as you clear your throat, “that’s, uh, that’s…great?”

“Of course it is!” Hands capture your cheeks, squishing as you worry about the state of your makeup. Alyona speaks brightly, “We need to celebrate, Солнышко. Come.”

Before you can protest she’s dragging you away from the other women and the direction of the changing rooms, all had stopped and were listening intently from behind; nosey. Everyone in the Allurement Modeling Agency building, AMA for short, just had that way about them—your business was their business and vice versa. 

And Alyona had no problem airing out her grievances with her estranged father to the choir. She lived for drama.

“Aly,” You huff a soft breath at her and her bobbing hair. She said it was blonde and you had no other option but to believe her. Not yellow-blonde, she had specified. Ice-blonde. “I can’t go out in company property. Plus, I have a photoshoot for Chanel in under an hour. The photographer needs me to be ready.”

But it seems your concerns fall on deaf ears and you can’t help but chuckle and grin at your friend's lack of care about work. She herself was a model, but the entire company halted when she said it should. 

You were truly surprised they hadn’t fired her yet. 

“And I’m sure Chanel has an absolutely hideous dress for you, my Seraph.” Ashen eyes turn back to stare at you, and once she realizes you wouldn’t fight her, her grip releases. “Some Медовик will do you good before the vultures close in, yes? Let us hope they don’t shackle you to those damning lace lingerie sets over cake.” 

Your head tilts with a short sigh, and you walk beside the woman in your clacking heels. The sound of the authentic honey cake seemed to itself to coat your insides with a lust for it—dripping layers of plush gray sponge with pale cream. Your mouth waters. 

“I’m only eating half a piece.” You settle slowly, though you hate your own words as your stomach rolls with hunger. Some time outside will do you good, anyway. Perhaps you’ll learn to photosynthesize like a plant. “I still have to be able to fit into those fabric contraptions, you know.”

Alyona squeals and loops her arm in yours easily, bright teeth in a grin like a cat. Ever one to run into objects and lacking a general ability to walk in a straight line, the support from Alyona was much appreciated. Her help with lending an arm went far, especially for you. 

Your heart warms with soft care.

“I’ll take it! We can split one.” When you both make it to the front of the building, having grabbed your jackets and purses on the way there, you come to three familiar faces while chatting with Alyona about both of your upcoming bookings. 

“I was under the impression you had the day filled,” Petya speaks, heavy accent like stone. The clean-shaven man in his late thirties was built and wearing a dark suit, the tallest out of the other two—Aleksandr and Yefim—who both wear similar outfits. They were resting in the front seating area of AMA as they’d been doing for weeks already, waiting for you to come and go like escorts.

Well, bodyguards, to be more precise. Yours.

You smile politely to them while Yefim sends one back with his boyish charm and dimples. “On break. We’re off to get some Medovik down the street. I can pay for you if you’d want a piece.” 

“Of course, the three will have to tag along, hm?” Alyona huffs, staring blandly as you both slow to a stop near the large white entrance, colored as if it was Heaven’s gates. Your friend had said coloring around this building was rare. Whites and grays. Green chairs, apparently. “I’m just ecstatic.” 

Petya didn’t like you, and, you assumed, Aleksandr didn’t either. With the ladder, his sharp face was always too blank to tell; body tight and unwelcoming with weasel-like eyes. Petya was simpler, blatantly more outward with his distaste.

“Not a smart idea. This isn’t a game to play, девушка.” Alyona’s face tightens, and you swiftly placate her with a squeeze to her bicep. You level Petya with a tilt of your head and a calm look. 

“What harm could a bite to eat do? It won’t cost you your life.” You chuckle smoothly. “Let me get you all something—it’s nearly noon, I’m sure you’re all hungry.”

“I could eat,” Yefim eases in, hands resting in his pockets as he stares at you. His accent was calmer than the others, and his face softer. Out of all of them, you liked him best. 

Your eyes rest on Yefim with a thankful expression. He smirks and nods. Aleksandr, as always, says nothing beyond a small scoff and a look around the room with shifting feet. 

When the tallest of the group does nothing to push back his sneer and heavy glare, you hum under your breath as you expect the words before they rush from his sharp mouth.

“I will have to speak to your mother about this.” The accent makes him sound so stiff—like a statue. A man built up of gravel and snow; concrete in his veins instead of blood. 

“Oh, yes,” Alyona mutters, “the Consul herself.” 

Your nose moves in a sigh, but you ease the situation with a simple, “Do whatever you need to, Petya. I know it’s your job and I’m thankful regardless, but we’ll be back in less than an hour. It’s no big deal.” You pause, plastering on an innocent look. “We’re hungry.”

 For whatever reason you always envisioned Petya with dark eyes—blacks more deep than the clothes they put Alyona in to off-set your given whites when you two are fitted together. But the man’s eyes were so painfully light it made you not want to stare into them. 

Petya grunts and continues to glare, working his jaw. After a moment he lets off a large huff and shakes his head in disapproval.

“Half-an-hour. No more.” 

Alyona manhandles you out the door quickly, growling, “I do not know how you can stand this, Seraph. Bullshit, all of it.” 

“It’s only until everything goes back to normal,” you reason, hearing three sets of footsteps behind you as the guards follow into the chilled air of Yekaterinburg. There was no reason to take a car, everything was within walking distance of one another in this dense city populated by over one million people. “My mother’s worried is all. I’m not going to make their lives harder while they’re only doing what they’re told to do.” 

Light eyes dart to your face, your friend’s hand guiding you along the concrete with a dim concern. “I do not like all of this, Солнышко. It’s been months…Are the gifts still coming?”

Your expression tightens, lips going stiff. Alyona notices and changes the subject for now.

“Ah, but what am I doing—I’m ruining the celebration! Come, come, we will talk about my engagement to Nikifor while we eat.” 

Nikifor, her soulmate. The one who brought her color and music with his performance at a nightclub two years ago; the only thing standing in the way of their marriage was Alyona’s strict father. Something about the man wanting someone with higher standing than a musician for his famous daughter. 

“How is he?” You ask, blinking away the thought of finally being able to see color for the first time and how that must feel. A piece of you would always be envious of that. 

Alyona must have blushed because she always tilts her nose lower when she does. You smile and chuckle under your breath. 

“Wonderful,” is all she offers, but the giddy grin on her lips is knowledge enough. 

You both make it to the small bakery at the end of the long street, heels clicking and cheeks chilled. People had turned to look at you, gaping at the two models still in their expensive clothes and attempting to take pictures on their phones. All were strong-armed by the three men close behind you who bark things in Russian. 

Alyona opens the door of the bakery for you and you accidentally knock your shoulder into the frame, giving a sheepish smile before carefully walking to your regular corner table. Your tall friend goes to order while you take your seat with a sigh, Petya, Aleksandr, and Yefim all shuffling in and sending glances to you; looking over the interior with sharp and calculating eyes. 

It’s like they think the sky’s going to fall, you surmise, twitching your lips their way. They’ve been here before with me, do they still not trust it?

Back when things had been less serious they’d allowed you to go where you wished with them—parks, for walks, stores—now it was only work and home. As if you didn’t already feel so trapped. 

“You boys can pick what you want,” you call to them softly. “My treat.”

“On the job,” is all Petya grunts before he takes his normal seat at the table closest to the door; everything in his bright sight. Your hand lightly tightens on the table, but you keep your expression placid. 

You’d tried to get him to lighten up, Aleksandr too, but the two weren’t as open to you as Yefim. There was a blatant distrust of Westerners here, even if you had given up your citizenship to move where your mother works in the Consulate building of this very city. 

While she was still employed by the American government, that didn’t stand in any sense with you. But on top of you being a famous model, your mother was well-known, regardless, and that ultimately fell back on you. 

Yefim’s gray eyes flickered to a case of Bird Milk Cake with a hidden longing as he grasped the back of his chair and slid into it—floorboards creaking loudly. You notice and chuckle under your breath, cheeks heating at the sight as the man’s gaze moves to you and blinks in surprise. He quickly averts his gaze and clears his throat, fixing the collar of his dress shirt.

You’d buy him a piece before you left; maybe kiss his cheek just to see him go all blurry-eyed. He certainly was adorable.

“The baker’s boy is staring again,” Alyona’s voice snaps into your head, and you peer at your friend’s face, startled. 

“What?” You ask as a plate is set in the middle of the table holding a single piece of Medovik. Your mouth fills with saliva, fingers immediately moving like a starved dog to grab a fork and cut into the layers; you shovel it into your mouth before you hiss to pace yourself. 

You chew slowly, swallow, and give Alyona a confused look.

She slides you an unimpressed frown. “The boy. At the front.”

“He’s probably gaping at you,” you take another bite, rubbing at your cheek with your free hand as people walking by the front window peek in with wide eyes; your men glare and move their chairs as the ground squeaks again. 

Your friend scoffs and mutters in Russian, shaking her head. Her hand waves quickly, barking, “Look!” 

Rolling your eyes with a small smile, you look over and dab your face with a napkin before you get locked into a staring match with the dark eyes of the man up-front. 

He wears an apron, head a mess of curls, and his upper arms stained with flour. You blink and pause, wondering if…perhaps…A pause, a sickly hope in your chest…but nothing happens and the contact is broken when he ducks his head before looking at the counter. 

Gritting your teeth, you focus back on your cake and shove aside the sinking feeling in your chest. 

Idiot, you criticize yourself. Now why would you think that would work?

“Nothing, then?” Alyona clicks her tongue and takes up her own fork. “Do not fret, we will find him eventually, Seraph.”

“It’s not like I would know.” The air goes a temperature warmer—bodies stilling. 

While soulmate colorblindness was simply the reality of life, diagnosed colorblindness was still a curse that couldn’t be solved. If you ever saw your soulmate…you wouldn’t even know it. 

All because of that stupid accident. 

You act unbothered by the shift in the conversation and sigh. “You said you wanted to talk about your engagement,” your words remind the woman and she sets off into a tangent about the dress and the location after a moment of quiet concern. A church, she explained, the big one down the road where they’ll be a few days after the civil ceremony and the outer city venue. 

Alyona is only twenty, but you know that it’s incredibly common here to get married this early. Listening, you offer input here and there, but as it always does, the topic falls back to you as you eat the slice of cake dedicated to a dead man. 

Your knife-driven problem. 

The gifts. 

Already, you begin feeling uncomfortable.

“Aly,” you try to grumble, resisting the urge to eat the entire piece of Медовик as you put your utensil down. Your hand jerks over the table and you glare down at it in annoyance, ignoring the tensed nerves. “It’s not important—”

“How many more pieces of jewelry has he sent, hm? Letters?” The woman shivers and rubs at her arms. “It is horrendous behavior. Total fuck-up. And the fact that no one has caught him? Gah!”  

Your spine straightens itself, eyes sliding to the people gawking outside the window and seeing the multiple faces, shuffling bodies that pile next to each other like sardines in a can. 

“I just don’t want to think about it, okay?” You shake your head, turning away as a pit forms in your gut; realizing the fragility of your psyche when you think about the fact that anyone outside could be the source of your problem. The stalker. “If it’s just the gifts I can deal with them—the letters I never even read. If I ignore it they’ll stop eventually. All of this can be one big bad dream.” 

Your hand continues to shake on the table, not exactly in your realm of control just as the inability to walk in a straight line is. It was no wonder why they never let you do runway shows, you think sarcastically. You’d be stuck in a photographer’s room for the rest of your career.

Alyona pushes a strand of her hair out of her face. 

“Seraph…you know it does not work like that.” Of course you did, but asking for help was never your strong suit. And your mother had already given you three well-trained bodyguards to escort you to and from work—that was more than enough protection. 

When you think of the expensive parcels that had been dropped at AMA’s front desk you had to restrain the honey cake coming back up your gullet. All of them had been expensive; pieces you could afford on a model's pension but still wildly elegant to even touch much less own in multitude. Gold bracelets inlay with black opal and sapphire, necklaces with Tanzanite, and rings of ruby, your mother had told you this when you had brought them to her off of only seeing washed-out tones on your part. 

You never showed anyone the letters; they lived in a lockbox under the bed in your apartment. Concerningly, lately the ‘presents’ had been losing the plot. Random bits of glass and shiny items—a slow deterioration but somehow even more scary. 

Even the older women at the front desk were softening the usual sneers they wore when you walked in every day, no longer chiding you in Russian they know you can’t understand. The way they seemed pitiful rubbed you the wrong way.

You pull your jacket closer to you and rub a hand slowly along your thigh in a soothing gesture. Aly pulls her brows in. 

“I want to help you, little Солнышко, but I don’t think this is something I can fix with my womanly charms.” Your lips release a snort, tiny chuckles hitting the air. 

Alyona joins you before silence once again lapses. 

“...Do you feel alright?” Your friend asks honestly. Worry was plain on her face. 

You smile, but your lungs tighten in your chest while your heart acts like a dancer and lightly skips beats. “By next month,” your hand shakes over your thigh, “all of this will be in the past. No one could keep this up forever. I just have to…wait it out. It’s only the gifts, I can live with that—jewelry isn’t hurting anybody except his wallet.” 

The woman narrows her eyes at you and frowns, but it’s not long before she goes back to her half of the Медовик and takes a bite with a moan of enjoyment. You rarely lied, so you supposed she had no trouble believing you.

If only you could fraud yourself like that.

“Quite a wealthy bastard, though, no?” Alyona slyly pokes fun and you blink quickly. 

“Aly!” 

“I am just saying!” 

You press your hand to your lips to hide your loud laugh, Yefim looking over with a certain airiness to his expression before Aleksandr jerks his shoulder to face him back forward. The two glare at each other as Petya stares violently at the front door—daring those outside to try and come in and ask for a picture. 

While you hadn’t come back to this bakery in a while, the three men always seemed to pick the exact same table; the one with the perfect view of everything going on near the door. While it was a small distance away, it allowed for quick action in any direction. 

You blink away as the wooden boards under the bodyguards’ table creak again, loud enough to cause Alyona to frown in that direction. Petya sends an annoyed look down and scowls. 

“How do you know he’s not just stealing them,” you bring back the conversation, smirking. “You know? Maybe he’s a,” your voice lowers an octave in fake secrecy and Aly’s eyes roll, amused, “jewel thief.”

“God above,” the woman huffs. “That would be the twist.”

The both of you joked and picked fun, but that half an hour went past quickly, and soon it was time to get back to the agency so you could change again. The photographer couldn’t take pictures of air and play it off as you with a smile and a nervous stutter. 

As you stand you stare long at the cases of baked goods, licking the remnants of cream off your lips 

“We can buy another, Seraph,” Aly suggests, fixing her coat. You shake your head immediately. 

“No, no, I’ve already had enough sugar. I had two muffins for breakfast. Chocolate.” Your face pulls into a cringe at the words. “Cheat day.” 

Alyona’s lips go tighter, but she says nothing as her hair is puffed out of her face. She out of everyone knows how demanding modeling can be—your entire life is dictated by two things: calories, and appointments. 

You turn to Yefim with his wavy hair and his soft, dimpled, smile; casual eyes. Not your soulmate, based on his lack of reaction the first time you had met, but in that time you’d grown a tiny crush on the man, admittingly. He was kind and treated you with respect. Capable and reliable—how could you ask for more than that? 

“Yefim?” Your voice calls out, a smile on your lips. The man looks over and blinks in surprise. He clears his throat, stuttering as he shifts in his seat. The wood tilts slightly under him and he steadies himself on the edge of the table.

“Да, Ma’am?” 

Restraining a giggle, you cock your head as Alyona snorts.

“Do you want a slice of Bird Milk Cake?” Petya slides you a blank look and Aleksandr taps his fingers to the table. You poke fun, “For when you’re on break, of course.” 

Yefim’s eyes sparkle in their colorless state, a handsome smile taking his lips back along his face. He makes a move to stand up, floorboards squealing loudly as weight is lessened. 

“I would be in your debt—”

The world explodes into a slate-gray blaze of heat and hellfire. 

Your body is thrown back before you can even begin to understand that you’re in danger, panic completely bypassed for a total blank sensation of confusion. Spine slapping into the glass of the window, your form is hurled by a vast boom out of the bakery entirely before it slams to the concrete multiple feet away. 

You slide, rolling in a mess of limbs and ripped silk. For a good moment, you have no idea what just transpired, confusedly lifting your head from the ground and blinking below you as everything rings. Your hand grips the side of your head, the thick liquid seeping in between your fingers as you peel it back and look with shaky vision. 

Blackened blood is coated along your palm, slipping along your wrist as you tilt your hand up in horrified uncertainty. 

Everything comes back in a millisecond of screaming and running feet; like a switch being flipped. You snap your head back to what remains of the bakery as blood slides down your temple. 

“A-Alyona?!” Heels sliding, you stand but stumble back down just as quickly, hands slapping against the ground as you raggedly cough more, chest burning from the force at which you’d been thrown. 

What the hell had just happened? An explosion? 

There was little left of the bakery beside the front door, smoke billowing out of the broken windows as gray flames spark with the familiar sound of burning material—a sharp burn is taken into your nostrils. 

Dragging an arm forward, you grasp something warm and wet in an attempt to get up again. You look to the side and immediately scream at what you see.

Yefim’s upper body was completely fine besides the burns and the lack of his hair, the peeling flesh…it was the absence of the entire lower body that struck you with waves of horror. You slam a hand to your lips and wail, slipping back on kicking legs as tears well in your tear ducts.

Guts were leaking over the concrete, and the dark, gaping, wound spread a fast puddle out around the sputtering that made his chest look like it was moving. Eyes flutter, lashes flapping quickly. 

He looked confused, and that was perhaps the worst part of it. 

Yefim died only half a man, his entrails pooling out of his ribcage, only twenty seconds after you’d asked him if he wanted a piece of cake. Your fingers hide the loud sobs as you stare into this blank expression, hand shaking so bad that it hits your nose. 

“I…I,” you stutter, shapes and flashes rushing back and forth at the sides of your vision. Pressure holds at your left shoulder. 

“Seraph!” The sentence falls off into feminine Russian cursing and screaming, a grip shaking you back and forth, urging you to listen. 

There are wails and the roar of cars, but you don’t have to be given a speech to know the truth about the toll as the fire burns hotter and the blood runs faster. Petya, Aleksandr, and Yefim are dead. They had been sitting on top of something that had triggered when Yefim had released weight from it. 

The creaky floorboards. 

“Seraph!” Alyona tries again, grabbing you under the shoulders and dragging you away from the corpse as bystanders’ phones flash with pictures being taken. There’s just so much screaming. “Seraph, please, we need to move! The fire is spreading!”

They had been sitting right on top of it. But…but they always sat there…they…they were always…

In the corner of your eye, a dark phantom looms across the street as the first sirens of the police cars race down the road; a burning silhouette of black mist and ashen smoke.

As the bakery burns and the corpse of Yefim grows cold, it slips away into the forming crowd.

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