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kayla1993-world · 2 years

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RCMP superfan in Ontario spent 2 weeks in jail following N.S. massacre

Warren Thwing enjoys collecting model trains, Avro Arrow memorabilia, posters, and stamps. The mementos include flying, hockey, Star Trek, and motor racing. But by far his most valuable collection is of RCMP memorabilia.

Instead, he channeled his admiration for the national police force into its equipment. He claims to have spent thousands of dollars buying hundreds of artifacts, mostly on eBay and at collector shows, including three complete uniforms, crests, shoulder insignia, hats, collar pins, epaulets, and a Stetson hat. On his mantel are RCMP figures and two commemorative Royal Doulton china busts.

He dressed up in the red serge outfit he had purchased and had photographs shot at his home; he put the photos online and framed them for his home wall. His Facebook feed is littered with good wishes and congrats to the Mounties on different anniversaries and achievements.

Thwing claims he never dreamed his enthusiasm--which police described as an obsession — would lead to his arrest.

Thwing lay in bed, listening to the radio, anticipating the start of his day at 6:30 a.m. on May 7, 2020.

SWAT squad men dressed in commando gear pounced on his side entrance and surged into his residence and bedroom, weapons drawn. Thwing's home security camera captured seven police officers, while he recalls more than a dozen others.

When they told him they were going to execute a search warrant for impersonating a police officer, Thwing stated it made no sense. He claimed he questioned an officer, "Why didn't you ring the doorbell? And he responded, "You had a gun. Yes,' I said. It's safe.'"

Thwing said he received a tarnished and broken antique revolver from his grandfather decades ago. Thwing indicated that he has never shot it and has no ammo.

Thwing was arrested, detained, and escorted to a police station, where he was charged with one count of impersonating a peace officer. Later that day, he appeared in court for the first time.

Under normal conditions, Thwing's collection of RCMP memorabilia would have piqued the interest of authorities. However, on April 18, 2020, another guy disguised in a genuine RCMP uniform massacred 22 people in and around Portapique, N.S., including a Mountie. He eluded police for 13 hours, due in part to the fact that he was driving a decommissioned RCMP patrol car that he had purchased at an auction and rebuilt to seem like the real thing.

In the weeks that followed, Mounties in Nova Scotia combed social media for anyone who had uploaded photographs of RCMP uniform. The force revealed in an email that RCMP officers in Nova Scotia were monitoring social media sites for mentions of RCMP uniform items being worn by non-RCMP workers.

Officers discovered many images of RCMP uniform items online, according to the email. The distinctive red serge uniform, for example, may be purchased on eBay, and the official Mountie web site sells a range of RCMP-branded merchandise.

The only basis for concern was a Facebook account called Warren Thwing.

An RCMP spokeswoman stressed that there was no connection between the Nova Scotia shooter and Thwing.

On May 5, 2020, the Mounties turned over the case to Kingston police. Thwing's Facebook profile was then examined by a Kingston investigator, who discovered the following posts: One is from March 2019, when he was at home wearing his ceremonial red uniform; another is from October 2019, when he was walking around the Queen's University campus wearing pants that matched the RCMP's yellow-striped uniform, an RCMP hoodie he bought online at the official Mountie boutique, and a hat with a store-bought RCMP crest; and a photo of Thwing at home wearing the same hat and a face mask.

The detective sought the next day for a search warrant for Thwing's residence. "I think William Warren Thwing has an interest in the RCMP and has been seen in public wearing what seems to be an RCMP outfit," he stated in his search warrant application. "I feel that if a member of the public saw Thwing wearing his uniform, that person would assume Thwing was a peace officer."

According to the search warrant application, investigators were worried Thwing's Facebook bio at the time read: "I am the biggest screw-up and honestly wonder why I was even created. I wish I were no longer alive."

Thwing also had a firearms license and was the registered owner of a weapon, according to police.

Leora Shemesh, a criminal defense lawyer who talked with the CBC about Thwing's case but had no involvement in it, said the conditions should have allowed him to be released on a promise to appear in court later.

However, following his initial court appearance, someone — Thwing isn't sure who because he attended by videoconference — demanded that he be evaluated psychologically. He was imprisoned for two weeks owing to COVID-19 isolation requirements in provincial jails at the time, before being released on the condition that he surrender all "police uniform, badges, or other memorabilia" to Kingston Police.

Thwing said it was a difficult period in jail, with COVID-related lockdowns restricting detainees to their cells for up to three days at a stretch. He didn't obtain all of his prescribed medications for his diabetes and heart disease, he said, and he wasn't provided the correct meals at first.

The case against him was dropped in March 2021.

Police in commando gear storming into someone's home uninvited is said to be uncommon in Canada. Officers are usually required to knock and announce their presence and intent when carrying out a search warrant, according to hundreds of years of legal precedent.

Exceptions are permitted under Canada's Charter of Rights and Freedoms where there are legitimate reasons to fear evidence destruction or potential danger to officers or residents of the residence.

CBC News showed her the Kingston Police search warrant application and a police event record from 2018, when Thwing wrote about it being a good time to leap from a pedestrian bridge in neighboring Gananoque, Ont., that was closed for construction. She also saw the home security camera footage of the police raid on Thwing's house.

Shemesh stated that not only did she believe the door-bashing raid was unnecessary, but she also saw no reason for a search warrant.

Kingston Police did not answer to CBC News's queries last week, claiming that the officers engaged in the operation were on vacation.

An ongoing CBC News investigation into no-knock police raids through several has uncovered a number of questionable operations, including instances where tactical teams smash their way into people's houses based primarily on the evidence of hired, confidential informants, only to discover no narcotics or weapons. Some police departments have admitted under oath that they utilize no-knock raids, sometimes known as "dynamic entry" in police jargon, in practically every narcotics investigation.

There is no official national count, but the CBC has tallied hundreds of no-knock raids in Canada each year through access-to-information requests, prompting some defense lawyers and criminology scholars to call for more stringent regulation of the tactic.

One issue, legal experts agree, is that no one — not police, nor the provincial ministries that govern them — keeps track of how often a raid on someone's house results in no charges or all charges being dropped, making it impossible to judge the tactic's success.

Shemesh believes that requiring police to obtain prior consent from a court would assist to curb a practice that has grown in popularity in recent years.

Thwing claims he has had difficulties sleeping since the homeowners insurance premiums climbed after he submitted a $5,000 claim to replace the damaged glass-paneled door. While some of his memorabilia was returned to him, he alleged that police kept more than $1,000 in things deemed to be official RCMP apparel.

And, while his criminal accusation was withdrawn, his legal saga is far from done. Police seek to revoke his firearms license. A provincial weapons officer informed Thwing that "Your collection of RCMP memorabilia has definitely progressed beyond the collector stage and has become an addiction.… Your preoccupation with the RCMP and wearing their uniform regularly worries me."

Thwing's doctor, according to court documents, also opposes him obtaining a firearms license, but without saying why.

Thwing is challenging it, and a hearing is scheduled at the end of the month.

He was formerly a fervent admirer of the Mounties, but now has mixed feelings about them.

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bensonbock3 · 2 years

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Wireless Surround Sound System: How To Choose A Wireless System That Is The Best

For most applications, lower radio frequencies work well for a greater range. This is evident when you look at a broadcasting TV-station. A typical VHF station operates at about 100,000 watts and has a coverage radius range of about 60 miles. A UHF station operating within a 60-mile radius needs to transmit at 3,000,000Watts. What is the main difference between television and radio? You can have audio and video on TV. Only visit here can provide audio. That age is gone. Some of the new radio services now offer visuals. Enjoy radio music with vibrant visuals. It's unbelievable, isn't it? Once you've determined the boundaries, and allowed space for the radio frequency, it's time to look at obstacles. It is important that you plan well for areas that are difficult to cross. Although asphalt driveways can cross at any location in the world, concrete driveways most often cross at existing expansion joints. These expansion joints can be used to hide the wire, without the need to cut another line in concrete. The wire must form a complete loop. This is why it's important that you have a clear path all around your property. Online shopping can be a great way of shopping. You can find information on different Grundig SW Radios on the internet. These sites will give you all the information you need about the model and price of each product, as well as their colour and other details. How long will this treatment take? Because each case is different, no one can tell you for sure. It all depends on your dermatologist's assessment. One more thing to mention about setting boundaries. You can keep your dog out of the flower beds and keep him or her in the yard. It's great that the wired underground fences can be spliced into the loop, creating multiple smaller loops that protect your dog and your flower beds. The wired systems have a lot of benefits. The frequencies of radio waves vary between a couple of hundred KHz (KHz = kilohertz = 1,000 hertz) right up to around 1,000 GHz (GHz = gigaHertz = 1 billion Hertz). A wavelength that travels 1 metre per second has a frequency of 300MHz. It is best to identify your target audience in advance. Then, aim to reach them multiple times by repeating the process.

#SDPPI type approval agency #Type Approval kominfo #Kominfo certification agency #Telecommunication app

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let-me-write-shit · 4 years

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Like We Used To: 15

A/N: I posted chapter fourteen at 2 AM, so make sure you read that one first!

Please let me know if there’s anything you’d like to see in the next (or any) upcoming chapters! I might be able to try and find a way to include it. :) Enjoy!

[CLICK HERE FOR PREVIOUS CHAPTERS]

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CHAPTER FIFTEEN

The sun wasn’t even up yet by the time Harry and Elizabeth had woken up. Mitch and Sarah wound up staying until a bit past midnight, so the two of them only got maybe five hours of sleep that night before having to get ready and meet everyone else at the news station. Harry reassured her that she would blend right in because of the amount of people that came with him, which did settle her a bit, but as soon as they got to the venue Harry’s publicist had pulled him to the side.

Apparently the man they saw taking pictures of Harry’s car after dinner last night had also managed to grab a picture of when Harry grabbed her hand, leading her to the car. It started spreading around news outlets overnight and his fans started to notice that she was the same girl in the background of the pictures of Harry going to the club on Sunday. Now there was speculation of a ‘new girlfriend’. Although this first arrangement was just a performance on the news to promote a show next month, they would be heading directly to a broadcasted radio station afterwards for an interview. He was warned that they might ask about it. She suddenly felt a bit foolish for wearing a white lace bra poking through her semi sheer white half buttoned shirt tucking into her ripped high-waisted mom jeans.

“I’m so sorry,” Elizabeth whispered when he came back, “We shouldn’t have gone out to dinner last night.”

“It’s fine, I just don’t want this to scare you off. I can handle it.”

Harry joined the rest of his bandmates to rehearse while Elizabeth joined Lisa and Jeffrey off to the side. They had comforted her in reminding her that it wasn’t the first time he was pictured with a girl that caused dating rumors, but then the thought of him having been with international models sunk in and she started to feel silly that she was even remotely involved with Harry in the first place.

She watched at the side of the stage, out of view from his fans, as Harry and his backing band performed ‘Cherry’. She hadn’t seen him perform since they were kids. Of course she saw some of his performances online in passing, but she tried her best to avoid it as much as she could. Elizabeth found herself feeling extremely proud of how far he’s come and in awe of how great they all sounded together.

As soon as he finished singing and the cheers from the fans had died down, a news anchor made her way over towards him to congratulate him on the success of his album. She reiterated his Halloween performance next month before wishing him good luck and cutting the camera. He had managed to give final thanks and goodbyes and within an hour they were ready to go.

Since there were no performances at the next interview, his bandmates were able to head off and enjoy the rest of the day off until tomorrow. Elizabeth had traded phone numbers with Mitch and Sarah in case she wanted to meet up with them later and joined Harry, Jeffrey, Kenneth, and Lisa to the radio station. Harry had gone through the office introducing himself and his manager before vaguely introducing the rest of them. They didn’t really pay her, Lisa, or Kenneth any mind, which actually made her feel a bit better. Maybe they didn’t really know who she was.

Even though the interview was for a radio station, it was still being video broadcasted live to their website, so Harry was prepped in the studio while the rest of them sat off to the side out of frame of the camera’s. Elizabeth sunk in the back between Kenneth and Lisa so she wouldn’t get noticed and looked between Harry in the studio, and a television above them that displayed what their website video would look like.

Harry was given some headphones to wear and when commercial break was over they introduced Harry. The first few minutes went pretty smoothly. There was a good amount of banter in between questions like if he had been working on any new album or songs, which he admitted that he was in the works on making new songs. Most of the questions were pertaining to his current album and the concert coming up before it started getting a bit personal.

“Now it’s been discussed that this album is, essentially, a break up album, correct?” The broadcaster said, “I mean, I know that there are a few songs that are influenced by the start of a relationship and the fun that comes along with that, but for instance, Cherry. You include a voicemail from your ex at the end. How was that song to write? Was it a bit emotional to get it out, or was it just a relief to get it off your chest?”

Elizabeth’s stomach twisted a bit hearing Harry talk about past relationships, especially songs written about them. Obviously it was his job, but it almost felt like she was intruding on a part of his life that she wasn’t supposed to know about for some reason. She supposed this was better than actually having to interact with one of his exes like he had to do last weekend.

The interview continued to get more personal and her heart started racing, knowing where this was about to go as the radio host said, “So we have to ask, are you currently seeing anyone?”

Harry did his lopsided grin and Elizabeth could tell that he was starting to get a bit embarrassed as he said, “Euhh...I’m just having fun at the moment, really.”

“So no girlfriends?”

“No girlfriends, no,” Harry shook his head.

“Because I have to bring it up, the listeners will kill me if I don’t,” he laughed, “I can already see the hundreds of angry emails coming in. You were spotted last night holding hands with a beautiful woman, leaving a Chinese restaurant in LA...” the picture of the two of them last night popped up.

Harry nodded, only vaguely saying, “Yeah, that is me. Yep.” and laughing a bit

The host chuckled and said, “Right, now your fans also noticed the resemblance between this woman, and the woman you were seen at a club outside of London last week,” the picture of him walking into a club with her and their friends in the background had popped up. Elizabeth was circled.

“I am always impressed with the amount of investigative work by some of the fans,” Harry responded.

“I know, it’s crazy! I mean there was also talk of, you know, some kind of scuffle you might have been involved in at the club. Is there any truth to that? Or what’s going on?”

Harry shook his head, glancing at her and Jeffrey before turning back to the host, “No, do you know what it is? So the woman in the picture is just an old friend of mine from school. I was back home and attended some friends wedding, who happens to also have gone to the club with us, and yaknow, everyone got a few too many drinks in them at the club and things got a bit rowdy, but no, I didn’t fight anyone.”

“So this woman is just an old school friend of yours? Not your girlfriend?”

“Right. I’ve known her since I was fourteen. I knew most of these people since I was fourteen,” he pointed to the picture, “It was nice to get back home and spend some time with old friends, to really get back to my old life for a while. It was great fun. That weekend actually inspired a few songs for the next album that we’re working on, which is really cool, so I’m excited for that.”

Elizabeth’s eyes widened in shock. Harry never told her that he was writing songs about that weekend, which was odd because they’ve been pretty much inseparable since. How could he have hidden that from her? She started to wonder if maybe that was what he was doing while she was working, whenever she interrupted him in the middle of playing his guitar. And maybe that’s what him and Mitch went to work on last night. She suddenly started to get nervous that he might have mentioned their sexual intimacy in those songs, unsure how to feel about it.

This round of questions gave Elizabeth mixed feelings. She was impressed with how Harry was able to get around the questions and so easily shoot down the idea of the two of them being any more than friends, but she also felt a bit saddened about how plausible it all sounded. She could easily be just Harry’s old friend, and the thought of that was slightly upsetting.

“So, since you are single,” the host carried on, “Are you looking to be in a relationship? Or are you just enjoying being single at the moment?”

“I’m not necessarily looking for a relationship at the moment, but if something happens, then it happens, you know what I mean?” He laughed.

“So what would you say your ideal relationship looks like?”

“I would say my ideal relationship looks like…..” he thought for a minute, looking around the room and catching eyes with Elizabeth before saying, “it’s sharing a sleeve of oreos together so I don’t have to eat the entire sleeve on my own.”

Elizabeth’s heart danced in her chest as the host laughed. A smile started to form on her face, suddenly feeling more at ease with where her and Harry’s ‘relationship’ stood. She might not have technically been his ‘girlfriend’ yet, but she was feeling more confident in the idea.

When they wrapped up the interview Harry had joined the three of them along with two of the people from the studio, thanking him for his time and congratulating him. The main interviewer turned towards Elizabeth and smiled.

“I hope I didn’t embarrass you with some of those questions,” he said, kindly, offering a handshake, “What’s your name?”

Elizabeth stuttered, realizing that he had recognized her from the pictures, and shaking his hand “Oh, no. It’s okay, I understand. I’m Elizabeth.”

He nodded, and smiled inquisitively “So you two really aren’t dating?”

She felt her cheeks blush and looked over at Harry who was in conversation with someone else, “No, sir. Just old friends.”

He nodded, looking at her for a minute before saying, “Alright. Well, it was nice to meet you, Elizabeth.”

As soon as they were back in the SUV together and headed to the next interview, Harry turned to Elizabeth with a slight smirk.

“You okay so far?” He asked.

Elizabeth laughed, “I was not expecting it to be like that. First of all, you’ve been writing songs about all of us?”

Harry grinned, “I’ve been dabbling around with some ideas.”

“You never told me! Can I hear them?”

He hesitated, “.....not yet. I’m not done with them. Maybe once we’re all able to go in the studio and start working on it more. We’ll see.”

“None of them are about me, though, right?” she asked. Harry was silent, looking at her like a deer in headlights. Elizabeth gasped, lightly slapping his arm with a giggle, “Harry!”

He put his hands up defensively, laughing, “I can’t help it! I’m an artist! It’s what we do! It’s just song ideas, anyway. Nothing is written yet.”

Elizabeth shook her head with a grin, “Anyway. I’ve just texted Sarah. I think I’m going to take an uber from the next location to meet up with them. I don’t know if I can sit through another interview of them asking you about ‘the mystery girl in the photo’. It’s too embarrassing.”

Harry nodded understandingly. When they had reached the next destination, Jeffrey, Lisa, and Kenneth had stepped out. Harry was supposed to be the next one out, but he quickly turned to give her a kiss and whispered, “I’ve been wanting to do that all morning without anyone seeing.”

She smiled sweetly at him before pushing him out of the car so as not to look too suspicious. She had said her goodbyes to them in the lobby of the building, waiting for an uber to come and pick her up. So many emotions were running through her, but for some reason she didn’t care as much about the repercussions of being photographed with Harry anymore. But was that a good thing?

KEEP READING

#Harry Styles #Harry Styles fluff #harry styles smut #harry styles imagine #harry styles one shot #harry styles oneshot #harry styles fanfic #harry styles fanfiction #harry styles fan fic #harry styles fan fiction #one direction #one direction fanfic #one direction fanfiction #one direction fan fic #one direction fan fiction #one direction smut #smut #fluff

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becomingminimalist · 3 years

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Eulogy for Harold E. Salem

One thing has become very clear to me over the last several days and that is this: Everybody has a Pastor Harold Salem story.

People at the grocery store, at church, those who have known him for decades and those who’ve just met him, everybody it seems to me, has a story they want to share about grandpa.

They will tell you about the first time they met, the sermons he preached, the jokes he told, or the experiences they shared. In every story, you can hear the same refrain, “He touched my life. And my life is better because Pastor Salem was part of it.”

I read one such story on Facebook this week that went like this, “It was Pastor Salem’s Christmas sermon in 2003 that led to my grandmother’s salvation. Thank you Pastor Harold.”

There is not a doubt in my mind that every single person in this room, or watching online, could stand up here today and share their story about Harold Salem.

At the very least, every mother in this room could stand up and share about the time he offered them $100 to name their child, Harold.

I have my own story:

10 years ago, I had an unexpected conversation with my grandpa. I happened to be in town and he asked if I could meet him in his office at 1pm the following day. It was an unexpected request. It wasn’t unexpected that I’d be in his office. I mean, I’ve been sneaking into his study since I was a child to steal Tootsie Rolls or Certs out of his drawer.

But this request was more formal, official.

When I sat down with him, my grandpa took a sheet of paper from his drawer and slid it across the desk. When I picked it up, I read clearly typed out across the top: Funeral Service for Harold E. Salem. Every detail of his funeral had been planned out.

He pointed out my role, where it landed in the service, and asked if I’d take part in it.

It was a conversation that I have never forgotten, even to this day. It wasn’t particularly surprising that my grandpa had planned out his funeral, he was just that type of guy. Thoughtful and thorough.

The surprising part was when I looked up from the paper and looked into the eyes of my grandpa. They were calm, assured, and unafraid. He spoke of the end of his life plainly and matter of factly. He spoke of his death as something that he looked forward to with joy.

He had lived his life well. He had no regrets. As he liked to say, “If I had a hundred lives, I’d give them all to the ministry.”

He told me that he was ready to die—that he desperately wanted to see Beulah again and he couldn’t wait to finally meet Jesus face-to-face.

He was not afraid of death because he had run the race well. He had finished strong. Oh how I long to reach the end of my life as satisfied with my pursuits as he was with his.

That was over a decade ago.

For the last ten years, I have known this day was coming. And for the last ten years, I have been at a complete loss of words to know how to articulate the person Harold Salem was and the impact his life has had on both heaven and earth.

The day after my grandfather passed away, my mom got a telephone call from a woman requesting information about the funeral. Her father, 97 years old and confined to a nursing home, wanted to be there at the funeral to pay his respects properly. And she would do whatever it took to get him there.

The following morning at church, just 12 hours later, a prayer was offered from the pulpit mentioning Harold’s death. Immediately when the prayer ended, a 10-year old boy in the row in front of me, looked up at his mother with tears in his eyes, “Pastor Salem died?”

What type of man compels a 97-year old man in a nursing home to move heaven and earth to attend a funeral and yet can also bring a 10-year old to tears at the mere mention of his death? Who has this type of impact across generations and can communicate love so effectively?

I only know one man—and the world lost him this week.

His accomplishments are second to none. I know not everyone watching and listening online has access to Harold’s obituary. For your sake, allow me to just read a few paragraphs from it:

He entered the ministry at age 23, serving faithfully as the pastor of First Baptist Church in Belle Fourche, his home church, for 13 1/2 years.

In 1958, he accepted the call to the First Baptist Church of Aberdeen, South Dakota, where he faithfully served as Pastor for 52 1/2 years. While pastoring the church, he started the First Baptist Christian School, now Aberdeen Christian School.

Harold founded the Christian Worship Hour in 1979 by telecasting the church worship service on a single TV station. Today, his preaching is broadcast on over 100 stations around the world and shortwave radio reaching 90% of the world’s population.

He was a well-known and well-loved community member of Aberdeen where he served on countless nonprofit boards including the YMCA, Red Cross, Habit for Humanity, St. Luke’s Hospital, Presentation College, FCA, Northern Plains Hospice, among numerous others.

He served as the President of the South Dakota Baptist Convention, served on the faculty of the Billy Graham Schools of Evangelism for 16 years, was named “Pastor of the Year” twice in the state of South Dakota, and was inducted into the South Dakota Hall of Fame in 2000.

He is the author of three books and the subject of one documentary, Heart of a Shepherd, produced in 2018 to document his extraordinary life. He worked passionately for the Lord every day of his life promising repeatedly that he would retire “3 days before his funeral.” He fulfilled that promise working full-time until the very end.

Harold’s selfless spirit, kind words, sense of humor, impeccable memory, sharp mind, and boundless energy endeared him to others wherever he went—whether a country farm or an executive board room.

His children will tell you he was the same person at home as he was in the pulpit. Always loving, kind, fun, and faithful to the Lord. His love for Beulah was unconditional and his love for others was never questioned.

What can I say about this man? What can I say about a man I’ve always wanted to be just like? What can I say about a man who shaped my worldview and understanding of God more than anyone else? What can I say about a man I named my own son after?

For ten years I have wrestled with this question.

And it wasn’t until just a few weeks ago that I knew what I wanted to say.

Two weeks ago, on a Sunday morning, I received a text from my mom. And it said this, “Please pray for dad. He is going down hill. It is very hard to watch.”

I knelt down to pray and felt immediately at a loss for words.

I recalled my conversation with my grandfather ten years ago, when he told me contentedly, “I just want to go see Beulah and finally meet Jesus face-to-face.”

Praying for his recovery, in an odd way, began to feel selfish. Oh, how I’d love more time with him. Oh, what good he could continue to bring into this world. Oh, how many souls could he continue to bring into the kingdom of God if he would live longer here on earth.”

And I know, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that my grandpa would have welcomed that opportunity. If he had recovered, there’s no question that he would have returned to preaching and answering letters and sharing the love of Jesus with everyone he met.

Because that is who he was—selfless through and through. His life was for Christ and his life was for others. Harold lived an entirely selfless life.

He never lived for the glory of himself, he never loved in a self-serving manner. He gave himself, every day, to the God who saved him and the sheep He sent his son to save. Through and through, he had the heart of a shepherd, giving his life for the sheep.

As I closed my prayer that Sunday morning, I said to God, “Maybe just this one time Lord, maybe just this one time, you give him what he wants. A chance to see you, and Beulah again.”

The reception he received in heaven, I’m quite confident, is greater than he ever imagined. As countless souls line up to share with him their Harold Salem story of how he touched their life, how they accepted Jesus because of his preaching, and how their souls will spend eternity with God because of him.

Heaven is fuller because of Harold Salem’s life. And I can think of no greater compliment to offer a human being.

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ckret2 · 5 years

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How would the humans react to two genius titans? Especially Ghidorah’s music box?

Anonymous said: How would the humans react to two genius titans? Especially Ghidorah’s music box?

Anonymous said: I imagine that Monarch is just losing their minds over Rodan’s globe while Xochitl is cackling like the feral scientist she is.

GOD y’all got me monologuing about research and headshipping when I meant to post this fic I wrote today for these asks, I almost forgot to post before I went to bed.

Here, I haven’t thought of a title yet.

###

“I’m telling you,” Arturo said excitedly, looking up from the screen he was monitoring. “Ghidorah’s making a radio. I did one of those make-an-AM-radio kits as a kid? He’s making the, the wire coil and everything.”

Nobody was listening to him. Everyone else in the Outpost 56-B trailer was crowded around Xochitl’s computer, watching Rodan sculpt a world globe. Big deal. They’d already figured out he was sculpting a globe. That was last hour’s news. The new mind-blowing titan activity was making a radio.

Nobody cared.

“How’s he doing that? How's—what’s the melting point of glass?”

“I’m looking it up, it’s like fifteen hundred degrees? We’ve measured the Nest at twelve hundred degrees, right?”

“No, no, that's—that’s window glass. Pure sand is even worse, it’s like seventeen hundred degrees. How’s he making up the difference?”

“I bet he’s breathing fire. I bet he’s got, like, flamethrower breath—”

“Guys.” Arturo leaned back, gesturing at his screen. “Radio.”

Dante waved him off. “Man, he’s wrapping wire around a tree, that doesn’t prove anything.”

“He’s got two speakers!”

“He’s not doing anything with them.”

Arturo threw his hands up and turned back to his computer.

The door banged open and the Dr. Zareen Jangir hurried into the trailer, dragging a luggage bag still bearing international travel tags. The Dr. Jangir had transferred from Antarctic Outpost 32 to Isla de Mara after Ghidorah’s awakening, gone back to 32-B while Rodan and Ghidorah had been visiting, and only just today finally returned to Isla de Mara. “Hey.” She tossed her luggage in one corner. “What’s going on?” (She asked the same question every time she arrived; she wasn’t terribly fluent in Spanish yet. They let her get away with English sometimes, but only because she was trying.)

Two different people answered, “Rodan’s making a globe!”

The Dr. Jangir had transferred from Antarctic Outpost 32 to Isla de Mara to 32-B to Isla de Mara again for one reason and one reason alone. That reason was not Rodan. “What else is going on?”

Arturo had an ally. “Ghidorah’s making a radio!”

“No way.” She pulled a folding chair out of the stack by the wall and sat next to Arturo, already enthralled.

###

“It’s gonna be a geography lesson,” Xochitl said breathlessly. “I knew it. We’re going to learn place names.”

By now, there were eleven people crammed into the trailer—all five of the full-time Monarch 56-B employees currently on Isla de Mara and another six of the part-timers who’d come in just to for the show—all watching fascinated as Ghidorah inspected Rodan’s handiwork. Xochitl gestured vaguely with one hand to catch the others’ attention and pointed at the screen. “Can we—can we get a drone up there? I want to see what Rodan’s pointing at when he starts giving names. If we keep the drone far enough—”

She cut off as Ghidorah claimed the globe from Rodan, bunted his forehead, and retreated down the volcano to inspect his new prize. Half of the crowd in the trailer—which was by and large made up of the kind of people who worked for Monarch because at one time they’d watched Jurassic Park and felt overwhelming affection for the T-rex—cooed, “Aww.” Zareen popped open a window and leaned out to look up at Ghidorah, who had settled down hardly the length of a soccer field away from 56-B’s trailers.

“Just for the record,” Xochitl said, tapping her headphones, “that word we took a vote on and we’re like, eighty percent sure it means something like ‘love’ or ‘like’ or 'fuck’? Ghidorah used it to describe the globe.”

There were another couple of odd coos. Dante muttered, “I really hope it doesn’t mean 'fuck.’”

“This is absolutely going on Twitter.” Arturo opened a second screen next to his live feeds of Ghidorah and started scrolling through their collected footage, looking for a good shot of the bunt.

The crowd gathered around the other computer started chattering excitedly. “Hey, you know what would drive HQ crazy? If we make a big fuss about the gift giving but don’t even mention that Rodan made a globe. Just use a shot where it’s obvious what it is but don’t say anything about it.”

“Hah! God, just go 'apparently Ghidorah’s impressed by Rodan’s glassblowing technique,’ like we already knew Rodan could—”

“They’ll send us fifty emails going 'Rodan's what?!’”

“Do you think they can send us a scanner? Like a 3D scanner? I wanna compare his globe to the real Earth for accuracy.”

“Did you see it’s got Hawaii wrong? It’s missing the big island. How old is the big island?”

“HQ probably already knows about the globe, someone else on the island’s probably taken a picture and put it online by now—”

“Yeah but—will they know it’s a globe? Will the details show up on a phone camera?”

“I mean it’s fifty meters across—”

“—would be blowing up our phones by now if they already knew—”

The trailer fell silent as a burst of static came through their tinny speakers and the open window. After a moment, the noise resolved into, of all the improbable sounds, “Nada Nuevo” by Christian Nodal.

Arturo was on his feet. “Yeah! RADIO! I knew it! I told you!” He high fived Zareen.

And then the rest of the trailer was screaming and grabbing each other. They were still trying to shout simultaneously about the implications of Ghidorah building a radio when Rodan came down the volcano to join him. Someone shouted over the din, “Hold on, hold on! What are they saying to each other?”

“Ghidorah’s asking if Rodan understands the music,” Zareen said, still leaning half out the window. “Rodan says no.”

Xochitl applauded. “You’re keeping up with your language lessons!”

“I barely get any of it. 'Do you understand’ is just the most common question Rodan asks.”

“I know that station, they’re listening to 1050 AM,” Arturo announced, listening to the station identification bumper as it switched from music to commercials. “I didn’t know they were still going. When’s the last time any of you listened to AM radio?”

“Can you believe it?” Zareen asked, in that The-Dr.-Jangir-Is-Talking-About-Ghidorah voice that they were all beginning to recognize. “He can make electronics. He knew about radios. He didn’t learn that here.”

“Fuck, right, are there aliens with radio?” Dante asked. “There must be, right? You guys ever stop and think about how Ghidorah proves that there’s actual alien life out there? Like, we’ve made contact with extraterrestrial life. And it tried to kill us, but—still. We’re so busy going 'Oh, that’s a titan,’ but no, he’s an alien—”

“And how advanced is he?” Zareen asked. “If he makes radios, what else is he capable of? Has he worked with computers? Alien computers?”

Xochitl waved to get the trailer’s attention again. “Guys, guys look—” Everyone huddled around the various screens with camera feeds. Zareen leaned outside to watch them up close again.

The radio had switched back from commercials to music. Crackling through the speaker was the waltz-time accordion line of an Intocable song.

Rodan had started headbanging along with it.

The entire trailer cheered.

###

(Replies/reblogs are welcome! Check the “source” link below for my masterlist of fics in this KOTM verse, as well as my AO3 and Ko-fi links.)

#rodan #ghidorah #king ghidorah #godzilla #kotm #fanfic #my writing #anonymous #ask #(original the radio station referenced here was a real station)#(but then i was like that's kinda weird that's a real station real people work at)#(so i took out the station name and changed the number)#(but for anyone curious i based the station off AM 1060 La Raza)#(in terms of geography & genre it's closest to what Isla de Mara would have)

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aviationfiction · 5 years

Text

XXXV

Autumn Dupont

“Autumn, how the hell do you come up with this shit? Dante, you’re going to be overweight about six months into your marriage, once you two finally tie the knot.” As my lazy frame further sunk down into the chair on the right side of the dining room table, I snickered as my brother stuck his fork into the nearly finished pile of gingerbread Belgian waffles that I placed in the middle of the table about a half an hour ago. With it, I fried up a couple of pieces of boneless chicken and scrambled some eggs for the hell of it. The setting felt like an odd double date between Isaac, Lauren, Dante, and myself as we all sat around the table enjoying the breakfast I made after both men whined endlessly about being hungry.

I had no intention to make breakfast, because I wanted to go out for it and Dante was more than willing to oblige that request if I dressed myself quickly enough, but instead of pressing his pregnant wife to cook, Isaac pestered me into the kitchen and in front of the stove. With it being Christmas Eve, the gingerbread aspect of it made sense and plus it’s a recipe that I actually wanted to test out for breakfast tomorrow. Now I’m going to have to come up with something else. It’s bad enough that I’ve been baking since this morning.

“What’s that in the oven that smells so good?”

“I tested out this new recipe that I found online. It’s an apple-pecan gingerbread cobbler.” My fiancé nearly choked on his orange juice as his eyes widened in excitement at the sweetness that his taste buds will experience tonight and tomorrow night. Christmas is always my baking extravaganza. While in Miami, I was quite ridiculous with it and would do it out of sheer boredom, only to end up having to throw away the majority of it because I couldn’t eat it all alone. Anything that wasn’t trashed went to Mario’s house. I even baked for Lebron and Savannah James a couple of times and in exchange, she’d always make an extra one of her famous red velvet cakes with cream cheese frosting, just for me. Now that? I absolutely indulged and I’m not ashamed of it whatsoever.

“I can finally use the excuse that I’m eating for two and no one will bother me about it.” Lauren endearingly ran her hand across her budding belly.

The baby has certainly become an everyday topic of discussion around here with my mother being in overdrive and overkill mode. We’ve already secured a venue for Lauren’s baby shower and given the magnitude of it, the guestlist is going to contain a couple of hundred attendees. I’m not sure if I’ve ever attended or been a part of planning a baby shower that has already leaped over the imaginary twenty-five-thousand-dollar budget Isaac playfully tossed out there when it was spoken about, but twenty-five thousand seems to be just the tip of the iceberg.

Per the parents-to-be request, if they’re having a boy, Winnie The Pooh has to be incorporated into the theme and if it’s a girl, Tinkerbell. There’s also Heather’s celebrations that I’m automatically in charge of given that I’m the only one in her life who has the best friend and “sister” title. In all fairness, her mother and I agreed on a gender reveal being done right here in New Jersey and the actual baby shower being in Miami, where both she and Mario currently reside. With Mario being from Anchorage, Alaska and Heather being from up this way, choosing Miami is fair. That way, everyone has to travel and no one can pull the “inconvenience” card due to jealousy or indifference about the event being in either one of their native cities. Despite Heather’s protest, I’m paying for a portion of both events. It’s the least I can do as the God-mother. My gift to Isaac and Lauren will be the Balmoral Pram stroller that she’s been raving about ever since she confirmed her pregnancy and maybe an incredible bassinet of some sort.

“You certainly can. I’d like to think that’s one of the joys of pregnancy; eating and relaxing.”

“It’s going to have to be a joy because it seems to be all the grandmas and your brother wants me to be doing.” The way Isaac treats her as if not even the ground is not even worthy of her footprints, says more than enough. No offense, but her being barefoot and pregnant has been his goal since the two of them met. He’s the bread winner millions of times over, so what is the point in her having to do anything else? He never once asked her to sacrifice her career for him. It was a conversation and a choice that she ultimately made and she’s been more than satisfied ever since, from what I’ve observed. So that comment is no complaint. It’s leaning more in the lane of bragging.

“Well you know how this family is.” With her. In plenty of ways, Lauren has replaced my presence around here and it’s up to me to come to terms with it and whatever it entails.

“Hey. You still feel like driving me into the city so that I can pick up that last-minute gift? If you don’t feel like it, I can take myself. It’s no big deal.”

“Yeah, of course. Whenever you’re ready.” Dante instantly nodded his head as I pushed my seat away from the table and stood up.

“I just need to take that cobbler out of the oven and wash the dishes. I should be ready once I’m done with that.”

“I can do the dishes. You cooked. I’ll wash them.” He volunteered without a second thought about it and I shooed his effort away with the wave of my hand and the shaking of my head. Even with the fiancé status, he’s a guest in the house. I could never and would never allow him to wash a dish in here.

“No. It’s fine. Just finishing digesting those waffles. I have it under control.”

“I’ll do it. Go and handle your business. I’m sure the traffic in New York is a nightmare right now. The quicker you get there, the quicker you’ll be able to come back.” Isaac’s offer came as a surprise. Though I’m unsure if there’s a motive behind it, I’ll take it for the sake of exactly what he mentioned. Last minute shoppers are always a nightmare and I’d rather not have them trigger an intense headache that is sure to ruin this Christmas Eve as I try to maneuver through their desperation to finish off their Christmas lists. What I need is already gift wrapped and awaiting my pick up.

“Are you sure?”

“Yeah, go. Maybe you’ll run into mom and pop out there.”

“Dear God, I hope not. She’ll keep me in the store longer.”

Once I secured my cobbler in the perfect place for it to be able to cool down, I ran upstairs to grab my bag and met Dante at the car. He’d gone out ahead out me to warm it up and to make a phone call.

It didn’t take much of a debate to get him to come and spend the holidays with my family. Initially, I was going to keep things between just he and I simply because I decorated his apartment for specifically for that and most of all, because I didn’t want to necessarily snatch him out of his comfort zone, but he insisted that he was more than okay with joining in for our dorky Christmas traditions and my enthusiasm about the holiday. The man is currently donning an exact replica of the Christmas sweater the Grinch wore to the Whobiliation in the Jim Carry live action remake, just for me. I’m one hundred percent sure he probably internally cringed when I pulled it out of the box that it came in but he put it on without much protest. I hope he’s just as enthusiastic about the matching pajamas we’re going to be wearing tonight.

“We’re going to the one on Fifth Avenue?”

“Yeah, the Rockefeller Center location.”

Per his usual, he looked on as I pulled the seat belt around myself and secured it. He then double checked it. As his eyes transitioned to the driveway, I change the station on his radio to Light FM so that I could enjoy the endless sounds of my favorite holiday songs. I’ve been doing it every single time I’ve gotten into his car or anyone else’s since the middle of November and I have no plans to stop until New Years Eve.

“You know, I’ve been watching you in action ever since December hit. You’re so in love with the holiday season. I feel like I should be mentally preparing myself for when we have kids because it’s going to be all that you’re doing now, but times a thousand.”

“Sounds about right buddy. You got down on that knee and asked, so you’re stuck with me and all of my Christmas loving antics.” Am I loser for looking forward to my first holiday Christmas card with my own family? We’re going to shoot for a holiday Christmas card once we’re married whether we have children or not at that specific point. Do you know how many of them I’d gotten in the mail in Miami from the fellow WAGs on the team? I had to deal with a stack or two being piled up on the entryway table in our foyer all throughout December. And then there’s the one that my own family does that I avoid like a plague nowadays. Even since being back, I’ve yet to find time to make it to the little photo shoot they do in the living room right after Thanksgiving. I’m one hundred percent sure that I’m going to look like the oddball and will be the one all of my relatives have so much to say about when it lands in their mailboxes. I’m the “fuck up”; you know the one who did everything wrong. The more I stay under the radar, the less they have to say about me. I thought I’d been doing a good enough job with that until Richard St. James decided to make himself a presence between his son and I.

“I’m looking forward to it.”

“Is it because of Heather and Lauren?”

“No. I’m thrilled for them, but I’ve always wanted kids of my own. You know this.”

“I do know that. What I mean is, does it make you want to speed up the process?”

“No, not really. As I said to you before, whatever happens will happen. I used to have a time frame on it, but I don’t anymore.”

“I have a time frame on it. I have nothing to show for myself individually. I’d at least like to get somewhere in life so that my kid will be able to be proud of me.”

“And where do you believe you are in life right now?”

“A college dropout.”

“Yeah, and so is Mark Zukerberg, Michael Dell, Steve Jobs was one, Bill Gates, Evan Williams, Jan Koum, and a bunch of others. What’s your point? I will never understand why you constantly berate and belittle yourself all in a way to unfairly compare yourself to others.” I don’t expect him to understand it, because he’s not in my position nor will he ever be. It’s something that I have to live with until I improve on it.

“Did you just compare me to the men who created Facebook, Microsoft, and Apple?”

“I compared you to college dropouts.” His lips pursed together as his brow creased in a growing frustration.

“The comparison was to make the point that the college dropout label has no standing when you go and do something beyond that. Why is it that everyone else notices the talents that you have more than you do? If going back to college is what you want to do, then baby, I’m all for it. I’ve told you that before and will tell you it again. Go back and get that degree. I know that it means something to you and you’d like to be able to at least have one higher education diploma hanging up on your parents’ mantle alongside Shane and Isaac’s. If you don’t want to go back, don’t. I’m just as fine with that. If you want to go full throttle into beginning a business for your designs, I am all for it. Whatever you need for it, I’m going to give it to you with no second thoughts or hesitation about it. Your event planning expertise is unmatched. You want to open a business for that? I’m supporting it. Whatever you want to do, I have your back, sides, and front. So, don’t sit there and make it seem like our children will look down on you because you didn’t graduate from college. If the way you take care of those who you love is any example of the kind of mother you’ll be, then consider our kids blessed.” His words never fail to silence me, especially when he’s expressing a point about what he feels about me.

In a lot of cases, we typically feel like those who love us have those moments of obligation to say something nice, whether they mean it or not, especially when we’re being our own toughest critics. Whether they truly do believe I’m a failure or not, my parents do it. My mother is always eager to have a moment to pet me and shower me with love that I sometimes do and don’t need. My father is less likely to do it than she is and it’s because I try my best not to have too many emotional moments within his presence more so for his sake than my own.

I don’t think he knows what to say to me at this point in my life other than for me to get it together and he doesn’t even say that because I’m sure he believes I’m too sensitive to hear it from him. I’ve disappointed him, though he doesn’t use that exact word or anything synonymous with it. He had to go from bragging to the entire family about my future as a doctor to maneuvering around with his head tucked between his thighs because I’d become a public spectacle. So, I usually control the direction of our conversation with one another and I keep them extremely general or focused on whatever is going on in his life. It’s for the better.

“Stacey is planning our engagement party. I just thought you should know.”

“Sounds like something Stacey would do. I’m not surprised.” At all. I’m one hundred percent sure she began planning that party in her mind as soon as he slipped the ring on my finger; maybe even before that.

“I think she wants to reach out to your mother about it. It would probably be best to include her in the planning of something like that, right?”

“I don’t know, I guess so. She kind of has herself tied up in everything going on with Isaac and Lauren’s baby, so if Stacey can bare the bulk of the work, it would probably be for the better.” The faint dust of snow trickling onto the windows immediately caused my eyes to lighten up. We’re not going to have a white Christmas at all. Because I was never anticipating it, I’m more than okay with the flurries that we’re going to get throughout today and the middle of the night. They’re further enhancing the spirit.

“Okay.”

“I already know you shut down at least twenty of her ideas about it.”

“Not twenty but maybe five or six. She’s trying to invite the whole entire New York City. You know that’s not my vibe.”

“You have a nightclub.”

“And that’s exactly why it’s not my vibe. I’d rather not have people putting on the most expensive outfit in their closet and showing up to a personal event of mine for the sake of clout chasing. If I can’t look at you and immediately recognize who you are, then no thank you. Speaking of the club, are you coming to the New Year’s Eve party?”

“I’ll be there. Will you have time for me is the real question here.”

“I will. We’re going to be double staffed that night, so that’s less of a work load on Fred, Mike, and myself. So, I’ll be by your side the majority of the time. I promise.”

“Alright, because I don’t want to have to find some random to kiss when the ball drops.”

“I’d rather not start the New Year off in handcuffs, Autumn.”

“You’re one to talk. I was five seconds away from snatching that bartender from behind the bar at the holiday party.” The smirk on his face nearly made me punch him in the chest. Though I doubt he fed into her antics, I’m sure it stroked his ego and allowed him to know that he still has that aura that can instantly make a woman drop her panties for him without him ever having to try or say anything.

“You saw that?”

“How could I not? Her eyes were following you around the room all damn night. And then, she looked like she wanted to kill me when we were speaking.”

“You had nothing to worry about. Heather was going to kill her for you. I had to hurry up and hug her so that I could get her to turn around. If looks could kill, that chick would have been instantly dead.”

“That’s my sister!” My shoulders rose in pride. I would have done the same exact thing for her.

“I already know that you know you have nothing to worry about, so I don’t think I have to reassure you, but I will anyway. I only want you.”

“Even when I’m a horny old lady and my boobs are sagging down to my stomach?”

“We’re just going to get you a good bra and I’ll pop a Viagra or two and handle that.” As I ran my hand over his arm, we shared mutual laughter over what our lives may be like when we’re somewhere in our late sixties or seventies. I’m looking forward to it. When you’re living your life and you have someone alongside you who only enhances the greatness of that, all you want to do is live out the experiences so that you’ll have something to be nostalgic about when speaking to the younger generation. God willing, our love story will be one worthy of a novel or one that will pass down through generations of our grandchildren.

The best part in myself singing and snapping my fingers along to all of my favorite Christmas hits is Dante in the driver’s seat butchering them after I invited him to join me in my glee. While snapping his fingers, he threw in words and lines that were never apart of the songs or would ever make sense. It was so comedic that I had to whip out my phone and record him. If we had the windows down, we certainly would have attracted the attention of New Yorkers walking along the sidewalks in the busy city. I had to accuse my man of being biased because while he butchered all of the songs sung by white artists, he certainly knew the Motown classics much better than he did those. I’m so mad that I didn’t bring our Santa hats out of the house with us. They would have been perfect for the video.

“This is a gift for your mother?” Dante glanced around at the display cases while I waited for my pick up order. I’d gotten her eighteen karat rose gold bangle with round rubies within it from their Atlas collection. It cost me just a little over six thousand dollars. The bracelet I originally wanted to get for her was a nearly ten karat gold cuff with three large rubies in it, but the thirty five thousand dollar price tag was a bit too hefty. Hopefully I’ll be able to grab it for her next Christmas. It’s so regal and attention commanding, much like herself.

“Yeah. It’s a bangle. She loves bracelets.”

“Good, because I got her one too.”

“Did you? That’s perfect. I know she’s going to love it and I don’t even know what it looks like.”

My curiosity had gotten the best of me, just as his did, and I too began to look around the store at the breathtaking pieces that most would only see in a fantasy. As the thought of Dante purchasing my mom a bracelet for Christmas, I couldn’t help but to think about his own and if he’d gotten her anything. I can’t even begin to imagine how it feels to have the one son born from her womb not be interested in seeing her on the most family-oriented holiday of the year.

“Wow.” I was a bit breathless as I nearly pressed my face against the glass to get a good look at the bracelet that was reminiscent of a flower bush with its light green tourmaline gems representing accenting leaves and floral patterns filled with diamonds. I’ve never seen anything like it.

“You like that?” I didn’t even know he was behind me.

“It’s beautiful.”

“Want it?” I knew it was coming. I fucking knew it.

“No.” As quickly as he asked is as quickly as I shut him down. I don’t even want to know how much it costs.

“Why? It’s Christmas.”

“So, what.”

“And you call me the fun police.” As I waved him off, he rolled his eyes.

I thought shutting him down would keep him off of my trails as I continued to look around the store, but he still continued to follow along and then linger around areas that I’d walk away from. Even after I picked up the gift, I still continued to walk around the store for a couple of minutes not only taking in the beauty of the jewelry but also the Christmas decorations donning every area of the place. I’ll miss all of the decorations when they’re gone next week.

“Are you hungry again? You want to grab a bite to eat before we go back to the house?”

“I have something else in mind. We’re in good timing too.”

“Good timing for what?”

“You’ll see.”

“See what?”

“Oh, don’t you love this song?”

The Temptations “Let It Snow” easily drowned me out during our short-lived drive. He literally only drove a few blocks and parked the car. I threw out every urge to be stubborn and continue questioning him as we walked down the sidewalk hand in hand, and I immediately wanted to jump into the air and click my heels as Radio City Music Hall came into view. I nagged about forgetting to get tickets to this show two weeks ago. We saw it literally every year when we were kids but I haven’t been in quite some time now. I’ve yet to experience the new changes such as the 3D effects and the LED lighting.

“It took ya’ll long enough. Do ya’ll know how cold it is out here?” Mike readjusted his beanie hat.

What I thought was going to be a little afternoon date between Dante and I turned out to be a group outing that included Mike, Fredrick, Erica, Stacey, and surprisingly Heather and Mario. How does this man do it?

“Aw! My friends!” The sight of all of them standing there warmed my heart more than anything else could have done within that moment. Everyone was just as festive as Dante and I in their ugly Christmas sweaters and hats. Heather had even gone all out and gotten green and red stripped leg warmers.

“Friends? Friends don’t let their friends freeze.”

“I didn’t even know.” To further annoy him, I pulled him into a bear hug and jokingly rubbed my arms up and down his body to warm him up.

“Don’t be rubbing on him. His body heat can handle that.”

“Don’t be a hater your whole life Al B Sure face ass.”

“Where were ya’ll anyway? Dante kept texting us to make sure we’re all on time and look at the late ones.” Heather cut her eyes at him.

“At Tiffany. We were literally a few blocks away.”

“Doing rich people shit, on colored people time. Sounds like Dante.” Stacey drew me in for a hug and I immediately made a mental note to ask her about her perfume.

“I’m surprised you’re here. Where’s the baby?”

“At home with my husband and his family. His mother is getting on every fucking nerve I have, so this saved me. If I wasn’t doing this, I was going out regardless. I’ll be back in time to be there with them for the evening.”

“Can we go inside? It’s fucking cold.”

“Can we? Because if he says that one more time, I’m leaving his ass out here.” Fredrick warmed Erica’s arms by doing the same exact thing that I’d done to Mike.

“Yes. Come on. We’re going through the entrance on the side of the building.”

Our kids are going to be spoiled. I’m beyond sure of it now, because I felt like the biggest pre-teen ever as we attended the pre-show reception in the Roxy Suite. He didn’t want to go and eat because there was already a ready-made buffet and open bar for all of us. And the best part? We were able to mingle with Santa and the Rockettes, take pictures, and we shared a hot chocolate toast to the coming holiday. Though they all ripped me to shreds for shedding tears of joy, I couldn’t refrain from doing so even if I tried. This is the first holiday season without an emotional roller coaster happening within my mind. I’m not experiencing those unstable moments of my mood being up and suddenly viciously crashing without warning. Though I miss Shane with every fiber of my being, I’m smiling and living. There’s a fulfillment there that I haven’t touched the surface of since everything spiraled in my world. I feel good; great even. My tears are joyous this year. I’m thankful.

“You know, this is the happiest he’s ever been for this holiday. Look at how much Scrooge is laughing.” Stacey quickly pointed towards all four men who were huddled together and laughing at God knows what as we awaited the show’s start.”

“It’s crazy, because Fredric said the same thing.” Erica winked to give me all of the credit for that.

“I know. I thought I was in overkill mode and making him uncomfortable, but he’s been such a good sport.”

“Anything for Autumn.” Heather mocked his tone of voice as best as she could.

“It’s not even like that.”

“Yes, it is.” Unison. It felt like I was standing before a choir of three as that response came out of their mouths. Okay, I’m a bit spoiled, but so what? He’s spoiled too.

“It’s alright though. Though he didn’t agree with me, he needed someone to take care of him in all of the ways that people weren’t; in ways that I couldn’t. I do my best in the big sister role, but he needed more and you came. I believe in fate. You’re damn sure that.”

“Fate, huh?” That’s an interesting way to put it.

“Hell yeah. He’s yours too. Someone had to come through and show you that Andreas wasn’t about shit when you met him and isn’t about shit now. Now look.” Indeed. I don’t regret anything and I’m not into labeling people an upgrade, but I learned when you open yourself up to change, some beautiful things can happen within your life in the best ways.

“Well damn. Just slander the man Heather.”

“Slander? I still contemplate slashing his tires at every game I attend.”

There was a point in time when I too, wanted revenge, but I’d like to think I’m having it already. Most of all, I’m having it healthily.

Our seven o’clock arrival time back at the house was the perfect timing. I’d made it back just in time before my mother began to call my phone complaining. While changing into our pajamas for the evening, I was able to wrap up her bracelet and slip it under the tree without her ever detecting it and our traditional board game festivities began. While playing, we experimented with different flavors of hot chocolate. I came up with the idea days ago and scrambled around Jersey looking for the ingredients. I think the milk chocolate peanut butter, gingerbread, coconut tres leche, and Oreo flavors were hits. I enjoyed the eggnog version more than most of them did and there was something about vegan chai flavor that slightly impressed me. I’ll be trying that one again.

“Autumn, we’re not watching the Polar Express. Grow up. We’re watching A Christmas story.” Isaac and I argue every year during movie time. We’d already been arguing because he cheated to win Monopoly but I don’t care about that. Movie time, is my time.

“I don’t want to watch that. We can watch that tomorrow after we’ve eaten and we’re all falling asleep from the itis. The Polar Express is a better watch. It has music.”

“Let her watch it.” He’d say anything to get either one of us to quiet down. My dad hates when we argue.

“No. I want to watch a Christmas story.”

“Why don’t we just watch both tonight? That should work right?” Dante’s solution sounded like bullshit to me because we’re watching Home Alone and Home Alone 2 right after.

“Nope.”

“Baby. You have to be fair.”

“I am being fair. I said that we can watch it tomorrow.”

“Autumn. Be fair.” I thought Lauren would say something, but for whatever reason, this particular argument, she found to be hilarious. She hasn’t stopped giggling yet. It’s not even funny.

“Ma, I am being fair.”

“Whatever. She can pick the movies like she does every year. The bratty youngest child tradition continues.”

“You’re just mad because you’re old and boring.” Dante threw an arm around my shoulder as we sat on the floor and leaned against the bottom of the couch. Though he protested against wearing a onesie, there he is, sitting there in one that is identical to mine. My promise to be completely naked under mine is what convinced him to put it on, but who cares? It worked.

“And don’t forget, we’re all opening one gift before we go to bed. It’s tradition.”

“I didn’t get Autumn anything.”

“I got you something. I bought you a personality big brother.”

As I continued to search for the movie, a pillow smacked into the back of my head and laughter filled the room soon after. Once I selected The Polar Express on the screen, I relaxed against Dante in satisfaction that I’d gotten my way with the movie selection. I’ll be the same way until their child is old enough to do it. The youngest always gets to choose. That’s my tradition, whether they know it or not.

“How did you like your gift?” Unlike everyone else, Dante’s hands randomly selected one of his better gifts under the tree. I opened up a spa gift certificate from Isaac. My mother opened up a pair of Christian Louboutin pumps gifted to her from my dad. Isaac opened up Tom Ford cologne from me and Lauren squealed in excitement when she opened up The Golden Girls complete series from me. I’m not sure why she’s so obsessed with that show.

As for Mr. St. James, he opened up a vintage 1964 Rolex watch with a yellow gold smooth bezel and a navy-blue strap that even had me slightly jealous. Engraved inside was: ‘We Love You Son’. Everything about it is timeless and sophisticated. Both my mother and father had done well with that one. She claimed they picked it out because that’s exactly the vibe they’d gotten from him upon meeting him. Their observations were on point if I must say so myself.

“I’m in love with it. Your mom is the sweetest.”

“She is.”

“It further lets me know how lucky I am, because you have a lot of her qualities.”

“Look at you trying to talk me out of my panties.”

“Based upon the agreement that we made earlier, they should already be off.”

“They are.” He didn’t hesitate to reach for the zipper of the onesie to confirm it. As the weight of his body met mine, I had to laugh because I’m beyond shocked that he’s even willing to go there while in my parents’ home.

“I love you.”

“I love you too.”

“You have to promise me something.” His lips met mine for a tender kiss as he palmed the sides of my face with his hands.

“What’s that?”

“I know you like to surprise me sometimes and I always love and appreciate it, but promise me that you will never show up to A&M again. Don’t even stop by if you happen to be in the city and want to see during my work hours. I don’t want you coming there. Okay? Promise me.”

“Why?” And just like that, paranoia settled into the room like a thief in the night and snatched the joy away.

“There’s a lot that you don’t understand right now, baby.”

“Is there someone else?” His eyes narrowed.

“I only want you Autumn. Just you. There is not and will never be anyone else. You have to trust me with this. Please.”

Before the disappointment, I saw indifference within his eyes blended with a fear that I cannot understand. His needed promise was more of a plea and if I didn’t grant it to him, he wouldn’t be at peace. But why?

“I promise.”

“I only want you Autumn.”

As our lips met again, his hands began to draw away the wool material covering my frame. He rid me of my thoughts and it had to be his intention. I could only be lost in a world that only nested he and I; a world that is slowly being invaded no matter how hard we fight back.

The sweat on our skin meshed our frames together in a stickiness as I opened my eyes from my short-lived slumber. My eyes washed over his beautiful face as he peacefully slept. The moonlight illuminated it so perfectly. As I reached my arm up to caress his skin, diamonds dazzled and danced along my wrist like the most beautiful lighting show. A gasp instantly left my chest as I stared at the bracelet I fell in love with at Tiffany. It was the only piece of anything covering my skin besides my engagement ring. How could I ever protest this? I can only be humbled and gratified; loved and cherished.

“Merry Christmas, baby.” I kissed his supple lips.

“Merry Christmas.” Though it was mumbled and rasp filled, he opened his enchanting eyes and stared into mine.

Aside from the birth of Christ, this right here is truly the reason for the season.

Love.

#fanfiction #fan fiction #fanfic #j. cole fanfic #j cole fanfic #j. cole fanfiction #j cole fanfiction #rihanna fanfic #rihanna fanfiction

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arrghigiveup · 5 years

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There's a lot of news going on about the "black hole girl" right now, and how she's being given too much credit for her role in the historic first image of a black hole. Because this is too important, I want to set the record straight.

Once Katie Bouman became the "face" of the black hole photo, and articles began to call her "the woman behind the black hole photo", an assortment of people that I'm strongly inclined to call incels but won't decided to figure out just how much of a role she had in it. Why? You'd have to ask them. Something about her attractiveness, youthfulness, and femaleness disturbed them to the point where they had to go digging.

And after digging, they found Andrew Chael, who wrote an algorithm, and put his algorithm online. Andrew Chael worked on the black hole photo as well. And because people kept saying that Katie Bouman wrote "the algorithm", these people decided that "the algorithm" in question must be Chael's.

So they looked at Chael's GitHub repository and checked the history. The history showed that Andrew Chael made 850,000 commits to the GitHub repository, while Katie Bouman made only 2,400.

"Oh my god!" they all said. "He did almost all of the work on the algorithm and yet she's the one getting all of the credit!"

They dug a little deeper - but not much - and discovered that the algorithm that "ultimately" generated the world-famous photo was created a different man, named Mareki Honma.

"She's taken the credit from two men!" they gasped. "Feminism and the PC media is destroying everything!"

There were, of course, those who tried to be kind. "She's always said that this was a team effort," they said. "We don't blame her, we blame the media. She didn't ask to become the poster girl of a team project she barely contributed to."

Meanwhile, Andrew Chael - a gay man - tweeted in defense of her. He thanked people for congratulating him on the work he'd spent years on but clarified that if they were doing so as a part of a sexist attack on Katie Bouman, they should go away and reconsider their lives. He said that his work couldn't have happened without Katie.

And it turns out that he was the one who took the viral photo of Bouman, specifically because he didn't want her contributions to be lost to history

So I decided to find out for myself what Katie Bouman's actual contributions were. As a programmer, I'm well aware that the number of GitHub commits means nothing without context. And Chael himself clarified that the lines being counted in the commits were from automatic commits of large data files. The actual software was made up of 68,000 lines, and though he didn't count how many he did personally, someone else assessed that he wrote about 24,000 of those.

Whether 68,000 or 24,000-- it's more than 2,400 right? Why call it "her" algorithm, then?

Because there's more than one algorithm being referenced here. These people just don't realize it.

I'll work my way backward because it's easier to explain that way.

The photo that everyone is looking at, the world famous black hole photo? It's actually a composite photo. It was generated by an algorithm credited to Mareki Honma. Honma's algorithm, based on MRI technology, is used to "stitch together" photos and fill in the missing pixels by analyzing the surrounding pixels.

But where did the photos come from that are composited into this photo?

The photos making up the composite were generated by 4 separate teams, led by Katie Bouman, Andrew Chael, Kazu Akiyama, Michael Johnson, and Jose L Gomez. Each team was given a copy of the black hole data and isolated from each other. Between the four of them, they used two techniques - an older, traditional one called CLEAN, and a newer one called RML - to generate an image.

The purpose of this division and isolation of teams was deliberately done to test the accuracy of the black hole data they were all using. If four isolated teams using different algorithms all got similar results, that would indicate that the data itself was accurate.

And lo, that's exactly what happened. The data wasn't just good, it's the most accurate of its kind. 5 petabytes (millions of billions of bytes) worth of accurate black hole data.

But where did the data come from?

Eight radio telescopes around the world trained their attention on the night sky in the direction of this black hole. The black hole is some ungodly distance away, a relative speck amidst billions of celestial bodies. And what the telescopes caught was not only the data of the black hole but the data of everything else as well.

Data that would need to be sorted.

Clearly, it's not the sort of thing you can sort by hand. To separate the wheat (one specific black hole's data) from the chaff (literally everything else around and between here and there) required an algorithm that could identify and single it out, calculations that were crunched across 800 CPUs on a 40Gbit/s network. And given that the resulting black hole-specific data was 5 petabytes (hundreds of pounds worth of hard drives!) you can imagine that the original data set was many times larger.

The algorithm that accomplished this feat was called CHIRP, short for "Continuous High-resolution Image Reconstruction using Patch priors".

CHIRP was created by Katie Bouman.

At the age of 23, she knew nothing about black holes. Her field is computer science and artificial intelligence, topics she'd been involved in since high school. But she had a theory that black holes have shadows, and her algorithm was designed to find those shadows. Katie Bouman used a variety of what MIT called "clever algebraic solutions" to overcome the obstacles involved in creating the CHIRP algorithm. And though she had a team working to help her, her name comes first on the peer-reviewed documentation.

It's called the CHIRP algorithm because that's what she named it. It's the only reason these images could be created, and it's responsible for creating some of the images that were incorporated into the final image. It's the algorithm that made the effort of collecting all that data worth it. Any data analyst can tell you that you can't analyze or visualize data until it's been prepared first. Cleaned up. Narrowed down to the important information.

That's what Katie Bouman did, and after working as a data analyst for two years with a focus on this exact thing - data transformation - I can tell you it's not easy. It's not easy on the small data sets I worked with, where I could wind up spending a week looking for the patterns in a 68K Excel spreadsheet with only one month's worth of programming for a single TV station!

Katie Bouman's 2,400 line contribution to Andrew Chael's work is on top of all of her other work. She spent five years developing and refining the CHIRP algorithm before leading four teams in testing the data created. The data collection phase of this took 10 days in April 2017, when the eight telescopes simultaneously trained their gazes towards the black hole.

This photo was ultimately created as a way to test Katie Bouman's algorithm for accuracy. MIT says that it's far more accurate than similar predecessors. And it is the algorithm that gave us our first direct image of a black hole.

Around the internet, there are people who have the misperception that Katie Bouman is just the pretty face, a minor contributor to a project where men like Andrew Chael and Mareki Honma deserve the credit. There are people pushing memes and narratives that she's only being given such acclaim because of feminism. And because Katie Bouman refuses to say that this was anything other than a team effort, even the most flattering comments about her still place her contributions to the photo at equal or less-than-equal contribution to others.

But I'm writing to set the story straight:

When it is written that Katie Bouman is the woman "behind the black hole photo", it is objectively true.

When Andrew Chael says that his software could not have worked without her, he isn't just being a stand-up guy, he's being literal.

And while it's true that every one of the 200+ people involved placed an important role, Katie Bouman deserves every ounce of superstardom she receives.

If there must be a face to this project - and there usually is - then why shouldn't it be her, her fingers twined across her lips, her gleeful eyes luminous and wide with awe and joy.

Edited:

Thinking on it a little further, I felt I should clarify that I'm not actually trying to downplay Andrew Chael. His imaging algorithm is actually the result of years of effort, a labor of love. Each image that could be composited into the final photo brought with it a unique take on the data, without which the final photo wouldn't have been complete.

So let's take a moment to celebrate the fact that two of the most integral contributors to the first direct photo of a black hole

were a woman

and a gay man.

=============================================== 2nd Update (LONG!)

I went to bed at 19 shares on a post I wrote to vent to my FB friends, and now it's over 2K. I guess it's gone viral. That means I have some work to do.

I'm going to provide a list of the various articles I read to piece this together. When I wrote this, I wasn't trying to write an essay so I didn't put sources in and I didn't ensure that every detail is 100% accurate. So I'm doing that now.

Any edits I make are mentioned below (apart from spelling/grammar fixes). The resources that led me to write this are listed below. And because I value accuracy, I welcome people to point out mistakes of any kind. I'll make corrects and credit them here.

Edit: I incorrectly wrote that Bouman worked on the algorithm for 6 years and spent 2 years refining it. This was an accidental mush of facts: She's been working on this project for a total of 6 years (ages 23 to 29). She spent 3 years building CHIRP and 2 years refining it. I've corrected that and included that she led the four teams, as two separate articles mention it.

Edit: One of the leads for the 4 team project was a man named Jose L Gomez. I added that to the above, after being sent a twitter thread from Xu S. Han. Thank you! Twitter thread here: https://twitter.com/saraissaoun/status/1116304522660519936…

http://news.mit.edu/2016/method-image-black-holes-0606 This is a 2016 MIT article announcing CHIRP. It gives a pretty excellent idea about the magnitude of Bouman's contribution.

https://www.extremetech.com/…/229675-mit-researcher-develop… This goes into detail about Katie Bouman's algorithm. It describes how her algorithm differs from normal/traditional interferometric algorithms. This article explains the difficulty she faced in how trying to capture a black hole is like trying to photograph "a grapefruit on the moon." This also explains how Bouman's algorithm made all of this work-- it combines all of the data from the participating telescopes into, in essence, one massive telescope.

https://youtu.be/BIvezCVcsYs This is a 2016 TEDx talk from Bouman where she describes her work. Note: though I am intentionally focusing on her contributions specifically to defend the attend she's getting, she makes it clear that this was a team effort. She always gives credit to her teammates who work with her. She is full of humility and wonder.

http://people.csail.mit.edu/…/papers_an…/cvpr2016_bouman.pdf This is the paper based on Bouman's work, where she's listed as first author. The position of her name is important. While the meaning of being first author can differ in certain fields, I'm basing the 'primary contributor' interpretation on the fact that multiple other articles say she was lead, MIT refers to the algorithm as hers, as well as the fact that she named CHIRP.

https://github.com/achael/eht-imaging This is Andrew Chael's imaging library available on GitHub. It's where our original "sleuths" discovered that Bouman had contributed very little and assumed that she was stealing the glory from others. NOTE: Andrew Chael didn't make these claims or ask for this sort of attention!

https://arxiv.org/abs/1605.06156 This is a paper describing Chael's work, which is impressive. Bouman is in the position of last author. Again, the relevance of the author order can differ, but the common significance of 'last author' is either the supervisor or the relative least contribution. In Bouman's paper, the position of last author seemed to indicate supervisor(s) based on the organization hierarchy on the EHT website. In this instance, I interpret Bouman's name being last as her being a minor contributor to Chael's specific work.

https://eventhorizontelescope.org/ This is the official EHT telescope website. I can't remember what I looked at here, it's in my history. I think I was trying to find out who Bouman's project lead was.

https://twitter.com/thisgreyspir…/status/1116518544961830918 This is the twitter thread where Chael defends Katie. He explains that he didn't write 850K lines, defends Katie and says that his algorithm couldn't have worked without her, mentions his LGBTQ status, and more. He seems like a great guy.

https://physicstoday.scitation.org/…/10.1063/PT.6.1.2…/full/ This article speaks to some of the other people involved, including the project leader Sheperd Doeleman. This describes the process they went through in creating the black hole image and is where I got the information about how they split the teams into 4, and how the final image is a composite.

https://phys.org/…/2019-04-scientist-superstar-katie-bouman… This is the article that talks about CHIRP sorting through a "true mountain" of data, and how that data was passed out to four teams to check for accuracy.

https://www.theguardian.com/…/black-hole-picture-captured-f… This article talks about Bouman coming up with a new algorithm to "stitch data across the EHT network" of telescopes, and how she led an elaborate series of tests (splitting the data up across four teams, etc) to verify that the output wasn't the result of a glitch or fluke.

http://www.asahi.com/ajw/articles/AJ201904110037.html This article explains Honma's significant role. It describes what Honma's algorithm does and how it was used in this project.

The final link is the document by all 200+ participants. This document is important because it gives such a clear idea of the work that went into this, the fabric of which Bouman is a part. While I intentionally highlight her contributions in defense of her, her statement that it was a team effort is true. https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3847/2041-8213/ab0ec7

#Katie Bouman #Andrew Chael #black hole #black hole photo #science #programming

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chau735473623711-blog · 5 years

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Music Quizzes

The effect different genres of music can have in your mind, body, and community. Then there's promoting. Bossa nova - Portuguese for "new wave" - gained foreign money, in response to Brazilian music historian Ruy Castro, when it appeared in an advert for a 1958 multi-artist concert put on by Grupo Universitário Hebraico do Brasil. World music was hashed out in 1987 at an business assembly. It was meant only for a short marketing marketing campaign to pump non-Anglophone musicians in retail areas they won't otherwise fit into, only to stay an acknowledged, if unwieldy, class. Radio codecs sometimes impose themselves on the music. AOR is a US abbreviation for "album-oriented radio" (later "rock") coined in 1972 by Lee Abrams and Kent Burkhart's consultancy agency for the FM rock radio stations that will outline ultra-slick center-American rock: Styx, Boston , Aerosmith. In practise, it usually translates to "definitively pre-punk".

For example, you might say, Within the refrain of ‘Poses,' Rufus Wainwright sets his first line of text to a protracted, arching melody, harking back to opera." This describes the music and lets the reader know what part you might be speaking about and how you are hearing it (it reminds you of opera). Now tell the reader what is significant about this. What does it do for the which means of the textual content? The textual content suggests that ‘you mentioned watch my head about it,' however this rising operatic melody appears to suggest that the singer is de facto floating away and gone into one other world." Now your description of the music capabilities as evidence in an argument about how the tune has two layers of meaning (text and music). In the highlands of Tibet, for hundreds of years, it was commonplace for farmers to sing a particular sort of track to their yaks. The melodies were intended to coax the yaks to provide more milk, praising the sheen of their coats and the beauty of their horns. The actual combination of tones was said to have particular powers to chill out the yaks and get the milk flowing. Right this moment, only a handful of old-timers nonetheless keep in mind these songs; younger herders merely don't learn the music, distracted by the pop songs coming in over the radio. And when click the following internet site outdated-timers die, most certainly the songs will die as nicely.

Setting a distinct precedent, Friedrich Nietzsche's views on music are a byproduct of his common philosophy of culture. Nietzsche initially defends the prevalence of sure strains of European classical music. He praises composers whose irrational genius gives the Dionysian power needed to right the rational excesses of European tradition. Nietzsche eventually reverses himself. In an extended attack on Richard Wagner's operas, he rejects the continuing value of the nice" model that characterizes artwork music. In what quantities to a reversal of Kantian aesthetic priorities, Nietzsche praises Georges Bizet's extensively standard opera Carmen (1875) for its triviality and ease (see Sweeney-Turner). Nonetheless, most philosophers ignore Nietzsche's protection of light" music. Two mid-вЂ90s albums outlined these ideological threads higher than any other. In 1994, GravediggazвЂ debut 6 Toes Deep found RZA and Prince Paul collaborating on the peak of their powers together with StetsasonicвЂs Frukwan, plus, um, a fourth man. The result was dusty, violent, funny, and endlessly inventive, valorizing unhealthy PCP trips and imagining a suicide hotline that talked you into it. A yr later, MemphisвЂ Three 6 Mafia launched its eerie, lo-fi debut Mystic Stylez, a druggy exploration of 35mm, oversaturated haunted-house music. ItвЂs an album of just about ambient violence, barbmagill1531.wikidot.com its warbling synths a pink fog that creeps in from underneath your door and subtly normalizes its lyrical malevolence, like the steadily reworking worlds of JacobвЂs Ladder or Silent Hill. Literary curiosity within the fashionable ballad kind dates back at the least to Thomas Percy and William Wordsworth English Elizabethan and Stuart composers had often evolved their music from people themes, the classical suite was primarily based upon stylised people-dances, and Joseph Haydn 's use of people melodies is famous. However the emergence of the time period "folks" coincided with an "outburst of nationwide feeling throughout Europe" that was particularly robust on the edges of Europe, where national identity was most asserted. Nationalist composers emerged in Central Europe, Russia, Scandinavia, Spain and Britain: the music of Dvořák , Smetana , Grieg , Rimsky-Korsakov , Brahms , Liszt , de Falla , Wagner , Sibelius , Vaughan Williams , Bartók , and plenty of others drew upon folk melodies. There are numerous completely different kinds of jazz dance, every with its own traits and influences. In general although, jazz dance has all the time been associated with standard tradition and it has changed over time in parallel with the music and kinds of widespread entertainment. Presently, many alternative styles coexist, in addition to numerous levels of fusion with other genres. Some important figures in the history of jazz dance are Katherine Dunham, who reinforced the connection between jazz dance and its African origins; Bob Fosse highly influential figure in the development of dance in films, and Matt Mattox , who developed his personal approach based on ballet training. Like by no means before, the web has change into a spot for sharing creative work - similar to music - amongst a world group of artists and art lovers. Whereas music and music collections predate the web, the net enabled a lot bigger scale collections. Whereas folks used to personal a handful of vinyls or CDs, they these days have prompt entry to the entire of published musical content material by way of online platforms. Such dramatic increase in the size of music collections created two challenges: (i) the necessity to mechanically organize a set (as customers and publishers can't manage them manually anymore), and (ii) the necessity to robotically recommend new songs to a consumer understanding his listening habits. An underlying job in each those challenges is to be able to group songs in semantic categories. Through all of it, RCA — Kelly's label home for the whole lot of his solo profession, each immediately and as a part of its partnership with Jive Data (which merged with RCA in 2007) — has stood by the singer, primarily, sources tell Selection, as a result of he has never been convicted of a crime and has steadfastly maintained his innocence. Makes an attempt by music firms to assemble a morality barometer for https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/100259256-ulysses-beaver artists is a precarious task, as Spotify learned final yr when it tried to ban artists — significantly Kelly — from its playlists based mostly on conduct it vaguely outlined as hateful conduct" Spotify ended up briefly penalizing two artists — Kelly and rapper XXXTentacion, neither of whom had been convicted of the related expenses of sexual misconduct — earlier than walking back the policy resulting from its vague definition and execution.

Maybe enjoyable rock music continues to be being made but it is not being performed on my local different station, so I'm not aware of it. It appears to be like like pretentiousness has taken over rock music. If a song would not have a severe that means, it has no right to exist. Rock fans decry the loss of life of "actual music." This can be a turn off to many people who want music to serve completely different purposes. Generally, it should be fun. Sometimes, it should be severe. Generally it must be about things we are able to relate as to if that is falling in love or a painful breakup. Generally it could possibly cope with social points.

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narniakid · 5 years

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The majority of 2018 I spent educating people about the worst drought in 800 years. The Central Coast listened; we not only banded together to raise thousands of dollars, but we filled an entire truckload of donations to deliver to farmers in Western NSW.

It all began sometime around February, when I can recall seeing an article somewhere about how Australia was currently in drought. My family own and operate Mangrove Produce and Hardware, where we supply hay, grain and feed to locals in the Mangrove Mountain region. My mum had mentioned she was having a bit of trouble sourcing feed, because with no grass for cattle to eat, the demand was quickly rising – and so were the prices.

One night when I was reading statistics and stories about the drought, I stumbled across a charity called Rural Aid, who’d been running their fundraising campaign, Buy A Bale, for some time. The aim was to encourage donors to purchase a bale of hay for a struggling farmer by donating $20 or more. It was a fantastic idea, and I got in contact with them. At a time when they weren’t a very well-known non-profit nationally, they were eager to send me fundraising materials to help raise money and spread the word.

March 2018: Help my Mum & I raise money for Buy A Bale!

As I asked around friends and family, and began posting about the drought on social media, I found that most didn’t even realize the majority of our own state was in the middle of severe drought. My good friend and photographer Andrew Cooney approached me with an idea; he discussed travelling to the worst of the drought-affected areas to document the damage, and we agreed to team up with our fundraising efforts to educate the Central Coast and just how bad it really was. Below are some of his photographs from his first visit to a farm in Gunnedah, NSW, and they speak for themselves.

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His photographs caught the eye of Samuel Lentini from Eastcoast Beverages – a local juice company on the Central Coast. Sam decided that he wanted to come on board our fundraising campaign as well, and so – with me still busy collecting our donations, spreading the word, and putting together marketing materials – Andrew and the Eastcoast Beverages team headed to Gunnedah once again, where they delivered a truckload of orange peels from the factory for the cattle to eat. It was such an extraordinary site, it attracted a lot of media attention, including The Daily Telegraph, ABC and Prime 7!

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We spent another few weeks fundraising in person and online, when all of a sudden, the national media seemed to wake up. TV stations and major news publications started to report on all the debt, all the cattle lost, and all the mental struggles the farmers were dealing with.

That was when I met a lady named Sara Evans. She came into my workplace at the radio station, after listening to the breakfast shows discuss the massive impact of the drought. A co-worker steered her in my direction, as I had already been campaigning and fundraising to support our farmers for several months. Sara basically said to me, ‘I’ve got a truck and a driver who’s willing to donate his time, I want to do something really BIG to help these farmers.’

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We both agreed to organize a Coast-wide donation drive, which was a huge job, and we’d only given ourselves a month to plan, market and collect donations leading up to the event day. The idea was to run a drive-through drop-off zone in a central location near the freeway, as we wanted to make it as easy as possible for the public.

We both had a bit of previous fundraising experience, but nothing of this scale, and we hadn’t taken into account exactly just how much help we were going to need – pallets to pack the donations on, a place to sort and store the goods before they were loaded onto the truck, a forklift and qualified driver, traffic control on the day, a LOT of fuel money to get the semi-trailer across the state and back… we’d sort one problem, and then another would arise. And we were juggling this all while still working full-time. It was definitely a giant learning curve for both of us, but we were so incredibly grateful to have the help from dozens of local businesses.

Working for a media company, I was lucky enough to have marketing materials at my disposal – radio interviews and commercials, flyers and posters, and access to our promotional cars to draw listeners in on the day. My whole workplace was extremely supportive, and I am still so thankful to this day for all of their help. I couldn’t have pulled it off without a platform to send out the message across in the first place.

The Central Coast For Our Farmers Donation Drive was a success – while the number of people we had wasn’t as many as we were hoping, the amount that came brought an enormous amount of goods. There were donors who had collected that much dog food, groceries and water that they had to make second and third trips to bring it all to us. We had local schools collect items, business owners filling boxes and boxes of stuff at their workplaces, and families who had added extra items into their trolleys every week when they did their own shopping. It was just phenomenal how much people wanted to help. I certainly didn’t expect collecting enough donations to fill the entire truck, but we did!

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When deciding on where we were going to deliver the donated goods, we had a look into some of the most remote parts of the state, where help hadn’t yet reached. We chose the Packsaddle region, an area about 180km north of Broken Hill. The standout feature of this barren land was a popular venue called Packsaddle Roadhouse on Packsaddle Station, where tourists and truck drivers would often stop to stay the night and grab a feed. The roadhouse was also home to the local SES Base, and Sara got in contact with the venue owner, who kindly offered up the venue for free to deliver and unpack the donations for the farmers, as well as a place for us to stay the night.

We began the road trip about 2 weeks later, with volunteers from Rotary Gosford North coming along as well. My wonderful Dad offered to drive my partner and I in his car, and on the first day, we traveled 14 hours to Broken Hill. As soon as we passed the Hunter Valley region, it was like entering a different country – the overcast weather and rolling hills of the wine country suddenly turned into flat open plains scattered with gumtrees. Everything was so incredibly dry and brown, it was hard to believe that it was once all green. We passed lots of herds wandering the roadside, with farmers leading them from behind to any patches of greenery they could find – the paddocks had turned to dust, so they were forced to look beyond their own properties for food.

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The halfway point to Broken Hill was a town called Cobar, and that was really when the effects of the drought were evidence. I almost expected a tumbleweed to roll past as we got out of the car for a stretch. From there, it got worse – we passed countless signs marking where rivers once were, now dry as a bone. The amount of dead animals on the roadside almost doubled, and as we drove the endless, straight route towards Broken Hill, there was almost no evidence that it had actually rained 50mm in the previous 24 hours. Most of the puddles had dried up already, and the sudden dump of rain had washed away the top soil on any spring crops that were planted. It was heartbreaking to think that at the time we were travelling, it was supposed to be the peak season for growth, but there wasn’t a blade of green grass in sight.

After a night’s stay in Broken Hill, we drove another 4 hours north to deliver and unpack around 60 pallets of donations. Sara and I had organized a party for all the local farming families at the roadhouse, and some had already arrived when we got there to help us set up.

The people I met were just amazing – the most hardworking, honest and down to earth people who could laugh at anything. The best part was seeing the joy on their faces. These farmers, they’d been stuck in a depression, some had really been struggling to get up to work each day. I feel so humbled and privileged to get to see first hand these people reunite with their neighbors and friends, some who they hadn’t seen for months, but had known all their life. We cooked them a free feed for lunch and dinner, treated them to plenty of free beer and set up the truck as a stage where they sang, danced and partied on till early hours of the morning.

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Most of them owned well over 100,000 acres. I spoke to a beautiful woman who’d lived on the land her whole life. To give you an idea of the size, the entire city of Chicago in the USA is around 149,000 acres – she had 250,000 acres, with a few thousand head of cattle. I asked when she’d last received rain. She laughed and said the last time she can recall was late 2015 – more than 3 years ago.

She had 10 working dogs, and the bagged dog food cost too much, so she was shooting kangaroos for them to eat instead. Each dog needed about 2 kangaroos each for a decent feed, but the ammunition for the bullets cost hundreds as well, with each bullet equaling about $5 each. There were hundreds of goats on her property which she could also shoot and sell (too skinny for the dogs to eat), but their value had dropped to $2 per goat – less than the cost of the bullet needed to shoot them.

This same lady had broken down in tears when we showed her the shed full of donations, because it wasn’t the donations themselves that brought these people overwhelming joy – it was the fact that we had gone to the effort to collect them, bring them out here, and put on a big party for them.

We wanted to show them that we cared beyond just making a cash donation for a farm thousands of kilometers away, we wanted to say ‘we hear you, we know you’re there, and we’re coming to give you a well deserved break from the day-to-day stresses of the big dry.’

Every farmer would only take the bare minimum of what they needed, insisting that there were others that needed it more. It was like a big supermarket; they could grab bags and boxes and fill up their utes with whatever they needed. They put aside boxes and pallets of stuff for their friends and neighbours who couldn’t make it.

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Many had told me that a major problem they’d encountered was the rise of bore water in the area. The water quality from the bore water, due to a substantial increase in bores being put in, meant they had to go deeper, and the little water that they could get was full of poisonous minerals and wasn’t drinkable. Most of the money they had went to buying bottled water and bagged feed, because hay prices had skyrocketed.(My family’s own business was suffering too, and we were getting phone calls from all over the state with people willing to travel hours and hours for any hay available to purchase). A lot had told me in terms of food, water and feed, they were down to about 3-4 weeks supply on hand at a time, because they couldn’t afford to redirect any money to stock up. The donations we brought have added another few weeks’ worth of supplies for them and – as equally as important, if not more – a well needed mental relief.

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Andrew and I have continued to raise funds for Buy A Bale, long after I returned from delivering donations with Sara and the Rotary team. We just recently crossed the $19,000 mark, thanks money raised at our local Grill’d restaurants through their Local Matters program. We also raised money through selling merchandise and continuously spreading the word through an online campaign, radio commercials, money tins in our workplaces and articles in local newspapers and magazines.

Despite raising the money and delivering the donations, what truly touched my heart and made this experience stand out from other non-profit work I’ve done was actually travelling there and seeing the devastating impact of drought for myself. It’s one thing to press a button, share an article, give some money, but to actually see the difference it’s making is just extraordinary, and to this day it is one of the most challenging but life-changing things I’ve ever done.

Local businesses are doing it tough and desperately need an economic boost from visitors. A recent NSW Business Chamber survey in regional areas found the drought has negatively impacted more than 84%. Domestic tourism is the backbone of many regional communities, with 86% of domestic travel done by car.

Tourists spent $110 billion in local towns, cities and communities in regional Australia during 2016-17. However, of the international tourists that do visit, over 90% only stay in Sydney or Melbourne.

The best thing you can do to support our farmers is get out and shop in the local shops, eat at the local pubs, and get the money flowing through the local economy again, because the drought affects everyone – not just everyone in these remote towns, but our whole economy.

Drought conditions of NSW as of 24th January 2019 (Source: edis.dpi.nsw.gov.au)

How I Led A Team Of Volunteers to Deliver A Truckload Of Donations & Raise Over $19,000 For Aussie Farmers The majority of 2018 I spent educating people about the worst drought in 800 years. The Central Coast listened; we not only banded together to raise thousands of dollars, but we filled an entire truckload of donations to deliver to farmers in Western NSW.

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hellodeliciouscollectorbird-blog · 5 years

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Classic Retro Toys Of The '60s

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#Classic Retro Toys Of The '60s

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ckret2 · 5 years

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Godzilla Recycles

It’s been more than a month since the reawakening of the titans. In that time, they’ve been a constant fixture in the world’s news headlines. But... generally not for the expected reasons. More for things like starring in YouTube language lessons, stealing cars, and recycling their plastic.

This is part of an ongoing series of Rodorah one-shots. It’s not ABOUT Rodorah but mentions of the ship are made. If you don’t wanna read the others... tbh this sorta sums up a lot of the stuff that’s been going on in them, just from the perspective of the humans who have no idea what’s going on. All you really need to know going in is that Ghidorah (grudgingly) yielded the fight before he otherwise would have killed Mothra. Half of the fic is a sum up of the bizarre crap the titans have been up to; the other half, is, indeed, the promised Godzilla recycling. Fic hasn’t been proofed yet because this sonuva took me almost two months to write and I want to get it out already. EDIT: now proofed!! Links to the other fics are in the source at the bottom of this post.

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HEART OF MONARCH FOUND ALIVE

Throughout the titans' mass awakening, every news station, site, and paper in the world was filled with towering headlines screaming about the monsters crawling and careening across Earth's vast landscapes. Each and every individual titan had hundreds of live streams in both video and text, constantly updating the terrified world on the latest actions of the monsters storming through their cities.

The greatest number of cameras stalked Ghidorah and Godzilla's every dread-inspiring move, not just because anything that happened to the United States east coast always seemed to get disproportionate coverage, but also because someone had leaked intel revealing that Ghidorah had awakened the rest of the titans and appeared to be commanding them. Anyone dealing directly with a titan attack tracked their own beast's news, of course; but for the parts of the world situated between the attacks, watching clouds roiling far too fast overhead and listening to their homes rattle from earthquakes hundreds of miles away—their eyes darted between news about whatever nearest creature might menace them and news coming out of Boston about the titans’ supposed ringleader, waiting to see what was going to happen next.

In the aftermath of the fighting, for days there wasn’t a major paper or station that had a story that didn’t somehow feature titans, whether directly or tangentially. Every eye in the world was gazing fearfully into the distance, waiting fearfully for some several-hundred-foot-tall beast to lumber over the horizon.

And so it was somehow both amazing and completely understandable that the news totally ignored that Serizawa Ishiro had been found alive in Boston.

He was located the second morning after the fight. He was unconscious on the northern shore of Spectacle Island in Boston Harbor, within easy sight of the spot where the final titan battle had been fought. He was evacuated to the nearest operational hospital to receive treatment for exposure, dehydration, and what a week earlier might have been misdiagnosed as one bitch of a sunburn but which by then the doctors could unfortunately easily identify as radiation burns. It was another day before he was identified, and from there only a few hours before the room was full of balloons and flowers sent by dozens of Monarch employees. He hadn't woken up yet, but he was stable and expected to recover, and when he did wake up he was going to know he was appreciated.

Monarch had no idea how he'd survived. Godzilla must have saved him, everyone agreed; the leading theory was that Godzilla had stuck Serizawa in his mouth moments before the bomb exploded, driven some unknown godzillish instinct, to release him somewhere safe when he arrived in Boston just before attacking Ghidorah—and that was only the leading theory because nobody could come up with any others. (Rick Stanton's proposal that the explosion had opened up a vacuum-powered tunnel between Godzilla's lair and Boston was rejected out of hand.) Serizawa couldn't explain as long as he was unconscious, and Godzilla himself certainly wasn't going to tell them anything. But whatever had happened, they were grateful it had.

Serizawa's survival didn't make headlines; who was Serizawa to the world but another one of the many talking heads that sometimes spoke for Monarch, and not even the most frequently seen one at that? Only a few articles were devoted to his miraculous discovery, and most of them were in more specialized publications geared toward biologists, environmentalists, or titanologists. In most places, he was a two-sentence comment near the end of a longer article about Monarch's response to the tragedies or Boston's clean up efforts.

But the world was still reeling from the damage, struggling to sift through the rubble for any little signs to reassure them that this could have been a lot worse and that from now on, things could start to get better.

For Monarch, finding Serizawa alive was their sign.

GHIDORAH ROOSTS OFF EAST COAST OF MEXICO, AVOIDS FURTHER DESTRUCTION

For many others, their sign was Isla de Mara.

After the battle in Boston, when Rodan and Ghidorah began their slow flight south, Monarch was sure that they were going to head to Isla de Mara. Monarch operatives were surrounding the island when they arrived. The titans’ trajectory had been calculated, their arrival anticipated, and—although Monarch had no idea what they could actually do when the titans arrived—Monarch was sure to be there, all the same. If for no other reason than to document.

The town was still all but empty—under quarantine by the Mexican government. Rescuers were working their way through town, looking for bodies or survivors that hadn't joined the initial evacuation, in toppled buildings or buried by pyroclastic flow; but nearly everyone who could be removed from the island had been.

All the same, there was a perceptible tension over the quiet radio lines as the two titans descended into view through the clouds of volcanic ash. Just their arrival stirred tumult, kicking up clouds of previously-settled ash and rubble. Monarch and the few rescuers in the town braced themselves for hurricane-force winds to blow through what was left of the town, knocking over already-damaged buildings.

They didn't.

Although the ash on the volcano churned in the air around the two titans, not so much as a breeze stirred in the town below.

Then the titans were settled, Rodan sinking into his crater as comfortably as a vacationer into a jacuzzi, Ghidorah clinging to the side of the volcano like a bat.

And when the news got out, the world let out a tense sigh of relief. That was the sign everyone had been waiting for: the sign that, at least for now, this was really over.

PRELIMINARY FLUID DYNAMIC ANALYSIS OF AIR CURRENTS IN JOINT LANDING BETWEEN TITANUS RODAN AND MONSTER ZERO

It took days of analyzing Monarch's footage of Rodan and Ghidorah landing before a pack of fascinated aerodynamicists with expertise in computational fluid dynamics could run a proper simulation demonstrating how their wings affected the air. What the simulation revealed was that Rodan's landing should have blown devastating wind into the town below. However, Ghidorah's landing, facing directly across from Rodan and wings tilted at just the right angle, had pushed the air currents back the other way—effectively turning the force of Rodan's flaps out to sea.

And furthermore, they said it wasn't accidental. They had abundant footage now from the first time Ghidorah had landed on Isla de Mara, from his various takeoffs and landings in Boston, and from the few times he'd left and returned to Isla de Mara without being accompanied by Rodan. That wasn't how Ghidorah usually landed.

It was, however, what he had done when Rodan landed; and it was what he did in subsequent days every time Rodan returned to his volcano, until Rodan began habitually landing on the north side of the volcano instead.

The paper was released as a messy rough draft directly online, bypassing journalistic publication entirely to make it as easy as possible for everyone who might be concerned to get to the findings; in the aftermath of the titan attacks, the authors had the patience neither for peer review nor for the slow publication process and paywalls blocking off most of their usual journals. To everyone who read the preliminary paper—mainly titanologists and other aerodynamicists—the thought of a flying creature so consciously and precisely manipulating air currents like that was absolutely mind-boggling.

Even more mind-boggling was the thought that Ghidorah had bothered to do it.

Why?

TITANS EXPLORE LANDSCAPE: MOST HUMAN INTERACTIONS PEACEFUL

Over and over, they were discovering just how alarmingly clever the titans were. More than once, Kraken had camouflaged itself as a capsized ship, tentacles pressed together in the shape of a hull, just to splash any boats that came close to investigate and disappear beneath the sea, like it was playing a game with humans. Behemoth, on his way back down from Boston to Rio de Janeiro, had stopped in Guatemala to observe a construction site, waited there until the panicked workers decided he wasn't going to attack and returned to work, and then, after watching them a bit, had started doing the crane's job by picking up steel beams and putting them in place.

As articles about the damage, the deaths, and the global response to the tragedies began to receive smaller and less dire headlines, the articles about the titans' frightening and fascinating intelligence began popping up—usually not making front page news, but popping up regularly on page 2. Cell phone videos racked up millions of views.

Scylla had etched deep grooves in strange shapes in Death Valley before heading north; a few days later, the MUTO passed through, stopped and studied the grooves, before turning north as well. Which meant they were, what, a map? Instructions? It at least indicated that titans were capable of communicating with abstract symbols—that was ninety percent of the way to writing. It further suggested that the titans had language, mutually intelligible language.

Many of Monarch's employees already suspected as much; the titans vocalized at each other so much, it was completely plausible that they'd developed the capacity for speech.

They didn't expect the theory to be confirmed so blatantly.

"LANGUAGE OF THE BIG BIRDS"? MONARCH RELEASES TITAN LANGUAGE LESSONS STARRING RODAN, GHIDORAH

Outpost 56-B, which had been cobbled together within hours of Ghidorah's landing on Isla de Mara, consisted of five permanent employees, three trailers, two porta-potties, eleven (and decreasing) drones, forty cameras, one satellite, and one big red button to radio the Armada de México in case of dragon-shaped emergency. Along with the full-time employees, they had fifteen part-timers they'd hired from among the people slowly returning to town: fourteen to help monitor the titans through the cameras 24/7, and one to bike in from town with lunch each day. The outpost was stationed just north of the still-standing portions of the town of Isla de Mara, near the very edge of the volcanic rock that had been spilled when Rodan emerged. (They used to have four trailers, but the one that had been standing on volcanic rock had been kicked into town by Ghidorah. They took that to mean they weren't allowed to step on the rock.)

Outpost 56-B was surpassed for Monarch's most pathetic outpost only by Outpost 75-B, which consisted of two motorboats, a pair of walkie-talkies, a generous Airbnb stipend, and a rechargeable flashlight with a cord that, they'd discovered too late, wasn't compatible with Sudanese power outlets.

And yet, for what a ramshackle little operation Outpost 56-B was, it had been the one to provide proof of titan language. And god, what proof! They had recorded evidence of a giant pteranodon giving language lessons to a three-headed alien dragon. Slowly, and carefully; gesturing to each object or performing each action before giving the word; saying each word clearly, several times; using them in simple sentences based on previous vocabulary, each word kept separate and distinct.

Consequently, Monarch was learning Rodan's language alongside Ghidorah. So far, they had eighteen nouns, seven verbs, five adjectives, a catch-all question word that seemed to mean "who," "what," "when," and "where" all together, the words for "yes" and "no," and one interjection that seemed to mean "look at me" or "pay attention." They knew that Rodan had words for compass directions—two of them, anyway—and that his language conflated the concept of "west" with "up" and of "east" with "down" into only two words. They had Rodan's name for Ghidorah—and Rodan's name for himself, a three-part carrying "Rrrr-DAAA-nnn" cry that they immediately identified as the probable source of the remarkably consistent name that cultures around the world assigned members of Titanus Rodan. Had this one Rodan been spotted in so many locations? Or had he given Ghidorah his species name rather than his personal name? Did members of Rodan's species have personal names?

Very soon, they might be able to ask him.

Outpost 56-B started a YouTube channel, titled it "lenguaje de los pájaros titánicos (para principiantes)" and started uploading videos with both Spanish and English subtitles for anyone who couldn't work out the translations just by watching Rodan. (When Monarch HQ emailed to complain that 56-B had to ask before declassifying that kind of material, they kept posting videos, blurred out the extremely easily identifiable titans' faces, and emailed back to request a third porta-potty.) There were human beings, alive today, all over the planet, learning alongside a literal alien how to understand a titan's language.

Over the next couple of weeks, while every titan's face battled for screen time on every major news station, Godzilla's and Ghidorah's gradually appeared less and less on North American stations as the recently-averted apocalypse became old news and full-blown sapient speaking life found off the coast of the Mexico-U.S. border became the new hot story. Between his face flashing on every major news station over headlines about titan language as talking heads speculated about the possibility of complex titan civilizations, and a wave of Tamaulipeco defenders eager to claim Rodan as a state symbol who were ready to point out that most of the damage on and around Isla de Mara had actually been caused by the U.S. military, Rodan was now the most popular titan on Earth.

And then he made a trip to Infant Island.

INDONESIAN INFANT ISLANDERS VINDICATED: "GODDESS" MOTHRA COMES HOME

Many articles mentioned the fact that after the battle, Mothra had retreated to a small island in the Indonesian archipelago. Some of them even mentioned the name Infant Island.

Very few outside of local and specialist publications discussed that the Infant Islanders were reveling in the fact that their previously derided "local folkloric" claim to having been the home of a goddess had been very recently validated when Godzilla ferried Mothra straight to their island, where she settled down into a well-worn groove in the middle of town square as though she'd never left it. One reason this news was under-reported probably had to do with the fact that they refused to let reporters on the island, fearful that it would become trampled as a new tourist destination; and the threatening psychic weight of Mothra's mind pressing down on any presumptuous reporters approaching in boats hoping to be the exception deterred those who tried to defy the ban. Instead, they arranged for interviews off island or online, and provided any requested pictures of Mothra—when she agreed, of course.

The only outsiders who had been allowed on the island had been the Chen twins, accepted as valid representatives for Mothra. Although their island still had descendants from the line of twin sisters that Mothra had gifted them, they had no living twins from that line. Mothra had already promised them that their next generation of children would have twin daughters. In the meantime, visiting twins from another of Mothra's nests were... well... acceptable, the Islanders supposed. They hastily established rules about how much the Chen twins could report to outsiders about the island and its people and culture, which they faithfully followed. (Even as much as it killed legend collector Ilene to not immediately ask a million questions about what stories they'd passed down about Mothra.)

They were, however, allowed to transcribe any of Mothra's telepathic conversations with visiting titans into Mandarin as long as she herself permitted it—and she did continue to permit it—and so it was when Rodan arrived to have a long, apparently one-sided conversation with Mothra.

TITANIC ROSETTA STONE? MONARCH TRANSLATES RODAN, MOTHRA CONVERSATION

It wasn't quite as cut-and-dry as Rodan's accidental language lessons; especially since there were parts of the conversation where Mothra had sought out information straight from Rodan's mind that the Chen twins couldn't make any sense of—except that Rodan’s thoughts had something to do with a very interesting hug-like display on Isla de Mara from the day before, and that they were rotten with fear.

(The “hug” from Ghidorah to Rodan—if that was what it was—was already infamous in Monarch. The 56-B team had eagerly circulated it throughout Monarch yesterday in the form of a several-second video that was set to the cheesiest pop song they could find and covered in heart emojis. Shortly before they’d uploaded the same video—without authorization—to their official Twitter and TikTok accounts. Stories about Rodan were beginning to pop up not just under news sites' World sections, but also under Entertainment. It was a jarring sight, considering how many of those stories also featured an alien dragon that had recently tried to destroy the world.)

But despite not having a word-for-word translation, Rodan's conversation with Mothra and its Mandarin translation did offer the possibility of a rosetta stone with which they could decipher far more about his language. Comparing his language lessons with Ghidorah to his conversation with Mothra was like comparing day one of a college Spanish 1 class to Don Quixote. It was a huge leap forward toward the day—which now seemed not like a possibility but an inevitability—when they would be able to pipe sentences in Rodan's language through a speaker and have a real conversation with him.

Rodan's trip to Infant Island should have been the most noteworthy titan news of the day.

But noteworthy news was nearly impossible to predict.

GHIDORAH RETURNS TO BOSTON, LIVE UPDATES: ONE INJURED. EXPLORES RUBBLE, INTERACTS WITH HUMANS.

Two hours before Rodan's conversation with Mothra, the eyes of half the planet had been glued to a constant live news stream coming out of the United States, as one local station after another trained its cameras toward the skies, following Ghidorah as he headed north. The world dreaded that the moment Rodan left him unsupervised, he'd decided to pick up exactly where he'd left off. It seemed that he’d even returned to Boston specifically to continue his apocalypse.

Instead, he stole a speaker and a car, made fun of the U.S. Army, complied with some demolitionists' request to help them take down a building, and went home.

After that, the far more academic matter of a new jump forward in titan linguistics was relegated to a small article on Monarch's official titan tracking website.

MONARCH ISSUES RED ALERT: GHIDORAH AND RODAN MOVING SOUTH OVER ATLANTIC

Another example of the unpredictability of newsworthy items:

Rodan—along with Ghidorah—was back in the news later that evening for what the 56-B crew was insistently calling a "lovers' spat," a brief skirmish that ended with Ghidorah literally storming off to Antarctica and Rodan charging into the hurricane after him.

For several hours, the world was braced, yet again, for the potential end of the world.

But before the next morning, it was clear that the skirmish was going to end with no further loss of human life—even the four Monarch employees stationed in what was left of Outpost 32 had evacuated long before Ghidorah had arrived to sweep the ruins into the very hole he'd emerged from. Coasts in the southern hemisphere on both sides of the Atlantic were hit with vicious waves as Ghidorah's hurricane passed by, but nothing that threatened seaside homes, and the worst they got in the way of weather was strong drizzles and stiff breezes. Satellite monitoring, a few absurdly far-off jets, and the evacuated Antarctic Monarch employees squinting through the blizzard caught fuzzy lightning-lit glimpses of another terrible titanic battle; but by the time anyone was close enough to record the fighting properly, it had ended with the two titans sitting on the coast of Antarctica together, having another language lesson.

(Outpost 56-B demanded that HQ send them the footage so that they could update their YouTube channel. HQ refused to do so until they'd reviewed the footage themselves. A traitor within the ranks sent 56-B the footage anyway, and the world was graced with the knowledge of Rodan's word for "snow.")

But despite the fact that the turbulence from Isla de Mara ultimately ended up having all of the newsworthy appeal of celebrity relationship drama, it still received far more coverage than the real breaking news happening halfway around the world:

GODZILLA RECYCLES

In the town of Kuta, on the island of Bali, in Indonesia, was the Ngurah Rai International Airport.

Godzilla had been harassing it for the last two weeks.

The airport crossed nearly the entire length of a peninsula, its runway jutting out into the sea to the west and to the east only separated from water by a strip of trees hardly a fifth of a mile wide. Kuta Beach stretched out along the coast both north and south of the runway. Located an equal distance away from the outposts that had contained titans "Typhon" and "Bunyip," Kuta was untouched by the recent attacks; but the beaches were still oddly barren, as the tourism that would usually be ramping up this time of year was reduced due to the vast swathes of the human population that had to instead turn their resources to recovering from the recent attacks. Still, there were some tourists out on Kuta Beach—enough that, when Godzilla's dorsal plates rose out of the ocean to the west, the wave of people running east to avoid him could be veritably classified as a stampede.

As Godzilla approached the Ngurah Rai International Airport, every airplane that hadn't taken off was grounded and those coming in were frantically redirected to nearby islands. He lumbered straight up to the side of the runway, feet still in the water of the beach as he leaned over the runway, dropped a massive pile of nets, and promptly turned around and returned to the ocean.

The airport shut down all operations and called Monarch.

As Serizawa, the world's only true Godzilla expert, was still in a coma, Monarch had to guess at what he'd say about Godzilla's strange behavior. They decided that Serizawa would probably say he was trying to restore Earth's natural order, which probably included dealing with its pollution; so Godzilla was returning human detritus to whom it belonged—the humans—so that they could properly clean up their own mess.

So the airport waited a day, removed the nets with a hazmat crew, and the next day was cautiously back in business.

And a day later, Godzilla was back with another delivery of nets. When he reached the spot where he'd dropped his first pile, he paused, looked around, and then climbed onto the runway and stormed along the length of it, apparently looking for his original stash. He pushed aside airplanes and bent over to peer into hangars and terminals, where terrified travelers who thought they'd be safer inside stared back at him. Eventually he gave up and, with a roar of frustration, sank back underwater.

This time, Monarch decided they were pretty terrible at roleplaying as Serizawa and advised the airport to leave the nets be.

They pushed the nets to the very corner of the airport grounds, near where Godzilla had left them and still out in the open but off of the runway itself. They stank. Apology signs were posted on the nearby beach and the tourists moved further south.

The third time Godzilla visited, he graciously accepted their relocation, added his new nets, and left in peace.

After several more such trips, he showed up in the middle of the night with a new piece of cargo: Mothra, riding on his back, her wings—one whole, one tattered since the battle in Boston—raised high.

A monarch ship, with the Chen twins on board, followed close behind, ready and eager to find out from Mothra just what in the hell Godzilla was doing with the nets.

Whatever the titans talked about on their way to Bali, Monarch had been too far away to hear. But now that they were on land and speaking to each other, in roars and in telepathy, the Chen twins began translating and transcribing their conversation:

"It's ugly," Godzilla said, "But I think it will work."

Mothra had climbed off of his back and onto the airport grounds, and was prodding at the pile of nets with one leg. I'm not so sure.

"We can try it! It'll be fine."

Why are we so close to humans? Mothra turned toward the airport, which was one again closed. At least at this time of night there were far fewer travelers. They're nervous.

"This is the only place with flat enough ground." He jerked his head toward the runway. "Lay down with your wing on the flat strip. I'll trace it."

Someone had produced some spotlights—Monarch didn't know who, they weren't working with them—and pointed it at the titans. Mothra had gestured for them to point the light down at the runway instead. Although whoever was behind the lights apparently didn't have enough sense to not shine a giant flashlight in a couple of city-destroying monsters' faces, they did at least have enough sense to listen when the less destructive one made a request, and pointed the light down. It shined off of Mothra's good wing as she maneuvered herself onto her back and lay it flat on the runway.

Godzilla knelt next to her and very carefully traced around the wing with a claw, scraping a gouge into the concrete. "I've melted the humans' floating weeds before," he said, and Mothra silently clarified to the Chen twins that he was referring to the nets. He did have a word for nets, but the word didn't convey his disdain for them the way "floating weeds" did. "If you get enough of it together, when it cools, it makes a solid layer. We just have to make a barrier around the outline and melt the weeds in it. The hard part is making a barrier that won't melt or catch fire. I still don't know what to use, but we can probably find something nearby. Maybe we can make glass on the beach."

Why don't you make a flat layer from the floating weeds without a barrier and then cut a wing shape out of it?

Godzilla stopped halfway through tracing Mothra's wing, looked at the gouge he'd already carved into the runway, and said, "I guess that would be easier."

As they dragged the nets onto the runway, Mothra said, Rodan visited today.

Godzilla's head jerked up. "Has the freak tried to kill him yet?"

No.

"Is he being mind controlled?"

I'm not sure. I don't think so—he doesn't think so—but I don't know.

Godzilla let out a low, displeased grumble. "What's going on over there?"

And Mothra didn't know—not for sure—so, for a moment, they were both silent. They finished piling the nets together in the middle of the runway. Godzilla's dorsal plates began glowing—not their usual piercingly bright blue, but a very dull glow that flickered near the bases of his plates like he was trying unsteadily to keep his power low. The light traveled far slower than usual up his back. He opened his mouth halfway as the light neared his head.

Finally, uncertainly, Mothra said, I think they might like Rodan.

Godzilla's plates flashed nearly white. He hacked out a ball of blue light, then let out a cough that rattled windows.

Sorry.

"Timing!" Godzilla looked at the bit at the edge of the nets that had been incinerated, whined, and started gearing up for another, more controlled burst. To the Chen twins' surprise, the conversation continued; apparently either Godzilla was also telepathic, or could simply think thoughts that Mothra could translate as easily as his usual speech. What do you mean, "like"? As a mate? As a meal? As something to beat up?

(Someone on the Monarch ship made a mental note to call up Mark and tell him that Godzilla also wasn't sure whether Ghidorah was looking to Rodan for food, a fight, or a fuck.)

As a mate, Mothra said. Or a friend? Something positive. Something social. Either they like him, or they're trying to trick Rodan into liking them—and if it's the latter, I don't know what they're after.

If it's not the latter? This time, Godzilla got it right. His atomic breath looked more like the flame of an oversized bunsen burner: translucent blue, mostly steady, faintly flickering. He began slowly melting down the massive pile of fishing nets.

If they really do like him... then I still don't know what they're after. I have no idea what someone from another world thinks mating is for.

You'll have a better idea than any of us. You're the only one that's been to other planets.

(Ling Chen clapped both hands over her mouth and let out a long, quiet, high-pitched noise. The Monarch employees, watching an automatic google-translated English copy of the conversation going up on the ship's main screen as Ilene and Ling typed it up in Mandarin, each silently flipped their shit in their own personal ways. One shouted "No!" Someone else just slid out of her chair to the floor, quietly repeating, "Oh my god." Another kicked over a waste bin, laced his hands in his hair, and stared at the ceiling, overcome with emotion. )

I've never been to their planet, Mothra said. I don't know what to expect. But, I think that it means that we're safe. For now.

For now. The nets were now a massive greyish-orange-teal ooze stretching out along the runway. Godzilla shut his mouth and straightened up. The grass sizzled where the nets ran over the side of the runway. "For now—as long as the freak stays interested in Rodan. And as long as Rodan doesn't turn him down. And as long as another Rodan doesn't hatch and try to mate him. And as long as Rodan remains alive."

(Ling made notes differentiating between the two different words Godzilla was using that she and her sister were both putting down as "Rodan" in their transcriptions: "Rodan (personal name; untranslatable?)" versus "Rodan (species name; 'volcano bird/pteranodon')." Ilene came back and changed "volcano bird/pteranodon," with a tiny smirk, to the English "volcanic roc.")

More or less, Mothra said.

"Then we should kill him while he's got his guard down."

Rodan will defend them.

"Then we get backup before we go."

You don't want to have to kill Rodan.

"No! I don't! But if it's between him dying or our whole world, I'll rip his head off!" Trees trembled with the force of Godzilla's roar. "If it's only a matter of time before the freak wants to destroy the world again, then we shouldn't wait around until he decides to. We can't let him make the first attack. It only takes him a few seconds to seize every mind on the planet. What if he gets me next time?"

I'd save you, Godzilla.

(Although Ilene wrote "Godzilla" in her transcription, she almost absent-mindedly included a parenthetical translation for the name that Mothra was really calling him. The watching Monarch employees were once again thrown into paroxysms of shocked disbelief.)

Godzilla was silent for a moment. "I know you would," he said. "That's not the point. The point is, we lost to him last time. We might not be able to beat him unless we take him by surprise. But you don't want to, do you? Why?"

Mothra didn't reply immediately. Instead, she lay back down, laying her wing along the length of the solid sheet of nylon on the runway. Godzilla started tracing around it with a claw tip again. What if they can change? she finally asked. Maybe we don't have to fight them again. Maybe this is a chance to get them to integrate into this world. Maybe they'll have a chance to heal.

(Underneath the word "heal" was this sense of massive, dark wounds, damage that felt as deep and ancient as Earth's very tectonic plates—something broken in Ghidorah's psyche that still ground together painfully inside him, spawning earthquakes and jagged mountains and chasmic trenches and volcanic explosions in his soul. The feeling was so strong and so dark that Ilene briefly had to stop typing, pressing a hand over her aching heart. Ling did her best to transcribe it, but ended up with only a string of characters that translated vaguely like "pain break scar wound darkness psychic hurt trauma?")

"Healing is the exact opposite of the thing I want to help him do."

I know. But if we can—wouldn't that be safer for the world? If we fight again, even if we win, people will die.

"Only small people."

Mothra ignored him. And that's if we win. They probably would have won last time if they hadn't gone to Rodan. If we don't have to fight them at all, wouldn't that be better for keeping the world safe?

Godzilla made a low growl that the Chens couldn't figure out how to translate any way other than "Noise of grudging resignation." He straightened up. "Okay, your new wing's cut out."

Mothra rolled over, Godzilla pried the wing off of the runway with a creaking cracking sound, and turned it around to hold it up to the remains of her injured wing.

How are you going to attach it?

Godzilla broke off another piece of plastic from the runway, held it on the other side of her damaged wing, and said, "I'm going to melt it a little bit to seal around your wing."

For a creature without anything in the way of human facial muscles, Mothra pulled off a very convincing look of utter disbelief.

"It might burn a little," he told her.

Okay, she said, resigned. Fine. I guess it can't make it worse. Do it.

She let out a long, shrill hissing noise as he melted the end of the new wing and the opposite piece of plastic together around the remains of her damaged wing, and both Chens' faces screwed up in pain. When it was done, Godzilla held her wing until it had completely cooled, and then stepped back. "Okay," he said. "Try it out."

She moved her new wing up and down slowly. It's light, she said. She attempted to flap it.

On the second flap, it snapped in half. Mothra and Godzilla both watched as the tip arced high in the air, flew off into the distance, and landed half a mile away standing up in the sand of Kuta Beach.

They looked at each other.

"We'll figure out how to fix it tomorrow," Godzilla said.

Mothra climbed onto his back. He trudged over to the broken wing, handed it to her to hold, and sank back into the ocean to swim Mothra back to Infant Island.

Although Godzilla's plastic-recycling jump into the brave new future of environmental conservationism was all but ignored by the media, in several days, one tiny detail out of the Chen twins' transcription of their conversation caught the fickle eye of mass media. A new headline dominated countless news sites' front pages:

GODZILLA'S REAL NAME: "SWEET FISH"?

Most of the articles were accompanied by an image of Godzilla photoshopped next to a pile of red Swedish Fish candy.

###

(Replies/reblogs are welcome & encouraged! Check the “source” link below for my masterlist of KOTM fics and Rodorah fics in this verse, as well as my AO3 and Ko-fi links.)

#godzilla #mothra #rodorah #rodan #king ghidorah #ghidorah #kotm #my writing #fanfic #('so why did you decide Serizawa survives??' because somebody asked me 'what if... you made Serizawa survive' and I was like 'ok')#(also im now inordinately fond of the Outpost 56 B crew)

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richardcady · 3 years

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thethespacecoyote · 6 years

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“Don’t Wish Me a Merry Christmas”

She and Jack almost never got presents for each other around Christmas, and if they did they were usually given with little if any mention of the holiday. Jack usually forgot to wrap his, and Nisha often just tossed it into a bag left over from past gifts. But when Rhys used Jack’s credit card and bought a tree that almost touched the top of the penthouse and proceeded to spend two hours decorating it with Angel, she knew that anything half-assed wouldn’t fly. And as much as Rhys’ Christmas shit annoyed her, she didn’t want to see the kid disappointed. It was like watching an abused kitty commercial. Nisha had a tough skin but even she wasn’t that cold-hearted.

So it was for Rhys’ sake—cute little festive parasite that he was—that she was braving the pinstriped den of horror itself. The mall, one week before Christmas Eve.

First day of Requestmas done! For the lovely @dauverney who had an idea about Nisha hating Christmas, but reluctantly braving it to go and buy some gifts for her boys :) Just some modern AU fluff with Rhackisha and some bonus Angel too.

Nisha hated Christmas.

Most people were surprised when they heard that. She got a lot of “but everyone likes Christmas!” or “Jeez, what did Christmas ever do to you?” from astonished wannabe well-wishers. Lately she’d taken to telling people her dog died the morning of, or if they were especially annoying she’d upgrade the death from a car accident to a drunken Santa on a rampage. Tragedy tended to make people back off and feel embarrassed they’d ever asked.

So Yeah. Christmas. Nisha. Mixed about as well as hot chocolate and motor oil.

Though the deluge of holiday crap pissed her off, up until lately she’d been able to ignore it pretty good through years of practice. Avoid malls and promenades. Order most things online. Stick to the single classic rock radio station in her truck that had yet to betray her strict no-Christmas music ban.

But due to some recent changes she was about ready to bit the head off the next festive fanatic that entered her crosshairs.

Like most things that annoyed her, it all started with Jack. He used to dislike Christmas right alongside her. A regular Scrooge she could commiserate with, who would groan and roll his eyes whenever one of the thousands of holiday standards infected even quasi-neutral zones like liquor stores or the DMV. They spent nights others might waste going caroling or decorating cookies instead drinking beer and having rough, secular sex. Their apartment stayed its sleek color palette of black and white and yellow without a trace of red or green infected its modern chic.

That was, until Rhys had popped into their lives.

Nisha had never been opposed to adding another partner to their duo. A third person had occasionally crossed into their relationship over the years, but usually Jack tired of them within a couple of weeks or the slight edge to the couple’s relationship put them off (and on occasion, sent them running for the door). The option had always been there, but no one had exactly fit the bill, up until a little middle manager in Jack’s company had caught the CEO’s wandering eye. It’d been around Valentines’ Day. Jack had called it fortuitous. Nisha thought he just wanted an extra present. But couple choice flirtations and a handful of dates with Nisha tagging along to make the nature of the relationship blatantly obvious to the dumbstruck young man had soon caught him hook, line and sinker. By June, he’d moved in with them.

Nisha didn’t hate Rhys. Not at all, really. It’d taken some getting used to, the fact that her boyfriend having a boyfriend meant she now had to deal with two, but she liked him. He was slender enough but thick in all the places Nisha liked, and though he was sweet he could give sass right back when Jack was being a little brat about something stupid.

But when Nisha had woken up on the first of November to find that the Halloween decor had been replaced by garlands and holly as the smell of vanilla-peppermint candles filled the air—she’d known there’d be trouble.

Rhys wasn’t nearly as crazy about Christmas as some of the people Nisha had run into had been, but it was still enough to put her off just a little bit. The month had barely started and he’d already bought matching sweaters for the three of them and even Angel, and had roped Jack into doing such cloyingly festive shit as decorating ornaments, ice skating, and making a gingerbread house. Now thoroughly brainwashed, Jack had even bought Rhys tickets to the frikkin’ ballet so they could sit on their butts for two hours and watch people dance to the same music blared on every single commercial that she had to endure. Mercifully, Angel had had a swim meet that evening, so Nisha had been able to dodge that bullet, though Rhys had ended up humming the melodies in the shower the next morning and even Jack had mumbled along to the tune as he’d made his coffee.

They were so mushy with each other that it was small wonder to Nisha that they didn’t melt. They nuzzled their noses together over peppermint hot chocolate bobbing with snowflake marshmallows, blushing like kids on a cold winter’s day. It was like a fucking Hallmark card and Nisha’s head was practically spinning off her neck at Jack’s sudden holiday whiplash.

So it was for Rhys’ sake—cute little festive parasite that he was—that she was braving the pinstriped den of horror itself. The mall, one week before Christmas Eve.

Jack’s wealth afforded them a nice place to live in a bougie neighborhood full of fancy boutiques, speciality foods, and high-priced knick-knacks, all of which were on full display in the shopping mall nearly the size of a small airport. Thanks to the acres of parking, she managed to find a space to squeeze her maroonn truck in without scraping the paint of the Mercedes Benz on her left.

The sight of so many cars circling the mall like sharks made her queasy. The wreaths hanging from every streetlamp seemed like signs screaming “Turn Back Now!” But the sound of the other car door opening sealed Nisha’s face as Angel popped out, bundled in an oversized cargo jacket with colorful reusable shopping bags already slung over her shoulder.

“You ready?” She piped up as she grabbed Nisha’s hand. The sheriff worried her lip before remembering she’d agreed to let Angel put some lipstick on her before they’d left. She cringed for a moment, then nodded.

“God. All right. Suppose we’re already here.”

Nisha only felt more dread as they walked towards the entrance to the mall, navigating the cars still fishing for a spot. There were already way too many people for her comfort level, most of them either yakking or screeching way too loud or looking like they might snap and kill someone if they didn’t get the latest game system for their warbling crotch spawn. She felt tense, hand Angel was holding jerking almost instinctively to where she usually kept her gun clipped as they entered through the sliding doors into the mall proper.

Naturally, the crowds inside were even worse.

“Oh god damn it, look at this shit,” Nisha groaned as she was hit with not only the sight of hundreds more stressed, obnoxious shoppers, but also an audible wall in the form of some sugar-pop cover of “It’s Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas.” A song which, honestly? Kind of felt like an omen at this point.

“Ugh. Fuck me.”

“Dad would be mad if he knew you were swearing in front of me…” Angel said with a giggle.

“Yeah, well Jack can go suck eggs,” Nisha hissed, shaking her head. “It’s all because of him that I gotta do this anyway.”

“Hey c’mon, it’ll be nice. Rhys has been really cool to me this year and I really want to get him something special…” Angel smiled, and damn if the kid didn’t make Nisha melt a little bit. It was kind of why she’d brought her along, anyway. Would probably stop the sheriff from going completely fucking bonkers with the sheer Christmas overload she’d have to endure.

The mall’s main atrium was dominated by the biggest Christmas tree Nisha had ever seen—so big it had to be fake, plastic needles simply perfumed with pine scent—surrounded by boxed presents nearly half the height of the average adult and certainly bigger than most the kids squealing and trundling about. Twinkling lines of crystal and LED draped the trees branches, every inch fat with bight red ornaments bigger than Nisha’s head. Garish signs wished her a Happy Holidays while also advertising expensive Santa photo packages. She was just happy Angel was too old and Jack too cynical to fall for that kind of nonsense.

“So, uh…” The sheriff scratched her head, looking about. “Where do we go?”

Nisha hadn’t heard of half of these boutiques. Most of the clothing outside of her uniform was either old stuff or had been bought by Jack, and while he occasionally spoiled her with a fancy dress or jacket for date nights, typically he just gave her his credit card and told her to get whatever she wanted. Her wardrobe consisted mostly of pants and tops and accessories that, while nice, weren’t as pointlessly expensive as some of this stuff. She already had the status, the symbols were a little superfluous.

But Rhys got a kick out of having access to this fancy stuff he’d never been able to have before. Nisha remembered he almost cried when Jack gifted him a Rolex for his birthday. Kid had been little more than an ordinary Hyperion programmer when Jack had plucked him for his personal harem, and he still got a little starry-eyed in a way Nisha no longer did whenever Jack decided to shower him in designer gifts.

So she ended up following Angel’s more fashion-savvy lead, making sure not to lose the teen in the crowds as they squeezed their way into the mall’s least-busy Hugo Boss. Angel had brought along her own allowance, so Nisha let her buy a couple of pairs of socks for Rhys, which ended up rolled all nicely and packed in a little red box with a bow on top. Her own credit card picked up a navy cashmere scarf and a slim pair of leather gloves that’d look good on the kid’s long fingers.

Angel offered to carry the gives in her patterned cloth bag as they trundled off in the direction of the Crate & Barrel Nisha was sure you could land a plane in.

Jack had been bitching about a stand mixer ever since Rhys had confessed his favorite pie was lemon meringue over Thanksgiving dinner, so Nisha picked out the fancier model in the shiny red chrome and put it on hold so she wouldn’t have to lug the damn thing around all afternoon. The price tag had made her briefly reconsider—taking into account the likelihood that Jack would only use it once—but she pushed that out of her mind. As annoyed as the whole Christmas charade made her feel, there was a prickle of enjoyment deep inside at the idea of buying something she knew Jack had talked about. It made her feel a little sly as she added a maplewood rolling pin and a springform pie dish to her lover’s present haul.

They took a break from the crowds to sit on one of the many benches ringing one of the mall’s many decorative water features. Nisha slipped Angel a ten dollar bill and told her to get a waffle cone from one of the fancy ice cream kiosks. While she was gone Nisha darted away, coming back to sit in the same place with a nondescript little black bag next to her by the time Angel returned.

“What’s that?” Angel asked, pointing it out as she licked at the veritable mountain of strawberry-chamomile ice cream overloading the poor cone.

“Adult stuff. You wouldn’t wanna know.”

“I’m not so sure about that…”

“Kid it’s probably gonna go up Rhys’ butt, you definitely don’t wanna know.”

“Eww.” Angel pulled a face, trying to distract herself with the ice cream as Nisha perused the presents they’d already bought.

“Feels like…I dunno. Feels like there should be something more here.” Nisha hummed, bobbing her leg. “Christ. This is like a freaky kind of rush. No wonder all these people are subjecting themselves to this.” She gestured vaguely at the crowds milling about.

“Any ideas, kid?”

Angel crunched into her waffle cone, chewing thoughtfully.

“Well,” she spoke from behind her hand, “how ‘bout we check out one of those fancy jewelry stores?”

Nisha hadn’t set foot in one of these places since she’d been little and dragged along by her mother. They’d always seemed a little too clean for her tastes, like a doctor’s office almost, with its pure white carpeting and sleek shiny cases and uniformed security.

She pursed her lips, wrapping her arms around herself as she took a cautious step towards the jewelry laid delicately out in the long glass displays. Angel bustled towards the earrings, leaving Nisha alone to browse something her boys might like. She had already started to dismiss the idea of getting them jewelry the moment she’d walked into the store, but to her surprise something almost immediately caught her eye.

Right smack dab in the middle of the main case were were two pretty rings paired next to each other that practically took Nisha’s breath away. Silver, embedded with fine strands of diamond and that broke around the metal like sap bleeding from a tree. She wasn’t exactly a huge fan of jewelry, but damn.

She put her hands on the top of the glass, peering up close. The rings’ stones twinkled like the enticing little bastards they were. Fuck. Those would look damn good on her boyfriends’ fingers.

“Oooh, those are soooo cool!” Angel awed as she bobbed over from the earrings case, pointed at the pair of rings. Nisha nodded in agreement.

“No kidding. You think your dad and Rhysie would like ‘em?”

“Oh yeah. Rhys likes blue, and dad likes blue ‘cause Rhys likes blue.”

Angel tapped her hand.

“You should get one for yourself, too.”

Nisha snorted.

“C’mon, Ang. I’m buying stuff for the guys, not for me. Doesn’t buying yourself a Christmas present kind of defeat the whole purpose? Besides,” Nisha held out her hand, “silver doesn’t really look good on me. Gold, platinum, maybe, but silver? Nah.”

She bought the two rings before she could second-guess the purchase, watching as the jeweler lovingly placed them in a pair of delicate heart-shaped boxes. The little knowing smile on her red lips annoyed Nisha slightly as she took the gift bag from her hand, Angel quickly thanking their clerk as the sheriff tramped out of the store and back out into the hustle and bustle.

When they returned home, Jack and Rhys were already there filling the house with the smell of baking cookies. Rhys giggle and shut his eyes when Angel shouted at them to look the other way, and when Jack didn’t do the same he covered his face with a palm dusted in flower. Nisha gathered the presents from Angel, letting her gossip with her father and Rhys about the mall as she went to go hide them in the furthers corner of their closet, underneath the suits in the way back that Jack never bothered to wear.

Cookie decorating seemed lame but as Nisha stripped down and sat on the couch in her boxers and a loose tank top, she still needled Jack to save her one before they ruined them all with frosting and sprinkles.

Christmas morning came quicker than Nisha had expected.

She and Jack had been in a dead sleep, her arm flung across his chest, when Rhys had bustled into their bedroom with small tray balancing three cups of coffee. Nisha had been irritable for a moment as she shook sleep from her eyes, but perked up at the sight and smell of coffee prepared just the way she liked it.

With enough caffeine now in his system Jack was able to trundle out of bed and whip together some apple cinnamon pancakes that drew Angel out of her bed and into the living room where piles of gifts now lay underneath their massive tree. The thing was decked head to do with enough ornaments to sink a small ship, and wrapped with so many lights that they reflected against the pure white walls like a stained glass window. Rhys welcomed Angel with a tight hug and a mug of mint tea to go along with the pancakes as they all took a seat on the couches and began to divvy up the gifts.

Each had a stocking to go along with their haul, ostensibly stuffed with gifts from “Santa” marked with handwriting that was obviously Jack’s—if the ham-fisted wrapping job didn’t already give that away. But they all played along, tongue in cheek as they thanked the man in red for giving them their favorite candies and little stocking-stuffers. Nisha was grateful for the kitschy trinkets, as it gave her and Rhys and Angel something to do as Jack tackled the pile of gifts given to him by servile stockholders and executives.

“Harris really thinks she can impress me with a frikkin’ Spiralizer? Do I look like a guy who makes his pasta out of zucchini? Instead of frikkin flour like a normal human?” Jack snorted as he tossed aside one box in favor of a more expensive-looking one. “Garcia’s got me, though. Cheese knives! Heck yes. We’re gonna have so many fancy cheese parties now, kiddo.”

“Are we?” Rhys looked up from where he was sniffing a tiny peppermint candle taken his stocking. Jack nodded yes and patted his shoulder.

“Dad, can we move onto the real presents now?” Angel moaned from the other end of the couch, the little LED lights she’d gotten from her stocking draped artfully about her shoulders. Jack relented with a sigh, setting his stack of employee gifts on the floor as he welcomed the ones they’d gotten for each other. Rhys insisted they let the youngest go first, much to Jack’s indignation. The bit of peppermint bark Rhys shoved in his mouth quieted him pretty quick.

Angel went just a starry-eyed as Nisha thought she would when she opened the huge, cutely packaged makeup palette she’d grabbed for her.

“So you weren’t getting something for Rhys!” She grinned knowingly. Rhys raised an eyebrow.

“Huh?”

“Don’t worry about it, kid,” Nisha snickered as she nudged Rhys with her elbow. “Go on, open yours.”

“Paisley!” Rhys exclaimed as soon as he lifted the scarf from the unwrapped box. “How did you guys know?”

“She’s seen your boxers, pumpkin,” Jack winked. Rhys’ face glowed with blush as he busied himself opening up the socks, gushing as he thanked Angel with a gentle hug.

Jack went apeshit over his stand mixer, immediately crowing about how he could finally make a delicate enough meringue worthy of Rhys’ palate. Nisha smiled into her coffee, feeling a touch of happiness inside her at the look on her boys’ faces. And they hadn’t even gotten to the crown jewels of her gifts.

Rhys of course, almost cried when he opened the ring boxes, covering his mouth with his hand as he looked at Nisha in shock. But weirdly enough, Jack had a small smirk on his face as he glanced down at his. He looked up at Angel, nodding in the direction of the tree.

“Princess. Why don’t you go ahead and grab that last gift?”

Nisha peered over, slightly confused to see Angel procuring a small box wrapped in shiny purple paper she hadn’t noticed before. She raised her eyebrows up at Jack and the teary Rhys, who was busy wiping his nose on his candy striped sleeve.

“Go on, Nish, open it up.” Jack encouraged as he took a sip from his coffee, watching his girlfriend over the rim. Jack’s smarmy, knowing look was usually kind of annoying, but right now it was kind of making her….excited to see what was in this little box.

She pulled the wrapping paper off with eager fingers, popping open the tiny velvet box to see a copy of the same ring she’d bought for her boyfriends. Except instead of silver, it was cast in rose gold and set with rows of amber stones and deep, purple tourmaline.

“Holy shit, you didn’t, how…how did you…?”

Jack jerked a thumb over to where Angel was wiggling on the couch, just barely able to contain her beaming smile.

“This one practically dragged us to the mall to buy it for you at the eleventh hour. Took a bit of ‘convincing’ on my part to get it commissioned at the last second in colors you’d like a little more. Though for the record, babe, you look great in silver.”

“Oh, you little sneak,” Nisha wagged her finger at Angel, who merely giggled and tucked her legs up into her oversized sweater. Rhys shyly scooted up close to Nisha on the couch, hand cautiously closing around hers as he rested the other on the ring box.

“Um…may I?” Rhys flustered.

“Such a gentleman.” She winked at him and wiggled her digits. “Knock yourself out, sweetie.”

Rhys gratefully slid the ring onto her finger, his own twinkling in the myriad lights glowing on the Christmas tree.

“You know I’m probably gonna never wear this, right?” She turned to Jack, still letting Rhys hold onto her as she took her other boyfriend’s hand in hers.

Jack shrugged.

“We still wanted to get it for ya. Angel didn’t want you feeling left out.” Jack set his mug down on the table, leaning in to peck Nisha on the lips.

“I know all the Christmas crap isn’t really your thing, but we still wanted ya to know how we feel,” Jack confessed, scratching his belly underneath the fuzzy sweater Rhys had bought.

The sheriff’s face softened as she chuckled. Rhys practically purred as he snuggled up close to her, resting his cheek against her shoulder. Keeping her warm on both sides.

“I gotta…fuck…”

“Language, Nish.”

“Oh shut up, I was gonna say I’m starting to warm up to this whole Christmas thing. Maybe…”

She glanced from Jack and Angel to Rhys, the very kid who’d infected her whole life with festive cheer who was cuddling up to her with all the meek sincerity of a kitten. It was hard to feel much malice towards the holiday she otherwise resented when everyone was being so sweet to her.

Ugh. At this rate, she’d be tame by the time next Christmas rolled around.

But, she thought—as she watched Rhys fumble on his socks to the tune of Jack’s laughter and Angel’s flattery and smelled the scents of pine and apple and peppermint mingling together as they all sat close and shared the warmth of the family—maybe that wouldn’t be the worst thing.

#long post #fanfic #spacetext #fluff #12 Days of Requestmas #rhackisha #dauverney #tftbl

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