#or alternatively: me going ‘I understood that reference’ like cap

[gggoldfinch]

Do you ever just.,, read something in a ~niche fandom~ fic,, and instinctually know exactly what this one irrelevant passing thing is in reference to. Like, say, a pet’s name being a super obscure reference to something in the fandom/irl that one would not get unless they were originally in on it. I’m SCREAMINGHDHDJKD 

[whumpzone]

Tomas and Rowe - Part 18

Masterpost

@sola-whumping @just-another-whumper @misspelledwitch @looptheloup @briars7 @black-polarf @zipadeedooda-drabbles @just-a-whumping-racoon-with-wifi @rosesareviolentlyread @thingsthatgo-whump-inthenight @jazz-0307 @kestrelsparverius @whumpsy-daisies @whumpersworld @memoriesneverforget @sky-or-something-idfk @cupcakes-and-pain @frankieswhump @ihaventwritteninsolong @mybrokenlittletoy @kiretto-laorentze @morelikepainsley @lavmars @tears-and-lilies @whump-me-all-night-long @newbornwhumperfly @itaina-anta @whump-it @haro-whumps @simplygrimly @alex-ember @rippedjeansandfadeddreams @mnmlover2002 @jordanstrophe @princessofonward @xmonster-under-the-bed @as-a-matter-of-whump @5boys1house @crystalrainwing @starnight-whump @chifechi @unicornscotty @penny-for-your-whump @getyourwhumphere @likeit-or-whumpit @jasm0307 @lightdrinker @hurting-fictional-people @captainseconds @glamrockgregory

CW: recovering pet whumpee, environmental whump, references to an amputated finger, paranoia/hallucinations

-

As he turned to lock the final door behind him, Rowe could see that he had been in a warehouse, evidently a rarely-used one. A single floodlight was on, illuminating nothing but a bare wall and the road leading up to it. Rowe had been correct- it was night. The open air was a thousand blessings as he breathed it in. His eyes felt clean, he could stand up properly, he wasn’t wearing that fucking collar anymore.

The happiness was short-lived, but he let himself have it. He was free. He just had to get home, now.

Rowe would have panicked, at that moment, but instead his heart toughened, because Kasia hadn’t been able to break him down. He was missing a finger, and the throbbing pain made sure he wouldn’t forget in a hurry, but he was still there, still himself. His nightmares would probably take a new form, and he wondered if he’d ever be able to sleep alone again, but he was fine. He was a Pet. He was a person. Surviving was a skill of his.

He rested a hand on the wall, making sure he was hidden in shadow, and let himself take some of the weight off his scarred leg. Burnt, smashed, sewn up and burnt again. He would be limping, by the time he got home. But get home he would, and in some way, it was thanks to his leg. He had been sat on his bed, back when he couldn’t walk, looking for something to distract him from the feelings of anger and uselessness and what if he throws me out?

So he’d looked down and practised his reading. He remembered it perfectly. Tomas G…Grz…. something… 12 h-a-r-t… Hartland Road… your Pet… s-p-l-i-n-t…. bed rest for up to one week…

Rowe had read the address, and perhaps even then he’d known he might one day need it. It didn’t solve the problem of knowing whereHartland Road was, or whether he’d make it there without being stolen or beaten up or killed, but he had to try.

Kidnapped, he thought. You’d only say stolen for a piece of property.

The warehouse was evidently on the outskirts of town. Was it the right town? Rowe thought so, as he studied the lights shining down the road. Several of the shapes were familiar to him. The colourful string bulbs that were hung up along the shopping streets, the glow from the theatre on the hill, the dark spot where the graveyard sat. From his bedroom window he had to crane to get a good look, but he could see it well from the office. He ached to be back there. In the warmth and familiarity of it. Back with- Master? The word sounded strange now. Especially since- since Rowe felt like he understood him now. Understood his intentions.

He started to walk. Kasia’s jacket rested on his shoulders, and he couldn���t bear to put his arms in. The idea alone made him feel trapped. The thing smelt distinctly of the bastard, but Rowe knew it was preferable to the cold of a dead night. He found a main road soon enough, built up above the rest of the grassy flatland, so he gingerly climbed down the hill and walked alongside. He would be hidden from passing cars well enough, but his bare feet soon began to take the brunt of the choice of rough land over tarmac. Stones, sticks, was that roadkill, oh, god, all were littered through his journey which was only sparsely lit by the occasional road light. After a particularly sharp stone, or possibly even a discarded glass bottle, Rowe knew his foot was bleeding. He ground his teeth together. It wasn’t real if he couldn’t see it. And right now, he couldn’t see his own hand in front of him.

He kept his eyes on the lights from the town before him, slowly drawing closer.

He thought he heard footsteps behind him, running closer with horrifying speed. As they drew near he could hear Kasia screaming at him.

You think you can fucking get away from me? You think you locked that collar? You really think I won’t come back?

He kept his eyes fixed on the town. “It-it-it’s n-not real,” he whispered past the lump in his throat. He was trembling with fear. “It’s not real, I locked him up, I st-stopped him, it’s not real, it’s not.”

The paranoia wouldn’t leave him, though. Every passing car, though they were few and far between, made him jump and crouch down, hands clamped over his mouth. He couldn’t shake the fear that it was Kasia after him, out searching for the rotten escaped Pet. His leg burst with pain every time, making him whimper and cry when he tried to stand back up.

The sounds of footsteps gradually stopped, and Kasia’s voice faded, but Rowe could still feel his hands clawing at him. His back tingled with the overwhelming sensation that someone was behind him, creeping up and reaching out to grab-

Against his better judgement, he turned back. Darkness there, and nothing more. “Fuck, f-fuck, keep it together,” he muttered.

Just up ahead, he could see streetlamps. Proper ones, glowing a gentle orange. He went as far as he could along the grass, then climbed up, wetting his hands in the dew. He checked for cars, and seeing none, scrambled fully onto the road.

He realised he couldn’t run anymore- his leg would give out, or he wouldn’t be able to contain a howl of pain- so he limped as quickly as he could towards the next patch of shadow, over and over.

Eventually he came upon a sign: Welcome to….

It was half shadowed, but it was a map. He pushed himself up on his tip-toes, eyes scanning the jumble of letters and lines and symbols. Eventually he spotted it. Hartland Road. He traced the direction in his head, making sure it was committed to memory, although he knew he wouldn’t forget it even if someone tried to beat it out of him. And then, he started walking.

He couldn’t tell exactly what time it was, but he would have guessed around three or four in the morning. The pub, as he passed it, was quiet, although he still kept his distance, hugging the shadows.

He soon reached the base of the hill he knew he’d have to climb. As he started to ascend, he saw the Pet hospital in the distance. Oh god, would he have to go back there to get his finger treated? He pushed the question to the back of his mind. If he did, there wasn’t anything he could do.

A few cars drove by, as he walked. He wanted to duck into one of the smaller streets that branched off, but he had only memorised one route home, and he didn’t trust himself to improvise in the dark. So instead he squared his shoulders, stopped hunching, tried his best to look like a person walking home in his heavy jacket, not afraid, not prey. It didn’t feel quite right, but it was easier than he’d expected. And it worked- no cars stopped, no one seemed to give him a second glance.

He finally reached the street, the name lit up. Hartland Road. The sign was scuffed, like kids had popped the cap off their beers along its edge. It was fixed to the wall of a garden, weeds poking out through the bricks, a flyer from the council tied at eye-level to the neck of the streetlamp. Rowe took everything in as he walked. The bicycle clipped to a fence, the parked cars, the black bins left out for collection. Before, he never would have taken notice. None of it had mattered. But now, Rowe felt as if he had a new connection to the world around him. He could interact with it. He wasn’t leashed or under the watchful eye of an owner, he wasn’t crawling or blindfolded in the boot of a car. He was in pain, yes, but he was always in pain, so constantly that it hardly registered anymore. He was free.

Rowe didn’t recognise the house itself. The only times he’d ever left it, he’d been unconscious, or practically so.

But when he turned around, he saw the same view he’d had from his bedroom window every morning and night. He was home.

He remembered Kasia’s key, but it no longer fit into the front door. The lock must have been changed. Rowe hated that the alternative was to make a loud noise, at this hour, but perhaps that was the smarter way than simply slipping inside like- like Kasia. So he hesitantly pressed down on the doorbell, hitting his fist against the wood as well. He waited. He thought about how he’d never rung a doorbell before in his life.

Silence. Rowe wasn’t exactly surprised, but his heart still tightened. Suddenly the fresh air didn’t feel freeing, it felt exposed. He rang again, knocking harder, not giving up. Surely he would know it was urgent? Surely he would come down, and Rowe would get to see his face again?

Faintly, he heard the creaking of the stairs. “I-I-It’s me!” he said, hushed. “It’s me, I…”

His words died as the door slowly opened. Half a face, an eye framed by blond curls peered out, full of apprehension. In a heartbeat it landed on Rowe and widened, and the door flew open.

“Tomas,” Rowe said, loving how it felt to say his name, loving him, loving everything. “I’m back, I, I’m back, I’m back.”

Tomas raised a hand over his mouth, and for once he was the one shaking. “Oh my god… oh my god.”

And then he was reaching both arms out for Rowe with a sob. Rowe threw the horrible jacket to the ground and fell into him, wrapping his arms around his waist and holding on tight. He couldn’t have known whose knees failed first, but suddenly they had collapsed on the floor, clinging onto each other, not leaving a shred of space between as they both cried. Soaked in the orange light that pooled through the still-open front door.

[cyberaxolotl]

One Word Works Wonders..?

A Cap’n/Sweet confession fic.

notes: this one will also be tumblr exclusive probably. there are some references to other cultures in here that may not be quite right as well as spanish sentences that may be janky. in this fanfic, Sweet is british english, Cap’n is spanish mexican, and k_k is spanish colombian.

Alt Ending

fic below the cut

“Choreography? Really?” Sweet raised an eyebrow at Cap’n, who was presenting plans for their next band performance. Which… wouldn't be for a while, given Queen still reigned and denied them the right to music.

Cap’n looked over with a lopsided frown. “Any better ideas to spice up our new first performance?” He hissed, putting his hands on his hips.

“Oi, keep your cap on- I never said it was a bad idea.” They retorted, poking him on the forehead. “I’m just saying neither of us are quite… cut out for dancing.”

“And what’s that supposed to mean? You can’t be saying what I think you’re saying.” He snapped back as Sweet walked away, standing on a higher part of the flooring as though on a stage.

“I am.” They confirmed, turning back around to face him. “K_K’s the only one of us with what you’d call a traditional ‘dance’ body, y’know.” They said, dramatically pushing their body forward and motioning their hands down themself.

“And are you calling me fat then, sabelotodo?”

“As much as I’m calling myself square.” Sweet crossed their arms, turning away and acting like they understood what Cap’n had just called them.

That was when K_K herself walked in. “I got the stuff you asked me to get! What’s the new plan?” She asked with a full box in her hands.

“Perfect timing, Cakes!” Cap’n turned towards her and said, giving Sweet the opportunity to get back on the two’s level. “The new plan is some tight choreography, technically two separate acts at once, but they’re gonna go together perfectly, see?” He explained, motioning towards his sketched out plans.

“Oooh! Tell us about it!” She said happily as the speaker got up next to her, also awaiting a more thorough explanation.

“It’s like a complimentary dance- you’re gonna dance your style in the back, meanwhile Sweet and I are gonna do a partner act up front, and we’re all gonna have our microphones-“

“We’re gonna do a WHAT?!” Sweet butted in, taking a step forward. “Cap- you can’t be serious!”

The radio groaned, rolling his eyes. “We are a TRIO and as a good trio should, we should also be able to work as duos.” He explained, putting a hand on his hip.

“Cap’n- we know two COMPLETELY different styles of dance!” It was true- while the three were a trio, and they knew dance, it was all mostly a side act. They never practiced the same types of dance as each other, instead focusing on the dances of their cultures- Sweet did English morris dancing, Cap’n was a commoner in Mexican derivative flamenco, and K_K knew traditional Colombian cumbia- none of which went together.

“And that’s why we’re all gonna learn a new style for this! Alternative dance!” Cap’n said with a smile, putting his hands together. “We all already know basic dance stuff, this’ll be quick and easy- plus, we have forever.”

“It sounds fun, I’ve always wanted to learn another dance style!” K_K stepped between the two and said, realizing they were about to start bickering. “My abuela taught me cumbia, but I’ve always wanted a dance that didn’t need a big dress to do correctly.” She said, suddenly staring dreamily, likely going back to her younger years.

Sweet crossed their arms, sighing. “Fine. But you better not make the learning process completely intolerable, Cap!” They yelled, and then started to walk out.

And that was just the start of a long few weeks. From that day forward, they used an empty part of cyber field as their stage, practicing and practicing every step, move of an arm, and turn of a head. There was one part of it where Cap’n and Sweet would back up to each other and put their heads together, and GOD, the amount of times they slammed their heads into each other with too much force. Eventually though, they started getting it right, and right again. It started chalking up to not being as bad as Sweet had thought.

After one session of practice that was just the two of them, the two got into their ending position, posing by each other’s sides. Cap’n found himself smiling, while Sweet was just happy out of satisfaction. “Are we perfecting that or what?” He said as the two released from position, turning towards each other.

The speaker allowed themself to take his hand, putting the other on their hip and smiling. “We sure are- I gotta say, this has been fun.”

The radio let out a chuckle, a small sign of ‘I told you so.’ “I figured it would be, as long as you cooperated. I really only chose the two of us ‘cause Cakes is too tall to partner with easily.”

“Well, I think you made a bloody good decision, innit?” Sweet said, looking into his eyes. “I think this is the most fun I’ve had with you in a while.”

“Yeah, agreed.” Cap’n looked back, and then silence settled in. The two kinda just… stared at each other for a while. There wasn’t awkwardness, there wasn’t tension- just content, and the feeling of each other’s hands together.

It was that part where the speaker realized they were still partially holding hands. Quickly, they pulled their hand away. “Uh… I guess we should- head home now?” They said awkwardly, looking away.

“Oh, dah… I guess you’re right, K_K expects us to be home soon.” He put his hand on his arm, following behind them. And now comes the much expected awkwardness, present to both of them, but more apparent to Cap’n.

The two started walking out of that area, standing side by side, when- Cap’n grabbed their arm, not linking arms, not holding hands, only grabbing their arm. Sweet didn’t question it at first, assuming he’d grabbed them because he was losing his balance or something, until he just… didn't let go. They let the two of them walk like that for a while, but eventually, the speaker started feeling bothered by it. “Do you mind?” They asked.

“Huh? Oh, sorry.” He pulled his hand off and said, putting his hands in his pockets. He didn’t follow that up, but they could still hear him mumbling to himself in a language he didn’t speak.

That only bothered them a little more. “If you have something to say, say it in a way that’s understandable, please.” They narrowed their gaze at him.

“No es de tu incumbencia.” He responded blankly, keeping his gaze forward.

It was only then that bother turned into concern. Cap’n didn’t usually speak so emptily like that- had they upset him by taking his arm off of them? But, hell, it was bothering them, only a little, but still. Maybe they should’ve just let him have that.

They didn’t have time to bring anything more up as when they reached home. Whatever.

Tomorrow was another day.

~~~~~~

A few days later, the two had fallen into a form of routine. Any day K_K wasn’t there to practice with them, they’d “accidentally” take the long way home, and talk. Cap’n was himself most of the time, talking smoothly, flirting not-so-subtly, the way he always spoke. Yet sometimes, he’d look a little distant, talk a little quieter. Sweet chalked it up to nothing, but still took note of it. Was something up?

One night, after practicing, the two had just started walking home again. “Ah god, all of this dancing makes me want to do a good flamenco routine again someday. It’s been a while.” Cap’n said, smiling.

“Flamenco is a partner routine, right? Maybe you could guide me through some.” Sweet got up next to him and offered, putting their hand out.

“Oh- well, sure.” He accepted, suddenly looking shy as he took their hand. “Just follow my lead, alright?” He said, and then started adjusting his position for the leading side of a flamenco routine. He quickly adjusted the other for the guided side, and then they started making their way around the path.

Now starts the flamenco- Sweet’s curiously good at following the lead, though stumbly, but able to pick themself back up again. Cap’n knows that dance to heart though, and the two are quickly making their way through one act.

“Right, I should probably warn you, these routines usually have a hard dip in them.” The radio said in the middle, right as he was turning the two of them around.

“I’ll be prepared, then.” The speaker didn’t seem bothered at all. Without another word, the two continued on, guiding and being guided.

Then came the aforementioned dip. The two came to a sudden halt, and Cap’n switched his hand from their back to their hip, and finally, dipped- with a twist. He dipped his head further than he traditionally would have, pulling himself down to right where Sweet was, and connecting his mouth with the top of their front in some kind of kiss. Quickly though, they both straightened out.

“So- how was that~?” He asked smoothly, his face dashed in blush.

Sweet was not blushing. Not even a little. “Um.” They started. “What kind of stunt was that?” They asked bluntly.

“..?” Cap’n’s face went from blushing and smooth to pale. “The- the kiss-?” He asked, getting a nod. “Well- I thought- you know flamenco’s a romantic dance, right, and this whole time we’ve been together a lot I- I thought it’d sparked something between us. At least- at least I thought it did?” He explained, spluttering.

“…” Sweet stared for a moment, not a positive light on their face. “Nnnno. No, it didn’t.” They said, shaking their head and stepping away, out of his hands. “I’m sorry that you thought it had.”

“Oh.” The look on his face said it all. Heartbreak, confusion, all in an instant. “I’m- uh- sorry I did that, then.” He tried to spit out, trying to keep the sadness from his tone.

“It’s…” The speaker started, but then looked away. “…Well, it’s not okay, you pulled a stunt that violated my personal boundaries under the half-baked assumption that I had some form of romantic interest in you, but…” They explained, seeing Cap’n only get crushed further with every word. “…Listen. We can just- forget this happened. I can go back and start taking the other way home if it eases the blow.”

The radio stared for a moment, putting his hands in his pockets, looking as tense, embarrassed, and dejected as Sweet had ever seen. “Yeah. Yeah, it would.” He spit out emptily, still trying not to sound as bad as he felt.

They nodded. “I’ll… see you at home then.” They responded, and with that, started going back the way they had come.

Cap’n watched as they left, staring. As soon as they were gone though, he reached up to his chest, letting a few soft whimpers escape his throat. “Damnit.” He muttered. “¡Qué estaba pensando-?!” He cursed at himself, gripping his chest. He wasn’t ready for that. He wasn’t ready at all.

He wasn’t ready to go home yet either, but he started to walk down the long way anyway, gripping his chest and sulking. So many thoughts ran through his head, failure, rejection, embarrassment- he couldn’t stand himself in that moment. He really was a cocky bastard sometimes. “Whatever- y'know what, whatever!” He yelled.

“Whatever. Tomorrow is another day.”

(Alternate ending coming soon.)

[iclaimedtobethebetterbard]

it was always you (falling for me) - chapter 2

Fandom: Sanders Sides Characters: All the sides Rating: Teen & up (for swearing) Relationships: Prinxiety, Moceit, and QPR Intrulogical (eventually this will develop into Intrulosleep!) Warnings: Language; Remus being Remus; Shakespeare fans will probably hate my interpretation(s) of the plays I reference here, if the English major friend I showed this to is anything to go by, and I’m very sorry about that 😂 Word Count: 9042

Read on AO3!

My writing masterpost

start - previous - here - next - masterpost

Summary: In a world where you and your soulmate swap dreams once a month, seven young adults enter the same college as freshmen. Each of them is wondering when they’ll find their soulmate and what that will mean for them.

Notes: Secret Santa gift for sanders-sides-fics!

Chapter 2

Roman had a problem. A person-shaped problem. Specifically, a problem shaped like his brother’s excessively pretty roommate, who seemed to take pleasure exclusively in needling Roman every chance they got.

Roman groaned, burying his face in one of the pillows on his bed.

“Hm?” his roommate, Patton, said sympathetically.

“I swear Virgil has, like, an agenda against soulmates, or something,” Roman said, rolling over and staring despairingly at the ceiling.

“Now, kiddo, I’m sure that’s not true.”

Roman lifted his head to look at Patton. “Aren’t I older than you?”

“Only by a few months,” Patton said serenely. “Spiritually, you’re my kiddo.”

“Pat, that makes no sense.”

Patton blinked up at him with a too-innocent face. “If it feels dad to you, just don’t think about it any father.”

“Oh my god.”

Patton giggled, a noise of pure delight, then circled back to Roman’s original topic. “What makes you think he’s got something against soulmates?”

“Uh, the way ze rails against them at every opportunity, for a start?” Roman sat up. “We have argued five times in the last two weeks about soulmates, and only three of them were even about Shakespeare like usual!”

“Haven’t you only known Virgil for, like, three weeks?”

“Well, yes, but that’s not the point.” Roman climbed down the ladder to the ground. “Also, I feel like that makes it worse?”

“Hmm, maybe.” Patton seemed amused. “You talk about them a lot, you know?”

“He’s so annoying!” Roman said defensively. “Ze gets this stupid smirk like ze knows something I don’t and he doesn’t even seem to care about constructing sound arguments half the time!” He put his laptop into his backpack.

“Going somewhere?” Patton asked.

“Yeah, Virgil and Remus invited me over to their dorm to study.”

“Oh,” Patton said, a funny sort of look on his face like he was trying not to laugh.

“What?” Roman asked.

“Nothing, nothing.” Patton waved him away, still smiling to himself. “Have fun studying with Virgil.”

“I will,” Roman said brightly, heading out the door.

***

“I want to go get ice cream,” Remus announced suddenly, hopping to his feet. “Who’s coming with?” It was late, almost midnight, and Roman was sitting on the floor in what had been a nice triangle with Remus and Virgil until Remus had stood. The three of them had been alternately working on homework and arguing about Disney characters.

“Sure,” Virgil said with a shrug, tugging their hoodie up onto their shoulders—they’d been wearing it dangling off their body, with only their wrists in the sleeves holding it on. “Let me fix my eyeliner first, though.”

Remus nodded distractedly, looking around the room and turning in a circle.

“Whatcha looking for?” Roman inquired, getting to his feet as well.

“My wallet,” Remus said, gaze still roving around. “I don’t know where I—”

“By your chapstick,” Roman said.

“Ah!” Remus dove under his desk, scrabbled on the floor, and emerged with his wallet clutched triumphantly in one hand and his chapstick in the other. “Thank you.”

“How the fuck did you know that?” Virgil asked, turning away from the mirror hung on the door with their eyeliner in their hand. They’d reapplied it to one eye, in a perfect, pointed wing; the other eye still had the only slightly less perfect, barely faded wing they’d been wearing this whole time. It matched their black lipstick and the carefully blended eyeshadow on their upper eyelids.

“He put it down there when he was telling the story about trying to collect dried gum off the street,” Roman explained. “And the chapstick was already there right next to it. So that’s how I remembered.”

Remus nodded. “I would have gotten there in a minute, probably,” he agreed.

“I still don’t understand how the fuck you knew that, but good for y’all, I guess,” Virgil said, turning back to the mirror.

“ADHD solidarity,” Roman explained.

Remus made finger guns at him, nodding. “ADHD solidarity,” he agreed.

Virgil paused halfway through drawing the other wing on. “Oh, that makes sense.” They picked up the line again, their hand perfectly steady, drawing it out to a fine point. “I thought you said you were autistic?” they added after a moment, their face holding perfectly still as they filled in the eyeliner with a practiced hand; their monolid eyelids allowed them to draw the wings of their eyeliner wide and dramatic.

“Yeah, I’m both. There are high rates of comorbidity, and also they’re both genetic, so neurodivergence runs in families,” Roman explained, the sentence rolling out of his mouth without him stumbling over the words once or having to think about it at all. “Did you know about ten percent of the population is probably ADHD?” he went on eagerly. “It’s super underdiagnosed. Especially because of race and gender biases in doctors who diagnose it, and the misconception that it’s only something children have. I only got diagnosed because Remus did when we were little, and we’re twins, so then they tested me too. Even though we aren’t identical. It’s super frequent for identical twins to both have ADHD if one of them has it, though.” Roman bounced on the balls of his feet, tapping the tip of his finger against his thumb. “I wish we were identical, I think it’d be so funny. Like, impersonating each other, and things. We could make such good video skits.”

“We make fantastic video skits already,” Remus protested.

“Okay, fair. But you know what I mean. And we could switch places for a day and see who noticed. All the stuff twins do in stories. Twins are always identical in stories, it’s so annoying, I wish there were more stories with fraternal twins.” Roman paused for a second, his mind hovering for an instant between a not-fully-realized train of thought about the gender politics of twin representation in stories and the question of what animals were most likely to have twins. He chose, almost before he was aware there was a choice, the animals question, his emotions nudging him away from the energy talking about gender representation would take up. “Do you think kittens dream?” he asked, only a second or two after he’d stopped talking in the first place.

“Yeah, probably,” Remus responded without missing a beat, likely following his train of thought. “Better question, do other animals have soulbonds, and how do they know if so?”

“Maybe it’s a scent thing,” Roman said thoughtfully.

“Ooh, like with glands or some shit?” Remus looked thoughtful. “That could make sense. I wonder—I bet there’s answers on the internet. I’m going to look this up later. Are you coming, too, by the way? To get ice cream?”

Roman thought it over. “Sure,” he agreed.

“I’m ready,” Virgil announced, capping their eyeliner and setting it down on hir desk. “Also, I got whiplash about five times just listening to that conversation.”

“Good, my chaos is overtaking another victim and soon I shall rule the world. Let’s go!” Remus led the other two out the door and started walking towards the end of campus.

“Where are we going, exactly?” Roman inquired, shoving his hands into the pockets of his red letterman jacket to keep them warm.

“There’s an ice cream shop that’s open till one in the morning about ten minutes away walking,” Remus said over his shoulder. “Logan and I found it the first weekend here.”

“You two went in search of sweets without me?” Roman put a hand to his heart. “I’m hurt,” he declared in his most dramatic voice.

“Oh, shut up, we would have gotten around to telling you about it eventually. I mean, I’m telling you right now, so.” Remus shrugged. “Virge, aren’t you cold?”

“Yeah, but I’m pretty, so it’s worth it,” Virgil said, tossing their head so the long hair on the top of their undercut swished. They were wearing a distressed band tee and a black skater skirt over fishnet leggings and a pair of doc martens. It was quite chilly out, and even though they were wearing a hoodie too, Roman understood why Remus had been concerned.

“You are very pretty,” Roman told them seriously. Even aside from their clearly carefully chosen outfit, this was true. Their eyes were round and curious and a captivating shade of dark brown. Even with the boost from the platform of the shoes they were wearing, they were tiny. Roman was sure they couldn’t be more than 5’2” without the boots. The hair on top of their undercut was very long, almost down to their waist, contrasting with the closely-shaved back and sides of their head. About six inches on the ends of their hair were dyed purple. Their makeup, of course, was flawless, as was their golden-brown skin, which was just a little bit darker than Roman’s. He made a mental note to ask them about their skincare routine sometime; no matter how much care he treated his skin with, the acne on his cheeks refused to go away. It was his least favorite side effect of taking testosterone. “But you can be pretty and warm at the same time, if you want. I hate being cold. But I respect your decision to be pretty and cold if you want to,” he added quickly.

Virgil let out a slightly nervous laugh, rubbing the back of their neck. “Thanks, I think.” Their eyes widened as they looked past him. “Oh, my god, Remus, shut up!”

“What?” Roman asked, looking over at Remus, who was giving Virgil an evil grin.

“Nothing,” Virgil snapped.

“I didn’t say anything,” Remus said innocently.

“Shut up!” Virgil repeated, flipping the hood of their hoodie up and dragging it over their face.

“What’s going on?” Roman asked, confused, while Remus burst into cackles of laughter.

“Nothing!” Virgil repeated with great emphasis.

Roman let out a sigh of frustration, but Virgil seemed genuinely upset about whatever Remus had done when Roman wasn’t looking, so he dropped it. Maybe Remus would explain later.

Remus did not explain later; however, he did turn around to walk backwards after the silence had stretched on long enough to become awkward. “Is the ocean a soup? Discuss,” he commanded.

“Oh, not this again!” Roman groaned. “No, absolutely not!”

“Yes,” Virgil said, almost as soon as Roman stopped talking.

“No!” Roman stamped his foot. “That makes no sense!”

“It makes lots of sense. Explain how it’s not soup,” Virgil challenged.

The resulting argument lasted them all the way to the ice cream shop and halfway through their treats.

“Aren’t you going to take a side?” Roman demanded of Remus at last.

Remus looked up from his cone. “Oh, no, this is very entertaining for me, I could watch you two bicker all month. Please keep it up.”

“You’re a terrible person,” Roman told him, trying not to laugh.

“I never claimed to be anything else,” Remus said happily.

***

“—and that’s how you do it. It’s really easy, but it’s so fun, I could balance chemical equations for hours,” Remus said, bopping the tip of his dry-erase marker against the giant whiteboard in the library for emphasis. He and Roman and Virgil had all met up here to study; it was a sunny afternoon, and they’d gotten a nice spot by the window. The marker left a little black mark next to the diagram Remus had spent the last ten minutes drawing; he wiped the dot away with his finger. He was wearing a turtleneck with horizontal black-and-white stripes and a pair of faded jeans with paint splatters all over them and huge rips in the front that ran from his mid-thighs almost down to his ankles; he’d finished the outfit off with socks in sandals and a black felt beret. His outfit—vaguely artistic, but mostly just terrible—contrasted comically with the intensely technical pseudo-lecture on chemistry he’d just given.

Roman nodded without looking up. “I remember balancing those was fun,” he agreed. He hadn’t taken a chemistry class in a couple of years now, but Remus was majoring in it, and the best way for Remus to study was to explain it out loud, so he’d gathered Roman and Virgil in the library. They’d even been able to snag one of the coveted whiteboards. Roman was able to focus on his notes better with Remus’s animated talking in the background, and Virgil preferred quiet but was willing to put on his headphones to block out Remus’s noise, so all in all this arrangement worked out well for all three of them.

“Yes!” Remus agreed with a happy wiggle. He picked up his water bottle off the table and took a long sip. “Okay, next I have a bunch of molecules I have to memorize the structures of. Do you need anything first?” He addressed his question to both of them, but Virgil seemed pretty focused—or perhaps his music was loud enough to drown out other noises.

Roman, however, thought the question over. “Yes, actually, can you help me go over my lines for this one scene? It’s not very long.”

“Mmhm.” Remus held out his hands expectantly, and Roman handed him his script. Remus began fiddling with the dog-eared bottom corner of the page it was open to, folding it back and forth.

Roman dug in the pocket of his cargo shorts—he liked cargo shorts, partly for the shape but mostly for the pockets—and handed Remus a star-shaped fidget toy made of sequins that could be flipped back and forth. He’d rather the corner of the script didn’t get torn off by mistake.

“I think I’m off book, I just want to make sure,” he said as Remus accepted the toy and began fidgeting with it.

Remus nodded, scanning the page. “Sounds good. It’s just this one page?”

“Yeah. Ready?”

Remus nodded, and Roman launched into the scene. His character had most of the lines; it was essentially a glorified monologue. Remus interjected the two lines from other characters, using a hilarious nasally voice that made it hard for Roman to stay in character without breaking to laugh, but he successfully made it through the final line before dissolving into snickers.

“You’re word-perfect, kid,” Remus proclaimed as Roman got ahold of himself, handing him back the script.

Roman grinned. “Thank you!”

Remus nodded and took another sip of water before wiping down the whiteboard and launching into a ramble about the molecular structures he had to memorize.

Roman had just about tuned Remus out again and slipped back into the headspace where he could focus on his work when Remus broke off. “Logan!” he exclaimed, sounding delighted.

Roman looked up, and so did Virgil, pulling off hir headphones. Roman followed Remus’s gaze, and there indeed was Logan, his flat top haircut and dark academia outfit unmistakeable. He was stepping out of the stairwell that led down from the floor above, adjusting the strap of the leather messenger bag they used instead of a backpack. Even at this distance, the pins he kept on the bag were visible, neatly affixed in alternating rows on the bag’s buckle straps—a demiboy flag, an aromantic flag, an enamel pin shaped like an open book, and a handful of other pins Logan had collected from the university’s cultural centers during orientation. Roman had a few of that last category on his backpack himself; he knew he and Logan had matching land acknowledgment pins now, but he wasn’t sure if any of the other pins they’d chosen matched.

Remus darted across the wide open floor, weaving his way around a few students. “Logan! Hi!”

Logan looked up, a small smile finding its way onto his face as he saw Remus. He said something—presumably a greeting—but was too far away for Roman to hear, since he was speaking at a normal tone.

Remus seized Logan by the hand and dragged them towards Roman and Virgil. Logan laughed and said something in protest, pushing his square glasses up his wide nose as he followed Remus.

“Remus, I have to go to class,” Logan was insisting as they got close enough for Roman to hear. “Hello, Roman. Virgil.” They adjusted their already-immaculate clothing, the tendons in their thin hands flexing as they smoothed their mustard-brown cable knit sweater vest and tugged on the rolled-up sleeves of their periwinkle button down shirt.

Virgil gave a two-fingered salute. “Sup.”

“Hi Logan,” Roman said happily. “We’re studying!”

“Very nice,” Logan said, raising Remus’s hand—which was still clasping his own—and gently pressing it with their other hand. “I am always glad to see you, Remus, but I can’t stay long.”

“Okay,” Remus said. “I just wanted to say hi.” He gave Logan a quick, tight hug around the ribs before releasing them just as fast as he’d darted in.

Logan smiled again. “Hello, then. I hope your studying is going well?”

He received nods from the group, and gave them his own nod in return.

“You’ve got to go,” Remus reminded him. “You don’t like to be late.”

“True. I’ll see you later, dear.”

Remus nodded. “Wanna hang out tomorrow night?”

Logan considered this. “Maybe. I’m going to the Black Student Union meeting tomorrow evening. So it would have to be after that.”

“Okay, I can do that! I love you!”

Logan smiled. “I love you too, Rem.” They made as if to leave, then paused. “Roman, while I’m thinking of it—are you and Patton still free for lunch tomorrow?”

“Yeah,” Roman confirmed. Logan and Patton had two classes together, and so together with Roman they’d formed a tight-knit little friend group very quickly; the three of them tried to make sure to meet up for lunch at least once a week.

“Wonderful. I’ll text our groupchat about it. See you then.” Logan tugged his hand out of Remus’s grip, waved, and set off at a brisk pace back towards the stairs.

***

“I’m telling you, Virgil, Oberon and Titania are a really good example of how soulmates can make it through rough patches!”

“Bullshit. They’re obviously not a metaphor for soulmates, why would the fae even have soulmates? Their story is a cautionary tale,” Virgil said languidly, lying on their back on the floor of their room.

“No!” Roman pounded his fist on the floor. “Why do you always do this?”

“Because it’s funny,” Virgil replied with a snicker.

“But you always bash on soulmates, specifically!” Roman said.

“Yeah, because I think society’s emphasis on soulbonds is dumb.” Virgil shrugged. “Anyway, if you think Oberon and Titania’s relationship is a good example of anything, I have some concerns.”

“No—no, stop! I didn’t mean it like that! They’re fae, like you said. I obviously don’t condone any of the ways they treated each other! I’m just saying that viewing them as a metaphor for soulmates makes a really interesting lens to view the other couples in the play! Right, Logan?” He turned expectantly to Logan.

“Wh—no,” Logan, who was sitting on Remus’s bed and combing their fingers through Remus’s hair, his head in their lap, responded. “You are both, objectively, wrong. Horribly so. Painfully so.”

“Hey! You’re not allowed to tell me I’m wrong about Shakespeare,” Roman countered quickly.

“Why did you ask me for my opinion, then?” Logan asked, rolling their eyes.

“I don’t know,” Roman grumbled.

“Wait, why can’t they talk to you about Shakespeare?” Virgil asked.

“Because they always win!” Roman crossed his arms.

“Oh, and I don’t?” Virgil demanded. “What am I to you, Roman? I thought we had something special here,” they went on playfully. “You make dumb arguments, I make worse ones, and then I win. I thought that meant something to you.” They pouted at him.

“That’s different!” Roman protested, stifling giggles at the mopey puppy dog eyes Virgil was sending him. “You just don’t care what I say. Logan actually refutes my arguments! It’s very humiliating!”

“I only do it because your logic is physically painful to listen to,” Logan said.

Roman crossed his arms and pointedly turned away from Logan, nose in the air. “Anyway. As I was saying. Puck’s role in all of this is really interesting, if you consider the question: are the fae supposed to be able to truly alter soulbonds, or are they only messing with feelings?”

“Dear,” Logan said plaintively, looking down at Remus, his fingers still carding through Remus’s curls.

“Hmm?” Remus responded, not opening his eyes.

“Make them stop,” Logan said beseechingly.

“Sorry fellas, you heard them. Stop torturing Logan, he’s already an English major, so he’s plenty tortured already. Or else I’ll have to dissect your spleens.” Remus wagged a finger in Roman and Virgil’s direction.

“What a terrible fate that would be,” Roman commented, flopping over to lie on the floor beside Virgil.

Seconds later, his phone buzzed; he pulled it out to see a text notification from Virgil.

Virgil: oberon sucks btw

Roman: Oh, it is ON!

Roman grinned as he sent the response, already anticipating the thrill of the argument that was about to ensue. He felt a warm thrill in his chest at Virgil’s answering chuckle—it was good to know Virgil was having fun with this too.

***

“—so I was hanging out with Virgil the other day at the library cafe, and he said The Tempest was dumb because magic solves everything.” Roman was lying on the floor of his dorm, tossing a bouncy ball up in the air and catching it over and over again. Logan was sitting at Roman’s desk, legs up and crossed on the seat of the chair as he worked on readings for an English class, half-listening to Roman’s rambling. “And that since it solved all the problems, it made no sense for Prospero to give it up. Which was completely ignoring all the bad stuff magic had done and the symbolism of him throwing it away!”

“What did Remus have to say about that?” Logan inquired with a small laugh, not looking up from the copy of Frankenstein in his hands.

“What? Oh, nothing. Remus wasn’t there.”

“Oh?” Logan blinked, glancing up from the book.

“Yeah, we were at the library getting Starbucks, we do that on Wednesdays now. Remus was in his history class, I’m pretty sure.”

“I didn’t know you and Virgil hung out together,” Logan said, raising their eyebrows.

“Oh, we don’t, we just get coffee on Wednesdays, it’s different,” Roman said.

Logan stared at him. “...What?”

“Like, we only hang out on our own time to get Starbucks and then argue about Shakespeare. It’s really fun! It’s a great system, honestly. And this way, you don’t yell at me about Shakespeare or text Remus rant essays about what you think I’m getting wrong!”

Logan looked away, a very called-out expression on his face. “You weren’t supposed to see those…”

“Oh, Remus didn’t show me, I just broke into his phone the other day and it was open to your texts,” Roman said reassuringly.

“Why would you break into—” Logan began, not seeming reassured in the slightest.

“I needed to check his calendar to see if he was available to come with me to the grocery store,” Roman explained. “You know we’re really good at guessing each other’s passcodes. He doesn’t mind, we break into each other’s phones all the time.” He paused, assessing Logan’s face, trying to gauge if their expression was upset or not. “I’m sorry I read the texts, though,” he added, just in case it had hurt their feelings. “I only saw the very end of it, it wasn't on purpose or anything. Promise.”

Logan sighed. “I know. It’s alright.” He reached across the space between them to press the back of Roman’s hand.

Roman grinned. “Only you would come up with a whole essay in a text,” he teased. “Dunno what I expected, really.”

“It wasn’t an essay,” Logan said defensively. “Technically speaking.”

“I dunno, it sure looked like if you formatted it with MLA, you could turn it in for a grade.” Roman giggled. “But hey, what do I know?”

Logan opened his mouth to reply, but stopped as the doorknob rattled with the sound of keys.

Patton stepped in. “Hey! If it isn’t some of my favorite people!” he greeted the two of them with a smile. His dark, wavy hair was a little ruffled. Normally he combed it to the side, but Roman remembered it had been windy today, so Roman guessed that was responsible for the irregularity. “How are you doing?” Patton asked the two of them.

“Better now that you’re here,” Roman told him with an answering grin. “How’s your day been?” He’d noticed that Patton really liked being asked how his day had gone.

Sure enough, Patton’s smile spread a little wider. “Pretty good, thanks! I haven’t had too much to do today, which is nice. How are you doing, Logan?” He sat down on the floor beside Roman, sliding his backpack off his shoulders.

Roman immediately sat up and scooted over to lean against Patton—he was an excellent cuddler; he was tall and chubby and he ran warm, and Roman liked cuddles. He tended towards understimulation rather than overstimulation, and hugs were one of his favorite things. Patton was always happy to supply.

“I’m alright, thank you,” Logan said as Patton wrapped an arm around Roman’s shoulders. “A little underslept, but otherwise good.”

“Good, good. You should sleep more. Are you both busy?” Patton asked.

“No,” Roman said, because Patton always had fun ideas.

Logan pursed his lips, glancing down at the book in his hands in consideration. “I can finish this chapter later. Why?”

“Oh, I was just wondering if either of you wanted to play a board game,” Patton said. He and Roman had each brought a couple from their homes, and together they had quite the little collection.

“Yes!” Roman agreed eagerly, breaking away from Patton and crossing to the shelf where they kept the games. “How about Clue?”

“I will decimate you both,” Logan said, deadly serious, adjusting their glasses and scooting to the floor.

“All part of the fun, Specs.” Roman pulled out the box and set it down between them. “Dibs on the red piece!”

***

“—so I told him that was utter bullshit—not in so many words, of course—and listed off the reasons why, and he simply did not seem to recognize how completely nonexistent his logic was, he just kept repeating his original points louder and louder.” Logan punctuated his rant about a classmate with hand gestures as he walked next to Roman on the sidewalk.

“I hate guys like that,” Roman said, making a face.

Logan nodded. “But I got full credit on my discussion post when I typed up my argument and I cannot imagine he got the same, based on his talking points. So.” He shrugged, clearly trying not to look too smug with himself.

“Good job!” Roman told them.

“Thank you.” Logan’s happiness was palpable. “How have—”

“Logan!” Remus’s voice shouted.

Roman looked in the direction of the noise; they were almost an entire block away still from the quad, where they’d agreed to meet Remus, but he seemed to have spotted them. He was sprinting at full speed directly towards them.

“Oh, dear,” Logan said, the exasperation in his voice belied by the grin on their face. They took a step back and braced themself, just in time.

Remus full-on tackled Logan in a hug, colliding into him at full speed. Logan stumbled back a couple of steps, but successfully avoided falling over. “Hello, Remus,” he said composedly, wrapping their arms around Remus and returning the enthusiastic hug. “How are you?”

“Much better now. I missed you,” Remus said into Logan’s shoulder. “Normal people get all weird about it when I tell them cool murder facts. You're much cooler than normal people.”

“It has been twenty-seven hours and about thirty minutes since you last saw me,” Logan informed him. “And thirteen minutes since we last texted.” They rumpled his curls, which fell messily in loose spirals about his face; they were mostly about chin length, although some of them were choppily trimmed shorter than others. Remus was very insistent about cutting his own hair. It was always mildly disastrous, but he insisted he liked it that way. He’d dyed it himself, too; he’d bleached a streak at the very front of his head and dyed it silver about a month before college started, with a surprising amount of success.

“Yeah, and I missed you.” Remus stepped back from the hug as Logan released him. “Also hi Roman, I guess.” He tossed Roman a grin.

“You are a terrible brother sometimes,” Roman informed him. “Hi.”

“Uh, I think you mean all the time,” Remus corrected him. “I’m joking,” he added. “C’mon, I got Starbucks for us! I have extra meal credits!” He seized Logan’s hand and reached invitingly for Roman’s.

Roman let Remus grab his hand, too, and his brother immediately began dragging both Roman and Logan at a slightly breakneck pace down the sidewalk. Several students dove out of their way until he dragged them to a halt by the food truck, bouncing on the balls of his feet and waiting expectantly.

Not even a moment later, the barista placed three cups on the delivery window tray and called out Remus’s name.

“Yes!” Remus pumped his fist, darted over, and picked up two of the cups—Roman recognized Remus and Logan’s go-to coffee orders, a trenta mango-dragonfruit refresher and a grande vanilla sweet cream cold brew with extra ice. Roman picked up the last cup, a warm drink in a grande cup; he sniffed to check what it was even though he knew what Remus usually got him. Steamed apple juice with a sprinkle of cinnamon on top—his favorite as a kid and still one of his favorites now. He wrapped his hands around the warm cup and followed Remus and Logan over to a sunny patch on the lawn.

Remus sprawled out, taking up more space than seemed humanly possible for one person to fill; Logan tucked their legs beneath them as they sat beside Remus and began pulling out a textbook, a dog-eared novel, and a handful of pens and pencils from their messenger bag.

Roman sat so that he completed the triangle between the three of them, his legs crossed so he could lean his cup against them between sips and not worry about knocking it over.

“Thank you for the coffee, Remus,” Logan said, his cup halfway to his lips as he flipped through the worn novel.

Roman nodded in agreement, breathing in the warm cinnamon scent of the apple juice.

“Of course!” Remus said exuberantly, taking a noisy slurp of his drink.

Roman and Logan both winced slightly.

“Could you be a little quieter, there?” Logan asked mildly.

“How dare you.” Remus clutched his heart, leaning back so far Roman was surprised he didn’t lose his balance and fall over.

Logan sighed, reaching over and placing a hand over Remus’s, gripped around the edge of the cup’s lid. “At least please be careful not to splash,” he said, guiding Remus’s hand downwards until the cup came to rest on the ground. “This textbook cost rather a lot and I’d like to sell it back in a decent condition at the end of the term.”

Remus let go of the cup, leaving it to rest where it was, and leaned forward. He took Logan’s face in both of his hands and looked seriously into their eyes. “Hey. You are my best friend in the whole world and you mean everything to me. I love you and I’m so glad we’re soulmates. But I draw the line at stopping my annoying behavior for anything less than a natural disaster.” He released Logan and picked his drink back up. “I promise I won’t spill on your book, though,” he added lightly. “Roman gets no such promises.”

“You wouldn’t dare, you know I hate being sticky—” Roman began heatedly.

“Okay, okay. Jesus. You two are really conspiring to foil all my chaotic little gremlin dealings today. I’ll order an ice water to spill on you instead, will that make you happy?” Remus snickered.

Roman frowned. “If you must,” he begrudgingly agreed, since this seemed the closest thing to a compromise he was likely to get out of Remus. He suspected it might be a joke anyway, but he wasn’t sure about that and didn’t want to take any chances.

But Remus didn’t return to the food truck, so it seemed likely that it was a joke after all. Instead, he devoted himself to more noisy slurping, crossing his eyes and looking like he didn’t have a care in the world.

“You’re the tallest one of us,” Roman said after a moment.

“Huh?” Remus looked up at him.

“He has a point, dear,” Logan said, turning a page.

“Like yeah I know I am, but what’s the point?” Remus asked.

“You said we were foiling your chaotic little gremlin dealings,” Roman elaborated. “You’re, like, fucking… six two.”

“And a half,” Remus added. “Emotionally, I am a chaotic creature of spite who’s about three five and can sneeze fire, though.”

“That makes no sense,” Roman protested.

“Does too,” Remus responded, crossing his arms.

“It does,” Logan agreed. “For example, emotionally, I punch that one classmate in the face twice a week, but we can’t always embody what we want to be. And you, Roman—emotionally, you’re very invested in Shakespeare, but in actuality, your interpretations are painfully bad.”

“Hey. You talking about me and Shakespeare is off limits. We’ve discussed this.” Roman waved a warning finger at them.

“I still think that’s unfair and have raised a motion to reject and overturn the ban.”

“Unfortunately for you, the judge and jury are my feelings, and you hurt them, Logan. Shakespeare and I have something special. You need to stop trying to come between us like this.”

Logan glanced up from his book to give Roman a singularly unimpressed look. “You are preposterous.”

Roman beamed at him and made a heart shape with his hands, holding it up like a picture frame to look at Logan through. “But you loooooove me,” he singsonged.

Logan nodded. “This is true.”

“You’re both nerds and Shakespeare isn’t even that good,” Remus put in, a shit-eating grin on his face.

“I’m divorcing you,” Logan said immediately.

“Noooo, come back!” Remus dramatically grasped at the air as if reaching out from afar for Logan.

“Fine.” Logan shrugged. “Then Roman’s disowning you.”

“Hey, that’s my line!”  

“He can’t disown me, he’d miss me,” Remus said confidently. “Y’all are stuck with me.” He looked very pleased with himself.

There was silence for a beat, then all three of them burst into laughter.

“I’m really glad we’re all friends,” Remus said happily, leaning back and taking another long sip of his drink.

“Yeah,” Roman agreed.

“I don’t know,” Logan said, holding back a smirk. “Sometimes I think about a world where I don’t have to deal with a pair of himbos every day of my life.” He maintained his faux-serious face for all of the three seconds it took both twins to start pelting him with ripped-up blades of grass, then devolved into helpless laughter again.

***

“Patton, you good? You’ve been kind of spaced out all day.”

“Huh?” Patton looked up, blinking through his round gold-rimmed glasses. “Yeah, I’m okay! Just… boy problems, I guess? Which is… it’s new.” He wrinkled his nose for a second in a face of dissatisfaction before smoothing his face back into a smile.

“Oh? Want to talk about it?” Roman asked eagerly, leaning forward and resting his chin in his hands, interest definitely piqued.

“I don’t know…” Patton glanced away. “It’s complicated. And it’s probably not a big deal.”

“Patton. We are friends. The main purpose of friends is gossiping about crushes.” Roman crossed his arms. “I am offended that you would ever doubt my capacity for talking about boys in a gay way.”

“I don’t think that’s the main purpose of friendship,” Patton said, but his smile looked more genuine.

“Shush, I know that, I’m being dramatic. How about a movie night and you can spill the deets in a cozy setting with popcorn? And Logan?”

“I mean… okay,” Patton relented. “It’s probably not as exciting as you’re hoping for, though, I’m sorry.”

“Nonsense. You are perfect and so is everything you do,” Roman said absently, pulling out his phone and FaceTiming Logan.

“Roman! You’re sweet, but you know you shouldn’t go around passing out compliments that should go to you,” Patton said.

“Oh, stop,” Roman said, grinning wide.

Logan picked up on the second ring. “What do you need, Roman?”

“To see your gorgeous face, nerd. Also we’re having a movie night at me and Pat’s, attendance mandatory. Seven works, right? Pat’s having boy problems.”

Logan stared at Roman with a blank face for several beats. “And… you want me there to help… why?” he deadpanned.

“Shut up, you have a nonromantic boy toy, you’re basically qualified to help.”

“Don’t call Remus that! He’s a person, not a—wait, he’s your brother, Roman, that’s worse, that’s so weird—”

“—Anyway, I can more than handle giving Patton plenty of terrible advice on his love life,” Roman interrupted. “You’re there to tell him everything I say is a terrible idea and let me throw popcorn at you. We can watch Big Hero Six. C’mon, it’ll be fun!”

Logan heaved a sigh. “Fine. But you have to put your dad’s curry powder on the popcorn.”

“What kind of man do you take me for, Logan? Of course we’ll have curry popcorn! See you at seven, love you, bye bye.” Roman blew a kiss and hung up.

After his English class, Roman grabbed a burrito from the dining hall and hurried back to the dorm, making it there at half past six. Patton was already back; he made hot chocolate while Roman microwaved popcorn and tossed it in a bowl with curry powder.

At precisely seven o'clock, there was a knock on the door; Roman let Logan in and the three of them climbed into the nest of pillows and blankets Patton had built on the bottom bunk, pushing aside the bi pride flag and the Puerto Rican flag Patton had hung like curtains around his bunk.

“So,” Roman said eagerly as the movie’s opening bot fight began on the laptop screen, turning to Patton and bouncing (Logan grabbed the popcorn bowl out of Roman’s lap as it jostled), “spill!”

Patton squirmed under the attention, a half-hidden smile ghosting its way onto his face. “I don’t know… what should I talk about?”

“What’s he like?” Roman asked. “How do you know him? Is he cute? Have you got his number?”

“Oh, wow—that’s a lot.” Patton giggled nervously.

“Okay, start with is he cute?”

“He’s really cute,” Patton allowed, biting back another smile. “He’s got all these freckles all over his face and neck and hands, and his eyebrows are really expressive—he gets this really serious face when he’s thinking, and it’s… really pretty.”

“Eyes?” Roman demanded. “How are his eyes?”

“I mean, they’re eyes? They’re this kind of greyish blueish color. I don’t know, I try not to stare, especially when he’s looking, you know?”

“Okay, that’s fair,” Roman relented. “What else? Is he fashionable?”

“I—not really, honestly. He mostly just wears longsleeve tees and jeans. Sometimes beanies. He has these really cute yellow converse that he always wears, though. He, like—oh, gosh, I’m not sure how to describe it. He’s not, like, fashionable like you asked, but he—kind of the way he holds himself makes it seem like he is? He wears his clothes well, I think is maybe the phrase.”

Roman nodded. “Alright. Do you know whether or not he’s queer?”

Patton hesitated. “Um… I’m not sure. I don’t know either way. But he was the only one that laughed at a bi pun I made one time, and he wore a pink shirt and yellow belt with faded jeans one time, which I might be reading way too much into but it sure looked like a sneaky pastel pan flag.”

Roman nodded very seriously, taking mental notes. “All good signs. Anything else? Any stickers on his laptop or water bottle? Pins on his backpack?”

Patton shook his head. “They’re, like, super empty. He doesn’t really do anything that tells people about his personality. His outfits are usually really plain, like I said, and everything. It’s weird, because he’s got such a distinct personality, and he really doesn’t seem like someone who’d leave his stuff unpersonalized. It’s like he’s afraid of something, or something.” Patton was silent for a moment, chewing on the inside of his cheek. “But then, he seems kind of nervous around me in general.” He looked away, a worried expression crossing his face.

“Maybe he likes you back?” Roman suggested. “Plenty of people get nervous around their crushes.”

Patton shook his head quickly. “No, I don’t think that’s it. I think I know what the thing worrying him is. I just… don’t know how to talk about it with him.”

“You do realize you’re being super vague here, right?” Roman queried; he couldn’t parse what on earth Patton meant by that, but his curiosity was piqued.

“I know.” Patton bit his lip. “I, um, don’t want to talk about it yet, I think. It’s complicated. I don’t think it would be fair to him to discuss it with others.”

“Oh.” Roman did his best to hide his disappointment. “Okay, that’s fine. How do you know him?”

His attempt to change the subject didn’t seem to ease Patton’s discomfort, based on the way his shoulders drew up even closer to his ears. “...Kind of from a class we’re in together?” he answered after a long pause. “We’re partners on a group project.”

“Sounds like a meet cute to me,” Roman said, searching again for new lines of questioning that would hopefully not be as upsetting for mysterious and unknown reasons. “What do you like about him?”

Patton lit up. “He’s really sweet, actually. It takes some looking to see it, because he’s got a lot of walls up, but you can tell he’s really thoughtful and observant, and he’s really warming up to me, I think—he’s being much nicer to me than most people, and I’m starting to think he really means it and wants to be nice to me just to be nice, not because he feels like he has to.”

“Well, of course he’d be nice to you, you’re like the sweetest person I’ve met in my life,” Roman said, feeling bewildered by this line of reasoning.

“No, I—oh, nevermind. I was worried he wasn’t genuinely being nice for a while, but I’m really starting to think he means it, is my point. Anyway, he’s really smart—he’s so good at like, you know, synthesizing stuff? He’s really good at finding the information we need and paraphrasing it in a way that works really well for our project. I have such a hard time wording things how I want, you know? So it’s awesome that he can do that so well. And he’s good at puns, too! He tries not to laugh, but he scrunches his nose up and gets really red cheeks so you can always tell, it’s really cute. And one time I was trying to explain to our professor he was wrong about something, but I was kind of having trouble getting my point across, the teacher didn’t seem to get it, and he just spoke up and pointed out exactly where the misunderstanding was. It was really nice and reassuring of him. He just seems really protective of people he cares about, you know?”

“He sounds great, Pat!” Roman agreed.

Patton nodded, giving an excited little wiggle.

The brief silence was broken by a quiet crunching noise. Roman looked to his other side to see Logan, eyes fixed on the movie, who had worked their way through a solid third of the popcorn.

“Oh, you fiend!” Roman cried, seizing the popcorn bowl back since he was sitting in the middle.

“What?” Logan defended himself exasperatedly. “You two seemed to be handling that just fine! I like this movie! Neither of you asked for the popcorn back! What did I do?”

“...Okay, technically nothing,” Roman admitted after considering this defense and finding it to be unfortunately solid and covering all of Logan’s bases. God, they knew him too well. “But we are supposed to be doing this as a group.”

Logan rolled his eyes. “Fine. Patton, he’s probably queer. You should ask him out and see what happens. Happy now?”

“Wh—how are you saying that with such confidence?” Roman demanded.

“Which part?”

“That he’s queer. I agree Patton should definitely ask him out at the first opportunity, we just hadn’t gotten to that yet.”

“I mean, I can’t say for sure, but being the only person in a classroom to react to a queer joke is pretty telling.” Logan shrugged. “Any other relevant details?”

Patton shrugged. “I don’t know. Janus—that’s the guy—he doesn’t talk about himself very much—”

“Hold on, Janus?” Logan interrupted. “Lanky white guy? Constantly acts like he’s just swallowed a lemon? Kind of a twink? Looks incredibly uncomfortable in his own skin? Growing his hair out?”

“Yeah, that sounds about right,” Patton admitted. “You could maybe be nicer about him, though.”

“I’m sure I could,” Logan said, seeming unconcerned. “Yeah, I know him. He’s queer, I’m pretty sure he’s compatible with you. No idea if he’d be interested, or frankly what you see in him, but go for it.”

“Wh—how do you know him?” Roman demanded. “I feel left out now!”

“We met at the Aspec—at a pride center identity group. Also he’s Remus’s roommate’s best friend. They’re practically attached at the hip. I’m surprised you haven’t met him yet, with how much you hang out over there lately.”

Virgil had a best friend? A best friend here, at college? That was news. Surprisingly unpleasant news—Roman wasn’t quite sure why. It wasn’t like he disliked Virgil to the point of not wanting them to have friends! Of course not! Frankly, he was glad to hear the tiny emo had a social life. It just kind of stung that this was the first time he was hearing about someone evidently so important to Virgil. And not even from hir own mouth. He’d kind of thought they were closer than that. That he’d have learned basic facts about what and who was important to Virgil by now. Learning otherwise was a remarkably unpleasant experience.

Logan took another handful of popcorn out of the bowl in Roman’s hands, startling Roman out of his thoughts.

“Stop!” he yelped. “I want some, too!”

“You have more if this bag runs out,” Logan pointed out. “I have some extra popcorn in my dorm too. And you’ve been holding out on me with your curry powder.” He popped another handful into his mouth and crossed his arms.

“If you just asked my parents, you could have some of your own! They’d even give you the recipe! Now share with Patton!” Roman leaned himself and the popcorn bowl away from Logan, trying not to laugh.

“I don’t mind,” Patton put in. “It’s very tasty, but I’m not as attached as Logan is.”

“No, you have to take some, he’s been hogging it,” Roman insisted.

“I don’t mind!” Patton insisted. Roman shoved the bowl in his face, and he relented and took a handful.

“Let Logan have some more now,” Patton said, gently pushing the bowl back into Roman’s lap.

“Thank you,” Logan said primly when Roman relented.

“You’re welcome!” Patton said with an easy smile. The smile fell away after a moment, though, and he looked thoughtful. “I’m not sure about asking Janus out, though,” he said hesitantly.

“Why not?” Roman asked. “You really sound interested in him! What have you got to lose?”

“It’s more complicated than that,” Patton said, worrying the edge of a blanket between his fingers. “I’m not sure if he’d be comfortable with it. I don’t—I don’t know.” He looked away. “I’ll figure it out, I guess.” He looked back at Roman and Logan, forcing a smile onto his face. “Thank you both for the advice, though. And for listening.”

“Patton—” Roman began, concerned.

Patton shook his head. “Let’s just watch the movie now, okay? Really. Thank you. But I’m good for now. Can I have some more popcorn?”

Logan wordlessly held out the bowl and Roman allowed himself to be mostly distracted by Big Hero Six. He felt better when Patton leaned on his shoulder, a genuine smile on his face as he watched Fred goofing around on the screen. Whatever the issue Patton was dealing with was, at least it didn’t seem big enough to keep bothering him after putting it aside.

***

“So,” Remus said with an evil grin.

“Whatever it is, I don’t want to know,” Roman said. They were both sprawled on Remus’s bed, sharing earbuds as Remus swiped through TikTok.

“It’s nothing!” Remus protested.

Roman gave him a suspicious look. Remus’s face was entirely too innocent.

“I was just wondering when you’re going to get your shit together and do something about your crush on Virgil,” Remus said, the evil grin back.

“My what?” Roman did a double take. “I—I don’t have a crush on Virgil, we barely even get along!”

Remus rolled his eyes. “Oh, please. The tension between you two is so high I’m surprised something hasn’t snapped yet. And you definitely have a crush.”

“I do not!” Roman grabbed Remus’s pillow and threw it in his brother’s face. “We’re barely even friends!”

Remus shoved the pillow aside and rested his chin on top of it, making a skeptical face.

“I mean, are they really pretty? Sure. But that’s not a crush,” Roman insisted.

“Mmhm. Okay. So what makes it not a crush?” Remus pressed.

“I—well—” Roman stammered, flustered by the very question.

“Uh-huh.”

“No!” Roman snapped, voice cracking. “I just—that’s a hard question to answer right off the bat! How do you define a crush? It’s just not, okay?”

“I mean, I define crush as, like…” Remus paused. “Huh. Okay. You have a point, or whatever. I guess… a crush is, like—huh. No. Okay. You’re distracting me. I’m teasing you about your crush that you totally do have, we are not veering off topic.”

“I do not have a crush on Virgil! I just want to be his friend! Okay?”

Remus made a skeptical face. “Sure, whatever you say. I’m still going to tease you about it.”

“Oh, whenever you find that third soulmate, I am getting so much revenge.”

“Eh.” Remus shrugged. “Like, go for it, but I dunno if you’ll have that much time to tease me about it before we get together. You know? Like, think about me and Logan.”

“Logan knew you were soulmates for two and a half years before you got togeth—”

“Yeah, because he’s smart, but I didn’t figure it out until thirty minutes before we got together. Or like. Thirty minutes before we started talking about it. You know this.”

Roman crossed his arms. This was unfortunately a very good point; the day Remus had figured out that Logan was one of his soulmates had been a pretty memorable one even for Roman. Logan and the twins had grown up next door to each other, and had been best friends since elementary school. One Saturday morning near the end of their senior year of high school, Remus had bolted upright in bed while Roman was brushing his teeth, blurted out something nigh incomprehensible, and taken off at a sprint; he’d slammed the front door behind himself on his way out and he hadn’t answered any of Roman’s texts for two hours, only to show up by sprinting back into the house and screaming at the top of his lungs “Logan and I are soulmates!”

This had prompted a lot of confused questioning from Roman. He’d learned that yes, Remus and Logan were definitely soulmates; Logan had figured it out in sophomore year but hadn’t said anything; Remus had only just figured it out; yes, Logan was still aromantic; yes, Remus was still allo; no, neither of them felt like either of these facts was an issue; and Remus was very happy.

“We’re going on, like, a date, but platonic,” Remus had announced to him that day, bouncing on the balls of his feet. “I’m really excited, this is so cool! Who’d have thought, right? Logan and me!”

Roman had smiled and tried hard to just be happy for Remus and Logan, and not jealous of them. Particularly about two months later, when they’d made their relationship official and become queerplatonic partners. He was happy for them! He was!

But Remus had never cared that much about finding his soulmates. Roman had. It didn’t feel fair. Remus, who didn’t care, got two soulmates, and one of them was literally his childhood best friend. Roman, who’d been daydreaming about finding his soulmate since he was too little to remember, and had learned just about everything there was to know about how soulbonds worked, seemed to have just the usual one soulmate. His soulbond hadn’t even developed until he was sixteen—admittedly, that was an expected side effect of the puberty blockers he’d been on for a few years before he’d been approved for T, but he was still salty about it. And when his soulbond finally had developed and he’d started tuning into his soulmate’s dreams, they were so creepy! He wasn’t sure he’d had a single souldream so far that wasn’t a nightmare. They ruined his sleep for the night whenever he got one. It was irritating and frustrating and all sorts of bad things; he’d actually cried over it a couple of times, not that anyone but Remus knew.

But as annoying as it was for him, it had to be worse for his poor soulmate—if these nightmares were what was making it through the soulbond, he could only imagine how much worse their nightly sleep must be.

He hoped he’d find them soon. He was ready for a proper romance, thank you very much!

[death-burst]

My thoughts about His Dark Materials

I’ve finished volume 3 last week, and I wanted to come back to the earlier discussion now that I have a fresh memory of the conclusion.

And ooh boy, I don’t like that conclusion, but not for the reasons mentioned by star-anise that started this discussion. I’ll start with my own criticism, and go back to that after.

[Obviously, SPOILER WARNING, proceed at your own risk.]

So, in the last 30 pages or so, we get:

a reiteration in even clearer terms of that “servants have dog daemons” point, that a daemon represents a person “true” nature. We already had a branch of the previous discussion on that topic, and we all agreed it was bad. Some where doubting that it was what Pullman actually meant, or whether it was only some unreliable narrator’s opinion. Well, for me there’s no doubt anymore. At least, there’s a vague suggestion that it isn’t definitely fixed and that people could, theoretically, change, they just choose not to, so you know, silver lining and all that....

Lyra coming into her prophesied role as the “new Eve” and somehow preventing all the Dust from exiting the universe through the huge gap in reality caused by the Church’s bomb, without any explanation of what made her special or even how it works at all, and without any real story need for that, since the (good) Angels would close it soon after anyway. It’s just that, looping back to the foreshadowed prophecy, only for the sake of meeting expectations, but I find that it actually weakens the story a lot.

a confirmation that Angels are dumb-asses, and have been so for the last 300 years. For real, if it was so important, why did they need to ask Will specifically, and not any of the previous knife holder, how to close the portals?

and not only are they dumb, they are also mean for no reason to the kids that JUST FRICKING SAVED THE UNIVERSE, no big deal. Seriously, I’m not opposed to bad/sad endings when they are credible, but this one, gosh, I’m so angry, there was probably a dozen workarounds to have a happy ending instead, based on the books own premises. Just to name a few:

They are closing dozens of portals that have stayed open for hundred of years, but really, the universe can only withstand A SINGLE portal, strict limit, I promise. No way you can keep two portals open, no way. Yeah, I don’t believe you...

OK, OK, let’s admit we can’t keep two portals open. But we can open the second one briefly every 5 years or so to visit each other’s world, right? No? It will create a specter? AND HOW IS THAT A PROBLEM EXACTLY?!! You just fricking dealt with thousands of specters that accumulated and grew over a couple centuries. One specter every five years is peanuts. Just send a couple Angels to get rid of it as soon as it is spawned, and voilà! Or a squad of volunteer ghosts. With the number of people dying over 5 years over the whole multiverse, I’m sure you’ll get more than enough volunteers. You bunch of ungrateful pricks, you owe this two kids at least that much, and probably a thousand times more.

And what about the “natural” portals, those not created by the knife that do not leak Dust? Oh, you will close them to make sure I don’t waste my life looking for them? WHAT THE HECK!! Alternate proposition: I promise I won’t look for them myself, YOU look for them, AS YOU INTENDED TO ANYWAY, and instead of closing them, you map them, and if you finally find a route from my world to hers, you come back and tell me? Yeah, you know, try to find a solution instead of squashing hope and all that? I think someone needs to read Pandora’s myth again, the importance of hope and all that...

(sorry for all the caps. i’m REALLY *that* angry)

Also, in the grand explanation of everything at the end, we get told that the big fight between “good” and “evil” is actually a fight between wisdom and ignorance, with a flat affirmation that half the universe, including all organized religions, was fighting on the side of ignorance, to keep people dumb. I’m more or less an atheist myself, and even me, I feel so offended by such a rash statement. That’s such a narrow understanding of the origin and role of religion, how can you write a whole three books about it and come to such a broad and coarse conclusion? Get some nuance, dammit.

..... Probably the worst ending I’ve read to a series that I enjoyed.

Because yes, I enjoyed most of the series, it’s just the conclusion that is so awfully terrible, but the vast majority of the story is interesting and entertaining.

Despite all that, I still disagree with star-anise original post, at least as far as the books are concerned (she was watching the recent TV series). For reference, it’s here: https://star-anise.tumblr.com/post/190192181909/im-trying-to-watch-his-dark-materials-but

If I understood the gist of her argument correctly, she’s annoyed by Dust’s sudden change of behavior during adolescence, the claim "that puberty is the most pivotal time for a child developmentally”, to quote a later post in the thread. But in my interpretation, the books are NOT claiming that. I don’t know what the TV series did with that topic, but numerous points in the books point to a more continuous transition:

Lyra is always able to interact with Dust, through the alethiometer or Dr. Malone’s devices, even before she meets Will and fall in love or has sex.

The kids become gradually more aware of the Specters, it’s not a sudden shift. And they become fully vulnerable to them before their Daemons take a fixed form, showing that even before that they already have accumulated a lot of Dust.

There are various remarks that Dust accumulates slowly overtime. It says that young children have very little Dust (compared to adult), but not none at all. And it also says that old and wise persons have much more Dust than the average adult, evidence that Dust keeps accumulating over the whole life, it’s not just one change happening at puberty and/or with the discovery of sex/love.

Daemons do go through a sudden change of behavior at puberty, but a) it doesn’t seem related to Dust directly, and b) it’s implied they can still change, they just don’t want to. This sudden change is not “encoded into the physics of the universe”, it’s just a statistical trend, not an absolute truth.

On the other hand, supporting star-anise argument, there is one such change, but it’s about the mulefa, not the humans, so I’m not really sure what to make of it. The mulefa physically cannot accumulate Dust unless/until they absorb oil from the wheel trees, and so their youngsters do get through an abrupt transition when they get big enough to start using wheels, which is the closest equivalent for them of puberty. But once again, no link with love or sex.

At no point whatsoever is Dust presented as related to Sin, except by Miss Coulter and Lyra’s world’s Church, which are obviously bad guys and misguided.

So personally, I don’t fault the books on that topic, and I find that they present, on that topic specifically, a nuanced and interesting take. I think a more legitimate criticism in that direction is about the “special nature” of humans compared to animals, as if humans aren’t just another kind of animal, as if animals are not conscious at all. They are, and we should respect that more, and treat animals with more compassion in general. Animals should attract Dust too, even if at a slower rate.

(Also, I’m still annoyed by that “Daemon as true nature” bit...)

[dirtdoesntneedluck]

Second Futurama Script

I wrote a script for an episode of Futurama a couple month’s back, inspired by writing that first one I started a second, got stuck on where to go and have only a few weeks back finished it off. I don’t think it’s as good as the first (I don’t know if either are that good, but still) however I thought I’d share it regardless. Feel free to criticize it, all opinions are welcome, as long as it’s not a personal attack then I’m fine with it, we all have opinions on episodes of the actual show, so why should this be different?

Be warned, it’s 30 pages on Word so it’s a long read, it’s your choice, you don’t have to. For reference: Italics are description, bold is who’s talking, normal is dialogue, (Under name is the way the line is delivered).

(Disclaimer: I obviously don’t own the rights to Futurama, this is a non-profit idea and simply a writing exercise to keep me amused, so I believe it falls within fair use, please don’t sue! If you want me to take it down, I will.)

OPENING CREDITS

CAPTION: (Typing onto the screen) HELP! THEY CAUGH- (Previous text is deleted, replaced by-) NOTHING TO READ HERE. CARRY ON.

BILLBOARD CARTOON: ‘The Laughing Fish’ from ‘Batman: The Animated Series’.

EXT. PLANET EXPRESS – DAY

Low shot on the building as several ships fly overhead.

INT. LOUNGE, PLANET EXPRESS – SAME TIME

The crew, minus Farnsworth, are sat watching the TV, but not really paying attention as they do other things

ON THE TV: Morbo and Linda present the news.

MORBO

-Sending prices skyrocketing again.

LINDA

(laughs)

I’m just glad I’m rich.

(pause)

Turning to more serious news and the late night robbery of a liquor store by a swarthy Latin bandit.

Everyone perks up and turns to Bender, who shrugs.

BENDER

Nope, wasn’t me.

They’re still staring.

BENDER

What? I can’t commit every robbery. I have a lot of scams to run.

Farnsworth enters. Fry turns off the TV.

FARNSWORTH

(happy)

Horrifying and terrible news everyone! We’re all certain to be killed!

The crew cheer, it takes them a few moments to separate the tone from the words.

LEELA

Wait a second, what do you mean killed?

FARNSWORTH

That’s right, killed.

FRY

Well, I can’t complain, I did live a thousand years.

FARNSWORTH

Alternatively however it may simply be-

(happy)

Good news everybody!

(normal)

And no one will be killed at all.

Bender tuts, half way through engraving a headstone, it reads: ZOIDBERG, FISH MONSTER, UNBELOVED BY ALL.

BENDER

Make your mind up, which is it?

FARNSWORTH

It all depends on the success, or lack thereof, of your latest mission. A delivery to the warring planets of Alpha-Zeta and Beta-Omega. Two delightful little places located in the cheerfully named ‘Murder Zone’.

FRY

What bit am I supposed to understand here?

FARNSWORTH

Only that they exist a mere 100 miles apart and have been fighting over a perceived slight perhaps committed by one, or the other of them, sometime in the past. No ship has ever gone directly between the two planets, as anyone having been to either is labelled a threat by both. Luckily, however, I’ve prepared disguises for you and the ship so you can blend in on both planets.

FRY

Cool, disguises, I understood that part. Can I be a pirate?

FARNSWORTH

No.

LEELA

What are we delivering?

FARNSWORTH

Both planets are being delivered the same items, parts for there large manufacturing plants. So it’s vitally important you don’t give them the wrong package, otherwise you’ll be killed on the spot.

LEELA

(confused)

Okay?

AMY

Wait, I thought you said we’d all be killed?

FARNSWORTH

No, only Fry, Leela and Bender will be killed.

HERMES

So what about us?

FARNSWORTH

We’re all going to take Nibbler for a walk, get ice-cream and have a generally pleasant time.

Amy, Zoidberg and Hermes cheer as they exit the room with Nibbler and Farnsworth. Fry, Leela and Bender sit, annoyed.

BENDER

Well this sucks.

They continue to sit. Farnsworth pops his head back in.

FARNSWORTH

Well, what are you waiting for? I’m not paying you not to be killed.

EXT. PLANET EXPRESS SHIP – LATER

The ship idles a little way off from the twin planets of Alpha-Zeta (left) and Beta-Omega (right). A-Z seems to be covered in a thick smoke, where as B-O is incredibly clean, you can practical spot the people on the street.

INT. CARGO BAY, PLANET EXPRESS SHIP – SAME TIME

Leela, Bender and Fry stand in the middle of the room, between the sets of clothes and packages for both planets. A-Z’s are very old looking, like something from Victorian London. B-O’s look is ultra modern, all clean and sharp edges.

LEELA

Alright gang these are the disguises we’ll have to wear. Alpha-Zeta first then Beta-Omega.

Fry picks up a pair of trousers from B-O’s side, there baggy, the only item from there outfit which doesn’t seem to fit.

FRY

Look at these clothes, they sure are goofy.

LEELA

Fry, it’s not for us to judge what these people wear, besides they aren’t goofy, there just weird.

BENDER

(laughs)

Well, I’m just glad I don’t have to wear anything.

LEELA

Actually Bender, the professor said we had to re-spray you for both planets.

BENDER

(grumbles)

Fine.

Fry picks up a giant stencil and wraps it around Bender, Leela then uses spray paint to fill the gaps.

Completed the stencil comes off and Bender is now covered by a lot of light brown markings, he looks in a mirror.

BENDER

Well I still look better than you two do.

Leela and Fry have changed in the interim, it’s all drab grey’s and browns. Leela wears a flat cap that covers her hair and Fry has some raggedy fingerless gloves on. Both of them, despite the nature of there top half and shoes, are wearing very thin black trousers.

FRY

That’s for sure, this cotton is real rough.

Fry itches, quite uncomfortable.

LEELA (O.S)

Don’t forget your moustache, Fry.

Leela throws Fry and identical moustache to the one she’s wearing. It’s a thick brushed early 1900’s design.

FRY

What’s this for?

LEELA

The air quality down there stinks and so does the planet, these will help us to breathe and release a blast of strawberry every few minutes.

Fry has put his moustache on. Can smell strawberry’s.

FRY

Oh, nice.

LEELA

Bender you’ll-

Bender has already equipped a stick on handlebar moustache.

BENDER

Way ahead of ya.

LEELA

Alright, that just leaves the ship.

Leela press a button on the side of the hull, which...

EXT. PLANET EXPRESS SHIP – CONTINUOUS

...sees tiny little lights pop up out of the ship. They turn on creating a hologram. In this case the ship looks like a steam punk version of itself.

It heads towards A-Z.

EXT. SIDE STREET, A-Z – A LITTLE WHILE LATER

The ship carefully lands. The buildings here are made of stone and sit very close together. There longer than they are tall.

EXT. STREETS, A-Z – A FEW MINUTES LATER

Fry carries the package as he, Leela and Bender stride on. They seem to fit in well, aside from the trousers.

Smoke hangs just over head height. It means the residents of this planet, who are quite tall, have developed a forward lean, always looking down.

FRY

I’ve never seen so much smoke.

BENDER

Then some more won’t matter.

Bender lights his cigar and puffs out yet more smoke.

LEELA

Bender, you shouldn’t be revelling in the plight of these downtrodden people, you should be trying to help them.

BENDER

I don’t see you leading the charge.

LEELA

Hey, I give to charity you know.

FRY

You do? Which one?

LEELA

How should I know?

EXT. A-Z MANAFACTURING PLANT – A FEW MINUTES LATER

A large sign hangs above the plant: APLHA-ZETA MANUFACTURING CONCERN (NOT AFFILIATED WITH MOM CORP.). Only ‘not’ is in red whereas the rest of the words are in white.

Fry, Leela and Bender wander through the area until they reach the main door, it’s oddly short.

Leela presses the call button on the intercom.

LEELA

(male voice)

Planet Express.

Its a few seconds and then the door opens, they enter.

INT. CORRIDOR, A-Z MANAFACTURING PLANT – CONTINUOUS

Leela and Fry instantly have to lean forwards like the locals. The corridor is low because they’ve no need for the extra head space. All Bender has done is shorten his legs.

FRY

I think my spine just compressed.

LEELA

Mine too. Let’s get this over quick.

BENDER

(laughing)

You guys are always proving why your the infer-

Bender walks right into a low hanging light.

BENDER

Ow!

RECEPTION ROOM – MOMENTS LATER

The trio emerge into a slightly taller area. A woman sits behind a desk, is instantly suspicious of them.

RECEPTIONIST

You’re the delivery crew?

FRY

Sure are.

RECEPTIONIST

Right.

She’s unconvinced for some reason, exits the room into the office behind it.

LEELA

(low)

What’s that about?

BENDER

Fry, you idiot!

FRY

What?

BENDER

I dunno, do I need an excuse?

The receptionist returns, false smile on her face.

RECEPTIONIST

Please enter.

Leela leads Fry and Bender into the office.

OFFICE – CONTINUOUS

The office is again slightly taller. The height of a room here defines the occupant’s social standing.

The plant manager stands behind his desk. He watches as figures approach the frosted window that separates this room from the reception area.

PLANT MANAGER

So, you’re the delivery crew?

FRY

(slightly worried)

Sure are.

PLANT MANAGER

Uh huh.

Fry steps forwards and hands over the package.

PLANT MANAGER

(suspicious)

Let’s see, shall we?

The manager opens the package, is surprised to find it’s exactly what he wanted.

PLANT MANAGER

How about that. It’s what I asked for.

BENDER

Of course it is. What were you expecting?

Bender’s comment is ignored. The manager sinks to his desk and uses the phone, an old rotary model, talks very softly into it. The figures behind the frosted glass leave.

The manager gets back up.

PLANT MANAGER

Alright then, cheerio.

EXT. MANUFACTURING PLANT – A FEW MINUTES LATER

Fry, Leela and Bender walk out of the door and back into the smoke ridden area they were before. Bender extends his legs back to normal height.

LEELA

That was odd, right?

FRY

Definitely.

BENDER

They sure didn’t trust us.

LEELA

Maybe the professor was right. We’d better be careful.

They head back towards the ship, aware that there receiving a lot of attention.

EXT. PLANET EXPRESS SHIP – LATER

The ship fly’s from A-Z and stops a safe distance away. Off goes the first holographic design, replaced by the second, the ship now looks ultra modern, sleek and clean.

INT. CARGO BAY, PLANET EXPRESS SHIP – SAME TIME

Fry and Leela have changed outfits. Again, the trousers don’t seem to fit. As for their hair it’s pushed way up to a point, like a cone.

Bender is cleaned and then re-sprayed in the same manner as before. This time he looks a little like R2-D2.

EXT. METROPOLITAN CITY, B-O – A LITTLE LATER

The ship has no trouble landing, spaces are plentiful.

STREETS – LATER

Fry, Leela and Bender wander through the city. Its inhabitants are tall like their neighbours only they stand straight, making them almost eleven foot. It’s not only their height but their gaze, everyone looks up.

FRY

I wonder what it’s like being that tall?

Bender extends his legs up, reaching the height of the people around him. Its a few seconds before he comes back down, tear in his eye.

BENDER

It’s great.

LEELA

Did you see the building up there?

He extends again, comes down crying.

BENDER

Next left.

EXT. B-O MANUFACTURING PLANT – MINUTES LATER

This place is taller than any skyscraper on earth and it’s not even the biggest building here. It has almost the same sign to the first plant: BETA-OMEGA MANUFACTURING CONCERN (NOT AFFILIATED WITH MOM CORP.).

Leela, Fry and Bender approach the door. The intercom is too high for Leela to reach.

LEELA

Bender?

Bender lowers himself. Leela gets on his shoulders and then holds on as he extends his legs.

Fry is left alone for a few moments, can’t quite here the conversation but it’s the same as before.

Leela and Bender come back down hugging and crying.

LEELA

Fry, it’s great up there.

The door opens.

INT. CORRIDOR, MANUFACTURING PLANT – MOMENTS LATER

This plant doesn’t look like it needs any parts, it’s almost fully automated. The crew head down the huge corridor.

RECEPTION AREA – MOMENTS LATER

Fry, Leela and Bender enter. A male receptionist sits at his desk. Looks down his nose to see them.

MALE RECEPTIONIST

You’re the delivery crew?

The tone is the same as before, the crew share a look.

LEELA

Sure are.

MALE RECEPTIONIST

A moment.

The receptionist exits into the office behind.

LEELA

So-

FRY

Yeah-

BENDER

Right-

There on the same uneasy page as the receptionist re-emerges.

MALE RECEPTIONIST

Enter, please.

OFFICE – MOMENTS LATER

A very tall room. The manager sits at his desk to make it easier for him to inspect Fry, Leela and Bender.

MANAGER

Well, it seems you’re the delivery crew.

LEELA

(strong)

Sure are.

MANAGER

All right then.

Fry walks the package over. To the tall manager it’s very small. He opens it keenly, looks stunned.

MANAGER

The supplies?

BENDER

(to Fry and Leela)

Jeez, what do these people think there getting?

MANAGER

If you’d stay there a moment.

It’s a nervous few moments as they wait. The manager speaks hush tones into the phone.

The doors open, two security guards enter. The trio gulp.

EXT. PLANET EXPRESS SHIP – LATER

The ship, normal livery, heads away from the two planets.

INT. COCKPIT, PLANET EXPRESS SHIP – SAME TIME

The cork of a champagne bottle is popped. Leela pours the drink into three separate glasses. She takes one, Fry and Bender the others. They wear two medals each, clean gold and dirty bronze.

LEELA

Heroes! Can you believe it!?

FRY

I knew that psychic wasn’t lying!

BENDER

Yet another achievement for me to add to the list.

They clink glasses, down the champagne.

Leela picks up a copy of the B-O paper, the headline reads: PACKAGE DELIVERY COMPANY DELIVERS PEACE BETWEEN PLANETS. The picture is of the crew standing with the leaders of the planets A-Z and B-O, who shake hands.

LEELA

I can’t wait until everyone knows!

FRY

Finally I can make my nephew proud of me.

BENDER

This calls for only one thing.

Fry and Leela wait to know what that is. Bender opens his compartment and takes out two more bottles of champagne.

BENDER

MORE CHAMPAGNE!

Bender shakes both bottles until the corks pop and the champagne flies out.

INT. OFFICE, MOM CORP. – LATER THAT DAY

A robot butler pours more champagne into Mom’s glass. She soaks in a bubble bath, watching a TV the size of a cinema screen. On her left is a case of dodo eggs, she picks one out, dips it in caviar and then eats it like an apple.

ON THE TV: Morbo and Linda are reporting the news.

MORBO

Surprising news just coming in from the ‘Murder Zone’, Linda?

MOM

I feel richer already.

Single on Linda, the picture from the paper beside her.

LINDA

That’s right, Morbo. It seems a package delivery crew has brokered a peace deal between warring planet’s Alpha-Zeta and Beta-Omega. This has-

MOM

(screaming)

WALT! GET ME FARNSWORTH!

WALT (O.S)

Philo or Hubert?

MOM

HUBERT!!

EXT. PLANET EXPRESS – THE NEXT DAY

The ship arrives rather sloppily into dock.

INT. LANDING BAY, PLANET EXPRESS – MOMENTS LATER

Noise can be heard before the crew comes down the stairs. All three are drunk. Eight bottles of champagne will do that to a person. Their arrival is something of a farce.

When they do focus, slightly, they find a furious Farnsworth standing waiting for them.

FRY

Good news, professor?

FARNSWORTH

No, not good news at all. The opposite in fact. Bad news.

LEELA

(laughing)

Bad news everyone?

FARNSWORTH

Yes. You’re all fired.

That sobered them a little.

BENDER

Fired?

Mom enters, bucket of water in each hand.

MOM

FIRED!

She throws the water over Fry, Leela and Bender.

READY AREA – LATER

Leela and Fry are still soaking, though drying off with towels. They sit with Bender as Mom strides angrily around the room. Farnsworth watches on.

MOM

What exactly did you numbskulls do to broker peace?

FRY

Nothing, we just delivered a package to each planet.

MOM

Nonsense, you must have done more than that?

LEELA

No, we really didn’t.

MOM

Hubert! What did you tell them to do?

FARNSWORTH

Nothing.

Mom picks up the B-O paper, rolls it to hit Farnsworth with. Unfurls it to show him to front again.

MOM

This isn’t nothing!

Farnsworth looks at the picture. With Mom stressing him he really pays attention. Something clicks.

FARNSWORTH

Which planet did you go to second?

LEELA

Beta-Omega.

FARNSWORTH

(of picture)

And this is what you wore to it?

LEELA

Yes?

FARNSWORTH

God lord! You were wearing the trousers for Alpha-Zeta on Beta-Omega!

FRY

That’s how they were laid out?

FARNSWORTH

It was?

LEELA

Yes.

FARNSWORTH

My word. With you wearing the wrong trousers on each planet, they both must have thought you were ambassadors from the other. The resulting niceness fostered an atmosphere of peace between them.

MOM

Destroying my manufacturing concerns on both.

FRY

Don’t you make, like, a billion dollars a minute anyway?

MOM

Not since you screwed everything up I don’t!

BENDER

Then just start another scam. I’ve got a great one going with-

Mom takes out a remote, points it at Bender, presses a button to shock him.

MOM

Enough!

LEELA

What exactly do you want from us?

MOM

To re-start that war!

LEELA

And why would we do that? Both planets are going to be much better off without it.

Mom shocks Bender again.

BENDER

Shut up, Leela!

MOM

You’re going to do it because if you don’t I’ll not only destroy this company but the lives of everyone who works here!

FRY

(shocked)

Even Scruffy?

MOM

Especially Scruffy.

Scruffy, who’s been stood just out of shot the whole time, looks very concerned.

SCRUFFY

I reckon you kids better go cause war.

He wanders off.

MOM

You have three days. Starting from two days ago.

FRY

(confused)

So we have?

MOM

ONE DAY, IDIOT!

Mom storms off.

FARNSWORTH

Okay, you heard the mean lady.

MOM (O.S)

AND SHE HEARD YOU!

FARNSWORTH

I’d better be going.

Farnsworth scurries away.

INT. FRY AND BENDER’S PLACE – LATER

Leela paces up and down the room. Fry sits nervously beside a far calmer Bender, who sips a beer.

LEELA

We are catastrophically boned.

FRY

Got that right, I don’t want to start a war.

BENDER

Why not? Plenty of money to be made from war.

LEELA

No Bender, no wars.

BENDER

Just a little one?

LEELA

No.

BENDER

Fine. Then I’ll guess we’ll just let Mom destroy our lives.

LEELA

We’re not doing that either.

FRY

Then what are we doing?

LEELA

I don’t know.

FRY

Why does Mom even want a war?

LEELA

That’s a good question. We should find out. She’s bound to have files we can steal.

BENDER

How? Mom has the best security out there?

FRY

It’d take some kind of thief to pull off that job.

BENDITO (O.S)

Perhaps I can help?

On a wire above them is BENDITO, a bending unit with a thin moustache and an eye patch covering a missing left eye. He drops down. He’s like a more suave Bender.

BENDER

Bendito! What are you doing here?

LEELA

Bender you know this bending unit?

BENDER

Are you kidding? Bendito’s my mortal enemy.

BENDITO

We’re also in the same book club.

FRY

Why are you here?

BENDITO

Bender scammed me. I came to even the score.

LEELA

Bender is this true?

BENDER

Do you even need to ask?

BENDITO

You cost me a grand total of three dollars.

From his compartment Bendito takes out the medals earned earlier.

BENDITO

These shall suffice as compensation.

FRY

Hey, those are my medals!

BENDITO

I found them in Bender’s room?

LEELA

Bender you stol-

(thinks about it)

Of course you did.

BENDITO

(handing medals to Fry)

My apologies.

BENDER

So, you gonna help us break into Mom Corp.?

BENDITO

Why should I?

BENDER

It’ll be fun.

BENDITO

I’ll do it.

INT. CAFE ACROSS FROM MOM CORP. – THAT NIGHT

Bender, Bendito, Fry and Leela occupy a window booth that looks out towards Mom’s. They plot the potential heist.

BENDITO

According to my source-

BENDER

“Source”? You mean the robot mafia?

BENDITO

(sighs)

Yes. The robot mafia.

(starting again)

According to them the system installed in the offices works on facial recognition. If we can fool them, by dressing up as Mom and her sons we’ll have a small window to hack the computer.

LEELA

How do we get in?

BENDITO

According to a different source-

BENDER

Elzar? Is it Elzar? Sometimes Elzar cooks there, you’re talking about Elzar, right? I know you know Elzar.

BENDITO

(louder sigh)

Yes, Bender. Elzar, I talked to Elzar! Any other questions?

The waitress passes by.

WAITRESS

Refill?

BENDITO

No.

A robot in the next booth turns round.

RANDOM ROBOT

What’s two times three?

BENDITO

Six.

FRY

Why does a robot need an eye patch, can’t you just replace your eye?

BENDITO

It’s a style choice.

(pauses waiting for more questions)

Any more questions?

BENDER

We’ll ask the questions here.

BENDITO

(even louder sigh)

Anyway. Elzar says there’s an express elevator exclusive to Mom. If we can convince the operator that Leela is Mom we can gain access to the penthouse.

FRY

I wanted to be Mom.

BENDITO

Leela is Mom. Bender is Larry. I’ll play Walt and Fry you’ll be Igner.

FRY

Igner?

BENDER

Larry?

LEELA

Fine with me.

BENDITO

Then it’s settled.

EXT. MOM CORP. – A LITTLE LATER

The group are now dressed as there respective characters. Leela wears sunglasses to cover her eye. Bender and Bendito are very obviously robots. Fry actually looks like Igner.

BENDER

At least if we get caught we’ll have funny mug shots.

FRY

There’s a relief.

LEELA

Will you two shut up?

BENDER

Someone’s already in character.

LEELA

What do you mean?

BENDER

Nothing, ‘Mom’.

They enter the building.

INT. FOYER, MOM CORP. – CONTINUOUS

This place is a lot busier then they were expecting. They walk as quickly as possible to the back and the waiting lift. A robot in a suit operates it.

LIFT ROBOT

Back already, Mom?

There are quick glances between each other, they’ve totally forgot to check if Mom was even out. Leela reacts fast.

LEELA

(sweet Mom)

Oh yes, uh, deary, we forgot the candies.

LIFT ROBOT

You and those candies.

The robot moves to let them into the lift, joins them.

LIFT

The doors shut. The five of them are closed in without the chance of escape, a most dangerous time. This is tempered somewhat by Bender whispering something about Leela being like Mom to Fry and Bendito, they chuckle to themselves.

Something else is said, the chuckles become laughs. Leela becomes annoyed. Turns.

LEELA

(mean Mom)

Will you knuckleheads knock that off?

Leela swings a slap that connects on the cheek of all three of them. Is oddly satisfied by it.

She turns back to see the Lift Robot minding his business.

LEELA

(sweet Mom)

Boy’s need discipline is what I always say.

LIFT ROBOT

Yes, Mom.

PENTHOUSE – MOMENTS LATER

The lift opens. All bar the lift robot flood out.

LEELA

(sweet Mom)

We’ll be but a minute.

The lift door shuts. Now they’re in the clear.

FRY

So, ouch.

LEELA

I’m starting to like being Mom.

BENDER

Already got the mood swings down.

He laughs, gets slapped by Leela.

BENDER

See?

She slaps him again.

OFFICE – A MINUTE LATER

The group are in the office. Bendito searches the computer without success. Fry watches the wall of security screens.

BENDITO

Nothing yet.

LEELA

Hurry up, who knows when she’ll be back.

Leela looks around, nervous, spots Bender rifling through a filing cabinet.

LEELA

Bender, what are you doing?

BENDER

I was trying to find my warranty but all I keep coming up with are replies to letters.

LEELA

Which letters?

She walks over and picks out a letter, it’s from Alpha-Zeta, dated a hundred years ago. She finds a different one, Beta-Omega, again, a hundred years old.

LEELA

Praise to Athena. These are replies from the two planets. Mom must have sent letters to them and started the war. We could expose her totally with these. Good work, Bender.

BENDER

Even when I not trying I’m a genius.

FRY

Hey look, it’s the people we’re dressed as.

ON A SECURITY SCREEN: Mom and her sons approach the lift.

BENDER

We gotta cheese it.

LEELA

How, we’re on the top floor?

FRY

Bendito-

They turn to find Bendito has left the office already.

PENTHOUSE

Fry, Leela and Bender emerge from the office to find Bendito slowly opening one of the windows. He turns, caught.

BENDITO

Oh, hi.

(pause)

So I can explain.

MOM (O.S)

Can you?

Exiting the lift are Mom, Larry, Igner and Walt.

MOM

(to Leela)

Well, well, it’s like looking in an ugly, one eyed mirror.

BENDITO

(taking offence)

How dare you.

MOM

Quiet, Bendito.

LEELA

It’s over Mom. We found the letters.

MOM

So I started a war so each side would buy equipment from me, who gives a crap? I’ve seen war start for a lot less.

(laughs)

How exactly are you going to leave with those letters anyway?

Fry, Leela and Bender look to one another, they have no idea. Leela catches Bendito edging towards the open window, spots his escape plan, a good old fashioned rope.

LEELA

I think the real question is. How are you going to catch us?

Leela rushes Fry and Bender to the window, together with a late reacting Bendito they grab the rope and begin to slide down it.

CUT BETWEEN PENTHOUSE AND EXT. MOM CORP.

Everyone is sliding down the rope at pace, but the building is huge, there not even a quarter way down.

FRY

(getting rope burn)

Ow, ow, ow, ow, ow.

Mom looks down from the window at them.

MOM

Idiots.

She unties the rope. It slackens.

LEELA

Um, guys.

Everyone looks as the rope passes them by.

FRY

That’s bad, right?

Everyone bar Leela starts screaming, she has to think fast.

LEELA

Everyone grab on to my legs.

They do. Leela slips through the Mom dress, still wearing her normal clothes beneath, and grabs the bottom of each side of it. It catches the air and becomes a makeshift parachute.

Mom stares at them as they float away.

MOM

What the crap? I didn’t know I could do that?

EXT. SKY – CONTINUOUS

Leela is barely clinging on to the dress, she’s being weighed down too much, it’s starting to affect the altitude.

LEELA

We’re too heavy.

FRY

(offended)

What are you trying to say?

BENDER

Wait, I have an idea.

Bender spots the roof of a building coming up. He kicks Bendito off of Leela’s leg. He drops.

BENDITO

(falling)

See you Thursday.

Bendito lands with a thud on the roof. The gang laugh as they begin to gain altitude.

EXT. PLANET EXPRESS – DAY

We whip around the building.

INT. LOUNGE, PLANET EXPRESS – SAME TIME

The whole crew sit around watching the news on TV.

MORBO

Mom stock took a dip today as letters emerged showing her to have set the war between Alpha-Zeta and Beta-Omega in motion almost a hundred years ago. However Mom stock trebled in value just hours later when war broke out between Sigma-Epsilon and Kappa-Tau.

Leela turns off the TV, disgusted.

LEELA

Typical, we stop one war just to cause another.

FRY

But at least it’s not the same war, right?

BENDER

The important thing is it’s not happening here.

FRY

Amen.

LEELA

Ugh.

CUT TO CREDITS

[space--cadet-glow]

Translation: “The Minish Cap” in German, Part 6: Meet Ezlo, the Talking Bird-Hat

Whilst on our quest to find the Minish, we find... A Minish. Sort of. Meet Ezlo, who is infinitely funnier in German than he is in English. Here is my translation of the German version of "The Minish Cap" to English!

My translation key: DT: „direct translation" (translated word for word) EQ: "English equivalent" (as in, as close to an English-sounding sentence as it's gonna get) DT/EQ: „"direct translation/English equivalent" (for when the DT is so similar to an EQ that it's practically English already) OE: "official English (translation as given in the European English version of "The Minish Cap")" (NOTE:) "anything I need to point out" (exactly what it says on the tin) BG: „backwards German" for the Minish language in reverse form

My translation work under the cut.

Ezelo: „Aua! Hört... He, hört doch auf!" DT: „Ow! Hear... Hey, cease that!" EQ: "Ow! Hey, quit that!" OE: "Ouch! Won't somebody stop them!?" (NOTE: Idiomatic, I think...)

Ezelo: „Autsch! Auaaa!!! Hilfe! Ist denn da niemand?!" DT: „Ouch! Owwww!!! Help! Is then there nobody?!" EQ: "Ouch! Owwww!!! Help! Is anybody there?!" OE: "Ow! Ow! Help... Somebody! Can't anybody hear me?"

Ezelo: „He! Du! Kleiner Mensh! Ja, du!!! Aua!" DT/EQ:  „"Hey! You! Little human! Yes, you!!! Ow!" OE: "Hey! Kid! You there! Ow!" (NOTE: Ezlo is called „Ezelo" in German.)

Ezelo: „He, du da! Guck nicht einfach nur zu... Autsch!" DT: „Hey, you there! Look not simply only to... Ouch!" EQ: "Hey, you there! Don't just look at... Ouch!" OE: "Hey! Don't just stand there! Do something!!!"

Ezelo: „Jetzt steh doch nicht untätig herum! So hilf mir doch!" DT: „Now stand but not idly around! So help (for) me nevertheless!" EQ: "Now, don't just stand around! Help me nevertheless!" OE: "What's wrong with you!? Do you like watching me take this abuse!? Help me!" (NOTE: Help is provided "for" somebody in German.)

Ezelo: „Puh! Das ist ja gerade noch mal gut gegangen." DT: „Phew! That is indeed just yet (softener) well went." EQ: "Phew! Well, that went well!" OE: "Phew! Well done! That was close." (NOTE: „mal" is used to soften the harshness of a sentence.)

Ezelo: „Na ja, ich wäre auch alleine mit denen fertig geworden. Apropos..." DT: „Well indeed, I would have also alone with (to) those finished become. By the way..." EQ: "Yes indeed, I could have been finished by them alone. By the way..." OE: "Not that I couldn't handle them myself. But that's beside the point!"

Ezelo: „Was macht ein Kind wie du ganz alleine hier im dunklen Wald?" DT: "What does a child like you all alone here in the dark forest? EQ: "What is a child like you doing here all alone in the dark forest?" OE: "What in the world is a lone child doing so deep in the woods?"

Ezelo: „Ach so... Ich verstehe." DT/EQ: „Oh so... I understand." OE: "Ho ho! I see."

Ezelo: „Minish?! Vaati?!" DT/EQ: "Minish?! Vaati?!" OE: "The... Picori you say? And Vaati?"

Ezleo: „Fluch?! Heiliges Schwert?!" DT/EQ: "Curse?! Holy Sword?!" OE: "Vaati cursed somebody? What? The sacred blade?!?"

Ezelo: „So ist das also! Ja, gewiss, ich habe dich verstanden." DT: „So is that so! Yes, certainly, I (have) you understood." EQ: "So, is that so! Yes, I certainly understood you." OE: "Is that so? I see, I see..." (NOTE: Ezlo's second sentence is in conversational past.)

Ezelo: „Es ist nämlich so, dass ich selbst auf Reisen bin, um einen Weg zu finden, wie man den Fluch des Hexenmeisters brechen kann. Man braucht also das..." DT: „It is namely so, that I even of travels am, in order a way to find, how one the curse of the sorcerer break can. One needs also that..." EQ: "You see, even I am traveling in order to find a way for how one can break the curse of the sorcerer. One also needs that..." OE: "You know, you and I have quite a lot in common. You see, I, too, am on a quest to break a curse of Vaati's." (NOTE: „Es ist nämlich so" can mean both "it is namely so" and "you see" as in interjection.)

Ezelo: „Heilige Schwert? Gut, dann werde ich mich dir anschließen." DT: „Holy sword? Good, then will I me (to) you connect." EQ: "Holy sword? Good, then I'll join you." OE: "And you say that reforging the sacred blade can break his curse, eh? Well, then you have found yourself a companion, my boy!"

Ezelo: „Mein Name ist Ezelo. Es freut mich, deine Bekanntschaft zu machen." DT: „My name is Ezelo. It pleases me, your acquaintance to make." EQ: "My name is Ezelo. It's a pleasure to make your acquaintance." OE: "My name is Ezlo. It's a pleasure to make your acquaintance."

Ezelo: „Warte! Warte doch mal!" DT: „Wait! Wait still (softener)!" EQ: "Wait! Wait a moment!" OE: "Wait! Wait, I say!" (NOTE: Even with the „mal", it's still idiomatic.)

Ezelo: „Renn doch nicht so, mein Kind!" DT: „Run yet not so, my child!" EQ: "Don't run so, my child!" OE: "You walk so quickly! Too quickly, in fact!"

Ezelo: „Kannst du nicht langsamer gehen?" DT: „Can you not slower go?" EQ: "Can't you go slower?" OE: "Can't you go any slower? Surely you've noticed that I have no legs..."

Ezelo: „Sieh mal, Kindchen. Wie soll ein kleiner Wicht wie ich je mit dir Schritt halten?" DT: „Look (softener), little child/kiddo. How shall a little wretch how I ever with to you keep in step?" EQ: "Look, little child/kiddo. How shall a little wretch such as me ever keep in step with you?" OE: "Boy! Take a good look at me! Do you really think I can walk that fast!" (NOTE: Originally, I planned to translate Ezlo's nickname for Link as "little child", but I realised that "kiddo" not only works better, but is a dimunitive just like „Kindchen" is!)

Ezelo: „Also wirklich!" DT: „So really!" EQ: "Honestly!" OE: "Augh!" (NOTE: Idiomatic again. Now that I think about it, most of what Ezlo says is idiomatic...)

Ezelo: „Was für eine absolut unmögliche Göre du doch bist!" DT: „What for an absolute impossible brat you still are!" EQ: "What an absolutely impossible brat you still are!" OE: "If it isn't one thing, it's another! You are a troublesome boy!" (NOTE: Just realised that it could have come out as, "What an absolutely impossible brat you are, indeed!")

Ezelo: „Viel besser! Wenn ich hier oben bin, kannst du mir nicht mehr devonlaufen." DT: „Much better! When I here overhead am, can you (for) me not more out-run." EQ: "Much better! When I am overhead here, you cannot out-run me anymore." OE: "There! Now, you can't possibly leave me behind."

Ezelo: „Ah! Sehr hübsche Aussicht hier!" DT/EQ: „"Ah! Very nice/pretty view here!" OE: "My... It's quite comfortable up here. More comfortable than it looks, surely."

Ezelo: „Und außerdem äußerst bequem für mich!" DT/EQ: „"And furthermore, extremely convenient for me!" OE: "And much easier on me!"

Ezelo: „Hm? Was grummelst du da? Los, auf geht's, zackizacki!" DT: „Hm? What grumble you there? Go, let's go, make it snappy!" EQ: "Hm? What are you grumbling there? Go, let's go, make it snappy!" OE: "Hey! Quit your squirming! Can't you sit still? See! There..." (NOTE: Idiomatic. „Zackizacki" just sounds so cute.)

Ezelo: „Ach, ehe ich es vergesse!" DT: „Oh, before I it forget!" EQ: "Oh, before I forget!" OE: "Yes, yes! That's it. Much better."

Ezelo: „Für kleine Kinder wie dich gibt es allerlei Dinge, die sie nicht verstehen." DT: „For small child such as yourself there are various things, that they not understand." EQ: "For small children such as yourself, there are various things that they don't understand." OE: "Now, I suppose a boy like you still has much to learn about the world."

Ezelo: „Drücke in solchen Momenten einfach SELECT! Ich helfe dir dann." DT: „Press in such moments easy SELECT! I help (for) you then." EQ: "Easily press SELECT in such moments. I'll help you then." OE: "If you ever need my insight, press SELECT. I'll be happy to help!"

Ezelo: „Herrje! Das wird anstrengend!" DT: „Oh, dear! This will exhausting!" EQ: "Oh, dear! This will be exhausting!" OE: "Ah, such a hopeless child..." (NOTE: Alternate translation would be "Oh, dear! This is exhausting!")

Ezelo: „Kindchen! Ich verrate dir etwas." DT: „Kiddo! I reveal to you something." EQ: "Kiddo! Let me reveal something to you." OE: "Hold on for a moment, my boy! We've stumbled across something important!"

Ezelo: „Die Welt der Minish ist sehr klein. Du kannst die Minish nicht treffen," DT: „The World of the Minish is very small. You can the Minish not meet," EQ: "The World of the Minish is very small. You cannot meet the Minish," OE: "The world of the Minish is very small. You're far too big to meet them now."

Ezelo: „solange du groß bist." DT: „so long you big are." EQ: "as long as you are big." OE: "Eh? Who are the Minish? Ah, yes! Silly me! Allow me to explain..."

(OE Ezlo proceeds to completely hi-jack the plot with two text boxes that aren't present in the German version.) [OE: "You humans call them "Picori," but they refer to themselves as the Minish!"] [OE: "Strange how, in the world of humans, only this forest kept that name..."] (NOTE: I think this is because the OE version added a plot twist where the tiny people are referred to with two names: "Picori" and "Minish". I also think it's to justify the title of "The MINISH Cap". The dual-names are completely lost in any version, German included, that calls them just "Minish" or "Picori".)

Ezelo: „Schau mal dort! Sieht aus wie ein normaler Baumstumpf, nicht?" DT: „Look (softener) there! Looks like a normal tree-stump, not?" EQ: "Look there! Looks like a normal tree-stump, no?" OE: "Anyhow, deep in the forest they built a tiny village, where many now live." (NOTE: Idiomatic.)

Ezelo: „Ja, ja, aber!" DT/EQ: „"Yes, yes, but!" OE: "But if we're to enter the village, we'll have to make you a touch smaller first."

Ezelo: „Dieser Baumstumpf ist ein geheimes Portal, das die Menschen vor langer..." DT: „This tree-stump is a covertly Portal, that the humans before long..." EQ: "This tree-stump is a covertly Portal that the humans a long..." OE: "Look at that! At first glance, it appears to be a mere stump, yes?"

Ezelo: „...Zeit erschaffen haben, um ihre Körpergröße ändern zu können!" DT: „...Time created have, in order their body size alter to can!" EQ: "...time ago have created in order to be able to alter their body size!" OE: "No! That stump is a portal used by people long ago to adjust their size!"

Ezelo: „Wenn ich dabei bin, kannst du dort so klein werden wie ein Minish!" DT: „When I nearby am, can you there so small become how a Minish!" EQ: "When I am nearby, you can become as small as a Minish!" OE: "With my help, you can use it to shrink down to Minish size."

Ezelo: „Wenn du auf dem Baumstumpf R drückst, wirst du klein." DT: „When you on the tree-stump R press, become you small." EQ: "When you press R on the tree-stump, you'll become small." OE: "Just stand on the stump and press R to shrink."

Ezelo: „Um wieder groß zu werden, drückst du erneut R." DT: „In order again big to become, press you anew R." EQ: "In order to become big again, press R anew." OE: "To return to normal, stand next to the stump and press R."

Ezelo: „Also los, ab geht die Post!" DT/EQ: „"So go, off you go!" OE: "Get me up there, and we'll give it a try." (NOTE: That was hilariously idiomatic.)

Ezelo: „Jetzt siehst du die Welt mit den Augen eines Minish!" DT: „Now see you the world with the eyes (of) a Minish!" EQ: "Now you see the world with the eyes of a Minish!" OE: "Welcome to the world through the eyes of the Minish!"

Ezelo: „Und, war das nicht nett von mir? Du brauchst dich nicht zu bedanken!" DT: „And, was that not nice of me? You need you not to thank!" EQ: "And was that not nice of me? You don't need to thank me!" OE: "Now, aren't you glad you saved me? No need to thank me, though!"

Ezelo: „Solche Portale gibt es hier und da, in verschiedenster Gestalt." DT: „Such Portals are there here and there, in different shapes/forms." EQ: "There are such Portals here and there, in different shapes/forms." OE: "Portals that reduce your size are all around, in different shapes and sizes."

Ezelo: „Um wieder groß zu werden, stell dich neben den Baumstumpf, und drücke R!" DT: „In order again big to become, place yourself beside the tree-stump, and press R!" EQ: "In order to become big again, place yourself beside the tree-stump, and press R!" OE: "If you want to return to normal, stand next to a portal and press R."

Ezelo: „Du musst aufpassen, denn wenn du klein bist, lauern viele Gefahren!" DT: „You must watch out, then when you small are, lurk many dangers!" EQ: "You must watch out, because when you are small, many dangers lurk!" OE: "But there is one thing you must know: being Minish-sized is full of dangers!"

Ezelo: „Wenn du groß bist, ist es eine kleine Pfütze, wenn du klein bist, ein Meer." DT: „When you big are, it is a small puddle, when you small are, a sea." EQ: "When you are big, it is a small puddle; when you are small, a sea." OE: "Mere puddles at your normal size are bottomless swamps to the Minish."

Ezelo: „Wenn dir was passiert, geht es mir auch an den Kragen. Also aufgepasst!" DT: "If to you what/something happens, goes it for me also on the collar. So watch out!" EQ: "If something happens to you, I'm in for it, too. So watch out!" OE: "And as your companion, if anything bad happens to you, it happens to me, too! So proceed with caution, my lad! If not for your own sake, but for my own!" (NOTE: „an den Kragen" is an idiom akin to "in for it", as in "in trouble".)

[askfreddiemercury]

Freeside is a slum that surrounds New Vegas, it’s inhabited by junkies and drunk people almost all the time. Some points of interest are The King’s School of Impersonation, the Atomic Wrangler casino, and Silver Rush, a place for all your energy weapon needs.

But we decide to visit the Old Mormon Fort first, this is the home of The Followers of the Apocalypse, these people try and help those in need in and around Freeside with what they can. And someone I need to be on good terms with.

Boone: What are we doing here?

Freddie: I’m just exploring, Boone, I want to get a feel for Freeside before we find a way into the strip to find Benny.

Boone: We’re gonna help the people here, right?

Freddie: Yes, absolutely.

But not long after we get attacked by muggers! They don’t last very long against us so after dealing with them we can continue to make our way to the oldest place standing in Freeside.

~~~~~

Walking inside the walled fort there’s a pretty large camp set up inside, a flag with the Follower’s logo on it a cross inside a circle, tents all around the camp, and a sandbag barricade in front. We all take a look around and greet the people, I make my way to the southwestern tent to greet a man with blonde hair.

Freddie: Hello.

He turns around, holy moly.

Arcade: Hi. If you're looking for medical help, try the other doctors. I'm just a researcher. Not even a particularly good one.

I shake my head and focus.

Freddie: What kind of research?

Arcade: Oh, you know. Finding alternative treatments for common illnesses and injuries. Stimpaks out of barrel cacti and other fantastic improbabilities. As far as fruitless wastes of time go, it's quite noble in its aims.

Freddie: What’s the goal?

Arcade: For the past hundred years or so, the Followers have managed to get by using salvaged medical supplies from the Old World. But the side effect of medical success is that more people live longer. Funny how that works.

He then looks sad.

Arcade: Eventually, we'll run out of hospitals to loot. We need new ways to produce those supplies. Or maybe old ways, if this research goes anywhere.

Freddie: What kinds of illnesses and injuries?

Arcade: Cuts, lacerations, broken bones. Infections resulting from all of the above. Common cold, influenza. Take your pick. There are plenty of ways to die out here, and most of them, surprisingly, don't have anything to do with war. Just common human fragility.

Freddie: You don't sound too enthusiastic about it.

I tilt my head as he pushes up his glasses.

Arcade: I'm enthusiastic about helping people, but nihil novi sub sole.

Freddie: Nihi-what?

Arcade: Oh. Sorry. "There is nothing new under the sun." If agave and mesquite were that miraculous, the locals would have figured it out a few thousand years ago.

This guy is starting to sound like someone in the Legion.

Freddie: Isn't that the language that Caesar's Legion speaks?

Arcade: Caesar can cite Cato to suit his purpose. Many people have spoken Latin. Some of them were quite pleasant. It's unfortunate that the language is now associated with the gentlemen across the river.

Wow, this guy is so smart and so handsome. No wait, I have to be serious here. Ahem.

Freddie: Where did you learn that?

Arcade: Not from the Legion, if that's what you're getting at. Books. Sheet music. Gladiator movie holotapes. Bits and pieces here and there. The Followers have extensive libraries, but we all draw water from the same old well. Even Caesar.

Freddie: So why do you do research instead of providing medical assistance?

Arcade: Not all Followers are "people persons." Besides, someone needs to do research. I have no problem with Julie sticking me back here. Out of sight, out of mind. There are worse things one can be, though I do admit, it is a bit boring. Though it has a noble goal, I don't think this research will yield much fruit. No pun intended.

Freddie: Well Arcade, do you and the Followers need any help?

Arcade: Me, specifically? No. I'm sure Julie Farkas does, though. Lab coat, pointy hair. Answers to the name "Julie Farkas," strangely enough.

Freddie: Why don't you come with me?

Arcade: No offense intended, but why should I go anywhere with you?

Time to work your magic, Freddie.

[Confirmed Bachelor] Freddie: I need a good-looking doctor to help take care of me in the big, bad wasteland.

With that, he laughs and places a hand over his glasses. I got him.

Arcade: Overt flirtation will get you everywhere, you know. On a slightly more serious note, if you're interested in helping out with the troubles plaguing Freeside, I can come with you. Just don't do anything obnoxious, like trying to help Caesar's Legion, and we should be fine. Understood?

Freddie: I’d never help the Legion, my other companion would have my head if I did especially after everything I did for him. After I get what was taken from me back from some guy on the strip, I plan on terrorizing the Legion just like they do us.

Arcade: Heh, I don’t think the Legion is going to be scared of you. Unless you take out Caesar and his legate, Lanius. But seeing as you’re asking me to come with you. You aren’t going to be doing that any time soon. Don’t get too cocky now.

When I go tell Boone the good news about Arcade, I can’t help but notice that he’s staring down ED-E. Does he have a problem with him? Maybe he’s seen ED-E before.

Freddie: Hey, Arcade, I can’t help notice that you seem to have a problem with ED-E here, what’s up?

Arcade: it just seems a bit twitchy. Some of these robots, you look at them the wrong way, don’t screw in a vacuum tube right… The next thing you know you’re a pile of ash on the floor and someone’s stepping out of a vertibird to sweep your remains into a Nuka-Cola bottle.

Freddie: Oooo-kay, I’ll keep my eye on him.

Arcade: Safety first. That’s all I’m saying.

Freddie: Let’s get going then.

~~~~~

We all head southwest towards the gate until an old man stops us.

Old Ben: You look new to Freeside, so here’s a little advice, friend. Don’t go past the South Gate greeter without talking to it first.

Freddie: Going past it seems rude, why wouldn’t I want to go past the greeter?

Old Ben: Those bots are programmed to vaporize anyone who enters the fenced-in area without authorization from the greeter.

Freddie: Thanks for the advice.

He smiles and walks away towards a campfire near the gate. Let’s see what this robot says. I walk to the Securitron Gatekeeper.

Securitron Gatekeeper: Submit to a credit check or present your passport before proceeding to the gate. Trespassers will be shot.

Freddie: Credit check? What’s that for?

Securitron Gatekeeper: Admission to the Strip requires an official passport or proof that you are carrying the required minimum balance.

Freddie: What’s the minimum balance?

Securitron Gatekeeper: 2,000 caps.

Freddie: 2,000 caps?! I don’t have that kind of cash! Uh, what else can I do?

Securitron Gatekeeper: If you are unable to meet the minimum balance requirement, an official passport is an acceptable alternative.

But after telling me about the passport he doesn’t say where I can get one, wow thanks robot. The gang takes a step back.

Arcade: I heard of a shop called “Mick and Ralph’s” who sells things you can’t buy anywhere else.

Freddie: You think I can buy an unofficial official passport from them?

Arcade: Who’s to say?

Arcade tries to act very sly about it, after all, I did flirt with him so he could join my team because he wasn’t convinced I was good enough to travel with. Guess I must just have a thing for doctors. Or researchers, whatever he is. Lab coat people.

~~~~~

Ralph: If you’re looking for guns, talk to Mick. Otherwise, I’ve got a nice selection of general supplies.

Freddie: Do you offer any other services?

Ralph: I only offer services if The King gives the okay. Impress him and we can talk.

I’ll do whatever the King’s have in store for me another time, maybe I can get the passport out of this guy in a different way.

[Speech 50] Freddie: A resource fellow such as yourself must have something on the side.

[Succeeded] Ralph: All right. Yeah, I’ve got a little side business going, but what I am about to share with you does not leave this room, eh? Over the years, I’ve gradually perfected my craft to the point of perfection. No one can distinguish between my work and the real thing. What I am referring to is a passport. If you’ve got the caps, I can whip up a Strip passport which will fool even the most well-trained eye.

Freddie: Ah, now I see why you want to keep this low key.

Ralph: Hey, if you’re interested and have the caps, they go for 500. Any less and it ain’t worth the risk of getting caught. What do you say? You game?

You’ve gotta be kidding me… Looks like I’ll have to barter with him.

[Barter 50] Freddie: No way your material and expenses require that. How about half?

[Succeeded] Ralph: Hah! I like your style, kid, but the best I can do is meet you halfway. 375 caps, and we can call it a deal.

He says with much enthusiasm.

Freddie: 375 works great. Okay, I’ll take one.

I hand over the caps and he hands over the passport. Sweet! I bid Mick and Ralph goodbye and make the way back to gate.

[Passport] Freddie: I’ve got a passport.

Securitron Gatekeeper: Thank you, sir. You may proceed.

With that, we can finally open the main gate to New Vegas.

~~~~~

Before I can stare at New Vegas in awe, I’m approached by a familiar face.

Victor: Howdy, pardner! You’ve come a far piece, haven’t you? Welcome to New Vegas!

What the hell is this guy’s deal?! Why is he everywhere I go?!

Boone: Why is this robot following us?

Freddie: He’s the one who dug me out of my grave after all. What are you doing here?

Victor: Consider me your personal welcome wagon! Now hear this - the head honcho of New Vegas, Mr. House, is itching to make your acquaintance.

Arcade: Did he just say Mr. House?

Freddie: It seems like you pop up everywhere.

Victor: Aw shucks, pardner. I suppose it can’t hurt to let you in on my little secret! Old Victor wouldn’t be much use stuck inside just one Securitron! No, I can move from one to another with the snap of a finger! Pretty nice trick, ain’t it? Just don’t ask me how I do it, because I don’t know!

Freddie: All right, I’ll go meet Mr. House right now.

Victor: Yeehaw, pardner! That’s the spirit. He’ll be waiting for you.

He quickly makes his way to the front of the Lucky 38 casino and I follow behind him.

Victor: Boss is waiting for ya upstairs, so get a move on!

A massive gate behind him opens up and we all walk on inside.

[donnnoir]

Austin, Texas                                                                         June 15, 2019

Well on to the crux of the argument; at least by installments….

Or so it seems, now if I can spew this out on a more regular basis we will be getting somewhere.  Now as previous noted I suspect rather than a purely chronological order that I will be bouncing around quite a bit.  Because no matter how I would try I would no doubt have to constantly go back and amend any attempt at some birth to present presentation.  Besides I am not sure I could make such an endeavor worthy of you the reader’s time.  Overall I consider the majority of Life to be boring to mundane at best; into which are punctuated moments and or events that go far beyond the pale of what could possibly be part of the norm of a conservative Life.  Understanding your time is immensely valuable let us begin….

Over the years whenever I have attempted to share some of the uniqueness of the events and the accompanying knowledge associated there to. Since for a long time within Popular Culture we enjoyed and endured the TV series “The X-files”.  Seeking context and relevance to our social experience, I have asked many a person if they were familiar with the series and if so.  I am sure you have noticed the poster above Mulder’s desk in the basement of the FBI’s headquarters.  The poster with a flying saucer between some trees. The caption on the poster reads “I want to Believe”.  Because of the popularity of the series this poster and that statement have become almost Iconic.  Well as a matter of fact a good friend of mine took that photograph.  His name was Paul Villa.  I meet and knew him while he lived in New Mexico, in a little town south of Albuquerque. He was a very genuine sort of individual, the kind of man that the statement “salt of the Earth” could be sincerely applied.  Her earn his daily bread as a fabricator or if you prefer as a wielder. Back in those days, this was in the ‘70’s, within the supposed community of the UFO Phenomena were individuals who were known as contactees.  Unlike the group commonly referred to as abductees, these persons via one means or another were contacted, approached and either as part of a short period of association or as part of an ongoing relationship would be involved in a dialogue or variety of ongoing communications with beings not associated with the human population on the surface of the Earth.  Paul was one such individual.  During those years I was fortunate enough to have met several such persons.  Most were if nothing else true believers; a few struck me as being at best misguided to being charlatans.  But of all these individuals Paul was the most genuine and sincere, a man of character.  He never tried to make a profit from his experiences nor did he ever feel comfortable being the center of attention.  The particular photograph used in the poster is actually one of a group or series of photographs taken at that location and time frame.  As memory severs me it is one of the group of like a dozen to twenty pictures of that particular flying saucer at that time and location. Paul never copyrighted any of his pictures, or anything else in association with this association with these visitors.  As a consequence many of his pictures have been used in movies and books by others.  Paul, himself would have condoned and appreciated the dissemination of these.  If you had ever run into him as he was picking up his photographs from the developer; and had asked for a copy of the pictures.  He would gladly do so for the price that the developer charged him for copies.  He often said that this “friends”, those that visited him in their flying saucers wanted him to more openly show the pictures and discuss the elements of what he and them discussed.  

Recently I YouTubed Paul’s name and lo and behold if there weren’t more than a couple video spots giving a brief discussion about my friend. In all honesty I only viewed two of these, an although they do a fairly good job of offering to the public a view of Paul that is objective and honest.  I do take exception to the volume of material they cite him as having had.  I recall on my visits that he had substantially more than the narrators of either video gave him credit.  As to photo-albums containing pictures of various flying saucers, space ships, observation vehicles, sampling drones, alien landscapes, phenomena, living dinosaurs and much much more these numbered in the hundreds of albums packed full of various pictures devoted to this hobby, shall we say.  Now in immediate approximate association to these were voluminous numbers of spiral notebooks.   Hahahah….. why spiral notebooks?  Well it should be quite obvious actually, in his dialogues with the different and varying persons from elsewhere.  How does one accomplish such a feat.  The new age crowd would have us all believe that some light or telepathic communication from the “superior” being would provide the solution.  According to Paul the affair was much more mundane than all that hype.  Yes, some could simply talk in a language he understood.  However, since among themselves speech is unnecessary, their mouths are used for other things.  The process of speaking was difficult for the vast majority.  Yet wishing to dialogue; the concept of writing is not limited to the constraints of physical aptitude of the one.  It is easy enough to learn the symbols or if you prefer pictography necessary to carry on a intelligent conversation, or as intelligent as could be presumed.  Now, I meet Paul in 1973, I was thirteen years old.  Yes I was a precocious young man, however.  My introduction to Paul was facilitated by Bill Miller my friend and employer under whom I was apprenticing as a silversmith.  Bill had for some time been Paul’s friend.  So I enjoyed the benefits of their association.  It also afforded me the opportunity to peruse the large library of spiral notebooks and a few of the other artifacts Paul had on open display in his living room. I should also note here that I was acquainted with the fact that Paul would limit access to his hobby depending on who was his guest.  I also was made aware that certain photographs and or artifacts would only be shown to persons he was instructed to do so with by his “friends”.  Thus I was aware I did not have full unlimited access to what was in Paul’s possession.   This may sound odd or suspicious to some; sounds rather sensible and practical to me.  

I read many kinds of documents in my visits to Paul’s home.  Some were written to JPL or some similar quasi governmental agency or contractors.  Usually concerning developments or design flaws within any given space program or vehicle.  An as always there were the spiral notebooks, to occupy my attention.  As a general rule from what was described to me, Paul would have this overwhelming sense he needed to drive somewhere.  He would just drive out beyond the urban sprawl ultimately he would end up in a remote location where he would have an encounter of one kind or another.  He was encouraged to bring his camera and take photographs.  As these encounters came with some degree of regularity and so would the conversations; he soon learned to keep a notebook to write down questions of one kind or another in anticipation of these.  From what I could tell he usually had a dozen to a couple dozen questions ready and waiting between encounters. Sometimes a line of questioning would continue on into a at large discussion, though usually not.  Much of the material I read comes and goes in my memory of events, there are a couple of notable exceptions….

The most notable exception concerned the Flood, as in the Biblical Flood of Noah.  Among a variety of questions Paul had written down the question; where did the water for Noah’s Flood come from?  The written response was simple and succinct; Mars.  Now you the reader if perhaps you are unaware, but at the time the accepted scientific stated fact was that there was NO water on Mars.  That the observable polar caps were actually frozen CO2, common dry ice.  This was taught at all levels of academia (though there was a very small group that knew otherwise; a story for another installment in my narrations if you will) from elementary schools to universities.  I thought it intriguing and filed it away mentally.  At this point may I say that though I have always wondered of the short falls, mistakes and disinformation contained within what is presented as our collective histories and of scientific note.  I like most everyone generally accepted what I was taught in our institutions of education, all be it with more then a grain of salt.  As I discovered more and more of the Truth of the matter, I abandoned these illusions and lies only keeping current so as to maintain relevance in society and even simple conversations.  Presently as the consequence of these divergent realities presses down upon all of us, I as of late no longer share my understanding from the perspective of mere food for thought, or an alternative belief system; all the while being politely accommodating of the false or failed paradigms other hold. It is a disservice to my fellow men and women to feign such a posture for the sensibilities of those who refuse to question what is before them.  Thus upon meeting I fully acknowledge and realize that my “crazy coefficient” is ostensibly high. Any one who takes a moment to share what Life has given us, usually gives me the benefit of the doubt.  An as has been the case for the majority of my Life others shall always call me “crazy”.  Which isn’t purely a bad thing!  

As we fast forward to the present; we now know that Mars once was a great water planet.  In fact it seems it had vast oceans and water in larger proportions than does our Earth.  Which bates the question of where did it all go?  Before science made these “discoveries”; I have long believed such.  Including that the water for Noah’s Flood did in fact come from Mars.  I shall leave you with that Fact to ponder.  Because believe it or not we shall be revisiting this subject and many others, so we shall have a rich WTF content….

[bensaunderschp-blog]

Ben Saunders Creative Honours Project Critical Diary

For our creative honours project this year, we were tasked with 

I very quickly came to a decision on the form my project would take, that being a concept album based around F. Scott Fitzgerald’s great American novel The Great Gatsby. My band had already started work on a composition inspired by the work entitled Buchanan Street, and when presented with the opportunity to do an ambitious creative project I thought it would be an excellent idea to build upon that to create an entire concept album. This also tied into my dissertation subject of what makes a concept album successful. I chose The Great Gatsby because it is such a rich text full of strong themes and fleshed out characters. Gatsby is about optimism, hope, the American dream, a man who builds an empire and amasses huge wealth in pursuit of his goal, before it is all cut down and destroyed by the reality of life and the underlying theme that nobody is really pure and true, we all have our dark sides, and even Gatsby, the apparent protagonist, is selfish in pursuit of happiness on his own terms, and blind to how his joy would affect others. This provides seemingly endless inspiration for music and lyrics as one can both draw on one’s own experiences regarding unrequited love, loss, disappointed and disillusionment, while also looking at things from the perspective of the characters and events depicted within the book, the two views hopefully working to support one another.

Taking shape

Shortly after deciding what I wanted to do for my creative honours project, I went to the pub with my long-time collaborator, lyric writer and vocalist Mark Shankland in order to outline a general game plan for how we were going to accomplish our task, as well as running the idea by him to make sure he was up for it. He was, and quickly we decided not to attempt to re-tell the book necessarily, but to use it as a springboard for our own ideas and use its structure as a guideline. As the project developed over the coming months, the album actually became much more of an adaptation of the book than we had originally intended, because we found such inspiration from various events and quotes from the story, and our album follows the general curve of the narrative quite closely. Our goal of making sure that the album was enjoyable on its own terms, not requiring pre-knowledge of The Great Gatsby in order to be enjoyed and understood, was however stuck to, as I think the themes in the book and in our music are general enough to be appreciated outwith the context of the novel itself. We tried to keep things general and avoid just quoting large swathes of Fitzgerald’s writing, never referring to anybody by name or giving exact play-by-play retellings of sections of the story. Again, as the project progressed we ended up quoting or paraphrasing directly from the novel more and more, partly because we thought some lines from the book were just stunning, partly because they said what we wanted to say, partly because it seemed the easiest and most logical thing to do. But most of all, we knew that we could stick to our idea of generality and enjoyment sans understanding of the novel, while also having things be more effective and offer deeper appreciation for people who are familiar with the text. To this end, phrases like “young and vulnerable” and “the green light” absolutely had to be included as these are staples of The Great Gatsby, and towards the end of the final track we actually included a line of dialogue from the most recent film adaptation of the story, but again it is kept general enough here that if you don’t know what movie the dialogue is from, it still makes sense and still hits the emotional chord it is going for, you just might appreciate it that little bit more if you have read the book or seen the film.

We knew early on that we wanted five to seven tracks for our album, aiming higher rather than lower, because a mere four tracks would be too short to really be called a concept “album”, and we knew that we really wanted to create something special and to a high standard. We also, however, didn’t want to give ourselves an impossible amount of work to do, and so decided six or seven tracks would be ideal, giving us enough time to work on them and hone them to be as good as they could be, rather than having to rush out ten lower quality compositions. In the end we capped ourselves at six songs as our writing deadline began to approach and we felt our time would be better spent developing what we had rather than trying to come up with something completely new. I would have liked to have done one more upbeat song both to pace the album better and to cover the narrative gap wherein Gatsby et al meet up and have their confrontation following the outing of he and Daisy’s affair, however time did not permit this, and perhaps this gap will be unperceivable by the audience.

Scheduling

We originally gave ourselves the five months from October to February to write, arrange and demo our work, planning to use the final two months of March and April to record, with everything being finished in plenty time before the hand-in on the 3rd of May. However, numerous roadblocks would get in our way and much stress would be laid upon us as our original timeline became harder and harder to stick to, and eventually fell out the window entirely. We were pretty slow to start, having various half-baked ideas here and there, but we didn’t really kick into gear until the new year, thinking we had plenty of time for our ideas to gestate and develop naturally. This was a mistake for which the blame rests entirely on us, but even our idea to really buckle down and get a move on following the Christmas break was not one that would go smoothly, to the degree that I was considering abandoning the collaborative aspect of the project altogether and continuing on myself, creating something that would be of a lower quality but would at least be actually finished in time for the hand-in. Setback after setback caused me to really think about whether or not this collaboration was going to work out, or if I should end it. I decided, though, that in the end our collaborative project would be a thousand times better than anything I could come up with myself, and the terrible stress of an unreliable collaborator was worth it for the end result. We originally planned to meet once a week, going home after each week to listen back to and ponder on what we had done each day. However, Mark fell ill on several occasions, something which could not be avoided unfortunately, so a number of dates fell by the wayside. Then, Mark had to miss two weeks because his uncle died and he had to deal with funeral arrangements and the like as well as his own personal grief, again completely unavoidable. Following this, his family whisked him away on a two-week holiday, and it was at this point I was starting to have serious doubts, and hammered home to Mark just how little time we had to get things done, and just how important this deadline was for me. He agreed to put in extra effort and try to go the extra mile to see our project come to fruition. However, a couple weeks into our accelerated work rate, tragedy struck again as his gran was diagnosed with dementia, and he had to take on a number of duties in order to care for her, missing one week because he was the only persona available to visit her, another because he had to help put the carpet in for her new closer-to-home living space, another because he had to help paint the walls, and another which culminated in a whopping two months of writing we simply could not do on the project. To make up for lost time we began meeting up two or three times every week, alternating three-hour sessions in Glasgow’s Carlton Studios where we would focus on vocal melodies, arrangement and structure, and much longer, up to five-hour sessions in my house where we would focus mainly on analysis and discussion of The Great Gatsby and the writing of lyrics. This immense crunch and the fear of the deadline actually led to us being extremely creative extremely quickly, and perhaps led to us actually generating higher quality work, although this would be very difficult to quantify. We did, however, complete all of the writing in record time, and to a degree we were largely satisfied with. There are a couple of lines here and there which I think could be better, and I would like to add a lot more overdubs and moments of interest and slightly different arrangements to a number of songs, but overall I think we have written something truly special here, and I am immensely proud of our work.

Recording

However, our original plan to finish all of the writing before recruiting a drummer and a bassist as well as a recording engineer and studio time etc in order to record our work to a high standard well in time for the deadline was completely scuppered by this horrific inability to stick to our writing deadline. As a result, we decided to completely eschew the idea of recording in a studio or even getting a live drummer, as recording has to be booked well in advance and takes a very long time, and we simply could not expect a drummer to become familiar enough with all of our material with its changing time signatures and tempos all over the place in the time allotted, to be able to perform it reliably to any degree of consistency or quality. Because of this, I began to look into re-amping guitars and finding higher quality drum VSTs, to enable myself to record, mix and master the album on my own. I had plenty of experience in recording demos and a couple of tracks myself, so was confident that if I found the right re-amping service and drum sample library I could craft a decent sounding, if not completely professional or totally polished sounding album myself. Of course, professionally recording everything would have been better, but I think I have managed to do a pretty serviceable job which is certainly of a high enough quality for the purposes of my hand-in, although we are absolutely intent on re-recording everything with proper musicians and real instruments, professionally, before officially releasing our work. We will also go back and potentially re-draft some of our lyrics, make the arrangements slightly more interesting, and maybe even write that final seventh song before entering the studio for real.

Expo

About a month before the deadline, we were required to do a short little presentation of our plans and what we had so far at an expo. At this point I only had some mostly-MIDI demos I had made in Logic, so I presented those alongside a short write-up of the project’s scope. I played some of these to my lecturers and we discussed my progress and goals. They remarked that they liked the ambition of my project and thought the music was sounding appropriately complex and just about there, but expressed concern at the fact that I had not started the recording process yet, and urged me to get a move one - something I with which I wholeheartedly concurred.

Evaluation

In conclusion, I think that me and my collaborator have produced a quite successful work, one that largely sticks to our goal of being inspired by The Great Gatsby, but not reliant on the listener’s familiarity with the source material in order to be appreciated as an album in itself. We lifted a little more directly from the book in terms of quotations and narrative structure than perhaps we originally intended, but we think this not only improves the work’s quality and cohesiveness from the perspective of a Gatsby fan, but also does not hinder the enjoyment of anybody unfamiliar with the work. Our album tackles the themes of hope, optimism, adventure, a new world, the American dream etc, before taking a slightly biographical stance on Gatsby and Daisy’s thoughts and feelings during certain relevant stages of their relationship, and finally deals the with darkness, foreboding, loneliness, and the shattering of the dream that permeates the story. We talk about how real life gets in the way of our fantasies, how everything falls apart in the end, how human nature is ultimately selfish, and how at the end of it all we feel lost, nowhere to go. Daisy and Gatsby’s yearning for each other and Daisy’s inability to leave her life behind and join him are addressed in Sins of the Father, as Gatsby’s meteoric rise to empty wealth is depicted in Destination, while Nick Carraway’s forward-looking boat journey is what inspires Land of the Free. Behind Dark Glasses touches on the thoughts and feelings of Daisy and Gatsby, or really any two lovers, realising that their relationship is not the bed of roses they expected it to be, with the woman being stand-offish and distant and the man wondering why. Wake Me Up uses the narrative moment of the death of Gatsby to talk more generally about the death of hope, the ultimate hollowness of everything and the erosion of the “American dream”. Buchanan Street acts as an epilogue to everything much in the way that Green Day’s Whatsername tops off their American Idiot album, reflecting on the events and core themes we just went over and looking forward to the next chapter in the story of our lives. In terms of adapting the themes, characters and ideas of The Great Gatsby, I think we did a wonderful job, with perhaps a few lines being a little clunky (any direct references to a “story” or “book”) and perhaps one more track being needed to really address every aspect of the story and round it off. In terms of being an enjoyable product in and of itself, I think we have also succeeded here as many of the themes addressed are universal, and the situations are depicted in ways that knowing what happens in the book isn’t required to understand what is happening in the song. The pacing of the album could be slightly better with one more upbeat track inserted between before or after Behind Dark Glasses, and of course the recording/mixing quality could be better, if we had had time to work with a professional recording engineer. We should have started work much earlier than we did and at a much faster pace initially in order to protect ourselves against inevitable setbacks such as the ones we experienced, although the ones we experienced were of a much larger number and much more inconvenient than we could have realistically planned for, I would say. Still, we have definitely learned to schedule things much better and work at a faster pace further ahead of any deadline we have, and now that we are in the swing of things creatively we hope to continue on, using what we have learned over the course of this project to continue being as creatively successful in the future.

[attraversiamo19]

Always

Well guys, here’s my first fanfic. I would love feedback if you take the time to read.

Thanks so much to @ereri-writing-prompts​ for the prompt and to @omglevixeren​ for reading through it.  I greatly appreciate it. <3

Read on AO3 or under the cut.

Rating: Teen And Up Audiences

Fandom: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan

Relationships: Levi/Eren Yeager

Additional Tags: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Angst, Fluff, Bittersweet, Older Levi (Shingeki no Kyojin), Older Eren Yeager, Memory Loss, Ereri Writing Prompts, I just want them to grow old together y'all, I promise it's not all sad

Summary:   Despite the trials of old age, Eren will be always be there for Levi. No matter what.

Eren knows that Levi doesn’t care what people think of him, not really.

He’s unapologetically himself and people who can’t tolerate that - or appreciate it, even - aren’t worth his time. But Levi does take pride in his appearance. Never understood teenagers who went into public without even pulling a brush through their hair, or people in the grocery store wearing their pajamas. It’s not vanity by any means, but it’s important to him that he looks put together.

Even after all these years, Levi still irons his pants.

Eren thinks it’s silly and often chastises him gently for it whenever he walks into the bedroom to find Levi setting up the ironing board.

“We’re old now. We get to walk around in wrinkled pants if we want to. It’s a privilege,” he would say with mock exasperation. And Levi would simply roll his eyes and nod and carry on with what he was doing.

They know each other far too well by now for Levi to let Eren’s words bother him. It has been almost 40 years, after all.

Eren drags himself up out of the recliner in the living room where he’s reading and shuffles toward the bathroom. It’s not a joke when they say you’ve gotta pee more often as an old guy. An older guy. Whatever.

Partway down the hallway though, he hesitates due to the smell of something burning. Concerned, he changes direction immediately and heads back to check the kitchen. They had toast that morning for breakfast, perhaps the toaster oven was left on and was burning up some crumbs.

The kitchen looks and smells normal. Eren frowns. “Levi? Do you smell something burning?” He calls down the hallway to their bedroom.

The sudden shrill beeping of the smoke detector from their bedroom confirms what Eren’s nose already knows.

“Shit.” Levi’s curse is quiet but still audible enough for Eren to hear the frustration in his voice. Alarmed, he moves quickly despite the ache in his muscles to the bedroom. Levi stands a few feet from the ironing board, silver hair drooping into his eyes and a horrified expression on his face.

Small flames lick up around the iron, which is laying down on a pair of what Eren assumes was, until about two minutes ago, slacks.

The fire is easy enough to put out, once Eren has snapped Levi into action and grabbed several towels from their bathroom to smother it.

When the flames are extinguished, Eren snags the back-scratcher next to their bed and taps the button on the smoke detector to silence it.

He turns to Levi. “What happened?” Eren asks, bewildered.

Levi sits on the edge of their bed, looking down at his hands wringing nervously in his lap. His brow is furrowed and he won’t meet Eren’s eyes.

“Nothing.” Levi glances up quickly at Eren. “It was nothing. I left the room for a minute to check something on the computer. It’s not a big deal.” Levi looks over to the ironing board to examine the damage and mutters, “Shit. This all needs to be replaced.”

Eren sits down beside him on the bed and places his left hand gently over Levi’s, still wringing in his lap. Levi’s hands stop moving.

“Levi,” Eren says quietly. “Look at me.”

Levi sighs deeply, then turns his face toward Eren.

Eren reaches up and pushes a bit of Levi’s hair out of his eyes. When Eren had first met him all those years ago, he had been struck by Levi’s eyes. A deep steel gray with a hint of blue that reminded Eren of the ocean on a stormy day.

Aside from some extra wrinkles around the edges, they’ve stayed exactly the same.

Eren is intimately acquainted with the intense range of emotion that Levi’s eyes communicate. Emotions that the casual observer would miss entirely. And right now…

Right now they’re haunted. Filled with embarrassment, with frustration.

With fear.

Eren’s heart hurts. Levi is the bravest person he’s ever met. His eyes should never be filled with fear like this. “Talk to me, sweetheart,” he says quietly.

Levi looks away from him, down at the floor, and pulls his hands from Eren’s. He begins to fidget with some piling on his bathrobe.

“This isn’t the first time,” he says, almost inaudible.

Eren stays silent, giving him the time to formulate the words.

“Last week I left water boiling on the stove. Was going to make noodles. Forgot about it. Completely scorched the pan when the water all boiled off.”

“When did this happen?” And how had he missed it?

“You were visiting Mikasa. I took care of it all before you got home,” Levi answers.

Eren just nods at this. They sit silently, Levi continuing to pick at his bathrobe and Eren utterly still, staring at a stain on the carpet that Levi has never been able to banish despite countless tries over the years.

How long has this been going on?

There had been little things, if Eren’s honest with himself.

Things like leaving the cap off the tube of toothpaste. Or forgetting to pick up coffee beans on a grocery run. Or the television being left on overnight when they’d talked repeatedly about saving money on the electricity bill.

Levi had always been so detail-oriented. So vigilant.

But just last week he had left the stove on when they left the house. And just a few nights ago the front door was left open overnight, when Levi had told Eren to go to sleep, he took care of it, don’t worry about it.

It’s true they’re both getting older, and Levi is ten years his senior. Technically no one is immune to aging and the forgetfulness that comes with it. It could happen to anyone.

But this isn’t just anyone.

This is Levi.

His Levi.

Eren finally breaks the silence, needs to reassure himself, reassure them both. “Maybe you’re just tired. You have been sleeping a lot more lately--”

“I’m not stupid Eren. I’ve never been this forgetful.”

“I know,” Eren says.

And Levi’s right. It’s always been Levi reminding Eren to pick up his clothes off the bathroom floor. Levi remembering to pick up a gift for Mikasa and Jean’s anniversary. Levi who would discreetly grab Eren’s wallet from the nightstand when they were on their way out the door, shoving it in his pocket and pulling it out with an amused smile the moment Eren realized he had forgotten it.

“What can I do?” Eren asks.

Levi scoffs at this. “Nothing. I just need to pay more attention to what I’m doing.”

Eren shakes his head, “There has to be some way I can help though…”

“You could just stick me in an old folk’s home and forget about me.”

“That’s never happening. Asshole.” Eren nudges Levi’s shoulder with his own, and Levi chuckles softly.

A few more moments of silence, then, “I don’t want you to have to care for me, Eren.”

Eren looks at him questiongly.

“I can’t…” Levi trails off. Sighs deeply. Then, steadily, “I can’t be a burden to you. I won’t.”

Eren actually smiles at this and laughs a little. Levi looks at him like he’s gone crazy. “What the hell is funny about this?”

“Levi, I have always cared for you. And I always will,” Eren says.

“You know that’s not what I mean.”

“Well it’s what I mean. I don’t care if you’re wandering around naked with your pants on your head. I’d never abandon you. And you’ll never be a burden.”

Levi stares at him.

Eren leans forward and plants a chaste kiss on Levi’s lips. “I love you.”

Levi refuses to see a doctor. Eren doesn’t push it, but he does do a lot of research about memory loss online. He refuses to google words like “dementia” and “Alzheimer’s” because that’s just ridiculous. Levi isn’t losing himself, and Eren sure as hell isn’t losing Levi.

The websites he finds recommend things that do help. Eren insists on being around when Levi is cooking, climbing up on things - still ironing, for god’s sake - anything potentially dangerous if he were to lose his train of thought.

Levi hates it, Eren knows he does, but Levi puts up with it; he’s learned over the years to accept help from someone he trusts.

They make a lot of lists now too: Grocery lists, morning routine lists, evening routine lists. Eren leaves sticky notes throughout the house, reminding Levi to turn off the stove, lock the front door.

Eren buys a white board for the wall in the kitchen so he can record his plans. That way Levi can always reference them if he gets confused.

They write notes to each other on the bathroom mirror with dry-erase markers, Levi in blue and Eren in green. “Don’t forget to move the clothes from the washer to the dryer!” “I won’t, you idiot.” “I love you!” “I love you too.”

Simple things. Because Levi’s not so far gone that he’s forgotten names or faces.

They spend time together each evening playing card games or chess, because the doctors all say that those kinds of activities are good for “flexing your brain muscles.” Levi, however, says that “flexing your brain muscles” is the most asinine thing he’s ever heard. So Eren uses the phrase as often as he can. Just to make Levi roll his eyes and curse under his breath.

Mikasa and Jean come over every Friday night and the four of them make dinner and watch a movie together. Sometimes Eren catches Levi staring off into the distance during the film, so he’ll grab his hand to place a kiss on the back of Levi’s palm and give him a smile. Trying to pull him back into the present.

Sometimes Levi smiles back at him. Sometimes he doesn’t.

“I forgot who Mikasa was tonight,” Levi says to Eren one Friday after Jean and Mikasa have gone home for the evening. They’re sitting side by side on the couch, Levi working on a sudoku puzzle and Eren reading a book.

Eren’s stomach clenches. He marks his page and sets his book down in his lap. Forces his tone to be neutral. “Mikasa is my sister.”

“I know that now,” Levi glances up at him from his puzzle with annoyance, then flicks his eyes back down. “But for a few minutes... I just stared at her and wondered who she was and why she was here in our house.”

He keeps his eyes down on his puzzle, and Eren doesn’t respond right away. His mouth has gone dry.

Levi’s never been good at being vulnerable. At opening himself up, even to Eren. He’s gotten better over the years, but god, it must have taken a lot of courage for Levi to share this with him. Or, maybe courage is the wrong word.

Levi looks back up at him, searching Eren’s face. “I just thought you should know,” he says quietly with a shrug.

Eren doesn’t really know what to say to that. Not out loud, at least.

He meets Levi’s eyes again, and Levi gives him a small sad smile. Then he closes his puzzle book and silently scooches over on the couch until he’s pressed up against Eren and resting his head on Eren’s shoulder.

Eren leans down to kiss the shorter man lightly on the crown of his head and breathes in the scent of him. They’re going to be okay.

It’s not all sad smiles and nervous stomachs though.

“Eren!” Levi hollers from down the hall.

“Yeah?” Eren shouts back, hoisting himself painfully out of his chair and heading toward the sound of Levi’s voice. “Everything okay?”

“Just come back here please,” Levi responds, panic in his voice.

Eren’s expecting another fire, or worse. But as far as Eren knows, Levi was only doing laundry.

Well, he wasn’t wrong.

Levi is indeed standing in the laundry room. The washing machine is spewing out copious amounts of soap bubbles. They’ve pooled around Levi’s ankles, and they’re quickly growing into a mountain that is blocking Levi off from the doorway.

“I must’ve added soap instead of detergent…” Levi trails off, almost in a daze, before finally meeting Eren’s eyes with a horrified expression.

Eren glances down at the expanding onslaught of bubbles, then back at Levi. And he can’t help it. He tries, tries so hard to muffle the laughter that is beginning to spill out from behind the hand clamped over his mouth. But it’s no use.

Levi smiles then, because he knows Eren isn’t laughing at him. The sheer ludicrousness of the situation hits him, and now Levi is suppressing laughter, his eyes crinkling with mirth.

Finally pulling his hand away from his face, Eren allows the laughter to come out full force, and he begins to walk toward Levi, directly through the path of the creeping bubbles.

“Eren,” Levi breathes, laughter breaking apart his sentence, “You’ll make even more of a mess.”

Eren reaches down to pick up a handful of bubbles and unceremoniously deposits them right on top of Levi’s head before leaning down to plant an obnoxiously loud kiss on his cheek.

Levi bats him away and tries his best to remove the suds from his head. “We should probably turn the fucking machine off or it’s just going to get worse.”

“Let it. This is hilarious,” Eren is still laughing, and Levi rolls his eyes when Eren wraps his arms around his waist with a deep sigh.

“Seriously, turn the thing off. Are you gonna clean this up?” Levi huffs, but he’s smiling, and he holds on to Eren tightly.

They stand this way for a few minutes, just the two of them surrounded by soap bubbles. And Eren thinks that, yeah, sometimes things are tough. Sometimes Levi gets frustrated when he can’t remember. Sometimes he gets cross with Eren for repeatedly reminding him of things.

But moments like this makes everything else worth it.

The past six months have been difficult for them both. Levi recognizes faces less often, and he’s been withdrawn and spending a lot more time alone. Last week he had asked Eren to cancel their weekly dinner with Mikasa and Jean because he didn’t want anybody else to see him like this. Didn’t want anyone feeling sorry for him.

Eren had denied the request, saying that spending time with Jean and Mikasa was good for them both. Levi huffed and complained, but had eventually given in. It had actually ended up being a really good night - Levi had been in a great mood and he hadn’t had any issues with forgetting or zoning out.

Their anniversary is coming up next week. Forty-two years. While Levi’s never placed much weight on celebrating birthdays or anniversaries - “It’s just one year closer to dying,” he’s always said - Eren’s a romantic at heart who enjoys celebrating those kinds of milestones. Levi usually relents and plans something.

Eren doesn’t expect anything from Levi this year for their anniversary.

Nowadays, Levi struggles more frequently with basic things like remembering what day it is, or forgetting which drawer the spatulas are in. Sometimes he can’t remember what they did yesterday, or the plans they have for later that night.

Eren has started keeping a journal to record what they’ve done each day and any new important information in their lives. There’s a calendar in there as well where he marks important dates, doctor appointments, things like that. He leaves it on the living room table so Levi can reference it when he’s ‘having a blank’, as they’ve come to call his episodes of forgetting.

Eren leaves the date of their anniversary unmarked.

Levi is under enough stress right now as it is. He doesn’t need the added pressure of trying to plan something for their anniversary. And Eren’s okay with that. He really is.

He loves Levi. And he knows Levi loves him. They don’t need to celebrate their anniversary for that to be true.

Eren sits in his chair by the fireplace with a book, like he does most of the time when he’s home alone now. Except this afternoon he’s not reading. He’s deep in thought, staring blankly at the page in front of him.

The house is quiet, nothing but the ticking of the grandfather clock on the mantle. Mikasa and Jean had come to pick up Levi early that morning so they could go visit Hanji, per Levi’s request. They usually all went together, but Eren had said he hadn’t felt well and had stayed home. He’d needed some time to himself.

He sighs and pulls off his reading glasses, pinching the bridge of his nose.

Today is their anniversary, and Eren hasn’t planned anything to celebrate.

He wants to celebrate, of course he does. But Levi’s already chastising himself for his more frequent blanks and getting increasingly frustrated every time they happen. It’s infuriating for him because he knows it’s happening and he’s powerless to stop it.

Eren would never do anything that could make Levi feel guilty. Like planning something for their anniversary, only to have Levi realize he had forgotten it.

He’d tried not to get his hopes up. No need for that. But despite his efforts, the sliver of hope had been there the past few days. The hope that Levi would remember. That he would say something, anything, to acknowledge their day, even just in passing.

But he hadn’t. Levi had kissed him goodbye this morning as if it was any other day. Which, Eren supposes, to him it probably is.

He hadn’t expected anything, but he’d be lying if he said it doesn’t hurt. The past two years have been hard on Levi, but it’s different for Eren. He’s sitting on the sidelines watching the man he loves slowly slip away from him. Watching Levi beat himself up every day over something he can’t control.

They’re both pretty powerless here, in reality.

Eren shakes the thoughts away and slips his glasses back on so he can attempt to focus on something else other than his thoughts. His book. Right.

He’s just gotten back into his book when his concentration is broken by the creak of the back door. Levi’s home, and Eren smiles. At least they have the rest of the day together, whether or not they’re celebrating.

“How was it?” Eren calls into the kitchen, closing his book and collapsing the recliner before standing up and stretching a bit.

No response.

Eren walks toward the kitchen. “Levi?”

As he rounds the doorway, Levi turns around to face him from where he had been fiddling with something on the counter.

“Everything okay?” Eren asks, eyebrows raised. “How was Hanji?”

“We didn’t go see Hanji.”

Eren’s brow furrows in confusion. “Then where…”

Levi stares at him, eyes searching. Then he sighs. “Did you really forget our anniversary? I’m supposed to be the one with memory loss here, not you.”

Eren doesn’t quite know how to respond to that. “Uh. How did you..?”

“You’re not the only one who keeps a calendar, you idiot.” Levi’s lips quirk up in a smug grin before he turns around to fetch something from the counter behind him.

It’s a small bunch of petite blue flowers tied up in a green ribbon. The same green as Eren’s eyes. Levi thrusts them toward Eren and looks down at the ground. Still so awkward after all these years. Eren loves him all the more for it.

“They’re forget-me-nots.” Levi says. “Seemed… appropriate.”

Eren’s not going to cry. He’s not. But his lip does quiver for a moment before he breaks into a huge grin and closes the space between them. He wraps his arms around the shorter man and envelopes him in a massive bear hug, lifting him up off the ground before Levi can attempt to stop him.

“Eren...” Levi huffs in his ear, a warning in his voice.

Eren laughs heartily and sets him back down. Pulling back from the hug, Eren asks, “So Jean and Mikasa were in on it?”

“I asked them to give me a ride earlier this week, yeah,” Levi confirms. He’s still holding the flowers and he pushes them to Eren’s chest. “Put these in some water, eh?”

Eren takes the flowers but doesn’t move. Levi looks at him now, meeting his eyes, grey on green. Levi’s eyes are glassy, like he’s holding back tears. He takes a deep breath and, a little shakily, says, “Happy Anniversary Eren.”

“I love you, Levi.”

“I love you too,” Levi murmurs.

Eren is certain that his eyes are just as glassy as Levi’s, and there might be a tear slipping down his right cheek, but Levi won’t care. He leans down to touch his forehead to Levi’s and closes his eyes, just appreciating the moment.

When he opens them again, Levi is looking at him. “Thanks for sticking around.”

Eren’s heart clenches and explodes simultaneously.

“Always.”

[theseadagiodays]

May 11, 2020

Sanctuaries

My favorite refuge: The view from the summit of my backyard park

I’ve been thinking a lot about sanctuaries lately.  Defined as “a place of refuge or safety; a nature reserve; or a holy place,” the meaning of the word is entirely interpretable by each individual.  

Recently, the term has proliferated in reference to US cities who claim they will protect migrants from a certain unnameable leader’s xenophobic policies.  Unthinkably, this same buffoon has even threathened to withhold coronavirus relief funding to such cities if they continue to harbor “unwanted” residents.

It seems, for every sanctuary, there exist forces who want to threaten them.  This is as true of religious persecution around the world, as it is with safe houses for women escaping violence.

In our Lullaby Project, Instruments of Change works quite intimately with this population.  Through this time, we’ve been fortunate to continue supporting single mothers to write original songs about their hopes and dreams for their children.  What we’ve learned from them is that, ironically, while many of us have struggled to self-isolate at home, these women have never felt safer, with the prospect of being found, or of unwelcomed visits from their abusers temporarily lifted.  

In Women Rock, another program that we’ve shifted to digital engagement through Google Classroom, our participants have written a secular choral hymn identifying nature as the sanctuary that has provided them the most solace during this time.   A verse from their song, Hidden Symphonies is below.

Listen to the silence

Morning bird calls at play

Soul refreshing music

Through isolation days

It is interesting that more and more evidence suggests people rarely catch the virus while outdoors (https://globalnews.ca/news/6906508/coronavirus-outdoors-parks-closed/).  Intuitively, this resonates with me, as someone who has always found sanctuary staying active outdoors. So, while experts stress that social distancing in public parks is still necessary, simply sharing these wild places six feet away from strangers has been a blessing.

Art has always been another refuge for many.   And it’s no wonder some artists have been turning to nature as their canvas.  The Swiss artist, Saype’s work is perhaps the most ambitious example.  His stunning ephemeral piece, Beyond Crisis, made with biodegradable spray paint, is designed to fade naturally as the grass grows, in much the same way we all hope this virus will eventually disappear once nature takes its course (with ample cooperation from humans).

https://twistedsifter.com/2020/05/giant-biodegradable-artwork-of-hope-appears-atop-swiss-hillside/

And finally, another creative community, in Sag Harbour, NY, has found an inventive way to share their work while galleries are closed.  Barns, front yards, and back gardens have become museum walls for dozens of installations that locals are welcome to view, as safely distant drive-bys.  https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/11/arts/design/drive-by-art-long-island.html?action=click&module=Well&pgtype=Homepage&section=Art%20%20Design

Paintings by Darius Yektai; Diane Blell’s “Table for Two Separate tables”; Erik Fischl’s “Young Dancers Dancing”

May 12, 2020

Daily Delights

I have also been trying to hone my lens for finding a different kind of art in nature.  With time to slow down and stay close to home, I have paid much closer attention to the little wonders that surround me.  I began the practice of doing this shortly before self-isolation, when I learned about Ross Gay’s poetic essays collected in his book Daily Delights. https://www.amazon.ca/Book-Delights-Essays-Ross-Gay/dp/1616207922

As if prophetically, NPR featured him on my favorite podcast This American Life, in late January.  https://www.thisamericanlife.org/692/the-show-of-delights

And this reminder, to savor life’s small pleasures was exactly the armor I needed for this period.  Since February, I’ve kept my own daily delights journal.  And here are just a few snapshots that have made the cut since quarantine began.

Baby ducks, Hula hoops, Elderly couple park bench massage, Backyard swing

May 13, 2020

Radio Days

While so much has changed about my daily rhythms, of late, there are a few pillars that I’ve kept in place to give my life some necessary scaffolding, in order to maintain a sense of familiarity and grounding.  

One of these is the ritual that my partner and I have had for years, of listening to This American Life every weekend.  Ira Glass’s strangely pleasing-though-nasally drone has accompanied hundreds of our road trips to mountains, lakes and forests, as we’ve sought weekend adventure. But for now, living room listenting has had to suffice.

On May 4th, the show just happened to be honored with the first ever Pulitzer Prize for audio journalism.  So, that’s a well-earned feather in a podcast’s cap.  But, awards or not, their carefully curated slices of life never fail to amuse and inspire.  

Interestingly, I think more and more people are turning to podcasts, perhaps as an antidote to screen fatigue, and also because it seems to align with the nostalgia for days past that is so alive right now.  So, I wanted to suggest a few podcasts that might particularly resonate at the moment.

If it’s a longing for “other” that’s calling you, there is an incredible website called Radio Garden that lets you travel anywhere in the world, to sonically “drop-in” to whatever environment intrigues you (http://radio.garden/listen/alpha-boys-school-radio/ijKUlByg). For a real time sense of what moves people across the globe, you can experience the music, stories, and language of cultures from Antanarivo to Zagreb, with just a spin of their online globe and a simple click.  Here, you can access literally thousands of radio stations.  However, in my experience, their interface works best on a Chrome rather than Safari browser.

Early in quarantine, when I was in sorest need of a good laugh, This American Life put together an episode on fiascos that really helped bring levity at a time when we all began to feel our world fall apart.  https://www.thisamericanlife.org/699/fiasco

And speaking of when things fall apart, Buddhist nun Pema Chodron’s book of the same name has served as a sort of bible for many westerners, as they’ve turned to the ancient Tibetan tradition in which she was ordained.  Another podcast favorite of mine is Krista Tippet’s On Being.  And her most recent May 7thepisode featured herself and musician/meditator Devandra Banhart alternatively reading passages from this sage book, while reflecting on its relevance for the times.

https://onbeing.org/programs/devendra-banhart-when-things-fall-apart/

May 14. 2020

Finding Bliss

Ai Weiwei’s 2010 “Grapes”, with a coincidental resemblance to the coronavirus

Interviewed about how he’s responding to the virus, Ai Weiwei replied, “I never create anything.  I just try to cope with the situation at hand.” We all need coping tools and strategies for those times when things fall apart.  Ai Weiwei’s plainspoken answer sounds almost religious, the way he describes art as his salve.  And this makes sense to me.  But for many years, faith in an actual religion never did.  Raised as a half-Catholic, half-Jewish Unitarian, I only attended services until I was about 11, when Sunday youth orchestra rehearsals took their place.  So, I never fully understood the role of weekly church service until we travelled to India, for 10-days of Dalai Lama teachings.  This annual offering, which he made for 30 years, was an even greater gift than we expected, given that these Kalichakra teachings ceased just after our 2007 trip, unbeknowst to us.   Every day, for 5 hours, 1,000s of seekers flocked to the grounds of his Dharamsala temple, and listened by radio simulcast, in 1 of 17 native tongues, to his special blend of humor and clarity.  Each day, we all left bubbling to the rim with reaffirmed intention to be our best selves.  The coffeeshops, all over town, were a twitter with armchair philosophy between strangers trying to understand and integrate his words.   Uncanny kindnesses abounded.  And you could feel our resolve get ever more reinforced with each return to his daily talks. However, it’s only once we left Dharmasala, with equally grand intentions to “remember”,  that I recognized the role of these daily infusions. Because with each passing day, best behaviors, careful speech, and pure thoughts deterioritated, if only a little at a time.  

Note the curly-haired, golden-sweatered sore thumb in this sea of burgundy-robed monks...

So, while that did not instill in me a renewed church-going tradition, I have found my own ways to be “reminded.”  They’ve just come in different forms.  

For Geoff, it’s long runs and bike rides that serve as his spiritual medicine.  And for me, it’s a panoply of things.  Sometimes its communion with nature.  Other times yoga.  Writing. Handstand therapy.  Or even what my favorite yoga teacher likes to call “Hammock Enlightenment.”  

Eoin Finn is an artist of the highest order.   Good living is his canvas.  The body is his brush.  And bliss is his paint.  He calls his teaching Blissology, and spreads his backbends, heart-openers, and ocean loving vibes from Indonesia to Byron Bay.  

He and his family have been quarantining in Bali, since they were leading teacher trainings there, just before global travel nearly shut down. And fortunately, he continues to extend his generous spirit through free weekly livestream Stay Om yoga classes, on Facebook.  If you happen to miss his 5 pm Sunday classes, the videos remain online to follow any time. So, I hope some of you take the opportunity to worship the DUDE (Delight in Universal Divine Energy) with him some time. I promise there will be plenty more acronymns and puns where that one came from.  Plus, a good dose of deep stretches for your limbs and soul.

https://www.facebook.com/blissarmy/?__tn__=%2Cd%2CP-R&eid=ARD502BDBWegIvZPmn6ec9pFCtdEPtRnELt_iabxb0_c5Mmnzq3UPiAddV8fEanrbJLeSOhgYWdeQOlu

May 15. 2020

Birthday Bash

Those who know me are aware of the special challenges birthdays pose for my creativity.  I relish the quest for the perfect homemade card, surprise gift, Bitmoji or GIF for a friend or family member.  And I love throwing a good bash.   I am also aware of the undue pressure this has caused my partner, over the years, to come up with a reciprocal gesture or party idea.  But given the added constraints of a quarantine, Geoff went over and above the call of duty this year to produce!

While the novelty of Zoom parties had already worn off, he still managed to find a brilliant way for my loved ones to send serial video messages throughout the day, with the bonus of a clever twist.  I’m not quite sure how he found the time, in his manic 70-hour work weeks, to put this together.  But, 43 clues later, I was delivered a personalized crossword puzzle, with each hint related to the messenger.  He really outdid himself this time, and I could not feel more grateful.

Meanwhile, unsure if he had anything up his sleeve, I got up to my own fun messying my hands to make this Covid Pinata.  I confess, I borrowed the idea from an article I saw online, but just couldn’t resist.  

And last night, of course with proper social distancing, we took great delight in beating the crap out of this brutal virus with a couple of friends.

[lost-in-our-words]

“Stellar Hearts” Chapter I (Part II): Juliana

Again, thanks to anybody who offers any suggestions, corrections, or constructive criticism. This story belongs to me, so please do not copy this story in any way, shape, or form.

---

By that point, the day was beginning to reach its final moments. The sky had yet to transform from its usual baby blue to the splendid rainbow of pinks and purples that I had always found myself falling in love with, but the blinding sun was now tucked behind the vivid aspen and maple. Peering its crescent from behind the roof of the Cabin, I could see the moon gently glowing high in the sky, preparing to replace the sun. Thus, it was time for me to part ways with my friend, promising that we would have to meet up again later that weekend. Agreeing, Mya bid farewell and returned to her lipstick red Prius before speeding off rather carelessly southwards, around the woods to where her neighborhood sat. Meanwhile, and not so disappointingly as Mya would have thought herself, I was left walking back to my own house. As opposed to Mya, I lived in a smaller neighborhood, known as Hearth Ridge, which adjoined the western border of the woods. Considering Haynes stood proudly opposite of my home, I was left with the task of traveling a somewhat long distance in one of two directions. First, I could have decided to venture around the woods in a similar direction to Mya. This was the longer route, yet, whenever I ended up in a situation similar to this, I would always choose this option, simply because the alternative was to trek through the interminable woods, so brimming with seemingly untouched nature, and more importantly, effortlessly easy to lose oneself in. However, today, my heart pulled me into the trees. It had been quite some time since the last time I had actually been deep within the woods, and so, I suppose I had decided to visit once more.

The further inside I wandered, the more potent the cardinal and gold leaves became. I had felt as if I had been walking inside of an artist’s canvas, paint being brushed above me in a majestic manner, creating a natural masterpiece. The air smelled cleaner, free of pollution, and the ground was soft with loose dirt. Around me yet out of my sight, I could hear the pleasantly melodic chirps and tweets of redbirds and jays, and beside me on the rugged bark of a maple tree, two bushy squirrels raced down the trunk and scurried across the ground in front of my feet.

Perhaps I had been missing out on more than I thought. Between the refreshing atmosphere and the change in scenery, I was becoming infatuated with the woods.

Then, my feet came to a halt and my lungs became still. Before me, peeking its head through a thin bush gazed a white-tailed doe, donning a brilliant tawny coat and eyeing me cautiously. Her build was on the small side and I could vaguely see her ribs protruding from sides, obviously at the very least a little malnourished. Nonetheless, she stood in front of me proudly and on edge.

Ever so slowly, my shoulder wiggled my camera bag off of them, the straps gliding down my arms, and once I had removed it from my body, and still keeping a close eye on the doe, I rummaged through the bag for my camera. Upon pulling it out, I once again zipped up the bag and moved it onto my back as it had been before.

She was such a beautiful creature, and I admired her lavishly.

My photography career had always revolved around portraits, primarily that of senior pictures, and rarely, aside from the not-so-often occasion that my family sought out a Summer vacation, would I find myself capturing any images of Mother Nature or her creations. Yet here I stood, a mere handful of yards from a gorgeous deer. A wide smirk spread across my face as I fumbled around with lens cap. To my grief, the round item slipped from my fingers and plummeted to the ground where it exuded a moderate thud.

Consequently, with its long ears shooting up in surprise, the creature turned and bounded off away from me, and with a heavy, disappointed groan, I chased after the animal. She seemed to always stay within my sight, leading me on a goose chase. One moment, she would be bouncing off gracefully through the woods, and the next she would come to an unexpected halt and glance around through the nothingness until spotting me creeping up on her. Then, I would stop, raise my lens, and hover my finger over the shutter button, but as my luck would have it, the doe would be overcome with camera shyness and rush off once more with me following. Luckily for me, though, I was in no rush to return home, and so I could carry on with the endless chase without worry.

Occasionally, I would find myself able to capture a picture, but it was never anything to ogle at. One would be of the deer just as it was hopping off, and another would be of it glancing around curiously, but the golden shot, the photograph I had set my heart on, required me being face to face with the creature to the point that I could see every hair on its face and the reflection in its eyes. The animal, however, was adamant about avoiding me, and so it seemed impossible, and when the doe found itself wandering into a small clearing, I approached it with extreme prudence. Alas, it paused and watched as I came closer and closer to it, and finally, it did not budge from its position. Perhaps it gave into my persistence, or maybe it understood that the mechanism hanging around my neck was not a weapon that would cause harm. So there I was, ultimately a prime distance away from the magnificent doe. She was looking directly into the camera, most likely curious. I was not about to let this opportunity to escape my grasp. Thus I focused my camera, and without any more hesitation, the shutters snapped.

The doe became spooked and once more bounded back into the woods and out of my sight. A short moment passed where I simply stood in my spot, praying that the photograph would live up to my expectations.

“Please be at least decent,” I murmured to myself. Some voice deep inside of my soul demanded I not look at the photograph in case it had turned out to be a failure, but I had to see if I had succeeded. My finger hovered weakly over the image playback button, my breath being held anxiously.

“I think you ought to charge that doe for the photograph,” a voice snickered from behind me. Startled, I responded to the voice by swiftly spinning on my heels in surprise, which sequentially resulted in my heels catching on each other and myself tumbling onto my ass, covering my jeans with dirt.

Grimacing due to the pain in my rear, I glanced up at where the voice had emitted from, and to my surprise, in front of me sat two boys which I had failed to notice before, presumably too distracted by the deer to have detected. Sitting inside of a small cavity in the side of a protruding rock formation, they both eyed me carefully, seemingly waiting for me to make a ensuing move.

“Dammit,” I grumbled, dusting off my pant legs. “I didn’t realize that other people roamed these woods this late at night.”

One of the males was about six feet tall with skin heavily tanned. His hair, brunette and styled in a pompadour fashion, glistened presumably with some sort of hair product in the sky’s remaining light, which was now turning those favorable shades of unnatural colors. I could make out a tattoo wrapped around his ankle, peeking from between the top of his sneakers and the bottom of his black skinny jeans. It seemed to be a beautifully detailed depiction of a range of mountains, snowcapped and illuminated by a strong moonlight. Upon hearing my comment, he turned to the second, appearing to send a bitter glare towards him. This other person was much larger in build, both by muscle and height and his eyes burned a rich amber and which stood out against his rich, black, quiffed hair, noticeable even from a considerable amount of feet away. In contrast with the first male, his skin appeared unblemished of tattoos, and he had a very relaxed presence about him despite his friend’s glower.

The latter of the two was the first to lower himself from the hole in the rock, the other reaching out seemingly in an attempt to stop him. He must have been unsure of me being there. Nonetheless, the man persisted to approach me and offered a hand to help me up, which I took graciously and was brought back to my feet.

“Cam over there can vouch for me when I say that I am not the most subtle person in the world,” the man declared, his eyes much more vibrant up close if that was at all possible. It was a rather difficult attribute not to take notice to. “Despite this, I am surely a man who understands when an apology is in store, and so I hope you accept my apology for frightening you.”

My lips shifted in thought, still a bit irked with the pain in my behind. Nonetheless, I nodded to assure him that everything was fine, and happily, he offered me a toothy grin.

“The name is Orion Shepherd,” he introduced, still smirking with happiness. “Over there with the salty stare is Cameron Drake, or as you heard me refer to him, Cam. I’m not too sure, though, how kindly he would take to a stranger addressing him in such a way.”

Don’t go assuming I plan on making friends with a pair of strangers I just met, Orion.

“He’s likes to bark, but he doesn’t have any bite. Honestly, I’m quite surprised that he hasn’t called you out on the sudden arrival.”

I glanced at this supposed Cam, who still seemed unsure of me intruding on their whatever-the-hell get-together.

“I apologize if I was interrupting anything,” I apologized, hoping not to get on anybody’s bad side, particularly Cam’s. Orion did not seem to mind my sudden appearance, though. “On my way back home, that doe caught my attention and I found myself chasing after it.”

“For a photograph?” he chuckled. “I hope it was worth the chase. Those deer sure can be swift and easy to lose track of.”

I nervously nodded in agreement. His comment led me to believe that Orion was a hunter of some sort. However, these woods were strictly off-limits to hunting. Of course, that didn’t rule out the possibility of him being a hunter, and more importantly, whether or not he was one didn’t matter to me.

Why was I thinking about it so thoroughly?

“Time, time, time, Orion!” Cam finally blurted as he hopped out of the cavity and approached Orion with steam coming from his ears. The smaller man leaned into Orion’s ear and seemed to give him a very intensive lecture out of my earshot about who-knows-what, yet Orion simply continued to smirk, his friend’s words seemingly going in one ear and out the other.

Throwing his hands in the air, Orion responded. “We aren’t in a rush, Cameron. Hush now. I’m still in the middle of introducing myself.”

Grumbling, Cam demanded that he leave him out of the conversation. “Maybe this little discussion will be over faster if you leave my intro out of this.” Following his temper, Cam leaned up against the rocky protuberance, arms crossed and foot tapping, waiting impatiently.

“Excuse Mr. Grumps. He forgot to eat his breakfast this morning and now he’s cranky.”

Cam found little humor in the joke from his crotchety position off to the side. I, however, found myself offering a vague giggle. This seemed to in turn make Orion happy and proud that he got a different reaction out of me. Thus, feeling accomplished, he continued to introduce some more pieces of information about himself.

“In case if you were wondering, which I’m sure you were, the two of us were simply spending the rest of the evening out here. Earlier, we were having a nice dinner at some restaurant up in Bear Creek and made the decision to spend a little time out here, mainly for my sake, because let me tell you I absolutely adore these woods.”

I couldn’t blame him. The Foxborough Woods sure had stolen my heart since I entered them earlier this evening. “It sure sounds like you two were having a rather glamorous date,” I joked with a wink towards Orion.

Once again, Cam did not enjoy the humor, shouting with clenched fists, “What the hell is that supposed to mean?” I swore I could see a long stream of spit shoot from his mouth. Meanwhile, Orion was cracking up in a fit of laughter, similar to the one Mya and I had at the Cabin. These two characters sure seemed to have contrasting personalities. Orion was very laid back and seemed to enjoy his introductions. Certainly, he was the social type, whereas Cam appeared to not take to fondly to strangers. He had turned his back for a moment by that point, face red with anger, his chest rising and falling ever so calmly as he attempted to regain a little composure, and once the atmosphere again returned to normal, Orion no longer stumbling through his outburst and Cam once again quietly sulking and digging his foot into the dirt, I continued the conversation, questioning if they attended school somewhere in the Haynes area. The two both appeared college age to me, and so I assumed they were both students at the community college.

However, Orion shook his head. “Sadly, I’m not pursuing an education as of now.”

“Neither am I,” I added. “I graduated from Haynes High School last year, but have yet to decide exactly what I want to do.”

“Haynes High School?”

I nodded. “Did you not?”

“I’ve lived here in the Haynes area my entire life. I used to attend the elementary school here as it was the only one nearby at the time, and did the same for middle school. However, once I hit high school, I began attending Jefferson High School down the road a few miles. My mother worked in the office there and, at the time, I had been dealing with an unmanageable amount of anxiety, and so I figured it would be best to be near a family member during the school day in case if anything happened.” He shrugged, his grin now fading into indifference as if recollecting on the troublesome experience, but a beam of understanding from me returned that smile back to his lips. “Graduation was a couple years back and I never found the need to pursue an education just yet.” Orion paused and hummed for a moment again, once again looking at the sky, which was starting to lose its color as the sun was setting further, the brightest of stars and Venus peeking through the streaks of cotton candy clouds. “Cam is attending the community college, though, to fulfill his gen-ed classes for now.”

“My friend, Mya, is doing the same thing. I avoided going through anything like that for now just so I could avoid the stress until I decide what I want to do with my life.”

Understanding my situation, Orion nodded before advancing the conversation. “How come you’re out here?” he queried. “You do understand that these woods are thick and easy to get lost in if you don’t know your way around, especially when night hits.”

“I can navigate these woods fairly easily. After dining with Mya in town, I decided to cut my way through the woods on my way home. Besides, I enjoy the Autumn leaves.” I narrowed my eyes, a bit offended that he would think I couldn’t handle my own navigation.

“So you’re risking getting lost in these woods, which are practically a forest, just to look at the autumn leaves?” Cam asked snarkily.

“Don’t be critical Cam!” Orion snapped. Cam was now sending a fiery scowl, sharper than any glare before. Nonetheless, Orion did not budge and turned back to me. His gaze lowered down to the camera around my neck and he cocked his head in a curious fashion. “I never gave you the opportunity to look over that picture of the doe.” He held out his hand. “Perhaps you would allow me to be the first to take a gander at it. Photography has always amazed me you see, so I am genuinely interested in what you captured.”

My fingers wrapped tightly around my camera securely. Sure, Orion appeared to be kind, but he was a stranger nonetheless. I wasn’t quite sure if I wanted to trust an unfamiliar person with my expensive device, but the man gave me a gentle smile and I could not see a speck of criminal intent in his eyes. Hesitantly, I pulled the camera from around my neck and handed it to him. “Careful,” I demanded softly.

“I promise.” Orion held the Nikon in his hands, wary of his grip on it, and found his way to my gallery of photographs. The first one to appear on the screen was the one which I was greatly interested to see myself. Another light hearted grin spread softly across his face and he turned the back of the camera to me so I could see the image on the screen. A rush of joy and relief flashed through my body as I laid my eyes upon the splendid image that I had been chasing after, clear and crisp. Without a word, he continued to search through more of my photographs, which were at first pictures of the girl from that afternoon and followed by other senior portraits which I had taken prior to today.

“I’m an amateur, so I’m not entirely sure how good they are,” I commented in a humble manner, yet still proud of the photo of the doe.

Orion looked up at me without the slightest twitch of his head. “These are pretty damn good if you ask me.” Not expecting the comment, his compliment sent me sputtering for a grateful response, but before I could find the words to thank him, he raised his palm and shook his head, and thus he switched my camera off and held it back out to me. “You claim you aren’t a talented photographer, but I would definitely beg to differ. In fact, if it wouldn’t be too strange a request, I would be very appreciative to be given the opportunity to take a look at a few more of your gorgeous pictures.”

At that moment, Cam cleared his throat obnoxiously loud in order to interrupt our conversation. This resulted in Orion’s sweet smile fading into a frown of displeasure. As the two of us glanced over at the impatient man, he walked towards us, obviously still frustrated.

“Need I remind you again, Orion, about our prior commitments,” Cam spit through half-clenched teeth. “I’ll have you know that I have yet to be late thus far, and I do not plan on being tardy now.” He seemed to stumble through his words as if unsure of what he was intending to say, perhaps due to the palpable anger boiling inside of him.

I figured I had outstayed my welcome despite Orion seemingly enjoying the company. Besides, the sky was finally reaching the brink of night, all colors now disappearing from the clouds above us, and I presumed Orion was right about being out in the woods this late. The remainder of the journey home would prove to be fairly difficult in the thick of nightfall, despite my confidence in my ability to navigate through the trees solo.

Cam continued to shoo me off, Orion repeatedly demanding that he check his manners, which never happened. As I was being led away, I recalled that I had forgotten to introduce myself earlier. Therefor, I blurted out, “Juliana,” before departing, reaching my hand around Cam and giving a brief handshake to Orion before it was broken up by his friend as well. “Juliana MacKay,” I reiterated before giving in to Cam’s wishes and turning, beginning to head off towards my home.

Before I could find myself venturing too far, my attention was once again turned towards the two boys as Orion called out to me. “Juliana!” he squawked, his voice echoing through the woods. “I’ll be expecting those pictures tomorrow.” I could vaguely see that same sort grin that he had been giving me the entire evening once again spreading from cheek to cheek.

Unsure if I should commit to his request, I simply continued on my way westwards, reflecting on the meeting with the two boys. Albeit a strange and sudden encounter, I was inexplicably curious to return. Tonight I would consider returning in the morning, but for the time being I focused on finding my way home underneath the crescent moonlight, tired and now aching for the warmth of my bed sheets.

[jaygraphicarts3]

'Lost and Found’ Part 1—Objects as Type

As part 1 of the 3-part ‘Lost and Found’ workshop series, the aim of this session is to produce a type specimen which looks to promote and sell a typeface. The type specimen, however, will showcase a typeface made solely using strange objects. In this case, I partnered up with a peer (Alex) to help make each character using some garden wire. Before getting into the production though, I was briefed about what makes a successful typeface along with some of the theories of type.

Construction of a Typeface

A typeface will typically include 26 letters (either lowercase, uppercase or both) and punctuation. Because of the limited time we had, it wasn’t a realistic expectation to produce all 26 letters in both lowercase and uppercase along with numbers and all punctuation, so we chose what we thought to be the most common punctuation: 

Full stop [.]

Comma [,]

Colon [:]

Question Mark [?]

Exclamation Mark [!]

Quotation Marks [”]

Brackets [ ( ) ]

Ampersand [@]

Octothorp/Hashtag [#]

When a typeface is being used, if there are symbols missing then whoever is using the typeface will be stopped from using these symbols, so it’s important to have as many as possible included within the typeface. Similarly, both lowercase and uppercase characters must be accounted for. More so with read type, as capitals are a form of punctuation; display typefaces still function with only one case.

What Makes a Good Typeface? 

Although there are no strict rules to how you should make a typeface, there are qualities which separate the good from the bad. Some of these include: 

Style: A typeface with a unique style will become recognisable which is why customised typefaces are popular in brand identity. 

Consistency: With no consistency, the typeface when applied to words and sentences will be perceived as various unmatched letters rather than one group of letters. Consistencies amongst type can be in line weight, angles, serifs, kerning and much more.

Readability: Especially for read type, the typeface must always be clearly understood as a whole piece of text.

Legibility: How each individual letter is perceived is just as important as how it reads as a whole. As well as this, legibility refers to the relationships each letter has to other letters.

As well as these, when making my typeface, I should follow a cap height to ensure all of my letters are the same height. This relates to the consistency of the typeface in its size/scale. A cap height is the height in which the upper case characters of a typeface should be. The X height is the height for lower case letters (excluding tall letters such as ‘t’ or ‘h’). 

Considering all of the requirements for a successful typeface, Alex and I chose to create a display typeface with only uppercase and punctuation. Because of the limited amount of time we had to produce this, we felt like aiming to include both upper and lower cases of the alphabet was an unrealistic goal. We had the choice between a set of soldier figurines or some garden wire. We chose to use the garden wire as our material as it would be easier to create letterforms due to its malleability. 

Process

Firstly, we made sure to measure a cap height to use for all of the letters we would make. Considering we were using garden wire, we knew the typeface would have a less structured look, so the cap height was just a rough guideline for us to follow. Then, we started constructing the typeface. Allocating each other alternating letters, making sure to stay with the same style throughout. For instance, a style choice we kept consistent was avoiding overlapping where possible. 

What I personally found to be the hardest about this part was carrying the same aesthetic across every single letter. Especially as two of us were making the letters, at the start it became hard for us to reach an understanding of a look to follow. As we produced more letters, Alex and I both picked up the aesthetic of the typeface and used this to correct some of the earlier letters we felt didn’t match with the rest. 

Once we had all of the characters, afterwards was converting them letterforms to a digital typeface and eventually making a type specimen. To do this, Alex photographed each letter before transferring them to the Mac, where I opened them as separate layers in a Photoshop document. From here, in a similar method to the creation of the letters, Alex and I split the workflow between us to speed up the process. We added a ‘Levels’ adjustment to each letter to remove the background and just leave the characters. One thing which was an issue at this stage was certain shadows being left behind. However, after some discussion with other peers as well, we felt the shadows gave the characters an extra layer of depth which wouldn’t be present when they are vectorised. 

Following the image adjustments, we laid out all of the characters in alphabetical order (with punctuation at the end) to showcase it in its entirety. Along with this, we made various quotes and demonstrations of the typeface in context so these could be used for the type specimen. 

What is a Type Specimen? 

A type specimen has a sole purpose of promoting/demonstrating a typeface. They are often used to help sell a typeface by showing how it works in different scenarios or even how versatile the look of it is. They can be presented in countless ways. Some more simple typefaces can be presented on one piece of paper, whereas those with more characters, character styles, line weights, cases, punctuation, numbers or in some case symbols/icons often require more presentation to fully showcase the flexibility of the type.

Above is an example of what I think is an effective type specimen sheet. I chose this because, in a similar way to my garden wire typeface, it is showcasing a display font and shows a good contrast of size for different ways it can be applied. I also think the use of just black and white works well to emphasise the characters. It’s easy for colours and layout to become distracting when displaying a typeface, but I think this example has the legibility of the typeface as the main priority. 

For more modern typefaces, digital presentations are more popular and allow for more diverse ways of showing the type in use. The main difference is through the use of animation. 

I chose this ‘Sew’ typeface as an example because it is also made with an unconventional object, but also offers an example of how I could display my own typeface in more detail. This presentation shows: 

Textured variants

Digital vectorised variants

Construction of the typeface

Different sizes

Quotations

Ligatures

Patterns

In this case, I think going into more depth helps to sell the typeface, so it is a potential for me looking forward. 

When creating my own specimen, I found it hard to design something visually appealing without sacrificing how the type was read. Because my typeface (which I called ‘Garden Wire’ for the type specimen) is a display font, it’s important to have a design which is exciting for the audience; this shouldn’t mean the type has to become harder to read.

Extension—Type Zine

Having looked at various examples of other ways typefaces can be displayed, I wanted to experiment with another way to present a type specimen. For this, I created a small 8-page zine. I preferred this method because it split the presentation into separate pages. This meant that I didn’t have to consider how all of the elements of the type specimen could be laid out onto one page. I also thought the Zine made the typeface easier to understand to the audience.

Looking Back

This workshop got me to work with unconventional methods of creating work and pushed me out of my comfort zone. I can link this to the rotational workshops, which used the 10 curious objects as fuel for my outcomes. Using garden wire challenged the method of creating type that I am already comfortable with, and posed it with a challenging new way to think. By doing so, I understand the importance of the curious objects and how they act in a similar way in regards to the ideas I currently have for my project.

Moving Forward

The next workshops I will take part in will be part 2 and 3 of the ‘Lost & Found’ series. I am unsure what these will include, but I aim to carry the mindset I learnt from this workshop forward into future ones. I think this will encourage me to be more experimental with my outcomes, which is something that in past projects I have shied away from. 

[entergamingxp]

Remembering a golden era in Dark Age of Camelot • Eurogamer.net

I never understood why people would race towards a level cap until I played Dark Age of Camelot. Why on earth would someone sacrifice sleep to power a character to maximum level? Why the rush – we’ll all get there at some point. You’ll run out of things to do. You won’t have people to play with.

I was missing the point. It started to sink in when I had sunk in, inadvertently becoming a part of the race myself. I hadn’t meant to. I started the game without any real idea of what I was doing or where I was going. To me, everything was new. But as I grew, and the game encouraged me towards other people, I began to learn about the wider world.

Everyone knew there was a war. It was the premise of the game. It was on the box. Three kingdoms all at war with one another. Hibernia, the realm based on celtic folklore, Midgard, the realm of Norse mythology, and Albion, home of Arthurian legend. I knew, the moment I entered the world, as a cleric in Albion, who my sworn enemies were, but it would be a long time before I actually saw them. The war was a long way off. My day-to-day was a tedious grind.

An old-school grind, I’ll have you know. Progress in Dark Age of Camelot wasn’t based on going quest to quest as in World of Warcraft. Oh no. In Camelot, levelling meant finding a monster spawn and staying there. You didn’t have private dungeons, so you had to jostle for positions, and good groups were – always are – hard to find. When you found both, you clung to them. You could be in the same spot with the same group all day. It gave everyone a lot of time to talk.

War – from an Albion perspective. Notice the Midgardian enemies are referred to by race and rank, not name. Pictures courtesy of Kardinal, a friend, and the paladin very much in trouble here.

Talk did a lot in Dark Age of Camelot. It spread rumours, it spread legend, and until I’d been out to the frontline and seen it for myself, it fuelled my imagination. Had I heard about this norseman skald called Rastaf? They say he’s nearly level 50 – already! He appears out of nowhere and kills anyone he comes across. God he sounds cool. And did I hear about the lurikeen enchanter Greyswandir? He hadn’t slept for three days to get to level 50.

What if one day people talked about me like that? My desire to level more quickly increased. But I was a long way off. I was in my late 30s and had exhausted the barrows dungeon under Stonehenge, which I liked very much – I was fond of the gangly wights. At this rate, I’d never catch them.

Then I got my lucky break. Did I want to join a group of level 40s? They were stuck for a healer. Had I been a damage-dealing class, it wouldn’t have worked. I wouldn’t have been able to hurt the enemies they were fighting – I’d miss more, be resisted more and barely make a scratch when I did hit. But as a healer it could work, just about. Of course I wanted to join!

It was my bridge from the chasing pack to the frontrunners, and I found myself called up for healing duty more often and by more people. I found myself rubbing shoulders with the heroes of our realm. I revelled in it, giddy with the pace of progress and the idea I was becoming one of them. These people had been to the front. These people encouraged me to go to the front. These people took me to the front.

I’ll never forget my first time beyond the border keep. I was on my own, curious, and given all I’d heard, nervous. I expected to be pounced at any moment, so I skulked through Snowdonia flinching at any sign of life. Then an arrow hit me and I shit my pants. I’m being attacked! I’m being attacked! Hardly the picture of heroism.

A line of Albions, probably on a relic raid, all following the leader. I might be in there somewhere!

I turned and ran, bolted through the trees. Where are they where are they?! I spun the camera looking for them. I spun the camera around so much, in fact, I failed to notice I’d barrelled into a monster camp. While I lay on the floor, face down, dead – a good time for contemplation in Dark Age of Camelot – I looked through my combat log to see what had happened. An elf had shot me. An elf! I was thrilled… until I looked around and realised they were computer elves, there to make the zone more exciting. It hadn’t been an enemy player at all. And to think: I’d even screamed in guild chat.

My first real taste of action came in Emain Macha, the Hibernian warzone, which was very green. I was very green. Emain Macha was where everyone would go for a pile-up at the end of the night. We’d fight at the mile wall not far from our portal keep and it was always utter chaos, hard to make anything out. All I really knew was there was a mass of them behind, and on, the wall, alternately Hibernian or Midgardian thems depending on who held the other side – the joy of having three kingdoms. Either noseman, trolls, kobolds and dwarves; or celts, furbolgs, lurikeens and elves. It was pandemonium. Sometimes we’d manage to charge through, sometimes they would come charging through, and all of the time, people died.

What those chaotic first impressions did were introduce the big players, the people dominating the kill feeds, the people barking orders. The legends. I even came across the notorious Rastaf for the first time, and true to legend, he appeared out of nowhere like lightning. I remember clicking on this norseman enemy, seeing the name Rastaf and squealing. Then he snared us, killed us one by one and ran off. It was like being hit by the SAS – I couldn’t have been more impressed.

All of this propelled me to level faster. I had to get there, I had to join them. Levels made all the difference. While Rastaf was levels ahead, I could never hope to challenge him. Levels made you strong, made you famous. I doubled down and spent entire days killing forests-worth of evil trees in Lyonesse. It was agonisingly slow. But eventually I got there. From being a clueless nobody not bothered about my place in the world, I had become a level 50 somebody obsessed with it.

Messing around with the enemy. A moment of calm in the war as players from all three realms lark around together.

I was the third cleric on the Percival server to reach level 50. It’s an embarrassing claim now but it was a proud one at the time. It earned me some respect among my peers and, I hoped, some trepidation among my enemies. I meant I could hold my own on the fields of Emain Macha and get my name in the kill feed.

I imagined people looking at me while I was idling on the portal to the enemy lands, thinking what I once thought about the people I had looked up to. Cor, look at him. I imagined people seeing me running around, smiting and wanting to be like me, or looking to me for guidance or protection during busy keep sieges or battles.

What I loved more than anything, though, was going it alone. Logging on at a time when everyone else was asleep (being a Euro on a US server had its upsides) and roving the snowy tracks of Odin’s Gate, or the grassy hills of Emain Macha, looking for ragtag groups to tussle with. Away from the din of the battlefield, other stories could emerge. Stories of personal rivalries and close-fought one on ones. Stories, even, of friendship. We couldn’t understand each other – a masterstroke of Dark Age of Camelot was how it garbled enemy talk – but we could point and bow and laugh, we could communicate through gestures.

That’s how I came to know the people I fought with, learn their names, build a rapport. And I became fascinated by them. I’d see them during sieges and single them out, pointing and waving, or see them on the busy battlefields, waving as I charged by. One friendship in particular stood out.

It started one night as I sacrificed myself on an enemy keep – it was the quickest way home. As I got within range, enemies came charging out to take me down. All but one, that is. One elf sat on the hill, not budging, and as I was pummeled, she stood up and waved. I was taken aback. I’d never seen anyone forego a chance to kill before, never seen anyone do anything like that. It stuck in my mind, that moment, evidently forever, and I made a pint of waving to her every time our paths crossed after.

A view from a keep. A small Midgard force thinks about attacking an Albion hold.

At the same time, I discovered a forum where people from all of the realms talked and, through it, an IRC chat channel where they hung out. They were all in there, all the people I’d been fighting for weeks and gesturing to – even the elf on the hill. We all became friends. We even went on a sojourn to a new server to make a guild there and play together like we hadn’t been able to on Percival. It was a lot of fun – I have some wonderful memories – but it didn’t last.

Slowly, the game changed. The scrappy era of ragtag groups came to an end and organised groups took their place. Disciplined, eight-person gank groups, as they were known, moving at speed and decimating anything but equally disciplined groups in their paths. I drifted away.

I often wonder whether anyone remembers me now, nearly two decades later, or whether each subsequent era paints over the last with legends of their own. Deciding to force the issue a bit, I posted in the Percival Facebook group about a hazy memory of mine. I wasn’t sure what I’d get back, I hadn’t heard a peep from the group in years. Was it just me clinging onto old memories of a game, or did people care as I did?

I shouldn’t have worried. Within moments, replies came. Yes, they remembered and much more besides. Old friends and enemies came out of the woodwork to share the memories they had clung onto. The memories of a community making a game more than the sum of its parts.

Take the Alarm Clock Raid, for instance. The raid the Midgardians had meticulously planned. They had groups of stealthers whittle down the doors of our frontier keeps to breaking point, so when the horde awoke in the middle of the night, at the planned time of 3AM, hence the alarm clocks, they would steam through in the space of minutes. And they did. Five minutes it took them to get to our relic keep, and before we could wipe the sleep from our eyes, they’d made off with the Scabbard of Excalibur. It was a chef kiss of an operation, a perfectly executed sweep, and it fuelled our war effort for weeks.

It’s in remembering times like these I remember why Dark Age of Camelot was so special. We made the game special, the people who played it. It was memorable because of the wars we created for everyone to join in on, or the rivalries we cooperated in establishing. It wasn’t because there was a new tier of armour added, or a new monster. That was just fluff around the core. It’s why I think World of Warcraft, however much it may have been better in other ways, lacked the same spark. The magic.

And those golden times in Dark Age of Camelot, they were – they were magic.

from EnterGamingXP https://entergamingxp.com/2020/02/remembering-a-golden-era-in-dark-age-of-camelot-%e2%80%a2-eurogamer-net/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=remembering-a-golden-era-in-dark-age-of-camelot-%25e2%2580%25a2-eurogamer-net

[joejstrickl]

IP Guide To Developing Promotional Campaigns

As a brand licensing strategist I spent five years at the NBA, which in addition to basketball was known as ‘Nothing But Attorneys’. Fortunately those attorneys were fantastic in-house counsel to whom we had access, and they were happy to pass on their knowledge – especially to those who were prepared, eager to learn and understood the importance of protecting the collective intangible assets of the NBA.

Since my time at the league, I’ve worked in a variety of environments from corporate to entrepreneurial and have found with many companies whose primary product is not intellectual property that training and knowledge more often comes through trial, error and experience. Corporate often assumes everyone knows what they are doing, and this assumption can be costly.

Ultimately you may not be responsible for each component of a promotional campaign, but you are accountable for the campaign. From and intellectual property standpoint, the following checklist will help guide you through the lens of best practices:

1. Know Your Contracts And Assets.

Where there is a marketing partner or sponsorship component, if you aren’t the one negotiating the contract, read it. If you aren’t allowed to read it, ask your legal department for a summary of what rights have been granted, the assets, and the guidelines and restrictions for activation.

If negotiating a partnership with another property, brand or celebrity consider “event clauses” as it pertains to money. For example, if a celebrity doesn’t approve something by a specific date, they don’t get paid.

2. Define The Elements Of The Proposed Campaign.

Custom content, POP, TV storyboards, print advertisements, press releases, internet and mobile components, sweepstakes & contest rules, premium items etc., create a checklist of who needs to give approval for each component.

Based on the start date of your campaign, know your “drop dead” dates – meaning if you don’t have a component approved and finalized by a certain date is there a plan B, or is there only plan A.

3. Photo License And ‘Work For Hire’ Agreements.

If you use a photograph in any way shape or form, you need a photo license agreement unless you own the copyright. Photo license agreements will define a period of time for its use, so if you extend a promotional campaign, you must amend your photo usage agreements.

I once worked with a global ski brand. No one in their marketing department in Japan had been trained on or was familiar with photo copyright matters. They took previously licensed photographs, and “mutilated them” creating a new collage for a follow up campaign the next year. Long story short the Japanese government fined the ski brand $2.0 million dollars for the infringement.

If you use a photograph to create a cartoon of someone, that is a derivative of a copyright protected photograph. So unless the cartoonist personally knows the person in question and can sketch from memory, just get a photo for reference and license it.

In the scenario above, just because you pay a cartoonist to create a cartoon doesn’t mean you own said cartoon, unless you execute a ‘work for hire’ agreement assigning ownership for the copyright to the cartoon to you. So even if your sister’s dog-walker happens to be a cartoonist and is willing to create a cartoon for you for free as a favor, it would be wise for you to “as a matter of policy” have said dog-walker sign a document assigning ownership of the cartoon to you. Trust me you are inviting big trouble if you do not.

4. Define The Proposed Geographic Area And Time Period.

Keep a checklist of what other components would require approval or amendment should you need to extend the period or geography.

5. Is There Anything In Your Promotional Campaign That Goes Beyond Your Partner’s Contractual Rights?

For example, event tickets, co-branding with or prizing from third parties, use of any marks that your partner may not have the right to? Does your partner have pass-through rights (i.e. pass through rights to a third party retailer)?

6. Clear The Tagline.

If you come up with a tagline for your promotion, make sure you have your legal department clear it. Imagine you have just hit “print” on everything and get a cease and desist.

I suggest you familiarize yourself with searching word marks and phrases on www.uspto.gov . Pick your phrase, go to the site and do a basic word mark search, and put the phrase in quotes to help narrow the search. For example, a search of “Come Alive” yields 126 results, some of which are live, and others dead.

If you are to use a tagline in another language, be sure the translation is “correct”. Years ago Pepsi launched “Come Alive with the Pepsi Generation” as a promotional campaign. In China, the slogan was mistranslated to mean ‘Pepsi brings your ancestors back from the grave’, and in a culture where they worship their ancestors, people thought that if you drank Pepsi it could bring back the dead.

7. Does Your Promotional Campaign Involve A Sweepstakes Or Contest?

To the general public, a contest and a sweepstakes are the same thing, but for marketers there are clear differences; it is vital that the rules establish the difference. Simply put:

A contest is a competition where entrants perform a task (submit a photo, follow a social account, share content, etc.) and are subsequently judged based on the results of that action.

A sweepstakes is a way for sponsors or brands to give away prizes based on luck of the draw. The entrant typically enters with only their name and contact information.

Official rules. Don’t glaze over this. Don’t ever re-use or re-purpose rules from a previous campaign – it is not worth the risk. Google top sweepstakes/contest rules mistakes and this will always be listed in the top 5.

Read the rules yourself. Rules contain the details of a promotion and your legal department will be relying on you to review the rules to make sure that they accurately reflect the proposed sweepstakes/contest.

Are there going to be abbreviated rules? Do they include things like: No purchase necessary; Void where prohibited; Contest end date; Age and residency limitations; Where can the official rules be found.

Do the rules provide for a free, alternate means of entry? Consumers cannot be required to give the company sponsoring the campaign/promotion any benefit. The entrant entering through free means of entry should have equal choice as a person which is entered via a purchase. If there is no free and alternate means of entry, then the promotion may be an illegal lottery (and you don’t want that).

Promotional Campaign Mistakes

We all make mistakes from time to time. Here are a couple of examples of mistakes I am glad I didn’t make.

In 2001, a former Hooters waitress sued the restaurant where she worked, saying she was promised a new Toyota for winning a beer sales contest. Instead, she said, she won a new toy Yoda – the little green guy from the Star Wars movies. Long story short, she got the Toyota of her choice, as well as she sued the parent company for breach of contract and fraud, and won. This pun, while cleaver, was not appreciated.

In short, for one if its promotional campaigns Pepsi was to have produced only two bottle caps with a winning number, and accidentally produced 800,000. Triple check your quality control process. When it is the fault of your own company, only you can decide your path to redemption.

However, if you ever have a third party printing something like this for you, you may wish to pay attention to the indemnification clauses in those contracts. For example if a newspaper accidentally over prints a winning code, who pays for the mistake? Never, ever assume anything as laws can vary.

***Looking for a great holiday gift for co-workers or clients, send them the new branding book “FOLLOW the FEELING: Brand Building in a Noisy World” today, written by Branding Strategy Insider Kai D. Wright.

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