#sasha is so cool.. i will work harder to present the other two just as well.. | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

janekfan · 4 years

Note

hmm prompt time... jon angst about his humanity or lacktherof? worrying about him not being good enough for+worthy of+safe for martin/general guilt/self hatred? before or after apocolypse idk maybe safe house maybe post change? maybe season 4 after coma? could end up being jmart h/c or just be jon sad time whatever works

https://archiveofourown.org/works/27232381

For everyone else it had already been six long months.

And for Jon.

Well. For Jon, it was just yesterday.

Sasha.

Gone.

Tim.

Gone.

Martin.

Gone.

Himself?

And wasn’t that the question of the day Jon thought as he dragged himself up the steps of the Magnus Institute. He didn’t have anything with him. He didn’t have anything left that he knew of. Just the Oyster card and set of clothes the hospital had been kind enough to give him as his own were thoroughly shredded in the explosion. Everything else was gone.

He should be gone.

He’s the only one who should be gone.

But he’s still here.

And they’re just.

Was he even allowed to grieve?

“Jon” Melanie’s sharp, irritated voice raked over his ill-fitting skin like claws and he lifted sore eyes in acknowledgment.

“Hm, y’yes?”

“Been calling your name. You up to your spooky monster shit already?” He winced, wishing the scratchy two-sizes too big tee shirt would swallow him the rest of the way. “Barely through the door and you can’t resist.”

“N’no. Was. Was thinking, s’all.” Rubbing his arm, trying desperately to feel something, Jon didn’t know if he was allowed to leave or not. If he moved would she be upset? If he stayed?

“Least keep to your office. Don’t want you...watchin’ me.” She shoved past him, knocking him against the wall, still unsteady on his feet, the effects from the statement earlier were wearing off, or whatever the supernatural equivalent was and he slipped like a shadow through the halls to his door to hide himself behind it.

Things did not improve. He was always in the wrong, always a menace and he’d caught a glimpse of himself in the restroom mirrors a couple times, surprised at how thin and pathetic he looked. But they were afraid of him. He Knew it. Because the Eye gravitated to these heavenly tastes of fear like a starving man did to food.

So he kept to himself.

I’m sorry.

As days crept in and out, Jon tried to keep stock of what was different and the only thing he could conclude after his careful analysis and study was that he. Jonathan Sims. Was now something less than human.

Less than.

That made sense. That was okay. He’d always been better off alone because when he was alone he couldn’t hurt people and all he seemed to do was hurt people.

Wasn’t that true?

Georgie Sasha Tim Martin Daisy Georgie Sasha Tim Martin DaisyGeorgieSashaTimMartinDaisy

What was the point of learning that hard-won lesson if he had no one left?

I’m sorry.

And there was no way to go back. He’d caused it. Been causing it since he was a child, alienating, precocious, and so unlikable.

And there was no way for him to fix it. Not when he was in so deep. Not when he was addicted to these, these tales of dread and panic and horror and pain and death and terror and loss. Not when he had taken from those that he haunted and hunted through nightmare and dream. Took what they had and made it his, feeding, feeding, feeding like some animal.

But animals didn’t have a choice did they?

I’m sorry.

He’d already been judged and found wanting. Georgie was right. He should have died, or stayed in the coma, or anything other than turning into whatever he was now. Something inhuman, un-human.

Un-made.

Twisted.

I’m sorry.

Pity there was no one left who would accept his worthless apologies. Not from whatever he was now.

Jon was barely in control, not in control. Not really. Exhausted and hungry and lonely, lonely, lonely. He decided to take control back, just a little, whatever he could because to be human was to stay in control.

And he takes it.

In the only way he can think how.

Blood wells up from scratches Jon gouges into his arms, from beneath the blades of dull knives and keen razors, deep and dark and dangerous if he were human. But he wasn’t. He couldn’t harm himself enough physically, healing too fast to really feel it like he wanted to feel it and the marks never stayed long enough. Didn’t, didn’t bleed long enough, fast enough, never enough.

There’s no one left to notice the rust and ruby lining the bin so Jon doesn’t bother putting effort into cleaning up evidence. It’s around him in the florid streaks crossing the blotter, the cardinal fingerprints on old envelopes, the scarlet trails of irregular constellations mapped beneath his chair.

The answer to his problem became clear soon after. The statements. Addicted to them, it wasn’t until Basira pointed out that he should stop that he realized the easiest way to hurt was to deny himself. And they wanted him to stop. They want him to hurt and he should hurt. It’s fine, it’s okay, it’s what he’s been looking for.

Maybe when they thought he’d hurt enough, they would forgive him.

The pain was good. Every time he denied the Eye was good. Better than, it was intoxicating. The smallest act of rebellion and he revelled in it. Knowing he was weak, that he couldn’t be used for whatever purpose he’d been created for while he was like this, filled him with a perverse hope.

Restless, Jon retraced his steps through the Archives, trying to avoid Basira and Melanie where he could though they didn’t do anything more than ignore him unless he had a purpose or interrogate him about leaving, finding a victim. Compelling them against their will.

“You look shite, Jon.” He avoided their eyes, stared at their feet and watched them fade in and out, as he swayed back and forth, and he knew they were sneering because he could hear it in their voice. “Proof enough, I suppose.” Melanie lifted his face with a gentle finger placed under his chin. “Haven’t been galavanting in people’s dreams?” Back bowing under the weight of her scrutinizing stare, Jon did his best to stand straight. Removing the influence of the Slaughter didn’t make her undivided attention any easier to stomach and he put effort into quelling the ever present shiver thrumming through his bones, playing his sinews like strings.

“Uh, n’no. I don’t leave much. Or at all.”

“Mm.”

“Melanie?” Narrowed eyes stared through him, followed the quick rush through the highways of his veins. She knew where to strike to do the most damage.

Jon Knew it wouldn’t stick if she tried.

He was sure he’d seen him come this way. Martin. Whom he missed more than he ever thought one could miss someone. And, really, what did he know of Martin? Other than how best to ridicule him? He’d done this, or at the very least pushed him toward it. A victim for the Lonely. For Peter Lukas to control and manipulate and Martin assured him he was fine. He was fine and Jon shouldn’t look for him anymore because it was making it harder, it was making it worse. And Jon could do that. Could do one thing to make it easier for Martin?

But when he saw him, pale and small and Martin should never seem so small, Jon abandoned all his promises. He’d never been good at keeping them anyway. Why start now? Dizzier than he thought, the first step almost sent him sprawling and he just managed to catch himself on the wall, resting against it long enough to lose him. He pushed off, caught himself again as the hall twisted around him, spiraling like Helen’s eyes when they burrowed into his own and he followed, stumbling, a body ricocheting from surface to surface; floor, window, door, battered and bruised where no one could see. Not like the scars and the timeline they’d scripted silver and hoary on translucent brown vellum.

Martin is not there.

Jon has arrived too late.

He was good at that.

The first sob cleaved him in two, the second carved his chest clean out. Empty. Painfully empty and worse than anything he’d done to himself thus far. There wasn’t room to breathe between, there wasn’t time or space and rather than cower in the open doorway Jon threw himself into the office, crashing to his knees and pressing his face into the wood of his neatly organized desk before he gathered the wherewithal to pull himself into the chair, nicking the jumper folded over the back of it before crumpling again. Soft against his cheek, the well worn wool comforted him enough that he gained tentative control over himself again. He spent the time there dazed between bouts of crying, gradually tugged into the deep and the dark, exhausted and guilty.

He’s visited by dreams instead of nightmares. A cool palm gently coaxing the blazing, feverish heat from his skin. Stroking back tangled curls from his damp face and murmuring gentle things, lovely things, that he had no right to take comfort from. Jon dreamt of being hushed, of tears swept away by mindful fingertips, of clinging to Martin’s cardigan so tightly his hands ached. There was warmth here. Softness here. That he didn’t deserve and stole anyway, greedy and covetous because that’s what monsters did. And he took it, held it close, let it soothe the aches and the agony he carried so deep in him it hurt to let free.

Sasha.

Tim.

Martin.

Jon woke to the smell of sea air and surf.

To the last of a thick fog clinging around his ankles.

To a mug of tea, still hot.

And a statement.

#Tma #the magnus archives #jon sims #martin blackwood #hurt/comfort #self worth issues #self harm #Cutting #Blood #starvation #It's dark times up in here #Be careful #angst

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ollieofthebeholder · 3 years

Text

leaves too high to touch (roots too strong to fall): a TMA fanfic

Tumblr tag || Also on AO3

Chapter 43: Jon

There aren’t words to describe what being home feels like.

It’s not just the four walls of the house they’ve bought together, or the warmth and beauty of a March sunset, or the sounds of a London evening. It’s Charlie flying down the sidewalk to attack Jon with a hug and a bright smile and a flurry of words about how much they’ve all missed him and then coming back two hours later, pleased as Punch and bearing a “welcome home” cake he baked himself. It’s Sasha calling, not texting, to tell Tim she’s home safe and then asking to talk to Jon so they can reassure each other that they’re both okay. It’s Martin gently tending to the marks on his wrists and ankles, still raw from his desperate attempts to pull free before his strength started to desert him, and singing the song he remembers from when he was a little boy and his father came back from a voyage. It’s Tim cooking Jon’s favorite dinner, but serving him in small helpings so that he doesn’t overstretch his stomach after two weeks while still making sure he eats his fill. It’s the cool, clean sheets and the thick, warm quilt and the weight and security of Tim and Martin on either side of him as he falls asleep, and it’s Tim and Martin soothing and reassuring him, as much with their presence as with any actual words, when he wakes up screaming in the middle of the night.

Going back to the Institute is harder than he would have thought. Only the fact that he knows he can’t be away from it for long gets him to go back—that and the fact that he can’t, won’t, leave his team alone to deal with Elias. Once there, though, he slips back into the routine easily enough. Despite Elias’s snide insinuations, the Archives ran fine without him, but he knows they’re glad to have him back.

They take Tuesday morning to regroup and plan. It’s all very well for both Elias and Jon Prime to tell them to find Gertrude’s notes, but Gertrude was, in Tim’s words, a paranoid old bitch, and it’s not likely that they’ll find a conspicuous notebook with detailed plans on how to stop the Unknowing. More likely that whatever they find will end up being more memory aids than anything, cryptic jottings that only mean something to Gertrude, and sussing it out won’t be easy. But it’s a place to start nevertheless, once they figure out where those notes are.

In the end, Tim and Martin take to looking through the shelves of statements—Tim looking for anything to do with the Stranger, Martin looking for a few of the tantalizing little threads they’ve noticed weaving through the tapestry of their database. Sasha attacks the filing cabinets, with the logic that Gertrude may have pretended to file something important. And Jon takes his counterpart’s advice and goes through his office.

It’s not like he doesn’t know what’s in all the drawers of his desk, but he does his due diligence, pulling everything out of each drawer, tapping for false backs or false bottoms. He does find, stuck in the back of the drawer where he keeps the spare statement forms, a creased and faded concert program printed on green stock from 2003; it doesn’t seem to have any immediate significance, though, so he sets it aside with the intention of looking into it later. Perhaps it’s simply a concert Gertrude attended that she enjoyed, but it might also be a clue to the Unknowing. He’ll have to research.

It isn’t until Wednesday morning that he finds the laptop, hidden along with a key under a floorboard that’s been creaky as long as he’s been working in the Archives. There are scratches on some of the floorboards that Jon’s always hoped aren’t fingernail marks, but several of them are loose and one of them levers up fairly easily, revealing Gertrude’s hidden stash. He digs around a bit but finds nothing else, only the laptop and the key. He sets both on his desk next to the concert program and goes to tell the others.

The laptop is dead, of course. Jon vaguely remembers seeing a charger for it when he was in Gertrude’s apartment, but he didn’t grab it then and it’s far too late to go back now. Luckily, Sasha’s laptop is almost the exact same model, so she simply swaps over the cable and lets it charge while they go over what they’ve found so far. Tim has three statements he thinks might be Stranger ones, but hasn’t looked at yet to be sure; Martin found a third statement involving the Daedalus, which Tim seems positive is a Dark statement, and another statement involving Salesa. Sasha hasn’t found anything in the filing cabinets—yet—but she does have Elias’ schedule, so they’re able to plan their briefings when they know they won’t be observed.

She also kindly hacks into Gertrude’s laptop for him, once it’s charged, and he spends most of Thursday painstakingly going through the files, emails, and Internet history. The latter is by far the most voluminous. It almost makes him laugh to discover the account name “grbookworm1818”—how had he not figured out that was Gertrude, attempting to buy Leitners? She seems to have obtained three, one of them being the copy of The Key of Solomon he found fragments of in the tunnels and the other two being ones he’s never seen or heard of. There are also purchase reports for Archival supplies, airline tickets and travel bookings, and sporadic but suspiciously large orders for petrol, lighter fluid, pesticides, and high-powered torches.

When he comes out of his office at the end of the day, eyes bleary and with no clear plan, he finds a number of dusty boxes scattered about and his assistants attempting to find space for them, but they refuse to tell him where they came from or what they’re for. The next morning, however, Martin and Tim usher him into one of the storage rooms they’ve never really got around to sorting out the second they arrive in the Archives. It’s completely empty, save a table, four chairs, a low set of shelves, a whiteboard, and a corkboard, to which Sasha is tacking a large map of the world. The shelves hold fourteen boxes of the kind designed to hold photographs, a large box of pushpins, three different-colored balls of string, and a laptop cord, ready and waiting.

“We thought we needed a war room,” Tim explains, obviously trying to fight back a grin. “You know, somewhere we can keep everything together and not…get mixed up with the rest of the work we’re doing.”

“Allegedly doing,” Sasha says over her shoulder. “I’m still not sure how much of this job is what was presented to us when we took it and how much is the sort of thing we’re doing right now…can one of you give me a hand here?” she adds as the upper corner of the map flops over onto her head, just above her outstretched hand. Tim comes over to assist.

Jon looks around, surprised and pleased, and opens his bag to pull out Gertrude’s laptop. “Why did you pick this room, out of curiosity?”

Martin pulls the door shut behind him. “The molding.”

“What?” Jon frowns at him.

Tim gives the map a firm stroke to smooth out any air bubbles and presses the pushpin deep into the cork, then turns to give Martin a warm, approving smile. “You know how Elias always seems to know what’s going on in the Archives whenever it’s least convenient for us? Martin realized why the other day.”

“It was an accident,” Martin insists, face turning slightly pink.

“It was brilliant.” Tim claps him on the shoulder. “Those fancy decorations at all the joins in the molding? You know, those elaborate carvings at the top of the fake columns and the corners of all the doorframes and whatnot?”

“Not…I’ve never paid much attention to them.” Jon’s only five foot seven, and since he’s never had to worry too much about clearance or anything like that he’s never really looked too much at anything over his head.

“It’s at the corners of all the shelves, too,” Martin offers. “At least the ones where the statements are stored, the ones that are pretty obviously original to the Institute. You know, with what looks like a medallion in the middle?”

Those Jon has seen. “It’s the Institute seal, isn’t it? Or the Magnus family crest?”

“That’s what I always thought, too, but Martin got a good look at one the other day while he was getting down a statement for me.” Sasha’s eyes sparkle behind her glasses, which instantly puts Jon on edge; these days, anything that excites Sasha is likely to have bad ramifications for them. “It’s an eye.”

“And if he can ‘see through any eye, real or image’…” Tim spreads his hands out invitingly.

Jon sets the laptop down harder than he probably should, eyes wide. “He’s been watching us through the moldings!”

“Yep. It’s anybody’s guess whether or not Gertrude knew about it. I ran it down right after I told them and got a lot of stammering and profanity. Although not from who you might expect,” Martin adds with just the tiniest bit of a smirk. Sasha practically cackles. “Anyway, this room doesn’t have anything like that, we double-checked. So we just…cleaned out all the stuff that was in here and set this up. Give us a bit of breathing room, anyway.”

“At least until Elias comes down to the Archives to figure out why he can’t see us easily,” Tim adds. “But, you know, it’s a head start.”

Jon is six inches shorter than Tim and a full nine inches shorter than Martin, so there’s no way to make it look less than deliberate if he attempts to give either one of them even the most casual kiss on the cheek, but good Lord, he wants to. Instead, he just beams at them both. “God, you’re brilliant. Right, let me get a cup of tea and we can get started.”

“I’m on it.” Martin slips out of the little room.

Sasha smirks at Jon behind Tim’s back, but he does his best to ignore her and focuses on the boxes. “What are these?”

“Tapes. We made copies of all the recordings we’ve done so far of the real statements and sorted them by which fear they belong to.” Sasha taps the lid of one of the boxes and indicates the label on the front. It’s a bright yellow set of concentric circles—no, Jon realizes, it’s a spiral. “Tim did the labels.”

Jon glances up at Tim, both impressed and worried. “You didn’t—”

“Nope.” Tim pulls out a box and shows him the label, simply the word US in a rich, vibrant green. “I don’t know how detailed the ‘image’ has to be, but I’m not risking it. Everything else I tried to do the symbols they described, or…something that made sense. Like antlers for the Hunt.”

“And the ink colors? Is that corresponding to—it’s not the labels we use.”

“No. Those are the colors I’m pretty sure the fears are.”

Martin comes back in with four mugs of tea. Jon takes his with a grateful smile. “Actually, let’s start there. We’ve never really talked about the colors, beyond…”

“What I told Elias,” Tim completes.

“And the little bit you described when you took a look at all of us.”

Tim takes his own mug from Martin, and for some reason Martin’s ears turn slightly pink. Jon’s distracted for a moment until Tim muses, “It’s…weird. Some of them are obvious. Like I said, it’s super obvious the Eye is green and the Stranger is indigo, because I saw that one at the Trophy Room with no other colors interfering. And the Corruption being yellow-green is obvious because of—”

“Me,” Martin finishes.

Tim nods. “And the Spiral being yellow—Christ, that door. The others I…sort of had to guess. Even with…you know…it was hard for me to suss out. The Eye is everywhere. Looking at him is like looking at the shelves in the Archives. The scars are pretty obvious, but not completely.” He frowns. “Like the Hunt and the Slaughter. They’re really close in color. I think the Slaughter’s got a bit more orange in it, the Hunt’s a true red, but especially under the cover of the Beholding, it’s hard to tell the difference. And, actually, sometimes it’s hard to tell the Stranger from the Web at a glance. I mean, until you really start looking at them. The Web is purple, so if it’s not by itself…I mean, it’s a subtle distinction.”

Jon glances uneasily at the carefully-inked purple spiderweb, then turns away. It still bothers him.

They manage to get nearly two hours into their discussion, moving from the colors to the Stranger threads they’ve picked up to what Jon’s gleaned from Gertrude’s laptop. Tim is just jabbing a pin into Nairobi on the map when Sasha stiffens and glances over her shoulder. “Incoming.”

Jon’s about to ask what she’s talking about when the door opens and Elias pokes his head in with a patently false smile. “Knock, knock.”

Tim and Martin make nearly identical noises of frustration. Jon clasps his hands behind his back and gives Elias his best I’m-annoyed-at-being-interrupted-but-you’re-my-superior-so-I’ll-be-polite look, which is only partly put-on. “Can we help you, Elias?”

“I simply wanted to see how you were progressing with finding out about the Unknowing.” Elias looks around the room with interest, and Jon has to work hard to use the tricks Jon Prime has been teaching him to keep his excitement from being obvious. Martin and Tim are right; Elias can’t see into this room. “What have you uncovered so far?”

Jon is immensely proud of his team. They manage to weave an incredibly tight explanation of how much they’ve learned, within limits, that doesn’t let on how much information they were given ahead of time, listing steps without revealing that anything other than chance led them to it. Elias completely acts the part of the mildly interested academic and bureaucrat, but he’s also obviously fishing for information. Martin does a masterful job of acting like he’s falling directly into Elias’ traps while neatly sidestepping them, Tim cracks jokes at the appropriate times to distract him while putting just enough bite into them that Elias will assume they’re simply angry and sarcastic jabs, and Sasha throws a flurry of technical terms into the discussion that are certainly relevant to the topic at hand but serve to make Elias change the tack of his questioning. Like Jon, she knows the value of a well-placed info dump.

There is no redirecting him from the map, however. While he must have known about Gertrude’s travels, at least in a general sense, it’s clear he knew little about her actual movements. Jon masks his reluctance with annoyance and gives Elias a clipped version of his findings.

“Is there any significance to the colors of pins you have used?” he asks, gesturing to the map, where they’ve been marking out Gertrude’s travels. “Or is it random? Or for the…aesthetic?”

“We were trying to do it by what year she took the trip, but we only have so many colors,” Jon answers. “We’ve just switched over. Red are trips that were very definitely expensed back to the Institute, white are ones that were not, and yellow are the ones where we aren’t quite sure.”

“Mm…Gertrude did request a rather high travel budget, comparatively. Of course, if the Archivist job was as simple as it is in other institutions, she would have required no travel whatsoever, but in her capacity to stop the rituals…” Elias seems particularly fascinated by the pin on Beijing. “Why is this one in blue?”

“We just haven’t swapped the pin over yet. That’s one of the last trips we have a record of in Gertrude’s laptop.” Tim tilts his head at Jon. “From, what, six months before she died?”

“Closer to nine. Actually, Martin, can you change that one out, please?” Jon gestures at the box. “It’s a yellow one, I think.”

Martin mumbles an excuse me and switches out the pin. Elias purses his lips thoughtfully. “I don’t recall there being a ritual anywhere near Beijing at the time. What could have sent her there?”

“No idea. What’s bothering me is that we don’t know where she went from there.”

That draws Elias’ attention away from the map and back to Jon. “Surely she came back to London.”

“No.” Jon folds his arms over his chest. “Or at least, not that we can find. As I said, we’re largely tracing these trips from booking confirmations sent to Gertrude’s email address, and she largely purchased one-way tickets. Her last flight purchased out of London was to Paris, and then she booked a flight from Paris to Beijing. From there…I don’t know. I suppose she was buying tickets as she went along. It’s not like her credit card statements list where the flights went, only what airlines she flew and when she purchased the tickets. No hotel accommodations, though. Doubtless she paid cash, or else Gerard paid for those.”

“Gerard?” Elias says with interest. “Gerard Keay? Who told you he was traveling with Gertrude?”

Panic strikes Jon. Most likely it’s something he gleaned from Jon Prime—but on the other hand, did the Primes actually mention that? Flustered, he stammers, “I—someone must have—”

“No, no one told you. You Knew.” Elias sounds delighted.

“I probably just—gleaned it from the statements.” Jon glances at the shelves.

“No, Jon, this is a good thing. You’re getting stronger! It’s one thing to be able to—” Elias gestures vaguely and almost dismissively at Tim and Martin “—glean something from somebody in the room, but just Knowing something like that, that’s a big step.”

He sounds like a proud father, and it makes Jon feel incredibly uncomfortable. He balls his hands into fists, gathering up the cuffs of the sweater he definitely didn’t steal from either Tim or Martin, to stop himself from reaching out to one of them for protection. It’s stupid. Elias won’t hurt him, not here, not now; he needs him too much. He knows he’s safe. It just feels…dangerous, and he wants them to make him feel safer. Rather than risk Elias knowing how much he depends on them and doing something about it, he grips the sweater.

Elias practically beams at him. “It seems to me your next step should be obvious.”

“It should?”

“You should start retracing her steps. Are her notes from this trip on there?”

“Ah—no.”

“Then you’ll need to go where she was. Find out where she stayed, what she did.” Elias clasps his hands behind his back. “Where she went from there. How soon do you think you can leave?”

Jon blinks. This is going a bit faster than he expected. He turns to Tim and Martin. “Do you two have a passport?”

Martin looks a bit stunned. “N-no, I’ve never—never needed one?”

“Mine’s still in good standing,” Tim answers. “But if Martin needs one, that’d be—what, four weeks, at a minimum?”

“Jon, I asked when you would be able to leave,” Elias says, mildly enough but with a bit of steel behind it. “Your assistants need to stay here. We do need to get all of this straightened out still, and there’s research that needs to be done from here. You can relay whatever information you find back to the Archives, and I’m sure they can assist you if needed, but really, the Institute can’t spare the funds to reimburse more than one of you for an extended trip.”

Jon is pretty sure that’s a lie, but he knows Elias won’t reimburse them, and he also knows that neither Tim nor Martin can actually afford to pay their own way to come along, not with the house payments and Martin’s mother’s medical bills. He sighs heavily and fights to maintain eye contact with Elias. “I can get a flight out Sunday night or Monday morning.”

“Monday will be fine,” Elias says without batting an eyelash. Jon knows Sunday, statistically speaking, is the most expensive day to fly, so anything to save the Institute a few pence, he supposes. “Well, it seems you’ve all done marvelously well. I think you all deserve to take a half-day today. With pay. Finish up what you need to do here, and you can leave at twelve. Jon, do keep me appraised of your flight information.” He flashes them an absolutely terrifying smile, turns on his heel, and leaves the room.

The second the door shuts behind him, Jon sags, bracing himself against the table. “God.”

Sasha collapses into a chair, looking absolutely wiped out. “Tell me about it.”

“Hold on.” Martin picks up Jon’s mug, then Sasha’s, and slips out of the room.

Tim tentatively reaches out and touches Jon’s arm. “Sit down before you fall down. You look almost as bad as she does.”

“I’m all right.” Jon sits down anyway, grateful for Tim’s concern.

A phone buzzes from somewhere; Jon instinctively reaches for his pocket before remembering that he hasn’t replaced it yet. He spent longer than he should have trying to resurrect his shattered phone after Martin silently handed him its remains, but finally had to give up. “Is that yours, Tim?”

“No, I think it’s Martin’s.”

With that rare sort of timing that almost never happens, Martin comes back in, bearing two brimming mugs of tea; he hands one to Sasha, then one to Jon. He has to bend over to do it, and Jon brushes a quick kiss against his cheek as it comes past before he loses his nerve, then tries to play it off like he didn’t notice he did it. “Your phone went off.”

Martin’s ears are pink, and he goes to pick up his phone rather quickly. He actually snorts with laughter and shakes his head, a slightly amused smile on his face as he taps out a reply.

“Everything okay?” Tim asks with a raised eyebrow.

“Yeah, it’s from Melanie. Just says ‘Jet lag sucks balls.’ I’m guessing she’s back in town.” Martin slips his phone into his pocket and sighs. “What do we do now?”

“Unfortunately,” Jon mutters, “I think we do what Elias said. Finish up what we’re doing here, and leave early.” He looks over at Sasha. “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine.” Sasha manages a smile that even Jon can tell is fake, then drops it immediately and sighs. “I was trying to keep on top of how much he knew, or thought we knew. It’s a weird sort of balancing act…thing. Like keeping just the right tension on a rope.”

“Sasha.” Martin sounds upset. “You were reading his mind?”

“Just—skimming the surface,” Sasha protests.

Jon sighs and pinches the bridge of his nose. “You have to stop doing that. I know it’s tempting. God knows I know that. But you can’t just—and you knew he was coming. Was that intentional?”

“Sort of. It’s not like I’m constantly trying to read his mind or whatever, but…I don’t know. I just got a sense of…something.”

“All right, Gwen Stacey,” Tim says with a smirk. “Jon’s right, though, you’ve got to quit feeding it or it’s going to start feeding on you.”

Sasha sighs heavily. “I’m…trying to try.”

“Well, it’s a start.” Jon takes a sip of tea.

They get the room straightened up, then head back into the Archives. Martin keeps periodically replying to text messages on his phone, but the others don’t ask. It’s not until Jon, having brought his laptop out to join the others, is finalizing his booking that he frowns at his screen and looks up at the others. “Melanie wants to know if the rest of you’d like to join us for lunch, seeing as we’ve got the afternoon off and everything.”

Jon hesitates. On the one hand, he’d like to decline; he and Melanie tend to prick at each other whenever they interact, despite his best intentions. On the other hand, he admittedly wants to spend as much time with Tim and Martin as he can before he leaves on this trip. Heaven knows how long he’ll be gone and he’ll miss them, he knows that.

“If I’m included in that,” he says at last, “I’d be honored.”

They lock up at twelve and head to the pub Jon has begun to think of as “theirs”, even though they don’t go often. It’s cool and overcast, and there are definite signs it rained earlier, most notably the worms on the sidewalk. Jon notices Martin carefully avoiding treading on them and reaches over to take his hand comfortingly just as Tim throws his arm around his shoulders from the other side. It makes Sasha laugh, which makes them laugh, too, and at least gets Martin to stop watching his feet.

Pat waves when they come in and gestures to one of the tables, and Martin steps forward with a warm smile as Melanie King rises from a chair and meets him with a hug that would probably make Jon jealous if he didn’t know Martin was gay, and also if he had any right to be jealous. “God, it is…surprisingly good to see you.”

Martin huffs a laugh. “I’m not sure how to take that.”

Melanie actually laughs and gives Martin a friendly punch on the arm. Martin laughs in earnest as he reels back in an exaggerated manner, rubbing at his arm. “Ow! Hey, I need that!”

“Sure.” Melanie turns and offers Sasha a smile and her hand. “Sasha, good to see you.”

“Good to see you, too.” Sasha shakes her hand, then turns slightly. “Sorry, don’t think we’ve met.”

Jon turns, too, and his brain pulls up short. She’s changed up her hairstyle and shed her glasses, there’s a tattoo peeking out from under the collar of her t-shirt, and he’s pretty sure there are a couple additional holes in her ears, but the smile is unmistakable to someone who’s spent six years running from it.

“Georgie,” he stammers.

Georgie Barker’s smile gets a bit more uncertain, but there’s at least no hostility in her eyes. “Jon, hello. I didn’t expect to see you.”

“I, ah—” Jon gestures vaguely, either at Martin or at Melanie, he’s not sure which.

Melanie shrugs. “I did say the invitation was open to everyone. Kind of didn’t expect you to accept, to be honest, but—”

“Frankly, it’s been a shit month and we’re an all-or-nothing deal right now,” Martin says. He looks slightly quizzical and slightly worried as he eyes Georgie. “I—did I talk to you on the phone once?”

“Right, introductions. Georgie Barker, Martin Blackwood, Sasha James, and—” Melanie waves at Tim. “I actually haven’t got a clue who you are.”

“There are some who call me….Tim?” Tim quips with an arch of the eyebrows.

It’s the right thing to say to diffuse the tension, especially as Melanie and Martin both let out exaggerated groans as Georgie, who consumed every bit of media even vaguely associated with Arthurian legend during a time when she was obsessed enough to qualify as a minor expert on the subject, bursts into laughter. The six of them arrange themselves around the table as Pat brings over a tray of pints, then takes their food orders and heads off to get them together.

Martin takes a sip of his pint and evidently starts to speak three times before saying in a carefully neutral voice, “I hope you had a…successful trip.”

Melanie lifts an eyebrow at him. “You were a lot less cagey before. Is it them?”

“No, I’m a bit tired,” Martin says. “Like I said, it’s been…a lot.” He hesitates, glancing at Georgie for a brief second, then evidently gives up. “Remember how I said we all had…weird stuff we could do? My thing is that I can make people answer questions when I ask them. And if I’m tired or not really paying attention, sometimes I do it without meaning to, and that’s not fair to you.”

“I don’t believe you.” Melanie folds her arms over her chest. “Prove it.”

Martin hesitates. “Okay, um…what made you so upset when I asked if you wanted to come to lunch with me when we met?”

“If you weren’t a bloke, you’d be exactly my type and I had just a second where I wondered if I was actually a lesbian,” Melanie answers automatically, then blinks. “Fuck.”

Martin’s face catches fire. Tim grins and winks. “That just proves you’ve got taste.”

“Yeah, well, still.” Melanie presses her lips tightly together. “S’pose I can’t get too mad. I did tell you to prove it. Not your fault I didn’t actually expect it to work.” She snorts. “Successful? Yeah, I guess. I found out what I went to find out. And I didn’t die, so…promise kept?” She shrugs. “I owe you the whole story, but maybe not here.”

“Come by the Institute on Monday,” Sasha offers. “We can get your statement—oh, right.” She looks at Jon. “That okay with you?”

“No, that’s fine. Ah, take your pick on who you want to tell it to,” Jon says to Melanie, indicating the other three. “I promise you don’t have to deal with me.”

“I don’t mind all that much,” Melanie says with a sideways glance at Georgie. “You’re not…actually that bad to talk to. At least you’re trying not to be a prick.”

Georgie turns a laugh into a cough. Jon studiously avoids looking at her. “Thank you, I think, but I didn’t mean that in a ‘you can choose to talk to someone else’ way. I meant that as in ‘I’m leaving on a business trip Monday morning, so I won’t even be there.’”

“A business trip—for an Archivist? What, are you going to the Library of Alexandria or something?”

“No, the last one blew that up,” Tim says under his breath.

Jon kicks Tim under the table. “Beijing. My…predecessor traveled there some time before her death, but she didn’t leave any notes behind on what she may have learned there. So, lucky me, I get to follow behind her and try to pick up a three-year-old trail.”

“You can’t tell me the idea of piecing together something like that doesn’t appeal to you,” Georgie says, sounding amused. “What’s your—hang on, what was it called—your PFX count these days?”

“I haven’t—yes, all right, I suppose the idea of the hunt’s not altogether unwelcome,” Jon admits. “I just…would really rather not be doing it right now. For God’s sake, I only just got back from my last—unexpected absence.”

Martin’s hand tightens on his glass. Tim takes a huge swallow of his. Georgie looks back and forth between the two of them, then frowns at Jon. “So why are you leaving so quickly? If it’s been three years, it’s not like the clues are going anywhere.”

“Yes, but the situation is…somewhat time-sensitive.”

“Critical,” Martin supplies.

“Life-or-death, you might say,” Tim offers.

Georgie’s frown deepens. “You’re an Archivist. Which I’m still wrapping my brain around, by the way. You were a researcher, Jon. I know you don’t just have a degree in library science lying around.”

“No,” Jon says with a sigh. “The Archives at the Magnus Institute are…interesting, let’s put it that way. Library training in the actual Archivist is surprisingly less important than you might think. Besides, we have Martin, and what he doesn’t know about organizing and categorizing isn’t worth knowing.”

“Christ.” Martin buries his face one hand. Both Sasha and Melanie snicker at him. If the two of them are going to be friends, Jon thinks, God help them all.

Only Georgie can manage to frown while simultaneously arching an eyebrow in a knowing fashion. Jon tries very hard to pretend he doesn’t understand what she thinks she knows. “So you have a degree in library science.”

“No,” Martin says, voice still muffled by his palm. “I don’t have a degree. But I worked in the library at the Institute for ten years before I got assigned to the Archives, so I kind of know what I’m doing.”

“Right. Still. What do you have to do, as an Archivist, in China, that is life or death?”

Protect my team, Jon wants to say but doesn’t. The ritual, according to the Primes, can’t succeed; Orsinov’s Unknowing will collapse on itself. They’re probably going to try to stop it anyway, because he doesn’t doubt that Orsinov will survive the ritual’s failure and try again, and they can’t let anyone else fall prey to that. This world tour, retracing Gertrude’s steps, won’t give them any information to help them with that. But Elias doesn’t know they know that, and Jon can’t risk what he might do to the people he loves if he doesn’t obey orders.

“It’s…a long story,” he tries.

Georgie shrugs. “I’ve done my recordings for the week and I’ve got plenty of time for editing. And I thought you got off early today.”

Pat turns up then with everyone’s lunch. Jon waits until he heads back behind the bar to say, “I don’t…know where to begin, honestly. Trust me when I say it’s all pretty unbelievable.”

“You’re an archivist. We left believable behind a while ago.”

“Ha, ha.” Jon gives Georgie his best glare. As usual, she sticks her tongue out at him and rolls her hand for him to continue. “I—really, I don’t know where to—”

“Jon.” Martin sets down his glass, reaches over, and covers Jon’s hand with his own. Jon meets his eyes instinctively. “In thirty words or less, what is the story behind this trip?”

“There are monsters in the world, tied to different fears,” Jon answers immediately. “They’re trying to reshape the world in their own image and basically kickstart the Apocalypse. We’re trying to stop them.”

Martin sits back, looking miserable, and it’s only then Jon registers the wash of static receding from his mind. “Sorry, Jon. I really should have asked first.”

Jon grabs Martin’s hand before he can pull it away and squeezes. “I’d have sat here dithering to the end of time if you hadn’t. Thank you, Martin.”

Martin manages a tentative smile. Georgie’s frown has eased back a little. “Huh. How many of these things are there?”

“Monsters? Or rituals?” Jon blinks at Georgie. “You believe me?”

“Well, yeah.” Georgie waves a hand as if to say duh. “It’s not like I didn’t know there are monsters in the world.”

Sasha’s hand tightens on her fork, and she pushes back from the table abruptly. “Be right back. I—I need a minute.” She strides purposefully for the front door.

“Sasha, don’t—” Jon begins to call after her, but too late; she’s out the door.

“Did I say something wrong?” Georgie looks concerned.

Martin sighs heavily. “I’m going to go out on a limb and assume you’ve seen…monsters before.”

“Yeah? What’s that got to do with anything?” Georgie asks with a deepening frown.

“Oh…damn.” Jon looks at Georgie, and now he can feel it, too—the static building behind his eyes, an almost imperceptible itch beneath his skin. This shouldn’t be happening, he’s taken two statements already this week, first Michael’s and then Tim and Martin’s, and even if Sasha siphoned off most of that one…he can’t possibly need one this badly, not now. But it’s not need, it’s want, it’s a desire at this point, so he can fight it…

“The Institute serves one of those fear things we’re talking about,” Tim tells her, his voice subdued. “In our case, it’s about knowledge and secrets and…hidden information and stuff like that. We usually just call it the Eye, it’s quicker than most of the other names. But one of the ways it sort of feeds itself is with other people’s stories of their spooky encounters. Usually with something touched by one of the other beings.”

“You’ve got a story to tell,” Martin explains. “The Eye wants it. And Sasha and Jon can both…” He hesitates, looking at Jon. “Sense it?”

“Better than saying ‘smell it,’ I suppose,” Jon says softly. He takes a deep breath and closes his eyes, forcing the static back.

Georgie blinks. “I mean…I’ll tell you about it. If you want.”

“That…would probably not be a good idea. I can’t—we can’t take but so many statements in any given period of time.” Jon opens his eyes, feeling a bit calmer. “Not without wearing ourselves out, or hurting ourselves. And I’ve had two already this week.”

“And we’ve had one each,” Tim adds, gesturing to himself and Martin. “Right? You just read—”

“Statement of Manuela Dominguez, regarding her unconventional religious beliefs and their intersection with her project aboard the space station Daedalus,” Martin recites. “And you read yours yesterday, it was—”

“Not, as it turns out, a Stranger statement. The Web. Statement of Darren Harlow, regarding a failed psychology experiment at the University of Surrey.” Tim rubs his forehead and sighs. “Actually, I need to talk to you two about that one. We may have a problem.”

Melanie looks back and forth between the two of them, blinking. Jon sighs, too. “Anyway, yes, it’s…there’s a lot. The ritual we’re trying to stop right now is the Stranger’s. It’s—kind of the opposite of the Eye? The ritual’s called the Unknowing. We’re still piecing together what it’s all about, but anyway, that’s what I’m about to go haring off around the world about. Which I would really rather not do, but I don’t have much of a choice. Our boss made that perfectly clear.” He can’t keep the bitterness out of his voice.

Sasha comes back in, looking much calmer, and slips back into her seat with an apology. Melanie looks at Tim. “So what about you, then? If he can ask questions and make people answer, and they can tell when someone’s got a story—”

“It’s not quite that. It’s more—” Sasha spreads out her hands. “Less stories and more secrets. Things people haven’t told. At least, that’s how it is for me. The ones who come to make statements and will talk to anyone, they’re not as interesting to me. It’s the ones who just…don’t want to talk about it, I guess. Or choose not to. Sometimes I know things without meaning to, but I’m trying to throttle that back. Jon is more…all of it.”

Jon nods. “I have the—the question thing, too. And the knowing, although it’s not just hidden things, it’s facts or important information. It’s not as bad as it could be, but it’s getting worse. On top of that, there’s the compulsion to read out the statements, and…it’s just a lot.”

“None of which actually answers my question,” Melanie says. “What did you get out of all this?”

“Oh. I can…look at people, or things, and see if they’ve had anything to do with one of the fear…things,” Tim says. “They glow different colors.”

“You can see auras,” Georgie supplies.

“Not—exactly. I mean, I can’t say ‘oh, you have a calm personality’ or ‘you’re a very troubled person’ or anything like that. But if you’ve bumped into one of the powers, if I concentrate, I can see where it marked you and…usually figure out from there.”

Georgie folds her hands on the table and meets his eye. “What color is mine, then? Or am I making it up?”

Tim hesitates, then takes a deep breath. His eyes go slightly unfocused, and Jon feels the faint crackle of static—not quite the same as when Martin asks questions or Sasha blurts out a secret, but close, like the dial on a disused radio station turned a single click in a different direction. After a moment, Tim’s shoulders relax and he blinks. “White. Bright white. The one you’ve met is Terminus. The End.” He hesitates. “Death. Am I right?”

There’s a short pause before Georgie looks at Jon and says, “You’ve got a good bunch here.”

Jon looks at both Tim and Martin and says, softly, “I know.”

#ollie writes fanfic #leaves too high to touch (roots too strong to fall)#tma #the magnus archives #jonmartim #emotional manipulation tw #implied blackmail tw #slight misuse of beholding powers

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zashamalkin · 4 years

Video

youtube

Sport24 spent the whole day with Kasterova and found out how the wife of the three-time Stanley Cup winner lives.

Translation below the cut.

Sunday afternoon. The film crew and I drive up to the Malkins' house at 11:00. Anna's morning begins with a workout. The gym is located on the first floor of the house, where we meet the heroine and her coach Igor Kim, the CrossFit champion. “I always try to start the day with a workout, sometimes more intense, sometimes less. Today I will show you the standard workout that I do on the day of the broadcast. It gives a boost of energy, good mood, " Anna begins.

First, warm up on a treadmill for ten minutes. Then there are jumps and squats, several types of "planks". “I train almost every day. I make myself indulgences: one or two days. To be honest, in Moscow I train less often and less intensively . "

An obligatory part of the program is work with dumbbells. With them, Anna lunges. This is followed by exercises with TRX loops and on the machine. “We work a lot on posture, gait, ” explains Kasterov between approaches. While the trainer puts “pancakes” on the barbell, Anna talks about working with “weights” and her diet.

- You can't pump your ass without weights. This is unrealistic. And it's not a fact with weights. All have their weak points. I was once asked on Instagram the question: "Is it possible to pump up the ass in two months?" No you can not.

- Nutrition is also very important. - Of course! You kill so much in the gym, work for the result ... Well, what kind of rolls and gingerbread can we talk about? Already somewhere you have to choose steamed fish, vegetables. For example, now I don't eat sweets at all. In general, I have a sweet tooth: I don't eat fruits, but I like milk chocolate, kinders. But over the past two months I have not eaten sweets at all.

After squats with a barbell of 30 kg, jumping with an elastic band. The workout has been running for forty minutes, so it's time to cool down and stretch. At this time, Evgeny and Nikita Malkin appear at the door, who have come to say goodbye to their mother. Dad is taking his son to hockey practice. “When it comes to hockey, Evgeny is mainly involved. He himself sees and understands what load the child needs, how many times a week he needs to do it, ”says Anna.

After training, Anna leaves to get ready. And in a few hours we go to the Suistudio store to meet with Match TV stylist Ruslan Shakurov and try on clothes for the television broadcast next week. On the way, we discussed with Kasterova her return to the big screen.

- The news of your return to Russian television excited the public. When did you receive an offer from Match TV and how long did you think about it? - Everything always happens spontaneously with me. As practice shows, if you prepare for some projects for a long time, then something will definitely happen. We knew a lot of guys from Match TV, including managers, chief editors, and sound engineers, and worked together at Russia-2. We basically kept in touch all this time. Before the anniversary of Match TV (November 1, 2020, the channel celebrated its fifth anniversary. - Ed.) I got a call from one of the channel's top managers and invited me to a festive broadcast with Dima Guberniev. I was just about to fly to Sochi on vacation. I was very inspired by this proposal, immediately changed tickets, returned earlier and came as a guest presenter. The broadcast went easily, even there were such reviews: “We understand that you had a five-year break, but you worked so well, it was obvious that you were comfortable. Professionalism is not lost. How do you think about working while Zhenya is in Russia? " We discussed everything with the management, including Tina (Kandelaki, general producer of Match TV. - Ed. ). By the way, she just charmed me. An incredibly smart, wise, amazing woman.

- When the season begins in the NHL, will you fly with Zhenya to America? “I don’t want to reveal all our secrets, all our agreements with Tina. We have a specific goal with her for the next year, to which we are moving. Perhaps I will periodically appear on the air. I will stay with Eugene in the USA, then I will return to Moscow for a month. All this does not exclude my possible journalistic activity in America.

- Before the first broadcasts after your return, were you very nervous? - No. Many thanks must be said to Dima Guberniev, who was able to relax me, create a comfortable atmosphere, and it was all “for fun”. The first broadcast was easy, there was no excitement. Another thing is when I was offered to return. Here I am already responsible, I am the one who broadcasts with the guests. Before the first broadcast, I was worried. But everything went well. I know how to cope with nerves, years of work and experience have not gone anywhere.

- Has it become difficult now to combine personal life and work? - In general, I spend a lot of time with my child. Of course, now it turns out less. But you have to think about yourself somehow. All these years I really missed work, broadcasts, these feelings. Fortunately, I have a very understanding family. First of all, my husband, who supported me incredibly strongly. Before each broadcast, he tunes me in, gives me parting words. He's happy for me. Understands that I will not stay in Moscow forever.

- From the outside one gets the impression that your life in recent years has been ideal. Husband with son, Miami, high income and the ability to buy whatever you want. Why did you decide to return to television and what did you miss? - In general, I was not born in some kind of golden cradle. In order to achieve some results in my career, I had to work hard. Actually, it hasn't gone anywhere. Yes, we are definitely lucky. We have a wonderful life filled with comfort. But understand that there are pros and cons everywhere. This does not mean that I wake up when I want and do what I want. Living with a professional athlete is also a certain job. A lot of time and attention is spent on Eugene. He is the head of the family, he is the main earner. We are all adjusting to it.

The desire to work never left me. By the way, many acquaintances said to me: “Nafig do you need this? You already have everything. Live, get high. " But, probably, I am so arranged that I cannot. There was a feeling that I had not completely done something, that I still want ethereal emotions, sensations. It's like a drug.

- You are constantly included in the ratings of the sexiest and most beautiful women in Russia. When you open these articles and news, what emotions do you feel? - It is very nice. Recently, a rating of Maxim magazine was compiled, at first the publication announced a list of girls who were included in it. By the way, they have a very cool editor-in-chief Alexander Malenkov, we have known each other for a long time. He has a cool editor who deals with Instagram. And they wrote that I am one of the few who does not appear in the media, but at the same time do not lose the love of the electorate. For me, this is also a pleasant moment. We come to Moscow for just a couple of months, but nevertheless, people do not forget. The guys from my fan group leave comments under the posts all the time. Naturally, this attention spurs.

As for all these ratings, I will not say that it gives me confidence. I am a very self-critical person, I will find a bunch of flaws and flaws in myself. But, apparently, it means that people cannot be fooled. I like it, it's cool. I really appreciate all this.

***

- When you first moved to America to your Zhenya, how difficult was it to get used to your new life? Here you had a job, loved ones, and there is only him. - It was difficult, especially in the first year. A new country, people, a language that at that time was not at the same level as it is now. Naturally, there was a certain barrier. Zhenya was constantly on the road, plus pregnancy, no one canceled hormones. It was very hard, there was not enough work. I reflected very hard on this at the time.

- In the hockey world, it is often discussed that you spend more time in Miami, and Eugene in Pittsburgh. Doesn't he take offense? - It's all not true. I don't understand where it came from at all. I heard that from someone too. Miami just has more opportunities to take cool photos. And even then, if you look at my instagram, then there are photos from Miami and Pittsburgh approximately equally. But people are strange. If Zhenya leaves for three weeks, then, naturally, my child and I will fly to Miami. We, in fact, bought apartments there for this. Plus Nikita goes to an American school there, learns the language.

- Anastasia Ovechkina told me that if she and Sasha go to the shopping mall to buy groceries, they will recognize him everywhere and ask to be photographed. Do you and Zhenya have the same situation in the USA and Russia? - As far as Pittsburgh and Moscow are concerned, Zhenya is one hundred percent recognizable. Going out somewhere and not taking a picture with someone is unrealistic. He's so reliable. Now, maybe because of the coronavirus, he is somewhere afraid, after all, he is responsible for his family.

At first, his recognition was a problem for me. When we started dating, I understood who he was, but did not imagine the extent of his popularity. Going out somewhere to eat so that no one stares at you is really difficult. I don’t remember that. But now we already know certain places, we can sit in a separate room in the restaurant in order to calmly spend time alone or with a family.

- Is it unrealistic for you to go to Gorky Park with your family in good weather? - Get out this way we'll get out. But it will definitely not work out there quietly.

- Is the situation in America the same? - Yes.

- When you first started dating, was it difficult for you to get used to the fact that the schedule of the second person should be put first and your life should be adjusted to his schedule? - Now it's harder for me to talk about it, because I've already forgotten my feelings, whims. I'm used to being adjusted to me. But everything was smooth. Yes, and I fell in love, I wanted to please him, create a comfortable atmosphere so that everything in our family would be good. Everything was calm, harmonious, without any hysterics. There were, of course, small ones (laughs) .

- And you are still in a foreign country, alone. - Yes. Zhenya supported me. Sometimes, however, it seemed to me that he was not doing it enough. But then it passed, there was a complete mutual understanding.

***

For a pleasant conversation, we quietly reach our destination. In the boutique, stylist Ruslan Shakurov is already waiting for us. He takes a tour of the store, shows him the bows he likes, and we go to the fitting room. For the broadcasts Ruslan picked up three pantsuits: bright yellow, beige and blue with stripes. By a collective decision, we choose the brightest - yellow. In it very soon Anna will appear on the air. At the exit from the store, she even admits: “I never thought I'd say this, but I'm really a little tired of shopping” (laughs) . We go to a nearby coffee shop to discuss some more interesting topics.

- The first question suggests itself. Are you a shopaholic at all? - Well, in general, like any normal girl, yes. I love it. Cheers up. It's always nice to pamper yourself.

- In quarantine, your husband posted a video of how he plays computer games. Do you mind? And does he not involve his son? - Absolutely all children play with gadgets: be it a phone, an iPad. Of course, there are limitations. But I cannot completely forbid. He still pays attention to his peers, to older guys who play. I try to offer alternatives, some interesting games. As for Zhenya, I am also calm. Each person has their own ways to relieve stress: someone needs to go for a drink, someone has a smoke, someone needs to play computer games. I don't see it going off scale. Plus, he communicates with many guys there, who, like him, play. Zhenya is not the only hockey player. If it relieves stress, for God's sake. This is not the worst thing that can be.

- You have repeatedly said that you have a difficult character, both of you and Zhenya are hot-tempered. How is it in your family after unsuccessful games? - I relatively recently caught up to the end what my husband experiences after unsuccessful matches. When around, perhaps, no one noticed his mistakes, but he knows to himself that he played badly. I had such a broadcast when I was left very unhappy with myself, but everyone around liked everything and no one said anything bad. I went out and was not at all, because I realized that I did not spend it as I could, and reflected on this for several more hours. Probably at that moment I compared myself to Zhenya and realized that it was difficult to find some words at that moment.

In general, my husband doesn't have many bad games. Zhenya always shows himself, in almost every game. But if the match was not very successful, I step aside, do not torment me with questions and conversations. We had dinner, he went to play a computer game or read a book. At such moments I try to just not go to him. A person needs to be alone, to come to his senses.

- You somehow teased each other in the comments of Instagram. Is it the same in life? - Constantly! This is our communication style. Of course, in some moments there is tenderness, warmth. But we often joke about each other, everything comes from his side. Moreover, Nikita is becoming more mature, and her husband begins to involve the child in his events. It's funny! In general, in our family you will not get bored.

#evgeni malkin #anna kasterova #off season 2020 #moscow #match tv #sport24

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haro-whumps · 5 years

Text

Group Whumpees 4: Responsibility

CW: referenced noncon, transphobia (out of ignorance, not malice, but VERY present), modern slavery, aftermath of abuse, multiple whumpees, abrasive language

Tag list: @bleeding-demon-teeth @theycomeinthrees @redwingedwhump @whimperwoods @inpainandsuffering @whole-and-apart-and-between @whump-whump-whump-it-up @whumpingupastorm @newandfiguringitout @lonesome-hunter @looptheloup @icannotweave @cowboysrappin @deluxewhump @whumping-every-day @yeet-me-out-a-window @what-a-whumpy-world @burtlederp

This is... a LONG one...

First

Nyla and Evan helped Lilah clean up her open injuries and scabs, the many hands making light work, and they were off to join Greyson and Sasha in the kitchen in hardly any time at all. On the way there, Nyla detoured to the front facing window, and Master’s car from the night before was, indeed, gone.

She was the last to the kitchen but was able to smile and announce his absence. The nervous energy settled into relief and a bit of joy, and Nyla recounted the morning’s encounter to the others, Sasha frying up five sausages.

“He’ll be gone most of the day,” Lilah repeated, thoughtful, and Evan flicked a lock of her hair.

“And he doesn’t eat breakfast, so the bread’s all ours.”

Lilah and Evan shared a smile, and Nyla sighed. Troublemakers, both of them, Lilah couldn’t keep her face from twisting up sourly or going vacant and Evan couldn’t keep his mouth shut to save his life, and the moment they got an inch of leash they started acting like hooligans. She was so fond of them both; she just wished they’d stop getting into trouble.

“We should talk, while he’s out,” Nyla asserted, fingertips drumming on the kitchen counter. “Compare observations and start up some guesswork on how to please him. He told us to ‘not push ourselves too hard’ today, so we can spare an hour or so for conversation, I think.”

“Is th-that really s-s-safe?” Sasha asked.

“He told us to,” Nyla repeated, fists balling, “I’ll take full blame for any ire, but he told us to, and we need to know what we’re going to do, here out. Grey, tell us what happened last night. Why were you in bed with us?”

“He didn’t want anyone, last night,” Greyson stated calmly, though his normally immobile brow furrowed. “He cited being drunk, and said he wasn’t going to hurt us, but he was displeased, though by what, I cannot tell.”

“He probably wanted a fuck,” Evan said, and everyone tensed at his angry words. “Grey and I aren’t gonna cut it, anymore. We’ve got a Master now.”

“If that’s what he wanted, he would’ve sent for one of us, then,” Nyla dismissed with a shake of her head, washing her hands before checking to see if the bread was done. Close, but not quite yet. “He might have actually been too drunk to act on whatever he wanted, and that was what caused his displeasure.”

“I wouldn’t be so quick to assume either of those,” Greyson said contemplatively, and they all turned a wary eye on him. He leaned forward, even though there was no one else in the house to hear, and they all instinctively leaned towards him in response. “Things are… more complicated, with Master Galo. He’s one of those transvestites. I don’t know entirely what that means, for us, but I think that we shouldn’t rule any possibilities out.”

“He’s a girl?” Lilah asked, screwing up her face in confusion.

“Mm,” Greyson confirmed with a nod.

“Should we call him ‘she?’”

“I think that would be a good way to make him angry,” Nyla discouraged, crossing her arms. “Greyson, why didn’t you bring this up sooner?”

“I’m honestly still not sure what to do with this information,” Greyson said as Sasha pulled the bread out of the oven and set it on the counter to cool, waving away the steam with an oven mitt. “I didn’t want to throw us all into unnecessary concern and confusion last night, when we were all already concerned and confused.”

“And if Evan or I had gone to lay at the foot of his bed?” Nyla asked, trying not to sound accusatory, but she was a little peeved with her friend.

Greyson simply shrugged. “Then I would have told you, since it would have been relevant.”

“So if he has a cunt, does that mean Grey and I are still on fucktoy duty?” Evan asked, changing the subject in a way he probably thought was subtle.

“Don’t, um, t-trannies get s-surgeries?” Sasha asked.

“I do remember Mistress complaining about that fairly often,” Nyla agreed, and Greyson frowned.

“He hadn’t mentioned surgery when talking about his life events. Or maybe that’s what ‘going on T’ meant…”

“Going on penis? No, that starts with a p; going on… the surgery table?” Evan sounded out, pulling a sausage link and two eggs from the skillets and accepting a slice of bread from Sasha, then passing the plate to Lilah. He did it twice more with Nyla and Greyson, before accepting one for himself, and Sasha filled her own.

“Regardless,” Nyla said, accepting the plate from Evan, “we should remain respectful. Master Galo has not indicated that we should call him anything but Master, and we’ll just have to see who he wants to fuck when we guess right.”

“I h-hate all this gu-guessing,” Sasha said miserably, stabbing her fork into the sausage a little harder than she normally would. Nyla sighed, just barely, and her expression softened.

“I’ll ask him again for foods that he likes,” Nyla promised. “For tonight, potatoes. I don’t think there’s been a single guess of Mistress’s that didn’t like potatoes,” Nyla decided, looking to Greyson. He nodded in confirmation; as the designated waiter, he’d seen more of Mistress’s guests at the dinner table than the rest of them combined.

“I c-can do pot-tatoes,” Sasha agreed, and Nyla smiled.

“Do you think he’ll want the garden redone?” Lilah asked, staring at the door that would lead to the back exit. Nyla screwed her lips up, and took a bite of bread and egg, buying herself time to think.

“Do you think he’ll care?” Evan asked, rubbing a hand up and down Lilah’s back. “Worrying about gardens and flowers doesn’t seem very manly.”

“Lawncare is ‘a man’s job,’ though,” Lilah reminded.

“But if he’s not a-actually a m-man..?”

“I think we should probably operate under the assumption that he is a man, just not one that Mistress would approve of,” Greyson stated.

“Grey’s right,” Nyla agreed, “And Mistress is dead, and Master is here, so it’s his outlook that we should be concerning ourselves with, now.” Nyla smiled at Lilah reassuringly. “I’ll find out if he wants anything changed. Until then, carry on normally, and skip mowing for now.”

Nyla turned to Greyson next. “I’ll Attend, tonight, and if the displeasure continues we’ll take a new approach. Serve less wine at dinner tonight.” Greyson nodded.

“Are you gonna solve my problems too?” Evan asked, and she knew that although his tone was flippant, he was only half joking. She wasn’t though.

“Yes,” she said firmly, approaching him and crossing her arms, having to crane her neck back to stare up at him from this close but that was fine. She knew he was unsettled by this kind of proximity. “You, keep your mouth shut around Master. Don’t go peeving him for no reason; he’s not like Mistress.”

Evan met her gaze, and she couldn’t handle that, she could not handle that.

“Evan,” she said, a little harsher and a little more desperately, “You’ve seen how big he is,” she couldn’t help the crack in her voice on the words seen, “He could break you, Evan, he could kill you without too much effort. I know you made a habit of getting Mistress angry just so it would be over quicker, but you can not do that anymore.”

Evan’s eyes no longer met hers, sweat beading but that wasn’t enough.

“Promise me.”

“Nyla…”

“Evan, promise me you won’t do anything stupid or deadly. Promise me.”

“Ha… you’re really not having it, huh?”

“I’m not,” she agreed, voice smoother, now, controlled. She’d always had the best control, out of all of them.

“...I promise I won’t get myself killed,” Evan said, and she huffed. It was as good as she would get without this turning into a full on spat, and none of their nerves could handle that at the time.

“Alright. He hasn’t hurt any of us yet and he’s very friendly. He liked dinner last night, regularly attends the gym, and has claimed the turquoise guest bedroom. He’s a transvestite, Mistress Bethany’s nephew, and he likes spinach, apples, celery, ginger, pasta and carrots. Do we know anything else about him?”

“He doesn’t care for his father,” Greyson answered. “When he was a child, he enjoyed the pool and antique musicals.”

“The pool and musicals are things we can work with,” Nyla said, feeling a little better just from having that much more information to go off of, “And we’ll be careful to steer clear regarding his father. Anything else?”

A quick survey of the kitchen confirmed that that was it, Sasha wringing her hands, Lilah gone all distant and Quiet again, Greyson’s eyes both sharp and tired, Evan sulking.

“Alright.” Nyla brushed down her apron. “We’ve been ordered to take it easy, today. I don’t know what that means, but focus on completing the smaller, more specialized tasks than heavy maintenance, alright?”

Four nods met her words, and she nodded as well. “Good. Let’s hop to it then.”

A loud noise from the front of the mansion had the blood in Nyla’s veins run like ice, porcelain smile reflexively stretched across her face and her spine ramrod straight, hands clasped neatly in front of her. Sasha jumped, Greyson stood from the kitchen stool with his face void and posture perfect, Lilah’s arms wrapped around herself like snakes, and Evan’s eyes blew wide.

Three more times, the sound came, the loose branch from the front maple finally swinging low in the strong winds outside.

“...Actually, Evan, would you go ahead and help Lilah with that branch in the front yard?” Nyla suggested, not quite able to pull the perfect smile off her face just yet.

Evan nodded, slinging his arm around Lilah’s shoulders--and Nyla smiled more genuinely at how his presence always managed to bring her back out. Her eyes were never all the way glassy, with Evan paying attention to her, even on the worse nights. She took a deep, only somewhat-shaky breath, and then patted her apron again, a few more times than strictly necessary.

“Right. Meet back here for lunch, everyone.”

And with that, she spun and strode out into the house. She woke up the tablet in the computer room and ordered the groceries Master Galo had requested, as well as more pasta, carrots, some beans, potatoes, and rice. She’d make a second, more comprehensive order when Master Galo gave her a better idea of his desires, but for now it couldn’t hurt to stock up on dietary staples. She pulled her notepad out of her apron’s pocket and jotted down “groceries 1” then immediately crossed it out, and wrote “groceries 2” beneath it. She quickly wrote down her list for the day, and then set out to complete the tasks.

She met Greyson in Master’s bedroom, helped him strip the sheets off the bed and put on new ones, then left him with Master’s discarded clothes from the night before and the unwashed bedding. She watered the potted plant Master had brought in, simply because she wasn’t sure if that should be Evan and Grey’s job or hers, and when that was the case she defaulted to taking it as hers. She made a list of the personal grooming tools Master Galo possessed, lifting the bottles of shampoo and soap to check how full they were. If it were mistress, Nyla would add another bottle of conditioner to the second list of groceries, but Master Galo had significantly less hair than she did. Better wait on that.

Master Galo did not, judging from the pile of items he’d removed from the walls and tables and whatnot, like the particularly gaudy form of art Mistress Bethany liked. She made note of that, and decided to revisit that later. She checked the stock on laundry materials--good--and if Lilah had enough gasoline--she did--before moving onto Mistress’s craft room.

Nyla stared at it helplessly for only a moment. Mistress had required highly specific amounts of thread, beads, and fabric. Too much and there wouldn't be room to store them, too little and Mistress might run out, and that meant Nyla would be thoroughly beaten. Mistress never told Nyla what she had or hadn’t used; it was Nyla’s job to catalogue supplies every day, and make new orders every single day.

Learn Master’s hobbies and buy supplies, Nyla added to her list, closing the door to the craft room behind her. She would ask Master Galo how he would prefer to dispose of the materials. Ideally some other cousin or somesuch would want to inherit the supplies and would take care of it. Otherwise, Nyla felt the project looming over her head. She added garbage bags to grocery list 2, and then added totes and other moving containers as an extra precaution.

Her most time consuming task suddenly no longer relevant, Nyla assisted her family with theirs, jotting down notes and their concerns as they came. Every now and then, worry would ping at her. She’d Attended Mistress plenty of nights, but never for sex, only for pain and to offer midnight assistance. Nyla had never worked on her back before. Evan uniformly hated it, but Greyson gave mixed reviews. Master Galo was large, and strong, and frightening, so Nyla couldn’t spend too much time on those lines of thought, always dragging herself back to cataloguing belongings, checking in on her family’s progress, and she even had the time to stop by the boiler room and check the water heater for any new leaks. At lunch, she felt fairly accomplished, almost-ready to face their Master.��

How to approach him, though? Mistress was at her most approachable between dinner and Jeopardy. The wine wouldn't have made her too likely to strike, yet, still moving through her system, and Mistress never took well to requests after her nightly show. But Master? Nyla had no idea.

It meant guessing. It meant relearning everything she’d been viciously, painfully taught when she was fourteen and new here. It meant just… going for it, with no experience to take comfort in. Fine.

She was the head of the household, and that was her job. So she'd do it.

Galo had hoped that a trip to the gym would help clear his head. It had been a nice distraction, but not much else. So he called up the funeral place and got some groundwork laid out, and then wrote the email to his family and called his father preemptively, hopefully getting points for the fact that he’d called first, but probably not. And then his sister called, so he managed to weasel his way out of his father’s call with only an extra ten minutes after the beeps, and he called his sister back, and then his uncle called, and then a cousin wanted to know why the hell Galo had been the one put in charge and it had taken everything left in Galo’s fraying patience not to scream back, “Because I'm the only responsible member of this family!”

And so phonecall after phonecall went, and Galo had taken a painkiller before he’d dialed his father but he was still left with a headache when he was done. He couldn't even blame dehydration for it; he’d drunk plenty throughout the calls, wishing his water was alcohol.

He had hoped, rather vainly, that his subconscious would process whatever was happening in Auntie Bethany’s house while he worked out and talked to his godawful family. He tried to think about the people there, about the enormity of what had happened to them, and his brain still hit a blank wall.

It was too much, so, break it down. What did he, for a fact, know?

He pulled an old, beat up notebook out of his computer bag, flipped past the work he’d done in college, and clicked his pen.

The Den is a bad place

Nyla doesn’t like having her face touched

Galo felt his head clear, a little. He drew a line down the middle of the page and started a second column.

Auntie Bethany kept five slaves in a perpetual state of fear, and tortured them.

Back on the first column:

Greyson has burn scars all over his arms and whip/knife/??? scars all over his back

Sasha cannot speak, y/n questions only, or get Nyla

Don’t flex in front of them

Nyla is in charge(???) Probably.

Lilah is the gardener

Sasha is the cook

Greyson is a waiter? Probably?

Evan… housework?

Galo genuinely wasn’t sure what Evan and Greyson’s jobs were, but, whatever. They knew what they were doing. A sour thought twisted in his stomach, and he made another bulletpoint in the right column.

Auntie Bethany

It was too awful to write. He didn’t want to acknowledge it, didn’t want to spell it out. Not his own family, his flesh and blood. But shying away from the truth would probably only cause them harm, down the line.

Auntie Bethany raped Greyson. Probably Evan, too.

Auntie Bethany had been a deeply queerphobic individual. Galo could at least be certain that she would never have fucked Nyla, Sasha, or Lilah, as pathetic of a comfort as that was. But the fact that she’d--

Focus.

Lilah is very injured right now. Reassign her?

Nyla orders groceries, she wants foods I like. Think up some ideas.

Did he still have his blue highlighter? He did! He highlighted that one, since it required him to do something. Do something, ha, good idea. He really, really needed to think of what to do. These people needed help, and at present he was the only one who could give it to them. He flipped the page over and started, on a blank sheet, a new list, separate from his observations and theories.

Ideas!

Give clear, achievable orders.

Look into therapists who have a precedence with treating abused slaves.

Reassign Lilah?

He’d written that on the first list but eh, it belonged here more.

Keep acting cheerful?

The problem was: he wasn’t sure if that was working. His flighty reflex-brain had been insistent on acting calm, friendly, approachable, like nothing was wrong and everything was okay, but was that the best option? He frightened them so badly… But if not that, then what else?

Briefly, he thought of maybe scaring them into acting out, and then showing them it was fine for them to do that, but he quickly discarded the idea. He’d seen enough of Greyson and Sasha to know that whatever he did, they’d just accept it, and probably break down crying part way through. Whatever Auntie Bethany had done to them, she’d snuffed out their resistance.

He instinctively rejected the idea of playing pretend at a cruel master, but then forced himself to reexamine the idea. Not a cruel master, no, but maybe… a strict one? Give them order, stability, expectations.

Yeah, right. Galo was a reliable dude, but he’d never been strict a day in his life. He’d… half-play at Master Galo, since that’s technically what he was, but given his own abilities, what he’d seen so far, and what he knew of human psychology, keeping things friendly and chill would probably be the best route, especially at the start. He could settle into something more serious as they got to know each other better, and the five of them started to accept that he wouldn’t hurt them, but right now? Right now they’d surely take anything other than 100% happy as a sign of displeasure, and catastrophize accordingly.

Oh… maybe they could help Galo with funeral plans. A way for them to feel helpful and successful, and genuinely so.

Aunty Bethany had more than enough flowers on her estate to bury her in.

Funeral plans: flowers, setup, catering?

Galo wondered what Sasha did all day. Cooking for six surely couldn’t be… that time consuming? Maybe she was just slow.

Ask Nyla how quickly Sasha is able to cook large quantities of food, and if catering is an option

Asking Sasha herself, even if it could be framed as a yes or no question, would probably just give the poor woman the shakes again.

Galo read over his lists, and felt… better. Like, still garbage, definitely still garbage, but less headachey and less helpless in the face of it all.

He went back to his apartment, and surveyed his belongings. He’d brought his necessities to his aunt’s--his house the night before, but that still left, like, everything else. Hm. He was rich now. He could hire movers. He could pay people to do this shit for him. But also like… did he need the bed? The couch? No. He had no emotional attachment to most of his furniture, thrifted or found on curbs or given to him by a college roommate, it was mostly just the smaller stuff that was important.

He took some pictures, listed some craigslist ads, and then looked at a couple different moving companies. He skimmed reviews, searching through services that were pricey enough he would’ve once never even glanced at them, searching for people who took their time and packed things sensibly, and carefully. Satisfied, he called up the one he liked best, and scheduled the day after the funeral.

And then, because he was rich as hell now, and he could, he typed out a two-weeks notice and printed it out from his apartment’s printer. He would swing by his work… tomorrow or sometime, and drop this off. It was more of a “Hey I’ll be there next week” notice, since he’d taken this one off for funeral related reasons (and also slave related reasons, he knew now), and if his boss wanted to let him off the same day, he’d absolutely take it. It wasn’t like they were short-handed, at the moment, so Galo very easily could be staring down a very early retirement. He thought again of going back to school, once he sorted out everything with the slaves.

That would be nice.

He packed up his game systems, the book he was in the middle of, and his good luck charm, and left his apartment to head back to his house. He should probably start the process of letting his landlord know he was breaking his lease, and pay that off, but eh. He could do that… later. It was early enough in the month that he had plenty of time.

When he got through the front door (had it been oiled? He remembered it being heavier, the night before) he did a double take at the pile of gaudy garbage he’d made of his aunt’s weird… “art.” It was bigger than the night before.

He squinted down at a little green-red-white-gold “Egyptian” bird statue. He definitely hadn’t seen that the night before, though he couldn’t exactly say he was unhappy to see it in the garbage pile.

“Welcome home, Master,” Nyla greeted, gliding into the foyer with that unnatural grace of hers. In a different life, maybe she could’ve been a dancer.

“Hi, Nyla. I’m glad you’re here, I wanted--”

Galo cut off when Nyla dropped down to her knees, fluid as silk, cupped Galo’s hand and wrist, and placed a delicate kiss to his palm. Right. Hand kissing was a thing, he should add that to his list. He briefly considered discouraging it, but, well, it was a harmless gesture, and he needed to be careful about picking his battles here at the start.

“Thanks, Nyla,” he said, giving her a little pat to the head. He then extended his hand to her, and said, “I wanted to ask you a couple questions about how things, like, operate around here?” She placed her hand inside his, but when she rose it was weightless, no pressure to his hand in the slightest. Maybe not a dancer, maybe, like, a wraith or something.

“I would be happy to answer all questions, Master,” Nyla said, her hands clasped neatly in front of her, her smile looking genuine. Galo smiled back; maybe this wouldn’t be so awful after all? “If now is a good time, Master, may I ask you questions as well?”

“Yeah, yeah, now’s good.” Galo shifted his duffle on his shoulder. “Let me set this stuff down first? Is the living room good for you?”

Nyla bowed a little, eyes lowered deferentially. “The living room is a fine choice, Master. May I assist in carrying anything?”

“No offense,” Galo said, giving her a very brief once over, “but I’m pretty sure I’m better equipped to be carrying heavy shit than you are, Nyla.”

“Of course, Master,” she said, and there was that nervous little twitch, the way she locked up. Nyla was… a very good actor, Galo thought to himself. It would be hard to suss out what was a genuine reaction from her and what she’d been trained to show. Knowing Aunty Bethany, she’d probably told Nyla that girls are prettier when they’re smiling with their mouths shut.

Galo settled his duffle to the side, where hopefully no one would trip over it. He’d unpack it later. “So, Nyla,” he said, sitting down on the weirdly shaped, petite couch-adjacent thing that looked best able to hold Galo’s weight, “what is it you want to know?”

Nyla moved like water over well-worn stones, the way she knelt down at Galo’s feet, shoulder touching the couch lookalike but all of her weight on her ankles. He hoped his brain got over how fluidly she moved soon, because it was gonna get old fast, if he got taken aback every time Nyla did literally anything. Did his aunt insist on this, too? Was this part of what she did to them?

“Master, if I may trouble you for your preferences in meals, I would be grateful.”

“Oh, yeah, here,” Galo pulled a folded up piece of notebook paper from his back pocket and handed it to Nyla. “I mostly just jotted down general ideas and like, overarching stuff I like? Instead of specific meals, but I trust Sasha’s judgement.”

Nyla took the paper in slender fingers (she was too thin; was his aunt responsible for that, too?) and unfolded it with silent delicacy. She read over it briefly, and then refolded it and tucked it into her apron pocket.

“This is perfect, Master, thank you for your thoughtfulness and effort.”

“Yeah, sure. Hey, Nyla,” he said, coaxing and gentle as he could, but it still made her lock up, smile looking fixed, “would you sit with your legs bent in front of you? Like, sit with your butt on the floor and your legs, like, criss-cross-applesauce, but both of your knees facing the same direction. Yeah, like that, and lean your weight against the lip of the couch here--perfect, Nyla, thank you.” Galo smiled at her, glad now that her poor ankles weren’t taking the weight of literally her entire body. “Would you be okay if I touched your hair?”

A moment’s hesitation. “If Master wouldn’t find it troublesome…”

Galo chuckled, just a little, even though his heart ached for her. He placed his palm gently on her head, and pet slowly, carefully down, before repeating the motion. She seemed, at the very least, not to mind it. “What else did you need?”

“At your leisure, Master, would you find time to survey the estate gardens and see if they are to your liking? We will gladly change anything you disapprove of.”

“Oh, yeah, no, I’m sure they look fine, but that’s actually related to one of my questions.”

“Yes Master?” Nyla asked, and Galo would call the tone there eagerness.

“Should Lilah be the gardener? I know she’s not, like, young-young, but I’ve seen some of my aunt’s yardwork equipment and it seems kinda big for someone that small. Especially since she’s, y’know, all injured and stuff.”

“Lilah is the best gardener of the group, Master. I doubt anyone would do as well as she does, and she’s never been injured by any of the equipment, Master. However, if her role displeases you, Master, we will not hesitate to acclimate to your desires.”

So… Auntie Bethany had put each and every bruise and cut on Lilah’s body. It was a hard thought to swallow. “It doesn’t displease me,” Galo said, voice quiet. “If you all think she’s the best fit, you’d know better than me. Please tell her to ask for help if something’s too cumbersome for her, though.”

“Yes Master.”

Galo gave her a little scritch, smiling encouragingly. “What else?”

“Hobbies, Master. I would like to know your routine and hobbies, so that we may best provide for them.”

Galo tilted his head. “What do you mean?”

“Mistress enjoyed needlework and beading, Master. Her craft room is very full of her supplies, which I regularly stocked. I would delightedly do the same for you, if I knew what your hobbies are.”

“Oh, uh, video games, mostly, which don’t really require… like, physical materials. I like working out, but I’d prefer to go to a gym than have equipment here. It gets me out of bed in the morning, y’know? Um…”

Ha, Galo was a pretty boring person, huh? Working out and gaming, not exactly the most interesting set of hobbies…

“Thank you for informing me, Master. What would you like done with Mistress’s old craft room?”

“Uhh, probably just pack it up. If none of my cousins want it, I’ll drop it by a thrift store or something. Maybe donate it to one of those places that does crafts with kids? I dunno, I’ll find somewhere to donate it.”

“Yes Master, thank you sir.”

“Anything else?” Galo asked. She sounded like she was done but it was better to ask.

“No, Master, thank you for indulging your servant.”

“Uh, hardly an indulgence, Nyla. It’s good for you to ask questions: I don’t know what you don’t know.”

Was that worded weird? It took Nyla a moment to process, it seemed, before she answered back, “Yes Master, I will continue to ask questions, Master.”

“Good girl, Nyla,” Galo said, giving her hair another scritch. “So, hey,” Galo wished he knew how to start sentences without making her stiffen, “does Lilah grow flowers, do you know?”

“Yes, Master, is there a kind you like?”

“Uh, lilies?”

“There are a number of lilies that can be brought into the house for you, Master.”

“Sweet. So this would actually be for Auntie Bethany’s funeral this Saturday, and I would need them in arrangements. Do you think Lilah could make flower arrangements, or would I be better off hiring a professional?”

“Lilah is very competent, Master, and has done well enough to please Mistress for the past few years. She can do a sample arrangement for you, Master, so you may see if her work is to your standards.”

“Sure! Have that be her job for tomorrow. Thanks. And, on the same subject: do you think Sasha would do okay making horderves for the funeral, or should I cater?”

Galo was careful to provide a second option. If he gave a “no” answer, that would make it more okay than telling Galo no unprompted. He was trying, trying his absolute best, to remain delicate here.

“Sasha is quite competent, Master, and I am certain would be relieved to have enough work to keep her so busy. May I know what you would like to serve, so I may order the materials?”

“Yes, but not tonight. I need to call the funeral place again tomorrow morning and get some suggestions. I’ll get that to you then?”

“Thank you, Master. You are generous, sir.”

Galo frowned. That wasn’t generous. It wasn’t anything worth mentioning. But he needed to be clever, redirect Nyla, not shut her down entirely.

“And thank you, Nyla. You’re being a big help.”

He watched her lips part, her chest expand with a breath and then hover, uncertain, but before she could figure out what to say they were interrupted by Greyson very quietly announcing, “Master, dinner is served.”

It was delicious, and this time, Galo asked Greyson to pass along his appreciation to Sasha. He couldn’t avoid her entirely, he knew, that wouldn’t make her any less scared of him, but he could keep things infrequent at the start. After dinner he took a quick jog around the property, amazed once again by the sheer vastness of the garden. Was it fair that only one person, and a little person at that, was in charge of maintaining all this? Galo had second thoughts about Nyla’s advice, but unless he saw Lilah being actively exhausted by the labor, he would follow Nyla’s direction for now. It would be important to show that he valued and trusted the things they said to him. Just not at the expense of anyone’s wellbeing, which he thought a fair compromise.

He looked at Auntie Bethany’s craft room, but was quickly overwhelmed and left. That was a lot of tiny drawers, a lot of baskets of fabric, a lot of embroidery hoops and pincushions and things Galo didn’t even know the names of. Movers. He’d have movers deal with… that.

The pile of weird, gaudy shit had grown even larger. Galo sifted through it, checking that it was indeed all awful, intolerable junk that he wanted gone, and it all was.

Nyla and Evan entered the foyer, each of them on a side of the fugliest imitation Greek statuette Galo had ever seen. Where had Auntie Bethany even kept that?

“Master Galo!” Nyla greeted when she saw him, after setting the statue down. Evan sank fluidly to his knees, head low, while Nyla approached him, hands clasped and smiling wide. “Do all the items present fail to meet your standards, Master?”

“Yeah, yeah they sure do. You guys are doing great,” Galo praised, slowly reaching out and patting Nyla on top of the head. She seemed to like that? He had no way of actually knowing, but he was pretty sure she enjoyed it. “Thanks, Evan, for all your help,” Galo said, approaching him. He extended his hand half-curiously and sure enough, when Evan raised his head he kissed Galo’s palm. Galo smiled at him, admittedly befuddled but, hey, of all the weird habits Auntie Bethany could have and likely did drill into them, this one wasn’t so bad. Carefully, he pat Evan’s head, but retracted his hand when the man went entirely rigid.

“I’ve had a long day,” Galo said, turning back to Nyla. “I’m turning in early. Night.”

“Goodnight, Master Galo,” Nyla and Evan chorused, perfectly in sync.

Galo did not see Nyla standing there, smile unmoving, eyes unblinking, hands clasped so tightly her knuckles turned white. Galo did not witness Evan slowly stand, and place his hand warmly on top of hers. Galo didn’t hear Evan lean in and whisper that Nyla would be alright, that with men it went faster, anyways. Galo did not hear Nyla press a kiss to Evan’s cheek and tell him that she would be fine, yes, and to tell the others that they were done for the day.

Galo did hear her knock on his door while he was pressing his fingers gently into the soil of his potted plant, befuddled by the moisture there, and he did see her enter, her hands smoothing down her apron before she folded them once again in front of her.

“Nyla?” Galo asked, his memories with Greyson the night before vividly returning, sickly aware that this was probably going to be round two. “Why aren’t you in your room?”

Nyla didn’t move, barely twitched, her smile relentless. She took longer to respond, that time, than she had since Galo had arrived. “I watered the plant earlier today, Master,” she blurted, for a certain value of blurted. It was probably blurting, for her.

“You, oh!” Galo turned back to it, cup of water still in his hand, unpoured. “Thank you, Nyla. I appreciate how attentive you are, but please don’t do that anymore.” Galo left the windowsill and placed the cup on the bedside table. He smiled at her, he wasn’t unhappy, he didn’t want her to feel like she’d messed up, he just wanted her to not do it anymore. “I like having something to take care of, okay? Watering my plant is part of my routine. It’s a responsibility I enjoy.”

“Yes Master, I apologize. I will do better, Master.”

“Thank you Nyla,” he said, approaching her very slowly. He wished he hadn’t taken his shirt off already, getting ready to shower. It made this encounter feel even more charged, and that wasn’t exactly something he wanted. “If that’s all, then why don’t you go ahead and go to your room?”

Nyla kept smiling at him, although now it definitely looked forced. “I am here to Attend, Master. My body is present and available for your service and ple--”

“No,” Galo cut her off, raising a hand between them. He was far from her face, but she flinched anyway. Galo took a deep breath. So much of him was screaming, he just wanted to send her away, maybe cry, maybe hit something. He wanted to storm down to the mortician and revive Auntie Bethany so he could strangle her with his own hands. But he needed to address this, as much as he absolutely hated it, because it clearly wasn’t going to go away on its own.

“Nyla,” Galo said, trying very hard to keep his voice even. “What do you mean when you say you’re here to ‘Attend’ me?”

“You may punish me, if you like, Master. Beat me or whip me or slice me as you see fit.”

“You haven’t done anything worth punishing, Nyla,” Galo said, gentle and firm as his nauseous voice could manage.

“If not punishment, then simply a reminder of my place, that I am subservient to you and you are always able to do anything you wish with me.”

“I don’t want to hurt you,” Galo said, hating how this sounded like she was reciting something, like she’d been forced to memorize these words exactly. How could he stop playing into her script? What could he do to break this? But at the same time, he needed to know. He hadn’t known that Auntie Bethany would ‘remind them of their place,’ he hadn’t known that there was some sort of ritualistic punishment. It was almost as bad as--

“Then, of course, you may fuck me, Master. I am,” a hitch of breath that hit Galo like ice in the gut, “open, Master, and available to serve you however you wish.”

Galo reached out a hand and stopped himself, hovering near her cheek. Nyla didn’t like her face touched. He changed course and set his palm on top of her head, staring down at her with an ache inside him.

“I’m not going to rape you, Nyla. I promise, I swear to you.” He gently reached out his other hand and delicately pried her hands apart. She was gripping them hard enough to hide their shaking, but she trembled in his palm. “No more of this, alright? I don’t want you to, to Attend me. Any of you. No more coming to my room at night and offering things, okay?”

“Yes, Master.”

“Will you promise me, for all five of you?”

“Yes, Master. I promise, we will not come to your room at night or,” Nyla licked dry lips, “offer to Attend you any longer.”

“Thank you Nyla,” Galo said, rubbing a thumb over her pale hair. “Now go to bed, alright?”

“Yes Master,” Nyla whispered, and swaned away, light as a ghost.

#whump #gw #multiple whumpees #referenced noncon #aftermath of torture #slavery #slave whump #transphobia tw #Nyla #Galo #Sasha #Greyson #Evan #Lilah #mine #writing

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druid-for-hire · 5 years

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UNSWAYED PT. III

(pt i) (pt ii) (pt iii) (you are here) (pt iv) (pt. v) (epilogue) (askblog)

this one’s got some revisions/retcons/refinings and new content. there will be some minor rehashing. this edition is more on the drama eurydice goes through on the path to find orpheus, orpheus’ deterioration in the Beyond, little bit of persephone and even littler bit hermes, finding orpheus, and finally getting to leave

thank you @supercantaloupe, @sonyalone, @unholy-boi, @s-aint-elmo, @ferretteeth for helping author this & help out w ideas and all!! sasha, u esp.

ok.

sits down and rests my old creaking bones in a rocking chair by the hearth and lights a pipe

gather round kids. this one might be a little long

one note:

on the same night that orpheus falls, persephone, when she finally composes herself enough, marches up to hades. the fury is still present in the vitriol with which she speaks. “you can’t have done that,” she says. “you can’t have just thrown him away. he didn’t sign any papers. you can’t make him work.”

“there were no papers,” he agrees, “but prisoners do not get papers.”

ok jumping back to kind-of-present

it’s taking a while to find orpheus. (too much of a while)

in between work and searching for him, both of which already take up so much of her time, eurydice... makes her attempts to craft a new guitar. hades took orpheus’. he’s going to either want it back or want a new one, and right now, she doesn’t think she can manage the first. it’s going to be important to their escape, she thinks, because she isn’t planning on staying in hadestown forever

but she’s not skilled, and making a real, good, balanced guitar is incredibly hard. she’s not trained. it never comes out good enough, never remotely close to a properly tuned instrument, much less the guitar that seemed to fit perfectly around orpheus' hands. and she doesn’t have a lot of time

so as it turns out, stealing back the original is the more feasible option

problem being: it’s a trophy. hades didn’t smash it, but it’s locked away with his other little “victories,” and he’ll notice it missing eventually

(those other trophies are other relics from other daring humans he’s had to deal with in the past. no one has come as close as orpheus)

but she does have more buffer time than usual because it's also a reminder of the martyr and the fact that his marriage is in the shitter so it's been put out of sight (and out of mind), so she's got a few days or more before he'd notice it's gone

as she keeps searching for orpheus, telling her story and getting help and word of her spreading...

eurydice stirs the town as the ladle stirs in the pot; out of all the feelings her story wakes, the most dominant—and most important—is the anger.

and for the first time, somewhere in some could-be-anywhere part of Hadestown, someone says no.

the age-old, unmoving, immovable hadestown, begins to... change. there’s persephone’s crack in the wall, and then there are others, and then they join, and then there’s unrest, and then there’s the threat of riot.

(which i know i already established but shhh im reiterating my point for this:)

unholy-boi: hades was at least formerly hands on enough to give orders, to scrape down new souls, to preach about the wall

now he locks himself in his office, head in his hands, unable to handle the idea that he’s losing control, and every MOMENT he spends locked away he loses control more, but he needs to think, he needs to think, he needs to think--

The fates are at his door, they sing horrible music, things he doesn’t want to hear, lies and twisted truths to manipulate the king. except he’s not being manipulated at all. this is all him, he knows it--this is just him and his paranoia and the workers' rage beginning to boil on his doorstep.

the god is hidden away in his office and hardly lets anyone in. he isolates himself and Persephone barely even visits this winter anyway.

he wonders if the martyr boy really did fail.

(no, he tells himself--he did fail, because his goal was to get him and his lover out, and now both of them are damned here forever. all of this? an unfortunate side effect.)

hades... was very nearly swayed by orpheus, but took his “obligation” to a city (that he’s already lost) over the slightly breaking voice of orpheus, and the rumors. however when he sent orpheus away, things only got worse. but how could he just crawl to pull orpheus back now? would that not be sacrificing his iron will? his grip of steel? how can he turn to go back if he’s already made his decision? moreover- how can he trust bringing orpheus back will fix anything at all?

a lamenting reprise from hades with orpheus’ guitar would be cool. i don’t know if it’d be in character or appropriate to the story but. its been a fun thing ive been tossing between my hands

it probably starts when he accidentally kicks it over--there’s a trophy room, but he hasn’t cleared a space for the guitar yet. he kicks it over, and when it hits the ground the strings hum Menacingly at him

after the song he puts it away--out of sight, out of mind

show them a crack.

and they’ll tear down the wall.

besides the immediate danger orpheus is in and his voice failing being drives to find him as soon as possible, eurydice also has to worry about the fact that persephone won’t be there to help her soon. the hadestown debacle happens on the onset of proper spring

persephone, for once, is grateful that hades keeps her late. it means she can help the lovers. for so many weeks she sends that boy’s voice on a wind straight for Eurydice to keep her going

but later is not never, and to the surface one day she goes, and bitter with the absence of his wife Hades drives them all to work harder

which strains Eurydice for time and energy even more

things are harder when she’s gone, as always—eurydice has less time to track him down, and without persephone’s sing-sing wind, pinpointing him is more difficult.

Hermes is there at the station to greets her when she returns to end the winter

“how is he doing?” “not well.”

“you think they’ll make it?” “i don’t know.”

hermes asks her, “how long?” how long will orpheus last? how long will it take for them to find each other and leave? how long will it take until hades finally snaps? persephone can’t answer any of them

(hermes knows, of course. but he has a role to play)

the summer roars to life on top, but persephone can’t stop thinking about the lovers underground. she knows that orpheus won’t make it through the summer. she sneaks down below for two weeks in june and in that time, a hurricane devastates the surface without her to control it.

the sing-sing wind returns with a straining melody and eurydice wonders. she’s grateful, but she wonders

and... one day it doesn’t. she feels the breeze, but there’s nothing on it.

nothing.

i’ve fucking had enough, eurydice decides. i’m stealing that fucking guitar, hades be damned.

in the sleeping hours of hadestown she sneaks her way up to the palace, dodging searchlights and finding havens, already at an advantage because she’s scoured Hadestown so long and made allies in so many places

and when she makes it up to the palace, the... the guards, the hounds, all of them are... either missing or intoxicated to shit. which is odd, she thinks, but doesn’t question it

she makes it to the trophy room (after a Lot of searching, because she doesn’t have a map)

she walks in and marvels in awe at all the trophies

she wonders about the histories behind all of them

to be honest, she doesnt know that this is where the guitar is, but it’s a pretty good guess (and the right one)

and then there’s a sound at the doorway. eurydice freezes. there’s nowhere for her to hide

she turns, and... it’s persephone in the doorway. persephone, who should not be here.

they lock eyes for a moment, and then she points at a locked case in the back of the room and keeps on walking. whistling loudly. a very “nope, nothing here at all” move

... well, works for her

eurydice breaks off the padlock, gets the guitar, and flees

musing on kampê for unswayed because i really dont want her to just be a two dimensional villain:

- homegirl is bitter. she used to rule the underground. she was the queen of the dark, and every god and titan knew her name, and hades did fear her too.

until. well.

and now she’s practically half-forgotten—a footnote. she hates it. hades and persephone are both her younger and yet they came into her realm, and she was shunted aside to this dismal little hole, and she has to answer to him and she fucking hates it. no mortal up Top or even in hadestown remembers her name. if an old dragon like her has no place out there... if she can’t make herself known in the outside world anymore, then she’ll fucking sear herself into the minds of the people she has, in the only way she knows how

(it should also be noted that homegirl is. unstable. i think kampê sort of violently switches between abhorrently vicious to weirdly sweet and manipulative and anywhere in between depending on the day/time/situation)

(also, she wasn’t always deaf. but being even older than the world, than hades and persephone, things... happen)

also, part of how she keeps everyone here is 1) working them to death and 2) telling them that they’re needed here, and that hadestown is an oasis of stability outside the chaos up Top

orpheus is not doing well.

orpheus forgets.

orpheus wears down.

(orpheus gets sick.)

whoops! That’s An Issue. but still he works, because no one can rest long, and the coal dust and ash and smoke and stifling heat do him zero favors

his focus drifts; he loses track of eurydice, of his songs. the work is first and foremost

you ever get worked so hard and pushed past your physical limit that u get like, spots in your vision and want to throw up? yeah thts orpheus

orpheus doesn’t stop sneaking off every day to the spot at the edge of the Beyond. he doesn’t sing out for help anymore, but... he sits, because he knows that it’s important. this place, where he sang out for a lover he doesn’t remember anymore with songs he no longer has

(cue Flowers but for orpheus, in quiet & faltering breathy lines)

he’s “forgotten a little thing called spring”

kampê still comes after him to drag him back to work. sometimes it’s wordless; sometimes she yanks him to his feet by the straps of his overalls, sometimes all she needs to do is put a hand on his shoulder and he’ll get up and shuffle back into the mines and smokestacks

other times she asks why he’s still doing this, why he’s still out there. other times she tells him that there’s no need to come out here anymore. he shouldn’t have in the first place. out there--it’s no better than here.

the times when she yells--few and far between, because fetching him is hardly much of a chore anymore--he winces, since it’s not like she has the finest grasp on volume control, being deaf

the scene we see is her sing-speaking some fucked up reprise of hey little songbird, beckoning him to come back and taunting him; i didn’t write this one out but i imagine there’s some fun things to be had with the “vipers and vultures” line

and orpheus sing/saying, in this cracked, hoarse voice, “I wanna lie down forever”

he’s. so tired

(also singing his voice, long since shredded, sorta finally collapses in this one and i don’t imagine him having another sung line after that)

the canary in the coal mine isn’t dead yet but he will be

eurydice goes into overdrive after she steals orpheus’ guitar back

(she strums a few notes on it, and it hums warmly of sunlight in her hands. her chest fills with something indescribable. god, she missed this)

she takes more risks. sneaks out farther and strays out farther. skips out on work, keeps cutting close, nearly gets caught more often than she did before

eventually. finally. finally, she finds him, almost unrecognizable in the crowd masses, but she catches him alone

and she calls out to him, her arm outstretched, “come home with me.”

so i’m going w the “recognize her right away one” and following what i wrote in the first post

BUT: the callback to “come home with me i” with orpheus’ forgetting in “come home with me” “who are you?” is Too Fucking Good and I ended up writing my own lyrics to a “Come Home With Me III”

i’ll post it somewhere. i’d link the google drive link here directly but then tumblr would nerf this post off of the hadestown tag.

you can play off of that if you want, toy around with it as a sort of small canon divergence to this au, but for the main one i’m rolling with what i already did in the first post... it’s unfinished btw there’s this small section i’m stuck on but i didn’t wanna delay this post anymore for something so minor

eurydice sees how much the beyond has ground him into the dirt—his eyes are sagging and half-lidded, dulled and shadowed and barely focused on her, miserable but too exhausted to feel

she sees this plenty in the ver. w/ Come Home With Me III before he remembers her, and for a moment in the other version before his eyes light up with recognition and suddenly it’s like some of the soot has sloughed off of him with the way his whole face lights up

also she shoves his guitar at him and he’s !!

it’s. horribly out of tune though. he’s tuning it while they talk a little

but either way: the steam whistle blows, the signal to get back to work, and orpheus is immediately lowkey fearful and trying to get back before kampê catches them

eurydie is completely “oh hell to the fuck no i JUST got you back after MONTHS of searching you are NOT leaving”

orpheus is just afraid of what kampê’ll do if she sees them together, he doesn’t plan on leaving her -- he doesn’t hand her back the guitar, after all

again, kampê isn’t the most stable

then uhhh Whoops they spend too long there and she catches them, a la Papers

cue panic

cue tousling w/ eurydice and somehow getting kampê still enough (probably w pinning) to try and listen to Orpheus and she's just waiting to kick his ass because no music is ever gonna sway her, boy

(the dogs get placated by a few chords plucked out)

he can't sing, but he plays

and the other workers listen, and are moved

they are moved by eurydice's act of coming here after him

by listening to orpheus sing of love

by listening to orpheus forget, and deteriorate

by having spent months listen to their love last and finally succeed with eurydice's arrival, this stalwart notion of hope

they didn’t ignore it. everybody knows the walls have ears

and they join by accompanying orpheus' song with the heavy metal sounds of the factories

they stomp, they clang, they turn grinding gears that crash and pound, in synchrony

(where the little wheel squeals and the big wheel groans)

it’s a percussive song that they make

more than a simple tune, a steady beat, more than just the music of machinery

it shakes the entire Beyond with the force of the determination of a thousand weary souls, of the hopeless regaining hope for the first time in centuries

Forced through the percussive force of the entire Beyond, implicit in its rhythm and shake, is the old song. all of this old and rusted metal, all of this harsh machinery, all of it singularly resonant in the notion of la, la la la, la la la

kampê feels it all through her feet and it rumbles in her chest, it shakes her to her very core and rattles her down to her bones, twists in her gut and forces in her fear and awe, and awe and wonder, and... something else

eurydice feels her loosen under her grip and backs off from pinning her and she still doesn’t move

at some point she lurches forward with her fist raised--orpheus doesn’t stop playing but he does shut his eyes, thinking oh god this is it, and eurydice rushes forward to pull her back

but she just... punches her fist into the ground by his feet

she feels everything not only through her feet but up her arm, more directly to her chest, to her heart, to her head

at last, swayed, feeling far more of something other than fear or anxiety or anger than she ever has in a long time...

she lets them all go

ok ngl there’s some blank spots here. i’m blanking here. idk how to transition

but

it's an entire exodus out from this tiny secluded part of Hadestown

The Great Beyond empties itself out and Kampê is left behind

the move is headed by Orpheus & Eurydice and the mood is very similar to the exodus from Egypt by the jewish folk in the movie Prince of Egypt

including the dark lighting, teal against the warm orange-yellow of their torches (lamps in this case), the wind, the craggy rock, everyone together, overall just the general tone

so during this walk from the Beyond to central hadestown with orpheus & eurydice more or less alone at the front is when Promises happens

it’s. a hell of a lot sadder here, but also a lot softer and more tender

orpheus’ lines are spoken like with Come Home With Me I / II coz he ain’t singin’ anymore. he can’t

and that’s the thing, he can’t sing anymore.

all those things he said in wedding song, all his promises--that his voice would convince the world to give them everything they need

orpheus... doesn't have that anymore, or at least not nearly as strong, or traditionally lovely as it used to be

his voice was cut into pieces from the nasty shit air in the places he was sent to work

all he has is his guitar, and while he’s good at it, his real strength is in his poetry--it’s his voice and his words that makes the rivers and the trees and birds sing along

the people of the Beyond may have been inspired to percussion by his guitar, but they were more swayed by the notion of their love that was built up over the past few months ever since he got banished

so like. to walk with eurydice and be by her side for as long as he lives, is really all he can really promise her at that point anyway

it's not even that he doesn't have anything and broke the promise that he’d sing them all they needed. he can’t even do that anymore

the voice that charmed her, that said he’d provide for her, is gone

would she love him now, he wonders, if the great poet can no longer sing

and many thanks to @sonyalone for contributing this:

he offers his devotion to her. the only thing he has that’s worth anything, the only thing he can do. and when he does hes so afraid that he'll see in her eyes the understanding disappointment, the pity and "i suppose so" that he fears, but he finally raises his head and he cries because her eyes are shining with joy and love and hope. thats all she ever wanted from him. she just wants to be with him, voice or no, amenities or no, and hes never felt so loved

he weeps, and she weeps--from grief and relief and love--and they hold each other close

sheltering under each other

and they have never been more secure in their love

he walked the whole length of the railroad into hell for her, he survived in the pit for her, she scoured the underworld for him, she came for him and she's keeping him

and the return of all these workers startles everyone in central hadestown and a lot of the work gets stalled out

which, of course, draws hades’ attention.

tune in next time for more on this shit ✌️

(pt i) (pt ii) (pt iii) (you are here) (pt iv) (pt. v) (epilogue) (askblog)

#hadestown #hadestown au #hadestown fanart #unswayed au #hadestown musical #my art #my work #look i KNOW the guitar is too small but also I don't care #edit 6/26/19: forgot to include some stuff re: the face-off with Kampe and Promises

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0poole · 6 years

Text

Psychonauts is a funny thing

So, I got recommended the game on Steam after playing A Hat in Time because the games are uncannily similar (and Hat in Time definitely, 100% took some things from the game, I’m absolutely sure of it) and I just sort of passively cared about it for a while. I watched one of those compilations of the boss battles in the game, and it did look pretty cool to me. Then, the trailer for the sequel came out, and I watched it, had no idea what was going on, and reasoned I could probably play the original between then and the time it came out. The sequel looked pretty visually interesting, and if a sequel looks interesting surely the original has to be too. And, after a few months of sporadic playing, I finally finished it a few seconds ago. Basically, I’d recommend playing it.

But, I don’t think I’ve ever gotten this mad at a game before. It’s an odd feeling, being mad.

First of all, I bought the game on a Steam sale where it was literally only 99 cents. It was soon after the sequel trailer released, so surely it was there to draw people like me in. But, the issue was that the game wouldn’t even start when I first downloaded it. It played the intro, but it instantly minimized itself whenever I tried to pull it up. So, I put that off for a few weeks, and sure enough with no rhyme or reason it started working as intended again. Great. Surely this wouldn’t be representative of the future, right?

Well, sort of. There were a ton of glitches in the game. Most of them involving sketchy platforming, where I should’ve landed or grabbed onto a ledge but didn’t somehow, but only one legitimately stopped me from progressing. Not exactly spoilery, but I confused the first knife thrower you meat (no joke that was unintentional, but I’m keeping it) in the last (second to last?) level, and that made him completely stop doing anything, so I had to reset there. Not very fun.

But, before that, there was a glitch that actually was relatively cool. During the Den Mother boss fight, I used clairvoyance as intended, but after the first time it glitched (but I didn’t realize it) and the platform when completely invisible, but I could still see Raz’s body, so I just reasoned that it was just a progression of the difficulty of the fight. I could still piece together where I had to go to hit the boss, it was just going to be harder. Then, I died, and it started working as intended. It was a little lame, to be honest. Nothing changed from that point. I was obviously having trouble, though, so I wasn’t going to complain.

Then, an issue on my side of things was that I very often was stuck on what to do, and basically just ran around confused for 30+ minutes. I’m a pussy when it comes to video games, to be honest. I genuinely appreciate direction when I play, even if too much of it is obviously a bad thing. It’s usually because of how many Nintendo games I play. They usually give pretty clear hints where to go. I swear, if I couldn’t call on Cruller to help me, I would’ve never made it.

The funny thing is that, most of the time my confusion was a result of me just forgetting about the floating power. I would jump, fall, try again, and stare at the ledge until something magically appeared. Once I looked up the answer to my first problem online (where the old meat’s stench was the thing you had to float up on) I realized it, but still got stuck on later instances where you had to use it. I don’t know why that one mechanic constantly slipped my mind. I play video games. I should know updraft = you can float on it. That, and wood = burnable.

I do wish they forced you to get an item/power that you needed to get before you progressed BEFORE you actually got to the point where you needed it. Mainly when it came to the cobweb duster, at least. That thing was hella expensive, but I avoided it because I thought it was just one of those things for collectathon-ers who wanted to 100% the game. But, turns out, there’s only like one or two points where cobwebs are actually blocking your path, so I had to stop all progress and farm arrowheads to get that. Even worse, I bought other stuff with the arrowheads I got up until that point, so I had to farm a lot more.

But, apart from more specific stuff, that’s basically all the negative things I have to say about the game. Even though I did actually, legitimately get mad at multiple points, looking back on it all with a sound mind, it’s actually a really good, interesting game.

Honestly, the overall concept of the game is the best part. It has such insane potential, probably more so than any other concept I’ve heard of. The idea that you can go inside a person’s mind and interact with it in the form of a physical world/level is so cool. Really, there’s no better form of characterization. The serious contrast between the minds of someone like Milla, who’s clearly a partier, and Sasha, who’s clearly straight out of the Matrix, is such fun to experience. Obviously anyone would have a metaphorical, sprawling land as their mind, but how Sasha can control all of that and pull it out at will is really cool. On the other hand, Fred barely has a world to explore. He cares so much about the game that he only exists in a room, and the game is represented in the larger land, with all the different types of people. Then, Boyd the conspiracy theorist is trying to connect everything with winding pathways that flip over and cross with each other. Apart from the obvious ““normal”” neighborhood that’s constantly spying on him.

That level has to be my favorite in the entire game, even though it’s one of the ones that I got stuck on. A lot of that definitely came down to how the G-Men clearly inspired the C.A.W. Agents in A Hat in Time, who were really well done in both games. I noticed it instantly, and that made it so much more fun. Plus, that level introduced Clairvoyance, which might be the must useless yet the most interesting power in the game. They put so much effort into how you appear in the eyes of other characters (even the NPCs and enemies) that it’s kind of shocking. You really only use it for a part or two of that level and the boss fight (which made really good use of it), and then it just becomes a device for Easter eggs. Considering each of the other campers were mostly seemed like occasional throwaway jokes or funny images, they really thought about who they were and what they wanted.

Obviously, I’d be remiss to not talk about the character designs. This is essentially The Nightmare Before Christmas on steroids when it comes to character models. Some were obvious references to other things, like Sasha looking like Neo, or Cruller looking like Einstein, but even then they felt like their own characters. Overall, they’re a little too crazy to be at the top of my tastes, but they’re perfect for the atmosphere. I especially loved the Butcher’s design for some reason, even though it’s pretty standard for an over-exaggerated butcher character. He just looked really cool. The only design I was kinda iffy about was the Censors, who were awesome in concept, but looked a little too mortal-looking for something present in pretty much everyone’s mind. Maybe people just associate censoring with Cog-esque business people, and that’s why they always look like that. I do like the idea of them progressing into the giant Judges you see in the sequel trailer, though.

Then, the unsung hero of them all: The little bubble bug you always see in everyone’s psyches. I don’t think I ever actually used him, but he was adorable. Apparently his name is Oatmeal too? That’s adorable. I love him.

Back to the Butcher, though, with spoilers if you care: I liked the idea that both Oleander and Raz were embellishing their parents’ impressions of them and who they themselves actually were. It made sense, because children are so much more impressionable. They’d think that their dads are monsters, and carry that into adulthood (or, just later childhood in Raz’s case). Although, I do understand why Oly would be scarred by his father, but I don’t think we really got confirmation as to why Raz thought his father was so against his Psychic powers. Maybe that’ll be explained in the sequel? Maybe there’s some backstory I forgot about/didn’t know about? Probably. I doubt the writers just forgot about it.

Worth the 99 cents? Fuck yeah man. It sold me on the sequel, so they’re gonna get my money one way or another.

#psychonauts #opinions #review #rant #rambling #poole #2

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arlingtonpark · 6 years

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SNK 111 Review

Milkshake Duck Edition

“This subversive anti-corps organization shall be known as the Yeagerists.”

Dude, Eldian Freedom Caucus. That name is so much better.

So, the EFC really cares about Eldia. Cool. Here is why that’s racist:

First off, let’s establish here that Eren is basically a racist. He believes there are intractable differences between the races and that peaceful coexistence is impossible. What’s more, he seemingly supports restoring the Eldian Empire. This could be construed as supporting the restructuring of the global racial hierarchy so that Eldians are the dominant race again. That’s racist.

Racism is a commonly misunderstood term. Racism is a system of inequality built around the concept of race. It is not just prejudice. Racism is also an ideology. It is the idea that there are meaningful differences between groups of people (i.e. races exist) and that society should be hierarchically structured to reflect those differences. But racism also has another important component to it: power in society. Racism does not just hurt the dominated. It helps the dominators, the dominant race in society. In the United States, white people benefit from racism even as white people are occasionally the targets of racial prejudice. This is because the ideology of racism, which is pervasive in our culture, structures society so that benefits are accrued to them at the expense of other races.

Presently in the world of Attack on Titan, there is a globalized racial hierarchy that places Eldians at the bottom. But previously, the Eldians were at the head of an empire that dominated the world. But then, in a totally ridiculous chain of events, I’m sure, society was dramatically restructured basically overnight so that Eldians were at the bottom of the food chain. In this context restoring the Eldian Empire can only be understood as restoring Eldians to their former place at the top of the racial hierarchy.

That’s. racist.

The EFC is an inherently racist group fighting an inherently racist cause. Floch is a racist. Zeke is a racist. Grisha was a racist. That girl Mikasa saved and then threw in the slammer is a racist. They’re all racists.

And Eren has chosen to stand with them. He is a racist de facto if not de jure.

It is worth noting there are similarities between Eren’s view of race relations and the proto-racist views of the 18th century.

“Deep rooted prejudices entertained by the whites; ten thousand recollections, by the blacks, of the injuries they have sustained; new provocations; the real distinctions which nature has made; and many other circumstances, will divide us into parties, and produce convulsions, which will probably never end but in the extermination of the one or the other race.”

-Thomas Jefferson, on why he rejected the notion of whites and blacks living peacefully together.

This was bullshit when Jefferson said it and it is bullshit when Eren says it. The races can coexist. Obviously. Things are somewhat complicated by the fact that there are real biological differences between Eldians and the rest, but even that doesn’t make things intractable. Eldians only transform under specific, inordinate circumstances. Widespread public advocacy can educate the public to this fact.

And unfortunately the possibility that Eren is not just pretending to support the EFC’s cause but actually genuinely believes in it cannot be ruled out. It is entirely believable that Eren is a racist person. The reason Eren would support restoring the Empire would probably have something to do with his dominance centric mindset. Eren sees the world in terms of the dominators and the dominated. As such he believes you have to be strong in order to protect what you care about because that’s the only way to be safe from the domination of others. In the case of the Eldian race, that means restoring the Empire and Eldian global hegemony with it. This naturally also means Eren believes conflict is inevitable and unavoidable.

In this way, Eren’s ideology would be no different from your typical racist asshole, from your racist neighbor all the way on up to Adolf Hitler himself: racial conflict is inevitable (indeed, the defining aspect of human history) and the only way to win the war of the races is to be strong and dominate others.

Eren has an insular, possibly racist, worldview. This worldview informs his belief in Paradis’ impending doom and because he views the Survey Corps as being “soft on Marley,” he commits an act of insubordination, murders innocent civilians in the process, and drags his country into war. In multiple posts I’ve called on the series to make it clear that Eren’s actions were immoral and now we know where the series stands on the issue.

Not only is Eren a hero for what he did, the series casts him as a visionary ahead of his time!

While everyone else was dragging their feet, he was the one who acted (because he’s a nationalist), he was willing to do what no one else was willing to do (because he doesn’t give a shit about human rights), and, as far as the series seems to care for, he got results (except not really).

I seriously hope I’m misreading things here because it seems the series is actually trying to legitimize the grievances of these racist assholes! The story is plainly saying that the racists are the ones who didn’t have their heads buried in the sand. Those people called for a hardline stance against Marley because of their racism, because they rejected the notion of peaceful coexistence between the races. Stories are constructed and Isayama has chosen to construct a story that says the racists were basically right.

Excuse me while I have a minor panic attack as the notion this series is a right-wing nationalist screed keeps getting harder to refute!

Even worse, the series seems to cast attempts to avoid the conflict as a waste of time! Suing for peace is never a waste of time and it is never too late to sue for peace. People die in war. Was it not worth it to try and avoid that?

As I am writing this, it is the 100th anniversary of the end of World War I. That war started with the July Crisis, the rapid escalation of tensions between European powers that directly precipitated the war. But even at the eleventh hour, even as they were. Mobilizing. For. War. there were still serious, earnest overtures for peace being made. Can you imagine Eren even considering that? He thought suing for peace was folly before going to Marley.

Racial conflict is not inevitable and it was not a waste of precious time to make overtures of peace. In any other story Eren’s actions would rightfully be depicted as the work of a radical extremist, but here his opposition concedes the point to him even though he has no point!

The Military Police were planning on going ahead with Zeke’s plan, just without Zeke himself. Even after the stunt Eren pulled they were still planning to conduct experiments with the Rumbling. They never truly foreclosed on using the rumbling, but Eren had foreclosed on peace as a meaningful pursuit a long time ago.

Hange’s concession to Eren is so complete they even adopt Eren’s rhetoric on the matter. Hange frames the Survey Corps opposition to what Eren wants as them not moving forward. In prior chapters, Eren has framed his actions, the same actions the Corps opposes, as moving forward. By having the opposition capitulate and begin adopting their opponents framing, the story further emphasizes the point that Eren was right and they were wrong. That’s bullshit!

But things are even worse than that! Recall what I said earlier about racism being a system of inequality built around the concept of race. Well here’s the rub: the concept of race itself was invented by Europeans to justify their domination of the world. Because of this, the very idea of there being differing races is itself racist. This is why the story’s tackling of race will always be flawed at best. To frame racial conflict as being over legitimate differences is to not just miss the point, it is to concede the point to the racists.

(I really hope conceding the point to racists doesn’t become a thing with this series.)

Here’s a possible ending to the series: Eldians and Marleyans are unable to resolve their differences so they decide to self-segregate. All the Eldians are sent to live on Paradis and Paradis agrees to maintain an isolationist foreign policy. That ending would have a very pro-nationalist message, which is exactly why I wouldn’t be surprised if that’s how the story ends. I don’t want this story to have a pro-nationalist message, but there is a ton of smoke right now.

Where there’s smoke, there’s fire.

All that said, I can’t exactly blame them for deciding to negotiate with Eren. I just wish the story wasn’t written in a way that legitimizes the EFC’s worldview. Marley will be bearing down on them shortly and Eren has the titan shifter powers plus a small army of over 100 soldiers plus the advantage of being able to wage a guerilla style campaign against Paradis. Eren had a huge advantage and Pixis was smart to realize that.

This chapter can be divided into two halves. I just finished addressing the bigger one so that just leaves the smaller one.

It’s going to be hard for me to talk about this half of the chapter because of how difficult it is for me to read it. The whole sequence is like a black comedy.

Let’s run it down:

Nicolo is a total idiot, and I’m not just saying that because he’s racist. So this clown finds himself face to face with the girl who killed Sasha, you know, the good Eldian, and his response is to go in front of people and invite them to murder her?

WHAT AN IDIOT!

And yeah I know he’s acting in a fit of rage, but in a way that makes what he’s doing even more revealing. He’s not thinking so he’s acting on pure instinct, and what we see in this chapter is a man with the instincts of an asshole.

He’s so full of rage he’s totally cool with murdering Gabi. But what’s really revealing is his assumption that Mr. Blouse would feel the same way, when any reasonable person would just assume he wouldn’t. That’s why this whole moment plays out like a scene in a comedy, because of the irony of it. Nicolo thinks his dumb idea that Mr. Blouse will kill Gabi is a good one, meanwhile everyone else, including the audience, knows it isn’t.

The fact that Nicolo just assumed that they’d all be just as willing to kill a kid as he was speaks to him being a very closeminded person. He can’t fathom that other people would seriously object to his thinking.

The other reason is the sheer ridiculousness of it. Imagine being in Mr. Blouse’s position. You’re enjoying dinner with your family when out of nowhere the chef comes in with a knife and two bloodied children with him. Then he says the girl you’ve befriended is actually an enemy soldier who killed your daughter!

Someone give Mr. Blouse an award. There wasn’t a single trace of “What?” on him! All this crazy stuff is going on and he just rolls with it, even though he’s being asked to assume the veracity of things most people would at least question. I don’t know if I should call this a plot hole or what.

And then we get to the climax of the chapter: Mr. Blouse’s speech.

“Sasha was a hunter. I’d taught her how to use a bow and we’d go hunt food in the forest since she was a little one. Because that’s how we lived. But I knew the day would come when we couldn’t keep living that way. So I made Sasha leave the forest. Then the world got bigger. Sasha became a soldier. She went off to other lands, shot people, then got shot herself. Turned out, just when I thought she’d left the forest, the whole world was one big one. It was still kill or be killed. I think Sasha got killed because she wandered too far in that forest. We’ve got to let the children out of this jungle, at the very least. Or else the same thing’s just going to happen again and again. As adults, it’s our responsibility to shoulder the sins and hatred of the past.”

I will say this first: Mr. Blouse is a good man. The idea that he had to choose between revenge and forgiveness is a false dichotomy. He could have chosen to not forgive her while also not choosing to seek revenge. And he would have been well within his rights if he had.

The problems I have with this speech are about what it portends for the future. Mr. Blouse describes the world as being like a forest where you have to kill to survive. That’s basically how Attack on Titan presents the world as well. But Mr. Blouse rejects this as an untenable way to live. He got Sasha out of the forest because he knew that in a world where you either kill or be killed you were eventually going to be killed.

What he says next is key.

To break the cycle of violence they have to get out of the jungle. As far as the analogy is concerned, that’s true. If the jungle is a dangerous place to be in, the solution is to leave it.

The million dollar question here is, how do you translate that analogy into an actionable objective? If the whole world is a jungle, then how do you leave it?

The answer is simple.

You don’t leave it. You change it.

If you can’t leave the forest, you have to make it livable, and Mr. Blouse demonstrates this himself by forgiving Gabi. The world is a forest partly because people aren’t very forgiving. By exhibiting the virtue of mercy, Mr. Blouse shows how we can make the forest, the world, a better place to live.

But here’s another question: He shows how you can change the forest. But can you actually change it?

There’s still a good chance the series will answer this question with a resounding “no.”

Is Isayama hinting at how he intends to give his story a happy ending? Or is he showing us what he thinks people should do while planning to end the series with what he thinks people will do?

Isayama had Kaya turn on Gabi because he wants to remind us of the latter possibility. Kaya considered Gabi a friend and even she was filled with homicidal rage.

The message is clear: however warm and cuddly we may feel when we see Mr. Blouse show empathy for his daughter’s killer, there are always people who think and act in the opposite way and they could literally be anyone. If even a little girl can be driven to act and think in this way, can Mr. Blouse’s way of thinking really win in the end? Not likely.

So Mr. Blouse forgives Gabi, but what does he think of the act itself? It’s notable that he frames Gabi and Sasha’s actions as taking place in the context of a kill or be killed situation. Which unfortunately gives me chapter 100 flashbacks. My take away from that chapter was that both sides see themselves as being in a fight for their very existence and that they are simply doing what comes naturally in a situation like that. I also read an important statement about metaethics in that chapter.

The…exact reason why is hard to articulate, but ever since chapter 100 came out, one of my biggest fears have been that Isayama just doesn’t understand what he’s talking about. (see: smoke, lots of)

The series has made a point of emphasizing the humanity of all those involved in the conflict. That is not necessarily a bad thing, but what I fear is that the series will lose sight of the fact that you can want nothing but peace on earth and still be a fucking asshole.

“Eren isn’t a bad person, he’s just a guy with an opinion about what the right thing to do is and he’s not afraid to act on it.”

Do not make the mistake of thinking that being a bad person and not being a Saturday morning cartoon villain are mutually exclusive. They are not. If you think they are then you don’t understand morality.

This utterly revisionist version of morality, called student relativism (warning: PDF link) by professional philosophers, is pervasive in our society. It is not true that morality is “just an opinion,” as the above statement implies.

For many reasons.

Morality is objective.

Does Isayama understand that?

If the series does endorse a naïve moral relativism, then it is part of the problem. That problem is creeping nihilism.

Our society has been trending towards a bigger and bigger embrace of nihilism for centuries now. Friedrich Nietzsche very famously identified this trend in the late 1800s. This isn’t completely bad. It used to be in vogue to think that history was a march towards inevitably greater prosperity. Now it is recognized that greater prosperity is not completely assured.

But it is bad in other cases. The belief in the inviolability of “opinions,” as opposed to the unwavering truth of “facts,” is an example of that.

A big driver of this trend is the increasingly secularized nature of society. People in the West are conditioned to view morality as an imperative from God. Objectivity is conflated with divine command. But if God is dead, as Nietzsche famously put it, what happens to our notion of objectivity?

That notion falls by the wayside, even though it doesn’t have to.

There are many ways to get to an objective(ish) morality that doesn’t rely on the dictates of a god. Elaborating on those ways would be beyond the scope of this post (*cough* copout *cough*) but needless to say the idea that morality is in any way relative is a fringe opinion among people who study morality professionally. Almost no one defends it.

Which brings us back to Attack on Titan. The story does not shy away from showing the gruesomeness of the characters’ actions. But separate and apart from that, what is the series saying about the morality of those actions?

In chapter 40, Ymir and Historia (and some other people) are on a tower teetering towards collapse. Titans are swarming the tower’s base. At any moment they could be dead.

Ymir says something to Historia:

“I have no right to tell you how to live. So this is just a wish of mine. Live your life with pride.”

This is the first reference to student relativism in the series. We can’t tell people how to live their lives because that’s a matter of values and values should not be imposed on others because there are no correct values. When I realized what I was reading, my heart sank.

This one line completely ruins Ymir’s character. All this time she’s called for Historia to live for herself, but in the end she never truly believed in that. How can she? How can you think something is correct if you also don’t think it’s the binding Truth?

Ymir believes Historia should live for herself. “Should” implies “must” because if you should do something, you are obligated to do it. But if Ymir believes that she can’t tell Historia how to live then she doesn’t actually believe Historia should live for herself.

Attack on Titan, like all stories, is a work that tries to say something. But could it be that all this time it’s been “just a wish” on Isayama’s part that we agree with him?

If so, that’s very cowardly.

It’s cowardly because he’s trying to have his cake and eat it too. He’s trying to assert his opinion (and in a strong, high profile way at that) while also trying to dodge the liability that is inherent in making an assertion. He is trying to enjoy the benefits of partaking in public discourse (voicing his beliefs) while trying to avoid the pitfalls (the possibility of being wrong).

Saying that what you believe in isn’t binding truth is not only self-contradictory, it is a way of avoiding scrutiny. If we live in a world where there is no correct way of doing things then we live in a world where no one can be wrong; saying that, “No one can be wrong,” is just another way of saying, “I can never be wrong.”

That is the cowardice of student relativism.

And yeah, Ymir is a coward too for believing in this. I told you that line completely ruined her character!

…And it’s at this point I realize I’ve trailed off significantly from the point I was trying to make.

The bottom lines are these:

(1) Attack on Titan’s themes might be informed by junk philosophy ripped straight from the forums of 4chan; because

(2) The author might be the type of person who has to deny truth itself exists before he can make a claim in public; which would mean

(3) The story doesn’t truly stand for anything; and therefore

(4a) Reading this manga has been a complete waste of time

(4b) The corrosive trends that are undermining our society have been reinforced

(4c) The narrative is flagrantly self-contradictory and even hypocritical

(4d) Nihilism is the overarching theme of the story; and

(4e) In the end, Mr. Blouse probably does think the “kill or be killed” situation is exculpatory.

(it isn’t)

Ultimately what’s significant about this chapter is what it portends for the future. Attack on Titan has begun its final story arc, so the moment of truth is almost here: what does this series truly stand for?

#snk 111 #snk chapter 111 #shingeki no kyojin #attack on titan #spoilers

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nomorelonelydays · 7 years

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Dragon AU: Part 2 - submission

The first then Sidney felt, was warmth. He shifted beneath his blankets, before long he need to get up and attend the council meetings with his father. He opened his eyes a crack and then sat up in shock. Right. He was in the dragon’s lair. He took stock of himself, noticing that someone had removed his armor, setting it in a neat pile far below at the base of the pile and he wore the tunic and pants he put on under his armor. He was alone on top of the treasure pile, surrounded and covered by stolen furs but across the cave, he saw shadows moving in the firelight. A cold wind swept through the cave from the nearby entrance and Sidney shivered, tugging the pelts that had fallen when he sat up, back around his shoulders. Winter was coming. He might as well face his host since he was apparently not allowed to leave. He hoped the dragon wouldn’t mind as he wrapped one of the bigger furs around himself (big enough that is couldn’t be anything but a bear) and careful picked his way down the pile. He walked along what seemed to be a path, the smooth stone standing out among the glittering hoard and when he rounded a corner he saw a man standing at the fire. He was tall, taller than Sidney (and Sid he was definitely not short). The muscles of his shoulders visibly shifted beneath a shirt that had far to many colors, as he tossed another log onto the flames. The man must have heard him approach because he turned and smiled at him, “Good morning, little prince.” He set down the stick he was using to stoke the fire and came closer. “Not want you to be cold.” He tisked, and tucked the fur around Sidney more securely. Warm fingers brushed his collar and Sidney’s face grew hot. This close, he could see the dragon’s human form had warm brown eyes and a strong jaw. Zhenya placed a finger under his chin and tilted his head up, “Looks good on you.” He sounded almost proud and Sid wanted to die. He’d only talked to the dragon in once before he had been sent to kill him and it definitely had not made him feel like this. His stomach growled loudly, hopefully making the dragon forget about the comments he was making. He was used to teasing, the ladies of the court had always giggled about his scraggly beard and his awkward composure and none of the men of the court were willing to even consider a man who did and always would outrank them. Thankfully, Zhenya seemed more concerned about his stomach than his flaming face. “Hungry?” Sidney nodded rapidly.

While they ate, Zhenya told him about the cave system he had chosen as his home, “Cave was carved from old volcano” , he explained, “That is the reason why I choose. Volcano rock holds heat during winter, is cool during summer when I open vents.” “There’s vents?” The dragon set his fork down and pointed at several medium sized boulders close to the domed ceiling of the cave, bound by an intricate metal web, “When cold sets in I put rocks in place so I do not freeze.” Sidney squinted, trying to make out the pattern of what looked to be silver, “Did you make those yourself?” “Yes! You like? I’m write runes on rocks to make them stick.” “You do magic?” The king had banned magic years ago and more than one mage had been killed. Sid had never been allowed to be curious; anything that had been even slightly charmed or magical was immediately destroyed or banned. It was a miracle that the king had kept his alliance with the dragon for so long. Zhenya immediately lit up. “Of course, most dragons know at least little spells.” He wiggled his fingers over his fork and spoke something in what Sidney now realized was magic. Sid watched as it floated up like a feather falling in reverse. Then Zhenya snapped his fingers and the fork shot quick as an arrow and buried itself in the stone wall of the cave. “Can lift objects good and fireproof things.” He gestured to the fur wrapped around Sidney, “All blankets are charmed in case I forget that they’re not fireproof like me.” Sid hesitated, even he wasn’t immune to his fathers laws… but his father thought he was dead. Before he could psych himself out he blurted, “Can you show me how?” The dragon looked back over his shoulder from where he was attempting to wiggle his fork free, eyebrows raised, “Little prince wants to learn magic?” “I would like to, if you’re willing to teach me.” He was going to be stuck here a while and he might as well have something to do. Zhenya abandoned the fork in the wall and sat back down, drumming his fingers thoughtfully on table. “First need to see if you even have magic ability. Then maybe, can give you books and stuff. I’m think I have a test somewhere. Be right back.” The dragon jogged off through the hoard out of sight in search of the magic ‘test’ and Sid took the opportunity to look around what seemed to be the cooking area. It was tucked into the back corner of the cave and had a massive fireplace that looked like it doubled as both a forge and a cooking fire. There was a large pot on the grate in the fire and some bellows shoved to the side to make space for a table where the dragon had prepared the ingredients for their breakfast. It was cozy. Zhenya rushed back in holding an intricately carved box that was about two feet long and a hand-length wise. He carefully placed it on the table and opened it in front of Sid. The inside of the box was divided into five different sections with items in them: a burning coal, a small piece of metal, some water, a feather, and a handful of dirt. Zhenya drug his chair so he could sit behind Sidney and he explained how the test worked. “You put your hand over items and they sense which elements you do best.” “Which ones did you get?” The dragon grinned at him poking his tongue between his teeth, “Guess.” “Definitely fire.” “Of course. And… “ Sid looked over the objects and remembered the forge set up by the fire, “Metal.” “Very good, is why my hoard has so much metal. Is easier to keep track of. Now wave your hand over the first box.” As Sid did as he was told, the burning coal flared up and then faded when he withdrew. “Little bit fire! Alignment does not mean you can’t do that magic; just means it’s easier so you start there and then move on to harder elements. Keep going.” There was little to no response from the dirt and the feather but the water froze the moment he raised his hand and the metal glowed and then faded. Zhenya’s eyebrows almost hit his hairline, “Three! Lots of magic in you, Sid. Almost glow like little sun. No one do this with you before?” “I’ve never even seen someone practice magic.” “Never even- Why?! Even prince not have good education?!” The dragon looked horrified and Sidney wasn’t sure how to respond. “Magic hasn’t been allowed for years.” That must have been the wrong to say because Zhenya’s face darkened and he cursed under his breath, “Is against contact I signed, Sid. The king lie.” Of course he had. Sidney couldn’t believe that his father had done something that stupid. He had to know that eventually a very angry fire breathing dragon would find out. The dragon in front of him looked outright murderous. And he was the son of the one that betrayed him. Even when Zhenya was in human form there was no way Sidney could beat him in a fight. He might be broader but the dragon was most defiantly strong and had magical abilities. But instead of lashing out, Zhenya collapsed back into his chair, anger melting to exhaustion. “Is so stupid. Wanted to help but all he do is lie! Sasha tell me,” He spoke in a whiny approximation of someone’s voice, “ ‘Can’t trust humans Zhenya, they cheat and betray you!’ But he just over dramatic because Nicky cheats at cards.” “Who’s Sasha?” “Is dragon who lives on other side of the mountains. He comes to visit sometimes. He’s and asshole. His better half is Nicky, they meet in market place and Sasha annoy him into falling in love.” Zhenya heaved a sigh and stood, “Need to go do patrol to make sure no strange creatures come in my territory and then we have lunch and start magic lessons. Bring you back a present. Look around if you want. Back caves have river for washing, just follow torches.” He places both his hands on Sidney’s shoulders and smiles warmly at him. He’s close enough that Sid can feel the heat radiating off of him even in the slightly chilly cave, “Glad you decide to stay, solnyshko.” “I can leave?” Sid blurted out without thinking. The dragon’s smile wilted and he took a step back. Sid shivered and almost closed the distance between them before thinking better of it. What was wrong with him? “If you want to little prince. Not going to keep you here if you do. Is the reason I’m leave you alone in morning.” “You put me to sleep! What was I supposed to think?” Now he was frustrated. The dragon had literally magicked him to sleep after telling him he was staying. “So I just let traumatize person run off to death in woods? Not thinking straight, Sid.” “I wasn’t traumatized!” The dragon sighed, “Sid. You lose family, home, kingdom all at once. Almost die. While I’m gone, decide. Is fine if you go, I’m not going after you.” He hesitated, before saying in a voice that was a little less calm and measured, “But would be happy if you stay.” Zhenya started walking towards the cave entrance, his form flickering, shifting, growing into his true form. He was lonely, Sidney realized as he watched the dawn light reflect off of the dragon’s scales. And then Zhenya was gone.

#ohhhh my god!!!#dragon au #submission

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accessthearts · 5 years

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Colloquium : Accessibility in Art Spaces

On 6:30- 8:30 Friday September 27th in the Einstein Auditorium

Fala texted me earlier today to tell me about this panel being held at NYU. She sent me the above description and urged me to go even though she wouldn’t be able to attend. I appeared in the Einstein Auditorium hallway 10 minutes before the event to find a security guard infant of an ID scan desk. Neither I nor the friend I had brung with me were students of NYU however I approached the desk and asked for directions, the guard sent us on our way to the panel room. Once inside the panel room there was a long table at the back of the room with high quality snacks on it like fancy cheese and fruits and good bread as well as a section with wines. Some students mingled while others grabbed plates and headed to the rows of chairs. Me and my friend felt we did an excellent job disgusting our selves as NYU grad students and were happy with the surprise snacks of such high quality. As everyone settled in the auditorium was roughly 70% full, which I found surprising for a Friday night. The organiser of the event was Abby, an Arts Administration Graduate student at NYU who put this panel together because she had questions regarding the subject.

The first panelist was Kevin Gotkin a visiting assistant professor at NYU in the Media, Culture and Communication Department who on his website has topics ranging from disability, technology, and media. During his time he spoke about disability aesthetics which he intentionally said he was not going to define because the power was in the meaning everyone pulls from it. He said the word could refer to the height at which you hang a painting in terms of view-ability for those who may be reliant on a wheel chair to what representation in aesthetics does disability take up in a space. This concept also promoted a brief description of relational aesthetics which seemed just as broad a vague as the first term. However he did distinguish that liability aesthetics was more relational than relational aesthetics. I interrupted that the reason for this was because those with disabilities are more often interacting and engaging with their environment more than relational aesthetics would typically account for. The example of Park McAurthurs piece Ramps (2014) was brought in as an example to this as McArthurs work was critical of the passing of the Americans with Disability act and its real world implementation. Kevin also explained that there was a difference between artist and the access to artist and it had to do with engagement with its viewers. Kevin also briefly discussed access checks which are when you recognise strengths and weakness’s in your accessibility practice and that it is apart of the process of organising around accessibility to the arts and coming up with tactics. The idea of tactics was interesting to me because it changed my typically used language of best practice and made it so that it emphasised flexible strategy because no one way will work for everyone and really these practices do not even aim to be the best yet they just aim to be identified and utilised as basic standards. In this fight for rights to access Kevin also discussed recent legal activism such as a recent headline titled “ 75 New York Galleries Slammed With Lawsuits”. A title like that represents those with disabilities as greedy and aggressive when the reality is that ableism has been acting as an attacking force that has been normalised. Kevin said the best way to combat this injustice to to put efforts into access work. Access work can take the form of paying interpreters and real time captions fair wages by including them in budgets. Budgets should also make space for the entire ecosystem of access by taking the time, money and other required resources to properly educate the entire gallery on disability and consider its functionality.

Next up was Sasha Davis with her presentation “ Teaching Through Touch” she emphasised the importance of access educators and collecting research from different sources. She also talked about some white guy who collected art from non western countries and began to utilise more tactile tactics in the creation and display of art. This for me was problematic immediately because why is this white guy collecting all of these pieces from other countries and why is he not crediting this cool method of using touch in the creation and display of art as a non colonial practice that I am certain he took from one of the many cultures he stole from. Sasha also talked about utilising brail and large prints in museums written materials also pamphlets that included relevant information such as a map with clearly marked exists. Another practice she mentioned was classes specifically designed for those with disabilities.

The next panelist was Yo-Yo Lin who identified herself as a Taiwanese Artist creating memory scapes. She advocated for the reclamation of mental health trauma. Her platform utilised IP ( interactive projection ), other art, other tech forms for the purpose of activism. Yo-Yo talked about how disability is often contextualised in terms of the medical world and often forgets the lived nuances of the lived experiences. She expresses the nuances of every day through soft data. Soft data is all the stuff that harder to measure that science and tech usually prefer for data collection. Instead soft data can involve contradictions and uncertainty. Yo-Yo talked about her heightened sense of attunement to her body which reminded me of how Kevin, an earlier panelist, had discussed the increased relational nature of disability aesthetics. She said that feeling more attuned to her body gave her greatest awareness of the tactility of the skin and lead her to place contact mics on her bones and joints and utilise the sounds produced in her art/music. In using her own body she evaluated her own place in the world of disability as someone who lives with chronic illness. She said there were many intersections and overlapping between the two groups but in no way were they mutually exclusive. However she did make it cleat the she identified strongly with the “crip community”, the term was one that reclaimed the language around the disability community and was something she felt empowered by using. When creating events for those on the “crip community” she said it was essential to schedule in roughly an hour and a half for everyone to take the time they needed to get into the space, get comfortable and begin to engage with the activit. The importance of creating and holding “crip" communal spaces and time was highlighted.

Following Yo-Yo Lin was Londs who identified themselves as a cultural worker. She began her presentation by introducing a video that she ran while she did her presentation. She introduced the video by explaining what it depicted in detail so that those who preferred to hear what the piece would look like would get the opportunity to and then those who preferred to view what it looked like would be able to. Loads then went on to explain what the video meant and the significance it held. She explained that the video was of her and her autistic brother in a choreographed dance she had designed awhile back. She explained that it was relevant because while she wanted this form of expression to engage with him that she was simpotenosly engaged in an education program called applied behavioural analysis that aimed to change those with disabilities into versions of themselves an ableist society would accept. So although she wanted to work in a creative space with her brother that utilised collective design making she was being paid to enforce top down decision making. And although she wanted her brother to engage and be present on his own terms, she was denying that opportunity to her students. Loads also initially emphasised time and space based disability in museum spaces and referenced her time at The Whitney as her time in a big institution working in access programming however to emphasised the importance of access programming in local communities in particular. She stated that access work and disability studio looked different but held a place of importance in institutions of all sizes.

The panel moved on to the question portion of the panel so here was some relevant information that stood out to me. The questions panel first opened with a portion on language. The agreed upon appropriate terms two refer to people were disabled and non disabled which made the language disability centred. The term chronically ill was also mentioned as ok and an important disinguishment between the two communities. Another panelist made the point that language should not be the centre of this discussion and its best if we all show some humility and just be open about the discussion. A third panelists made the distinction between Identity First language which utilises a people first model or the Disability first language that defines their relationship with the world. Also to be inclusive to neurodiversity and recognise where neurotypical privilege lay. Overall the tone was one that could best be summed up by Fraud. “ Everyone says one million things because they’re nervous.” And to recognise that disability is not a bad word.

Another question was asked in regards to organisations that strive for accessibility and how to expand. The first response was that disability is diverse and the best practice is to ask people what they’ll need to engage. Audio descriptions can be an effective strategy but still needs to be specifically altered to the situation. The recommend way to look at issues of accessibility is to see art as the problem and aiming to ease its problematic nature. It is also immensely encourages to be inclusive in hiring places in order to build systems of accountability. Hiring practices must also question who is being engaged in the community and work to diversify the internal to match whom ever it is serving. Another response was that organisations need case studies written up for them (!!!!!!) Another practice to consider is do you have seating options? Do you have different kinds of seats? In order to see if you’re meeting your own goals for accessibility and inclusion make sure you do some consistent checking in. Take a minute to ask “ what worked - what could use improvement / change? “. Some one asked something about verbal description and the response informed people of a tool called Folk Museum Virtual which was apparently created by people for people in an effort to push to translate visual experiences into audio accessible things. Also in visual description it is stressed that you have a financial plan that includes needs such as audio description where one can have access to an education and visitor service centre, who pays educators fairly This requires those in curatorial roles to take on heightened attention of a more inclusive audience and to have these considerations and conversations very early on in the process and continual through out. Always be taking into consideration how people will engage with the space and the fact that 25% of the population is disabled. Access needs to be thought of as Love. Access as Justice. We need to strive for more hospitable spaces.

The following question dealt with ways of working towards access. Loren works in accessibility at the Whitney and is the first to do so in that institution since the 90’s and the reason they had some one in that position a that time was because a law was passed. The panelist encouraged that in order to create effective change it had to be a change of environment and systems, NOT PEOPLE. Spaces in museums are intended to be intentionally designed and created, this job must be done while keeping access in mind by asking the people it effects. There needs to be a revaluation of the cultural and policy plans in New York City that prioritises a resistance to systematic forms of violence. Systems need to model and enact a shared value and be easy to hold systems accountable.

Another questions was which cultural institutions currently hold respectable practices. The list included:

Particularly their access programming and arts festival with days of study

Other tips were

create and find guidelines so that there is a roadmap in place.

Watch, consider and support everyone

Consider how others are thinking of access and intersectionalities

Resources suggestions to become accessible

Is useful in the barrier money can pose

Be upfront about limitations of access in space

receiving request will confirm what needs to be done.

Be receptive and accommodating to those interested in attending

If a physically accessible space can not be created than perhaps you use the art to investigate the space and build the connection between physical and outside space.

Do not claim accessibility as it is a Frame work of which you move through.

A panelists described the work of arts administrators as “pedological” work in deign that will extend to the artist and hopefully generate an overall exhibition design that works to increase meaningfulness and accessibility. Accessibility must be woven into the fabric of art ( a quote by me ) In order to make this true we must be cutting edge in our design tactics and think of the audience in every step and not just as to meet some standard.

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schinkennudeln · 7 years

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To the Beat

A Jeanmarco fanfiction. Read on ao3 if you want

Jean thought he was being really clever. Like seriously, with a red beanie on his significant haircut (the two toned undercut), sunglasses on and a giant black hoodie that hid his slim figure he was sure no one would recognize him. Not like he expected any of his classmates ould be here, but you never know. Maybe some of the girls were also into Harry Styles. And hey who would judge them? That guys music was pretty good. Okay Jean didn’t thought Harry Styles music was “pretty good”, he thought it was awesome! He was convinced Harry would be the next King of Pop! He had been looking forward to this concet for months! Right now he was standing in front of the merch stand, really wanting the shirt with Harry lying in a pink puddle, but it was 40 fucking Dollars!! All his savings had already been used up for this ticket, but he really wanted a souvenier. That was when he heared a familiar voice next to him. “The one on the right side pleace. size L, yes thank you.” This wasn’t happening. THIS was NOT happening. Marco fucking Bodt was standing right next to Jean handing the guy behind the table 40 bucks for a Harry Styles Shirt. The guy Jean had been a crush on for the past year was at a Harry Styles concert. Was he here with a girlfirend Jean didn’t know about? (He had done some intense facebook stalking on the guy.) Jean was about to make a quick escape, cause he couldn’t be seen at a Harry Styles concert, that would ruin his reputation as the “cool guy who doesn’t care about shit” Of course Marco Bodt turned around right this second and brightly exclaim “Jean!” Jean would have sold all his comic books right this second for being swolloed by the ground. Marco took a step clouser. “DIdn’t know you would be here too. What a shame, I could’ve picke you up! My mom let me take the car tonight!” “I....eh...” Very eloquent Jean, he thought. Smooth move.

Marco was still smiling and Jean was sure his heart could handle this. Marco had transfered to their school in January, and Jean had been immediately drawn to the guy. He wanted to be friends with him so badly that he first didn’t realized that he had a crush on Marco till it was too late. Since that fatal day in May when they went out with Connie, Sasha and Thomas for ice cream and Jean had dropped his icre cream after two bites and after everyone had laughed at him and Jean was about to make an awkward exit, grumpy mumbling something to himself how everyone could stick their ice cream up their arses when Marco had offered him his own ice cream, feeling sorry for Jean. Only after he heared Sasha wispering “indirect kiss” into Connies ear, making them both giggle, Jean blushed the deepest red every seen on planet earth, making everybody laugh even harder, made him realized he was in love with Marco Bodt.

And now said person was standing right in front of him at a concert Jean couldn’t be more excited about making this place his personal heaven. “Can you hold this for a second?”, Marco suddenly asked, giving Jean the pink puddle shirt he just bought. Jean took it when Marco pulled his own hoodie over his head, he wore a shirt under it but Jean caught a glimse of his bare stomach and almost fainted, then Marco took the shirt back on put it over his head. Now Harry’s face was on Marcos body and Jean was sure that this was the most beautiful view he would ever see. “Looks good.”, Jean managed to say and was very proud of himself for not stuttering. “Should we go inside?”, Marco suggested and led the way, Jean on his heels. “Tbh” Yes Marco acutally said tbh he was the kind of guy who could pull this up without sounding stupid “I’m kinda glad that I met you. Beeing alone on a concert his pretty sad, even when it is Harry Styles!” He shyly grinned at Jean and Jean could swear his ears were going red. “You’re here on your own?”, Jean asked supirsed. “Well yeah, I don’t think any of our classmates know Harry Styles.” “Philistiners.”, Jean grumbled. “Right?”, Marco laughed. Then added:”But I’m actually not too suprised to see you here, I mean I am, but thinking about it, you always had a good taste in music.“ He grinned sheepishly and Jean felt his cheeks heating up again. He kinda wished he hadn’t abondened the sunglasses a while ago. “Ah well..”, then he thought screw it. Marco was here on his own so Jean probably couldn’t say anything sheepishly embarrassing about his choices. “I just love the way his music makes me feel. When I shout those lyrics out in my room or in the shower I feel like I could rule the world. His music actually makes you feel something, it’s nothin’ like this pop trash that you hear every day.” Marco nodded and Jean felt himself breath a little easier. The hall was packed and Jean and Marco tried to get as close to the stage as they could. They were both thankfull to their height advantage in regards to all the giggling girls around them. Their shoulders were pressed together and Jean really, really didn#t want to move. Harrys front band was amazing and Jean wished he checked them out before the concert so he could sing along like Marco did. Said wasn’t ashamed at all to sing at the top of his longs, and he wasn’t that good of a singer, but Jean found himself liking that part of him just as much as the rest. He kept sending Maroc side glances, watched how the lights threw coloufull shadows ofer his face.

When the front band left the stage and an anouncer told them Harry would be out in 10 minutes, Marco grabbed onto Jean’s arm. “I am so excited!” he shouted and all Jean could do was nod in agreement. His heart was hammering so hard in his chest, Marco next to him and Harry Styles would stand in front of them in just a few minutes. This felt like the best night ever. The lights then dropped, a drum sounded and they heared the anouncer voice again “LADIES AND GENTLEMEN; TONIGHT WE PRESENT YOU.... HARRY STYLES!” Girls screamed, spotlights were flimmering around the hall till they stopped in the middle of the stage were you could already see the band asembled which were already playning and then HE walking onto the stage, wearing a flower patterned suit. “Tell me something tell me something you don’t know nothing...” Jean hearted skiped a beat, the air felt electrical around him and he wished he had something to hold into. And because this was Harry and because his music always made Jean felt brave and Jean really really wanted to do this he reached his hand out and when Harry sang “And I’ve been payring, I never did before.” he grabbed Marco’s hand. Marco looked down suprised, but then squeezed Jeans hand back and he never felt this good before. Marco’s hand was warm, but not sweaty and his palms soft and Jean could feel every knuckle of his fingers pressed to his. This was magic. And together with the rest of the crowed they sang “OH tell me something I don’t already know!”

Harry started the concert with his more soft songs. Two ghosts, sweet creature (which Marco told Jean was his favorite, cause it remended him of his own sister and him) then the bass took a swingy tone and Caroline started playing. Their hands still locked Jean and Marco started swinging their shoulders in the rhythm, light dancing to the amazing tune. Singing out loud “SHE’S A GOOD GIRL” Jean could feel everyones good energy in the room, there was no one sad in here. A room full of people and love and a-ma-zing music.

For the next song Harry was handed his own guitre and after the first few tunes, Marco suddenly yanked his hand free form Jean’s grip, just to put his arm tight around Jean’s neck, jumping up and down “omg I love this song!” Jean was a bit confused cause he wasn’t familiar with the song. But seeing Marco this excited just made him grin like a fool and he slung his arm around Marco’s waist and jumped with him. Marco of course knew the lyrics by heart and sang along to “Who's that shadow holding me hostage? I've been here for days”

A rush of braveness hit Jean again and he felt happiness flowing trough him like waves and he really really wanted to kiss Marco right now. And like if Marco could read his thoughts he tunred his head to look at Jean a conflicted look on his face before shaking his head and then grinning and when Harry sang “Look what you’ve done to me.” Jean was about to lean in, ready to kiss Marco, Marco bowed his head down and pressed his lips to Jean’s. All his thoughts suddenly were fuck yes, fuck yes, fuck yes.

When they parted Marco seemed to have trouble looking into Jeans eyes. “You know.”, Jean started, never feeling more brave than in this second. “I was waiting for Kiwi to pull a move on you, but this works just fine.” He didn’t let go of Marco’s hips who had his arms hanging around Jean’s shoulders. “What?” It was a nice change to see Marco speechless for once. “I’ve liked you for quite some time.” Jean continued. He had to scream to make himself heard. A new song had started playing but right now he only wanted to focus on Marco whose face had turned an adorable shade of pink. “No you haven’t”, he exclaimed hiting Jeans shoulder. “Why didn’t you ever say something! I always found you where adorable but didn’t know which way you swung so...” Jean pouded, “ ’M not adorable.” That made Marco laugh “Yes you are and I like that.” He was grining and biting his lip. “This is the best night ever.”, he then said and Jean had to pull him down in another kiss, cause he didn’t know how else he could express what he was feeling cause he was feeling too much. And Marco happily leaned more into the kiss softly moving his lips against Jean’s. He was so soft and Jean never wanted to let go but then that particular drum sounded and the pulled away quickly from each other to scream at each others face “SHE WORKED HER WAY TROUGH A CHEAP PACK OF CIGARETTES!”

This was the best song ever! You coudln’t just sing along you had to scream it. But when the chours sounded the were at each other faces again. This song was just to sexy to not make out. By the second verse they saw Harry falling backwards into a chair that had been placed behind him. He was wearing a green suit by now, his shirt was hanging open, legs wide and he looked incredible.

“It's New York, baby, always jacked up Whole tunnels, foreign noses always backed up When she's alone, she goes home to a cactus In a black dress, she's such a such an actress“

Harry stood up again kicking the char away while screaming “She’s driving me crazy.” Everyone around them was screaming, this was amazing. Jean was sure he was this close to fainting, holding tightonto Marcos arm.

When the concert was over the walked out holding hands. Marco lazily swinging theit locked hands between them leaning his head onto Jean’s. THe night was warm and every part of him felt tingly. He wanted to jump and dance he was full of energy and happy. Incredible happy.

_____________

Sorry for any typos, english is not my first languages Hope you enjoyed this, cause I sure did writing this The-Parkster once wrote a script for a Harry Style music video and the Kiwi performance was inspired from it you should ask her about the script it is incredible!

#I kinda want to write a smut scene to kiwi lol #jeanmarco #harry styles #jean kirschstein #marco bodt #aot #snk #kiwi #fanfiction #jeanmarco fic

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workreveal-blog · 8 years

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Are Intel pc processors any good?

New Post has been published on https://workreveal.biz/are-intel-pc-processors-any-good/

Are Intel pc processors any good?

This year’s Customer Electronics Show in Las Vegas showcased 110-inch curved Tv sets, watches that screen your vital signs and symptoms, self-riding automobiles … and the technology industry’s efforts to shrink violence in the conflict-torn Democratic Republic of the Congo.Though Intel PC processors came a long way.

The one’s efforts are being led via Intel, the massive (annual sales of $52bn) maker of microprocessors for laptop, tablets and cell phones, among other things, and its new CEO, Brian Krzanich.

Intel

Near the give up of an excessive-profile keynote address wherein he tested “bright earbuds”, three-D printing, advances in video gaming and an embedded processor designed to allow “wearable computing,” Krzanich paused and stated:

“Okay. I’m going to replace gears for a minute now. … This isn’t an issue we’d commonly communicate approximately at CES. However, it’s miles an problem this is paramount and personal to me. That problem is battle minerals.” After he confirmed a somber video about the devastation within the Congo, where greater than five million humans have died on account that 1994 – many killed by way of armed organizations the use of income from the mining of four minerals, tantalum, tungsten, tin, and gold – Krzanich promised that each Intel microprocessor would henceforth be warfare-free. The arena’s first battle-unfastened processors might be established as no longer containing minerals sourced from mines that finance preventing inside the Congo, he said.

However, not all businesses have joined the unorthodox anti-battle campaign. While Intel and its NGO companion within the Congo, the Enough Challenge, were marking what the activists referred to as a “massive step forward to defend the warlords”, numerous powerful change institutions – the us Chamber of Commerce, the Enterprise Roundtable and the National Association of Manufacturers – have been asking a panel of federal judges to overturn a provision of the 2010 Dodd-Frank regulation that calls for businesses to disclose their use of minerals from Africa.

Those other associations (Intel is a member of all three) argue that requiring groups to file any source minerals from the Congo quantities to an abuse of government power.

In the Congo, should companies live or go?

As we’ve got said earlier than at Dad, or mom Sustainable Business, the warfare-free minerals difficulty is a thorny one for large Enterprise. An enormously straightforward option for companies would be to avoid the Congo absolutely – there are sufficient sources of the minerals someplace else – but that could set back the economic system of this desperately contrary kingdom. The venture for NGOs and companies that want to do the right aspect for the DRC is to locate methods to do Commercial enterprise with the area without helping rebel groups.

Electronics industry leaders inclusive of Intel and HP are operating each on their very own and with coalitions together with the Electronics enterprise Citizenship Coalition (EICC), which need to transport the DRC from a wartime to a peacetime financial system, to do simply that.

It is a frightening assignment. Supply chains lack transparency. It is tough to affirm that minerals shipped out of place are war-free. Meanwhile, others who use the metals, inclusive of the jewellery, aviation, and car industries, have remained on the sidelines.

“The solution is not clean,” Krzanich said, “but not anything worthwhile ever is.”

Of the four minerals, tantalum is the one on which the electronics industry may have the greatest effect, so that has been the industry’s pinnacle awareness. The process of untangling Supply chains for precious metals has been painstaking, as I discovered in Las Vegas, wherein I moderated a panel with Krzanich, Sasha Lezhnev of the Enough Mission and the actor and activist Robin Wright, who has visited the Congo. (Complete disclosure: Intel paid me to moderate the panel.)

How agencies rank on warfare minerals

Krzanich, who have become Intel’s CEO closing Might also, previously ran the organization’s Manufacturing and Supply chain operations, so he changed into correctly positioned to manipulate the issue. In contrast to, say, Apple or Dell, which outsource maximum or all of their production, Intel makes its personal silicon chips and takes pleasure within the environmental excellence of its “fans” within the US and some place else.

When Krzanich first found out approximately war minerals, he knew that he didn’t want Intel engulfed in a problem that had the potential to undo decades of proper work around smooth production and company obligation. “I want to be loved,” he joked. “We had to get ahead of the difficulty.”

Through evaluation, Apple initially ignored overtures from the Enough Venture, Lezhnev stated. While the organization couldn’t get a meeting with Apple, college students protested at the outlet of a brand new store in the tony Georgetown neighborhood of Washington DC in 2010. Now not lengthy after, a cell phone rang in Enough’s DC office: Steve Jobs was on the road, asking what the fuss was about.

The usage of a tactic called “rank ’em and spank ’em,” Enough on account that then has rated tech companies on their struggle-minerals policies. Intel and HP lead the ratings, with Apple, Dell, and Microsoft no longer some distance behind. Laggards consist of Nintendo, KTC and Sharp.

You also ought to look past the branding, due to the fact these PC days’ Core chips are distinctive from closing yr’s. Intel usually brings out a new era of processors every 12-18 months, and the Middle range is now in its seventh generation.

Technology game

Every generation of Middle chips has its code call, inclusive of Sandy Bridge, Haswell, and Skylake. The cutting-edge is Kaby Lake. Every technology brings more desirable functions, and a few mark a shift to a new production era, measured in nanometres. Smaller is higher. Center iX chips have long gone from 32nm to 22nm to nowadays’s 14nm. Shrinking the transistors permits Intel to place greater of them on Each chip, and consequently add new capabilities.Intel i7 processor pricre is 1200$ now. And building Intel desktop computers isn’t easy on a budget. Even intel i7 laptops. Hp intel laptops are pricey too!

The technology is proven through the first wide variety after the sprint in Each Middle chip’s name. As an example, a Core i7-3770 is a 3rd generation chip, While the Center i7-7770 is the 7th era version of the same CPU. Intel says the rest of the variety – in this case, 770 – is its SKU (stock-maintaining unit) designation. Better numbers typically suggest higher performance and different capabilities; however, I don’t have room for all the information you may discover online.

All Intel’s processors now include a photographs co-processor. That is also given a technology quantity. However, it’s one step in the back of. For instance, 7th technology Middle i7 chips have HD photographs 620 or something, While sixth-gen chips have HD images 520. The satisfactory photographs chips get Iris branding.

Velocity vs. strength consumption

People who want overall performance, which include game enthusiasts, frequently bitch that processors aren’t getting faster each 12 months like they used to. They may be getting a touch quicker, but mostly they’re getting smaller and consuming much less power. The key point, stated above, is

“performance per watt.”

Chips that use less electricity generate much less warmness, so they don’t want as tons cooling. This enables Producers to make thinner laptops with higher battery life, that is what most people want.

Development is now indicated primarily using the fall in TDP (Thermal Layout power) rankings. The second-gen Core i5-2500 in my 2011-vintage computing device Laptop is still quicker than most cutting-edge Intel chips. However, it runs at 95W. It’s barely slower than a present day Center i7-7600U. However, that runs at handiest 15W.

In other words, you could now position the same processing energy in an extremely skinny PC that used to need a tower machine with large cooling lovers.

Of course, chips with a Higher TDP will commonly run quicker, different matters being identical. In Intel’s current line-up, the small quad-Core chips with HQ after their names run at 45W or 47W, While the U chips are 15W or 28W designs. The Y chips eat simplest four.5W: see under.

Beneath the Center

Intel turned into able to out-Design and out-manufacture competitors including AMD but confronted a harder venture While ARM processors started to dominate the markets for phones, smartphones, and capsules. Intel’s chips were massive. Electricity-Hungry and steeply-priced; ARM chips were small, phenomenally energy-efficient, cheap, and speedy Sufficient.

Intel bought ARM chips for some time before figuring out to create its personal range of small, cheap and energy-efficient Atom processors to compete in this booming marketplace. Atoms, In contrast to ARM chips, could execute the x86 commands had to run Microsoft Home windows software.

Atom chips didn’t penetrate the phone and pill markets in sizeable numbers. However, they were successful in powering standard, small-display Home windows “netbooks” just like the Asus Eee Pc and Samsung NC10.

These first Atom chips had been as an alternative gradual. While designs became fast Enough for standard-cause use; Intel started branding them with well-known names – Pentium and Celeron – that had more prestige. These two strains dominate nowadays’s entry-degree Computer marketplace.

Unluckily, there doesn’t appear to be any common sense to Intel’s numbering device, past the fact that X7 Atoms are quicker than X5 Atoms, which might be better than X3 Atoms. Pentium-Atoms ought to additionally be more rapid than Celeron-Atoms. However, you’d have to run benchmarks to make sure.

Why Y?

In 2014, Intel introduced a new family of processors, which it referred to as Middle M. It stated that Middle chips had been for Folks that wished energy, and Atom chips had been for Those who wanted battery life, but Core M might bridge the two.

The Core M wasn’t a fulfillment within the Windows computer market, though Apple used it in the MacBook – the version satisfactory regarded as having a single USB-C port. That can be why the M range has survived. (Digital Fashion’s headline positioned it brutally: No person desires Intel’s Center M processor, and Computex proves it.)

processor

Unluckily, with Kaby Lake, Intel modified its naming device via placing a Y in some chip numbers. The Core m5 became the Center i5-7Y54, and the Center m7 became the Center i7-7Y75. People who might imagine They’re getting a Full-power 15W Core chip will, in reality, be getting a slower four.5W Core M. Caveat emptor.

Benchmarks

When buying a new Computer, you can take a look at the CPU’s call to get its age and relative performance level. The blurb also has to inform you the clock Pace and whether or not it’s a twin Core or quad-Middle chip. Greater GHz and more cores are usually better, even though a twin-Core chip can still be faster than a quad-Core.

After that, you may search for benchmark comparisons, in particular, if the benchmarks measure the types of things you commonly do – maths processing, video rendering, gaming or whatever. The hassle is that there are dozens of criteria and it could be hard to locate outcomes for new Pcs.

However, you could discover benchmarks for maximum processors(Intel & AMD mainly) at websites along with PassMark, Geekbench, and AnandTech. You can additionally examine PCs head-to-head at CPU Boss, CPU World, and AnandTech.but, for now, Intel processors revolutionised Pc gaming

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