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deepcreekvulture · 1 month

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Spencer Reid's College Timeline

So, I was chilling at my local Library and decided to use my very extensive free time to write out Spencer Reid’s College timeline (or at least how it makes the most sense to me).

There’s probably going to be a lot of inconsistencies and possible contradictions in this, but please give me a little grace. I don’t go to college, and I'm just silly.

I did try to be as accurate as I could, but there’s only so much I can do with my little brain and 10 mgs of Adderall.

I also tried to be as realistic as I could, especially with considering how Diana’s condition would affect his education. But, again, it's not going to be perfect. Feel free to share your thoughts.

What we know:

-Spencer Reid graduated from a Las Vegas public high school at the age of 12 (01.18 “Somebody’s Watching”)

-He went to Caltech. I personally like to think that he also went to MIT (Breen Frazier has admitted that Spencer saying he want to MIT in 07.04 “Painless” was a continuity error, but I think it is possible that he went to both, just not at the same time.)

-He has 3 PhDs in Mathematics, Chemistry, and Engineering (04.08 “Masterpiece”)

-He had 3 Bachelors degrees in Psychology, Sociology, and Philosophy (04.08 “Masterpiece”)

-Joined the BAU around July of 2004 at the age of 22 (05.16 “Mosley Lane”)

Spencer is talking to Sarah Hillridge and mentions that he’s been with the BAU for “5 years, 7 months, and 19 days...” doing the math puts it around July of 2004.

-Spencer was born in October of 1981

There is some confusion about whether his birthday is October 12th or October 28th. I believe that his birthday is October 28th 1981, Emily Prentiss’s birthday is October 12th 1970 (04.14 “Cold Comfort” & her headstone)- and it is very unlikely that the two of them would share a birthday and it not be mentioned. (It also gives some more insight to why Spencer loves Halloween so much- it’s right after his birthday!)

So, assuming he started kindergarten at 5 years old, Spencer was in grade school from around 1986-1994. It is likely that he could have finished grade school faster, but a lot of the time public school systems want to keep students from jumping too many grades in order to not stunt their social development.

I am taking the liberty of assuming that Spencer received all 3 PhDs before joining the FBI- so from age 12-22 (Over 30 years of schooling for three PhDs in the span of around 10 years, wowza).

Someone as smart as Spencer would’ve definitely gotten a 36 on the ACTs, so prestigious universities would be banging down his door to get their hands on his geniusness. BUT, Spencer loves his mom, and he wouldn’t want to stray too far from her. He also says he was drawn to Caltech because of certain professors in an article written about him.

We know that Spencer went to Caltech and would bike to classes and such. He was most likely able to stay at the dorms for free and given financial support from his scholarships. It is unclear how Spencer could’ve balanced having his mom in Nevada while he was in California, but there are buses and public transit to and from Las Vegas to Pasadena (ranging from 4-7 hours for a one way ride, so 8-14 hours round trip). William Reid, despite leaving Spencer and Diana, most likely maintained providing money to them due to paternal obligation and guilt.

There are, of course, ways for Spencer to care for his mom even all the way in Pasadena: Neighbors could’ve checked on Diana regularly/daily, Spencer could’ve called daily to remind her to take her medicine, etc.

To make Spencer going to both Caltech and MIT make sense, I figure Spencer would get his PhDs in Mathematics and Chemistry from Caltech then after Diana is institutionalized Spencer enrolls in MIT for engineering.

The University term dates are loosely based on the academic calendar they provide on their websites.

(Rough) Caltech term dates:

Spring term: April to June

Summer term: June to August

Fall term: September to December

Winter term: January to March

(Rough) MIT term dates:

Spring term: February to May

Summer term:June to August

Fall term: September to December

I know that in the U.S. you don’t have to have a Masters degree to get into the PhD program, but Spencer likes to learn and I figured he might want to get the most out of his time in college- or it might be a little contingency from the University so he’s still pacing himself and they can still see his growth and all that good stuff.

NOW ONTO THE TIMELINE.

At Caltech, Spencer would most likely have more freedom to complete his schooling faster and they would’ve worked with him to create a good plan for him to complete things at his own pace while also following whatever school protocols they have.

Spencer stays in Pasadena from the Fall term (Begins around mid September), through the winter term, and until the end of the Spring term (Ends around end of June), he goes home to Las Vegas during the summer term and winter/spring breaks.

Beginning of Fall 1994- Starts college @ Caltech studying Mathematics– Age: 12 turning 13

End of Spring 1995- Finishes his Bachelors in Mathematics– Age: 13

Summer 1995- Home

Beginning of Fall 1995- Starts Masters in Mathematics– Age: 13 turning 14

End of Spring 1996- Finishes Masters in Mathematics– Age: 14

Summer 1996- Home

Beginning of Fall 1996- Starts PhD in Mathematics & starts Bachelors in Chemistry– Age:14 turning 15

End of Spring 1997- Finishes Bachelors in Chemistry– Age: 15

Summer 1997- Home

Beginning of Fall 1997- Starts Masters in Chemistry– Age: 15 turning 16

End of Spring 1998- Finishes PhD in Mathematics & finishes Masters in Chemistry– Age: 16

Summer 1998- Home, Diana suffers a bout of bad psychosis and Spencer cannot return full time at Caltech during the Fall term. Due to his mother’s condition, Spencer contacts the school board and they work out a plan where Spencer can work on his Chemistry PhD in Las Vegas with the use of public Library computers and occasional trips to the campus for exams if possible.

Beginning of Fall 1998- Works on his PhD in Chemistry, living in Las Vegas– Age: 16 turning 17

Spring 1999- Works on his PhD in Chemistry, living in Las Vegas– Age: 17

End of Summer 1999- Finishes PhD in Chemistry, living in Las Vegas– Age: 17

Spencer starts making arrangements to move Diana into a facility when he turns 18. He also applies to MIT to start their engineering program, manages to work out a plan to enroll in their Fall term but only move to a dorm at MIT after he gets his mom institutionalized (around October/November 1999)

Beginning of Fall 1999- Enrolls in MIT’s fall term on scholarship, starts Bachelors in Engineering– Age: 18

End of Spring 2000- Finishes Bachelors in Engineering– Age: 18

Beginning of Summer 2000- Starts Masters in Engineering– Age: 18

End of Fall 2000- Finishes Masters in Engineering– Age: 18 turning 19

Beginning of Spring 2001- Starts PhD in Engineering– Age: 19

Summer 2001- Works on PhD in Engineering– Age: 19

Fall 2001- Works on PhD in Engineering– Age: 19 turning 20

Feeling immense guilt for having his mother institutionalized, Spencer splits his attention between his Engineering studies and studying Schizophrenia independently. At the end of the Fall term at MIT, Spencer starts corresponding with a professor at Harvard University and is invited to help with a study on understanding Schizophrenia and the effects of different medications. He takes off both the Spring and Summer terms of 2002 in order to do said study.

Beginning of Spring 2002- Independent study– Age: 20

End of Summer 2002- Independent study– Age: 20

Beginning of Fall 2002- Resumes working on PhD in Engineering– Age: 20 turning 21

End of Spring 2003- Finishes PhD in Engineering– Age: 21

Beginning of Fall 2003- Starts Bachelors in Psychology at MIT– Age: 21 turning 22

Spencer goes to a seminar hosted by the BAU (Most likely with Gideon and Hotch), he’s very engaged and vocal during the seminar and catches Gideon’s attention.

Spring 2004- Spencer starts at the FBI academy– Age: 22

FBI academy is 4 months.

Summer 2004- Spencer joins the BAU after graduating from the academy– Age: 22

After joining the BAU, Spencer transfers his credit hours from MIT to a University in Washington D.C. to continue going to school part time.

End of Fall 2004- Finishes Bachelors in Psychology– Age: 22 turning 23

Most of Spencer’s attention is on his work in the BAU, so he slows way down on getting his degrees, and gets a degree in sociology both because it interests him and also because it’ll help with work.

Beginning of Spring 2005- Starts Bachelors in Sociology– Age: 23

End of Fall 2005- Finishes Bachelors in Sociology– Age: 23 turning 24

Beginning of Spring 2008- Starts Bachelors in Philosophy– Age: 26

End of Fall 2008- FInishes Bachelors in Philosophy– Age: 26 turning 27

Again: Breen Frazier has said that the line in 07.04 “Painless” about Spencer going to MIT was an error. I actually think it might be another way to show Spencer’s guilt over putting his mom in the psychiatric hospital- being so close without visiting might’ve made him feel even worse so he wanted to run away to a school across the country.

Also I feel like Spencer having all these degrees shows that he didn’t really know what he was supposed to do with his intellect so he was just doing whatever interested him at the time until he met Gideon.

We are shown two articles (that I can remember) about Spencer college time frame:

There's one from 1997/1998, we are shown an article written about Spencer getting a Bachelor's degree, this would make him ~16. I’m not sure if it lists that it’s his first Bachelor’s degree- but I’m going to say that it’s just about the one he got for Chemistry which was his second Bachelors based on my timeline.

I don’t think it makes sense for Spencer to have done ~3/4 years of college before getting his first bachelors and then the other 6 or so years cramming the rest of his schooling? Eh, I don’t like it.

And there’s one in 04.08 “Memoriam” we are shown an article about Spencer receiving his first PhD at the age of 17. In my timeline he finishes his first PhD at the age of 16- which isn’t too far off so I’m choosing to believe that it’s a typo in the article (I know it’s kinda cheating but whatever).

I had his PhD programs take around 2 years to complete because research and dissertations take time, no matter how speedy Spencer is.

If Spencer wanted to make any extra cash on the side, he could help with tutoring, work at the campus library, help coach any collegiate sports teams at the college, etc.

A lot of the things I added in this are just things that I thought of and don’t have any sources from the show (ex: Spencer doing school from home to help his mom, and the independent study thing from Spring 2002 to Summer 2002).

Again: a lot of this may be inaccurate, if there is anything you want to add or correct, feel free to do so. I spent only around 5 or so hours on this, it’s not perfect.

I love Spencer Reid. Thank you for coming to my TED talk.

(if anyone is curious about how I write Spencer, my writing blog is @deepcreekvultures-writing )

#criminal minds #spencer reid #dr spencer reid #matthew gray gubler #mgg #gublernation #doctor spencer reid #spencer reid criminal minds #criminal minds evolution #spencer i love you #I love you Spencer Reid

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nb-octopus-writes · 23 days

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once you’re in the hive, the other bees assume you’re supposed to be there

[Masterpost]

Chapter 5: The Most Accidental of Thefts

Wordcount: 2.4K

~~~~

The rest of Virgil’s shift is about average, which means he's tired at the end but not ready to drop dead of exhaustion, and he catches the bus home like usual. He'd charged his phone at work, so he's able to put his travel earbuds in and drown out the various noises of mass transit with the dulcet tones of MCR.

Soon enough, he's home. He drops his apron in the hamper—he'd gotten splashed with coffee, so he's gonna need to do laundry tonight—and flops into bed.

The pool noodles are still there from this morning, which makes the flop considerably less pleasant than usual. Virgil tugs them out from underneath himself and drops them on the floor, settling back again. Man, he's tired. In a bit, he'll have to get up and do something about dinner, and start that load of laundry, but for now, he's just gonna be flopped for a bit.

Virgil lies there for a few minutes.

One of the springs is poking into his back. Virgil shifts, trying to find a more comfortable position. He may not have wanted to stay for so long, but his back sure hadn't protested sleeping on a softer surface for a few nights.

The spring is persistent, and Virgil slides a hand under his back to see if he can adjust it.

It's not a spring.

Virgil sits up and looks. Lying innocently on the bed behind him is a phone. It isn't Virgil’s phone. Virgil’s phone has a black and purple case, and it's still in his pocket anyway. This phone is red and gold and sparkly.

It's Roman's phone.

Well, fuck.

Virgil is a thief. He's a damn thief! Roman took time out of his own morning to drive him to work, and Virgil repaid him by stealing his phone! How could he!?

Virgil is going to die of shame. He really is. He's the worst houseguest ever. He didn't bother to learn their names beforehand—hell, he still only knows one name out of three even after being there for days, he showed up in an inappropriate costume that he's lucky didn't trigger Calico's arachnophobia, he stayed way longer than he was supposed to, he inconvenienced Roman and used him as a private chauffeur, and then, to top it all off, Virgil stole his phone.

How is he supposed to get Roman's phone back to him!? He can't text him, he doesn't know Roman's number and anyway Roman doesn't have his phone with which to receive a text.

He could text Remus. Remus would probably find the accidental theft hilarious. He also might just respond LOL and not help him return it nor inform Princey of its location.

Virgil’s out of ideas. He frowns at the stolen phone.

Well.

Maybe he has one more idea.

He can't text Princey, but maybe he can text Nerdbot or Calico.

Surely Princey has their numbers. Virgil can text them from his phone, and explain the situation. Mentally trying to compose the text, Virgil picks up the sparkly phone.

It's locked.

Part of Virgil wants to give up. He tried, he failed, time for bed.

He needs a number combination. Maybe Princey did the smart thing and came up with something unique, but maybe…

Virgil tries Remus's birthday, which is, after all, also Princey's birthday. The lock screen cuts him off after just four digits and says that nope, that wasn't it. Virgil tries just the year.

The phone unlocks.

“That is not a very secure passcode,” Virgil tells it. “Anyone could guess that, all they need to know is how old you are.”

Princey's phone is still open to the map app, and the route they'd taken from his house to Virgil’s apartment is still up. It had been a pretty quick trip, only a few miles.

Virgil has another idea.

Five minutes later, Virgil is on his bike, following the route in reverse. He doesn't dare touch any buttons and risk losing the starting position, so he can't ask for a route intended for bikes instead of cars, but he has the blue dot of his current location, and when he has to detour around a too-busy road with no bike lane or sidewalks, he's able to navigate back to the route without undue difficulty.

Soon, Virgil is pedaling up the driveway. He parks his bike in front of the porch, takes a steadying breath, and knocks on the door.

Nerdbot answers the door. “Virgil, hi,” he greets, looking mildly surprised to see him. Which, fair, they just got rid of him this morning.

“Hi,” Virgil says, trying to look past him without being obvious and rude about it. “Uh, is Roman home?”

Nerdbot raises an eyebrow at him, but nods and gestures for Virgil to step into the foyer. “Roman?” he calls into the rest of the house.

“Whaat?” Roman calls back from another room. He pops round the doorframe, and Nerdbot gestures to Virgil. “Scaramour!” Roman says, sounding genuinely pleased to see him. “What brings you here?”

“My bike,” Virgil quips. He holds up the accidentally stolen phone, and Roman lights up.

“You found it!” he cries, bounding over and snatching his phone out of Virgil’s hand. “Oh, I have been looking for this, where was it?”

“At my place,” Virgil admits.

“Huh,” says Princey, and, “Oops.”

Virgil’s about to apologize for accidentally stealing Roman's phone, when thunder rolls and the sky, which had gotten increasingly cloudy on the way over, opens up.

Roman shoves his phone back at Virgil, who only doesn't drop it due to luck and reflexes, and dashes out into the sudden rain. Before Virgil can process what's happening, Roman grabs Virgil’s bicycle and hauls it bodily up the porch steps and through the front door.

“...What,” Virgil says.

“You are my dark and stormy knight on shining bicycle,” Princey proclaims. “You have done me a great service by locating and returning my phone, and it would be dishonorable to send you home in such weather. Nor shall I allow your noble steed to rust!” He slicks his dampened hair back from his face. “I must insist that you grace us with your company until the storm passes.”

Virgil looks to Nerdbot for help. Nerdbot looks out the door at the rain. “I agree, this certainly isn't biking weather,” he says. “Have you had dinner?”

“Um,” says Virgil, feeling quite off-balance. “No?”

Nerdbot nods decisively and closes the door. “We were just sitting down to eat. I insist you join us.” He ushers Virgil into the dining room and says to Calico, “Please set another place, Patton. We have a guest.”

“Oh!” Calico—Patton?—says, smiling at Virgil. “Welcome back!”

“Hi,” Virgil says, and lets Nerdbot seat him, and lets Calico put a plate in front of him.

The rain doesn't let up all through dinner. In fact, it's pouring harder at the end of the meal than it had been at the start.

Nerdbot pulls up a weather forecast and frowns. “It looks like we're going to continue having heavy rain all night,” he says. “We currently have a flash flood warning until five in the morning tomorrow. ‘Do not attempt to travel unless you are fleeing a flooded area.’” He looks up at Virgil. “I'm sorry for the abrupt change in plans, but it looks like you're going to have to stay the night again.”

“Oh,” Virgil says. “Sorry.” He'd just meant to return the phone and apologize, but because of the rain they had to feed him again and now they have to put up with him for a whole nother night!

“It's no imposition,” Nerdbot reassures. “I'll prepare a guest room for you, and Patton can find you a spare set of pajamas.”

“Thanks,” says Virgil weakly. They're much better hosts than he deserves. He could have just slept on the couch again.

Nerdbot smiles at him. “You are welcome,” he says. “Roman, will you clear the table?”

Roman pouts, and Virgil offers, “I'll help.” It's the least he can do.

“Do you have work in the morning?” Roman asks while he puts away the leftovers and Virgil does the dishes.

“Yeah.”

“I'll drive you. Do you wanna stop by your place again, or wash your clothes here so you can wear them tomorrow?”

Fuck. Virgil winces. “I was going to do laundry tonight,” he remembers aloud. “My uniform is dirty, so I was going to wash it!”

“Oh no!” Roman says. “Do you have a spare?”

“I… I guess there's one at work I can borrow,” Virgil says, relaxing slightly. Yeah. He can do that, and then he can do laundry tomorrow.

Calico comes back with an armful of pajamas. “I think these should fit you,” he says, handing them to Virgil. “They might be a little loose.”

“I like loose,” Virgil reassures him. He hesitates. “Is… do you think I could take a shower?” He hasn't had one in days, and honestly he's feeling pretty gross.

“Probably?” Calico says. He starts back the way he'd come. “Logan?” he calls.

There's a muffled reply, and Patton leads Virgil up the stairs. “Logan?” he calls again as they reach the top.

Nerdbot steps out of one of the several doorways lining the long upstairs hallway. “What?” he asks.

“Is it safe to take a shower?”

“It's not ideal,” Nerdbot says, “but as the thunderstorm appears to have given way to just rain, we're unlikely to have a lightning strike. Go ahead.”

Patton smiles up at Virgil. “I'll get you a towel!” He opens one of the other doors, which leads to a stuffed linen closet, and hands Virgil a fluffy blue towel. “The bathroom's at the end of the hall,” he says, pointing. “Take as long as you need, we've got a big water heater.”

“Thanks,” Virgil says, and absconds into the bathroom. He locks the door behind him and sets his pile of borrowed clothes on the floor. Then he strips and enjoys a nice hot shower.

Their water pressure is great. Virgil stays under the spray far longer than is necessary to scrub the grime from his skin. When he steps out, Virgil is squeaky clean, and the most relaxed he's been all day.

Time to see what kind of pajamas Calico picked out for him.

Long pajama pants the same style as Logan's nerdy ones, but plaid this time, both a long-sleeved and a short-sleeved shirt, and a pair of boxer briefs. Virgil debates, but eventually decides that someone else's clean underwear is better than his own dirty underwear, and puts them on. He wonders for a moment whose boxers they are, but shuts that thought down. He doesn't need to know. He doesn't want to know.

There's also a rolled pair of ankle socks, a stocking cap, and a hairband. Patton really wanted to cover all his bases, huh?

Virgil puts on the pants and the long-sleeved shirt, but leaves the rest. They are loose, but not too much more than his own pajamas.

Virgil hangs his damp towel on the open hook beside the other towels, gathers everything else up, and slips out.

Logan had said he would prepare a guest room for him. Virgil figures his best guess would be the room he'd seen Logan come out of. It is indeed a bedroom, with the bed made and the covers turned down invitingly, and there's an unopened water bottle on the nightstand.

This is probably the right room. There's not really any personal stuff in it, so it's really unlikely this is someone else's bedroom.

If it's not the right room, they can tell him later that he was wrong and fucked it up. Virgil puts his dirty clothes on the floor, then cracks open the water bottle and sits down on the bed to have a sip.

What is this mattress made of, cotton candy!? It's soft and he sinks right in. He can't feel the springs at all. Virgil puts his water back on the nightstand and lies down.

He is in heaven.

Objectively, Virgil is in heaven right now. He is lying on a cloud, and it is the most comfortable surface he has ever laid upon. He is never getting up. He's not even near ready to go to sleep yet, but he's never getting up. They'll have to pry him out of this bed with a crowbar. This might be a problem for Future Virgil, when he has to get up for work or, like, to pee, but Future Virgil can suck a dick.

Around an hour later, there's a soft knock and Patton peeks in through the open door. Seeing that Virgil is still up and on his phone, he tiptoes exaggeratedly across the floor. “Sneak, sneak, I'm not here,” he whispers. “I'm just gonna steal your clothes to wash them so they're ready for you tomorrow, okay? I'll empty the pockets first so I don't accidentally destroy anything important.”

“’Kay,” Virgil says.

Patton empties Virgil’s pockets onto the nightstand, and then bundles up the clothes. “Thievery!” he declares softly, scampering away with Virgil’s dirty laundry. Virgil’s lips twitch and he holds back a giggle. Patton pauses at the doorway and asks in a perfectly normal tone, “Do you want me to turn off the light?”

“Sure,” Virgil says. Might as well, and it'll save him the trip. Or the falling asleep with the light on, rather, since he's never leaving this bed.

Patton turns the light off. “Goodnight,” he says, silhouetted by the hall light. “Sleep well. I love you.”

It's probably just a reflex. He probably didn't mean to say that, not to Virgil. He barely knows him. He probably says it to Logan and Roman all the time, and it just slipped out. Virgil bites the reflexive ‘love you too’ back from the tip of his tongue, then thinks maybe he should have said it back anyway, make Patton feel less awkward about his own reflexive slip. But then it's been too long, and it wouldn't sound natural, and Virgil just says,

“Goodnight.”

Patton pulls the door to, and leaves Virgil alone in the dark.

He plays a game on his phone for a few more hours, and then sinks back into the wonderfully soft bed and sleeps.

~~~~

Chapter 6: Baiting the Trap

#nb octopus writes #sanders sides #accidental polycule infiltration fic #5 #polyamory #polysanders #LMP #multichapter

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writersmorgue · 2 months

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You know all those time travel fics where little Izuku meets Pro Hero Deku? Last chapter got me feeling some things.. like.. his little self looks up at him, all gleaming eyes and boyish wonder and Pride and Hope, asking if he's a quirkless hero. And what is he supposed to say?? If he just says yes, then will that change his first meeting with All Might? Even if he still meets him the same way and saves Kacchan, will he just decline when offered a quirk?? What will that do to the timeline? Will All For One still be defeated? Will more people die? Even if Mirio can manage it as second place successor, having One For All all but guarantees an early grave for anyone who isn't quirkless.. and what will that mean for him? He only has all the support gear and public support to be a quirkless hero because he HAD a quirk and lost it saving the world, and Kacchan led the efforts to lift him up after.. but if he just says "no, sorry, you need a quirk" what will that change?? What will happen if his hope is killed too early? What will happen if he gets his hopes UP too early? Is it too much to tell him he gets a quirk eventually? Is it too much to tell him he gets it from All Might? Could he tell him more than that? What would his younger self do if he learned he would get a quirk and then lose it?? Is it more heartbreaking if he knows how it ends or if he goes in blind?

He stays silent so long just thinking that little Izuku gets nervous and says nevermind he's sure it's too complicated and dangerous to reveal information about the future and Deku just starts flashing through every traumatic memory he has knowing his little self is gonna go through every one...

my take on this! (read on ao3)

(warning: manga spoilers)

The road Izuku's on looks familiar. Asphalt cracked and faded Izuku remembers the particularly well hidden speed bump that he ate shit on when running late to school one day.

He remembers in his 2nd year at UA when they re-did the entire thing and added a bike lane with fresh white lines.

The kid standing in front of Izuku, with heavy scabs on his legs because after he fell off his bike he didn't stop picking at the wounds for months and ended up with a huge scar-

The kid standing in front of Izuku, with wiley green hair, wide eyes, dark freckles from a childhood spent exploring outside, and a healing split lip.

The kid's bright yellow backpack slides off his limp arm.

"I- What-"

Izuku knows this must look strange. He knows the kid is smart, knows he's figured out by now that they are one and the same. Of course it's hard to accept when this older version of you is much taller, much stronger, somehow even more covered in scars.

His nose is crooked from when Kacchan got a good hit, and Izuku was too embarrassed to go to Recovery Girl. His suit is wrinkled but new, his work shoes feel sharp on his feet. He still hasn't gotten used to wearing them.

His tame green curls, tired eyes, and dull freckles from hours spent in front of a screen.

His bright yellow backpack hangs on his shoulder.

"Hey," He says smiling at the kid.

"Are you- are you me?! I mean-" The kid's eyes are almost bugging out of his skull, "I'm you?"

Izuku nods.

"You're... older. Are you going to work?"

Even though Izuku will concede that he's older than this literal child, he can't help but be slightly offended.

"I'd say about eleven years in your future."

The kid makes an alarmed sound, jerking his chin back subconsciously like he does when he's trying to keep his mumbles in.

"What do you do... for work?"

Izuku considers telling him, but honestly he doesn't know what kind of effects it will have on his life. And he doesn't want to explain how he failed at being a hero, so now he teaches new ones instead.

"Sorry, I probably shouldn't tell you. I don't know how this quirk works." He smiles sheepishly, watching the kid's face fall.

"Oh, right," He scuffs his sneaker on the ground. "I just thought maybe you could give me-" a reason to keep going "-some good news."

Izuku smiles, "I know. Trust me, I have a good life. I'm happy." Sometimes.

"I have friends," That I never see.

"-and I like my job." I'm lucky to have one.

The kid nods, unsatisfied but not willing to push it. "Good, that's good."

This conversation feels more like one he'd have with his estranged cousin than his younger self. Christ.

He can see the words rolling around on the kid's tongue, liable to spill at any moment.

"Can I be a hero without a quirk?"

Izuku pauses, considering his options. If he tells him yes, will it throw off his entire future? All Might had told him no originally, so maybe he should do that, but even though he loved All Might like a father it would be different coming from himself. It would undoubtedly hurt more, knowing that Izuku knew for sure.

But truthfully, Izuku couldn't be a hero without a quirk.

It's not because quirkless people are weak, no Aizawa-sensei kept his underground job even after he lost an eye and a leg. The issue lies in Izuku himself.

As soon as he lost OFA, he knew his dream of being a hero was over.

He didn't have what it took to keep going.

So instead he lives vicariously through his teenage students as the run through the halls. The ones that had to be rebuilt after Izuku's battle with Shigaraki.

Yeah, Izuku was a hero. That's what everyone says.

But now he's not.

The kid is going to start crying if he doesn't answer soon, Izuku can see the tears welling in his eyes, but he doesn't know what to say.

Fuck, he wishes he were anywhere else.

"I-"

'I' what, what are you going to tell him?-

"I don't know."

I'm sorry.

#anon soup #drabble #izuku midoriya #angst #bnha 430 #manga spoilers #bnha spoilers #is this worth uploading on ao3?? idk #just a little guy #time travel #ficlet #llyn writes shit #mha #bnha #headcanon

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itsthecherryontop · 2 months

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Adrenaline Rush (Billy Hargrove)

Scene from Chapter Two of my Billy Hargrove Slowburn Enemies to Lovers Fic

Pairing: Billy Hargrove x Henderson OC (Halle)

Chapters Posted: 23/49 UPDATES WEEKLY

Sighing in relief, I turned out of the study room and gathered my things. There were ten minutes of lunch left and I needed fresh air. I walked my way to the bleachers lining the football field and took a deep breath of the cold air. I should have listened to Dustin and stayed home. I was too tired to deal with any more Upside Down shit today. Every muscle in my body was aching to get on my bike and ride away from there, but I knew I couldn’t leave Steve alone in class after what just happened.

Sitting on the cold metal I pulled out the sandwich I had packet. I wasn’t even very hungry, but it was better than sitting there with shaking hands. Slipping my headphones back on I laid down, watching the clouds pass. Maybe I could just sleep through the next period. If I didn’t show up Steve would leave to search for me and we could both skip.

The smell of a burning cigarette wafted through the air, instantly causing me further disinterest in my food. Sitting up on my elbows I looked for the sources. Leaning against the wall at the far of the school were Billy Hargrove and Tina smoking. Hearing Tina force a loud laugh at something the blond said through my headphones was the deciding factor that it was my cue to head inside.

Finding my seat next to Steve, he looked over at me like he wanted to talk about the scene at the library, but knew he couldn’t. Placing a forced smile on my face that I hoped was reassuring I addressed him, “It will be fine. Nancy’s smart she won’t do anything. Especially not if it puts people she cares about in danger.”

“I know. I’m just worried about her,” he confessed with a heavy sigh.

“I am too, but like you said. We are gonna go to that party and have a good time. We will be stupid normal teenagers.”

“Yeah, stupid teenagers. I can do that. Am I still driving you?”

“Well, I don’t plan on biking there.”

As I exited the building, I grabbed my bike and rode over to the middle school. As the younger students rushed out of the door, I searched the faces for my brother and his friends while I approached the bike racks. After the crowd had thinned out slightly, four boys emerged in Ghostbusters costumes.

“Hey, you guys ready to go trick or treating?” I asked as they approached.

“We were the only ones dressed up today,” Dustin complained as he reached for his bike.

“Last year everyone dressed up,” Lucas added.

“There is nothing wrong with that. It just means everyone else is a loser,” I replied trying to make them feel better. “I don’t even have to see anyone else's costumes to know that you guys had the best costumes. I mean you guys are the fucking Ghostbusters what is cooler than that?”

“My mom’s here. I’ll see you guys later,” Will stated before walking off as we called our goodbyes.

“No, everyone made fun of our costumes,” Mike snarked and we started pedaling home.

“Yeah, even the new girl,” Dustin commented.

“Well fuck them! It doesn’t matter what they say cause it’s not true. I bet all those other kids wanted to wear their costumes today too, but you know why they didn’t? Cause they were scared. Scared of what other people would think of them. And when they get older they are going to regret living for what other people want and not doing what makes them happy. You got that? But you guys did what you wanted and that makes you braver than all those other shitheads,” I ranted. “Who cares if they think you are weird or a freak?! Do you think a normal person could have fought literal monsters? I mean look at you, you are the bravest kids I have ever met. And if they can’t see that then they can go fuck themselves. You guys are badass fucking monster killers!”

The boys laughed as we made our way down the road, passing trees of changing colors. Spread out across the right lane the boys discussed why everything changed that Halloween. At the sound of an engine, I turned to see a car speeding toward us.

“Guys?” I called, trying to get the boys' attention. Seeing that the car wasn’t slowing down I tried again screaming, “GUYS! GET OFF THE ROAD!” The boys started frantically pedaling faster. “TO THE SIDE!”

One by one the boys crashed into the side of the road with shouts. Seeing as I was behind them I had to pedal faster so I would land further up than where they landed not wanting to hit them. Lord knew running into them at that speed would cause some serious injuries. My bike skitted out from under me as I reached the shoulder just before the car passed. Landing hard I slammed into the ground rolling until I hit a tree trunk. Looking down the road I saw the car speeding away. Even at just a glimpse, I knew that car, a blue Camaro, belonging to none other than Billy Hargrove.

Pushing my palms against the ground I lifted myself off the ground. My eyes watered at the sting of pain I felt.

“Shit,” I cursed sitting up. “Are you guys okay?”

Looking over at them they all looked fine. It didn’t look like they had a scratch on them. They seemed busy discussing MadMax who was probably siblings with that mullet-headed psycho. Looking down I could see all the damage done. My jeans were completely torn open on my right leg revealing scraps covering most of my leg. I could already tell I would bruise on my arm from where I landed on my bike, which also happened to leave a cut. Lastly, I could feel my face was fairly beaten up from hitting the ground.

“Holy shit!” Dustin shouted as he ran toward me, followed by Mike and Lucas.

“Are you okay?” Mike asked.

“Will you be able to walk? Your bike is wrecked,” Lucas exclaimed.

“I swear to god I am going to take Steve’s bat to that car. That psychotic asshole should have his fucking license revoked,” I seethed trying to stand up.

“So that must be Max’s brother driving then,” Dustin suggested.

“Are you sure you can walk the rest of the way home? You don’t look okay,” Lucas worried inspecting each of my injuries.

“I’m sure it looks worse than it is. Plus, I am not letting you leave me alone out here.”

“We will walk with you and you can hop on the back of my bike if you need. We still have a few miles to go,” Mike offered, picking up my bike to hand it to me.

“Thanks. You guys are good kids.”

The walk home was extremely tedious. Just the two miles left took an hour and 20 minutes versus the normal 15-minute bike ride. As soon as we entered the door Dustin rushed me to the bathroom to get the first aid kit. I was glad my mom wasn’t here to fuss over every scratch. Deciding it would be easier to shower before treating the wounds, Dustin left for his room.

Stripping my clothes off ended up being far more painful than I had initially thought. The blood had started to dry on my leg and arm causing the fabric to stick to my skin. After one of the worst showers of my life, I inspected the extent of my injuries in the mirror. There were traces of redness along most of the right side of my body. One of the worst consequences of fair skin: bruising easily. My torso survived pretty much unscathed, with my legs taking the worst of the heat. My face had scraps along my cheek temple and jaw, which was going to bruise.

Reaching for the rubbing alcohol, I tried to mentally prepare myself for the pain I was about to cause myself, knowing I would likely cry either way. Eventually, I just gave up and called Dustin in to pour the bottle over my leg. It would take too long to use a rag and I couldn’t bring myself to dump the bottle over the open cuts even after much self-convincing. Thank god, Dustin didn’t have the same reservations as he emptied half the bottle over my thigh. He did apologize profusely after I spent the next minute and a half cursing with watering eyes.

After covering any open wound as best as I could. By the time I departed the bathroom, it was already 6. Steve would be picking me up in 45 minutes. Changing into my costume, I made my way to the kitchen.

“You’re still going?” Dustin asked getting ready to leave to meet his friends.

“I already told Steve and Nancy I would go. It’s a big deal for them. They need a night to be normal teenagers,” I responded grabbing leftover pasta from the fridge. “And as you can see I am still standing. It takes a lot more to kill me than some dumb teenage boy.”

“Are you sure you will be okay? You were pretty hurt. The adrenaline might not have worn off yet.”

“It’s been two hours. I am pretty positive the adrenaline has worn off. I bandaged it all myself and you helped me disinfect it so there is nothing to worry about. Plus, I will be with Steve and Nancy, so go have fun and bring me back some candy.”

“Okay. Just be careful.”

“I always am. Love you,” I shouted as he closed the door.

Finishing up the rest of my reheated pasta, I cleaned my plate finishing just as I heard the horn of Steve’s car. Climbing into the backseat, both passengers turned to me in concern.

“Halle, what happened are you okay?” Nancy frantically asked.

“Teenage boys suck at driving so I fell off my bike racing to get out of the way, but I’m fine. It is all surface wounds. I’m patched up and good to go,” I explained.

“Are you sure you don’t just want to stay home? I’ve been in enough fights to know your face is going to bruise,” Steve tried to soothe.

“Look I iced my face already. There is nothing else I can do right now and I would rather not sit at home alone until my mother comes home and helicopters over me because I got a little scraped up. Plus I think it adds to my costume don’t you think? Dead or tortured Indiana Jones is way more original.”

“Okay, but if it starts hurting a lot tell me and I will take you home. Deal?” Steve negotiated.

“Yeah, that sounds fair,” I agreed as he turned, leaving only Nancy facing me with a tight-lipped smile.

There were already cars lining Tina’s driveway as pulled up to her house. I was already starting to dread my decision to come. Slowly exiting the car I followed the couple inside. The party had barely started and the inside of the house was crowded and hot.

Hanging around the edges of the party we talked, well more like Nancy and Steve talked while I played the third wheel. Glancing around I decided I would never host a party. There was toilet paper in the fan and empty cups and other trash abandoned on the floor. Tina had signed herself up for a serious clean-up tomorrow.

“I invited Jonathan,” Nancy announced to me.

“I doubt he will come. He doesn’t like parties and he is in charge of watching Will tonight,” was all I responded.

I was far more social than Jonathan and even I didn’t normally show up to parties. I would rather be with my brother and his friends than here as lame as that seemed. I just didn’t do well with small talk. I didn’t have any interest in a hangover tomorrow. Nor did I want some moron’s beer breath in my face or his hands on my body. I had no reason to be here other than for my friends and the fact I like dancing.

“Do you guys want to dance?” I asked hoping I would be spared from dancing without them. When they shook their heads no, I realized I was either going to have to solo it or suffer alone all night. “Okay, well come find me when you plan on leaving I guess.”

Making my way to the kitchen I grab a small amount of what I have no doubt is a strongly spiked punch. Downing the near-pure alcohol substance I make my way around the room until I find someone I know well enough. Before I could get far I heard someone call my name. Turning around I came face to face with Tina.

“Halle? Is that you?” She asked looking over me.

“Yeah, the one and only,” I responded.

“I’m surprised you came. You aren’t really known for your appearance at parties.”

“What can I say I heard it was going to be a great party. I love your Madonna costume by the way. You look amazing.”

“Thank you. I went all the way to the outlet mall a few towns over to get the right pieces for it. You certainly went all out with your costume. Indiana Jones right? The facial makeup for the injuries is incredible. How long did that take you?” she asked lifting her cup to her mouth.

“The scraps I got falling off my bike earlier but the bruises and blood are all fake. You’d be surprised with how far a little eyeshadow and food coloring can get you in the fake injury world,” I joked.

After a few songs, which luckily Tina joined in on, I went back over to Steve and Nancy, who were still near the wall. As I approached them I started regretting leaving the dancefloor as Shout at the Devil came on.

“Are you guys gonna dance or mope? It’s a party. Stupid teenagers remember?” I encouraged.

“Dancing sounds like a great idea,” Steve began to say, as chanting began outside. Steve’s eyes narrowed in on something across the room and I followed his gaze. “For fuck’s sake.” I heard Steve mutter as Billy set his eyes on Steve and made his way over.

“I am too sober to deal with this,” I declared walking back to the kitchen with Nancy in tow.

“What’s in this?” She asked a boy in a toga standing next to the punch bowl.

“Pure fuel!” He yelled.

I simply shrugged as Nancy grabbed a plastic cup. Grabbing my own I placed a small amount within it and downed it trying to ignore the burn of my esophagus. Nancy however always ambitious, downed half a cupful. As Steve suddenly appeared suggesting she slowed down. She quickly brushed him off and pulled me towards the dancefloor.

Looking at the interaction between Steve and Nancy, I had a feeling I was missing something. Either way, something was going to give and it was not going to end well.

Nancy and Steve seemed to ignore whatever it was, so I decided to not bring it up. Whatever it was could wait for tomorrow. Tonight was for normalcy. Feeling the light buzz and the Blondie song blaring through the speakers, I spun and swayed to the beat singing the words. It didn’t matter who was watching, the lights were bright, and the house loud enough to muffle the fears that whispered in my mind. For the first time in what felt like months, I didn’t have to worry.

Throwing my head back I laughed, feeling free. Why didn’t I attend parties more often? I felt like a bird spreading its wings for the first time after living in a cage. The desert getting its first rain of the year. The sun finally peeking through the clouds after a harsh winter.

After Nancy downed her third drink, I needed some fresh air. Excusing myself I stepped into the backyard, which had calmed down since Hargrove’s keg stand. Sitting down on an empty chair with a glass of water I leaned back and looked at the stars. At the edge of Hawkins, the stars were always easier to see, being farther away from the town lights. My mind stilled like ripples in a pond as I caught my breath, still riding the after-dancing high.

Finishing my water I headed back inside looking for a bathroom. Making my way back to the dancefloor, I searched for Nancy and Steve. Figuring they would join me I entered the mass of bodies, turning my body to the rhythm, dancing with random people.

After a few songs, I pardoned myself from the boy I was dancing with in search of my friends. When I didn’t find them outside or anywhere in the house I started asking random people.

“Harrington? He left with Wheeler after a fight, well more like he left alone and Wheeler left with the Byers Perv,” Tommy bragged overhearing me ask Nicole.

I could feel my face drop as I absorbed his statement. They wouldn’t just leave me, would they? They know I don’t have any other way home.

“Wow, Henderson. Why the long face? Don’t tell me they were your ride?” Tommy teased. When I didn’t answer he laughed. “Oh shit! Did they really leave you? Bummer. Knarly costume though.”

“Thanks, Tommy,” I said as I walked away.

Looking at my watch it was already eleven. Heading upstairs to where I saw a phone, I pushed past the stumbling bodies. Grabbing the phone I dialed Steve’s number knowing his parents weren’t home. When he didn’t answer I tried again. On the third call, I heard the phone connect.

“Steve-” I began before I heard him disconnect the phone. Knowing he left the phone off the receiver so it wouldn’t ring again, I slammed the phone down releasing a strangled scream.

Almost everyone in this house was far too intoxicated to drive, so I would have to walk the 5 miles. Downing another serving of punch, I grabbed a water bottle and practically shoved my way out the door ramming into anyone in my way. Sure enough, Tommy was right. Steve’s burgundy BMW was nowhere to be seen.

The road was dark as I walked on its edge. The further I walked the more I realized how tired I was. My body started aching the further I walked and being surrounded by the woods didn’t help my mentality. Every ounce of freedom I had felt at Tina’s vanished. I could practically hear the scraping of my self-created cage bars as they rose from the ground locking me in.

If I died out here I would spend the rest of eternity haunting the shit out of those two. I don’t care what happened, I would never have deserted them at a party without a ride home. Especially after the events of last year.

Is this how Barb felt? No, I mean I only left her to get snacks. I mean I was unaware of the Upside Down and less than 100 yards away. She was alone for five minutes tops. They left me alone for five miles. I mean did they not care about me? Sure I felt like an afterthought sometimes, but they at least tried to include me. God, being the third wheel sucked. I mean even Jonathan didn’t try to make sure I had a ride, but then again he likely thought Steve would take me home. This has got to be one of the shittiest days of my life.

I wish I at least had my Walkman, then I could overwhelm the eerie noises in the woods. Taking off my hat I swung it at my side. My feet were already starting to hurt, these combat boots were not broken in enough for this. Looking down at my watch, it showed I hadn’t even been walking for half an hour. I wasn’t even walking fast enough for my normal pace due to the aching in the right side of my body. Headlights shined behind me as I turned. Stepping off the road to avoid dying from drunk drivers, I watched as the car sped past me at an illegal speed. In fact, every car that passed was speeding far too fast.

I was going to kill Steve Harrington when I saw him tomorrow. Who leaves a teenage girl to walk home alone in the dark in the middle of nowhere? This is how I end up dead in a ditch and on the news for some vicious crime. I did not want to be the next victim of a Black Dahlia type of murder.

The more I thought about it the angrier I got. I mean what kinds of friends do that? I just wanted to punch something. Stopping my march, I released a scream until my lungs were empty and my throat was raw. Collapsing on a patch of grass to the side of the road a sob escaped my lips.

“Was I not worth caring for?” my mind whispered. “Would they even miss you?”

Dustin would. Dustin would always miss me. He was probably worried, I thought peeling my shoes from my feet to reveal bloody blisters on my heels. Tying my boots together I placed them over my shoulder as I stood whipping tears from my eyes. My socks scruffed against the cold pavement as I shuffled along.

Maybe I should have asked Tommy for a ride. Sure he was a little drunk, but he would have driven me. Even if he didn’t want to Carol would have made him. At least then I had a chance of making it to town before sunrise. Hell, I should have just gone to Tina and asked her if I could just crash in a spare room for the night. She would have understood. I would have offered to help clean tomorrow if I needed to.

Drinking a sip of my water I checked the time again. It was nearly one in the morning and I still had at least another two miles.

At the snap of a stick in the woods to my right, I froze, heart pounding, desperately looking for whatever was lurking in the shadows. Straining my eyes I couldn’t make out anything. Rationally I knew it was probably a mouse or raccoon maybe even a coyote, but my mind was already set on a Demogorgon lunging at me. When the leaves shuffled I bolted and my mind collapsed.

I was right back in Hawkins Middle School running from the Demogorgon while carrying El. I could hear the screams of the Hawkings Lab employees behind me. The tearing of their flesh, breaking of bones as it caught them. Lured by the smell of blood from dead bodies, the monster’s calling card. The echos of their useless gunfire bombarded my eardrums leaving a ringing. The lights flickered as the air chilled. Digging my heels deeper I pushed faster. I could feel my socks tearing, the soles of my feet being shredded by the rough pavement. The shoes falling off my shoulders, forgotten in my wake. The hat and water bottle slid from my grasp as they fell to the ground behind me.

My lungs screaming for the air I couldn’t breathe fast enough. Tears streamed from my face filling my eyes until I couldn’t see. It didn’t matter. It didn’t matter. I couldn’t stop.

I could feel my steps get slower no matter how hard I screamed for them to keep up. My knees weakened until they buckled and I collided with the pavement. Automatically I clenched my eyes shut and curled upon myself as I hit the ground. Sobbing, a scream erupted from my throat as I prepared for razor teeth to rip into my skin. When the impact never came I opened my eyes to find myself alone in the middle of the road. There was no sign of a Demogorgon anywhere. What was wrong with me?

Unable to pick myself up I wept until I threw up, continuing to dry heave until I thought I was gonna pass out. I was so tired I wanted to lay down right there. I didn’t even care if someone ran me over. Maybe whoever came would see me and take me to the hospital. Everything hurt.

I nearly fell over again when I eventually tried to stand. My feet were so scrapped I was leaving bloody footprints. My scrapes had reopened and I could already tell I created new ones. At an even slower pace, I dragged myself home. I thought about simply giving up and curling onto the grass or against a tree for the night, but Dustin would be worried. Mom would be furious if I was out all night.

By the time I made it to the house, it was almost three. The streets were completely empty, which is probably a good thing as I looked like I had stepped out of a horror film. Reaching the front door it was locked, and the key under the mat wasn’t there. I knew I didn’t leave my window open, so I knocked on Dustin’s. After a good five minutes of hard banging, he appeared.

“Why the hell are you back so late? Where were you?” He hissed in the dim shine of his nightlight.

“The door is locked and the key is gone,” I forced out as my as I could with the little remnants of my voice.

“Well come in,” he ordered pulling his window open further open.

Placing my hands on the window seal I tried to haul myself up, only to cry out. “I can’t. You’ve gotta open the front door.”

“Are you drunk?”

“No, I barely had anything and it was hours ago.”

“Fine, I’ll open the door,” he grumbled leaving his room.

As he opened the door he followed me back into the house announcing he was going back to bed. Entering the bathroom I bathed for the second time that day and cleaned my wounds. We would have to buy more rubbing alcohol at this rate.

I was noticeably far worse than I had been earlier that day. The bruises had begun to develop color along my legs, arms, and face. As soon as I crawled into my bed, after downing a cup of water and ibuprofen I was out.

I woke up that morning to a scream from my mother. Pushing myself out of bed I limped out into the entryway where my mother was yelling at Dustin

“Is that blood? Do you think it is funny to scare me like this? You are gonna clean this up before you go see your friends,” she shrieked pointing at the trail of bloody footprints I had forgotten to clean up last night.

“No, I didn’t do that. It’s pretty genius I have to hand that to Hal-” Dustin cut off as he saw me there. The color slightly draining from his face.

“Sorry, that is my fault. I forgot to clean them up, ” I lulled too sore and tired to say much else. As soon as my mother's eyes caught on me she stopped with widened eyes, slowly approaching me with outstretched arms as if she couldn’t believe what she was seeing.

“Oh, my god. My baby. What happened to you? Who did this? You know you can tell me. Oh, my poor baby. How could someone do this to you?” she cried hovering her hands over my arms afraid to hurt me.

“I crashed on my bike, Mom. I’m fine.”

“Oh honey why don’t you get in the car and I will take you to the hospital to get you looked at.”

“I already disinfected them and covered them. I was extra careful. I really just want to sleep. I am so tired, Mom.”

“Are you sure?” She asked. When I nodded she sighed, “Okay, I will make you your favorite for breakfast. How about that? I will head to the store right now. Dustin watch your sister please.”

Frantically she gathered her purse and keys. She was definitely going to come home with lots of snacks and first aid materials. As the door closed behind her Dustin stared at me until we heard her car pull out of the driveway.

“What happened? Don’t even try to pull that shit that it was only a bike crash that you pulled with Mom. I know you didn’t look this bad after you crashed,” Dustin demanded more seriously than I had ever heard him.

“I fell,” I stated as I began returning to my room. I could hear Dustin follow me as I entered my room. He stood at my door as I struggled to lie in my bed. “I’m tired and I had a really shitty night can you please let me sleep?”

“Do you promise to tell me later?” He bargained.

“Yes. If anyone calls tell them I am sick.” With that, he left me to fall into a dreamless sleep in the safety of my room.

“Halle. Halle, baby. You gotta wake up,” Mom instructed presenting a plate of eggs benedict.

“Thank you,” I smiled with heavy eyes taking the warm plate.

“I was thinking that I want you to take the old Volkswagen when you are ready to go to school again. Taking you and Dustin, okay? I don’t want you riding your bike when you are still healing. If you are responsible, you can continue to drive it once you are better. That means no more instances like before. If Hopper even mentions you speeding you will lose car privileges again, understood?”

“Yes.”

That night I couldn’t sleep despite being tired. My mind kept flashing back to how I was positive a Demogorgon was chasing me. There had been nothing there, my brain simply decided it would play a Halloween prank on me and got lost in it. It felt like I was losing my mind. My brain lost the line between reality and fiction.

Slowly I made my way to Dustin’s room, who was asleep at this time. Making my way to his bed I gently shook him awake.

“What?” he replied half asleep.

“Can I sleep in here? I’ll sleep on the floor. I just really don’t want to be alone right now,” my voice was still rough from the previous night breaking off at random places.

“You can’t sleep on the floor. You won’t be able to get up. We will just sleep in your room,” he offered standing up and grabbing his pillow and blankets.

Silently he settled onto the floor next to my bed. I stared at the ceiling as Mews jumped on my bed and curled up against my legs.

“I think there is something wrong with me. I’m losing it. I can’t tell what is real anymore,” I confessed. “I thought I was being chased by a Demogorgon last night, but there was nothing there. It was like I was right back in the middle school that night. I could hear those people from the lab, their screams, and their bullets. The sound of the Demogorgon. But I was all alone… there was nothing there.”

“Maybe it was your mind trying to protect you. Maybe there was something even if it wasn’t from the Upside Down.”

“But what if there wasn’t? What if it happens again, and this time in front of others? What if I am going crazy?”

“Then the rest of us will go crazy with you,” he stated like it was the most obvious thing in the world. I suppose he was right. We had all been through the same event. It would only make sense that we all suffered lingering effects the same. “I found a new species yesterday.”

“You did? Why didn’t you tell me sooner?”

“I named him D'Artagnan. I call him Dart for short. I think he is some kind of terrestrial pollywog. I’ll show you him tomorrow and maybe we can get some books from the library.”

...

Dart was the most disgusting creature I had ever seen. It wasn’t the fact that he didn’t have eyes or that he looked like a slug, but the slime. The mucus coating was cold, sticky, and smelt bizarre. I am all for animal protection, but if Dustin wasn’t obsessed with Dart I would have flushed him down the toilet. So I went along with it.

Continue Reading: archiveofourown.org

#billy hargrove #billy hargrove x original character #steve harrington #fanfic #ao3 #stranger things #billy hargove x reader #dustin henderson

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mattnben-bennmatt · 3 months

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LET'S TRY IT BEN'S WAY

Vanity Fair (October 1999)

A college dropout, Ben Affleck found sudden fame in 1997 after he and Matt Damon teamed up as writers and stars of Good Will Hunting. But at 27, even as he is offered up to $12 million a movie and acquires the spoils of success—the new house in the Hollywood Hills, the Tribeca loft, the five motorcycles—Affleck remains, indisputably, a guy. EVGENIA PERETZ gets him talking about the "Matt 'n' Ben show," his romance with Gwyneth Paltrow, and his upcoming thriller Reindeer Games, for which he literally knocked himself out

By Evgenia Peretz

To Ben Affleck, nothing is more meditative than a motorcycle. Today he has selected his red Suzuki GSX1300R Hayabusa, nicknamed "the Blackbird Killer," to take his passenger from Hollywood to the Brentwood branch of Koo Koo Roo, the fast-food chicken chain popular among those on "the Zone Diet." The route he takes? Scenic and maddeningly winding Sunset Boulevardideal terrain, apparently, for Affleck to do what he finds most uplifting: dodge between SUVs and BMWs, barrel up the lanes at 100 miles an hour, and play a hair-raising little game in which he weaves in and out among a line of cones set up in a construction zone. Affleck rides a motorcycle everywhere. He owns five of them, including a Yamaha R6 and a BMW R 1100 S.

"I don't think of it as 'I'm Bike Guy Affleck says over a barbecued-chicken lunch, for which he shelled out the entire $8.50. "I can't stand those guys who talk to you and all they say is 'Gonna put my leathers on and hit the canyons.' I'm not Adrenaline-Junkie Guy. "

He may not be Bike Guy or AdrenalineJunkie Guy, but spend a few minutes with Affleck, who's usually seen around town in baggy army pants, a T-shirt, and a leather jacket, and one thing becomes clear: he sure as hell is a guy. His best friends—and he does have other friends besides Matt Damon—are still his buddies from Cambridge, Massachusetts. They're currently camped out at his new, Mediterranean-style house (undergoing renovation) in the Hollywood Hills. He longs for the time when models looked like Christie Brinkley. He thinks Tom Cruise is a god. He stands behind Hootie. He has been known to forgo sex for video games. (A wall in his Tribeca loft—yes, Affleck is bi-coastal—is lined with old-school arcade favorites, including Ms. Pac-Man and Millipede.) And, these days at least, his favorite words seem to be "chump," "weak," and, especially, "jackass." "Jackass," to Affleck, is the worst of insults. A jackass is what he fears he sounds like in profiles like this one.

Indeed, Affleck might well come across as a jackass were it not for his acute self-awareness (which borders on the neurotic), his willingness to look like a fool, and the fact that he is naturally curious, disarmingly smart, a bit flirtatious, and lampshadeon-his-head funny. It is these very qualities, in fact, that make Affleck irresistible to men and women, and decidedly un-jackassy. These qualities have also made Affleck one of the busiest actors of his generation, a movie star without delusions of grandeur, who has bridged the gap between independent and mainstream films without getting too much grief for it. To wit, the 27-year-old Affleck has, in a little more than two years, kissed a boy in Kevin Smith's Chasing Amy, saved mankind from an oncoming asteroid in Armageddon, stolen scenes in Shakespeare in Love, and, along the way, picked up a best-original-screenplay Oscar for Good Will Hunting, which he famously co-wrote with Damon.

"He's larger than life and yet people can relate to him," says the producer of Affleck's upcoming thriller Reindeer Games, Bob Weinstein, who thinks Affleck is this generation's version of Harrison Ford and Mel Gibson. Or, as Sandra Bullock, his costar in the recent romantic comedy Forces of Nature, puts it, "He has that lummox quality. He's not afraid to make a fool of himself, but then he'll turn around and kick your ass."

Even the hard-boiled director John Frankenheimer, who cast Affleck in Reindeer Games—a kind of modem take on the Rat Pack heist movie Ocean's 77—melts a bit when talking about Affleck. "He has a very winning, likable quality about him," says Frankenheimer, who immediately thought of Affleck when he first read the script. "I've been doing this for a long time, and I've worked with some of the best and some of the worst. And he's really one of the nicest—really one of the nicest."

To hear Affleck tell it, his success has been sheer luck. "I have a personality that's kind of willing to let myself skate by," he says, "to get B's and not really try." But Reindeer Games, it must be said, provided him with the opportunity to put in a little effort. "I wanted him to like me—I wanted him to think I was good," Affleck says of Frankenheimer, who has directed 34 films, including The Manchurian Candidate, Seven Days in May, and Ronin. "I worked twice as hard just out of fear of having him say, 'You're a sham. You're a fraud.'"

In his role as Rudy Duncan, a down-on-his-luck ex-con who gets pulled into a casino robbery on Christmas Eve, Affleck, for the first time, is on-screen in virtually every scene. For the first time, he gets to engage in some "hard-core-style sex," with co-star Charlize Theron. And—also for the first time—he finds himself on the receiving end of actual physical pain. He gets chased by a vindictive gang of truckers. He falls into freezing water. And, throughout, he has his face pummeled by the trucker-in-charge, played by Gary Sinise.

And so it should come as little surprise that, in the midst of shooting, Affleck experienced his first Grade 3 concussion when, while filming a prison brawl, an inmate played by the Washington Redskins' 315-pound defensive tackle, Dana Stubblefield, accidentally slipped and landed on Affleck's head, knocking the actor unconscious. "I don't remember what happened.

I saw the tape later, and it's hard to tell. But the noise is kind of unmistakable. I just go, 'Whomp! Bang!'" says Affleck, suddenly looking and sounding like an 11-year-old skateboarder relating his latest awesome wipeout. "And my head goes, 'Boom!' Bounces off the concrete. It's like 'Whack!' Knocked me so stone-cold out that I don't remember a thing. That was the day I realized I had no chance of playing in the N.F.L." He sounds sincerely disappointed.

Is there anyone in America who doesn't remember exactly when, why, and how Ben Affleck became Ben Affleck? Naturally, he did it in typical guy fashion—alongside Matt Damon, his best friend from down the street since Affleck was eight years old. First they starred in the sensitive 1997 buddy picture Good Will Hunting, in which Damon played a working-class math savant and Affleck had a smaller but funnier role as his wisecracking sidekick. Then, at the Oscars, they scored major points by bringing their moms as their dates. Before you knew it, Ben 'n' Matt hysteria was full-blown (notwithstanding a vocal minority who considered their whole aw-shucks thing a big, annoying act).

"It was such a good publicity thing for marketing people," says Damon later at Affleck's house. "We ended up just talking about our friendship, which is really kind of a weird thing to do.... Hey, Ben," he asks, "what do you think about whoring out our friendship for personal gain?"

"At a certain point, some things in your life shouldn't be used to sell movies," Affleck replies. "Hey, I have two sphincters! See my movie!"

In the public mind, Affleck and Damon have become Hollywood's very own Bert and Ernie. Damon can't go on location without people wondering what in the world has happened to Affleck. For Affleck's part, the men reno [sic] his house call him Matt, and he is routinely congratulated for his work in Saving Private Ryan. On Affleck's coffee table in his Tribeca loft sits a recent issue of YM magazine—someone's idea of a joke, Affleck swears. Ben and Matt are on the cover, promising "Every Juicy Detail!"

Just as their friendship has become a warm and fuzzy American legend, the story behind Good Will Hunting will forever be a part of Hollywood lore: that it all began in 1992 with 40 pages that Damon churned out for a writing class at Harvard; that, after showing it to Affleck, then a struggling actor in L.A., the two worked it into a script; that it was briefly a "NASA thriller"; that they eventually amassed 1,500 pages; that they sold the script to Castle Rock Productions; that the project was put into turnaround, largely because Castle Rock demanded that the film be shot at a location cheaper than Boston; that the two were given 30 days to find a producer; that, with just 3 days left, Harvey Weinstein rode in like a white knight and purchased it for $ 1 million.

Weinstein also agreed to shoot the film in Boston, which allowed Affleck and Damon to feel comfortable doing the Boston accent, which, for obvious reasons, is near and dear to their hearts. "It was the whole reason I did the movie—just to do the accent," Affleck says, not entirely facetiously. Given any opportunity, he will launch into full-voltage riffs about Boston landmarks— from Jordan's Furniture commercials ("I think these sofas hajfta go!") to the pride surrounding the brutal winters ("Stock up on wahta, it's the Noreasta!"). He endlessly amuses himself with the names of Massachusetts towns ("You don't know me, fucker, but I'm from Hull. Bitch, I'm from Lynn. You don't know Medfield. Come down to Medfield, then we'll see what the fuck's up!").

"The Boston accent is more of an attitude than an accent," Affleck explains. "Underneath everything you say has to be the attitude of: You're an asshole, I know better than you, fuck you." It's an attitude that Affleck knows well. Dinner at the Afflecks' home, in Central Square, Cambridge, was characterized by heated debate on any topic, including whether to have the television on while eating. At times Affleck's reality wasn't so far from the scrappy existence depicted in Good Will Hunting. In addition to Ben and his younger brother, the up-and-coming actor Casey Affleck (who played Ben's weaselly younger brother in Good Will Hunting), there was Affleck's mother, Chris, a public-school teacher, and his father, Tim, an alcoholic and a frequent gambler who worked as a janitor, an electrician, and a bartender. "At the end of the football season," Affleck says of his father's tendency to bet on the games, "there would either be tough times or we'd get a VCR." The parents divorced when he was 12, and Tim is now a counselor in an alcohol-rehab center.

Affleck's neighborhood was largely African-American. So while other white kids from Boston were spending the 80s listening to the Cure and writing Goth poetry, Affleck (then called "Biz" to Damon's "Matty D") was listening to Prince and break-dancing in a nylon Puma sweat suit. "I was a real chump," he says.

Perhaps. But he was still on his way to starting his acting career. When he was seven, a casting-director friend of his mother's got him a tiny role in the independent movie The Dark End of the Street. By age eight, after winning a part in the PBS science series The Voyage of the Mimi and a brief stint as a Burger King pitch-boy, the young wiseass was hooked. Even as Affleck and Damon were starring in plays at Cambridge's Rindge and Latin high school, they were plotting their paths to glory. They had a joint bank account, designated strictly for New York excursions (the upcoming auditions and all), and even conducted "business lunches" during which, Damon recalls, "we'd basically sit over our cheeseburgers and not talk about anything." When Damon went to college at Harvard, little changed. Affleck hung out with Damon's new Ivy League friends and did his part to help drain the beer supply at the Delphic, the frat-boyish "finals club" Damon belonged to.

For Affleck, college held considerably less appeal than it did for Damon. After two months at the University of Vermont, he dropped out—much to the dismay of his mother, who, Affleck says, "always wanted me to be a history teacher." And so it was on to Los Angeles, where he and another friend lived in a one-bedroom "shit hole" on Franklin and Cherokee—"the Times Square of L.A.," as Affleck puts it. Between auditions, he spent his time rustling up the $300 rent and generally living a Slacker-style existence in which he spent too much time fielding calls from someone named "Fat Ed." "He'd always call and be like 'Yo, this is Fat Ed. Motherfuckers owe me $70 for groceries!'"

Luckily, it wasn't long before Affleck was getting movie work—the 1992 prep-school drama School Ties, Richard Linklater's 1993 Dazed and Confused, and Kevin Smith's embarrassing 1995 homage to New Jersey, Mallrats. Invariably, Affleck would be cast as the lunkhead, perhaps because he had yet to grow into his leading-man looks. Most of his roles required him to beat the crap out of some pencil-necked pre-adolescent. "I'd always go in for the lead," says Affleck, "and they'd be like 'You're interesting as Steve. We'd like you to read Bruiser.'"

Smith saw that Affleck had more to offer, and cast him as the main character in Chasing Amy, the 1997 Sundance hit that landed Affleck on the indie-film map. Playing an insecure, flabby, goatee-wearing cartoonist, Affleck got to do some hard-core, scenery-chewing emoting, including a monologue in which he pours his heart out to a yammering lesbian, played by Joey Lauren Adams. The scene was profoundly informed by Affleck's personal life at the time: he was in the process of breaking up with his high-school girlfriend. "I could strongly identify with the feeling of unrequited love," says Affleck. "Basically, I was in love with someone for years and years. And ultimately I felt like she just didn't love me in the same way—which was extremely painful."

Affleck would never admit that he likes to talk about mushy stuff—"It would be very difficult for me to say, 'That hurts.'" But get him started on any topic—including love and relationships—and he's virtually impossible to shut up. Nothing sends him on a sentimental roll quite like Gwyneth Paltrow, his girlfriend of a year, with whom he split last January.

"Gwyneth has a lot of things that haven't come across in her public image," says Affleck, who is forever defending her against the perception that she's an ice queen. "She's extremely funny, she's extraordinarily smart—not because she's a 1,600-on-theS.A.T. girl, but smart in the way that she kind of gets it," says Affleck. "She's actually the funny, down-to-earth fat girl in the beautiful girl's body." He is equally valiant about their well-publicized breakup. "People's stories always seem more interesting and more full of intrigue from the office-gossip perspective," says Affleck, perhaps referring to tabloid accounts that had Paltrow alternately sneaking around with Joe Fiennes, Viggo Mortensen, and ex-boyfriend Brad Pitt. "But when you're on the inside of your own relationship, you know the answers to those kinds of questions are much more mundane than when it's all shrouded in mystery and infused with conjecture: 'I heard he caught her in a menage a trois with a transvestite and two Pygmy lesbians!'"

Like a true movie star, Affleck is determined to keep the details of their relationship hidden. Like a true guy, he can't quite help himself from doing the opposite. An amateur photographer (his current passions are his Widelux camera and his Adobe Photoshop), Affleck keeps several albums of his work in his loft. Amid pictures of Cambridge, his mother, and his brother are pictures of Gwyneth: Gwyneth with flowers in her hair, Gwyneth waking up in the morning, Gwyneth dressed as Romeo on the set of Shakespeare in Love, Gwyneth about to head into Makeup. "Isn't she pretty?" Affleck says wistfully, gazing at the last image. "She's much more beautiful just natural like this than when she's all done up." He's lost in a Gwyneth moment. "I'm getting sad." But he's no sucker, and makes it clear that there will be no weeping here.

Affleck wasn't always so evolved in this department. Think back to the height of the Ben 'n' Matt frenzy, in 1997, when Affleck was dating Paltrow and Damon was seeing her friend Winona Ryder. "It was so gay," Affleck says, in the eight-year-old-girl sense of the word. "If I had gone by the tabloid stories of it, I would have been like 'Look at these fuckin' chumps. I just want to smack these people.' And I kind of wanted to smack myself," he admits. "But it's one of those things you kind of can't help. What are you going to say? 'Look, dude, don't go out with her. It'll look really weak.'"

Cringe-worthiness wasn't the only issue. More than anything, Affleck was concerned about how the tabloid stories would affect those around him—such as his ex-girlfriend. He likens the tabloids to "the friend who says, 'I don't want to get involved, but I did see Cathy blowin' three guys.'" Equally bothersome are the tabloid items describing Affleck as a rabid Lothario —buying out all the condoms in a 7-Eleven in Wisconsin (a state he's never set foot in), and getting cozy with Mariah Carey, Pamela Anderson, and, most recently, navel-baring pop star Britney Spears. "Britney Spears is 16 years old, O.K.?" says Affleck, rolling his eyes. "Can you dig it?"

Nor has Affleck been excluded from one of Hollywood's favorite games: Guess Who's Gay. His sexuality has been the subject of blind tabloid reports, and Affleck is often told that it's a foregone conclusion in the gay community that he and Damon are in love—a nugget that Affleck seems to get a particular kick out of. According to Hollywood gossip, says Affleck, "not only is every [actor] gay, but somebody has a friend who slept with them. Maybe there are gay people who are in the closet in Hollywood—I'm sure there probably are—but I'm sure they didn't sleep with Henry's friend. " As for his own sexuality, Affleck says, "I like to think that if I were gay I would be out. Rupert Everett-style."

Though Affleck has learned to handle the rumors with panache, his sudden fame and formidable wealth (he is now offered up to $12 million per picture) have been a bit harder to reconcile. "It's a tricky moral issue for me," says Affleck. "[Sometimes] I feel that maybe I should just keep $50,000 and give everything [else] away." His healthy Cambridge-liberal guilt is hard to miss. Even Frankenheimer, who briefly met Affleck's mother, couldn't help but notice that Affleck's "childhood was well formed and that he grew up with the right values." On the other hand, Affleck is too smart to pretend that he doesn't enjoy "priming the pump." "I once read an interview with a young actor who was saying, 'I'd like to live in a country house—the kind that Henry Miller lived in,'" says Affleck. "And I always thought, I want to live in the house that Reggie Miller lived in."

True to his guy-with-a-conscience form, Affleck has found himself somewhere in the middle: Sure, there are the two homes, the five motorcycles, the marble bathroom, the four computers, and the two cars (a Chevy Malibu and '69 Cadillac Sedan DeVille, which he shares with his brother). But he also gives a lot of his money to charity and to "needy individuals, whom I seem to come across with increasing regularity," has recently purchased a house for his mother, and, let it not be forgotten, often eats lunch at Koo Koo Roo. Yes, he implies, on occasion his behavior veers toward the prima donna-ish—he's been known to snub the press at movie premieres. But when he complains about anything, he feels "tacky," and when he catches himself trying to escape conversations with aggressive fans—by, say, claiming he needs to "go to the bathroom"—he feels, well, "shitty."

"Hey, Ben!" says a grizzled Koo Koo Roo patron who, in his full biker regalia, resembles a 70s-era Hell's Angel. Instead of running to the rest room, Affleck stands, bear-hugs the man, and launches into a long discussion about teeth. The interloper, you see, is not a Hell's Angel at all; he's Affleck's dentist, Dr. Stan Goldman, and Dr. Stan Goldman, like almost everyone who has crossed Affleck's path, is a serious fan.

"Love that dude," Affleck says after Dr. Goldman congratulates him for his work in Shakespeare in Love, bums a Camel Light, and takes off on his Harley. "I got sent to him by Disney when we were doing Armageddon. Fixed my tooth. My tooth was cracked and fucked up."

If the $100 million Jerry Bruckheimer asteroid juggernaut marked the moment when Affleck began worrying about his teeth (the whole set looks better than it used to), it was also the event that propelled Affleck from indie boy to action star—and spawned the inevitable talk about "selling out." It is an accusation that Affleck finds roundly preposterous. "How many opportunities do you have to go onto the space shuttle? To go into the neutral-buoyancy laboratory?" he says. For one thing, Affleck was raised on Star Wars. For another, he realizes that "just because a movie's independent doesn't mean it's good." Yes, he remains involved in several upcoming lowbudget projects (Kevin Smith's beleaguered religious send-up Dogma, Ben Younger's Wall Street drama The Boiler Room, Billy Bob Thornton's southern comedy Daddy and Them, and Jay Lacopo's The Third Wheel, a romantic comedy about a date gone haywire, which he and Damon are producing). But nothing lights up Affleck's bullshit meter like a lousy art-house film with a pretentious title. "I'm always like 'Yecch,' " Affleck says, cringing. "You know, Manny and Chuck with the Strawberries, or whatever it is. I want to see Enemy of the State

Which is not to say that Affleck plans to spend his career spraying bullets into gangs of international terrorists or delivering Bruce Willis-type lines such as "Yippee Kai Yay!" with a straight face. In Affleck's opinion, there's nothing so inane as "the best there is" movies. "[Hollywood] can't make a movie unless the lead guy's the best so-and-so," says Affleck, launching into a testosterone-pumped movie-trailer voice. "It's always like 'The best valet parker there ever was! And now he's back, for one ... big ... party!'"

If anything has characterized Affleck's role choices, it's the instinct to keep looking for what's different. "His wheels are constantly turning," Sandra Bullock says. "I don't think he can turn his head off."

And so Affleck, burned out on Armageddon's "deep-core drilling," chose to do Shakespeare in Love, despite fears that the cast was "going to be a bunch of R.S.C. knighted British people who were going to hate me and make fun of me." Next was Forces of Nature, which touched a nerve. "I identified with that dilemma, that fear of commitment," Affleck says of his character, a conservative groom-to-be who questions everything when he meets the free-spirited Bullock. On a few occasions, Affleck even rewrote dialogue in hopes of making the scenes more honest. "He'd brainstorm, and he'd get quiet for 20 minutes," Bullock recalls, "and we'd know what that meant. He was writing 12 pages of dialogue."

"I wished they had used more of my stuff," Affleck admits. "In retrospect, I think that movie would have been better served to be edgier.... If [Bullock's character] had been talking about sex toys," says Affleck, "that would have freaked this guy out, and he would have been made uncomfortable."

If Affleck is looking for a little discomfort, now is his moment. The new film Dogma—in which Affleck and Damon play angels with a penchant for automatic weapons—has come under attack by the Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights, which thinks the film ridicules the church. (Affleck views the controversy as, in essence, "three guys who had this little jury-rigged operation in Duluth who were trying to get their names in the papers.")

More emotional turbulence may be ahead for Affleck as he begins shooting Don Roos's romance Bounce, opposite Gwyneth Paltrow. And with Reindeer Games, the world will see what Affleck looks like as a victim. "I saw him as a throwback protagonist," Affleck says of his most recent character. "The hard-luck protagonist who doesn't look good all the time, who's constantly getting shit on, and who has the opportunity for a wry loser's irony. He kind of reminded me of my dad," he says. "Not that my dad's a loser, but [he has] that tough-luck sense of humor."

And thus it appears that Affleck may be nearing the end of guy territory and approaching manhood, a secure place to utilize some of the skills he's picked up from his various directors—directing, alas, is yet another target Affleck has set his sights on— and to explore the jackassery that he fears so intensely. Among the many issues that Affleck is now confronting are, he explains, a limited capacity for compromise and a lack of willingness to put his energy into a romantic relationship. "The reason I'm single," Affleck says, "is because I wouldn't want to be with anybody right now who would be willing to be with me."

And, just for a moment, Ben Affleck sounds a little like Woody Allen. But only a little.

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ellieloves2draw · 5 months

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my siblings are the funniest people i know

for reference: im ellie, brother is monkey, sibling 1 is magpie ( @fried-cowboy-1897 ), sibling 2 is cinnamon, and the youngest sister is astro. as the title suggests, theyre the funniest people i know. enjoy <3

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astro (in monopoly): i hate splitting hundreds. it makes me feel less powerful than i am

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astro (losing at monopoly) (12): i hate being an adult

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astro (reading an article): “you eat with your eyes before you ever take a bite.” (middle distance stare) the papa’s games taught me that

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magpie: like when the recipe calls for two cloves of garlic but youre smart so you put in FIVE

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cinnamon: this is to test if you have flexibility or strength. monkey, you have both

me: what do i have :D?

cinnamon: *disappointed head shake*

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magpie: rabies is a sometimes food

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astro (sadly): i have too much swag 😔

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magpie: i love it when giant crabs kill their abusers

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me: you’re such an obtuse triangle

dad: youre so acute :3

cinnamon: equilateral :D

magpie: right triangle.

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monkey: your attitude is not shobbiting my diggities

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mom: some people say “i don’t believe in anything i cant see”.

magpie: you don’t believe in the bottom of the ocean? 🤨

monkey: you don’t believe in korea? 🤨

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monkey: i think im moving a new bit of cartilage i wasnt able to move before! i just got spicier!

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magpie: millions of years ago there was a little land animal who wondered, “i wonder if i could go into the water?” and millions of years later, he’s in the water

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astro: i know what i can do!

dad: no spaghettios

astro: i can make— wait, no spaghettios??

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dad: that’s the bike lane

astro: if we drove on there, we’d avoid traffic

dad: uhhhhh

astro: at least not any traffic that we couldn’t plow over

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cinnamon (holding their boob angrily): i dont want them anymore! stay down, soldier!! stay down!!

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astro (while wiggling like a strange little octopus): i have a mAlLEabLe head

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astro: bibble is the powerhouse of the cell

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magpie: i dont really do the whole “picture in my head” thing

cinnamon: it’s because of your anemia

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magpie: i think that if i could drink water through my skin like a frog it would fix me

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magpie: “kill them with kindness” wrong. satellite at point nemo

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astro (playing minecraft): this is how most villagers live. alright now, look away

mom: what are you doing?

astro: keep looking away

mom: are you killing him? you could just let him free and let him live in the—

mimi: what’s done is done.

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magpie: she,*takes deep breath* world's funniest catholic guilt haver, let's just say that

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cinnamon: the only way to crack eggs *smacks egg against forehead* is the right way *smacks egg against forehead again*

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magpie: better be safe than mold poisoning, as i always say

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magpie: it’s a mermaid in a horror movie. they’ve gotta eat somebody. it’s what they do.

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astro: ellie according to this, you’re funnier than magpie *holds up chart*

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astro: no no no, mom. a woman cannot have a child, because that would display signs of unmanliness. OBvioUSly a man just manlinesses so hard that another man appears

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me: you’re so pale you're green

astro: i got that corpse slay 😎

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#ellie loves to ramble #to be continued maybe? idk

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kazeiia · 1 year

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this is just a lot of rambling, so bear with me for a second. i only got into the social media side of st after s4 when i couldn’t wait to get more of the story, and byler was one of the first ships i ever got into because i was getting edits and theories left-and-right. there were people that had byler theories for every single little thing, including stuff like lighting, the use of color, metaphors, analogies, etc to show how it was going to be cannon, but i took it all with a grain of salt because no matter how much i wanted gay representation (without the kill the gays trope) in one of the biggest shows in the world, the creators are still mostly middle aged white men.

BUT,,,, i recently rewatched s3 and things don’t add up. mike was so adamant about his feelings for el. he said he loved her to the whole extended party, and spend the entire summer trying to tell her that he loved her through his usual rambling, but it took will’s “not possible” to realize will was the only one who wasn’t willing to grow away from their party, even if they were going to be a thousand miles apart. when el finally said i love you back (even if mike never told her that directly btw), he looked confused and shocked—not the catharsis you would expect from someone whose partner finally said the Big Three Words.

there is a part in hopper’s letter to el that talks about not wanting to move on, and the scene focuses only on mike, looking back to the empty byer’s house on his bike. he goes back to his own house and hugs his mom (like he did after the quarry incident) looking just as lost and confused as he did when el kisses him goodbye. then he spends a hundred-and-something days giving will the cold shoulder??? like, why??? it’s not like mike to NOT be glue-trapped to the rest of the party. at this point, he still hasn’t said i love you to el. he can’t even say it when el brings it up directly, and he deflects by asking her what she the hell she was talking about. it might be chalked up to his family ties and how the wheelers don’t seem the type to show affection naturally, but i also think it could be a little bit of his aversion to lying to people he cares about. mike genuinely cares about el, but it’s a little bit like idol-worship, like this ideal in his head of superman el needing her own lois lane.

will is different because, to mike, he isn’t superman. he puts mike on the helm of the ship as the heart of the party. he looks up to him. he believes be understands him and he genuinely needs him. he believes he is smart, strategic and funny. he’s his best friend. so mike has the option to take on this responsibility, or to conform to what everyone around believes he will do—love el and be in love with her like a good boyfriend would be.

the only time mike genuinely smiles around el in s4 is when he gets the chance to help and save her from the whole owens-brenner lab thing. so it’s kind of obvious which choice he prefers. mike wheeler seems like the type of person that desperately wants to be needed because he hates it when people treat him like a good-for-nothing kid (his parents, steve, hopper etc). he even tells will that he’s scared of not being needed in the van scene, and will shuts him down by telling him about his role in the party. he spends all this time missing will (he goes back to dnd), and then when he finally sees him again, he pulls back because he doesn’t want to miss him. he doesn’t want to lie to him by not telling him how much he missed him. in s5, i really hope that the writers realize it makes the most sense plot-wise and theme-wise to get them together, but that’s a whole another theory and lots of people have discoursed about it before me.

anyways, i know no one really cares because i’m just one of many, but i wanted to let it out that now i’m fully convinced that mike wheeler is canonically a little fruity. let the delusions commence!

#byler theory #byler #mike wheeler #no one understands him like i do because he is me

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sethwarren · 6 months

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Technology and Innovation in Cycling

The world of cycling is undergoing a remarkable transformation, fuelled by advances in technology and innovation. This evolution is not just about the bikes we ride but encompasses every facet of cycling, from performance and safety to the very experience of riding itself.

High-Tech Materials: Lighter, Stronger Bikes

The quest for speed and efficiency has led to the adoption of high-tech materials in bike construction. Carbon fibre has become the gold standard for high-performance bikes, offering an unparalleled blend of lightness and strength. Innovations in metallurgy and composite materials have also allowed for more durable, yet lightweight frames and components, enabling cyclists to achieve greater speeds with less effort.

Smart Cycling: Connectivity and Data

In the digital age, connectivity has found its way onto the cycling paths. GPS-enabled devices and cycling computers provide riders with real-time data on speed, distance, and heart rate, while also offering navigation and route planning. Smart helmets incorporate built-in speakers, microphones, and even rear-view cameras, enhancing both convenience and safety. Furthermore, mobile apps and wearables have turned cycling into a connected experience, offering tracking, coaching, and social sharing capabilities.

E-Bikes: Democratizing Cycling

Electric bikes, or e-bikes, represent one of the most significant advancements in the cycling world. By combining pedal power with electric assistance, e-bikes lower the barrier to entry, making cycling accessible to a broader audience. They've become a game-changer for urban commuting, providing a sustainable alternative to traditional transportation methods, and have even found their niche in mountain biking and cargo transport.

Safety and Sustainability: Innovations for a Better Ride

Advancements in cycling technology have also focused on safety and sustainability. LED lights, reflective materials, and electronic braking systems have made riding safer in low-visibility conditions. Meanwhile, cycling infrastructure has benefited from technology, with smart bike lanes and traffic systems improving coexistence with vehicular traffic. These innovations not only protect cyclists but also encourage more people to consider cycling as a viable and eco-friendly mode of transportation.

The Horizon: What's Next in Cycling Innovation

As we look to the future, the potential for further innovation in cycling is boundless. Concepts like augmented reality cycling glasses, which can display vital information and alerts directly in the cyclist's field of vision, and further developments in bike-sharing and autonomous technology promise to redefine our cycling experience.

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#Seth Warren #Cycling #Cycling Technology #Youtube

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teagrl · 8 months

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More of Luke (Naberrie) and Mara do Nar Shaddaa. I'm having too much fun here.

Mara pays and the pit creatures take the bike.

They follow as far as halfway to the pit lane when three Weequay step into their path staring down at them. With full face helmets, the Weequay are actually glowering down at their mirrored images, a mental image which Luke finds comical right up until they growl, “Red Gang requires a tribute for new riders.”

I don’t know any Red Gang, Mara thinks. Luke doesn’t either.

Means they don’t exist in any way that matters.

“Oh, we’re not new riders,” Luke says. The helmet’s vocoder makes his voice flat, but Mara can hear the breeziness. Normal sentients would think twice about attacking a sentients whose face they can’t see, especially here. These Weequay might as well have baby criminals graffitied on them.

The alien growls, “I haven’t seen you before.”

Luke gives a careless shrug. “I haven't seen any of you here either, but I’m not asking you to pay up.”

“Smart,” he snarls, thumping one fist into his hand. “You know what we do to smart ones?”

Luke’s hand twitches by the holster on his side where he carries the lightsaber, her lightsaber, which Mara would begrudge, but seeing as to how she ruined his life, she’s not begrudging him much of anything. She drops an extra two steps behind him, slides her foot a few inches to the side to square up.

Luke shifts slightly, left foot sliding forward. “We don’t want trouble.”

Mara rolls her eyes.

A flare of alarm from the Force. The magenta lightsaber springs to life as Mara flicks for her holdout. With a slash, Luke catches the blaster as the Weequay lifts it to shoot. The alien is too slow. The shot that rings out is Mara’s as the first Weequay's hand goes flying.

Mara would have done the entire arm herself. Annoyance blares from Luke's side of the link at the thought. Nothing is ever good enough for her –

The first Weequay falls, yelling and holding his hand. Friend one drops a split second later, felled by Mara’s holdout, while Luke blocks a bolt then severs the third friend’s arm. They wait in case an extra friend or two emerges from the crowd as it has happened, but no one does.

That’s it for Red Gang.

Mara snorts as Luke powers down the lightsaber. He continues on after the pit creatures herding his bike.

Every two credit cretin with a pair of idiot friends thinks they’re a blasted gang. Mara flicks her wrist back to withdraw her blaster back under her sleeve. She steps around the screaming Weequay and darts forward to catch up to Luke.

A few onlookers stare, mildly interested but they soon resume their own path to the concourse. These days electro swords are not entirely uncommon. Jedi are back in style, some say.

#luke skywalker #(except not)#mara jade #my fic

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bikepackinguk · 1 year

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Day Twenty-four

Another day with an earlier update!

Camping on the clifftops south of Aberdeen was an amazing experience, the worst of the wind prevented by a convenient bluff and lulled off to sleep with the sound of the rain coming down and the sea crashing against the land. Definitely worth the effort getting out to the spot and back with all the gear!

It's back to the road though, and just around the corner some construction works mean a bit if a detour is needed to go visit Girdle Ness Lighthouse, before turning back around and begging the trip through Aberdeen itself.

I'm very glad I decided not to push in through yesterday. The initial road surfaces heading into the very busy city centre aren't great fun, but the route soon directs into Old Aberdeen, which whilst very pretty is a hell of a lot of cobbles. Rather than ride a pneumatic drill and shake the bike to pieces, I had to walk for most of the way through.

NCN 1 follows the River Don westwards, where the signposting gets a bit precarious and, combined with a mess of blocked roads due to more construction works, mean a lot of time is spent backtracking and figuring out where on earth to go.

This was compounded by some of the newer estates deciding to name all their roads almost identically. Mugiemoss road, Mugiemoss drive, Mugiemoss crescent, etc... Smart thinking there.

Regardless, finally out the other side we hit the A947 and push along this up to Dyce, where the trail leads onto a nice old rail route and allows some relatively flat riding.

The sun is out in force today and shade on this part is hard to come by, so it entailed a good few breaks in order to avoid horribly overheating.

The north east stretch of the coastline here is another mess of busy roads, so the bike route tracks inland past Newmachar en route to link back up to the coast at Banff.

A lot more uphill slogging in the late afternoon is finally rewarded with some excellent downhill runs, zooming down country lanes and providing a necessary breeze to take the edge off the heat!

By 5pm Tarves is reached, and a quick stop at the small park there allows for a bit of a break and to take a bit more shelter from the sun for a brief spell.

It's been a week since hitting the Scottish border and the last two day's hills have definitely been taking their toll! So whilst I've had a shorter run of it today and yesterday, I think a proper rest day will go a long way to easing some of the soreness creeping in in various places! Supplies are looking good so it's time to find a spot to rest for a while.

See you all back on Monday!

#bikepacking #bicycle touring #wild camping

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nitiemily · 3 days

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How Embedded Camera Modules are Shaping Smart Cities and Public Infrastructure

The development of smart cities has revolutionized the way urban spaces are managed, and at the heart of this transformation is the rise of embedded camera modules. These small, yet powerful devices play a crucial role in enhancing public infrastructure, improving safety, and enabling more efficient city management. As cities become more complex, the role of these cameras will only grow, impacting everything from traffic management to public safety.

The Role of Embedded Camera Modules in Smart Cities

Embedded camera modules are tiny, integrated devices used in various smart city applications. They offer real-time video capture and data analysis, making them a key component of modern city infrastructures. These modules are embedded into a wide range of systems, from traffic lights to surveillance drones, making them both versatile and highly effective.

Traffic Monitoring and Management

One of the most significant impacts of embedded camera modules is in traffic management. By embedding cameras into traffic lights, street poles, and other public structures, city planners can monitor traffic flow in real time. These cameras allow for data-driven decisions, such as adjusting signal timings to reduce congestion, or rerouting traffic during accidents or roadwork.

For example, cameras installed at intersections can detect traffic density and adjust signal lights accordingly, ensuring a smoother flow of vehicles and reducing wait times. These adjustments not only minimize delays but also help in reducing pollution by preventing excessive idling of vehicles.

Embedded camera modules also play a critical role in identifying traffic violations. Speeding, running red lights, or illegal parking can be captured on camera, with fines automatically issued. This not only deters traffic violations but also keeps city streets safer for both pedestrians and drivers.

Enhancing Public Safety

Safety is one of the top concerns in any city, and embedded camera modules have a direct impact on improving public safety measures. These cameras provide city officials with real-time footage, allowing them to respond to emergencies more effectively. Whether it's monitoring crowded areas during large events or keeping an eye on vulnerable neighborhoods, embedded camera systems provide eyes on the ground to detect unusual activity.

Many cities are using camera modules in conjunction with AI systems to identify threats in public spaces. For example, some systems can analyze video feeds to detect suspicious behaviors like loitering near critical infrastructure or abandoned packages that could be potential threats. This type of proactive surveillance helps law enforcement take preemptive actions, preventing crimes or incidents before they escalate.

Another area where these cameras shine is in disaster management. Whether it's a natural disaster like a flood or a man-made incident like a fire, embedded cameras offer real-time data that can assist emergency teams in coordinating evacuations or delivering assistance where it's needed most.

Smart Infrastructure and Urban Planning

Beyond traffic and safety, embedded camera modules are instrumental in broader urban planning and infrastructure development. City planners use these systems to monitor the health and efficiency of public infrastructure, such as bridges, roads, and public transportation systems. For instance, by integrating cameras into roads and public transportation systems, city officials can keep track of wear and tear, scheduling maintenance before issues become severe.

Additionally, embedded camera modules can provide valuable data to help optimize city layouts. For example, planners can use video data to study pedestrian traffic patterns, helping to determine where to place crosswalks, build parks, or install bike lanes. This data-driven approach ensures that cities are designed to meet the needs of their inhabitants, improving the overall quality of urban life.

Environmental Monitoring

As environmental concerns continue to rise, embedded camera modules also play an important role in monitoring pollution levels and other environmental factors. Cameras can be embedded into streetlights or drones to monitor air quality, track illegal dumping, or even assess the impact of construction projects on local ecosystems.

By gathering this data, cities can enforce environmental regulations more effectively, while also working towards sustainability goals. These cameras, combined with other smart city sensors, help create a comprehensive network that supports cleaner, greener cities.

Integration with AI and IoT Systems

The true power of embedded camera modules is unleashed when they are integrated with artificial intelligence (AI) and Internet of Things (IoT) systems. This integration enables cities to analyze the vast amount of data collected by camera modules in real time, providing actionable insights.

For example, AI can be used to analyze video feeds to detect anomalies or identify patterns that might go unnoticed by human operators. In traffic management, AI-powered cameras can predict congestion before it happens and suggest alternate routes, reducing delays and improving road safety. In security applications, AI can enhance facial recognition systems, enabling faster identification of persons of interest in crowded areas.

The IoT plays a crucial role in connecting these camera modules to the broader network of smart city devices. Embedded cameras, when connected to IoT networks, allow cities to create a cohesive and responsive infrastructure. For instance, traffic cameras can communicate with nearby sensors to adjust streetlights or notify emergency services in case of an accident. The seamless integration of camera modules with other smart systems makes city management more efficient and responsive.

The Future of Embedded Camera Modules in Urban Development

As technology advances, the role of embedded camera modules in smart cities will only continue to grow. The combination of AI, IoT, and 5G networks will allow these systems to operate more efficiently, processing data in real-time and making cities more responsive to the needs of their inhabitants.

The ongoing development of more sophisticated cameras—such as high-definition, thermal, and night-vision capabilities—means that embedded camera modules will become even more versatile, playing a critical role in areas like public health, waste management, and energy conservation.

For example, cameras equipped with advanced thermal sensors could help detect early signs of fires or gas leaks, preventing potential disasters. Similarly, cameras used for waste management can identify illegal dumping sites or track garbage collection trucks, optimizing routes to reduce fuel consumption and lower emissions.

The future of smart cities depends on these innovations, and embedded camera modules are at the forefront of this technological revolution.

Conclusion

Embedded camera modules are transforming the way cities operate. From improving traffic management and public safety to enabling more efficient urban planning, these cameras are helping cities become smarter, safer, and more sustainable. With the integration of AI, IoT, and other advanced technologies, the potential of these systems is virtually limitless, paving the way for more responsive and efficient cities in the years to come.

As urban areas continue to expand and develop, embedded camera modules will remain a key tool in shaping the future of public infrastructure and smart cities.

To Know More About embedded camera module

#iot #embedded systems

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