#solar sex ed

[hyunpic]

list of songs hyunjin has played on his lives/recommended:

note: im probably missing some & i couldn’t put links to all of them cause apparently tumblr has a link limit 🤨

lauv: julia, lonely eyes, invisible things, paris in the rain, never not, im so tired, the story never ends, i like me better

offonff: photograph, cigarette (ft. miso & tablo), dance, bath

beyoncé: crazy in love (remix)

billie eilish: i love you, &burn, idontwannabeyouanymore, ocean eyes, before i go, tv

honne: day1, la la la that’s how it goes

christina perri: a thousand years

shawn mendes: mercy, treat you better, in my blood

dvwn: phobia

dpr live: jam & butterfly

jehwi: dear moon

leehi: rose

bts: dna, waste it on me, make it right

colde: where love begins, string (ft. sunwoojunga), the museum, wa-r-r, your dog loves you (ft. crush), control me, a song nobody knows, im in love

got7: miracle, hard carry

justin bieber: lonely

josef salvat: call on me

taemin: criminal

night off: sleep

sam kim: make up (ft. crush), like a fool, sunny days summer nights

niki: lowkey

iu: the visitor, lullaby, knees, love poem, give you my heart, my sea

cha ni: starlight

sia: snowman

akmu: happening

sunwoojunga: run with me

the black skirts: everything

korea cracker: ocean (ft. hoyeon kim)

cosmic boy: can i love?

penomeco: no.5 (ft. crush)

yerin baek: blooming memories, limit

10cm: so…., however

day6: i’ll try, love me or leave me, when you love someone, you were beautiful, congratulations, zombie, days gone by, afraid

dean: d (half moon), instagram, what 2 do, bonnie & clyde

exo: first snow, the eve, love shot

sam fischer: this city

jukjae: do you want to walk with me?, lullaby

ph-1: nerdy love (ft. yerin baek), as i told you

baekhyun: love again, un village

amine: blackjack

young k: come as you are, guard you

flume: say it (ft. tove lo)

twice: dance the night away, fancy

ariana grande: thank u, next

hajin: we all lie

about: it has to be you

caroline says: winter is cold

h.e.r: u, wait for it

bol4: to my youth

monday kiz: winter is as i wished

paul kim: the road, additional

sweden laundry: the winter

jung seung hwan: in that winter

chungha: gotta go

zion.t: no make up, snow

airman: gloomy star, i’ll be your spring (ft. j_ust)

motte: dont run away

seventeen: a-teen, super

khalid: location

lukas graham: 7 years

imagine dragons: believer

bo kyung kim: dont think you are alone

jung ilhoon: spoiler (ft. babylon)

davichi: falling in love, 이 사랑

coldplay: everglow, viva la vida

lyn: my destiny

jus2: focus on me, long black, senses (jpn version)

crush: beautiful, you and i

ed sheeran: lego house, perfect, photograph, beautiful people

croosh: why

20 years of age: x

tori kelly: paper hearts

seulgi: always

luna: do you love me? (ft. george)

wisue: someone’s shining

epik high: eternal sunshine

jp saxe: if the world was ending

seori: fairy tale

bruno mars: marry you

the weeknd: earned it, die for you

jung seunghwan: its raining, an ordinary day, dear

sam tinnesz: play with fire

post malone: motley crew

jihyo: stardust love song

kim feel: your voice

sung sikyung: solar system, heejae

younha: stardust

wonpil: a journey

taeyeon: invu, some nights, toddler, drawing our moments

nct dream: boom

ha hyunsang: 3108

huhgak: memory of your scent

se so neon: nan chun, a long dream, midnight train, stranger

umi: remember me

tvxq!: mirotic

johnny balik: honey

red velvet: psycho

new jeans: hype boy

christian kuria: losing you

cigarettes after sex: k. , each time you fall in love, sunsetz, apocalypse

dpr ian: nerves, no blueberries, 1 shot

samm henshaw: broke

woodz: drowning

kelly clarkson: underneath the tree

kimmuseum: to you who cant sleep

taylor swift: betty

lana del rey: young and beautiful

harry styles: watermelon sugar, she

pink sweat$: honesty

masego: tadow

olivia rodrigo: vampire

troye sivan: youth, for him

kai: mmmh

2pm: my house

oasis: wonderwall, hey now

mac miller: that’s on me, everybody

nothing but thieves: amsterdam

bren joy: sweet

back number: i love you

mac ayres: next to you, roses

daniel caesar: blessed, ocho rios, get you (ft. kali uchis), take me away (ft. syd), do you like me?, disillusioned

green day: dilemma

puma blue: already falling

bruno major: nothing, easily, places we won’t walk, the most beautiful thing, old soul

[ghostalservice]

Tagged by @thetardigrape to share my most recent 10 opening lines!! THANKS TARDI YOU'RE MY FAVORITE DOPPELGANGER!! All OFMD, all Ed/Stede.

the curse of iphigenia (is an easily distracted god of the sea) (8.5k, E, seagod!Ed/Mer!Stede): Ed’s walking on the beach when he sees him.

The First Wave (10k, E, Mer!Stede/Selkie!Ed): Ed doesn’t want to go to the conference.

Punxsatawny Perfect (2k, T, modern AU): So Ed’s had a pretty fucking wild life—more than thirty years at sea, rising up through the ranks, winning and losing every kind of fight the ocean had to offer and coming out on top more often than not.

Splish-Splosh (2.4k, E, Mer!Stede/Selkie!Ed): When Ed opens the door to their house, he can already smell the steam from the bath.

the taste of marmalade (2.4k, T, immediately post-canon): The Revenge is still anchored off the coast in the morning when Stede finally wakes and pokes his head out of the little tent-nest they’ve constructed.

It Came from Outer Space! (10k, E, alien!Ed/UFO hunter!Stede): By the time Stede sees Frenchie’s message, he’s already on the road.

No Returns, No Exchanges (12k, E, cursed sex toy dick!Ed/awkward shopper!Stede, group collab): Lucius disappears before the shop door has fully swung shut behind them, giving Stede an awkward pat on the shoulder and a grimace of a smile.

when one door closes (2.4k, T, solar salesman!Stede/celebrity!Ed): The knock is somehow bright and cheerful, a quick three raps of knuckles against Ed’s door, and Ed groans into the back of the couch where his face has been pressed all night.

A Languid Summer (5k, E, Tree!Ed - a PWP sequel to A Latent Spring. Collab with @swashbuckling-sweethearts, and I think she wrote this line actually!): The light is fading fast—Stede can see bright neon pinks and magentas in the clouds above the city and it's turning the air almost violet purple between the dark silhouettes of the buildings.

the sweetest dream will never do (2.6k, E, Animorphs AU PWP sequel written with @petrichorca and based on @theogem's glorious comic): Ed wakes up slowly, not sure what’s pulled him from a really solid sleep.

Tagging @morethanslightly, @zombee, @xoxoemynn, @adhduck, @gaypiratebrainrot, @bizarrelittlemew, @bomberqueen17!

[youremyheaven]

I'm gone for three days....3 DAYS! And you got the 🍑 ate by balded brotha and arm guy (who I thought had ed game-y potential) poofed! Idk if I should cry or slap my forehead.

How you holding up dearest? Idk who gave nazar, but I hope he gets a cramp on his arm and dick 🖤 (Conspiracy theory: what if it was bigbro™ giving nazar on armguy™? Like you know ‘Maybe I have no competition, let her be mine 👁️👁️’)

JAJSJSJJSJWJSJ

I knew i could count on u guys to cheer me up 😭🤣🤣🤭🤭

But soooo much has happened that I haven't shared yet 👀🫣🫣

Arm guy is giving mixed signals rn 😮‍💨😮‍💨

But ngl having sex with two different Bharani men who act SUPER SIMILAR IN BED, it was so weird, scary, deja vu like and 💀💀💀💀 a few days apart was crazyyy 😩😌🤪 no ragretssss

The baldie was lowkey better at pounding tbh and his 🍆 is bigger 🥺😩 when he was pounding me doggy style, i literally floated up to heaven 😭😭😭 but unfortunately he couldn't stay hard 😔 which i actually didn't mind that much. Like I'm not an orgasm obsessed person, I feel orgasmic as I am. For me sex isn't just about the orgasm, it's about pleasure and I genuinely enjoy every aspect of it, be it giving or receiving head, being pounded or him manhandling my body 😩😩😩I loveeee being touched 🥺 in bed like 😩 the baldie held me close and told me "you have such a sensitive body" 🙈🙈🙈bc he'd literally touch me anywhere and I'd be like 😩😩😩😩and I'm like duh🙄

How do I feel? I feel like I've healed a lot of sex related traumas and started to see sex as just another part of the human experience which is nice 👍🙂

WHOEVER PUT NAZAR ON ME 🔪🔪🔪🔪🔪

lmaaaooo I wouldn't put it past him tbh, he's OBSESSED with me like GENUINELY, he donates money to charity in my name 😭🥺🫶

Arm guy adores me (or so i thought 🙄😮‍💨😒) but he's an Uttaraphalguni Rising and i don't think Solar men are capable of obsession 🙃🙃they be too chill for that

[utilitycaster]

I believe you mentioned seeing Love Lies Bleeding - would love to hear your thoughts on it if you have any (and good luck with the car troubles).

It's GREAT. Everyone who is not averse to grievous bodily harm shown on screen go see it. I am not like...terribly up on film just generally; I grew up in a house that limited TV screentime with parents who hate movie theaters so there is a weird cross section of movies I know that is immensely idiosyncratic since I just don't really have a movie-going habit. Also since getting into CR in 2018 it's like. well I don't really have two hours to kill watching movies; I watch 4+ hours of stuff a week and that's plenty. So I cannot speak to things like cinematography, though it did feel well-put together and attractive to look at and all that.

I think the story is solid - nothing groundbreaking except for the fact that usually this is not a story told about queer women that (spoilers) ends with them free and together (more on this later) but it's well done as a neo-noir, the acting is fantastic, and it feels so wonderfully...big and small at the same time? Like, do not get me wrong, I enjoy a blockbuster, but when I think back to the movies I've liked as of late*, Honor Among Thieves is the only one that takes place over a sprawling journey. I guess Barbie, debatably. Like, Love Lies Bleeding is almost entirely in a small town in New Mexico with a brief portion in Vegas or in the immediate surroundings. We are not jetsetting or using green screens. The majority of the film is in a handful of places, the core cast is like 6 people with two significant supporting players. I love this. As someone who leans more towards longer form fiction in general it's just really nice to have something that says "we have under two hours and we are going to embrace having under two hours and tell a story that fucking FITS in under two hours instead of just giving you some weird shard of a Cinematic Universe."

Re the queer women: thank GOD for casting queer women as queer women and probably more importantly having queer women doing things like writing and directing. The sex scenes are great and the relationship feels...I can't say I have the experience of being one of the only queer women in a small town in the late 80s and low-key detesting the one other woman but this all feels so much like. Of course Lou responds like this! This is the first new and fortuitous thing that has happened in her life! U-Haul jokes aside like yeah this is her big chance! It's both their big chances! And honestly until pretty late in the film, because I went in with little info other than "Kristen Stewart and Katy O'Brien bodybuilder lesbian romance crime drama" I expected it to end with one of them dead and the thing is the story works either way, and that feels really great to me, a tragedy enjoyer but also a comedy enjoyer.

Also I love pitch-black humor and this absolutely has that, and I enjoy magical realism when done very sparingly and this is precisely the right amount (if you assume it's magical realism, which I do; I also enjoy ambiguity). Anyway go see a fucked up lesbian and her fucked up bi girlfriend get entangled by ambition, righteous anger, vengeance, limited opportunity, and Ed Harris's skullet and bug obsession.

Finally, a personal anecdote: I saw this at the Alamo Drafthouse and as you may know they do various event screenings. They are showing Twilight: Eclipse for the total solar eclipse. It is HILARIOUS to see a trailer for Twilight: Eclipse (ft. young Kristen Stewart as personality-less girl in love triangle with two guys) before Love Lies Bleeding. talk about a glow-up. Absolutely wild to me that Stewart and Pattinson both ended up as genuinely talented actors with a taste for the unhinged given their breakthrough was Twilight.

[dippythestick]

about me:

u can call me dippy or dip

i am currently 18

male, he/him

not human

i am gay, aroace, and greyaplatonic

i am autistic, with adhd and mental illnesses

disabled

digital artist

furry

punk, metalhead, alternative

embodiment of "erm actually" and i have a chronic stick up my ass

i have the rude flavor of autism, i come off as passive aggressive but i am just blunt and genuine. i also have issues with empathy and tone, i take everything seriously and at face value

interests:

cartoons:

ed edd n eddy

TMNT (rise, 2012, and mutant mayhem)

pinky and the brain

metalocalypse

regular show

invader zim

futurama

craig of the creek

kick buttowski

out there 2013

catscratch

rick and morty

solar opposites

whatever happened to robot jones

smiling friends

gravity falls

other media:

criminal minds

undertale and deltarune

freaks and geeks

DHMIS

the nightmare before christmas

beastars

mr. robot

blorbos:

topher bus - clone high - kin

toki wartooth - metalocalypse - kin

duck - DHMIS - kin

allan - smiling friends - kin

donnie - ROTTMNT - kin

raph - 2012 TMNT - kin

ed - ed edd n eddy

papyrus - undertale

rigby - regular show

bender - futurama

waffle - catscratch

giovanni potage - epithet erased

music:

favorite genres: rock, metal, folk punk, midwest emo, alternative/indie, losercore

favorite artists: ICP, harley poe, AJJ, jack stauber, three days grace, korn, MSI, slipknot, avenged sevenfold, thousand foot krutch, rob zombie, lil darkie, linkin park, system of a down, the front bottoms, mccafferty, set it off, weezer, radiohead, pierce the veil, seether, black veil brides, escape the fate, crywank, deftones, modern baseball, will wood, glass animals, dethklok

other interests/likes:

science: sociology, psychology, psychopathology, biology (human and animal), astronomy, ecology, pathology, anthropology, paleobiology, archeology, taxonomy

linguistics, semantics, dialect, grammar, etymology, obsolete words, currently learning spanish, german, and hebrew

philosophy and politics

learning, researching, reading, making lists

sci-fi, fantasy, cryptids, scp, mythology

prehistory: i love the early paleozoic era the most (cambrian), but i also like dinosaurs and other extinct things

animals: i like animal biology, relationships, etc. marine animals are my favorites

clowns/clowncore: i like classic circus clowns, jesters, mimes, scary clowns, i like ICP, the joker, pennywise, i like circuses and carnivals in general as well. i also enjoy magic tricks and performance art

coffee

puns and shitty word play

eyesore art, psychedelics, things that glow in the dark, colored lights, trippy shit

collecting: rocks, bones, animal things (teeth, feathers, etc), shells, cool shaped glass and bottles, random blue things

taxidermy, graffiti, stop motion animation, and puppetry are art forms i enjoy but do not make

art/animated gore, violence, cannibalism, upsetting themes i guess?

dislikes:

astrology, fate, etc

guessing or gambling

all asmr, whitenoise

role playing (participating)

most sitcoms

reality tv, talk shows, game shows

most anime

most sex jokes/toilet humor

social rules/norms

sleeping

[axolotlsauce]

“Sales Pitch” by Philip K Dick

Commute ships roared on all sides, as Ed Morris made his way wearily home to Earth at the end of a long hard day at the office. The Ganymede-Terra lanes were choked with exhausted, grim-faced businessmen; Jupiter was in opposition to Earth and the trip was a good two hours. Every few million miles the great flow slowed to a grinding, agonized halt; signal-lights flashed as streams from Mars and Saturn fed into the main traffic-arteries.

"Lord," Morris muttered. "How tired can you get?" He locked the autopilot and momentarily turned from the control-board to light a much-needed cigarette. His hands shook. His head swam. It was past six; Sally would be fuming; dinner would be spoiled. The same old thing. Nerve-wracking driving, honking horns and irate drivers zooming past his little ship, furious gesturing, shouting, cursing...

And the ads. That was what really did it. He could have stood everything else -- but the ads, the whole long way from Ganymede to Earth. And on Earth, the swarms of sales robots; it was too much. And they were everywhere.

He slowed to avoid a fifty-ship smashup. Repair-ships were scurrying around trying to get the debris out of the lane. His audio-speaker wailed as police rockets hurried up. Expertly, Morris raised his ship, cut between two slow-moving commercial transports, zipped momentarily into the unused left lane, and then sped on, the wreck left behind. Horns honked furiously at him; he ignored them.

"Trans-Solar Products greets you!" an immense voice boomed in his ear. Morris groaned and hunched down in his seat. He was getting near Terra; the barrage was increasing. "Is your tension-index pushed over the safety-margin by the ordinary frustrations of the day? Then you need an Id-Persona Unit. So small it can be worn behind the ear, close to the frontal lobe --"

Thank God, he was past it. The ad dimmed and receded behind, as his fast-moving ship hurtled forward. But another was right ahead.

"Drivers! Thousands of unnecessary deaths each year from inter-planet driving. Hypno-Motor Control from an expert source-point insures your safety. Surrender your body and save your life!" The voice roared louder. "Industrial experts say --"

Both audio ads, the easiest to ignore. But now a visual ad was forming; he winced, closed his eyes, but it did no good.

"Men!" an unctuous voice thundered on all sides of him. "Banish internally-caused obnoxious odors forever. Removal by modern painless methods of the gastrointestinal tract and substitution system will relieve you of the most acute cause of social rejection." The visual image locked; a vast nude girl, blonde hair disarranged, blue eyes half shut, lips parted, head tilted back in sleep-drugged ecstasy. The features ballooned as the lips approached his own. Abruptly the orgiastic expression on the girl's face vanished. Disgust and revulsion swept across, and then the image faded out.

"Does this happen to you?" the voice boomed. "During erotic sex-play do you offend your love-partner by the presence of gastric processes which --" The voice died, and he was past. His mind his own again, Morris kicked savagely at the throttle and sent the little ship leaping. The pressure, applied directly to the audio-visual regions of his brain, had faded below spark point. He groaned and shook his head to clear it. All around him the vague half-defined echoes of ads glittered and gibbered, like ghosts of distant video-stations. Ads waited on all sides; he steered a careful course, dexterity born of animal desperation, but not all could be avoided. Despair seized him. The outline of a new visual-audio ad was already coming into being.

"You, mister wage-earner!" it shouted into the eyes and ears, noses and throats, of a thousand weary commuters. "Tired of the same old job? Wonder Circuits Inc. has perfected a marvelous long-range thoughtwave scanner. Know what others are thinking and saying. Get the edge on fellow employees. Learn facts, figures about your employer's personal existence. Banish uncertainty!"

Morris' despair swept up wildly. He threw the throttle on full blast; the little ship bucked and rolled as it climbed from the traffic-lane into the dead zone beyond. A shrieking roar, as his fender whipped through the protective wall -- and then the ad faded behind him.

He slowed down, trembling with misery and fatigue. Earth lay ahead. He'd be home, soon. Maybe he could get a good night's sleep. He shakily dropped the nose of the ship and prepared to hook onto the tractor beam of the Chicago commute field.

"The best metabolism adjuster on the market," the salesrobot shrilled. "Guaranteed to maintain a perfect endocrine-balance, or your money refunded in full."

Morris pushed wearily past the salesrobot, up the sidewalk toward the residential-block that contained his living-unit. The robot followed a few steps, then forgot him and hurried after another grim-faced commuter.

"All the news while it's news," a metallic voice dinned at him. "Have a retinal vidscreen installed in your least-used eye. Keep in touch with the world; don't wait for out-of-date hourly summaries."

"Get out of the way," Morris muttered. The robot stepped aside for him and he crossed the street with a pack of hunched-over men and women.

Robot-salesmen were everywhere, gesturing, pleading, shrilling. One started after him and he quickened his pace. It scurried along, chanting its pitch and trying to attract his attention, all the way up the hill to his living-unit. It didn't give up until he stooped over, snatched up a rock, and hurled it futilely. He scrambled in the house and slammed the doorlock after him. The robot hesitated, then turned and raced after a woman with an armload of packages toiling up the hill. She tried vainly to elude it, without success.

"Darling!" Sally cried. She hurried from the kitchen, drying her hands on her plastic shorts, bright-eyed and excited. "Oh, you poor thing! You look so tired!"

Morris peeled off his hat and coat and kissed his wife briefly on her bare shoulder. "What's for dinner?"

Sally gave his hat and coat to the closet. "We're having Uranian wild pheasant; your favorite dish."

Morris' mouth watered, and a tiny surge of energy crawled back into his exhausted body. "No kidding? What the hell's the occasion?"

His wife's brown eyes moistened with compassion. "Darling, it's your birthday; you're thirty-seven years old today. Had you forgotten?"

"Yeah," Morris grinned a little. "I sure had." He wandered into the kitchen. The table was set; coffee was steaming in the cups and there was butter and white bread, mashed potatoes and green peas. "My golly. A real occasion."

Sally punched the stove controls and the container of smoking pheasant was slid onto the table and neatly sliced open. "Go wash your hands and we're ready to eat. Hurry -- before it gets cold."

Morris presented his hands to the wash slot and then sat down gratefully at the table. Sally served the tender, fragrant pheasant, and the two of them began eating.

"Sally," Morris said, when his plate was empty and he was leaning back and sipping slowly at his coffee. "I can't go on like this. Something's got to be done."

"You mean the drive? I wish you could get a position on Mars like Bob Young. Maybe if you talked to the Employment Commission and explained to them how all the strain --"

"It's not just the drive. They're right out front. Everywhere. Waiting for me. All day and night."

"Who are, dear?"

"Robots selling things. As soon as I set down the ship. Robots and visual-audio ads. They dig right into a man's brain. They follow people around until they die."

"I know." Sally patted his hand sympathetically. "When I go shopping they follow me in clusters. All talking at once. It's really a panic -- you can't understand half what they're saying."

"We've got to break out."

"Break out?" Sally faltered. "What do you mean?"

"We've got to get away from them. They're destroying us."

Morris fumbled in his pocket and carefully got out a tiny fragment of metal-foil. He unrolled it with painstaking care and smoothed it out on the table. "Look at this. It was circulated in the office, among the men; it got to me and I kept it."

"What does it mean?" Sally's brow wrinkled as she made out the words. "Dear, I don't think you got all of it. There must be more than this."

"A new world," Morris said softly. "Where they haven't got to, yet. It's a long way off, out beyond the solar system. Out in the stars."

"Proxima?"

"Twenty planets. Half of them habitable. Only a few thousand people out there. Families, workmen, scientists, some industrial survey teams. Land free for the asking."

"But it's so --" Sally made a face. "Dear, isn't it sort of under-developed? They say it's like living back in the twentieth century. Flush toilets, bathtubs, gasoline driven cars --"

"That's right." Morris rolled up the bit of crumpled metal, his face grim and dead-serious. "It's a hundred years behind times. None of this." He indicated the stove and the furnishings in the living room. "We'll have to do without. We'll have to get used to a simpler life. The way our ancestors lived." He tried to smile but his face wouldn't cooperate. "You think you'd like it? No ads, no salesrobots, traffic moving at sixty miles an hour instead of sixty million. We could raise passage on one of the big trans-system liners. I could sell my commute rocket..."

There was a hesitant, doubtful silence.

"Ed," Sally began. "I think we should think it over more. What about your job? What would you do out there?"

"I'd find something."

"But what? Haven't you got that part figured out?" A shrill tinge of annoyance crept into her voice. "It seems to me we should consider that part just a little more before we throw away everything and just -- take off."

"If we don't go," Morris said slowly, trying to keep his voice steady, "they'll get us. There isn't much time left. I don't know how much longer I can hold them off."

"Really, Ed! You make it sound so melodramatic. If you feel that bad why don't you take some time off and have a complete inhibition check? I was watching a vidprogram and I saw them going over a man whose psychosomatic system was much worse than yours. A much older man."

She leaped to her feet. "Let's go out tonight and celebrate. Okay?" Her slim fingers fumbled at the zipper of her shorts. "I'll put on my new plasti-robe, the one I've never had nerve enough to wear."

Her eyes sparkled with excitement as she hurried into the bedroom. "You know the one I mean? When you're up close it's translucent but as you get farther off it becomes more and more sheer until --"

"I know the one," Morris said wearily. "I've seen them advertised on my way home from work." He got slowly to his feet and wandered into the living room. At the door of the bedroom he halted. "Sally --"

"Yes?"

Morris opened his mouth to speak. He was going to ask her again, talk to her about the metal-foil fragment he had carefully wadded up and carried home. He was going to talk to her about the frontier. About Proxima Centauri. Going away and never coming back. But he never had a chance.

The doorchimes sounded.

"Somebody's at the door!" Sally cried excitedly. "Hurry up and see who it is!"

In the evening darkness the robot was a silent, unmoving figure. A cold wind blew around it and into the house. Morris shivered and moved back from the door. "What do you want?" he demanded. A strange fear licked at him. "What is it?"

The robot was larger than any he had seen. Tall and broad, with heavy metallic grippers and elongated eye-lenses. Its upper trunk was a square tank instead of the usual cone. It rested on four treads, not the customary two. It towered over Morris, almost seven feet high. Massive and solid.

"Good evening," it said calmly. Its voice was whipped around by the night wind; it mixed with the dismal noises of evening, the echoes of traffic and the clang of distant street signals. A few vague shapes hurried through the gloom. The world was black and hostile.

"Evening," Morris responded automatically. He found himself trembling. "What are you selling?"

"I would like to show you a fasrad," the robot said.

Morris' mind was numb; it refused to respond. What was a fasrad? There was something dreamlike and nightmarish going on. He struggled to get his mind and body together. "A what?" he croaked.

"A fasrad." The robot made no effort to explain. It regarded him without emotion, as if it was not its responsibility to explain anything. "It will take only a moment."

"I --" Morris began. He moved back, out of the wind. And the robot, without change of expression, glided past him and into the house.

"Thank you," it said. It halted in the middle of the living room. "Would you call your wife, please? I would like to show her the fasrad, also."

"Sally," Morris muttered helplessly. "Come here."

Sally swept breathlessly into the living room, her breasts quivering with excitement. "What is it? Oh!" She saw the robot and halted uncertainly. "Ed, did you order something? Are we buying something?"

"Good evening," the robot said to her. "I am going to show you the fasrad. Please be seated. On the couch, if you will. Both together."

Sally sat down expectantly, her cheeks flushed, eyes bright with wonder and bewilderment. Numbly, Ed seated himself beside her. "Look," he muttered thickly. "What the hell is a fasrad? What's going on? I don't want to buy anything!"

"What is your name?" the robot asked him.

"Morris." He almost choked. "Ed Morris."

The robot turned to Sally. "Mrs. Morris." It bowed slightly. "I'm glad to meet you, Mr. and Mrs. Morris. You are the first persons in your neighborhood to see the fasrad. This is the initial demonstration in this area." Its cold eyes swept the room. "Mr. Morris, you are employed, I assume. Where are you employed?"

"He works on Ganymede," Sally said dutifully, like a little girl in school. "For the Terran Metals Development Co."

The robot digested this information. "A fasrad will be of value to you." It eyed Sally. "What do you do?"

"I'm a tape transcriber at Histo-Research."

"A fasrad will be of no value in your professional work, but it will be helpful here in the home." It picked up a table in its powerful steel grippers. "For example, sometimes an attractive piece of furniture is damaged by a clumsy guest." The robot smashed the table to bits; fragments of wood and plastic rained down. "A fasrad is needed."

Morris leaped helplessly to his feet. He was powerless to halt events; a numbing weight hung over him, as the robot tossed the fragments of table away and selected a heavy floor lamp.

"Oh dear," Sally gasped. "That's my best lamp."

"When a fasrad is possessed, there is nothing to fear." The robot seized the lamp and twisted it grotesquely. It ripped the shade, smashed the bulbs, then threw away the remnants. "A situation of this kind can occur from some violent explosion, such as an H-Bomb."

"For God's sake," Morris muttered. "We --"

"An H-Bomb attack may never occur," the robot continued, "but in such an event a fasrad is indispensable." It knelt down and pulled an intricate tube from its waist. Aiming the tube at the floor it atomized a hole five feet in diameter. It stepped back from the yawning pocket. "I have not extended this tunnel, but you can see a fasrad would save your life in case of attack."

The word attack seemed to set off a new train of reactions in its metal brain.

"Sometimes a thug or hood will attack a person at night," it continued. Without warning it whirled and drove its fist through the wall. A section of the wall collapsed in a heap of powder and debris. "That takes care of the thug." The robot straightened out and peered around the room. "Often you are too tired in the evening to manipulate the buttons on the stove." It strode into the kitchen and began punching the stove controls; immense quantities of food spilled in all directions.

"Stop!" Sally cried. "Get away from my stove!"

"You may be too weary to run water for your bath." The robot tripped the controls of the tub and water poured down. "Or you may wish to go right to bed." It yanked the bed from its concealment and threw it flat. Sally retreated in fright as the robot advanced toward her. "Sometimes after a hard day at work you are too tired to remove your clothing. In that event --"

"Get out of here!" Morris shouted at it. "Sally, run and get the cops. The thing's gone crazy. Hurry."

"The fasrad is a necessity in all modern homes," the robot continued. "For example, an appliance may break down. The fasrad repairs it instantly." It seized the automatic humidity control and tore the wiring and replaced it on the wall. "Sometimes you would prefer not to go to work. The fasrad is permitted by law to occupy your position for a consecutive period not to exceed ten days. If, after that period --"

"Good God," Morris said, as understanding finally came. "You're the fasrad."

"That's right," the robot agreed. "Fully Automatic Self-Regulating Android (Domestic). There is also the fasrac (Construction), the fasram (Managerial), the fasras (Soldier), and the fasrab (Bureaucrat). I am designed for home use."

"You --" Sally gasped. "You're for sale. You're selling yourself."

"I am demonstrating myself," the fasrad, the robot, answered. Its impassive metal eyes were fixed intently on Morris as it continued, "I am sure, Mr. Morris, you would like to own me. I am reasonably priced and fully guaranteed. A full book of instructions is included. I cannot conceive of taking no for an answer."

At half past twelve, Ed Morris still sat at the foot of the bed, one shoe on, the other in his hand. He gazed vacantly ahead. He said nothing.

"For heaven's sake," Sally complained. "Finish untying that knot and get into bed; you have to be up at five-thirty."

Morris fooled aimlessly with the shoelace. After a while he dropped the shoe and tugged at the other one. The house was cold and silent. Outside, the dismal night-wind whipped and lashed at the cedars that grew along the side of the building. Sally lay curled up beneath the radiant-lens, a cigarette between her lips, enjoying the warmth and half-dozing.

In the living room stood the fasrad. It hadn't left. It was still there, was waiting for Morris to buy it.

"Come on!" Sally said sharply. "What's wrong with you? It fixed all the things it broke; it was just demonstrating itself." She sighed drowsily. "It certainly gave me a scare. I thought something had gone wrong with it. They certainly had an inspiration, sending it around to sell itself to people."

Morris said nothing.

Sally rolled over on her stomach and languidly stubbed out her cigarette. "That's not so much, is it? Ten thousand gold units, and if we get our friends to buy one we get a five per cent commission. All we have to do is show it. It isn't as if we had to sell it. It sells itself." She giggled. "They always wanted a product that sold itself, didn't they?"

Morris untied the knot in his shoelace. He slid his shoe back on and tied it tight.

"What are you doing?" Sally demanded angrily. "You come to bed!" She sat up furiously, as Morris left the room and moved slowly down the hall. "Where are you going?"

In the living room, Morris switched on the light and sat down facing the fasrad. "Can you hear me?" he said.

"Certainly," the fasrad answered. "I'm never inoperative. Sometimes an emergency occurs at night: a child is sick or an accident takes place. You have no children as yet, but in the event --"

"Shut up," Morris said, "I don't want to hear you."

"You asked me a question. Self-regulating androids are plugged in to a central information exchange. Sometimes a person wishes immediate information; the fasrad is always ready to answer any theoretical or factual inquiry. Anything not metaphysical."

Morris picked up the book of instructions and thumbed it. The fasrad did thousands of things; it never wore out; it was never at a loss; it couldn't make a mistake. He threw the book away. "I'm not going to buy you," he said to it. "Never. Not in a million years."

"Oh, yes you are," the fasrad corrected. "This is an opportunity you can't afford to miss." There was calm, metallic confidence in its voice. "You can't turn me down, Mr. Morris. A fasrad is an indispensable necessity in the modern home."

"Get out of here," Morris said evenly. "Get out of my house and don't come back."

"I'm not your fasrad to order around. Until you've purchased me at the regular list price, I'm responsible only to Self-Regulating Android Inc. Their instructions were to the contrary; I'm to remain with you until you buy me."

"Suppose I never buy you?" Morris demanded, but in his heart ice formed even as he asked. Already he felt the cold terror of the answer that was coming; there could be no other.

"I'll continue to remain with you," the fasrad said, "eventually you'll buy me." It plucked some withered roses from a vase on the mantel and dropped them into its disposal slot. "You will see more and more situations in which a fasrad is indispensible. Eventually you'll wonder how you ever existed without one."

"Is there anything you can't do?"

"Oh, yes; there's a great deal I can't do. But I can do anything you can do -- and considerably better."

Morris let out his breath slowly. "I'd be insane to buy you."

"You've got to buy me," the impassive voice answered. The fasrad extended a hollow pipe and began cleaning the carpet. "I am useful in all situations. Notice how fluffy and free of dust this rug is." It withdrew the pipe and extended another. Morris coughed and staggered quickly away; clouds of white particles billowed out and filled every part of the room.

"I am spraying for moths," the fasrad explained.

The white cloud turned to an ugly blue-black. The room faded into ominous darkness; the fasrad was a dim shape moving methodically about in the center. Presently the cloud lifted and the furniture emerged.

"I sprayed for harmful bacteria," the fasrad said.

It painted the walls of the room and constructed new furniture to go with them. It reinforced the ceiling in the bathroom. It increased the number of heat-vents from the furnace. It put in new electrical wiring. It tore out all the fixtures in the kitchen and assembled more modern ones. It examined Morris' financial accounts and computed his income tax for the following year. It sharpened all the pencils; it caught hold of his wrist and quickly diagnosed his high blood-pressure as psychosomatic.

"You'll feel better after you've turned responsibility over to me," it explained. It threw out some old soup Sally had been saving. "Danger of botulism," it told him. "Your wife is sexually attractive, but not capable of a high order of intellectualization."

Morris went to the closet and got his coat.

"Where are you going?" the fasrad asked.

"To the office."

"At this time of night?"

Morris glanced briefly into the bedroom. Sally was sound asleep under the soothing radiant-lens. Her slim body was rosy pink and healthy, her face free of worry. He closed the front door and hurried down the steps into the darkness. Cold night wind slashed at him as he approached the parking lot. His little commute ship was parked with hundreds of others; a quarter sent the attendant robot obediently after it.

In ten minutes he was on his way to Ganymede.

The fasrad boarded his ship when he stopped at Mars to refuel.

"Apparently you don't understand," the fasrad said. "My instructions are to demonstrate myself until you're satisfied. As yet, you're not wholly convinced; further demonstration is necessary." It passed an intricate web over the controls of the ship until all the dials and meters were in adjustment. "You should have more frequent servicing."

It retired to the rear to examine the drive jets. Morris numbly signalled the attendant, and the ship was released from the fuel pumps. He gained speed and the small sandy planet fell behind. Ahead, Jupiter loomed.

"Your jets aren't in good repair," the fasrad said, emerging from the rear. "I don't like that knock to the main brake drive. As soon as you land I'll make extensive repair."

"The Company doesn't mind your doing favors for me?" Morris asked, with bitter sarcasm.

"The Company considers me your fasrad. An invoice will be mailed to you at the end of the month." The robot whipped out a pen and a pad of forms. "I'll explain the four easy-payment plans. Ten thousand gold units cash means a three per cent discount. In addition, a number of household items may be traded in -- items you won't have further need for. If you wish to divide the purchase in four parts, the first is due at once, and the last in ninety days."

"I always pay cash," Morris muttered. He was carefully resetting the route positions on the control board.

"There's no carrying charge for the ninety day plan. For the six month plan there's a six per cent per annum charge which will amount to approximately --" It broke off. "We've changed course."

"We've left the official traffic lane." The fasrad stuck its pen and pad away and hurried to the control board. "What are you doing? There's a two unit fine for this."

Morris ignored it. He hung on grimly to the controls and kept his eyes on the viewscreen. The ship was gaining speed rapidly. Warning buoys sounded angrily as he shot past them and into the bleak darkness of space beyond. In a few seconds they had left all traffic behind. They were alone, shooting rapidly away from Jupiter, out into deep space.

The fasrad computed the trajectory. "We're moving out of the solar system. Toward Centaurus."

"You guessed it."

"Hadn't you better call your wife?"

Morris grunted and notched the drive bar farther up. The ship bucked and pitched, then managed to right itself. The jets began to whine ominously. Indicators showed the main turbines were beginning to heat. He ignored them and threw on the emergency fuel supply.

"I'll call Mrs. Morris," the fasrad offered. "We'll be beyond range in a short while."

"Don't bother."

"She'll worry." The fasrad hurried to the back and examined the jets again. It popped back into the cabin buzzing with alarm. "Mr. Morris, this ship is not equipped for inter-system travel. It's a Class D four-shaft domestic model for home consumption only. It was never made to stand this velocity."

"To get to Proxima," Morris answered, "we need this velocity."

The fasrad connected its power cables to the control board. "I can take some of the strain off the wiring system. But unless you rev her back to normal I can't be responsible for the deterioration of the jets."

"The hell with the jets."

The fasrad was silent. It was listening intently to the growing whine under them. The whole ship shuddered violently. Bits of paint drifted down. The floor was hot from the grinding shafts. Morris' foot stayed on the throttle. The ship gained more velocity as Sol fell behind. They were out of the charted area. Sol receded rapidly.

"It's too late to vid your wife," the fasrad said. "There are three emergency-rockets in the stern; if you want, I'll fire them off in the hope of attracting a passing military transport."

"Why?"

"They can take us in tow and return us to the Sol system. There's a six hundred gold unit fine, but under the circumstances it seems to me the best policy."

Morris turned his back to the fasrad and jammed down the throttle with all his weight. The whine had grown to a violent roar. Instruments smashed and cracked. Fuses blew up and down the board. The lights dimmed, faded, then reluctantly came back.

"Mr. Morris," the fasrad said, "you must prepare for death. The statistical probabilities of turbine explosion are seventy-thirty. I'll do what I can, but the danger-point has already passed."

Morris returned to the viewscreen. For a time he gazed hungrily up at the growing dot that was the twin star Centaurus. "They look all right, don't they? Prox is the important one. Twenty planets." He examined the wildly fluttering instruments. "How are the jets holding up? I can't tell from these; most of them are burned out."

The fasrad hesitated. It started to speak, then changed its mind. "I'll go back and examine them," it said. It moved to the rear of the ship and disappeared down the short ramp into the thundering, vibrating engine chamber.

Morris leaned over and put out his cigarette. He waited a moment longer, then reached out and yanked the drives full up, the last possible notch on the board.

The explosion tore the ship in half. Sections of hull hurtled around him. He was lifted weightless and slammed into the control board. Metal and plastic rained down on him. Flashing incandescent points winked, faded, and finally died into silence, and there was nothing but cold ash.

The dull swish-swish of emergency air-pumps brought consciousness back. He was pinned under the wreckage of the control board; one arm was broken and bent under him. He tried to move his legs but there was no sensation below his waist.

The splintered debris that had been his ship was still hurling toward Centaurus. Hull-sealing equipment was feebly trying to patch the gaping holes. Automatic temperature and grav feeds were thumping spasmodically from self-contained batteries. In the viewscreen the vast flaming bulk of the twin suns grew quietly, inexorably.

He was glad. In the silence of the ruined ship he lay buried beneath the debris, gratefully watching the growing bulk. It was a beautiful sight. He had wanted to see it for a long time. There it was, coming closer each moment. In a day or two the ship would plunge into the fiery mass and be consumed. But he could enjoy this interval; there was nothing to disturb his happiness -- He thought about Sally, sound asleep under the radiant-lens. Would Sally have liked Proxima? Probably not. Probably she would have wanted to go back home as soon as possible. This was something he had to enjoy alone. This was for him only. A vast peace descended over him. He could lie here without stirring, and the flaming magnificence would come nearer and nearer...

A sound. From the heaps of fused wreckage something was rising. A twisted, dented shape dimly visible in the flickering glare of the viewscreen. Morris managed to turn his head.

The fasrad staggered to a standing position. Most of its trunk was gone, smashed and broken away. It tottered, then pitched forward on its face with a grinding crash. Slowly it inched its way toward him, then settled to a dismal halt a few feet off. Gears whirred creakily. Relays popped open and shut. Vague, aimless life animated its devastated hulk.

"Good evening," its shrill, metallic voice grated.

Morris screamed. He tried to move his body but the ruined beams held him tight. He shrieked and shouted and tried to crawl away from it. He spat and wailed and wept.

"I would like to show you a fasrad," the metallic voice continued. "Would you call your wife, please? I would like to show her a fasrad, too."

"Get away!" Morris screamed. "Get away from me!"

"Good evening," the fasrad continued, like a broken tape. "Good evening. Please be seated. I am happy to meet you. What is your name? Thank you. You are the first persons in your neighborhood to see the fasrad. Where are you employed?"

Its dead eye-lenses gaped at him empty and vacant.

"Please be seated," it said again. "This will take only a second. Only a second. This demonstration will take only a --"

[theheartgoeslast]

this is a good post but i think it's also very much worth mentioning that the likely deterioration of civil rights is not the only reason most forms of activism will be less effective under republican rule. you donate to your local food bank? hope you're ready to donate more once republicans cut tanf and free school lunches. you help people navigate applications for governmental aid? get ready to tell more clients that they're not eligible, sorry. you raise money for abortion funds? you'll need to raise more when more states make abortion illegal. you try to get people to reduce their carbon footprint? you'll need a new pitch once tax breaks for solar panels/electric vehicles/energy efficient appliances are scrapped. you volunteer at a free clinic? you'll have a lot more patients if people start losing their health insurance. you're trying to lobby your school board to put accurate, lgbtq-inclusive sex ed in the curriculum? good luck with that if said school board now contains members yelling about how gay and trans people are "groomers."

democratic victories up and down the ballot wouldn't eliminate the need for activism, but it would sure as hell make that activism a lot more productive and likely to succeed. which leads me to believe that people who say "i'm doing Real Activism instead of voting" either do not, in fact, do real activism, or they do it because they like the feeling of fighting against the system, not because they care about the people they're supposed to helping.

[our-flag-means-death-ao3feed]

Solar System Shuffle

by queenbee42

Having successfully stolen a new technology from the monarchy, and having had a mind-blowing encounter with the legendary space pirate Blackbeard while doing so, Stede Bonnet sets about wreaking his own unique brand of space pirate havoc throughout the solar system.

OR

Stede gets tenderly and lovingly ravished in zero-g in orbit around Saturn.

Words: 8880, Chapters: 1/1, Language: English

Series: Part 2 of See You Space Pirate

Fandoms: Our Flag Means Death (TV)

Rating: Explicit

Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply

Categories: M/M

Characters: Stede Bonnet, Blackbeard | Edward Teach, Lucius Spriggs, Jim Jimenez, Oluwande Boodhari, Israel Hands, "Calico" Jack Rackham

Relationships: Blackbeard | Edward Teach/Stede Bonnet

Additional Tags: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Queer Character, Canon Queer Character, Canon Queer Relationship, neurodivergent characters, Space Pirates, Alternate Universe - Space, Smut, Porn, Porn With Plot, Porn with Feelings, Blow Jobs, Oral Sex, Anal Fingering, Anal Sex, Dirty Talk, Zero-gravity sex, Innuendo, Author is Open to Hearing about Dead Batteries, Bottom Stede Bonnet, Top Blackbeard | Edward Teach, Blackbeard | Edward Teach Loves Stede Bonnet, Stede Bonnet Loves Blackbeard | Edward Teach, Ed’s eyeliner is its own character now, Ed is such a sexy dork, Stede is a sex god and has no idea, Ed is a sex god and absolutely knows it, lube is fun in zero-g, unconventional storage formats, Ed’s bun hides a surprise, ghost ship - Freeform, schooner I don't even know her, Ed Teach loves chocolate chip cookies, no hinges all the doors are automatic

source https://archiveofourown.org/works/44761525

[jamaisjoons]

I wish i had a sister like you girl, like cmon tell me all the magic tricks of sucking dick i wanna learn!!!!!!!!! i wanna maKE ALL MEN PRAISE MEE (but srsly babe tell me😭😭😭

i can’t believe i’m actually doing this - but here’s a quick guide on how to give some good head:

literally the first thing i’m going to say is pay attention to him. i know we all joke about how men are all the same and blah blah in bed - but the thing is they’re not. each man is different, with different likes and dislikes and different sexual interests. what works for one man will not necessarily work for someone else. so pay attention to how he’s reacting to you - whether he’s super into it or losing interest. like just pay attention to him okay. like you don’t have to constantly be like ‘oh do you like this? oh is this okay’ - you can usually tell by whether he’s being vocal, of if he’s moving around more than usual or if his dick reacting a different way. some classic signs (which i always use in my fics): is he throbbing, does his dick twitch, is he dripping precum, is his breathing becoming heavier, is he being more vocal etc etc. whatever it is, pay attention.

also communication. like if it’s a random one night stand it ain’t gonna matter whether u give good head or nah, but if its a boyfriend/partner/fwb or whatever and you’re gonna fuck more than once - communicate. find out what he likes, whether he likes it when you use your teeth (some men do, some don’t), whether they like it when you moan for them (some like the vibrations, some find it weird), whether he likes when u coat his cock in spit (again, some do, others don’t like their cocks bathed in spit) but w/e it is,, COMMUNICATE. ON GOD COMMUNICATE. good, healthy sex only works with communication and ofc it works both ways

actually want to give head. like i can’t stress this enough, but if you don’t genuinely enjoy sucking some dick - he’s not going to enjoy it and neither are you. just because he’s the one getting pleasure, doesn’t mean you can’t too. if you’re honestly into sucking cock, then you’ll get as much pleasure out of it as he will. also get into the headspace of giving head: i.e. if you don’t wanna do it, don’t. you have no obligation to suck a man off and if you do? go wild and show him you’re enjoying it

foreplay. on gOD u need foreplay. don’t just swallow his dick that’s counter-intuitive like - yes u want him to eventually raw ur throat (if ur into that) but BUILD UP TO IT. use your hands, your lips, your tongues. pump his shaft, give him teasing licks, kiss his cock - like whatever it is - FOREPLAY. like yes head is considered foreplay but u gotta warm up pregame pregame if ygm. also sometimes ur not always gonna have penetrative sex - some people can’t - so like, treat whatever you’re doing as endgame and whatever you do before is the foreplay.

work ur wAY SLOWLY. nothing is hotter than being a tease and getting him worked up before u give him that good sloppy toppy. start at the top and kiss and lick his slit (if u can stomach the taste and if his dick is clean,,, but tbh if his dick ain’t clean don’t suck him off till he cleans it smh nasty ass) and then slowly take him into your mouth. only take as much as you want/are comfortable. unless you’re into gagging/choking on cock/are used to deepthroating, you wanna go slow. unless ur like uno, just tryna get a good throat fucking in which go wild and let him use your mouth (ONLY IF U WANNA !!)

i hope u know about erogenous zones because USE THEM. if you don’T KNOW THEM LEARN THEM. some erogenous zones for men: their frenulum (like the underside of the penis) is super sensitive, also their balls ofc, their head usually too and ofc their perineum (base of their balls). but obviously, these aren’t the only places, i’m not gonna go into detail but like i knew one guy who has sensitive inner thighs and u can see where i’m going with this. but anyway  - lick, touch, kiss w/e all these areas - use them to ur advantage.

this may be stupid but USE YOUR TONGUE. USE IT. ON GOD USE IT. JUST SUCKING IS BORING. YOU NEED VARIETY. alternate between long and short strokes, change the pace, go from straight strokes to circular ones, and also change the pattern - hell use your tongue to draw shapes on his dick for all i care (actually drawing the alphabet or numbers or random geometric shapes on/around his head will do wonders). the tongue is a super agile muSCLE AND U WILL USE IT. also if u can manage, while he’s actually in your mouth, to move your tongue against his cock? 12/10

only do whatever you’re comfortable doing - but also don’t be afraid to test your limits. i didn’t start having sex with a choking/gagging kink and i definitely didn’t start enjoying with my face being fucked. but i did gradually build up to it and found out i thoroughly enjoyed it. but not everyone will - and that’s okay and that’s valid. like i said, blowjobs are just as much for your pleasure as his and if you’re not comfortable or enjoying - say something. if you wanna try something new, also say something. if you want ur partner to hold your hair and fuck your throat - let him know. if you don’t want that - also let him know.

i have more tips but these are the main ones. like jdnfefoe i can’t believe i’ve done this but yolo,,,, happy dick sucking xxx

[lacontroller1991]

Kinktober/Whumptober/Flufftober

HEY GUYS!!!!! So I am incredibly indecisive on which one of these challenges to do, so I combined them all into a list and chose which prompt I want to do each day during the month of October, and this is what I came up with:

Day 1 Dirty Talk : “This Wasn’t Supposed to Happen” : Wearing Each Other’s Clothes

Stephen Holder - He can't find his hoodie despite it hiding in plain sight.

Day 2 Mommy and Daddy : Confrontation : “You’ve told your parents?” 

Gordo Stevens - You and him have some fun while the kids are asleep.

Day 3 Sweat : Gun To Temple : Thick as Thieves

Rick Flag - Rick finds it distracting (but really hot) when you work out.

Day 4 Breath Play : Hidden Injury : Hobbies

Bucky Barnes - You hide a stab wound from Bucky.

Day 5 Breeding : Running Out of Air : “Oh no, you’re a morning person.”

Gordo Stevens - After an asteroid hits your capsule's air supply, you and Gordo face your inevitable death together.

Day 6 Cock warming : “I’ve Got a Pulse” : Candles

Rick Flag - You find him dead, until he proves otherwise.

Day 7 Costumes : Silent Panic Attack : Movie Marathon

Gordo Stevens - After Ed announces the crew of STS-83-R, Gordo gets overwhelmed and you're quick to notice.

Day 8 Creampie : Back from the Dead : Shooting Stars

Ed Baldwin - After a tiresome day at work, Ed takes you star watching.

Day 9 Stripping : Tossing and Turning : Game Day (Sports)

Rick Flag - Rick and you take your kid to their first soccer game.

Day 10 Drunk Sex : Waterboarding : Love Language 

Johnny Lawrence - Who knew a couple of beers would end you up in the arms of your ex.

Day 11 Erotic Photos : Self Done First Aid : Music

Ed Baldwin - "YOU SENT ME PICTURES OF YOURSELF NAKED WHILE I WAS AT WORK", prompt requested by @a-reader-and-a-writer from ages ago.

Day 12 Voyeurism : Rusty Nail : “You kept this?”

Daryl Dixon - Daryl finds a necklace that he gave you years ago.

Day 13 Dry Humping : Fracture : Secret Family Recipe

Stephen Holder - You're horny and Holder looks really handsome when concentrating.

Day 14 Love Bites : “I’ll be right behind you” : Truth or Dare

Stephen Holder - You didn't know you were dating a vampire.

Day 15 Overstimulation : New Scars : Accidents don’t just happen accidentally

Rick Flag - He comes home from another mission with new scars.

Day 16 Bath/Shower Sex : “No one’s coming” : “I hate you” “I love you too.”

OPEN

Day 17 Pegging : Breaking Point : Animal Shelter

Rick Flag - Rick finally snaps, accidentally ruining your relationship.

Day 18 Bondage : “Take my coat.” : Soulmate AU

Frankie Dalton - Despite you being royalty, Frankie knows that you're his and his alone.

Day 19 Masturbation : Head Lolling : Hot Chocolate

Takeshi Kovacs - Takeshi watches you while you pleasure yourself under his command.

Day 20 Mirror Sex : Going into Shock : Bedtime Stories

Joe Pickett - You watch your husband give bed time stories, except the stories are real.

Day 21 Praise Kink : “Take me instead.” : Kiss for Good Luck

Takeshi Kovacs

Day 22 Phone Sex : Withdrawal : “Have you heard?”

Stephen Holder - Holder hasn't been feeling his self lately, and you know why.

Day 23 Food Play : Forced to Kneel : POV Outsider

Gordo Stevens + Ed Baldwin - The duo invites you over for a BBQ except you're the menu.

Day 24 Outdoor Sex : Blood Covered Hands : All the Hugs

OPEN

Day 25 Sex Pollen : Lost Voice : First Dance

Gordo Stevens - When a solar storm hits Jamestown, you and Gordo accidentally breathe in regolith, igniting a spark you didn't know either of you had.

Day 26 Sexting : Separated : Blankets

Rick Flag - Rick comforts you on a bad day.

Day 27 Stockings : Muffled Screams : Reunion

Ed Baldwin - When Ed gets back from a mission, he's expecting you to be there to greet him, except you have other ideas. - @a-reader-and-a-writer

Day 28 Formal Wear : Punching the Wall : Picnic

Rick Flag - Rick tries on his old uniform and you can't keep your hands off.

Day 29 Body Worship : Sleep Deprivation : Leaves

Gordo Stevens - Gordo feels unworthy because of his weight, you prove him other wise.

Day 30 Public : Manhandled : Dear Diary

Gordo Stevens - After a flight, Gordo takes you in the hangar.

Day 31 Mile High Club : Comfort : A Sweet Treat

John Tavner - He's stressed and you help out.

The ones in Bold are the ones I'm doing each day! I combined prompts from @the-purity-pen @whumptober and @flufftober so make sure to check out these blogs for October writing challenges!

I will be taking requests if anybody wants to see a specific character for a specific day, though I do not guarantee I will go with that choice (I have most of them planned out but I would love to see what people come up with!) So please send some ideas in!!!!

Characters I Write For:

Rick Flag, Takeshi Kovacs, Stephen Holder, Ed Baldwin

Johnny Lawrence

Gordo Stevens, Joe Pickett, John Tavner

Negan, Daryl Dixon, Rick Grimes

Bucky Barnes

Can't wait to see what you guys come up with!

[sitp-recs]

Do you know of any fics under 10k that aren’t too angsty? ❤️

Hi anon, I most certainly do! Thanks so much for sending this ask, I was super excited when I saw it because I’m always happy to celebrate short fics - they could use more appreciation! I’ve wanted to do a proper shorts reclist for a while so I indulged myself and went big, hope you don’t mind! Putting this together was quite hard - going through my bookmarks I realized that I usually go for angsty shorts 💀 so I tried my best not to include anything too extreme, I hope these are okay!

This became a lil monster with 40 recs (and I have lots more hehe) so I decided to sort them by genre - the last category includes light angst (more on the contemplative side) because I can’t help myself. Shout-out to @tackytigerfic for giving me a 2nd opinion and helping me polish this - and for being a darling in general. Happy readings!

ROMANCE/COMFORT

1. Sun Stroke by @peachpety (2020, E, 3k)

Warm, sexy and wholesome, this fic makes my heart soar with the magical beach setting, amazing friendship dynamics and the sweet get together with a delicious side of smut!

2. oxygen [Fic & Art] by @maesterchill (2020, T, 4k)

Tentative acquaintances become something more over a shared smoke at the balcony. Sexy, mature, deliciously atmospheric and full of promise - plus Healer Draco is always a treat!

3. Catch the Snitch (No, Catch My Heart) by @prolix- (2020, E, 4.5k)

Gorgeous bath fic where Harry and Draco just... take care of each other. The raw emotion packed here! Lush and vivid build up with stunning body worship, hot and intimate and breathtaking.

4. Thermodynamic Equilibrium by DorthyAnn (2017, T, 5k)

This quiet comfort fic gives our boys some well deserved healing through physical touching and late night companionship. Love the 8th year atmosphere, soothing and familiar.

5. Blue Sky Is Living Here Today by ignatiustrout (2018, G, 5k)

The loveliest kid fic you’ll see today - real characters, gentle longing, soft understanding. It’s a joy to watch dad Draco through Harry’s smitten eyes, as he realizes there’s no rush to live that love.

6. Gravity Centered by @carpemermaidtales (2019, E, 6.7k)

Possibly my favorite Quidditch fic, this has an original premise and amazing Drarry dynamics, casual and organic, sassy and familiar, with a perfect lil twist at the end!

7. Up The by @shiftylinguini (2018, E, 7.5k)

One of the funniest PWPs I’ve ever read, clever and charming with easy banter and delicious smut. A sweet and sexy glimpse into the Drarry married life! Cw Mpreg

8. And a Malfoy in a Pear Tree by lauren3210 (2015, E, 8k)

Sweet sweet coffee shop Christmas romance! Love the light and fun atmosphere, the easy banter and cute wooing while supportive Ron cheers in the background, what a treat!

9. Ice Snakes, Glow-worms and Wolverine Stew by khalulu (2015, M, 8.4k)

Khalulu writes the softest Drarry, it never fails to put a smile on my face. This has a gentle and sweet get together, with lovely slow burn, a gorgeous San Francisco setting and matchmaker Kreacher 💗

10. Life goes not backward by @shealwaysreads (2020, T, 8.8k)

This delicate comfort fic has a special way to tug at my heartstrings - a gorgeous tale about found family and the unexpected wonders of life. Gentle, magical and breathtaking in its simplicity.

HUMOUR

11. in charge by @bonesliketambourines (2020, E, 2.4k)

The ultimate brat Draco, bossy and confident and absolutely gorgeous with his long hair and impossible snark. Charming and funny, this packs so much character and domestic bliss under 3k! Perfect spoiled Draco is perfect.

12. The Morning After by birdsofshore, capitu (2015, M, 5.3k)

This is hysterical and so delightfully creative - Draco exploring Harry’s kitchen and charming a prudish appliance is the kind of cute, silly endeavor I need with my morning coffee!

13. The Spoiling of Sex From Enthusiastic Ignorance by @cibeewastaken (2020, E, 6k)

I’m impossibly enamored with Cibee’s drama queen Draco and his passionate missions! This time he’s decided to get some good diq, and the dialogue and mutual pining will make you smile from beginning to end.

14. All Tied Up by MyNameIsThunder (2020, M, 6k)

This is a secret relationship delight! Sneaking around gets so much better when dramatic Blaise is losing his shit to protect the Council of Serpents’ integrity! A+ faux-drama, super fun and sweet.

15. Luckiest Fucking Size Queen Alive by @l0vegl0wsinthedark (2016, E, 6.2k)

My favorite brand of thirsty and chaotic Draco; being inside his mind is such a crazy ride and you won’t stop laughing for a second. Amazing dialogue and insanely scorching smut as per loveglows’ usual 🤤

16. Sex Ed for Aurors by curiouslyfic (2010, M, 8.7k)

This is a Harry triumph, so fun and charming! Here he’s the one chaotic and thirsty, for a change - I’m obsessed with his internal ranting under the lust potion. Brilliant narrative and top notch characterization, a classic!

17. Ferocious Determination, Insufficient Deliberation, and a Slightly Wrong Destination by Faith Wood (2012, E, 9.5k)

Drunk Draco has never been so absurd and I LOVE it! This goes from hilarious to vulnerable and sweet in a heartbeat; pining Draco is a precious thing and Harry’s gentle persistence made my heart swell.

18. Stand Back: I'm About to Perform Archaeology by Blowfish_Diaries (2018, E, 9.7k)

This fic could definitely use more appreciation - I had a blast with Draco’s hilarious voice and their cute married banter! The plot is quite original and I love the 8th year domestic vibes.

19. The Full Monty by @magpiefngrl (2017, E, 9.8k)

The calendar fic we deserve 👏🏻 this is ultimate thirsty Draco being completely obliterated by Harry’s casual attractiveness but mostly by his kind heart and big smile. One of my favorite comfort reads, hilarious, sweet and so damn sexy, the full monty combo is here!

20. Aural Gratification by birdsofshore (2014, E, 10k)

This fic is a classic, charming and hysterical with an adorable Harry thirsting over Draco’s smooth voice. Such an original concept and engaging read, not to mention the rewarding shade of smut!

SMUT

21. Tense by Faith Wood (2013, E, 3k)

Me, reading smut for the dialogue? It’s more likely than you think 😂 this fic is hilarious and hot all at once, with perfect banter and clever dialogue, really a smut triumph!

22. Under Your Skin by @p1013 (2020, Explicit, 4k)

Great premise and the sexiest build up, ugh so much teasing and anticipation as pierced Draco takes Auror Harry’s control away 🔥kudos at the A+ twist and promising ending!

23. The Slytherin Urn by @icmezzo (2015, E, 4.6k)

This fic’s geniality slaps me in the face, what a fascinating concept! Redemption kink and magical theory walk together as Harry loses his mind over competent Draco doing some badass curse-breaking ritual.

24. Once Bitten by Frayach (2012, E, 5.6k)

Still one of the hottest things I’ve ever read, lush and raw and absolutely breathtaking. Dark and tender at once, it explores biting kink with unapologetic precision and I love that!

25. Matched Set by astolat (2016, E, 5.7k)

One of my faves by the genius astolat, this is a perfect mix of hot size kink, A+ dirty talk and a brilliant and nuanced plot showing how Harry navigates his post-war reality. A must-read!

26. Teeth by @amelior8or (2020, E, 6k)

This fic is an emotional rollercoaster and goes from light-hearted and casual to vulnerable and tender in a second. Hot and intimate feat scorching wall sex, gut-punching lines and enthusiastic consent🔥

27. Born Slippy by @dracoladon (2020, E, 8.3k)

My favorite clubbing fic ever, clever and sensual, a master class in UST including the drunk haze confusion and panty kink as a treat! I can’t even talk about this fic without blushing 😳

28. The Page Eleven Wars by fireflavored (2010, E, 8.5k)

Competitive boys fighting for dominance both in bed and at the gossip column’s first page This is peak enemies to lovers: witty banter, hot smut screaming switching rights and feisty stubborn idiots finally getting over their asses.

29. The Things They Never Say by @bixgirl1 (2017, E, 9k)

Angry porn with (many) feels, this feels like a punch to the solar plexus. The explosive Drarry chemistry gives way to something quieter and gentler and full of longing, ugh but it aches so good. Absolutely exquisite!

30. Sweet Indulgence by @the-sinking-ship (2020, E, 10k)

The title says it all; this is a lush and charming read, with chaotic but nuanced Draco pining over authoritative, edgy Harry 😳 steaming pent up tension that culminates in glorious semi-public smut, is your body ready?

CONTEMPLATIVE/SOFT ANGST

31. Sharing a Pack by sugar_screw (2016, E, 2.7k)

A fully fleshed-out love story in less than 3k, with complex characters and powerful feels. Raw, poignant and unbelievably romantic.

32. Still Life by orphan_account (2019, M, 3k)

A superb and gut-punching story where Harry realizes all the little things that make Draco so very different from him - and falls in love anyway. Powerful in its simplicity and concise elegance.

33. Harmony (Left-Handed Melody Remix) by mindabbles (2010, M, 5.8k)

Draco finds his way post-war and Harry meets him in the middle. Aching and bittersweet but also hopeful, with a delicious side of coconut cake, Harry in black robes and Romeo & Juliet as soundtrack.

34. Let Me Have You and I'll Let You Save Me by Frayach (2012, M, 6k)

Enemies to lovers deluxe version! Come and feast on this original narrative, amazingly clever, rich and detailed, telling us an unlikely but inevitable love story.

35. A Pain of Our Choosing by @lqtraintracks (2020, E, 6k)

Broken boys fucking through their issues and healing together during the post-war is so my jam! A+ LQT goodness, this fic is evocative and quietly devastating, but full of feels and hope.

36. Our Little Life by @tackytigerfic (2020, M, 7k)

I’ve screamed about this brilliant fic recently; inventive, poignant and utterly romantic, this fic shows all the ways in which Harry and Draco find each other across space and time.

37. the keys to your kingdom by thistle_verse (2016, E, 7.5k)

A beautiful love story packing an impressive amount of character, conflict and emotion. We are invited to witness as work partners Harry and Draco finally take a leap of faith and grow out of their casual arrangement.

38. Clear As Mud by scoradh (2005, M, 9.8k)

Subtle and heart-wrenching, the sharp and clever narrative creates fascinating dynamics between this brilliantly written Draco and poor oblivious Harry trying to make sense out of it. An all-time fave. Cw: infidelity (not Drarry).

39. fine i'll hold my breath / til i forget it's complicated by teatrolley (2015, E, 10k)

Fucks buddies gone wrong but make it soft so we get to watch as pining Draco patiently waits for Harry to get the memo. Sweet and intimate, with lots of late night talks and comfortable silence.

40. Tidings of Comfort series by @blamebrampton (2012, G, 10k)

Quietly cathartic and atmospheric, this fic is a poignant balm to the soul; such a beautiful tone, such lovely interactions! A must-read for those who enjoy church settings, honest talks and redeemed Draco. All-time fave.

[lioninsunheart]

PANDEMIC OP-ED- “BOOMERS VS. THE HIPPIES’  (FREE SPIRITS OF CHANGE) - 11-3-2,021. PLANET: EARTH.

ALERT: LONG READ.

EXCERPTS FROM : 

“The Hippies Were Right! / Green homes? Organic food? Nature is good? Time to give the ol' tie-dyers some respect.”

-Mark Morford, SF Gate Columnist-

“Go ahead, name your movement. Name something good and positive and pro-environment and eco-friendly that's happening right now in the newly "greening" America and don't say more guns in Texas or fewer reproductive choices for women or endless vile unwinnable BushCo wars in the Middle East lasting until roughly 2075 because that would defeat the whole point of this little column and destroy its naive tone of happy rose-colored sardonic optimism. OK?.........”

....Look around: we have entire industries devoted to recycled paper, a new generation of cheap solar-power technology and an Oscar for "An Inconvenient Truth" and even the soulless corporate monsters over at famously heartless joints like Wal-Mart are now claiming that they really, really care about saving the environment because, well, "it's the right thing to do" (read: It's purely economic and all about their bottom line because if they don't start caring they'll soon be totally screwed on manufacturing and shipping costs at/from all their brutal Chinese sweatshops).......

.....There is but one conclusion you can draw from the astonishing (albeit fitful, bittersweet) pro-environment sea change now happening in the culture and (reluctantly, nervously) in the halls of power in D.C., one thing we must all acknowledge in our wary, jaded, globally warmed universe: The hippies had it right all along (Stop calling them ‘Boomers’ they still have feelings-it’s an insult and always has been). Oh yes they had it right!....

....Here's a suggestion, from one of my more astute ex-hippie readers: Instead of issuing carbon credits so industrial polluters can clear their collective corporate conscience, maybe, to help offset all the savage damage they've done to the soul of the planet all these years, these commercial cretins should instead buy some karma credits from the former hippies themselves. You know, from those who've been working for the health of the planet, quite thanklessly, for the past 50 years and who have, as a result, built up quite a storehouse of good karma. You think?.....

......Of course, you can easily argue that much of the "authentic" hippie ethos -- the anti-corporate ideology, the sexual liberation, the anarchy, the push for civil rights, the experimentation -- has been totally leeched out of all these new movements, that corporations have forcibly co-opted and diluted every single technology and humble pro-environment idea and Ben & Jerry's ice cream cone and Odwalla smoothie to make them both palatable and profitable. But does this somehow make the organic oils in that body lotion any more harmful? Verily, it does not......

......You might also just as easily claim that much of the nation's reluctant turn toward environmental health has little to do with the hippies per se, that it's taking the threat of global meltdown combined with the notion of really, really expensive ski tickets to slap the nation's incredibly obese ass into gear and force consumers to begin to wake up to the savage gluttony and wastefulness of American culture as everyone starts wondering, oh my God, what's going to happen to swimming pools and NASCAR and free shipping from Amazon? Of course, without the '60s groundwork, without all the radical ideas and seeds of change planted nearly five decades ago, what we'd be turning to in our time of need would be a great deal more hopeless indeed......

....But if you're really bitter and shortsighted, you could say the entire hippie movement overall was just incredibly overrated, gets far too much cultural credit for far too little actual impact, was pretty much a giant excuse to slack off and enjoy dirty lazy responsibility-free sex romps and do a ton of drugs and avoid Vietnam and not bathe for a month and name your child Sunflower or Shiva Moon or Chakra Lennon Sapphire Bumblebee. This is what's called the reactionary simpleton's view. It blithely ignores history, perspective, the evolution of culture as a whole. You know, just like America......

.....But, you know, whatever. The proofs are easy enough to trace. The core values and environmental groundwork laid by the '60s counterculture are still so intact and potent even the stiffest and hateful Republican has to acknowledge their extant power. It's all right there: Treehugger.com is the new '60s underground hippy zine. Ecstasy is the new LSD. Visible tattoos are the new longhairs. And bands as diverse as Pearl Jam to Bright Eyes to NIN to the Foo Fighters are writing savage anti-war songs for a new, ultra-jaded generation.....

And oh yes, speaking of good ol' MDMA (Ecstasy), even drug culture is getting some new respect. Staid old Time mag just ran a rather snide little story about the new studies being conducted by Harvard and the National Institute of Mental Health into the astonishing psychospiritual benefits of goodly entheogens such as LSD, psilocybin and MDMA. Unfortunately, the piece basically backhands Timothy Leary and the entire "excessive," "naive" drug culture of yore in favor of much more "sane" and "careful" scientific analysis happening now, as if the only valid methods for attaining knowledge and an understanding of spirit were through control groups and clinical, mysticism-free examination. Please.!........

.......Still, the fact that serious scientific research into entheogens is being conducted even in the face of the most anti-science, pro-pharmaceutical, ultra-conservative presidential regime in recent history is proof enough that all the hoary old hippie mantras about expanding the mind and touching God through drugs were onto something after all (yes, duh). Tim Leary is probably smiling wildly right now -- though that might be due to all the mushrooms he's been sharing with Kerouac and Einstein and Mary Magdalene. Mmm, heaven.......

....Of course, true hippie values mean you're not really supposed to care about or attach to any of this, you don't give a damn for the hollow ego stroke of being right all along, for slapping the culture upside the head and saying, See? Do you see? It was never about the long hair and the folk music and Woodstock and taking so much acid you see Jesus and Shiva and Buddha tongue kissing in a hammock on the Dog Star, idiots!....

....It was, always and forever, about connectedness. It was about how we are all in this together. It was about resisting the status quo and fighting tyrannical corporate/political power and it was about opening your consciousness and seeing new possibilities of how we can all live with something resembling actual respect for the planet, for alternative cultures, for each other. You know, all that typical hippie crap no one believes in anymore. Right?”

[justlightlysedated]

Soulmate 51!!!

51. Your soulmate’s current thoughts about you will show up on your skin for a short while.

Miss you, miss you, miss you, appears across the back of his left hand, a light tingling sensation like someone was passing their finger across his skin announces their presence just as Michael picks up his beer.

A warmth fuzzy and soft, simmers in the pit of his stomach, and he bites down on the smile that wants to spread across his face.

Instead he drops the beer back on top of the table, and closes his eyes thinking, I miss you, so much more.

When he opens his eyes, feels a little shocked to see Maria sitting across from him.

It had been almost six months since their break up, and with all of the restrictions in place thanks to the quarantine, Michael hadn’t had to try very hard to avoid her.

He hadn’t even heard her truck come up, probably too distracted by Alex. It’s been a while since Michael has fully embraced their soulmate bond, and over the last couple of months he and Alex have been leaving more and more messages on each other, deliberately thinking them at each other.

After hearing Alex sing that song, he couldn’t exactly keep his thoughts to himself, and when he’d run out of the bar, feeling a weird sort of embarrassment at the fact that everyone could see his thoughts spread across the backs of Alex’s hands and up and around his neck, almost like a collar.

Alex hadn’t followed after him, but the words, me too had settled around Michael’s left wrist like a snug bracelet.

"Is there something I can help you with, DeLuca?" He asks, covering the back of his hand with his other hand, almost automatically, so used to keeping the words that had sporadically appeared on his skin while they were dating away from her.

She opens her mouth and then closes it, brow furrowing, and looking a little frustrated, like the conversation isn’t going the way she thought it would.

Michael takes in the way she keeps licking her lips, and her shifty eyes, and her fidgety fingers, and the fact that her leg is bouncing so much the buckle of her boot is hitting the metal legs of the chair. 

And then he tilts his head to the side and takes in her outfit, something that he might’ve noticed right off the bat several months ago. She’s wearing one of those short jumper things, that he’s pretty sure he’s heard Isobel call a romper, in a brown color that very nearly matches her own skin tone, the neckline plunges all the way down, exposing a line down the middle of her chest with a thick black belt around her waist. Her hair was left curly and messy, the way that it usually looked in the mornings before she showered and took a straightener to it, the way that Michael used to tell her that he liked it.

She’s not wearing a lot of makeup, but the fact that she is, along with everything else, paints the picture of why she’s here for Michael, and Michael can’t help feeling both incredulous and a little bit angry.

Before he can say anything, Maria pushes her shoulders back, making the slit in the romper widen as she looks at Michael from beneath heavy lids.

"How've you been?" She asks instead of getting to the point. "It's been a while."

And the way she says the last sentence erases any doubts that Michael had in his head.

Maria was here not as an ex who was once a friend to check up on him, but as an ex who wants to keep reaping from the benefits of their failed relationship.

Michael hadn't been lying to Maria when he told her that he loved her, and it had hurt so much when she'd told him that it was over.

But it had hurt even more when Alex had told him that he was leaving, and it was then that Michael realized that while he did love her, he loved Alex more, and in a way that was completely different.

If Maria left today, and didn't talk to him again, Michael would go on living his life, maybe a little sad for a while, but he'd get over it.

If Alex decided to never speak to him again, Michael wouldn't die, but it would feel like he was.

It was that easy and that simple. So it's easy and simple, to grab his beer and take a long swig and then speak.

"I'm doing fine," he says, voice clipped, trying to copy how Alex talks to strangers who won't leave him alone at the bar. "Things are rough, yeah, but that's the same everywhere these days."

"I hear that," Maria says, chuckling a little and then making a hand at his beer. "You're not gonna offer me one?"

"I would," Michael says, taking the last swing of his beer. "If the beer was what you were here for."

Maria raises both eyebrows at that, almost like she hadn't expected to be caught out so soon, or like she'd been expecting for Michael to play along with her.

She tries to pull an innocent face at him, and then sighs, leaning back in her chair, and crossing her arms over her chest.

"Fine, you want the truth? The truth is that it's been months and I am a girl with a healthy sex appetite, okay? And my choices were either going to a super spreader event, the two numbers on my phone that I would consider only under dire circumstances, or someone who wouldn't mind having sex with an ex."

She says the last choice, voice a little breathy and gives him a pointed look that would've worked on him months ago, but it barely makes a flame flicker now.

"When did I ever give you the impression that I wouldn't mind having sex with an ex?" Michael asks, honestly interested in the answer.

Maria gives him an incredulous look back, as though the answer should be obvious, and it hits him almost like a ton of  bricks to the solar plexus.

"You're talking about Alex?" He asks, feeling even more incredulous.

"Obviously," she says, and then clears her throat, batting her eyelashes. "I know it's technically not the same thing, but I know you still had feelings for me when we broke up, and breaking up didn't just make my feelings disappear, so I was hoping you wouldn't mind, giving me a helping hand."

"DeLuca," Michael says, trying to sound earnest and kind. "I'm flattered. Really. But the answer is no."

Maria blinks at him a few times like he'd pulled a rabbit out of his hat, "Are you serious?"

She gives him a look like he would be an idiot to reject what she's offering, and there is a small part of him that is yelling at him to take the offer, because sex is sex, but he doesn't listen to that part because there is an even bigger part reminding him that Alex is coming back and that things will be different when he gets here.

"Yeah," Michael says, looking at her evenly.

Her eyes fall away from his face, just as he feels a tingling sensation across his forearm.

Michael lifts his arm to see the words as they appear.

Not possible.

Michael sees her noticing the words that must appear, and her eyebrows almost shoot off her face in her clear surprise.

"So that's why?" She says, sounding like she just figured something out. "You found your soulmate."

"I've known who my soulmate's been for a while now, DeLuca," he says. "Knowing that it was him didn't make it any easier for us to be together."

Maria frowns, "Your soulmate is a guy. But I thought that Alex was the only guy you've ever been interested in."

She says it with conviction like in the months that they dated they talked about their exes, but she never asked, and Michael never brought it up.

"I'm not straight with an Alex exception," Michael says, and he can't help the sneer when she fixes him with an incredulous look. "I'm bisexual, and I've been sexually attracted to and sexually involved with plenty of more men than just Alex."

Maria makes a face at that, like she doesn't understand, but Michael isn't a sex ed teacher, and he's not going to pull up charts and explain to her what she doesn't understand.

"What about Alex?" She asks, looking angrier by the second. "You're going to break his heart with this whole soulmate thing."

"Like you didn't come here with the intention of breaking his heart by propositioning me," Michael retorts.

Maria colors slightly, but doesn't back down.

She opens her mouth to keep speaking, probably to defend herself, but Michael shakes his head a little.

"Listen, Alex has nothing to worry about because he has a direct line to my thoughts about him at all times."

He gives her a pointed look and it still takes her a moment to realize it.

"Alex is your soulmate," she says, sounding both shocked and defeated.

"Yep," Michael says, popping the p, and wishing he still had another beer out here.

"How long have you known?"

"Since we were seventeen," he says and she makes a rude noise at the back of her throat.

She stares at him for a moment, stupefied and angry, "This was never going to actually work between us, huh?"

Michael just licks his lips, and gives her a helpless look, "Some things just aren't meant to be."

She nods her head sharply at that and then gets to her feet.

"Sorry, for bothering you, it won't happen again," she says and then turns to leave before Michael can say anything.

And then turns back around, "And please, don't tell anyone I was here. Me knowing that I fell low enough to do this is more than enough."

And then turns and actually makes it to her truck this time.

Michael lets the icy hurt that spreads across his chest at her parting words slide away.

Instead he looks back down at the words fading on his arm, and lets the warmth of knowing Alex is somewhere else thinking about him and missing Michael as much as Michael misses him, fill him up, chasing the rest of the chill away.

[beautifulvinyl]

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[jeannereames]

Is is true that Alexander used to perform dressed as the goddess Artemis? And, if it is, why do you think he did that?

Finally getting to this question. I wanted to double check some things before tackling it.

First, the story of Alexander dressing up as gods comes to us from Ephippos (Athen. 537e-538b). Ephippos of Olynthos was a hostile source, writing On the Death and Burial of Alexander and Hephaistion, which survives only in fragments. He was Greek, not Macedonian, and from the town Philip had razed to the ground in 348. He was probably a contemporary of Alexander, but if the Ephippos mentioned in Arrian is the same guy, he was left behind in Egypt as a superintendent when Alexander left—so he was not hanging out at his court. IOW, his reports are not from a long-term courtier. At most, Ephippos visited Babylon.

Anyway, I wanted to give a little context for who this person is, and that we cannot trust he knew what he was talking about, or had seen any of it first-hand.

Second, remember that Macedonian kings weren’t just military and political leaders, they were also religious symbols and the high priest for their people, required to conduct specific rites related to the health of the kingdom. For instance, he made a libation when leaving or returning to the capital city (whether just Aigai or also Pella is not clear), leaving the bounds of Macedonia, crossing certain rivers, regular morning sacrifices (ATG was still doing them when he could do nothing else prior to his death), etc. Spartans kings had similar roles, as did the elected “king” in other Greek city-states. When kingship ended in S. Greece, the religious role he had filled remained critical, and so they began electing a king by lot each year! We also know that the elected “basileus” (king) of Athens played dress-up as Dionysos at the Anthesteria, where he had sex (?) with his wife (as Ariadne)—although not in front of a crowd! LOL. But the idea of a king performing as a god at a religious rite is common enough. (Similar roles were required of ANE kings.)

We’re told that Alexander dressed up as Hermes, Artemis, Herakles, Dionysos, and Zeus-Ammon. Who they are is significant: especially Hermes, Herakles, and Dionysos, all of whom were important deities in the region, with connections to the Solar Deities (Dionysos) and The Rider, or Hero the Horseman (Herakles/Hermes/even Artemis, as hunters). And, of course, Macedonian kings were descendants of Zeus via Herakles. A lot is made of Alexander as the New Achilles, and he does seem to have courted that at points—but folks, there is TWICE as much about Alexander and Herakles in the sources. In the Hellenistic period, Macedonia had a huge cult to Herakles Kynegnidas, Herakles the Hunter, which almost certainly was older yet. (There was also some sort of office for young men as “hunters” but we have absolutely NO clue what they did, as it doesn’t seem to be actual hunting. Local police force has been suggested.) The Rider below:

We hear a bit about Thracian royal role-playing via Theopompus (Athen. 12.531e-532a), who also doesn’t seem to understand what he witnessed (and likely didn’t care) where a king, as Dionysos, performed a sexual rite with an earth mother figure. Kings as Riders or other divine figures is backed up by some iconographic royal representations. (Check out the work of Thracian scholars Fol and Marazov for more on Thracian religion.)

As noted, the deities Alexander is accused as “dressing up as” have significant connections with The Rider and, of course, Dionysos…also venerated in Macedonia and connected with the kingship. Coin of Alexander I with The Rider below

So almost certainly Ephippos didn’t know what he was talking about, and/or his source didn’t. Instead, it gets used as more proof of Alexander’s growing hubris as an Oriental Tyrant.™ SO many of our Alexander texts have moralizing overtones typical of Greek historiography that we have to be super-duper careful with their assessments of Alexander’s motivations. (Anytime you read something about his corruption by those Evil Oriental/Persian Ways, roll your eyes and move on.) Want a perfect example? Check out Lucian’s Dialogues of the Dead 12: a conversation between dead-Philip and dead-Alexander. Obviously fictional, certainly satire, and rife with anti-Asian bias.

Anyway, even without the moralizing, it’s possible that whoever originally observed whatever Alexander was doing simply didn’t understand it. This isn’t uncommon even in the same religion. If you were raised Southern Baptist and attend mass with your Catholic buddy, you likely won’t have a clue what’s going on half the time—never mind if you attend an Orthodox Shabbat service. Worshiping (basically) the same gods does not equate to the same rites. Greek religion was not homogenous, and all sorts of regional differences existed.

As noted with the Anthesteria, a “king” dressing up as Dionysos isn’t even alien to Athens.

If you’d like to read more about this in particular, let me recommend “Thracian and Macedonian Kingship” chapter 22, section 4 (Ideology and Religion, 344-48) by William Greenwalt in A Companion to Ancient Thrace, Julia Valeva, Emil Nankov, Denver Graninger, eds.

[soclonely]

the clones as... your mutuals

Oh man here we go

Rex- @lilhawkeye3 after seeing all the hard work you put in for the fandom fest. You are my Captain.promise I won't throw you

Echo- @padme--amygdala you are smart, lovely, and low-key a mischief maker and I love you for it

Fives- @ct7567329 the only fives I will accept

Jesse- @prfury you deserve this man, minus the end of season 7. My favorite mutual for my favorite trooper

Kix- @bomboclaaty like there is even another answet

Tup- @im-x-winging-it with more tooka and less murder. Unless 👀

Dogma- @poltergeist-squad I forgot how to spell your main I AM ASHAMED but you are the Dogma to our lives and Ang buir is proud

Hardcase- @big1ron ya clone Hardcase

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99- @suenami3 out here with all the love and positivity

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Waxer and Boil- @lodimius-skybreaker mom friend mutual always reminding me to take care of myself

Wolffe- @myriad501st anyone related to khai probably has a great eyeroll tbh

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