#someone mentioned the ender king and were so right

[rayven81194]

y’know when i said i wanted a Phil Insanity arc? I think this could also work, a chaos arc could suffice. Just him being an absolute menace to the admins while burning down a half burnt down christmas tree while chat bullies him

[hollowwhisperings]

"Speaker For The Dead": Bran Stark as a Reference to Ender Wiggin.

I read the first two Ender books when FAR too young to handle their themes of, y'know, the intimacy of xenocide when you're a child soldier. Scary stuff for a kid of age with the protagonist.

So colour me Unsurprised upon relearning that the language the aliens of SFTD's aliens to speak with humans... is named "Stark".

Because of course GRRM would find joy in a conveniently horrifying-by-implication Pun.

The Premise of "Speaker For The Dead" (the sequel to "Ender's Game", a Differently Horrifying inspiration for some of my childhood nightmares) is this: human colonists and the local alien species had been more-or-less at peace until a human is Suddenly & Inexplicably Murdered by the aliens who considered him a Friend.

Due to [the Plot of Ender's Game], Humans are wary of Jumping To Conclusions as to this seemingly Senseless Violence and Ender Wiggin (of Ender's Game) stops at the planet to Speak at some Funerals. To properly Speak for the Deceased, Ender investigates the Murders and because of [the plot of Ender's Game] feels certain that there has been a Fatal Translation Error.

Spoilers for SFTD & comparisons to Bran's POV Arc under cut.

He's Right.

The Piqueninos (the aliens) are still learning to communicate with the humans they're sharing a planet with, using a language named "Stark". The deceased men were both held in great esteem by the Piqueninos, one of the primary reasons why [A Xenologist Expert] was sought after: why kill someone who was their Friend?

It turns out that Ritualistically Vivisecting respected males of their society is how the Piqueninons Evolve: they had spent the entire book calling Trees their "Fathers" and they had meant that literally.

The gratuitously violent murders of their human friends were efforts by the Piqueninos to honour these men by making them Fathers, using the same method of Deification on the human men as they would to their own kind.

Cue the Horrific Revelation that, no, Humans Do Not Transistion From Life Phases via being Ritualistically Killed to Become Trees: the Piqueninos efforts to "honour" their Human Friends actually Killed Them. Permanently.

Now let's reevaluate what Bran Stark's been up with the Singers in ASOIAF.

Brynden Rivers has been sending Dreams to kids with Greenseer Potential and directing them North.

Jojen & Bran, inspired by such Dreams, go Beyond The Wall to seek out this "Three-Eyed Crow" who will teach Bran how to "fly".

Bran & Company end up in a magically warded Cave populated by the mythic "Children of the Forest" (Singers) and someone they call "The Last Greenseer", a man who has a weirwood tree growing through him & introduces himself as a Man Formerly Known as Brynden.

contextual clues identify him as "Brynden Rivers": one of three Great Bastards of Aegon IV had with Lady Melissa Blackwood*, Hand & Spymaster to Kings Aerys I & Maekar I, a Disappeared Lord Commander of the Night's Watch.

the Singers confirm the religious beliefs shared with the First Men as being Literal: the trees are gods and the gods are trees. Incidentally, Jojen brings up how Revered Greenseers are by those who worship the Old Gods.

Jojen has Greensight and Bran, as someone who can both Skinchange AND Greendream, qualifies for "Greenseer" status. Except... the Singers Very Consistently call Brynden "the Last Greenseer" even with Bran Stark right there contradicting that There Can Be Only One (the Singers also mention greenseers as existing in Plural, historically, & that those of their Own Species have "died out/[faded?]").

Brynden "The Last Greenseer" takes Bran as his [apprentice]. Part of this Training is going into the Weirwood Tree [Hivemind], a network that transcends Time & Space (because Roots, i guess?) and allows Bran to see all sorts of varyingly traumatising Visions.

Bran's lessons require his sitting on a Weirwood Throne beside Brynden who is, incidentally, a body horror Weirwood Tree-Human hybrid now.

BTW, Bran's "training diet" features an Ominously Described "Paste" fed to him by the Singers. It's made from Weirwood Seeds, apparently.

(hey isn't everyone stuck in this spooky underground cave because leaving it means getting eaten by zombies? whete are they getting these Weirwood Seeds from- oh. Hi there, Brynden the Tree-Man Abomination)

wait, if Bran's a Greenseet now then how come the Singers still call Brynden the "Last" Greenseer? is this, perhaps, an instance of, say... interspecies life phase transitions being Poorly Translated to humans due to Trees Being Gods and Trees Transcending Time & Death?

has Jojen, perhaps, Made An Assumption about "when" that Title of "Greenseer" is gained? He had said that Greenseers were Deified as Weirwood Trees, implying they were entombed upon death...

...but what if Dying is part of the deification process?

(well, for a given value of "dying"... *looks at Brynden The Tree-Abomination Rivers*)

...the Cave Singers are totally going to ritualistically vivisect Bran and make him their new Tree God, aren't they.

(and, from the looks of Brynden, some decades into HIS initiation... this process will Not Be Quick nor "Pretty")

Brynden is probably complicit in the Singers' Scheme to Make Bran A Tree, if only due to Brynden being the "Weirwood" Bran's Paste Training Diet is made from.

Brynden might also want Out from the whole "Unnaturally Alive & Conscious This Whole Time" thing because WHY WOULD YOU WANT TO BE ALIVE AS YOU ARE TURNED INTO A TREE.

let us Not Recall the descriptions of: Brynden's current appearance, the many non-peaceful expressions carved as Faces for Heart Trees, the states of humans "honoured" by the Piqueninos in SFTD, any descriptions of what Becoming A Tree involves...

...and any investigation into what, exactly, a Weirwood's "seeds" may be. I stop at "Horus in Set's Salad" and THAT WAS ENOUGH.

MOVING RIGHT ALONG, when Not Being A Tree Hivemind, Brynden & thus Bran seem to fulfil a role not dissimilar to that of "Speakers For The Dead": they examine historic events as Outside parties. Brynden instructs Bran on evaluating his Visions objectively, without reverance nor judgement. At least, I think he did. Again: preservation of own sanity > exact visuak descriptions of events in ASOIAF.

Interestingly, being an effective Speaker for the Dead requires much of the same skillset as a Competent Kingmaker (or, at least, a King UnMaker).

To Conclude, the Similarities*** between Bran's interactions with the Cave Singers and those of Human Friends & Piqueninos in "Speaker For The Dead" are Multiple &, knowing GRRM, probably Deliberate. Let's just hope Meera and Jojen have gone AWOL because Meera is Plotting Arson, not because they're of Interest to the Cave Singers' reproductive purposes too. Both series do enjoy subjecting female characters to Grim Maternity &/or Horrific Relationship Revelations.

Arson is my Ideal Plotline for Meera, Grand Elk Larceny as a distant second. All those "Last Hero" parallels Bran Stark has going on should be Recognised (by Meera) and AVOIDED (by Meera) WITH FIRE. I'm lowkey convinced Brynden would actually prefer being burned alive to "indefinitely trapped in rotting human flesh as he slowly becomes a Tree (potentially for the purposes of interspecies repropogation)".

Footnotes

*Lady Melissa Blackwoof was likely an aunt or sister of Lady Melantha Blackwood of Winterfell, Bran's great-great grandmother: there is almost certainly at least one other Blackwood in Bran's family tree, likely as one of his 4 unnamed great-grandmothers through Grandpa Hoster Tully & Grandma Minisa Whent.

It's also possible that all the Movement at the end of Brynden's reign as Hand (the Lords going to KL for the Great Council that made Betha** Blackwood Queen of Westeros & Grand Escort from KL to The Wall to send off Maester Aemon & Ser Brynden) was how Lord Beron Stark's Heir, Edwyle, ended up married to a Riverlander like Melantha Blackwood.

**Queen Betha & Lady Melantha were almost certaingly "cousins" of some sort to Brynden through his mother, Melissa Blackwood. The exact degree of relation is unknown but It's There.

The degrees of relation from "Lady Melissa, Paramour of Aegon IV" to "Lady Melantha of Winterfell" connect Brynden (through his Blackwood mother) to EVERY living Stark, courtesy of their one unanimously agreed shared Grandpa (Lord Rickard Stark, of "murdered by Aerys II & Part 3 of 4 Extremely Valid Reasons for Ned's Rebellion").

Lady Catelyn's being a Riverlander, specifically a Tully & a Whent of Harrenhal, make it likely that Brynden's related to HER too.

Jon, of course, has Black Betha as all 4 of his paternal great-great grandmothers AND Lady Melantha as one of his maternal ones (the others being Marna Locke, Arya Flint, & Lorra Royce): Jon's somehow being "5/8ths Blackwood" is how I got distracted by the blood ties of Brynden & Bran in the first place!

[hyperfixatinglove]

Short first meeting fic of my s/i and P ♡

A smaller puppet than those around it shadowed another of its kind. Determined to keep them in its sights they kept just enough distance not to be discovered. The other puppet was dangerous, zir had seen them rip apart fellow puppets left and right in the streets of Krat. The tiny puppet had a mission to fulfill, Grand Covenant or not. The king had been counting on it.

It was fairly easy to keep the male puppet in their sight. Short black hair, brown elegant shirt with darker pants was distinct from the dark, destroyed streets and buildings. Shine from the katana wielded as he ran.

The stalker of puppet collided with broad, heavy back made of metal. Brief stumble backwards.

They gulped. Cool metal against their neck, not cold, but pressure added made zir wary. Fierce, captivating blue eyes stared into its soul.

Their ticking hearts tick in unison, tick tock, tick tock.

Slowly, the edge of the katana lowered, the stare softened by no immediate danger.

Blue eyes radiated curiosity.

"I'm not going to attack you."

Nod.

"I'm Ender."

Another, quick nod. Fluffy,short,black bush of hair bounced.

"You don't have a name?"

This time the puppet shook his head.

"Well, you do fit Romeo's description.."

At the mention of King of Puppet's real name, the young man's eyes lit up. Ender could tell he had at least seen Romeo before.

"I was supposed to find Carlo.. or you. I had message to give, but I know I'm too late, he's gone. Others puppets have been attacking me all this time. If only there was safe haven.."

Words safe haven caused the puppet to react again. His glove-covered hand beconed Ender closer. As zir did so the man turned around and jogged ahead. Ender followed, but once again stumbled onto the other puppets back.

Their mechanical parts whirred and the puppet turned around. His metal hand, attached with small,round white shield, took Ender's more human-like arm and began dragging zir to where he wanted to go.

Ender kept their mouth shut. Ze knew this puppet was leading them to safety and the strength of the hold had them at strange ease.

The grand double doors, decorated with gold and painted green, barring access to Hotel Krat, stood before the puppet duo. Only then, the puppet with no name, let go of Ender and pushed the doors open. His parts clicked and whirred, the doors whined, but they opened before his strength with ease all the same.

A gentle woman, with blue hair and dressed in blue from head to toe, greeted the pair.

"Welcome back, Gepetto's puppet. I see you have bought another survivor."

Ender followed this puppet's movement, now claimed to be someones own, like property. They had not uttered a single syllable and only nodded to the woman who introduced herself as Sophia.

Cricket noises. "Don't worry about P, my pal. He doesn't talk much. Gemini at your service." More cricket noises, as the yellow lamp attached to the puppet, now dubbed P, shone in sync in his words, mimicking speech.

P. Such simple name. And yet, no name at all. Nickname at most, something to call him by the people around him, gathered here, in this grant hotel, the last bastion of humanity and puppets alike who were broken from Grand Covenant or survived the horrors from Krat's streets.

Ender did not know what to do, with such grand, fancy place. Ever since their ego had awakened, their skills with smooth conversations were lost cause. P was such enigma and he had helped zir, who Ender followed them upstairs, to front of old man with grey hair and stylish outfit.

Ender did not remember much, only they came beyond Krat, vague memories of refined lady who owned them. They could not tell how they ended to Romeo's care in Estella Opera House but Ender knew their friendship with Romeo was the spark that broke the hold and rules of Grand Covenant.

They listened closely as the elusive Geppetto had conversation with his son. Ender could not tell why, but the man didn't elicit loving father to them. From what little the small puppet knew about humans, they would not willingly let their offspring into battles and dangerous streets. Love was caring, not wanting someone to be hurt. Geppetto did the opposite, no matter how he claimed and pretended.

Ender's mechanical heart stirred as they stared at P. Their parts whirred and ticked, but in such a way Ender could not name why. He seemed oblivious to Geppetto's acting, the sinister undertone of his actions. As they stared and noted P had freckles underneath his blue eyes, they vowed to protect him from his father, his creator.

[findingjoynweirdstuff]

Dream SMP Recap (December 6/2020) - End of Week

What started as a sad but calm day ended with a revolution where morality was questioned and blood was shed. The server’s first canon death since the three lives rule was implemented occurred, and all hell broke loose.

Dream’s motivations have started to be laid bare, but whether or not he’s in the wrong or right remains foggy as ever in a world where everyone’s morals are gray.

Also, the prison’s construction continues and some strange red corruptions called “Blood Vines” have sprouted up on the server.

A short summary of the week’s total events is at the end of the post.

---

- HBomb hosts Niki and Wilbur’s L’Cast

- Fundy continues work on the chess board

- Ranboo is leaving a book with messages to communicate with Tommy

- Fundy and Ranboo visit Tommy and help him through the Nether to find blaze rods. It’s a very...interesting...time... Fundy fills Tommy in on the fact that Dream is officially recognizing L’manburg as a country.

- Tommy falls in lava and loses all his stuff

- Then he burns to death

- Then he falls in lava and loses all his stuff again

- He FINALLY gets an ender chest

- Lazar asks him for help since he’d fallen in lava and needed help getting out. As Tommy does so, Lazar questions why Tommy hasn’t turned against L’manburg. Tommy says it’s because Tubbo is there, but Lazar points out that Tubbo was the one who exiled him.

- Ghostbur comes on and says he has a gift.

- Tommy attempts to rescue Lazar from the depths of the lava pit. Techno starts arguing with him.

- Tommy falls in lava and loses all his stuff again. He gives up on helping Lazar, who is understandably annoyed at him.

- Philza joins the call wondering wtf is happening and why Tommy keeps dying, but Tommy just ends stream

- Psyche! After credits scene. Ghostbur asks Tommy to return to Logstedshire so he dies in lava to fast-travel back. Ghostbur gives Tommy a lodestone compass named “Your Tubbo” that points back to L’manburg at all times. Tommy puts the compass in his ender chest right next to the discs, saying he’ll keep it close to his heart.

- Thunder’s frustrated that Tommy got exiled exiled because the Prank War he was setting up between Dream and Tommy can no longer happen and Thunder’s great villain arc has been cancelled - he is no longer a villain now.

- Now, he wants to do the clay prank to George instead to try and get Dream and George to turn on each other as revenge for Dream burning his house.

- Puffy builds Tommy a second Christmas Tree.

--- Note: From this point on I tried to include more specific details than normal since it’s an important and confusing event ---

- Quackity declares war on the Dream SMP from Mexican L’manburg. He gets George, Sapnap and Karl on to help. He’s rigged TNT under Eret’s castle bridge and wants to invoke the same ideas as the Mexican Revolution. He wants to put M.L. on the map by staging an assassination and using George’s dethronement as an excuse to start a political movement.

- Sapnap wants to take on Technoblade but Quackity tells him that they have to take things step by step and that it’s an extremely bad idea to do it now.

- Eret asks Hbomb to be one of his knights. HBomb agrees.

- George wants his kingship back 

The explosion goes to plan with H and Puffy as witnesses.

--- ---

CANON DEATH: KARL 

Cause: Death by explosion and falling

--- ---

- George distracts Eret while Quackity, Sapnap and Karl steal his throne. Punz joins Eret’s side as one of his other knights.

 - The M.L. side reconvenes in L’manburg and drink invisibility potions. Dream is in Mexican L’manburg. He is tearing the dirt to shreds. Meanwhile, Eret gives a speech to his Knights as they head to Party Island. Dream, alone, is invisible in Boomerville.

- Sapnap gets Dream to log (he says it’s lag). The Dream SMP faction blows up M.L. with TNT. The Mexican L’manburgians kill Puffy. 

- They want to head to the Holy Land. Dream says he wants to talk. They collect at the Church.

- They argue. Dream threatens to kill Quackity permanently and make sure Mexican L’manburg can never rise again. (Also Karl’s acting is genuinely good holy shit)

- Sapnap tells George that he thinks Dream has completely turned against them, and that they’re better off disowning him.

---

Dream: “You’re painting me as this tyrant when I’m just trying to maintain peace.”

He refers to it as his castle, his throne. He calls the people of M.L. “terrorists.”

---

He says that in his eyes, Mexican L’manburg does not even exist, and that he’ll speak to Tubbo about making sure he sees that it doesn’t exist as well.

M.L. argues that putting a human life above a few blocks of gold is more important.

Dream refers to himself as the “ruler” of the Dream SMP, the “leader,” letting it slip that “king” is a meaningless title.

He says that Quackity is causing the most problems, the number one “enemy” of the SMP right now. Similar to how he referred to Tommy defying him.

He says that Quackity is not like Tubbo, who is a “fair, just ruler” and that is why New L’manburg is recognized and Mexican L’manburg is not. Tubbo would never do what Quackity did. Wilbur and Jschlatt and Tommy would. He says that he waited until New L’manburg had a reasonable leader to recognize it.

- “Un-killing” is implied to be a thing, where the person who gave you your canon death can take it back. 

---

 Dream: “The king is a figurehead and he knows that!”

Eret: “I do.”

Quackity: “So that’s what you are Eret -- a puppet--”

Dream: “Yes! -- no he’s not a puppet-- h-he has no power and I have - and - it’s the same thing and--”

(Dream proceeds to deny Eret being a “puppet”)

---

- Quackity decides to dissolve Mexican L’manburg for a clean slate and call it something else. He wants the server to have a precedent of establishing new countries without having to go to Dream for recognition every time.

- Eret agrees to recognize Quackity’s new country if they apologize and return the throne.

--- ---

CANON UNDEATHING: KARL (?)*

* Dream says that the death is still canon later since plot was based around it. I don’t know what Karl considers his death count to be? 

--- ---

- Sapnap declares that he no longer wants to fight Techno but Dream instead. He says he wants to slay Dream in front of everyone.

- Overall, Dream and Eret declare it a “failed coup” and say that the destruction is just a consequence of “what happens when you don’t plan anything” but Quackity is satisfied that his new country has been “put on the map.” 

- Quackity declares the country to be named “El Rapids” in honor of Cedar Rapids.

- Punz no longer wants to be an official Knight.

- Quackity misses Ghostbur and wants to speak with him. He tells Ghostbur about the war. Ghostbur asks if it was a revolution - Quackity says yes! Ghostbur also informs Quackity that he burnt the sacred texts - How to Sex 2 - in lava.

- Karl streams with the intention of rebuilding and preparing for Pokimane’s visit

- Karl steals Eret’s Museum Llamas and gets caught in the act. Fortunately this doesn’t spark up the war again. They take a llama to Party Island.

- They get into trouble at Boomerville and Lazar joins.

- Dream comes online and asks Sam about the prison’s progress. Bad gets annoyed at Sam for destroying the beachfront property value, and he didn’t authorize the seizure of the land. Dream is there helping to shovel but Bad wants him to stop. Bad is angry about the prison being built and starts shouting at Sam.

- Bad tries to negotiate with Dream. Dream refers to the prison as containing a “prisoner.” Singular. And that the prisoner would have nothing, and Bad would be in charge of helping to guard it. There are going to be multiple “layers.”

- The prison will be in the middle of the ocean bit, and Bad would have a terraformed beachfront property. All of the land would be considered property of the Badlands - including the prison.

- People are going to have to go through PORTALS to escape the prison.

- Bad starts to come around to the prison idea. Dream tells Sam he thinks they need more hands to help, potentially Ant and Eret.

- A strange, giant red “egg” has appeared in the corner of Bad’s statue room. He feels a strange aura coming from it, and he’s unable to bring himself to break it.

- Dream says Eret can’t help with the prison but he can help make the beach nicer. Bad says he might want to put Tommy in the prison but Dream says no, Tommy’s already exiled. So the prison isn’t for Tommy.

- Once the prisoner is in there, Dream says they would only be able to be let out “by the server.” It’s got certain secrets that only Dream and Sam know about. Sam says that he could potentially escape from it, but it will be so impenetrable that even if you know the secrets it would still be difficult to escape from.

- Bad shows Dream the Egg. Dream gets creeped out by it.

- Another Red Corruption has appeared near Hutt’s Pizza, and another at the Mansion. Everyone swears that it wasn’t there before, and there wasn’t enough time for someone to place all of it manually in the time that they were down there.

- Bad stabs Dream for trying to “hurt it.” He likes it for some reason.

- Bad asks Dream about who the prison’s for. Dream says “if you can’t kill somebody, you need to lock them up.” He mentions that it’s one of the more powerful people on the server, someone who either provides a threat now or in the future. He has someone in mind.

--- ---

Dream explains to Bad and Sam that the reason he switched sides in the Manberg-Pogtopia War was because Schlatt gave him something.

And that thing is “a card up his sleeve” until he needs it.

A book of great value.

It puts Dream in danger if people know of it, but also gives Dream power.

The “most valuable thing on the server.”

Something pertaining to the prison.

Something where they wouldn’t believe Dream if he told them what he was given.

--- ---

- The corruption grows AGAIN despite Dream, Sam and Bad all being in the middle of the ocean

- Another corruption appears on Tommy’s Power Tower

- The water level in New L’manburg has risen again, covering George and Quackity’s mushroom house

- The prison is going to be as tall as a MOUNTAIN

- Dream proposes the idea of Bad giving him the disc to piss off Tommy. Bad says that Skeppy has it so he’ll have to ask some other time. He might trade some information about Schlatt’s book in return for the disc.

- Bad says he likes the name a dono came up with for the corruption -- “Blood Vines”

- Dream and Sam removed the Blood Vines on the Mansion to Bad’s dismay. Sam burns the Vines and Bad goes on a murderous rampage against him.

- Technoblade got a “Bee our guest” achievement

- Dream burns down the Eiffel Tower again.

- The prison will be reinforced with 15 layers of obsidian, and the guards will have Ender Pearl Stasis Chambers that are alarm-activated.

- The Blood Vines have sprouted up from Schlatt’s Grave.

The prison’s unofficial name as of right now is “Pandora’s Vault,” but it is subject to change.

Upcoming events:

- Karl will be touring Pokimane around soon

Potentially Scrapped:

- Elytra Challenge

- Bad and Skeppy’s plan to burn the disc *

* Bad mentioned it on stream, but it’s unclear if it’ll still happen

END OF WEEK RECAP:

11/30: Fundy bonds with Wilbur, Cursed Lore Day

12/01: Creation of Mexican L’manburg, Girl Dream visits, Mexican Manhunt

Note: not sure what’s up with 12/02. Probably messed up the dates? Whoops.

12/03: Sleepy Bois Family splits in half, dethroning of George

12/04: Day of the Exile, Badlands start to divide

12/05: Tommy’s first full day in Logsted, Sean’s visit

12/06: The Mexican L’manburg Revolution, end of M.L., start of El Rapids

---

!!! SPOILERS AHEAD !!! 

- Wilbur had two special lodestone compasses in his inventory. He didn’t want HBomb to see, but H looked anyway.

[votederpycausemufins]

Chapter three for Surprisingly Familiar. It’s time to get to the real plot of this thing!

@petrichormeraki is the maker of the hermit Tommy au, @helleborusangel likes to read these and give me their rambles which are my beloved, and then check my tumblr for my masterpost of things I’ve made.

“Hey Paul, you’re done talking with X, right?” Bdubs asked as he noticed Paul walking by.

“Uh, yeah. He said he could let a guest in for a little bit because he needs to talk with Phil and Phil’d rather stay here instead of coming to the castle.”

“Yeah yeah, sounds great.” Bdubs sad, waving it off. “Hey, new question. Paul what the heck was that back there?!” He shouted, making a number of hermits look over.

“Hey, calm down, keep things off tap.” Paul tried to calm the hermit down, but it didn’t work that much.

“Oh this is Hermitcraft. We don’t do things on tap. Except Tommy but that’s different. Now, what were you doing back there?” And Bdubs pointed towards the room Paul and Phil had talked in. From the crowd, Jrum felt a little nervous, wondering if it was something he did, but the answer calmed the bot.

“Calm down. It was something Hoodie taught me. I’m sure Zedaph can back me up.”

Behind Bdubs, Zed stopped slurping from a coffee cup that was actually filled with a slushie. “Yeah, don’t worry he’s fine. No necromancy.”

“See? I just wanted a private conversation.” Paul replied, though Bdubs still looked grumpy.

“Alright, don’t make me call in Genny.” And Bdubs signalled that he was watching Paul before walking off. As he left, Scar took his place, seeming pretty confused.

“So, what’s with him?”

Paul sighed. “He’s not a fan of certain types of magic. I did a bit of necromancy for a time and there was someone else in the world who essentially became a dark lord, so Bdubs and some others became witch hunters.”

“Huh, That’s not something I would have guessed.” Scar said. “I mean, I’m a wizard and he’s been fine with me.”

Paul looked a little stunned. “Oh really? Didn’t realize. What style are you? My friend Hoodie is coming in for a quick visit. He’s ars based.”

Scar laughed a little. “Is that so? Haven’t seen many of those. I’ve got a mix. Vex magic and crystalline. Cub’s also a user of vex magic.”

Paul nodded. “That’s nice. How many magic users you got around here?”

The hermit mayor started to count on his fingers. “So there’s me and Cub. Pretty sure Stress has some. Cleo’s definitely got some magic. Grian of course. Uh, not sure if Joe does or not. I think Xisuma’s just-”

“Xel- er, Grian’s got some magic?”

“Yeah. And I guess the kids probably do too. Not sure right now.” Scar said, before looking Paul in the eye. “You're not going to freak out about Grian having magic, right? You’ve already got him upset which gets us upset.”

“Yeah, I know.” Paul sighed. “Just been through a lot. I get overly worried sometimes, and to me, I suddenly hear that ‘kid involved in murders is now causing wars in the world my friends are in.’ So yeah, sort of thought the worst.”

Scar inhaled sharply. “Okay, yeah. I can see what made you freak out. But Grian’s fine. He’s been through a lot and while technically he’s caused chaos, it’s never something we hate and normally we’re all in on it somehow.”

“Is that so?”

“Yeah, you should hear about the sewer cats.”

“Can’t wait to hear about it. Haven’t seen any letters about it.”

Scar nodded, before being just a little confused. “So, is there a reason you’re always using letters instead of other stuff? I’m sure some of the others could make you something that would work.”

Paul nodded. “I don’t doubt that they could for the most part. I just deal with a lot of factors and have always preferred the tried and true method. I’m all over the place and sometimes I can only really bring along paper.”

“What do you do?” Scar asked, interest piqued.

“Let’s see. Not sure if Phil’s told you, but he used to be king.” Scar nodded. It wasn’t Phil, but Grian had mentioned it. “Well, I’m one as well. Hoodie’s my right hand man and royal mage.”

“Ah, and you said he’s the one visiting?”

“Yeah. So I end up busy there a lot. I also spend a lot of my time visiting my kids so I’m going from world to world. Then, there’s also my wife and she’s in the world we raised the kids in which is essentially my main home.”

“And that’s what?”

“Uh, the same one I found Xe- sorry, Grian in ages ago.” Paul answered. “And I’ve got a job there that doesn’t really work with comms sometimes, but paper is easy enough to have on hand, especially enchanted paper.” And Paul took out a sheet of paper, handing it to Scar.

Scar took the paper and looked it over. As he moved it, he could see how the light caught the slightly physical aspect of the magic, much like how enchantments could be seen. “This looks good. You can hardly see the magic but I can tell it’s there. What all is on here?”

“Mostly stuff to get it to the right recipient and make it illegible if you’re trying to read it and it’s not for you.”

“Ah. That’s a commonly known one for ars mages, right?” Scar asked. “I haven’t heard much about them.”

Paul nodded. “Yeah. That’s due to the mage wars. They happened a number of years back before Hoodie was alive. He’s the main reason things are sort of getting back to normal for those guys.” Paull pulled out an old communicator which looked like it was being held together with duct tape and prayers. “He should be here pretty soon. He said he was only going to get a few books and amulets. And your admin said he would be able to get in.”

Almost as soon as Paul had said something, a message went out that someone new had joined the world. Xisuma sent a message that he would go to help the guest to Aque Town and from there Paul and Scar just waited for the two others to arrive. Xisuma was the first to arrive, gliding down on his elytra. The other person wore a royal purple hooded robe and seemed to arrive with the use of an ender pearl, but Scar didn’t see them use one.

Paul was the first to move, going over to the other person. “Hoodie! You made it!”

With the confirmation that this was the mage coming in, Scar followed along, a bit excited to meet someone new with magic. “Of course Sir. You did ask for my presence.”

Scar watched as Paul put an arm around Hoodie’s shoulder. “You don’t need to be so formal here. In fact, here. This is Scar. He’s the mayor, and based on the kind of place this is, I’d say he’s the local hedgewizard.”

“Ah, I see. It is nice to meet you. My name is Hoodie. I am King Soares’ right hand man and royal mage.”

Scar shook Hoodie’s hand, getting a slight shock. “It’s nice to meet you too. Paul already said I’m Scar. I’m guessing you’re a lightning mage or something?”

Hoodie took his hand back. “Ah, sorry about that. Yes I am. Or at least I specialize in it. Same as my father lest he’s recently changed his affinity.”

“Well I don’t know enough about your kind of magic to know what that really means.”

Paul walked away as the two magic users started to discuss their various forms of magic and wizardry. He needed to find Phil again since the main reason Hoodie was even there was so that Phil could get more of the enchanted paper. Not wanting to drag the mage away, Paul was instead going after his brother since he was the one insisting he wouldn’t take any of it without knowing for sure it was enchanted by Hoodie. After that, Hoodie would help out a bit around the world as repayment for Xisuma letting him on, then the two of them would head back home. At least, that was the plan.

. .

.

Drawing him away from the nest was almost laughably easy. Grian and Mumbo were both asleep and the chicken was theoretically trapped. At least trapped enough it wasn’t going to escape into the room itself. And then it could only see out the window and not into the room which was a big plus. Because of that, it was simple enough to have viridian magic surround the prison and really ensure the chicken wouldn’t be getting out.

“You know.” The person spoke in a whisper, making Grian twitch ever so slightly in his sleep, but not wake up. “You’re really making this far too easy. I thought it would be difficult with those guests of yours here, but it turns out everyone’s distracted by them. And they put you in such a perfect position. Let’s just move you to somewhere a bit more private, hmm?”

Grian of course didn’t wake up, but as the person left, a bit more magic appeared around Grian, and then a few moments later, he woke up with a start. Grian looked around, glad to see there was only Mumbo and a box in the corner. For a moment he was confused about it, but faint clucking from inside helped him figure out what it was. But something still felt off.

Grian went to shake Mumbo awake, but he hesitated a moment before actually waking him up. “Mumbo. Mumbo!” And Mumbo woke up from his name being shouted, looking around to see what was going on. “Mumbo, I think we’ve been up here too long. Something feels wrong.”

Mumbo pulled out his communicator to look at the time. “Oh dear! It does look like we have been here a while. It also looks like someone else has shown up.”

“Really?” Grian asked, pulling his own comm out to look at the message. “There’s no way this person would just happen to show up today of all days for no reason. What if they’re someone else with… I want to check on the kids.”

Mumbo stood up and then helped Grian to his feet. “Don’t worry. I’m sure if anything happened, the other hermits would be taking care of the boys. We can of course check on them, but you don’t want your panic to make them panic.”

Grian nodded and from there the two of them went back down to the ground floor, leaving Kokatori behind. Finding the new person was rather easy as he and Scar were both standing on the street of Aque Town facing each other. Scar was currently donning his wizard robe over his Aque Town outfit. In his hands, he held a number of crystals that Grian thought he was never going to see again.

The other person was wearing a purple robe and held a wand in one hand and a book with a yellow cover in the other. His hood had fallen back slightly, so Grian was able to see as the other person glanced over at him when he got closer. Normally the avian would assume it was just because he was getting close and was noticed, but there was some sort of emotion in the eyes that made Grian worry.

Both of them had their attention pulled away from each other as Scar moved, a yellow glow around him as he moved like he had a speed effect. When he reached the other person, Grian watched as the Scar’s netherite sword struck them, and then a ring of white magic appeared around them, acting as a shield against further attacks.

Realizing at this point that the two were fighting, Grian moved to try and stop them, but then out of nowhere, lightning struck the ground in front of him, making him stop. When Grian looked back up, both mages were looking over to him and then Scar called out. “Hey, don’t worry! We’re just doing some sparring! It was my idea!”

“Are you sure? Who even is this?”

“His name’s Hoodie. Royal mage of Paul it looks like.”

“Are you sure that’s a good idea?” Grian asked, concerned.

“Yeah, it just sounds like he was jumping to conclusions when he saw you. I’m sure it’s going to be fine if you talk to him again.”

Grian wasn’t completely convinced, but pretended enough for Scar to look back at Hoodie and then continue their sparring. Slowly, the avian started moving to where everyone else probably was, still in the party building. Mumbo followed him along, but eventually he passed Grian when the builder decided to actually watch the magic battle.

Scar seemed to mainly be using regular combat, but enhanced by his crystals which actually seemed to be doing something. Hoodie, on the other hand, was using his wand and casting a number of spells from his book. At one point, Grian watched the mage fumble a little bit to pull out a book with a green cover before casting a new spell that he hadn’t used yet.

Grian didn’t realize he was just standing there alone, and the magicians weren’t really paying much attention to him, but in the span of a few seconds, that all changed. To anyone watching, it would seem like it happened all at once, but really it was just one thing after the other.

Grian was barely aware of the space around him getting the slightest tint of green to it. As soon as that had happened, Hoodie turned away from Scar and instead faced Grian, pulling out a new red spell book. Scar was the next to react, still under the effects of his yellow crystal. He started to pull out a red crystal, accidentally pulling a pink one out at the same time. He threw them towards Grian just as Hoodie began to cast some magic aimed at Grian, but also in the direction of what would be in the path of the crystals.

Seeing multiple things coming his way, Grian started to panic, wings moving to act as a shield since he currently wasn’t holding one. As they moved, the tips of his wings started to change from red to purple, the shift in color working its way to the base of the wings. He couldn’t react fast enough to block everything, but the magic hit both of the crystals, making them shatter into dust. The pink and red dust didn’t completely stay their original colors, some of them charred by the magic attack that hit them, but each tiny piece seemed to glow with its own energy, and even with the, being broken so small, when the cluster hit Grian, there was enough force to make him crash to the ground.

For everyone not watching at that moment in time, they simply heard a large crack of thunder at the same time there was shattering glass, followed by screaming from Grian. Within a matter of seconds, people were racing out of the nearby building, there to see what had happened.

When people got out onto the street, Scar was yelling at Hoodie. “What was that?! Grian wasn’t involved! I thought I could actually- I can’t see why Bdubs actually trusted- I’m guessing he’s changed a lot since-”

“Please, I was just trying to defend myself. He was about to attack me. Didn’t you see it?”

“He was just watching us!”

“No. Your back was turned so you maybe didn’t see it.”

“I should have used a brown crystal too. What kind of spell was that?!” As they yelled, Xisuma was the first to get over to the pair to try and figure out what was going on, getting an answer from Scar. “That Paul guy’s mage just attacked Grian! If I hadn’t done something, it might have killed him!”

“What?” Paul asked, coming over. “Hoodie what just happened?”

The mage looked over to Paul, ignoring Scar and X. “Sir, the hedgewizard and I were simply having a duel to see each other's magic skills. As we battled, this avian mage came by and tried to stop us once. Of course Scar was able to prevent that the first time, but then the mage tried to cast a spell of attack. I was already using a spell to help my reaction time, as was the wizard here, so I began to cast a counterspell. At first I thought Scar was also about to assist me, but instead he seemed to try and stop my spell, causing our magic to collide. It seems to have still-” Hoodie tried to continue, but Paul held up a hand to stop him.

Paul then tried to speak himself, but then his shoulder was ground and he was whirled around by Phil. “Paul, what the fuck? Did you just have your wizard attack Grian?”

“What? No, of course I wouldn’t! It sounds like Grian was trying to attack Hoodie and he defended himself.”

“Yeah sure. Mate, just tell me the truth.”

“I’m just telling you what Hoodie told me. I know just as much as you do at this point other than what he told me.”

Again, the conversation was cut off by Mumbo speaking up, having joined the group. “Grian’s really hurt. His breathing is off and it looks like his wings were hurt enough for them to shift away. There’s also something else, but I can’t place it. Xisuma, can you look at him?”

Everyone moved out of the way for the admin to head towards Grian, but as soon as he took a step, everyone had their comms buzz with two messages. Xisuma peeked over the crowd to look where Grian had been a minute ago. He wasn’t currently lying there, but neither were any items that signified him having died and respawned. That could have been because he had nothing on him at the point, which was unlikely, but could have been what happened.

That being said, the shocked gasps from people who were looking at their comms didn’t assure Xisuma, so the admin pulled up the chat logs on his helmet. Instead of there being a death message for Grian, there were two messages of people leaving the world.

The_Grifter left the world Xelqua left the world.

[alien-romantic]

A thing for Kodie about films /nbh

I really like films with hidden meanings and easter eggs and things you only see on the second or third run through. I really enjoy films by Edgar Wright (Baby Driver, Hot Fuzz, Scott Pilgrim etc). I love analysing films too and would love to incorporate film analysis into my university course more.

As I said before, my memory isnt that great and i really struggle to recall what films ive watch, not just in the past few months, but like, ever. So when people ask me what my favourite film is, chances are its a film I cant remember because ive only watched it one and it's not ingrained, imbedded into my brain like films such as "Howl's.." is or "Robin Hood Prince of Thieves" (good film btw). So to find my favourit film, I need to Dig Deep... And maybe scroll through Netflix to see if I can remember what I've seen

The Old Guard: I loved this film. I watched it last year round my friend's uni house by the beach and it was amazing. I really liked what they did with the characters. The pacing was good, although I could tell that it was adapted from a comic book in the way they had to skip over certain things.

Stand By Me: an adaption of a Stephen King short story, The Body. I really enjoyed this film; its about four young boys who hear that an older boy has gone missing and they go in search of his body. It really encapsulates for me ideas about youth and friendship. I really enjoyed this film when I saw it.

The Nice Guys: a neo-noir comedy starring Ryan Gosling. Im not the biggest fan of comedies usually but I liked this film. My mum and step-dad often like to put on films in the evenings and sometimes I end up watching them. While I cant remember the entire plot, I know that there were many aspects of this film that I liked and would watch again.

American Psycho: (this is a funny one, actually) I told my parents at Christmas that I hadn't seen this film and that they might like it, and so we watched it on Christmas Day. On Christmas Day!!! Now while there's some elements of this film that aren't great (some questionable things, you know?), I would watch this film again.

Films that I do not like

Im not the biggest fan of big macho movies about GUNS and MILITARY and ALIEN INVASIONS. Im not the biggest fan of romcoms either, unless they kinda fit into a very specific niche of "'90s romcoms produced by Richard Curtis" (Like Notting Hill or Four Weddings and a Funeral). I dont like that certain genre of comedy films that are specifically aimed at men ( Paul, The Hangover) because I think theyre trash. I would be happy to watch a jumpscare based horror film if I was in the company of someone I trusted, so by living (kind of) alone, I dont watch any (and hey, arent horrow films always best watched with someone?)Ive had The Devil All The Time on my list for AGES and need to find the right time to watch that.

I think my knowledge about tv series I enjoy/have enjoyed is much better than my film knowledge lol

(Im really tempted to do this again but with books because there are many books that I've read once but I adore, so I might save that for next time :D)

Honorable Mentions: Knives Out, Divergent (only the first one though), The Time Traveller's Wife, What We Do In The Shadows, Ender's Game, Spirited Away, Call Me By Your Name (But fuck whatever Armie Hammer's thing is) , Legally Blonde (although I prefer the musical), Shawshank Redemption (another Stephen King classic!)

[siren07tucker]

Time to explain things!

So with the current events of the SMP heavily differing then what are used to make the kids I kind of shifted in a little bit!

 symphony leaves home for the first time after his dad does not come home for a while he follows his compass until he sees his dad on an alter talking about some country? Before pressing a button? After a while a blonde man stabs his dad with a sword and before symphony could recover from he’s shock The blonde man starts talking to the king and a couple other people about how they were going to revive his dad? They went on to talk about Wilbur not having his memories from when he was a ghost! Symphony had Learned about life and death the differences between him and his dad and how even though he was physically dead he was still treated like someone who was alive but legally he was dead and so lost the right to adopt or have children so that’s why he needed to stay away from people. But he needed to stop this what is his dad forgot about him! When his dad came back he rushed towards him yelling that he needed to stop and that he couldn’t leave him! And everybody was confused this random Child was acting like they were killing Wilbur even though they were trying to revive him, symphony explained that to him it’s like they were killing his Wilbur because that’s his dad! 

Ghostbur tries to explain to symphony there is a possibility that he would forget him, but it’s for the greater good this world needs a leader but symphony cuts in and says I need my dad! And for a horrible moment Symphony looked a lot like fundy. Ghostbur tells everybody he can’t do it but before anybody knows Philza sword is poking out of ghostbur’s chest and symphony runs where eventually he meets an odd kid around his age?

-

So the thing is Lucy is no longer what happens after the egg instead Bad starts getting a bit depressed about Skeppy and the egg decided to kill two birds with one stone sooo it gifted him a child but he had to keep them pier? Meaning that the child must never have desires and the child was not their own person. These plans do mess up though with a certain ram duck hybrid that left home for the first time! Anyway Symphony shows The child a good time even giving them a name, Lucy! (I also like the new meaning this version of the story gives Lucy‘s name because their full name is Lucifer and Innoway they are falling from what people consider Grace)  anyway bad not happy about this and demands that symphony be killed but Symphony manages to run to church prime!  but at some point Symphony escapes and since the whole time he has been using a human form he turns into his more natural animal form to save Lucy they runoff into the nether and quickly make it back to symphonies sewer home! And after a while Lucy becomes the flirty arsonist that we all know and love!

-

I should also mention that for this version of the story dream is possessed. The Dreammon that is possessing dream more or less makes dream experience the prison by himself and dream decides to bite the bullet because he knows if or when he does get out of the prison the Dreammon Will take control again...

The only thing keeping CJ‘s true parentage? Is a magic veil that dream has been keeping up even through his possession since he didn’t want his son to be wrapped up in his business, but a couple potatoes a day  it’s not making it easy to keep the Spell working! Especially through all of the walls of obsidian Eventually dream passes out and the spell is Broken. (and little edit when dream passes out the Dreammon takes control and more or less tell Sam that he still has a pawn to play)  It’s like a cold slap to the face the next morning when Eret realized who his son looked like and he more or less put his castle on lock down because he still loves his son but he knew the others might not understand, (especially because of dreams ominous warning) eventually though Nikki gets a good look at CJ and it’s snowballs from there. Eret has never once truly considered fighting but when his friends attempt a storm his castle to take a son to prison for a crime he did not commit  he raised his sword as his child ran away from the SMP wearing nothing but Jeans and a dark hoodie with his inventory full of food,gold diamonds, worms on a string, Emerald,ender pearls and practically all of Eret’s savings (I mean like money that is usable in all servers kind a like a common currency).

Eventually CJ made new friends in a public server named  Ethan and pat! Ethan goes by the nickname Goggles, he’s technically the oldest not by much and is the shortest. Pat goes bye a bunch of silly nicknames but they do call him Sap (either because he’s a big softy at heart or some parts of his arm are sticky like tree sap because of his T patches) CJ now goes by the name vision and his little group of friends call themselves the V team! (basically dream team part to electric Boogaloo!) with his new friends CJ learns that he can make himself more human but to do it  he needed to peel off all of his porcelain which hurt like hell! But his friend stuck by his side and helped him paint the new colors of his skin and eyes. He still has his original face he where is it as a mask now. Eventually they do start running out of money and since they’re technically they are all runaways and they are minors they have no way to get money and Pat is running out of patches so CJ started entering in local speed running tournaments and in their free time they would code and make videos and when Pat got better they fully announced who they were!  :)  The V team!

-

To be honest pink bluntly said that she was done with everybody’s bullshit SO she’s doing her own cottage core, retirement arc and nobody well fuck this up for her! Oh you’re practically dead because someone is trying to hunt you down sorry I can’t help I’m too busy tending to my garden and weaving flower crowns so kindly fuck off!  The only time she broke her retirement arc was when her cousin and totally not his boyfriend we’re running away from Bad boy halo, pink was originally just going to let the two fend for themselves but bad really just had to break down her aesthetically pleasing Massi cobblestone fence and trample her garden of tulips let’s just say that before pink re-planted her flowers she planted her boot far up his- *cough*



[1stunseeliefaelass]

Darksiders: Arthurian Tales

Chapter 3: Nerve Ending Nightmares

Uther spent the night pacing about his study. Fretting over where Strife could be right now and wondering how best to get Death to talk. He could set his prisoners in the fight the elder Horsemen by offering freedom. But even with that prize precious few would ever face him willingly. And those that'd face him, would likely not survive. As he pondered and guessed through ideas, a cold presence came into the room. With it, a tall, slender man with a spindly sort of a build entered the room. Despite being gaunt, he held an intimidating presence as his little minions that attended him proved. Two Redcaps with caps fresh with blood scurried around in pure reverence to their dark master. Clearly quite frightened of him. Other features included the wings of a wasp drone, a thin rectangular shaped head, piercing blue eyes, and black hair with streaks of blonde here and there.

"King Uther, I've heard from my children that you've got one of the Four as your prisoner." The man says, his tone full of ice.

"You have no children last I recall. And yes I do have Death himself in my grasp." Uther snaps at him.

The wasp wings flitted in surprise at that, "Ah but I was not told which of the Four you had. To know that it's the Reaper himself is both an intriguing and.....concerning matter."

"Cease your fretting, all I want from him is to know where his brother is. Once they're both locked away I'll have them answer to a plea bargain if they want to be free." Uther says.

"Unfortunately since you've neglected to think on this I am forced to do so for you, King of the Seelie." The man says with some venom.

"Enough with the vague terminology Unseelie Bug, tell me plainly what you're here about."

With an audible hiss at the insult, the man spoke again, "You've got the eldest of the Four, but how will long can you hold him? He won't just 'sit tight' like an average prisoner may. As for his younger brother, it doesn't matter which one, they've likely fled by now. In which case you're soon to have the Council hounding you. Even if they do not care, the other three Horsemen certainly will. You're a sitting duck here Uther."

"I have the book! Not even they can stand against that."

"Maybe not. But your weapon has a 'sentient' component to it. She won't do as you say I'm sure. She destroyed the original one after all. And last I heard she wasn't very fond of you."

"My sweet Morgana will come through for me. One way or another, I'll get what I want from her. I always do." Uther says a bit cocky.

"Then might I suggest limiting her visits with the Horsemen you've locked up? I fear his influence on her may sway her feelings on you all the more. Assuming your current actions haven't already done that."

"Don't concern yourself with her, you've more important things as a King to worry about. Speaking of which, why don't you go back to your 'children'?" Uther says mockingly.

"Very well, but heed my warnings King Uther. And do feel free to come crawling back when you inevitably need to. In the meantime take these gifts, they may help you in your endeavors."

The Redcaps placed two jars upon the table in front of Uther. Inside one were black colored spikes that seemed to follow Uther's hand. These he knew well enough. But the contents of the second jar confused him, inside it was a mass of black and dark gray tentacles that were moving slowly. When Uther peered closer, the thing practically sprang to life and tried to jump at his face. Only to just knock the jar on it's side as Uther jumped back.

"What in the name of the Creator is that?!"

"This is a baby Nerve Ender. In their larval stage, this creature feeds off of Nerve Cells in the Nervous system. They prefer new cells in particular, so they have a trick for sending false messages to the brain to recieve these cells. However, if they're forced to eat quickly, they will also send false messages of pain into the brain for even more cells. Naturally this triggers the pain receptors of the body heavily, causing intense pain. In the big creatures they typically feed on, no real damage is done. But on a man....well it's quite the show. To trigger the little fellow, just apply pressure spells to it. Their squishy bodies can't handle too much pressure." The Unseelie King says matter-of-factly.

"Ah so that's what a Nerve Ender is. I've only heard stories of them, but to be able to use one is quite tempting indeed. I'll need to think on this. But thank you for your gifts. I shall put them to good use." Uther says.

The Unseelie King leaves at this, and Uther hears a knock upon his door.

"Yes?"

The door opens and a maid comes in with a bundle. Inside is a squirming babe clearly upset and hungry. Uther came to the maid's side and took the baby from her. It did calm to an extent, but still ultimately was hungry.

"Where is my Morgana?" Uther asks the maid.

"Sleeping my lord."

"Have her wake then, her presence is always necessary for little Arthur." Uther demands.

Morgen is slowly roused by the rapid knocks on her door, and asks groggily, "Who is it?"

The maid opens the door frantically and tells Morgen quickly as she catches her breath, "Lord Uther requires your presence milady."

"Arthur is awake isn't he?" Morgen asks with a slight sigh.

"Yes ma'am, and very hungry."

"Oh...do you have a bottle ready?" Morgen asks her.

"I do miss."

"Good, let us go then."

The two women then hurried to Uther's study. Once there Uther gave little Arthur to Morgen. He calmed down all the more when seeing her, and began tugging at her dress where her breasts were.

"You heard the little man, feed him girl." Uther says simply.

"Very well." Morgen says taking the bottle from the maid. Only for Uther to take it from her in turn.

"Now now, you know how this works Morgana."

"Uther....I cannot produce. You know this." Morgen says concerned.

"Nonsense, you are a woman and your breasts are developed wonderfully. Now lower your dress."

Both Morgen and the maid looked at each other in disgust at Uther's blatant sexism and need to point out Morgen's 'development', but Morgen begrudgingly lowers her dress. The little tyke does certainly try for sure, much to Morgen's annoyance. But he gets nothing from it, so Uther shoves the bottle back to them. Grumbling in disappointment as Morgen finally lifted her dress back up and gave the bottle to Arthur. He was a bit fussy after picking up on Morgen's anger, but after some food he calmed completely. Falling asleep as he got full on the bottle, which was close to empty. The maid quietly and carefully scooped Arthur up to return him to his crib and then Morgen got up to leave. However, Uther raised his hand,

"Wait a moment Morgana. I have something to ask of you while you're here."

Morgen stayed and nodded to the maid so she'd leave with Arthur.

"What is it you require Uther?" She asks firmly, trying not to show any fear.

"It has come to my attention that you've been visiting the Reaper in his cell. Quite a bit in fact."

"I've only been there twice."

"Just twice is enough for concern. He can influence your mind, fill your head with thoughts you don't need. Therefore, I forbid you from seeing him further." Uther says authoritatively.

Morgen however clenches her fists, and after a moment of silence says, "No. Your actions at the ball show me that you will not treat him with fairness. Therefore I cannot and will not stop visiting him. Someone has to do what you will not."

Uther stands up at this and raises his hand again. This time Morgen feels the slap his her hard and despite her efforts a slight yelp slips out. Uther raises his hand to slap her a second time but stops just as she flinches,

"You will do as I tell you. I forbid you to ever see him again. There will be no other visits starting now. Am I clear Morgana?" Uther asks her in pure anger.

Morgen goes silent, giving him time to say to himself, "Hmm, perhaps the Unseelie King's little Nerve Ender will be of use to me after all."

He then walks back up to Morgen again, but she only shouts at him as he raises his hand to touch her face, "No! Get away from me!"

She runs off as Uther calls for his guards to stop her. They're highly reluctant to do this, but ultimately feel they have no true choice. Only his Captain refuses to be a part of this. Morgen flees as best she can, dodging the searching guards as she tries to reach Death to warn him. She does run into the the Captain of the Guard, who offers to help her. However, Morgen isn't taking chances and hurries away from him. Eventually she reaches Death's cell and finds that the guard beside the door is asleep. Seeing ink and a quill there on his desk she searches for and eventually finds paper. Quickly and quietly she writes down all she can about what's happened. She also writes about the Nerve Ender comment Uther made. And how she fears he may use the critter on him as torture. She only neglects to mention the slap. Morgen hears more guards coming just as she finishes her note and quickly raps on the cell door.

Death wakes with a start of sorts but upon seeing it's Morgen he comes over.

"Why so late?" Death asks her a bit annoyed.

"I don't have time to explain. Just take this and read it. Once you're done, shred it up." Morgen says frantically.

"Wait a minute slow down. What's wrong?" Death asks her before hearing the guards coming their way.

Instead of answering Morgen shoves the notes through the slit and then hurries away. Death about calls after her, but upon hearing how many guards are coming he decides against it. He crouches in his cell, and waits for them to pass before glancing at the folded piece of paper in his hand.

[soft-butch-cassidy]

Value of Scrap (ch. 2)

Summary: Mikris, a nobody, a Marauder, a dispensable underling, might have just made the most unlikely and powerful friend in the universe.

Tags/Warnings: OCs, canon-typical violence (mentioned)

A/N:  This takes place as an alternative to the Thief of Thieves adventure on Titan, with my Hunter Aurora-11. Her Ghost is named Saffron. This is part 2!

ch 1/AO3

“What will you do now?” Mikris asked the Guardian as they stood side by side, staring out at the ocean. It was calm, for now. The storm was moving out and away.

“Get the supplies to Sloane,” said Saffron, Aurora’s Ghost. “And then… I don’t know. We’re trying to find the rest of our leaders.”

Mikris looked at Aurora in worry. “Are they alive?”

“We don’t know,” Saffron said softly. “We can only hope.”

“I hope they are okay. You seem to care very much for them.”

Aurora nodded at the translation. “Cayde, especially,” Saffron said. “He’s the leader of the Hunters. Her mentor, though he wouldn’t say it.”

“Why?”

“Not out of any humility.” Saffron spun her shell with a scoff. “It’s mostly because Aurora’s done a lot of things that almost no other Guardian has done. She wouldn’t say this, and that’s because she is pretty humble. But she helped kill Oryx.”

Mikris drew up with a sharp gasp, staring wide-eyed at Aurora, who was frowning at Saffron and saying something. Saffron bobbed backwards, replying.

“Oryx, the Taken King, Crota, Son of Oryx, Aksis, Archon Prime, and the rest of the Splicers, we’ve been in the Vault of Glass and killed Atheon, Time’s Conflux, we killed Skolas the Rabid, so-called Kell of Kells--” Saffron rattled off the Guardian’s kills like they were nothing at all.

Aurora grabbed at the Ghost, exclaiming something. Saffron ducked out of the way, more prideful in her continuing words.

“Draksis, Winter Kell, Malok, Pride of Oryx, Alak-Hul, the Darkblade, Sepiks Prime, Taniks the Scarred, the Dark Heart of the Black Garden! Aurora killed them all!”

Mikris stared. Speechless. Stunned. Reeling.

The King-slayer, Kell-ender?

All slain by a single Guardian?

There was the rumor that it was a single Guardian, but it… it was true.

Mikris had asked the killer of Kells and gods for mercy. For help.

And she’d been given it.

Aurora swatted at the Ghost again, and looked at Mikris with worry. She said something, then a little more intently to Saffron.

Saffron huffed. “She’s mad I told you that. But I’m proud of my Guardian! I brought her back to life to help people and she slew gods! She’s a hero!”

Mikris felt a deferring shadow sweep over her and crouched into a bow. “I… I had no idea… if I’d known… I… I wouldn’t have… I’m not…” Her growl was soft and pitched, nearly a whine.

Stars above-- she’d been embraced by the most legendary Guardian of all time.

That was beyond scandal. Beyond anything she could think of.

Aurora reached for her, saying something almost pleading.

Mikris shied back a little from her hands. Fear? Shame? Was Mikris even worthy of standing near the King-Slayer? Ender of Primes? Killer of Kells?

Aurora’s face fell. Mikris didn’t know much about humans, but it was clear she was upset.

Saffron looked between them. “Maybe… that was a bad idea,” she said quietly. “Mikris? She won’t hurt you.” She murmured something in the human tongue with worry. “Are you okay?”

“Gods,” she rasped. “I asked the killer of gods and Kells for help. Who am I to do that?”

Aurora reached for her again, definitely pleading this time.

“She says… she doesn’t want you to think about her like that. She’s just a Guardian. Oh, I really shouldn’t have said all that… but she wants to help you.”

“But me… I’m no one.”

Aurora shook her head and grasped her hands in hers. “You’re important because you’re a person,” Saffron translated. “She’s right, too. Is that what they tell you, in the Houses? That if you’re not strong and powerful… you’re no one? It’s not true at all! Everyone is someone!”

“Is that how… humans see things?” Mikris blinked. “That’s… that’s your perspective?”

She was honestly stunned.

It seemed such a desperately beautiful way to think of things.

Someone having worth simply because they exist?

Something deep and lonely twisted in her chest. These tiny two-armed things were far more advanced than her people, it seemed.

Something changed in Aurora’s face at the translation. She softened, an expression that Mikris couldn’t define, but couldn’t keep looking at--something was a little unbearable about it. It wasn’t pity, exactly.

“It is,” Saffron said. “That’s why Guardians fight. Every life is important. From the tiniest young human to the oldest and most frail, the healthiest to the weakest. Everyone deserves the chance to live.”

“Did we think that way?” Mikris wondered aloud. “When the Great Machine was with us… was that our view of life? Have we fallen so far that this is such a novel perspective to me?”

Aurora squeezed her fingers gently. “It doesn’t matter what anyone else tells you,” Saffron said. “You’re a valuable person because you exist.”

“But we die… so many of us die. Dregs by the dozens, Vandals and Marauders… even Captains. Barons and Kells!”

“And it isn’t fair,” Saffron translated Aurora’s saddened words. “There’s so much Darkness and Aurora would want all the Eliksni to be like you. To talk first. To work things out without anyone getting hurt, without being violent.”

“It’s so ingrained in us,” Mikris murmured. “The aggression, the violence, the desperation. We’ve had to fight to survive since our homeworld was destroyed. Centuries. I don’t like it. But what else can be done?”

Aurora looked determined. Saffron spun her shell and responded to what Aurora said. Aurora repeated herself.

“She wants to be friends.”

Mikris started.

Friends?

“I… I've… never been friends… with a Guardian.”

Aurora’s face moved into a friendlier expression when she spoke. “She would be honored to be your first Guardian friend,” Saffron said. She bobbed a little in the air. “Me, too, I think. It’s kind of a relief, being near an Eliksni who isn’t trying to tear apart my shell. And you’re really nice, too.”

Mikris looked between the two of them, too stunned to know what to say.

After a quick conversation between Ghost and Guardian, Saffron spoke again. “If you don’t want to be friends, and just go back to what you were doing, that’s okay too. Guardians are dangerous. We all know that. And we don’t know how much longer we’ll be on Titan…”

“I don’t…” Mikris growled softly in uncertainty. “What does it mean to be friends with a Guardian? I don’t really think… I don’t think it would be how we have friends…”

“Well, for Guardians, and humans in general, friends just… sort of… hang out!” Saffron spun her shell. “They talk about things, and just spend time together? And do things together.”

Mikris hesitated for a long moment. “I… you’re… you’re so nice… even to me… you really want to be friends with me? With a Fallen? Even a Fallen who’s just no one special at all?”

Aurora shook her head. “You’re special!” Saffron said. “You’re the first Fallen who’s wanted to work with us on your own idea! You’re really brave for it, especially knowing how dangerous Guardians can be…”

Mikris flushed a little chilly at the compliment, ducking her head.

Aurora’s jaw was bright teal with a hopeful smile. She asked her Ghost something.

“Aurora wants to know if you can teach her Eliksni,” Saffron said.

Mikris chittered. “I’m not sure if you… can? Can you make the same sounds? Humans can’t, but… you’re an exo…” She murmured the word with a shy note of reverence.

It was a little hard to look at Aurora in the face for very long, as much as she wanted to study her. That was kind of weird, she thought, a little colder with a further fluster. She felt caught between an awed curiosity, a fearful deference, and an instinctive veneration.

Aurora made a thoughtful humming sound. She narrowed her eyes in determination and, to Mikris’ shock, mimicked an Eliksni’s growl nearly flawlessly. It was bizarre, really, hearing a sound intended to mean a cautious curiosity coming from a tiny humanoid, somewhat flanged.

“Oh,” Mikris said. “How… how did you…”

Aurora tapped at her throat as she spoke. “A lot of exos can mimic any sounds,” Saffron translated. “I’m not sure how to translate the term, but it’s the structure that allows her to speak. She’s never gotten the chance to learn Eliksni fluently yet, because of the cultural aspects that we don’t have in our databases.”

“I… I can try,” Mikris said. “I’m not sure how good of a teacher I am. But can you teach me more human-speak, too? Not just ‘hello’ and the other little things? You have such a strange and curious language.”

Aurora nodded eagerly with a laugh. She gestured for Mikris to follow her. “Let’s find somewhere a little safer.”

Mikris kept pace with the Guardian easily, bounding to ledges it took the Guardian two leaps to get to. It was incredible, watching the Guardian jump in midair. It should be impossible, but then again, this was a being that came back to life when she died. Was it rude of her to be so fascinated?

Aurora led her to a region more occupied by the Guardians. Mikris kept hunched, nervous, flicking her eyes around. Aurora seemed perfectly comfortable; her calmness helped ease Mikris a little bit.

This little room was pretty well restored, loose objects recollected and relocated, things secured tighter to walls. The table and chairs were bolted to the floor. Even the lights weren’t flickering as badly as other places on the rig. Aurora hummed, musical and casual, as she let her Ghost fly forward to scan the other airlocked door.

Aurora asked Saffron something. Saffron was quiet a second as she finished whatever she was doing before zooming back over. “Are you hungry or anything, Mikris?” Saffron asked. “We have some food rations, fresh water?”

Mikris blinked and thought a second before clicking a negative. “No, but thank you.” She suddenly gasped and brushed back her cloak to look at the Ether tank at her back. She sighed in relief. “And I’m alright on Ether for a while yet. Thank the stars.”

“That’s good!” Saffron sounded relieved, too. “We should be really safe here for a while. I’ve transmatted all those supplies, so the other Guardians will be looking through those. And we haven’t seen any Hive or Fallen here, either.”

She was alone with this Guardian who was grinning so excited at her. Mikris was breaking just about every rule she could think of, and she was almost dizzy for a moment with the fearful sort of glee about the entire situation. She’d never done anything out of line before, and this was going against everything she had been told not to do!

But despite her worry, her concern… here she was. The friendly eagerness of Aurora was infectious, in a way. She wanted so badly to learn anything she could, and even though she knew it was dangerous, she felt oddly safe around Aurora. A legend among legends, the only Guardian to reclaim their Light, a killer of gods and Kells… and she was sitting down gesturing for Mikris to sit across from her, almost wiggling with her enthusiasm.

Mikris sat a little awkwardly, trying to copy how Aurora was sitting, but the chair was a little small and she wasn’t sure what to do with her arms. She eventually settled on folding all her hands together on her lap.

Aurora leaned forward, hands gripping the seat of the chair between her knees, speaking with a bright tone.

Saffron spun her shell. “She wants to know if we can find you later, by the way,” Saffron said. “We’re not sure how long we’ll be here, but we can still hang out and learn while we are, and if we can come back, or find you again, we’d both like that!”

Mikris warbled softly in thought. “I’m… not sure,” she admitted. “We all have our own communicators? How good is your technology with communications?”

“Can I see it?” Saffron asked.

Mikris held out her arm. Beside her stealth controls was the control for her comms. She tapped it with another claw. “Here.”

Saffron hovered lower. “Is it okay if I scan it? I haven’t had the chance to do a good scan of an active Eliksni communicator.”

“It’s not active right now,” Mikris said. “I shut it off when I was stealing those tools because we didn’t know if you could detect them. Is that okay?”

“It should still be fine, yes. Hold still, please!”

Mikris watched a little beam of light shoot out from the Ghost over her arm. She heard the curious coo in her throat as she watched, amazed. She didn’t feel anything, but it was still very strange, and utterly fascinating. She kept still, waiting.

“This is incredible technology,” Saffron said, sounding amazed. “I could spend hours looking at this! I won’t though, don’t worry.” She laughed. “I can connect to this specific communicator, though, so that no one can detect it, but we can privately contact each other.”

“You can do that?” Mikris angled her head.

“Yep! Just a little bit of Light to do it. If you’re okay with it, of course. But we can pick up your signal if you ping it, almost anywhere in the system. So, if you need our help with anything, too, you can ping us and we can try to come and help.”

Mikris chirped softly. “That’s… very nice of you.”

“Guardians are supposed to help people in need,” Saffron said. “That’s what the Light calls us to do.”

“You include yourself with your Guardian, yet you seem… an entirely different mind?”

“That is true,” Saffron said, twitching her shell. “Ghosts and Guardians are a pair, though. As we work together, and master our Light, we develop a connection so deep we can feel each other’s emotions. I found Aurora a very long time ago. Though… it’s strange… with the Great Machine locked away, it’s… I haven’t really had the chance to talk about it with her yet, but it’s a little fuzzy.”

Mikris looked between the two and warbled soft in sympathy. “What happened? I only heard things…”

Saffron was quiet for a few seconds. Finally she floated upwards a little bit. “I connected to your communicator. One second.” She looked to her patiently waiting Guardian and spoke.

Mikris listened to their conversation. They both talked fairly quickly, so it was hard for her to understand the sounds of their words. What a strange language. It depended so much on words, not sounds. Aurora’s face went from her earlier excitement to something more somber.

“If you don’t mind a sad, painful, ongoing story,” Saffron said finally, much more serious, “I can tell you what happened.”

Mikris nodded. “I want to understand. I don’t know if I can… if I can help, I’m just one Marauder, but…”

Aurora reached out a hand after Saffron’s translation, palm-up on the table, like she wanted to take Mikris’s hand still resting there from the Ghost’s scan. Mikris hesitated before letting her fingers twitch forward. Aurora smiled gently as she knit her fingers with Mikris’ and spoke. Mikris tried not to think about the intimacy of the gesture; it wasn’t so for the humans, so Aurora was showing her friendship.

“Understanding and empathy is more than enough,” Saffron translated. “It’s been difficult for all of us… but a little kindness and friendship is welcome. Thank you.”

Mikris chirped with a duck of her head. “You’re not what I thought Guardians were like. Still strong, powerful, but… you’re so nice.”

Aurora squeezed her hand a little, making Mikris flush colder. Human friendship, she reminded herself.

She was still too much to look at for very long. Mikris was all shades of flustered, instead looking between their entwined fingers and the Ghost.

“You… still want to hear what happened, Mikris?” Saffron asked.

Mikris nodded, silently steeling herself. She knew it must be bad.

She was wrong. It was worse.

Far worse than the rumors said.

When Saffron went quiet, Mikris growled her sadness and horror. She gripped Aurora’s hand tightly, hoping the touch was sympathetic for her. “Is there hope?” she whispered. “If you have your Light…”

“There is,” Saffron said, determined. “We’re going to retake the City. The Cabal won’t have our Light forever.”

Mikris chirped softly. “Your hope is… it’s inspiring. Is it strange for me to feel that way?”

“Not at all!” Saffron translated for Aurora. Aurora sounded eager in her response. “Aurora said… well… maybe when we get the Light back… maybe we can stop this war, with the Eliksni. If at least one Eliksni wants to sit and talk and be friends, there must be more.”

“I don’t know,” Mikris said uncertainly. “The Kells… the Barons, Archons… it’s a lot of chaos now, but there are still so many who are greedy and selfish, who have lived without hope or Light for so long…”

“But the ones who will care?”

Mikris thought about that.

Could it happen?

She had met some of the former Wolves. The majority had… genuinely liked being allied with the Awoken. They had great respect for Marakel, great respect for Siyuriks pak Variisis, and had been treated with a kindness few Eliksni had known in centuries, even when they had been beaten in war. Eliksni were not nearly so kind to those they bested.

Perhaps it was possible.

“I… I think I would want that,” Mikris said softly. “If we could all live safer… live in Light… so many of us have given up any hope of it happening.”

Aurora grasped her hand in both of hers and spoke with determination. Saffron spun her shell as she translated. “We aren’t so different now, with the Great Machine stolen from us all. You were chosen once, it isn’t fair to let this keep happening to the Eliksni! Neither of us are sure what might happen later, but we’ll do what we can. We’ll fight for you, too. Our hope is yours.”

Mikris trilled with a little spark in her chest. She could dare to hope. She could! There might be a future for herself, for her people. Why would the Eliksni need to be alone? Why couldn’t they be friends with Guardians? Aurora was looking at her so brightly.

There would be a hard path ahead of them, she knew. But… it would start with this.

She felt a sudden burst of--she wasn’t sure. Fear? Anticipation? Something strong. Would she be the start of an alliance with Guardians? Had this happened before? It must have, surely, after this many years, she couldn’t be the first Eliksni to befriend Guardians.

But would this be different?

“Are you okay?” Saffron asked.

Mikris clicked her mandibles slowly, thinking. “I think so,” she said. “It’s… there’s a lot to think about. But I do want to be your friend. I want to learn about humans. About how you live, and how you have so much hope when everything seems so dark. I want to learn… how to feel that, too.”

Aurora nodded eagerly. “Just you being here means that you have hope,” Saffron said.

Mikris blinked.

She was right.

The Guardian grinned and leaned forward. “On a lighter topic,” Saffron said. “Let’s break this language barrier a little.”

Mikris sat straighter with an eager chirp.

[crayonwriting]

What Are You Doing New Year’s Eve?

Summary: No one deserves to be alone on New Year’s Eve. Not even a ‘shitty boyfriend’ like Steve Harrington. 

Word Count: 2.9k

Pairing: Steve Harrington x Reader 

Inspiration: What Are You Doing New Year’s Eve by Ella Fitzgerald . I mostly get inspirations from songs so, expect that a lot from me (my next fic is inspired by another song actually, haha.) This is just a sweet, sweet song and I am just a sucker for music in the 50s to the 80s. I HIGHLY suggest that you listen to it on loop; just to set the mood. 

A/N: Thank you so much for 100+ notes on ‘The Lady Killer’! Really didn’t expect that. Thank you to all who read it and enjoyed it. Thank you for the feedback and comments too—these give me fuel to write even more! So, I hope you all enjoy this one too! Another Steve fic because I am totally in-love with that boy! Set just days after the Snow Ball.

—

December 30th, 7:36 PM

You, Steve and the party were sitting on the sidewalk, just outside The Hawk. You had just gone and watch Christine, enjoying a good scare just before the year ends.

“So, what are you guys doing for New Year’s Eve tomorrow?” Dustin asked.

“Light fireworks, of course!” Lucas exclaimed. “It’s not the New Year if there’re no fireworks!”

“Yeah, we’ll probably light ‘em at my house. My mom bought a lot of stuff to light too.” Mike piped up. “You guys are invited, obviously.” Everyone laughed at this. “You’ll be there too, right El?”

The curly haired girl, who had her head laying on Mike’s shoulder, sat up straight and looked at him. She smiled softly before nodding. Mike smiled back at her, then looked up at the rest of the party. “Dustin?”

“I can’t.” Dustin frowned. “My mom wanted to visit her sister somewhere upstate. We’re leaving tomorrow morning.”

“Same here. Neil’s cousin or something is throwing this party. Unfortunately, we’re gonna attend.” Max sighed. She didn’t really want to go. Seeing more of Billy’s relatives was just gonna be a nightmare for her.

“Good luck with that.” Lucas patted the back of her hand. Max just smiled sadly. “You coming Will?” He asked.

“Yeah, I think so.” Will nodded his headed. “Jonathan is visiting Nancy, so yeah, I guess so.”

“Hey! Try to be a little more sensitive Will!” Dustin scolded. Will and the rest of the party looked confused. Dustin not-so-subtly pointed to the teenage boy who was sitting beside him. They all nodded in understanding, with Will mouthing a ‘sorry.’

“C’mon guys. I’m over it.” Steve said. Everyone remained quiet, not really believing it. Steve coughed and stood up. “It’s getting late. I’ll drop you all off. Let’s go.” He started to walk to his car which was parked nearby. You and the kids followed.

“Don’t worry about him guys.” You said. You put a hand on Will’s head smiling down at him.

“Steve, I’m sorry about earlier,” Dustin said.

“Kid, it’s okay. I’ll get over it.” Steve pulled down the front of Dustin’s cap. Dustin tried to dodge Steve’s attack but wasn’t successful. He smiled at the older teen before getting out.

“See you next year guys!” Dustin said as he closed the door of Steve’s car. He was the last kid to be dropped off. You waved back at Dustin from where you were seated.

“Enjoy the trip Dusty!” You shouted. Steve waited for Dustin to enter his house before starting the car and driving away.

The car ride to your house was silent. What were you supposed to say? Steve hasn’t talked to you about what really happened between him and Nancy, not with all the happenings in the tunnels and the gate and the Upside Down. You just hadn’t had time to sit down and talk about it.

Steve was your best friend, always has been since you met him in 6th grade. He stopped talking to you during his reign as ‘King of Hawkins High’, also he started hanging out with assholes like Tommy H and Carol. Your friendship was rekindled when you saw him—his face bleeding and bruised—scrubbing away the vandalism he and his so-called friends did at the cinema. You waited for him and cleaned up his wounds. Apologies were made and you became best friends again.

Despite it being cliché, you had a crush on Steve. How could you not, when you had spent most of your time with him during your middle school and the beginning of your high school days. You couldn’t blame him for falling for Nancy Wheeler. She was pretty, smart, and very determined. But hearing about their breakup—and they say it was bad—you couldn’t help but feel sad because you knew how much Steve loved Nancy. She was probably the first girl, out of all the girls he dated, that he loved.

From the passenger seat of his car, you could see how tight he held the steering wheel, how his lips were set in a straight line and how he was so focused on looking straight ahead. You knew he was hurting but he didn’t want to break. You wanted him to talk about it so bad but you couldn’t force him to. You decided that maybe a little small talk could do the trick.

Maybe it’s much too early in the game  Aah, but I thought I’d ask you just the same What are you doing New Year’s New Year’s Eve?

“So Steve,” you started, pulling on the hem of your shirt, “What are your New Year’s Eve plans?”

“Nothing. I’ll just be at home.” Steve replied.

“What? You can’t just stay at home for the New Year!” You were looking at him now. “It’s boring! You should be out partying!”

“That’s a lot coming from someone who rarely goes to parties.” He smiled lightly, adjusting his grip on the steering wheel.

Wonder whose arms will hold you good and tight When it’s exactly twelve o'clock that night

“You know me. I just don’t like the smell of sweat and alcohol.” You put your tongue out at him in a childish manner. “Tina’s hosting another party tomorrow. I heard it’s her big Year Ender party. You should go. Have some fun, Steve!” He stiffened at the mention of ‘Tina’ and he sat up straight.

“Listen Y/N,” he licked his lips and continued, “I know about Tina’s party tomorrow. Everyone’s been bugging me about it—the basketball team… Hell, even Hargrove’s been on my back about it, wanting to challenge me to another keg fight or something.” He took a deep breath and sighed. “And now you want me to go there too.”

“Listen, Steve, I—”

“I don’t want to go okay?” He cut you off. “I just… I don’t know… The last party I went to was bullshit. Just… let it go, okay?” He looked at you briefly, before averting his gaze back on the road.

The rest of the trip was quiet. So many thoughts ran through your head. Steve shouldn’t be alone on New Year’s Eve. Nobody should ever be alone on New Year’s Eve. It’s a symbol of new beginnings. With all that happened the past few months, you all deserved a fresh new start and that’s exactly what you’re gonna get.

The car stopped in front of your house. The porch light was on, but the rest of the house was dark. You turned to look at Steve who was still looking straight down the road.

“Look, I’m sorry if I stepped a line back there. But I can’t let my best friend spend New Year’s Eve alone and sulking.”

“I am not sulking.” He countered.

“You definitely are sulking.” You giggled. “So, I have a plan for tomorrow. If you ever decide to stop moping around and spend the last day of the year with your amazing best friend,” you leaned in closer to him, whispering, “that’s me,” he laughed at your antics, “pick me up at 10 PM.”

“What are we gonna do?” He asked.

“Pick me up and you’ll see.” You pushed the door open and stepped out of his car. “Drive safe, Harrington. Thanks for the ride.” You started up the steps of your front yard and to the porch. You opened your front door. Before entering, you looked back at Steve waving at you. You waved back and entered, closing the door behind you.

You let out a breath and got ready for bed.

—

Maybe I’m crazy to suppose I’d ever be the one you chose Out of a thousand invitations You received

December 31st, 9:58 PM

Ever since you woke up this morning, you have been in and out of your house preparing for what you had planned for you and Steve. You bought some groceries, making him and you some sandwiches and buying a pack of soda. You bought some sparklers at Melvald’s and also some flashlights.

Truth be told, you didn’t exactly know how you were gonna execute your plan. You just hated to see Steve so vulnerable and so sad. Even if he doesn’t feel the same way, you just couldn’t bear to see him like that. It was your job as his best friend to cheer him up. You sighed. You didn’t even know if Steve would come pick you up. He might just go to Tina’s party after all. But, he wouldn’t just bail on you, his best friend, right?

You checked your watch and saw that it was already five minutes past ten o’clock. Should you just go to bed? You should maybe just wait for a few more minutes. You were seated by the window, waiting for your best friend to come. The backpack that had all the things you needed was sat on the floor beside you.

Moments later, a familiar set of headlights were approaching. The car parked in front of your house. You jumped and scrambled to the front door, quickly putting on your shoes. Your heart was hammering against your chest. For a moment, you thought that Steve would’ve gone to the party. You squealed inwardly and rushed outside, just as Steve was walking up your yard.

“Good to see you, Steve. C’mon let’s go!” You yanked him back towards his car. When you reached the passenger door, you turned around and saw him still standing in the middle of your yard. “What are you waiting for?”

“Where are we even going, Y/N?” He asked, raising his shoulders in question, with his keys in his hand.

“Oh come on, Steve! Don’t you trust me?”

“Well yeah, but—“

“Bar none. C’mon.” You urged. Steve sighed before smiling to himself and jogging back to his car.

For the remainder of the night, you had tried your best to cheer Steve up.

You both drove around the town, directing him where to turn while eating the sandwiches you made. He complimented them and your heart leaped just a little bit. You told him random stories about how milk had suddenly come up your nose and out one lunchtime; and that time you smacked Mr. Colins’ toupee off his head after rushing to get to your class, or that time you almost set your lab partner on fire. Steve laughed at all of the things you said. These happened during the moments he left you for Tommy H and Carol, that was why he hadn’t heard of any of those happening to you.

“Holy shit Y/N, I knew you were clumsy but I didn’t know you were that clumsy!” Steve wiped a tear from the corner of his eyes. “Can’t believe I missed those moments with you.”

“Nah,” you brushed him off, “Don’t beat yourself up for it. It’s okay.”

The car grew silent as you told Steve to take a right.

“Y/N, where are you taking me?”

“You’ll find out, Harrington.” You flashed him a mischievous smile.

Soon enough, you and Steve found yourselves at the Quarry. You told Steve to stop and park here. No other cars were present so you parked in the middle of the road

“Why are we here again?” Steve asked. He turned the engine off, but the radio still played a low hum in the silence of the night.

11:18 PM

You hopped outside of the car, with your bag of necessities on your shoulder. You stopped in front of the car and pulled out a box of sparklers and a Polaroid camera. Steve was in front of you, with his hands on his hips, looking down at you. 

“C’mon let’s light these babies up.” You waved the box at him. You got a few sticks out and handed them to him. You pulled out a matchbox from your pocket and lit the ones he was holding up.

“There. Now do a pose, and I’ll take a picture of you.” You grabbed your camera and got ready.

“Is this really necessary?” Steve held the two sparklers awkwardly beside him.

“Yes, Steve! It’s been a long time since we’ve taken photos, so just shut up and pose!” You peered through the viewfinder of the camera and waited for Steve. Steve forced a big and awkward smile on his face and you took the shot. “Okay now take my photo.”

This went on for a couple more pictures, you and Steve making weird and funny faces. You even took a few pictures together. You held the pictures out to Steve.

“Here, pick a few. Your copies.” Steve thought for a moment and chose four pictures; one of him, two of you and one with the both of you.

“Thanks, Y/N.”

You smiled at him and pocketed the rest of the pictures. You were now sitting on top of his car hood, looking out over the cliff. The faint sounds of distant fireworks and the radio were the only sounds you could hear; the soft breeze humming along.

“You know,” you sat up straighter, “I used to come here when you left me for your shitty friends.” Steve looked at you, his eyebrows knotted together. “I hated you that time. And I was so frustrated. So, I came here to the quarry and screamed until I was okay again.” Steve was quiet as he looked away.

“I’m sorry.” He mumbled.

“Stop apologizing. It’s okay.” You put a hand on his arm and smiled softly. “Why don’t you try it?”

“What?”

“I know you’re hurt about Nancy. And I know you act all tough but I know you, Steve. I’m not your best friend for nothing.” Steve hesitated. He didn’t exactly know what to scream. He doesn’t want to curse out Nancy, god knows he doesn’t. Noticing his lack of response, you bit your lip before cupping your hands around your mouth and screaming,

“HEY! I’M BEST FRIENDS WITH THE KING OF HAWKINS HIGH AGAIN!”

His eyes grew wide at your actions. He stared at you but you continued to smile.

“C’mon Steve!” You took a deep breath and shouted once more, “WOOH!” Your voice echoed out into the air. After a while, you heard Steve take a breath and finally let everything go.

“I LOVED YOU NANCY WHEELER!” You flinched slightly. You didn’t expect that from him. “I LOVED YOU NANCY BUT IT’S OKAY! YOU DESERVE SOMEONE BETTER!”

“YOU DESERVE SOMEONE BETTER TOO STEVE HARRINGTON!” You shouted. Steve look at you abruptly. His chest going up and down, trying to catch his breath. “You do deserve someone better too Steve. I mean, yeah sure Nancy was great but I guess she just didn’t see how much you’d change since loving her. There’s someone who will appreciate that Steve. You just gotta look harder.”

Steve grew silent once again. He thought about what you said because all this time, he had thought he was a shitty boyfriend to Nancy. Maybe he was in a way. But then, maybe he was also good in his own way. Maybe their timing just wasn’t right or maybe him and Nancy just weren’t right for one another.

“Y/N, thank you.” He said quietly. You beamed up at him and punched his shoulder. “Seriously, thank you. For today, for being with me this New Year’s Eve. For putting up with my shit for years.”

“I don’t know how much longer I can take your shit.” You joked. He laughed and nudged your shoulder with his.

11:58PM

You perked up when you heard Ella Fitzgerald start to sing on Steve’s radio. You jumped up from his car hood and put out your hands to him. He gave you a quizzical looked, silently asking what you were up to again.

“Just get up Steve and dance with me!” You egged him on. He slowly took your hand and with force, you pulled him up to stand in front of you. You reached out through the car window to put the volume on full blast. You turned back to Steve and let out a breath.

Slowly, you wrapped an arm around his shoulder and held his hand out with the other one. Instinctively, he put an arm around your waist. You started to slowly sway the two of you, going around in a circle. You felt Steve follow you awkwardly and you couldn’t help but giggle.

“Steve, loosen up a little! Remember when I helped you learn how to dance so you can ask Sarah to the dance during 7th grade? ” He laughed at the memory and shook his shoulders loose. He looked down at you, giving you a heart-warming smile that you couldn’t help but blush at. You felt your heart beat loudly against your chest and prayed to the gods that he didn’t feel it. You leaned closer to him and pressed your cheek against his shoulder; he pressed his cheek to your ear. You both continued to sway slowly until the song was done and another came on.

The distant booms of the fireworks were a bit louder now as the clock had already struck twelve. Never moving from the position you were in, you greeted Steve a happy New Year.

“Happy New Year, Y/N.” He whispered and continued to slow dance with you.

You didn’t know if he intended for you to notice but he held you just a tad bit tighter, giving the side of your head a feather-light kiss. You smiled widely and held on to him tighter too.

Aah, but in case I stand one little chance Here comes the jackpot question in advance What are you doing New Year’s New Year’s Eve?

—

Posted: December 30, 2017

[somewhere-in-the-dungeon]

Genre

In regards to this post, I got some questions ( @proudly-arrogant, @dataandphilosophy) about what I’d read that fit them and what recommendations I had. Since the fact that something is in these genres is itself a spoiler, be aware that the following list should be read with caution. I’m going to write one list that has stories which fit at least one of the genres, and then under a cut I’m going to specify which genre they fit if you’re only interested in some of them and are willing to get spoiled a little.

Mainstays

Worm, by Wildbow.

Twig, by Wildbow

The Gods are Bastards, by D. D. Web.

Chronicles of the Unhewn Throne, by Brian Stavely.

The Reckoners, by Brandon Sanderson.

Mistborn, by Brandon Sanderson.

Prince of Thorns, by Mark Lawrence.

Lightbringer, by Brent Weeks.

Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality, by Eliezer Yudkowsky

Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency, by Douglas Adams.

Ender’s Game, by Orson Scott Card

Ra, by Sam Hughes

The Starlight Crystal, by Christopher Pike

The Girl Who Poked God With a Stick, by Scott Alexander

The Shannara books, by Terry Brooks

Professor Incognito Apologizes, by Austin Grossman

Honourable Mentions:

Artemis Fowl, be Eion Colfer

The Dark Tower, by Stephen King

Unsong, by Scott Alexander.

The Metropolitan Man, by Alexander Wales  

Animorphs, by K.A. Applegate

The Lies of Locke Lemora, by Scott Lynch

Gunner’s Apprentice, by Brent Weeks

Dragonlance: Legends, by Weis and Hickman

Breakers, by Edward Robertson

The Craft Sequence, by Max Gladstone

The Mayflower Project, by K. A. Applegate.

Homecoming, by Orson Scott Card

Hard spoilers beyond here.

Worm is dead centre for 1, and 3. Scion is an omniscient, omnipotent being who could reasonably be said to have ‘created’ all of the capes, and they kick his ass, and you would not have guessed that “all out war against an elder god” was where that story was going. the interludes occasionally give me 2 though not as often as I’d like, and Assault and Battery are appreciated as a nod towards 4.

Twig is a solid 2 and is great for 4 shipping. Sylvester Lamsbridge is a serious contender for the character I felt the most kinship with in any story I’ve read. It gets a nod for 1 on the grounds they Sy does slit the throat of his creator. (Ask me some about Sy/Mauer if you want to hear me laugh my ass off. Ask me about that chapter if you want an unstable gush of feelings.)

The Gods are Bastards had 1 happen in the background, and I’m kinda hoping that the main student group (Triss, Gabe, Teal, etc) winds up ascending to become new gods. I just got to the part where this is all a science experiment and the elder gods had ceremonial guards with lightsabers just for the hell of it. A+, good genre sneakyness. The sexist thief dude makes an appreciated stab at 2, and I gotta be honest I’m shipping Triss and Gabe so far. (Actually I want the whole class to devolve into a hot poly mess (possibly with Teal, Shaeine, and Vadge off in a disconnected polycule) but I’ll take Triss and Gabe if I can’t get that.)

Unhewn Throne is grand fantasy with incarnated gods walking the earth, a great founding myth of immortal emotionless beings who play with the lives of men like toys, and do not misunderstand me when I say I loved the ending of Skullsworn. Really though, this makes the list on the strength of 4. Huutsuu and Valyn are my fucking ship. The fact that I find them as hot as I do should probably put me on some kind of watchlist tbh.

The Reckoners and Mistborn constitute a pattern, frankly. Sanderson just loves to do 1, so I forgive him for his tragic inability to write 2. However, if you take the time to read the first three Mistborn books and then read Ars Arcanum, you get to see the rule of three employed around a conman punching god in the face. I heartily approve. Plus, we get a heist novel shift into deicide, and then get to see it shift into a western. Word of the Author says we might get a space version someday.

Prince of Thorns is some high quality 2, a bastard son carving a bloody path through his father’s kingdom in his quest to take power. Plus, band of mercenary swordsmen find what are pretty clearly nuclear warheads, so that’s awesome. (Upon seeing the destruction one causes, and finding out of the horrors of fallout that have been imposed on the surrounding territory, our hero goes “I know where to get more of those if anyone questions me again.”)

Lightbringer so far is looking like it might be a home run on 1 and 2. It’s a fantasy story that opens with two viewpoint characters- the emperor/archmage/pope, and the fat bastard son of a whore in a shitty little town. The Guile family are truly an inspiration to power hungry assholes everywhere, and I honestly want to give it some points towards 3 just for the number of fakeouts and misdirections involved in their twisted family tree. The emperor and his bodyguard make an okay 4.

HP:MoR gets mentioned here mostly for Professor Q.  being such a wonderful 2. It dances on the line of 3 a bit, but this will always have a place in my heart for the joys of a character who tried out being a hero, found it not to his liking, and went to do something else.

Dirk Gently is a delightful example of 3. It’s the best sci-fi fantasy comedy mystery novel built around a poem I’ve ever read?

Ender’s Game gives us Peter Wiggin, aka my childhood role model. It also gives us Petra Arkanian, my first fictional crush. ‘Nuff said.

Ra offers an explanation of magic that is as structured and ordered as electrical engineering, then starts hinting at deeper, less orderly magic, then goes full out “anything can happen” and then starts swerving hard. “Ra” of course is the name of a sun god, and when that penny drops it’s a pretty good moment. I would also like to point out that the main character scoops her boyfriend’s soul out of his body and sends it to hell in order to test a hypothesis.

The Starlight Crystal is like what happens if you cross All You Zombies and Unsong. As is The Girl Who Poked God With a Stick actually. Um. Huh. These are both great stories and someone should write it again actually, I’d read as many copies of this formula as people can churn out. 

I remember the Big Secret of a lot of pulp fantasy I read as a kid was “secretly, you were on post-apocalypse earth the whole time!” but the only example I think I remember the title of was the Shannara books.

Professor Incognito Apologizes brings a smile to my face. If any woman ever pulls off that, I’m probably going to propose to her on the spot. (The ring will, of course, be coated in contact poison.)

Artemis Fowl (the first book) is a good 2. Shame he turns into a good guy. 

The Dark Tower weaves fantasy, horror, and sci-fi together nicely. 

I probably should have seen the ending of Unsong coming, but I did not. 

The Metropolitan Man is a great example of forethought being put into how to kill the unkillable. 

The Animorphs fanfic I truly want is the one where the animorphs murder Crayak. The Ellimist Chronicles remains my second favourite Animorphs book. (My favourite is The illusion. Third would be The Attack.) 

Lies of Locke Lemora involves a heist novel turning into a vendetta, and also has the murder of a reality warping magi by a pair of angry guys with knives. Republic of Thieves is a worse heist novel, but I still ship Locke and Sabetha.

Gunner’s Apprentice is Weeks being an asshole, and I will not spoil his grand design :) Read it after you finish book 3 I think.

Dragonlance is, to me, the story of one man trying to become a god by eliminating a previous member of the pantheon. People who have played Tabletop RPGs with me are probably rolling their eyes right now.

Breakers gets props from me for misdirection. I kinda thought we were going to be doing a zombie novel, but no, it’s aliens. Gets a mild nod towards 1 for taking out a flying saucer with a hot air balloon.

The Craft Sequence opens with the tagline “God is dead. Bring in the necromancers and the estate lawyers.” Good stuff.

The Mayflower Project is full of terrible people.

Homecoming has people praying to what turns out to be a satellite. I can dig it.

[top1course]

Behind-The-Scenes Tour Of Dan Peña’s MASSIVE Guthrie Castle – Part 2/2

This is this, this is him or less when I first met in, and is 2324, it’s hard to believe it’s, the same young man, we came down to visit me and, 2003 when I said that, buy me breakfast, i really think it was going to come, it’s coming from Canada, but he showed up, and they and we spent a couple hours., and that was the beginning, and, proud, and the remarkable about 10 years ago, and now he’s back, are you coming back, and the, the kids, add interface with, and, we will be doing this, but he hasn’t successful, and I bet the otter speaking in front of, and where I’m going to beat him like a rented mule, i mean, to get more out of it because, they ought to be at 7, seven-figure tickets, is Amity Road Rage, excellent, the top of his game but he’s going to make it better, Is that even make it better and the, any is going to continue because heart, amish people, are all they can be all the time, high performance, all they can be everything in their life, rochester in, services, provides, for the kids, i can’t tell you how often, htci, because it come out of his stable, and, i never, and, improved you know how many millions, alive, where they, provide themselves more money, what my name is, support the family, etc and, take a tour, part of the grounds, if you were here, and the, and I look forward to, thank you very much, so-so Dance YouTube Rodney King, remember 10 years ago, remember what’s bigger, much bigger than I thought, this even my hell is that the lawn I know how much it cost, how much it cost to add a hundred grand a month, that’s nothing breaks and a new machine, With the wall Garden that there is to it is to Hector’s that’s 4 and 1/2 acres, the ground 256 acres in a golf course, 9-hole golf course which is on both sides of the debate with a lock which is Lakewood, and we have Royal swans I don’t own the swans, the queen owns, that’s her property, currently we have the two adult swans and we have poor signal, before babies, overlooking at a lock, and his manicured as you know the estate’s manicured, most of my neighbors, not only do we live in all, whereas most of my neighbors living, horsham the castles they have it walled off because of the heating in it, you don’t need air conditioning, but, and most of the Lawns aren’t uncut manicured and of course we have the, glitch with the lights around the stage and the roads are tarmac, and it didn’t used to be that way I mean, San Jose.

Combination of gravel and dirt, and it’s, it’s a beautiful place in the world, weather forecast, crafts Direct, but I don’t drive 25 years and we have a driver, lady driver, or What She Drives Me In, and it sounded drives, aston Martin and the Ferrari but I can’t even, bedtime, southeast electric Drive the rolls, i don’t drive anymore and we used to back in the day when I had a helicopter to land a helicopter ride here, i Know video, hey, land about, 50 60 70 yards from the plane, then I walked, and I on to the British air jet, normani, airlines that I normally use, thinking about how much time, we’ve sold off our other, we had a place overlooking the Pacific Ocean in Rolling Hills California we had a place in actually a cheap, places in London, we have picture Monte Carlo, But it’s become a fishbone now, taurus, whataburgers are we got rid of all those over the last 5 or 10 years and, so the only home we have now is got three, and we celebrated last year are 450th anniversary of the castle, and, james the 3rd of Scotland gave Sir John Guthrie, in 1468, acres, about 2 million Acres, plus, bi-Rite, to Build a Home Care, different parts, celebs are going over the years, the newest part of the castle was in the late 1800s 1898 295, what is it the Ender and then there was some parts in the 1700s, and then it was joined in the middle 1800 it was joining you can see the difference in me, the stonework and it’s, 55000 square feet, if you live in all of it and the, of course you become famous, and we’re expecting a program to come out and BBC investment and the, Sports, at my age I just turned 74 at my age I’m still, very healthy, and I’m you know I’m in demand, and so are the, so I’m fortunate and blessed in my career, a lot longer than I ever thought, if I know you, for teaching and, is higher than teaching, when knife when can they came the first time it was, cracked right now you have 20 from what you were, you doing more events which I think, with Arthur anything was someone coming here, ., first of all it’s a b**** try to get here, but that’s not easy for a lot of people, the environment, unless you hear you don’t really know, spireon remember back then 10 years ago like coming here the biggest thing for me I got out of it, expanding the context, what I believe, what was living with my mom, when I saw this it was such a, Conch, and, to believe it’s one thing to say you believe but it, dicks, and it’s quite spectacular, and I was very impressed, i’m very impressed, and then I’m sure when the kids come and see that they’re Blown Away, i can’t be your nuts blown away and, the, or the next level is Big Chateau someplace or big it up someplace in the, helicopter helicopter, but I mean, you never going to, outdoor overdue or go over your wildest expectation, and the most, the more wild expectation the better, and so the kids the kids to follow you and the kids to follow me, they have to dream bigger, i have to think figure you’ve heard that some of the webinar some of that, students say that one of the best things the greatest things are the most, advantageous things they got away from experience here and experience with me, Is that the thing finger.

And you know guys were going to do 10 million dollar deals I’ll do a hundred million dollar deals, $10 billion dollar deal, and the not dissimilar to my thought process, when I you know when I when I die, realized and I flipped, my my idea is, do you know the bill real wealth, and that’s what the kids have done in in in fortunately you know I’m at 775 billion dollars in generational, well now with the kids, not dissimilar to yourself, and it is, it’s quite an honor to have done that, but it’s not for everybody, as you well know, yo I mean not everybody want to make the sacrifices, then what would be your, challenge expectations of me, gina from 22 years old and I’m almost, 3738, you’re still a kid, well I mean the place where you live but I mean there’s place, 100 times bigger, okay you leave you make quite a bit of money but and the, i do Porter the kids don’t understand how much it cost to be rich, the expenses that are associated with being rich, yoga, and you mentioned that you had a grand to keep this place going but I mean for yourself I mean to get get, water footprint, expand expand, beyond the shores of North America to to you know we talked about, high ticket closing, certificate, where they’re like an MBA or they’re like you know some sort of college degree or some sort of diploma, accreditation, and I mean that’s all possible, i mean it’s all possible and, what’s up are you done fabulous but I mean you got another I don’t know 10:20 or more years, but you can do this and look what you’ve accomplished, just in the last 10 years, I mean and you can do multiples of that, and I would expect multiples, did the best of the high performance kids, that I’ve had the privilege of coaching and you’re obviously one of them I mean you just scratch the surface, scratch the surface, you know and I say you touch a Billion Lives, and not only will you become a billionaire, what’s your change the fabric of the DNA of the planets, and you know you can touch A Billion Lives because it’s certainly a billion people that need more income, for sure I mean, it’s probably 6 p.m., sorry I mean your universe is is it’s a so large, i doubt you know it it it really depends on, if you get tired, it really depends I assume your health is going to stay good, and but, that looks aside, you know it’s as easy to say wash it I don’t need any more money why do this, But I haven’t seen that and I don’t think that’s going to happen, i think I know it’s not going to happen, the fact that you come here now after these years and you’re getting, refreshing and, yeah and right now there’s so much money, interest rates at 5000 year low, is so much money available on the planet, all you got to do is, this is the one we went public or coal mines, and in Kentucky, this is one of our offshore, rigs in the Gulf of Mexico, back in the day, this is, copy of our first annual report when we went public, india, is why I gave him some of the, menchie’s from a few seminars ago just fucken do it, these are various articles been very speech papers, over the years, has been written about in the, Wall Street Journal in various newspapers.

And this is when we were at 8500, company with 195 and 196, 102b 152 and 195, back in the late 90s, and there was a picture, yep yep this is the picture, christian on social media, that I took out, the company, back on my birthday at 35 years ago August 10th, and the quite extraordinary dig, and continued, a whole lot of, supernatural things over the years, it’s locked up, my office, and I think people need on this, doesn’t like, tractor, calling, doing deal, volume, and, i run the, various organizations and I’m privileged to be the head up, and this is where I come up with the ideas about changing the seminar and, the seminar you seen today was different than the seminar that was in July that was different than the seminar in June, and I, artifact, correct special of frog, Yes NM, price because, i know that, kitchen faucet part of my job, and this is the Frog, that you gave me, 16 years ago, i was wondering never forget, how I got here and it’s by kissing frogs by, and that means turning over rocks, looking at countless., talking to countless people, and, that’s why when I travel around the world, on my website if you want to talk to me for 20 minutes to make an appointment, and what time in Vancouver Los Angeles, dallas Texas or London, i see people normally in the hotel lobby, those could be a total waste., correct, they might be one correct, correct there may be one or two, that, actually come to fruition, and the two-thirds of my time is pro bono, because my time is for free, i’m either doing charity work, or I’m talking to universities, which is, most danger animal pastime, I’m talking at the hyperloop, the guys that are Drilling, elon Musk Underground, los Angeles, a few months ago, and I continue to do that and I could even join back, when we just came back from the Paul I talked at I talk to you one of them, the leading Engineering University, and Cat man do, and, the packhouse, and I really enjoy it, now give me my, my first seminar, one day one day outside the castle of the century in the last 20 years, it’ll be the first time, i’m giving it in, heathrow Airport, at the Sofitel Hotel, on January 18th, all-day seminar, but that the Catholic seminaries where I can make you a cannibal, and that’s really important, and what the kids out there don’t have, and that what we give them here, and I think, youTube, social media, thing called anything is, 74, doing a 5, 7-Day train, i do a two-day training Anaya, do that, to give back, it’s, 10 *, easier, but then Jesus called there, brother correct teach a bunch of kids, scratch, track Finish Line, but I mean our system procedures and, second to none, we don’t have the best of practice, we have the best of best, the best, and even today I mean this week, we’ve seen people in the last few weeks, listen to Jason, who just did this deal., australia, who’s attending the seminar, and the, the system works, it just does, it right now, i mean Levemir Hayden President Trump, exchange Finance, forever, dance around the world, easier to get money, and there’s just, plethora, financial opportunities, they didn’t exist, 5 years ago, and so I’m here to tell you., make hay while the sun shines, i mean, in the end we are, and this is, is grouper a 24 inch, All over the world.

Youngest age 18, is, 55 and actually you’re the average, average age of the 20 for kids, 37, guys gals, children boys and girls I mean go out and get it done I mean, what are you going to ask you what what are you going to tell your grandchildren, did you did during the greatest transformation of wealth, the world has ever seen, sit on your ass with your thumb up your ass, or that you went out, creating generational wealth, it’s up to you you know, up to you how you going to, address, your kids and grandkids, and I’m going to continue to do this one of them healthy, there’s no time limit or anything like that but, i didn’t think I’d be doing it at 74, abraham and so I, the next year’s, and the, unless I’m, i’m called by the president then, i’ll take a hiatus, Couple years off, but then, anita Baker.

from WordPress https://top1course.com/behind-the-scenes-tour-of-dan-penas-massive-guthrie-castle-part-2-2/

[mintyyprince]

all of them? owo

u. i appreciate u.

200: my crush’s name is: good. its a good name.199: I was born in: september!!198: I am really: gay197: My cellphone company is: so-so??196: My eye color is: grey195: My shoe size is: nine or ten usually194: My ring size is: no clue dude193: My height is: five ten!! 192: I am allergic to: geckos...??? its weird191: My 1st car was: no car im dying190: My 1st job was: kitchen aid189: Last book you read: enders game188: My bed is: soft warm and welcoming uwu187: My pet: the best white lab ever i love him185: My favorite shampoo is: s..starts with an s....i think184: Xbox or ps3: i have an xbox but all the games i want rn are on ps4 183: Piggy banks are: good and cute i love them182: In my pockets: my phone181: On my calendar: calendars are for chumps180: Marriage is: uhhhh179: Spongebob can: do anything178: My mom: never heard of her176: Last YouTube video watched: this...175: How many cousins do you have? three!!174: Do you have any siblings? two or three173: Are your parents divorced? yes172: Are you taller than your mom? no clue171: Do you play an instrument? i used to play viola!! hh..170: What did you do yesterday? hm. good question.[ I Believe In ]169: Love at first sight: i believe in infatuation at first sight168: Luck: y..yes167: Fate: you make your own fate ultimately but yes166: Yourself: trying to165: Aliens: no clue164: Heaven: no clue163: Hell: not to be edgy or anything but were living in it arent we162: God: i believe there are many for different things!!161: Horoscopes: yes160: Soul mates: sorta159: Ghosts: yes158: Gay Marriage: i.. am gay...157: War: not really156: Orbs: yea155: Magic: yea[ This or That ]154: Hugs or Kisses: gimme smooches152: Phone or Online: phone if its someone close151: Red heads or Black haired: i mixed up the words and first read “black heads” and assumed this was a this-or-that acne question 150: Blondes or Brunettes: uh149: Hot or cold: youre yes and youre no youre in and youre out youre up and youre d148: Summer or winter: summer!!147: Autumn or Spring: oh.. tentative autumn146: Chocolate or vanilla: vanilla is now cursed but id say chocolate anyways145: Night or Day: night144: Oranges or Apples: apples.. with peanut butter... nice143: Curly or Straight hair: hm.142: McDonalds or Burger King: ew140: Mac or PC: pc please i love myself139: Flip flops or high heals: flip flops my dude138: Ugly and rich OR sweet and poor: hm.137: Coke or Pepsi: coke136: Hillary or Obama: is this even a question135: Buried or cremated: havent decided134: Singing or Dancing: singinggg133: Coach or Chanel: uh132: Kat McPhee or Taylor Hicks: uh??131: Small town or Big city: big city.. maybe130: Wal-Mart or Target: i have Memories in target129: Ben Stiller or Adam Sandler: ngh128: Manicure or Pedicure: pedicure it feels so awkward getting arm massages and not knowing where to look127: East Coast or West Coast: east coast beast coast126: Your Birthday or Christmas: birthday. christmas is cursed i hate it125: Chocolate or Flowers: oh.. oh no.... both124: Disney or Six Flags: six flags fuck yeah123: Yankees or Red Sox: yodels[ Here’s What I Think About ]122: War: whack121: George Bush: whack120: Gay Marriage: free me119: The presidential election: whack118: Abortion: its a choice117: MySpace: whack116: Reality TV:whack115: Parents:whack114: Back stabbers:whack113: Ebay:whack112: Facebook:whack111: Work:whack110: My Neighbors:  whack109: Gas Prices:whack108: Designer Clothes:whack107: College:whack106: Sports:whack105: My family:whack104: The future:whack[ Last time I ]103: Hugged someone: uhhh102: Last time you ate: just now101: Saw someone I haven’t seen in awhile: t..omorrow??100: Cried in front of someone: no99: Went to a movie theater: i saw spiderman i think its hard to remember98: Took a vacation: spring break i think97: Swam in a pool: no clue96: Changed a diaper: no clue95: Got my nails done: too long let me be a pretty boy94: Went to a wedding: Years93: Broke a bone: never actually92: Got a piercing: uhhh?? i think i was eleven91: Broke the law: never anything serious90: Texted: an hour i think[ MISC ]88: Something I will really miss when I leave home is: nothing i will be Free87: The last movie I saw: gotg2.. i left early it was so boring86: The thing that I’m looking forward to the most: hm.85: The thing im not looking forward to: hm.84: People call me: they call me bell they call me stacy they call me her they call me jane thats not my n83: The most difficult thing to do is: oh worm just one?82: I have gotten a speeding ticket: never im too nervous a driver81: My zodiac sign is: libraaa80: The first person i talked to today was: @/haj-ime and i love him79: First time you had a crush: this fucko noah in the first grade i think78: The one person who i can’t hide things from: myself........ was that edgy enough or77: Last time someone said something you were thinking: me?76: Right now I am talking to: no one im 2anxious4talk75: What are you going to do when you grow up: oh hey lmk when u figure this one out id love to know74: I have/will get a job: i stare into the camera like im on the office73: Tomorrow: yes?72: Today: what is the question here71: Next Summer: no really 70: Next Weekend: im so confused69: I have these pets: i have one single evil fish bc he ate all the others and also my puppy cooper i love him68: The worst sound in the world: anything to do with chalkboards i hate them67: The person that makes me cry the most is: oh hey trauma mention opportunity-66: People that make you happy: everyone on my friends page and my mutuals uwu65: Last time I cried: oh64: My friends are: Good i love them63: My computer is: a trooper even if it crashes at least twice a week62: My School: i am my school 61: My Car: NONEXISTENT 60: I lose all respect for people who: lose my respect59: The movie I cried at was: hm. its not a movie but does kiznaiver count?58: Your hair color is: uhhhh57: TV shows you watch: A Lot56: Favorite web site: the internet is a bottomless pit55: Your dream vacation: maybe a cabin in the mountains... good54: The worst pain I was ever in was: oh hey another trauma opport53: How do you like your steak cooked: c..ooked52: My room is: neat..ish51: My favorite celebrity is: none50: Where would you like to be: how many people do u think replied coffin49: Do you want children: yeah!!48: Ever been in love: hm.46: More guy friends or girl friends: boyfriends im gay45: One thing that makes you feel great is: making people happy44: One person that you wish you could see right now: my friends uwu43: Do you have a 5 year plan: it changes every week i42: Have you made a bucketlist: not really41: Have you pre-named your children: nah40: Last person I got mad at: uhhh39: I would like to move to: colorado.. maybe38: I wish I was a professional: something[ My Favorites ]36: Vehicle: none they all scare me35: President: obama maybe?34: State visited: coloradoooo33: Cellphone provider: hm.32: Athlete: hm.31: Actor:hm.30: Actress:hm.29: Singer:hm.28: Band:hm.27: Clothing store:hm.26: Grocery store:hm.25: TV show:too many that fluctuate 24: Movie: too many that fluctuate22: Animal: dogs!!!!!!!21: Theme park: all of them i think20: Holiday:hm.19: Sport to watch: no thanks18: Sport to play: double no thanks17: Magazine:hm.16: Book:hm.15: Day of the week: uhh14: Beach: all i think13: Concert attended: any symphony 12: Thing to cook: i like baking cakes.. 11: Food: either fettuccine alfredo or pizza bc im basic10: Restaurant:hm.9: Radio station:hm.8: Yankee candle scent: idk but i have this one really nice candle thats campfire smoke scented and mmmmmm i love it7: Perfume: i dont really wear perfume!!6: Flower: yes.5: Color: blue!!4: Talk show host:hm.3: Comedian:hm.2: Dog breed: this is such a trick question1: Did you answer all these truthfully? more or less

[enuffula]

Portrait of an American Family

On the People You May Know thing on Facebook, someone had this album cover as their avatar. That’s a step up from whoever had the bishified Jeff the Killer.

To be honest, I’ve been putting off listening to this guy. At first it was simply that I thought he was trying too hard to be edgy. This is due in large part to his younger fandom. Then I realized that I like Jack Off Jill. And my favorite band (next to The Beatles) is The Birthday Massacre. That’s when I began to feel like a hypocrite. But then I was put off because Marilyn Manson and the other original band members decided their stage names should include the surnames of serial killers. Who were (and are) still alive/had only recently died around the time the group was formed. What must the victims’ family members think?

Then I decided, “Screw it. I liked Ender’s Game and Lost Boys even though their author is a raging homophobe. The Mists of Avalon was the baddest thing to me in middle school next to Wicked* and the fact that Marion Zimmer Bradley turned out be heinous doesn’t change that.” Away from his work, I’m not sure what controversial-on-purpose Marilyn is like as a person. But I like his voice. 

In middle school, the first original song I liked by him was “Slutgarden” because of a Hunchback of Notre Dame AMV. The covers of “This Is Halloween” and “Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)” were good too but now my favorite genre is synthpop so whenever someone says they prefer his version of “Sweet Dreams” I’m disappointed, lol.  

“Prelude (The Family Trip)”: He’s a Dahl fan? Sweet. Still think that Johnny Depp was the right choice for Willy Wonka, tho’.

“Cake & Sodomy”: “I am the god of fuck!” That is a bold statement. And why baby bats look up to him.

“Lunchbox”: So apparently back in the day metal lunchboxes were often banned from schools because kids would fill them up with rocks and swing. It’s like how we almost never rode buses with seat belts.

“Organ Grinder”: Man, Marilyn, back at it again with the Roald Dahl allusions. One thing I’ve noticed is the good wordplay on this album. This song made me think “monkey” was a euphemism. I thought “My Monkey” was going to be him singing about his penis.

“Cyclops”: Not much to say about this one. Catchy.

“Dope Hat”: I thought of Marilyn hiding a baggie of mary jane under the hat from this pic while also wearing a “Slammed I Am” t-shirt when I saw the title. This is the theme song for Miss Carol from Rugrats.

“Get Your Gunn”: Due to the subject matter, I’d prefer not to listen to this. It’d be like reading Stephen King’s Insomnia all over again. It’s kind of like how I don’t want to read anymore prison stories after Green Mile and Shawshank.

“Wrapped in Plastic”: Before there was Melanie’s “Dollhouse” there was Marilyn’s “Wrapped in Plastic”.

“Dogma”: I feel ya, bud. Extremist behavior really scares me, as you can tell in my about page.

“Sweet Tooth”: Been working on a candy gore playlist and was going to add this then I remembered that the songs should be at least somewhat cute. 

“Snake Eyes & Sissies”: Didn’t know who was talking so I paused it and looked it up and now I don’t want to finish this.

“My Monkey”: I looked up the lyrics first and I was excited but then I read this page.

“Misery Machine”: My Brit Lit teacher actually recently mentioned how a work we were reading contained a reference to Aleister Crowley but, aside from the candy gore, I’m trying to keep this blog PG-13-ish so I can’t repeat what my teacher said about him.

According to Wikipedia, there were two Argentinian bonus tracks.

“Down in the Park”: A cover of a Tubeway Army song. If I heard the original before it didn’t stick out. But Marilyn’s cover is fantastic.

“Brown Bag”: Remix of “Lunchbox”. I think I prefer the original just a bit better.

In conclusion, I’ll give Smells Like Children a listen after finals next week. “Slutgarden” was on The Golden Age of Grotesque so I have a few more albums to go through until then.

This was my first review-type thing. The first one was for the anthology Slasher Girls & Monster Boys but because I wanted to tag all the titles and authors I didn’t get to put my personal tag on it. 

*Actually, that may have been Flow: The Cultural Story of Menstruation. You can tell I was... going through a phase.

[hopetofantasy]

PODCAST TRANSCRIPT - Nona Janssens

Other podcast transcripts: Veerle Dejaeger, Nora Dari, Nona Janssens, Nathan Naenen This is one of the literal transcripts of the wtFOCK cast podcasts by Ender Scholtens (’Gossip Guy’). You can watch it on YouTube with my contributed English subtitles as well. I didn’t put in any of the sounds, movements, hesitations or laughter, just the plain dialogue. Heads up: they never or barely mention the show, because they’re not allowed to (contract restrictions)!

--- “Nona Janssens: Do Tinder relationships work?” ---

Source: Gossip Guy - 1st of May 2020 (Podcast via webcam)

Nona Janssens: Hello! Ender Scholtens: Hey! Everything okay? Nona: Yes, you? E: Excellent, even. Nona: Should I sit somewhere else? E: You really don't have to. But do you have earbuds with a good mic? There is a bit of an echo. Nona: I always lose everything, I lost all my earbuds. I have some, I'll try them. E: Suspense... Nona: No, doesn't work, right? E: It actually does. Shall we get started? There are a bunch of fun questions. Nona: Exciting! E: Really exciting, even. Alright. Waddup people, welcome to a new episode of 'Gossip Guy’ podcast. My name is Ender Scholtens and today I’m here with Nona Janssens. Waddup, Nona, everything alright? Nona: Hallo, yes, yes. And you? E: Certainly, I'm happy you're in the podcast. For the people who don’t know you, could you introduce yourself? Where could they know you from? Nona: I play in a tv series for young people, whose name I cannot say. E: And we're not gonna talk about today. Nona: Exciting. No, yeah. But I don't think you know me from something else. E: Yeah, okay. No. Cool. I guess it's good summary, indeed. Nona: Yeah. E: So, I asked the people on Insta for some questions about you- or rather, for you. Nona: I'm very curious... E: Yes, you thought we wouldn't get a lot of them? Nona: No! I was seriously thinking: people are going to laugh at me, when he doesn't receive any questions. E: There are *still* some laughing at you, though.  Nona: Ah, yeah. E: No, no, no! But why did you think that? Nona: Yeah, I don't know. No, I'm curious. I think- Yeah... I don't know which questions they would- E: The kind of questions they would ask you? Nona: No. E: Now, I received- Around 200 questions. A lot about topics we're not gonna discuss. The C-word... And a tv series... Nona: Yes. Yes. E: Anyways, someone asked - since you're clearly an actress: 'Did you get any drama education'? Nona: No.  E: No? Nona: I've always done 'Diction' at the music school and stuff like that. E: Ok, cool. Nona: And in high school, I studied Modern- I mean, General Education. There I could pick four optional hours of theatre per week. So I did that. But I never went a 'real' drama school. Even though, I was very much interested, I did choose a different 'direction'. Just to have certainty. Although, I want to act for real in the future. E: Okay, okay, cool, I get that. Which 'direction' did you study in high school? Nona: Human sciences. With cultural education as an option. E: Okay. And 'Diction & drama', I did that too. All through high school. Loved it.  Nona: That's fun, right? E: Yeah, had a blast! Nona: Yeah, it's nice. E: Do you have any hobbies beside that? Since I received questions about youth movements? I think some people of *your* youth movement asked me questions? Is that possible?  Nona: I don't know, tell me their names. E: I'm not going to. But you're in a youth movement? Nona: Yes, yes. I'm in the 'Chiro'. E: Okay. Apparently you're playing a 'De Mol' (= 'The Mole') game at the moment? Nona: Ah, yes, we're playing 'De Mol' right now. [A popular reality game tv show]. I've seen * and she wanted to know who my 'mole' was. E: Okay! Nona: I'm not... going to say that... That wouldn't be good... If I already revealed my 'mole'. E: Sounds very logical. Ah, here. Let's ask this question to be done with it, it's been asked a lot: 'Are you single?' Nona: No, no, I have- I have a partner. E: Okay. Is this something that can be revealed to the public, otherwise I'll cut this part out? Nona: Yeah, of course, that's totally okay. Doesn't matter that much. E: No, that's usually something I ask beforehand. But I forgot. Not everyone likes to talk about relationships. Which I get. Been with your boyfriend for a long time? Nona: Yes, almost two years now. E: Wow, solid! Cool. Nona: Great, huh? We're doing well, right? E: Yeah, you go! Fantastic! Here, other people who are interested in your hobbies: 'Did you ever dance?' Nona: Yes, I did. I've done a lot- a lot in my life. I did dance, Chiro... Now not much extra... E: Dance, Chiro, music school... Were you one of those kids in primary school, whose week was filled to the brim? Nona: Yes, indeed. I did some sports too. Yet, every two years, I got bored and changed to something else. E: I'm laughing, but I was exactly the same. I've done- What did I- Tennis, hockey, volleyball, golf. I did a lot. Nona: Same, every time something different. E: What's your favorite? The one you really loved doing? Nona: Dancing, I did the longest. Still love doing it. I don't really do it anymore in a fitness or something... Always been the most fun. But I did every sport you'd ever imagine. For example, horseback riding. After a few weeks, I thought 'no'. 'No thanks!' At least I tried it. Oh god... I don't even know why. I don't like horses anyways. Still... Wanted to do it. Probably since my friends did it. E: Just checking where the hype of typical 'horseback girls' came from? Nona: Exactly. Didn't get it! E: Honestly... I don't get it. In movies, it always looks so cool. A man on a horse. Yet, in real life? People laugh if you say: "I do horseback riding". Nona: A 'horseback girl'. E: Although, it's fucking cool in movies. At least I think so. Nona: I think so too. Yet, it's not my thing. E: Prince Charming on his white horse, must've said the same thing, right? "I'm going to my riding lessons". People laugh. Still, everyone wants a Prince Charming. Nona: Yes! E: You said you wanted to be- You didn't get any drama education, but you want to act in the future? Do you have international ambitions, something in foreign countries? Hollywood, for example? Is that the dream? Or do you want to stay in Belgium? Nona: I would be happy already if I ever succeeded in Belgium. E: Yeah, I thought- My question was all over the place. Since everyone would like to succeed here, right? Nona: Yes, but- I'm not that fluent in a lot of languages! Not my greatest strength. I might be able to do it, but then I'll probably keep thinking: 'Is this correct?' or 'How should I say this?' I would get sick due to stressing too much! So I don't know if that's in my future. E: And are there any productions in Belgium, where you thought: 'Cool, I want to act in that?' Because I- There have been recent movies like 'Patser' and all that. I was really impressed. 'That's from Belgium?! That's fucking cool! So good!' Nona: Yes... E: Has there been a recent project, where you wanted to say the same thing? 'Wow, that's really cool to join'? Nona: Yes, right now, for instance 'De Dag', 'De Twaalf', ... Those kind of shows are great. If I could play in a series like that, I would be super happy. Yeah, those things certainly interest me... Super fun. E: Funny coincidence, I've interviewed one of the actors of 'De Dag' - Nabil - for a new Netflix series. Nona: Really? E: Yeah. Honestly, I was a bit starstruck in the beginning. My first question was really... bleh! I stumbled over my words. I hope they'll edit it to make it seem more spontaneous. Exceptionally friendly dude, by the way! Seriously.  Nona: Yeah? E: Every time- That's- For example, we're seeing each other for the first time. We're 'meeting'. In a way. It's a risk every time. Because you don't know... How someone really is. You never know. You see an online persona, someone in a series, or whatever, it's always... Hard to tell... how they'll be in real life. Nona: Certainly in a- You know their character isn't real, but still, if you meet them in real life, you keep thinking that they'll be somewhat similar. E: That's- Nona: It is. E: Indeed, indeed. Nona: Weird, huh? Yes. E: Do you think it's difficult for a lot of actors? Like, for instance, Game Of Thrones. Have you seen that? I don't know if you did. But the actor playing King Joffrey, a boy who's gotten hate in the show from episode one, received a lot of hate *in real life* too. Nona: That's weird, huh? E: Do you think that happens a lot? Nona: With 'Thuis' too, if they do something in the soap, I've heard that they get verbally attacked on the street. I didn't get that. My character gets a lot of hate, but I haven't gotten any of that, fortunately. E: Not in real life? Nona: No, but it happens often, you know, people really think you're like that... I've struggled with it, though. That if I go somewhere, I want to show *even more* that I'm different from my character. E: Okay. So you're faking a personality right now? That you-  Nona: Oh, no! No, no, no, I'm not doing that. But yeah... E: I'm just joking. Nona: Imagine. No. E: I know that. Do you experience difficulties in separating the art from the artist? Not only acting, but music too? For example, 'Justin Bieber is awesome' and then every bit of his music is awesome? Or 'I don't really like that artist, so his music is bad'?  Nona: No... E: No? Nona: No, I don't have that... It's not because they put out a bad song... If they produce a bad song, even if it's a good artist, I'll still say it. Then, then... Yeah... E: No, okay, alright. Are you a 'Belieber', by the way? Nona: No! E: No?  Nona: No, not really no. E: I am, that's why I'm asking. Or actually, I was more of a 'Belieber' during 'Purpose' and now with the new album... That's why I asked you, because I really *wanted* the album to be good. And then- Nona: Do you have that experience? Or do you separate it? E: The moment I heard the question for the first time - I've used it multiple times in my podcasts, it's an interesting question - I actually had to think... 'Am I listening to the music or the artist?' Am I- As... With someone like 'Russ' - a rapper that gets plenty of hate, the rap world hates the dude or idk - it might be easy to say "Fuck him and his music", while you could still hate the artist and like his music. Or love a song. So I never said 'Fuck that dude', but it made me think: 'Okay, do I listen to the music or the artist?' Nona: I don't have that. E: No? Nona: No. Great right?  E: Cool. Super, even. Nona: But I really don't have an artist that I'm crazy about. I listen to various genres, so I've never experienced that. E: Even better! Nona: Great, huh? E: Nice, nice. Someone asked to talk about social media. A topic I often explore in my podcasts. But... I don't want to drag it out. Since people made me aware of that fact. However, it's still an interesting topic and certainly for someone in a position like yours. Who gets a lot of attention on the socials. How do you deal with that? Do you feel like there are a lot of eyes on you? 'I should be careful of what I post'? How do you feel about it? Nona: I have... mostly... I'm like... There are people who always take good pics,  everything they post is amazing, and I'm like: 'I can't!" I want to try, but I don't know how! Someone told me I should do more with my social media, ask more questions, stuff like- E: Engagement with your audience? Nona: Yes! Things like that. But most of the time, I'll think of the people in my small town, who will laugh at me if I try to do that! Even if I do it as fancy as the others. I- I- I want to, but I don't seem to succeed! E: I get that. I have- What I personally- Last time, I saw on your profile that you sometimes - since I put it in my story for the questions - have beautiful, serious pictures. The one in black-and-white? Fucking cool! Because of you, I've posted a similar picture.  Nona: Really?! E: Yeah, it's *really* difficult for me. Sorry, I can't keep my face straight. I laugh all the time. If the photographer asks me: 'Give me a serious look.' I can't! Nona: Yeah. E: Do you have the same? Can you keep a straight face in front of the camera? Nona: I try to, because I keep thinking about how the pictures might turn out. E: So you have the goal in mind? Nona: I do. I laugh too, though, but I try to stop it. E: What you said about the people in your town: they might think it's weird if you're into social media... But it's not a secret anymore that you've... acquired some level of fame, right? So isn't posting on your socials considered normal? More accepted? Nona: Yeah, maybe... Yet, I still don't know what to do. I'm not good at that! I don't know *what* to post. Or something. Yeah, I should research that... E: Searching what you want to do. Nona: Yes. E: Okay, nah. Okay! A deep question... You don't have to have an answer. I wouldn't even know how to answer this myself. 'If you could turn back time, is there something you would change? What you did?' Heavy, huh?! Nona: Yes, never thought about that. E: Maybe to this morning, then I could ask Nabil the first question without stuttering. That's it. Nona: But yeah... What could I change? No, actually... If you do something wrong, I still think you learned a lesson. I couldn't think of something. Maybe later, when this is done. Not now. E: Like 'Ah, shit, shouldn't have said that'? Nona: Yes, indeed. E: I have the same feeling with a tv program that will be released soon. I totally forgot I filmed that. It's about... It'll be clear, when it appears online. But I totally forgot that I filmed it. I wasn't thinking then about the things I said and what they'll do with it. Not that I said mean things, but personal stuff. And then suddenly, you realize that it'll appear online. Literally everyone could see this. That's crazy. Maybe I shouldn't have said this now, but when it gets released. In a clear way. But I get what you mean. Like 'shit...' Nona: I have that *often*. Or when you were little, during fights, not knowing what to say until you're done. "Ooooh, I could have said that!" E: That moment. That moment! When you're in your bed and think: "Shit! That's it!" Nona: And it's a good one!? "Oooooh, I should have said this!" E: Usually the comebacks you see in movies. "If I had said this, it would've been a movie scene". Some time ago, I saw an online video about a so-called UFO. Every so often, there is always a video circulating.Always fucking vague, I don't know why we still don't have high quality cameras to capture a UFO in detail. But someone here is asking: 'Do you think there's life beyond Earth?' Nona: On the one hand, I don't think it's possible. On the other hand, we can't be the only living things that exist. E: Why do you think it's *not* possible? Nona: Yeah... yeah, I don't know.  E: Because we haven't seen it?! Nona: Yes, it would be a coincidence if we're the only living things, but on the other side I think- I mean, I don't believe the vague UFO images. I *really* don't believe that. But I mean... Some other life forms, not aliens or stuff like that. E: Rather some kind of microbes that live somewhere? Nona: Yes. E: Okay. Nona: Yeah, things like that. You? E: So... not something with the same brain capacity as us? Living the same way?  Nona: I think it's- I think- Yeah, not at the moment. If it does exist, then I would- Ah yeah. I don't know. Difficult. What do you think? E: Of course, it's all speculation! I can't say: you're wrong! What the fuck do I know? Nona: Yeah, nah. E: That's why I think it's interesting! But it's weird to assume that we- Do you know those videos were they start with 'the Earth' and then zoom out? The Earth compared to the sun. The sun compared to this, this and this. When you realize: 'WTF, how fucking small is Earth, how fucking small are we?' Then I can't imagine that in the whole entire universe, we're the only ones. Nona: It can't be. E: With the same intellectual level as we are. Nona: Ah, yeah... E: Crazy to think about it. Weird, right? Only two o'clock and we're already theorizing. I think it would be cool if... That's something I want to experience:  the first interaction with extraterrestrial life. If that ever happens, that would be phenomenal.  Nona: That would be... wow... E: That's probably something that would bring together humanity. Realizing that we, as humans, are one. We have to- There are others out there. I don't know...it's... By the way, there are a lot of compliments in here. About you. About your acting. I'll send them to you. They're adorable. Nona: Aaawww... Thank you! E: Something I forgot to ask you: you said you've done Human Sciences? So follow-up question: What are you studying right now? Are you a student? Nona: Yes, I study 'Remedial Education'. E: Okay, why that choice? Nona: I studied 'Criminology' last year in Leuven. But... Yeah, I think it's a shame, but I simply... Don't. Study. E: Okay. Nona: Seriously, I can get really angry at myself, but I don't do anything for school. If I get an assignment, then I'll start it at the due date. I want to change, but I can't. So I didn't do anything that year, still had loads of fun. E: As you should! Nona: So now I do 'Remedial Education'... And there... I have the end trajectory of 'Applied Juvenile Criminology'. Still in the same field and yet, the studies are far more interesting. I think it's - I'm *so* happy I changed. Oh yeah, really, I am. I need that, knowing what I'm studying for. I didn't have that in 'Criminology'. Now, in 'Remedial Education', everything we learn there, I know why. There are goals, why we learn it. I can remember the materials better. E: So, what's the goal exactly? Do you have an idea what you want to be later on? Nona: No.  E: No? Nona: I still want to be an actress. If it doesn't happen, then I don't know what... E: Yes, yes. Nona: Actually, within the 'direction' I study, almost every job is... somewhat interesting. I could be happy in a lot of jobs, I guess. E: Okay. Yeah, I'm asking in detail, because there are people listening to this podcast, who will have to make a choice in one or two years about what to study. That's why it's always interesting to ask a student- Nona: I would like to say something! For me, the exams are easier now, but you'll have way more work in university college than university. Since it seems easy, the way I told- E: No, no. Nona: You'll have to work harder in university college, more assignments, but for me, the exams are just easier now. My study has a six-week-system. [New modules with finals every six weeks]. So less tough. That's better for me. I can remember more. In short, I'm working harder for school. Not to minimize- E: No, no, no. Nona: As if I don't do anything... E: What you said about the purpose, why you study those topics. What the goal is of a certain class. Is it because they are less abstract graphs or something? Or literally: 'this class is named...' I don't know which classes you take, but that it's... Nona: No, there are similar classes to those I had last year,  but... Just... What we learn, is way more specific. Less 'general'. In uni, we had 'History’. I get the importance, but you don't do anything with that, later on. Now, when we have 'Psychology', those are exactly the things we'll apply. Useful for the future. E: Okay, super. Super. Now a question, that could piggy back onto the previous topic. A girl - also an actress - asks: 'Would you drop out, if you got a role,  where the combination studying-acting isn't possible?' Nona: Yeah, I thought about that.  E: Thought about it? Nona: I got lucky before, I was able to combine both. I don't always have to be in class. Self study is achievable. On my own. If attendance is not required, naturally. So yeah... I've thought... That's really... You have to think long and hard about that. Then I might think: 'That's my dream!'. But afterwards, when the series or project is done, I've got nothing. I didn't do drama school either. I wouldn't have a diploma. E: You have to have a back-up, right? Nona: Hopefully, you can keep going. If not too much time passed by, I think you can go back to school? I hope so. I think I would, if I know I can come back to where I left off. I would. E: Okay, nah, cool. I guess people our age, who do something creative, might think a lot about dilemmas like that. Nona: Yes. E: They say the same thing. That they would like to finish their studies, but if the opportunity of a lifetime arises... I get that. I had a good question, but I scrolled past it. Quite a few people are asking the same thing. I once posed this question to someone during a podcast and now it keeps coming back. They ask: "If you had to describe yourself in one word..." "What would that word be?" One word is not much. Someone else is asking three words. Let's say three words. That's such a yearbook question. Nona: Questions you need to answer often and I still don't know the answer to them. E: You should have it ready in your head. Nona: Always be prepared. E: That's like: "What's your positive and negative quality?" I never know! Nona: Yes, honestly, negative - no problem. But positive? E: Really bad, right? Quite a few people feel that way. "I'm bad at this, at this." "And now something positive?" Nona: "Euh, yeah..." Nah, I am... I think... Usually... Spontaneous. E: That was very spontaneous of you! Nona: Should it be a deep answer? No, right? E: No. Nona: Friendly. And... Two, is that enough? Or still going for three? E: Thats... You may stop at two, for me. Nona: I can say a lot of negative stuff. E: We'll try and keep it positive. Nona: Lazy... E: Nah, let's be positive! Some questions make me wonder... Funny, though! "What do you think 'week animals' (= mollusca) do in the weekend?" Okay... The same person as the funny question, but this one is important for me. I often have a discussion about the topic, with my mom. "What's your favorite chips flavor?" Nona: Super bad, but I only like paprika chips. E: Paprika, I can live with that. Salt is the most boring variant there is. Sorry to those who prefer salt... Nona: Yeah... E: You like that too? Nona: I could eat it. Yet, if I have had to choose, of course I'll go with paprika!  E: How can I stop this podcast... ? No, no. Nona: Paprika, no doubt about it! And you? E: I like plenty of variants. There aren't many I don't like. That's why I think: there are so much flavors. A world of choices. Large shelves. Filled with options. And then you go for salt?! Nona: Yeah... But I meant, not- At parties, for example, you can't go wrong? E: Fact. Big chance that people go for any chips, if they wanted to. Most of them will. Nona: That's important. E: True. My tactic in the past, when going on a bus trip or camp or school trip - I don't know what, I took chips with me that nobody would like, so I could eat it all by myself. Nona: You liked them yourself? Otherwise, that's not clever. E: I'm not a picky eater. I could eat salt chips. I just think if you have the choice, then why go for that? Yet, there are still people who go for basic. I get that. That happens. So, Pringles - Sour cream and onion. The smell alone, people hate it. I love it. Your face! Nona: Never tried it, but I don't know if I want to. E: Yeah, I love it, it's great. Quite a few who hate it. Nona: With so many flavors, once you open the bag, I'll... It can smell *so* bad. E: When I was little and tried to hide my chips from my parents, I would put the bag behind the sofa. Then my parents would enter: "Are you eating chips?" Nona: Chips is one of the hardest foods to hide. E: The crunch is too loud. Nona: Opening the bag... Yeah, then it'll be too late. E: Exactly. Again, hobby questions. I don't know... How many do you have? Did you put pics of it online? You seem to like skiing? Nona: Yeah, yeah, yes, the most fun one. E: Okay.  Nona: It's amazing.  E: How long have you been doing it? Every year... ? Nona: From age four. E: Cool! Me too. Same. Nona: Yes, fun. E: Did you ever do Austrian skiing school? Or with- Nona: No, always Flemish instructors. E: Okay. Nona: I think it's- If you ever feel bad about yourself, go skiing! You can't think about anything else, because you have focus on so many other things:  not falling, not crashing, following the right path. You can't concentrate on anything else. The perfect solution when feeling bad. E: I agree completely. Why I asked about the Austrian ski school... As a three or four-year-old little guy, in a ski school filled with all German speaking children... Nona: I did it once when I was little. Bad, huh? E: I couldn't handle it. E & Nona: I cried so much! [said at the same time] Nona: Yes! Bad right?! E: Yeah. But It's just- I mean, you can't ski, can't talk to others who can't ski either. Everyone is talking, you don't know what they're saying, 'are they talking about me?' Nona: You go to the lessons to learn things, but you can't understand what they're teaching you! E: Exactly! Then they suddenly said: "Go into a pizza shape! Let your skis touch like this!" First, I was just copying it with my hands. Then he skied backwards to show the shape, but backwards. Just a point! So I turn, go backwards too. The instructors go ballistic, they were angry at me. What do you do, as a small child? Nona: Fortunately, I just did it once. You don't really learn from them, right? E: Good for you. Indeed. I've got another question. Separately. You've got a boyfriend, so maybe it doesn't apply to you. But I've had fun on Tinder, recently. I get some funny pick up lines on the regular. Did you have a Tinder profile?  Were you ever active on it? Nona: No, never. E: Okay. Nona: I saw my friends' profile, just for laughs. But I really don't know how it works. E: The funny thing is, everyone does it for the laughs. They'll send a message, because 'it's just a Tinder match'. If everyone does it for fun, then we're still going about it in a serious way? Nona: Yeah... Do you have it? E: I have it. I just don't send a lot, just here for the pick up lines. I'm exactly the person I bitched about before: doing it for the fun. Nona: Do you start or the other person? E: I've never send anything myself. I would want to, though, since it's a good topic for a video or something. Just recently, I asked for pick up lines, so I could use them. But I haven't gotten the time to do it. In the meantime, I just answer to the messages they send me. Still nice. So you weren't a fanatic Tinder user, before? Nona: No, really, never. I wouldn't know how to use it. I've seen the process on a video, or something. Yet... E: Do you believe that... relationships formed through Tinder, could be good? Nona: Yes, I do. I think so. E: I think so too! There is always such a stigma surrounding it. Nona: That's not true, because if you go on a date, you still get to know each other? E: See? That's the answer I would say too. Nona: It's still a thing: 'Where did you guys meet?' 'Tinder'. Then everyone laughs at you. I think a lot of people make up stories. E: Make up different things. 'Yes, in the library.' Nona: 'What should we say?' E: See? Like that! Where did you met your boyfriend? Nona: We've been classmates since primary school. But I didn't really know him. Now- No, I mean, two years ago, he was also a 'Chiro' leader... E: So... Tinder? No, no. Okay, we've been talking for a while now. Is there something you would like to - Wow, my voice. Stuff you'd like to say? What you thought about recently? Something people should know? What people should know... About you or about life? Wisdom to share? Nona: No, don't have that. E: 'I don't have wisdom'. Nona: No, but I was- Before this conversation, I thought about how awkward I was going to be. E: No, of course not. Nona: Honestly, it takes a while. Fortunately, you're alone. But in group? I'm very uncomfortable, very quickly. It takes a while before I can be myself. I get so angry at myself. "Just be yourself" and then it doesn't happen. It takes so much time. I really get annoyed at that. E: Were you able to be yourself now? Nona: Yes, yes. If it's one person, I can. With a group, however... E: Can I be honest? I never told this. I'm exactly the same. People always think I'm super smooth. I'm only outgoing when I can talk one-on-one. It's easier. Nona: Right? E: Yes. Put me in a group and I certainly don't stand out. I'll wait and see. I'll try to read people. Who would laugh with this and that? And then I might talk. I won't be the loudest screamer. Nona: No, that's... Yeah... It might even happen that, in a group, I'll never be truly myself. Then I think- I don't know- It's not the people- No, probably is, but I don't know what's stopping me. That's really super... crazy, actually. When I finally can be myself, I think people think: 'I want to be the same. Speak my mind.' It has to develop, though. E: I feel you. Completely the same. It still happens with the people I know. I've had great one-on-one conversations with them. Yet, when they're together in a loud group, I still struggle. 'I know these people, they're my friends. I can talk to them.' Then trying to shout something in that group? Still... 'I'll keep quiet'. Nona: So crazy. Especially when they're all immediately themselves, from the first second. Loud and all that. Respect. I would love to be the same. But that makes it harder. 'Shit, I wouldn't dare to...' 'I don't know what to say' E: Indeed. Indeed. I feel you. I think a lot of people have this, we're not the only ones. Nona: No, and I think that, when you get older, it will probably pass. E: I think so too. You'll care less and less about what people think, after a while. Focussing more on people where you truly can be yourself. Okay, what a nice touch, to end the podcast on. Nona: Right? E: Super. I would like to thank you for stopping by. Is there-  'Stopping by', I say. Quotation marks. Are there accounts where they can follow you? Something you're doing? Where you'll post stuff? Nona: No, I'm not doing anything. I'm mostly focussing on school. E: As you should. Nona: And, yeah... the rest, not really... Bad, right? E: Instagram @nonajanssens? Nona: Yes! E: TikTok? Nona: No! E: No TikTok? Nona: I have it, but I don't use it. I've posted one video, where people- I'm in it too. I've got a lot of videos in which people fall. Coincidentally, I'm always the one filming it. E: Okay. Nona: And I've mixed them together. Everyone's falling. That's not really me. No dance video or something. E: No TikTok dancing? Nona: But I love watching stuff. E: Yeah, no, there are- Nona: So much fun stuff. E: The hours fly by if you scroll, that's crazy. Nona: Indeed. Sometimes I think 'Oof', but sometimes things are so funny. I have so much fun with that. E: Sometimes you think: 'People share too much on this app'. I feel you. Nona: That's true. E: I've said it too many times in a short period of time: 'I feel you'. I never say that. But 'I feel you', so... So, Nona Janssens, on Instagram and Twitter? You use that? Nona: Yes. E: Perfect. Thank you very much. Oh shit, I forgot, I have to give a Twitter shoutout! I'll do this quickly. You've probably seen it. So, one of the retweets. Follow and retweet the tweets @gossipguypodcast, if you ever want a shout out. The shout out of this week is 'Astrid', '@Houdjou'. Thank you for listening, Astrid. Thanks for talking to me, Nona! Nona: You're welcome! E: Until next Monday! Peace! Nona: Bye! E: Now I can stop the recording.