#something about Black folk on my screen heals my soul

[megamindsecretlair]

Man, everybody need to go watch Black Cake on Hulu and support an amazing show with talented writers, cast, and crew.

This show has my whole heart 🥲

[shirtlesssammy]

6x21: Let It Bleed

Then:

Dean and Cas broke up

Now:

March 15, 1937

Providence, Rhode Island

It was a dark and stormy night, and HP Lovecraft sits at his typewriter clicking away. He finishes his manuscript, and his door slowly creaks open. He pulls out a revolver and heads to the hallway, but quickly backs back into the room and locks the door. A window blasts open and a shadowy figure is there. He pleads with it --but becomes blood cannon fodder anyway. 

Dean continues to dissect what could have gone differently to prevent his breakup with Cas. Sam tries being the logical friend --but there’s no explaining heartbreak, folks. Bobby comes in to tell them that when Cas popped in for his late night tet-a-tet with Dean, he stole a journal. But don’t worry, Bobby had a copy. 

Upon reading it, Bobby discovers a mention of HP Lovecraft. Dean doesn’t know who that is --and you’re going to tell me the dude that knows horror movies like the back of his hand and reads Stephen King doesn’t know who the father of horror is? And I know that Dean lies to cover up things he thinks other people would look down on him for, but this would be a weird moment to do that. 

Anyway, Bobby thinks Lovecraft knew something about purgatory. 

Meanwhile, Ben is chilling in his room reading Cthulhu graphic novels while his mom is watching the sportsball with her new beau. Demons bust in and gut the boyfriend right away. One takes after Ben. Ben gets to his room and calls Dean in a panic. He doesn’t know what’s out there and he can’t get to the shotgun in Lisa’s closet. Dean tells him to jump out his window. It’s too late --Crowley’s there and has both Ben and Lisa. 

Crowley tells Dean that no harm will come to them if he backs off from the purgatory plan. 

Sam throws some salt on Dean’s wound and asks if Cas knows about this. “We gotta assume that he does.” OUCH.

While Bobby heads off to follow the Lovecraft lead, Dean and Sam set to finding Lisa and Ben. They summon Balthazar and tell him that Crowley is alive. He blinks and tells them Cas already informed him. They then tell him about splitting the souls in purgatory plan. Balthazar knew that too, ahem. He refuses to help find Ben and Lisa. 

Sam thinks they should call Cas. “WE’RE NOT CALLING CAS.” This is a man in pain, Sam, he needs time. 

Bobby, meanwhile, interviews someone who possesses a large collection of Lovecraft’s private letters. He asks about March 10, 1937 specifically, and the dude wonders if he’s working with the other guy --”trench coat, looks like Colombo, talks like Rainman.” We’re supposed to assume he’s describing Cas, but ?? okay. They’re competitors actually.

The guy tells Bobby that Lovecraft had a dinner party with other blackmagic followers. They were getting together to perform a ritual to open a door into another dimension. He has --or had-- letters describing the dinner. Bobby leaves, knowing exactly how the letters disappeared. 

Bobby discusses the case with Sam, revealing that one guest of the party -the maid’s son- didn’t die and has been in a mental ward since that night. He’s gong to interview the man now. 

Dean, meanwhile, is lining the demons up and taking them down if they don’t answer his questions. 

For Murderous Rampage Science:

Sam tries to get his brother to take a break, but Dean is 100% on an emotional bender and will not stop. Sam then heads outside to pray to Cas --pleading with him to bring Ben and Lisa home. 

When Cas doesn’t appear, Sam walks away, dejected. Only Cas is there, invisible to Sam. AND I WANT TO TEAR OUT MY EYES. 

Cas confronts Crowley. Crowley was “merely exploiting the obvious loophole.” Cas demands he tell him where they are. 

Crowley tells Cas the only way to save Lisa and Ben is for him to find Purgatory. 

For Literal Science:

Cas flaps away when Balthazar summons him. They meet in a wooded area, and Balthazar confronts Cas about his partnership with Crowley. 

Balthazar confirms that Cas would be the vessel to take on the souls from purgatory. He could explode from all that energy. Cas assures him he won’t (weeps). Cas demands Balthazar tell him if he’s with Cas, and Balthazar laughs but agrees. 

Bobby interviews the maid’s son, and discovers Cas was already there. Bobby asks for the story. The man tells what was said at the time, but then asks, “Do you believe in monsters?” He tells Bobby that the door did open that night, and whatever came through took over his mother. Then the others died. Bobby gives his condolences to the man, and he shows Bobby a picture of his mother. Bobby recognizes her.

Dean prepares his Tortures for Demons™ when his foot drags part of the devil’s trap away. The demon immediately gets the drop on Dean, only for Cas to flap in (or turn visible) just in time to save Dean’s bacon. 

Dean’s...ungrateful. Surly, even! Cas apologizes about Lisa and Ben, and he’s hurt when Dean doesn’t believe that he had nothing to do with their abduction. 

“Dean, I do everything that you ask,” Cas pleads. “I always come when you call and I am your friend - still. Despite your lack of faith in me, and now your threats.” Cas is just asking for backup this ONE TIME. (And you know what? Knowing the crap these Winchester boys have pulled, I always felt like Cas made a good point here.) They lob soulful looks at each other. Cas promises to rescue Lisa and Ben if Dean will just PLEASE stand down and let him absorb every single monster soul EVER it’s NOT A BIG DEAL. This is entirely the wrong tactic, and Dean tells Cas to go back to Crowley and he’ll save Lisa and Ben on his own. 

Cas flaps away. Soulfully. 

Bobby arrives at Eleanor-the-Dragon’s door. She’s at a little cabin in the middle of nowhere - one of her safe houses. He confronts her with the old photo and demands to know her agenda. “You know, we’re not all alike,” she retorts. She reacts similarly poorly to Bobby complaining about sleeping with her without knowing she was a monster. BOBBY! WASH YOUR MOUTH OUT RIGHT NOW. She tells him that the world’s lucky that she’s who popped through the portal. The professor is on Team Earth. Bobby begs to know the secret of the portal so that he can protect her from Cas. 

Balthazar flaps in on Sam. He’s joining Team Winchester because he’s terribly concerned about Cas’s life choices. He flies them close to Crowley’s angel-warded lockup, and Dean and Sam swoop in to save Lisa and Ben. 

They split up inside the warehouse - always a sensible plan. Sadly, Sam “Soft Noggin” Winchester gets knocked out IMMEDIATELY. Sam plz. Dean bursts into Lisa and Ben’s prison like a little angry blur of knives and in short order, he’s killed all the demons standing guard. They start to flee, when Lisa holds Ben at knifepoint, her eyes flashing black. 

The demon goes all in on the mental torture, telling Ben that Dean’s his real father (JK!) and that Dean is Lisa’s WORST EVER MISTAKE. While Dean catalogues the internal damage, he and Lisa fight. He sheathes the demon blade and starts an exorcism, and I look directly at the camera. Demon Lisa’s got another trick up her sleeve. While the exorcism progresses, the demon grabs a tool and jabs it into Lisa’s gut. Then, she gives Dean a choice: exorcise her and Lisa bleeds out or let Lisa remain animate (but a demon puppet). Wrenchingly, Dean finishes the exorcism. 

He makes sure Ben’s armed with a salt-round shotgun and then they head out of the factory. Ben shoots his first demon while Dean shouts at him to “pull it together” and I...just…….

Guys.

I’m just going to box these feelings up and stuff them in my Dean Winchester is a Sad Child attic, while humming Cat’s in the Cradle to myself.

They find Sam and head for a hospital, Dean muttering the whole time that she’s FINE Lisa is JUST FINE she is FINE. Cut to the hospital where Lisa is NOT FINE, but also is not dead! Yet! 

Cas flaps in. 

Dean refuses his apology. REFUSES IT. But Cas didn’t come to apologize. Okay, he DID, but he primarily came to heal Lisa miraculously. Dean looks up at him like he completely forgot that Cas can heal. 

For Healing Cas Science:

In Jensen Ackles your face is a menace news, Dean displays grief, joy, relief, anger, betrayal, sad cat memes, and more in like less than five seconds of screen time. He thanks Cas for healing Lisa. “I wish this changed anything.” Regrets lie thickly between them. Dean asks for one more favor. He wants himself erased from Lisa and Ben’s memories for good. 

When Lisa wakes, Ben explains that they were in a car crash. Dean enters, and introduces himself as the guy who hit them. GAH. The shitty things these characters do!!! Excuse me while I hurl knives at the wall for a solid thirty minutes!

“I lost control for a minute,” Dean says, not AT ALL metaphorically about their time together. “And I just want to say that I’m sorry.” He heads out, leaving the Braedens entirely unprotected from future supernatural threats and missing a substantial chunk of their lives. Hope Cas also cleaned up Matt’s body??? And the busted door??? (Side note: does anyone else have weird squid emotions thinking about Cas willfully blanking their memories when his own memories have been tampered with time and time again? I SURE DON’T!)

Dean meets judgmental Sam back at the Impala. Sam, I see your judgment, and I judge thee valid. Dean talks about his emotions in an open and healt----hahaha nope. Dean tells Sam that if he ever mentions the Braedens to him then he’ll break Sam’s nose. He punctuates that with mournful, red-rimmed eyes which definitely deal at least 1.5X damage against Sam’s puppy eyes. They drive off into the sad music. 

Elsewhere, Eleanor Visyak leaves her cabin, only to encounter Cas behind her. Cas flaps her away. CAAAAAAAAS!

You QUOTE Miette??!!

Your chocolate's been in my peanut butter for far too long

What’s with the slow burn?

You’re just a man. I’m better off protecting myself

I’m officially on your team. You bastards

Want to read more? Check out our Recap Archive!

[grimelords]

My November playlist is complete from Aretha Franklin to Blood Incatation, and I guarantee there’s at least something in here you’ll love. Thanks for listening!

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Don't Start Now - Dua Lipa: Dua Lipa said disco lives. I absolutely love this song, it’s rock solid disco without being throwback or ironic about it. The way this song starts with the first line of the chorus and then launches into the verse and only gives you the full chorus later feels like that thing movie trailers do now where they give you a little trailer before the trailer for some reason. It’s also something I’ve never heard before, and it gives the song a very fun structure in the intro where it has two different levels of elevation it can drop down to before the bass properly drops in. I think Dua Lipa understands something fundamental about being a pop singer: literally the only thing you have to do is make bangers. She has basically zero personality and was criticised massively around New Rules for having zero stage presence (which she's definitely gotten better at since) but I kind of like it like that - she's just an unknowable blank canvas that's not particularly interested in any kind of narrative, she just makes bangers.

Mirage (Don't Stop) - Jessie Ware: Jessie Ware has been putting out some extremely good singles since her last album and this song is another. It’s the kind of smooth neo-soul that Jungle is pioneering but the way this song is structured is really beautiful; it gives the ‘don’t stop moving’ part a lot of space early on before it really gets to take hold and take over the second half of the song - it gives the whole song this feeling of disco evolution and the song going on and on and changing rather than static pop.

What A Fool Believes - Aretha Franklin: I can’t believe I’ve never heard Aretha’s version of What A Fool Believes before. It’s amazing. It’s the best kind of cover where you just basically do the song exactly the same but better in every single way. Push the tempo slightly, put big brass in it, make the bass hot as hell, sing the hell out of it, add a sax solo obviously. She takes such liberty with the rhythm of the vocals and it gives this whole song this great swooping and diving energy that just uplifts in such a beautiful way.

Walking Into Sunshine (Larry Levan 12” Mix) - Central Line: Something I love about this song is the crowd noise that breaks in with a ‘woo’ near the beginning. It’s such a strange little detail that instantly injects so much life and love into the track. It positions it at a party rather than a studio from the outset and somehow that mindset carries through the whole rest of the song even though the crowd noise only lasts a couple of seconds until they reconvene right at the very end.

Freedom - Grandmaster Flash & The Furious Five: There was a time in the history of rap music where some kind of government mandate demanded that every song go for at least 7 minutes, so you ended up with great songs like this where they spend a good couple minutes in the middle killing time by going through everyone’s star sign and then asking the crowd their star sign too. Also they appear to have recorded their own kazoos on the track over the kazoos in the sample, which is a lesson in good production everyone take.

Freedom Funk It Up Freedom - Freedom: I was looking up where the sample on that Grandmaster Flash song Freedom was from and it turns out it’s from this band called Freedom. Easy enough. This isn’t the song Freedom samples though, this is Freedom’s other song Freedom Funk It Up Freedom. It’s fucking hot and contains maybe the livest crowd I’ve ever heard, they are just going absolutely nuts the whole time and it only helps the energy of the song which is already off the charts.

Set Guitars To Kill (Live) - And So I Watch You From Afar: For the 10th anniversary of their debut album, And So I Watch You From Afar just played the whole thing front ot back and put it out as a live album, and it’s amazing. They’re an instrumental band that’s always emphasised the rock part of post-rock, in the same space as bands like 65daysofstatic and Russian Circles but not so self-serious about it, just big honking rock and roll tunes with a surprising depth and complexity to them that never get bogged down in ambient buildups or the other space-making trappings of post-rock. Their debut album has always been my favourite of theirs because it felt the most ‘live’ and wasn’t as cleanly produced as their subsequent releases (which are still very good), and so this live version feels sort of like a definitive version for me, like this is how it was always meant to sound but they didn’t have enough fans to do the ‘woo!’ part properly yet, which is one of the most purely joyful moments in music.

Bullet The Blue Sky (Live) - U2: I saw U2 this week for the second time in my life and guess what: they’re still great. Even though they’re old as fuck and Bono is getting stranger and stranger they’ve still got it. They have a very good bit of stage design going with this current tour where for a big chunk of it they’re out on a little platform in the middle of everyone with no screens or fancy lights and it’s one of the most effective ways I’ve seen of making an arena show feel like an actual intimate experience. I was a million miles away and Bono looked like an ant more than usual but the energy still came across. Then, when they do the Joshua Tree Start To Finish part of the show they have big visuals for every song but it’s still pretty light on actual cameras on the band, which I think works really well - a sort of best of both worlds where you get the arena show but the actual band performance. This song was a highlight for me, and they’ve somehow managed to make it even more ferocious now than ever before. It got extremely noisy, far noisier than you’d ever expect from U2 at least and really amped up the swirling energy that I’ve always loved about this song. People accuse U2's politics of being too wide ranging, and it's well founded they're the prototypical 'heal the world' rock stars - even in this song and the way they've repurposed its messages to fit various political causes over the years they've tried to dilute it, but this feels to me like a song that you can't wash the meaning out of no matter how hard you try. It's one of the best and most direct criticisms of American evil put to song, and it's an arena song that doesn't particularly have an arena melody to it. Especially in the Joshua Tree/Rattle And Hum era, U2 have always been captivated by the American mythos but have never been able to completely ingratiate themselves as an American Rock Band because they're not and I think that point of difference in identity has them uniquely positioned to criticise the American mythos as well. They can have it both ways because they can't fully have it, so in this song the circle of American violence is complete in the women and children who run from the American fighter planes into the arms of America as refugees. Bono's actually mad, which is a nice change of pace from love healing the world.

Gingerly - Enemies: I love this Enemies album so much. A sweet spot between post-rock and midwest emo math guitar, and listening to it now this song really stood out in a way it hasn’t before. It turns up at a good spot in the album just as you might be getting tired of the twinkly clean guitars that characterise the rest of it and burns a hole in the speaker with that distorted bass and siren guitar sound.

You Look Certain (I’m Not So Sure) - WXAXRXP Session - Mount Kimbie: I think every band should get the chance to re-record their album a year or two after they’ve put it out, once they’ve had a chance to really sit with the songs for a while and figure out exactly how they work because this version is just so much better than the album version (which was already great!). The guitar sound is so much bigger, properly leaning into the post-punk idea they were only exploring on the album, and the vocals are so much stronger and more up front which makes it feel so much more like a full song than an experiment. This whole Warp Session EP is fantastic and I’ve been listening to it on repeat, it’s so great that they’ve morphed from this insular electronic duo into a proper band over the years and I'm excited to see where they'll take it next.

Peace To All Freaks - of Montreal: The new of Montreal single is great. Embracing an 80s dance vibe and immediately turning his back on it in the opening lines and not going out because he needs to educate himself instead. I love this song, an unironic and non-cheesy rallying against negativity which is a lot harder to do with earnesty than they make it sound here.

Taipei - Social Climbers: Thankyou to my friend and yours agrifuture for this recommendation. Social Climbers played an odd and paranoid version of art rock in the early 80s that on this song at least sounds more like modern opera trying to fit itself to a rock band than anything else. I can also say with confidence this is the only song I’ve ever heard where someone sends a quiche back in the middle of it.

Mad Eyed Screamer - The Creatures: I’ve never gotten much into Siouxie And The Bashees, they're probably somewhere on my list of bands to have a deep three week long obsession with somewhere in the future, but for now my biggest exposure to them is the time The Weeknd sampled them. I am, however, deeply interested in this drums and vocals only side project that Siouxie Sioux formed with her then-partner Budgie. I’m a big fan of any kind of restricted composition like this and I love this song. It’s so busy and the amount of reverb and extra percussion going on makes for this extremely chaotic, noisy vision of what is essentially a folk song in its lyric and melody.

Black Magic - Jarvis Cocker: I found out that the main guitar part in this song is sampled from Crimson & Clover by Tommy James and The Shondells. Which is something I don’t think I’ve ever seen before, a rock song like this built around a sample. Not exactly sampling in order to recontextualise across genres or approaches but sampling to recontextualise in a lateral, parallel approach. I love this song because his delivery is so feverish and impassioned it really does feel like he’s seen beyond the veil and come back without the language or capacity to explain what he saw, only the passion.

Year In Pictures - Dick Diver: Every year since this album came out it's shown up somewhere in my Spotify most listened list at the end of the year. It's surprising because I don't think of it as one of my all time favourites when it definitely is, it's such an easy listen that it just comes and goes pleasantly. This song is kind of about that feeling I guess, of things just happening and time just passing pleasantly enough year on year, everthing in its own time while the past disappears and doesn't matter anymore. "Whatever happens, I think everything will"

Heart - Bertie Blackman: I love the percussion in this song, the same propulsive clapping-centred beat that makes Single Ladies so good with the dark grinding bass underneath it that just pulses malevolently until the gearshift of the chorus where it morphs immediately into this 60s soul version of itself, with the ooh la la backing vocals and everthing, and that disonnance between the two styles drives the song for me. Where the verse lays out the evil plainly and the music matches, the chorus accentuates it in wide eyed irony "I know there's something sick with what I've been sold" sung with a smile and showgirl backing vocals.

Love Lockdown - Kanye West: Something I think we’re all learning as Kanye loses his mind completely on the world stage is that Kanye has always been insane. He has always had an unnervingly powerful self-belief and unwavering vision that has up until recently been what made him such a unique and era-defining artist. After the radical directions of MBDTF and Yeezus it’s sort of hard to remember just how radical 808s And Heartbreaks was at the time because unlike the self aware harshness and strangeness of the other two it was also so pop adjacent, because of its 80s synthpop influence but also because of the way it (and T-Pain) impacted all other pop music of the time. The instrumentation on this song is still so staggering, even just the pitched kick at the centre I could listen to on loop forever I think.

It Might Be Time - Tame Impala: Absolutely cannot wait for the new Tame Impala if this and Patience are any indication. The absolutely huge blown out drums on this are so good and remind me of something I’ve been trying to place for weeks and can’t. Maybe a Chemical Brothers song or some kind of big beat era thing. I think of Kevin Parker and Adam Granduciel from The War On Drugs as the same kind of guys, absolute craftsmen studio nerds that are completely obsessed with sound but unlike most other guys of that genre are actually great songwriters as well. Long haired studio hermits that emerge every few years to bless us all.

Never Again - Kelly Clarkson: I’ve been trying to decide whether this or Since U Been Gone is a better song and I’ve settled on this having the superior verses and Since U Been Gone the better chorus. The absolute venom in the lyrics is incredible. “I hope the ring you gave to her turns her finger green.  I hope when you’re in bed with her you think of me” is like.. the most metal opening I’ve ever heard. She literally sings “You’ll die together, but alone” in the second verse, jesus christ.

Giant Swan - The Blood Brothers: I found out recently from reading the wiki article on screamo (which like almost all wiki articles about music genres is about 60% artists claiming that genres are fake and critics coining new genre names half in jest) that The Blood Brothers were apparently part of a screamo subgenre called Sass, which is a term I have never heard before in my life and certainly never heard in the heyday of the style. You learn something every day I suppose. “It originated as an opposing style of hardcore punk to the machismo in heavy hardcore scenes. It takes influence from genres such as post-punk, new wave, disco, electronic, dance-punk, emoviolence, grindcore, metalcore and heavy hardcore. The genre is characterized by often incorporating overtly flamboyant mannerisms, erotic lyrics featuring sexual tension, and a lisping vocal style. The genre is also noted for its "spastic edge", blast beats, chaotic guitars, danceable beats and the use of synthesizers.” My understanding is that when emo went mainstream and the split between ‘emo’ as a music and ‘scene’ as a fashion occurred, this is the music that emerged from the middle ground. Turning against the masculinity of their screamo forebears and toward the queer aesthetics of scene, the resulting style was still furious and violent but furious with a light cabaret (but like, if cabaret was good and not just a guy in a top hat emoting, a different style of emo that Panic! At The Disco famously pioneered) and violent in a psychedelic, surreal way that set it apart from the depressed and black aesthetics of the rest of emo. I love The Blood Brothers and have never found another band like them in terms of lyrical inventiveness and sheer vocal insanity, the characteristic shrill falsetto that sporadically turns to screams is an amazing choice that’s incredible it works at all. This song especially stands out as unique even amongst the chaos of their discography. The loping lounge feel in the first half, coupled with the properly surreal description of the giant swan in the lyrics establishes such an strange and dark cabaret mood that makes this song so oddly singular to me.

The Ripper - The Used: I really appreciate the production on this whole album, it is so overdone and hyperactive that it creates this irrepressible momentum because something is always happening. The songs themselves are incredibly compressed in structure and extremely hook heavy, and it feels like to counteract and complement that approach they‘ve been gone over bar by bar finding every possible spot to add interest. Dynamics shifting, drums filtering and then revealing themselves, choirs appearing from this air for two lines. Guitar squeals fly in and out in the background and the bass suddenly becomes extremely chunky in parts. The whole mix gets sucked down a black hole and then a little glockenspiel outlines the vocal melody in the background for a second leading back into a huge chorus. Everything happen in this short song. It’s an interesting approach that can be overwhelming, but it has undeniable results.

Ilana - Mdou Moctar: Mdou Moctar rocks because he takes a big power chord riff like the one at the start of this song that could just as easily start a Thin Lizzy song and then immediately discards it and twists a melting solo that crosses time and space for the rest of the song instead.

Ancestral Recall (feat. Saul Williams) - Christian Scott aTunde Adjuah: The press release for this album says: “In its inception, Ancestral Recall was built as a map to de-colonialize sound; to challenge previously held misconceptions about some cultures of music; to codify a new folkloric tradition and begin the work of creating a national set of rhythms; rhythms rooted in the synergy between West African, First Nation, African Diaspora/Caribbean rhythms and their marriage to rhythmic templates found in trap music, alt-rock, and other modern forms. It is time we created a sound that dispels singular narratives of entire peoples and looks to finally represent the wealth of narratives found throughout the American experience. One that shows that all forms of expression in sound are valid, as all people are." All that and a bit of spoken word at the start that sounds like Hannibal Buress’ Morpheus Walruses rap and I’m sold. I’m such a fan of jazz like this that purposefully opens itself up to the influence of the modern world and modern tradition, and the percussion work across this album in particular is so unique and really does what he set out to do in my opinion, bringing the rhythms of tradition into a modern context seamlessly.

Spider Hole - Billy Woods & Kenny Segal: I only found out about Billy Woods this month and I’m surprised I’ve never heard of him before because he feels like the middle of the venn diagram between Earl Sweatshirt, Aesop Rock and Death Grips. This flat out sounds like a Death Grips song played at half speed. The justified paranoia and anger that runs through this whole album is palpable and jumbled, centring around a feeling of lashing out in a moment of hopelessness because you don’t know what else you can do. "4 million USD hovering over some mud huts, it's nuts, it's not the heat it's the dust" is one of the most evocative lines of the year for me.

El Toro Combo Meal (feat. Mavi) - Earl Sweatshirt: When this new earl EP came out I listened to it 4 times in a row because it is just so compulsively brilliant. He’s refining his style more and more with every release and he’s honed it to this fine point now where every song is so super dense in its lyrical content and production that a full length release would almost be too much. There’s just so much to absorb here. Mavi’s verse is incredible too. I’ve never heard of him before but I’m a big supporter now. The beats too, through this whole EP are the kind that sound like a radio stuck between stations - looping snatches of vocals and drums drowned out in tape hiss where the beat is only a suggestion that Mavi and Earl both glide over on some sort of metric modulation and only land every now and then just to take off again.

Drug Dealer - Slowthai: Slowthai is so full of fire on this song it's scary. Facing a dead end future down and screaming that something's gotta change, and that he's the one to do it.

Lighthouse (feat. Rico Nasty, Slowthai and ICECOLDBISHOP) - Take A Daytrip: I have never heard of Take A Daytrip before this song but doing some research it turns out I have heard them, because they produced Panini by Lil Nas X. I have also never heard of ICECOLDBISHOP before but the way he brings an absolutely deranged verse on this song has made me an instant fan. I love this trio of features: three out there, huge personality voices at the outer limits of mainstream rap that in their oddness complement each other perfectly.

Rich Girl - Michie One & Louchie Lou: Something I learned this month was that Rich Girl by Gwen Stefani isn't a direct rip of If I Were A Rich Man from Fiddler On The Roof, it actually samples this song which acts as a sort of bridge between the two, and I think there's something interesting in the transfer of intention between the three songs, lyrically and musically. In the original his conception of a rich man is someone who can afford to have lots of ducks and geese, eat well and have enough time to pray because he doesn't have to work, then in the Michie One & Louchie Lou version rich is being able to feed your family and start a school (as well as play the horses and never lose), and in the Gwen Stefani version rich is having a house in Hollywood and London, clearing out designer stores, and buying four Harajuku girls and naming them Love, Angel, Music and Baby. It spirals up mercilessly from geese to, I guess, human trafficking. Musically there's a transformation as well, where the jewishness of the 'daidle daidle deedle daidle dumb' in the orginal is changed to a 'na na na na na' in this version and only a part of the original melodic lilt remains, a part that is completely ironed out in the Gwen Stefani version's 'na na na na na's. The downsides of wealth morph too, in the original it's simply not a part of God's plan, in this version it can't buy love, is the root of all evil (is a  worldwide thing / rich is getting richer while the poor are getting stink) and only leads to more trouble (you reap but you never did sow / rich today you could be poor tomorrow / mind your back and watch your enemies grow) but in the Gwen Stefani version being rich is amazing on its own and the only thing that can top it is your love.

Santa Teresa - EOB: Tricked into enjoying ambient side projects once again. Ed O'Brien from Radiohead's new side project came up on my Discover Weekly without me realising it was him and I absolutely loved it. It’s expansive and cinematic and nice in a way that feels rare in ambient experimental stuff like this, to not be morose or depressing and gloomy for its own sake. It’s sharp and angular, or as sharp and angular as a song as slow moving as this can be and reminds me in part of HEALTH’s Max Payne 3 soundtrack, and Emma Ruth Rundle’s Electric Guitar One which are both masterpieces on their own.

Rough Sleeper - Burial: Reading Mark Fisher’s Ghosts Of My Life I was pleasantly surprised to see his Burial interview in there that I remember reading years and years ago before I knew who Mark Fisher was. I’ve thought of parts of that article here and there ever since and finally placing it in the wider context of Mark’s work was very satisfying, it’s funny how people come back to you in different forms over your lifetime. I don’t listen to Burial much now, or at least not as much as I used to at the height of my depression a few years ago where he was on near constant repeat and as a result his music became completely waterlogged with the feeling of that time and I couldn’t listen to him at all for a while without the memories completely marring any appreciation. But time passes as it does and it’s a nice feeling to finally be able to listen to Untrue again and not have it be so permanently soaked with memories of the worst time of my life, and now with a different mindset and viewpoint I can really see different sides of his music. Where before all I could hear was the bleak and empty future haunted by the ghosts of the past, now new colours appear - a warmth of hazy, pleasant memory and imagination. Reds and oranges creep into the black and grey and this song can feel like staying under covers while it storms outside instead of standing in the rain.

Night MXCMPV1 P74 - Venetian Snares & Daniel Lanois: I really don’t think I’ll ever hear another album like this in my life. The push and pull of the humanity of Lanois’ pedal steel and the digital nightmare of Venetian Snares percussion is just so engaging, and the moments where they overlap and move together in harmony contrast so beautifully with the times they feel like they’re playing two different songs altogether. Then they overlap, the effects overpower the steel guitar and it moves into a leaping angular digital realm and the percussion coalesces into an altogether human rush, or as human as Venetian Snares can be.

Were You There When They Crucified My Lord - Marisa Anderson: I can't find the quote but somewhere when she was doing interviews about this album Traditional And Public Domain songs, Marisa Anderson said part of the reason she likes traditional songs so much is because when she was coming up and playing in cafes around town she mistakenly thought she'd have to pay royalties if she did covers of popular songs, so she only did public domain songs instead.

Were You There When They Crucified My Lord - Johnny Cash: Another side of Were You There When They Crucified My Lord, one that expands magically into an amazing many-layered harmony led by June’s high and lonesome howl.

See That My Grave's Kept Clean - Blind Lemon Jefferson: Jefferson was buried at Wortham Negro Cemetery in 1929. His grave was unmarked until 1967, when a Texas historical marker was erected in the general area of his plot; however, the precise location of the grave is still unknown. By 1996, the cemetery and marker were in poor condition, and a new granite headstone was erected in 1997. The inscription reads: "Lord, it's one kind favour I'll ask of you, see that my grave is kept clean." In 2007, the cemetery's name was changed to Blind Lemon Memorial Cemetery, and his gravesite is kept clean by a cemetery committee in Wortham.

The Giza Power Plant - Blood Incantation: What I find so appealing about Blood Incantation is how dedicated they are. Zealots to the cult of being long haired death metal guys who wholeheartedly and sincerely believe in interdimensional aliens and the pyramids being the remnants of an ancient advanced technology. The dedication extends to them being maybe some of the best players in the genre I’ve ever heard, and them recording this whole album analog live in studio is such a feat of performance that adds another layer of intensity to this already extremely intense music.

listen here

[vampirefreakism]

The Scientist (Chapter 51)

Summary: In the events following Asgard’s destruction, Loki finds himself on Earth seeking refuge to await the inevitable. Much to his surprise, it comes from a source he would never have expected.

Warnings: science, mentions of sharp objects, some cutting, not bad, cool stuff

Word count: 5k

The AO3, Wattpad, and Spotify links are all available on the MasterList

Masterlist

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A/N: Hello, folks! New chapter! Yay! Alrighty, we are revisiting the lab again! More science and such things and the like. Gonna look back at the rose and the zebrafish from all those chapters ago. Remember the fish? The zebrafish Luna did some gene-splicing experiment on after the worm? I sure do. Yes, I know I haven't mentioned it in a while, but that's because there were more notable things to talk about first. We need a little mundanity now and then. Also, it's been about 5 chapters, so it's high time for more music!

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The remaining vacation days were as unexciting as the duo had hoped. They visited a couple museums, a restaurant for dinner and a café for lunch, and then returned home. It was a smooth ride, save for a spot of traffic in the afternoon. Luna gave herself enough time to account for such instances so she wouldn't worry herself. Naturally, Loki slept for most of the journey, but not before taking Luna’s hand in his and holding it for as long as he could. He was glad she didn’t demand an explanation because he hadn’t prepared one.

Another day of rest and unwinding in the apartment and Luna was back on the grind at work. Though she'd been away for a week, it felt like an eternity. As she walked into the building and to the lab, she was tempted to turn back around and go somewhere else. Anywhere other than the workplace. But she kept going, scanning her card and making herself known.

“Hello, miss,” FRIDAY said as Luna stowed away her bags and jacket, “welcome back.”

“Hello, FRIDAY. It’s good to be back.”

“How was your vacation? Eventful, I hope.”

Luna chuckled and shrugged on her lab coat. “Oh, you have no idea.”

“No, I wouldn’t, would I?” FRIDAY snarked a little.

“Any messages for me?”

“A few from Mr. Stark, but no high-priority items.”

“Ok. What are they about?”

“He wants a lab meeting soon.” Luna’s body stiffened. It’d been a while since she talked about her work with him. She didn’t know what she’d tell him.

But she huffed and snapped on a pair of rubber gloves. “Alright. I’ll see him about that later. Thanks, FRIDAY.”

“You’re welcome. Care for any music while you work?”

“Uh, yeah. Just throw on whatever.” As Luna unlocked a drawer and took out her lab notebook, ‘Twilight Zone’ played through the room speakers. Her ears perked up at the familiar notes. “Ooh, nice,” she said, turning to the last page she wrote in before vacation. Bobbing her head, she read over the tasks for the day. First things first, she needed to clean and change the filters to the fish tank.

As far as she could tell, the little fish was thriving. It swam contentedly about its tank and pecked at any particles it saw. Luna checked the UV light and changed the active-carbon filter. The filter pad was nearly black with sediment and dirt. Cringing, she folded it up and slid a new one in place. The pH and temperature levels in the water remained steady and fluctuated within the safe zones for them. Luna was thankful. She would have hated to have come back to an emergency.

Rinsing her hands off, she gingerly disconnected the pumps to the tank and took it to the sink. Her little fish didn’t seem perturbed by the sudden movement, though it did thrash a bit as Luna lifted it out with a net. She silently apologized to it. She didn’t mean to cause it any distress. It calmed down once it was in the fresh tank and knew everything was ok again. As an added comfort, Luna gave it a bit of dry food, and it inhaled all of it before it was back under the care of the system. She connected the tank back to the water pumps and breathed a sigh of relief. One job is done for the day.

As Luna cleaned the old tank and net with ethanol, her music cut out, and FRIDAY's voice came back on.

“Miss, Mr. Stark is on the line.”

Luna nodded, not stopping her scrubbing. “Yeah, yeah. Patch him through.”

“Long time, no talk, Baby,” Tony’s voice greeted her.

She laughed. “Hey, Tony. So we’re back to that now?”

“We sure are.” She heard a few faint metallic clangs. “How was your break?”

Luna slowed her hands. “It was, uh, good,” she lied.

“Just ‘good.’? What’d you do, anyway?”

“Mm, nothing much. Relaxed at home, went out to museums, and cooked stuff.” She lied right through her teeth, but lucky for her, Tony didn’t have to see her lack of a poker face.

“What about your guy?”

Luna nervously shuddered. “What about him?”

“Anyone recognize him?”

“We had a couple close calls, but nothing anyone can pin.”

“Good, because I seriously don’t know if I could take it if you two got into trouble. My blood pressure is teetering as it is, and Pepper would have the whole barn. You know, not just the cow.”

“And that’s why I stay out of trouble.”

“And that’s why you’re my favorite.”

“Aw, thanks.” Luna smiled. There was a loud bang over the speakers, followed by some repetitive whirring. “Hey, what are you even doing over there to make that much noise?”

“Uh, well, right now, I am on the ceiling.”

Luna set her hands on the edge of the sink. “You’re … you’re on the ceiling? Like, upside-down?”

“Yup. Trying out a new feature in the suit.”

“A feature that lets you … stand on the ceiling?”

“Not just stand. I can walk around, too. See?” A few more taps and whirs came through like Tony was walking around. “Oh, wait, no. Sorry. You can’t see.” Luna let out a loud laugh and resumed scrubbing the tank.

“What are you planning on using it for? Taking a trip to a place with microgravity?”

“Can never be too careful.” Tony paused, and some beeping filled the silence. “By the way, I was going through some of you-know-who’s phone history, and honestly, I don’t know what I expected.”

“What did you see?”

“Don’t you know? I thought you two were, like, the best of friends, or something.”

“Save for a few things, he never shows me what's on his phone, and I never ask."

“Hm. Anyway, his most recent searches were pictures of raccoons, articles about himself, conspiracy theories, and more pictures of himself.” He scoffed. “As if his ego wasn’t big enough already.”

“Heh, not as big as his dick,” she chuckled under her breath, but to her dismay, she was heard loud and clear.

“Excuse me?!” Tony yelled, followed by a thunderous crash. Luna winced as she pictured him falling spectacularly to the floor.

“Whoops, sorry, gotta go!” she called out, waving her hand to cut the transmission.

“Why would you say something like that?!”

“Hanging up now! Bye!” She gestured frantically, and the call cut out. Groaning as loud as she could, she hung her head. “I can’t believe myself sometimes.” She dried off the outside of the old tank, set it aside to air-dry, and dried her own hands. “Alright, what else is there to do?” She flipped back a page in her notebook. “Ah, yes, that's right," she stated through her teeth.

Her next possible point was to test the new virus on a live subject i.e., her own self.

Luna did a set of three things: stare at the floor, staring at the wall, then sit in a chair and stare at the ceiling. Of all the things she should be doing now, she did none of them, and she thought of nothing. A horrible thing to do in a lab filled with items of dubious safety, but she did it anyway.

Getting tired of thinking of nothing, she pictured something in her mind to fill it. She thought of the trees outside, birds flying high, and the porch by the river. Things that brought her peace and made her believe everything was alright. And as far as her life was concerned, few things were alright but not as many as she would like. She was saddled with issues out of her control, Tony was an anxious wreck most of the time, and Loki held the weight of several worlds on his shoulders. She always wanted to try and fix things for her friends, but she had to remind herself that it was impossible. A wish had to stay a wish.

Luna quickly got fed up with looking from an empty white space to another empty white space and decided to take a walk down the hall. She left everything stowed and locked in the lab, toting only her music along. She needed to manifest some semblance of privacy while in public, and the music did an excellent job.

Hands in her pockets, she moseyed to the lobby and stared out the giant floor-to-ceiling windows. It was a great design choice to open up the room to the world outside. Now she could see the trees and the birds she imagined. She’d seen them hundreds of times during all the seasons she was here, and it never got old.

Luna opened up her music app and hit shuffle on the ‘suggestions’ list. A new sound graced her ears. She looked down at the screen, furrowing her brow, and read the title. ‘Holding On’ by Nightly. It was new. Very new, and she liked it. She added it to her favorites list and put the device back in her pocket.

She knew the scientific procedure. It was simple: defrost the RePri virus, inflict a small injury to an inconspicuous place on her body, and inject the virus to the wound site. All to test how quickly it could heal surface injuries on a human with matched DNA. It was easy to write down and easy to conceptualize, but everything else was hard. The dilemma at hand reminded her of a phrase she heard a long time ago: ‘your scientists were so preoccupied with whether or not they could that they didn't stop to think if they should.’ A classic line from a classic film, and said by a fake scientist in a fake scenario.

However, being the real scientist in the room, it hit Luna hard. It was true that just because someone can do something, they shouldn’t necessarily do it. The presence of ‘can’ doesn’t automatically mean ‘everything will be fine.’

But Luna had a curious soul. Always eager to find things out and learn about them. She never felt there should be a limit to knowing things, but plenty of people with more power than her certainly did. Such people frightened her, especially the ones she had in mind concerning her work. S.H.I.E.L.D. or whatever they called themselves now, and groups like them. She heard about what they would do to scientists they were interested in. Jane Foster was a lucky one.

If they found out what Luna was doing, they would steal everything and erase her, or rope her into working for them and make her do whatever they wanted. Tony managed to avoid joining them by intimidating or buying his way out of surveillance via bountiful benevolence. Still, people like Luna were considered nothing but stepping stones to an end product.

On the other hand, what if she succeeded in hiding her project from the world? And kept testing the virus on herself and choice specimens. Say something went wrong, and Luna hurt herself in a way she couldn't fix. What would become of her? How would she explain it to Tony? He would lose all trust in her for keeping this a secret. How would she explain it to Loki? Would he have compassion? He was undoubtedly intelligent, but would he understand? Or would he be enraged that she used him for her own purposes? It tore at her heart. He would believe she thought nothing of his past pain and the courage it took to reveal a piece to her. He would think her heartless and precisely like everyone else. She’d lose him, and for what?

Luna felt a sharp tap on her shoulder. It startled her, and she jumped. She tore the earbuds from her ears and abruptly turned around, clutching her chest.

“Dammit, Tony!” she chastised. “You scared me!”

“Sorry, Lu,” he said, suppressing a giggle.

“Why are you here? Why couldn’t you have called me?”

“Uh, because sometimes, direct confrontation is the best thing.”

“What for?”

Tony stepped closer. “For that joke you made.”

But Luna played dumb. “What joke?” She wanted him to say it.

“The … you know.”

“Why you mad? You make jokes like that all the time.”

Tony huffed. “Yeah, but not you and not about him.” He sighed. “I don’t want you getting friendly.”

“What wrong with being nice, Tony?”

“There’s nice, there’s your level of nice, and then there’s too nice.” He pointed at her. “Don’t even think about getting too nice.”

Luna looked down at his hand and smiled, moving it aside. “It’s never even crossed my mind.”

Tony straightened up and brushed a hand through his hair. He looked her up and down and glanced outside. “So what are you doing out here anyway? Shouldn’t you be working?”

Luna swallowed. “Uh, yes. I am. Just, uh, waiting for something to defrost.” She waved a hand. “You know how long that can take.”

“In a way. So why not wait in the lab?”

“It’s dull in there. Besides, I'm keeping track of the time. Figured I would take a walk instead and check how my flower is growing. It’s been a little while, and can’t a girl check on her flower?” Tony opened his mouth to say something, and Luna lightly swatted his chest. “And don’t even think about saying what I think you’re about to say.”

He laughed and raised his hands. “Promise.” Rubbing his hands together, he rocked back and forth on his heels. “Alright. Well, don’t take too long. And no more jokes like that about you-know-who.”

Luna stepped back and gave him a mock salute. “Ay, ay, sir. Read you loud and clear.” Tony rolled his eyes, smirking, and made for the staircase on the other side.

Alone again, Luna groaned as she took off her glasses and put a hand over her face. "Ugh, what is wrong with me?" Grinding her teeth, she put her earbuds back in and restarted the song. It was good, and she wasn't sick of it yet.

She headed for the greenhouse as she fake-promised Tony. He had his eyes and ears almost everywhere, and she needed to keep up her lie. But it wasn’t all bad. It’d been a while since she'd last seen it, and she did need to check on its progress. On the trip there, all thoughts of her work vanished and were replaced with anticipation for the plant. Was it doing well? Did it bloom? Was it budding yet? Her pace quickened with her growing excitement, and in no time, she was there.

The warmth and humidity was a welcome difference from the cold, dry outside. The vegetables looked vibrant and lush, especially the tomatoes. Luna was tempted to snatch one and use it for dinner, but she hesitated. One tomato wasn't worth all the trouble if she was caught, and she was sure she had a proper one waiting on her kitchen counter.

Keeping her head down to avoid more distraction, she continued to the back where Tony’s personal garden sat. In and among the various flowers he kept was Luna’s rose. She crouched down and inspected it. As expected, it was much bigger than before. It had sprung a couple new leaves, and on the top, a sizeable bud had formed.

“Oh, hello there,” Luna said, reaching out to stroke it. She could see a speck of blue peeked out from bud’s seams. “You gonna come out soon? Hm?” She smiled wholeheartedly.

As she picked up the watering can, she could hardly contain herself. After months of waiting and gentle caring, she'll see the fruits of her labor. The flower will bloom, and she'll be able to bring it home to Loki. But once more, she second-guessed herself. Would he like it? Would it be too much? He told her about it only once in a passing story months ago. Would he read it as creepy, obsessive behavior? Maybe not. He properly confided in her now. They knew things about each other no one else did in the entire universe. Perhaps it wouldn't be too much. Maybe he would love it.

But if he didn’t, and rejected it, Luna would keep it for herself. At the end of the day, it was still the plant she raised from a seed. She would love it and care for it no matter what.

She stroked one of its leaves one more time and left. She'd spent enough time there, and any more would arouse suspicion. Well, she didn't know for sure, but it wasn't worth the risk. Besides, the plant wasn’t going anywhere.

Loki consumed Luna's thoughts on the way back to the lab. She knew so much about him, but at the same time, she knew very little. He shared as he wanted, and she did the same, but now with what she knew, what more could he be hiding? He had enough scars to last a few lifetimes – and to be fair, she did too – but she knew where she got hers and why. Where did Loki get his? And why did he have them?

Luna sat down at the lab bench and contemplated her questions. She wondered if it could have been someone he was close with, maybe family, but she quickly scratched the idea. Family could be cruel, but Loki said he’d been captured. It would have involved being far away from home, not in the depths of it. The injuries would have had to be recent to heal and fade as they did, but Asgardian physiology was different. Luna didn’t have the knowledge to know only by looking at them. And it was insensitive to ask outright. Whatever happened to him was severely traumatizing.

In a flash, something resurfaced in her mind, like a ping in a sea of silence. A memory from when she was still getting comfortable with having Loki in her home. When she was first starting her research into his genetic code.

The S.H.I.E.L.D. security videos from 2012. Loki had made passing threats and said some grave things, but thinking back on them now, Luna felt very unsettled. But she couldn’t remember exactly what he said. At least not at the top of her head.

“Hey FRIDAY, can we switch to my private server, please? And secure my connection?” Luna said into the air.

“Certainly.” FRIDAY opened up the interface and virtual files. “Is there anything in particular you need?”

“Yes. Show me those old S.H.I.E.L.D. videos again. The ones from when Loki came here.” The files spanned the screen. “Can you play the first one?” It opened up and played from the beginning.

Agents and scientists milled around, checking their computer screens and tablets. One of them poked at a device near the middle of the room. Luna assumed it to be the Tesseract. It fizzed and sputtered, and a beam of light shot from it, conjuring a portal. From the chaos and darkness, Loki appeared. Luna flinched at the sounds of guns firing and knives being thrown. It was all so violent. She looked away and waited for it to end.

“Please don’t.” Loki’s voice resounded from the video. Luna looked back up. “I still need that.” His attention was directed to a man in a black coat.

“This doesn’t have to get any messier,” the man said quietly.

“Of course it does,” Loki retorted. Luna shook her head, feeling grim. “I’ve come too far for anything else. I am Loki of Asgard, and I am burdened with glorious purpose.”

“Loki?” Someone else interjected with a start. “Brother of Thor?”

The first man turned and faced him. “We have no quarrel with your people.” He tried to placate, but Loki wasn’t having it.

“An ant has no quarrel with a boot.”

Luna’s feet grew cold.

“You planning to step on us?”

“I come with glad tidings,” Loki reassured, “of a world made free.”

“Free from what?”

“Freedom. Freedom is life's great lie.”

“No,” Luna whispered, leaning closer.

“Once you accept that, in your heart,” Loki turned around and pointed the scepter at the second man, “you will know peace.”

“Pause,” Luna commanded as she rose to her feet. Loki was now standing in full view of the camera. "Can we zoom in on his face and keep the image clear?"

"Certainly," FRIDAY said and did as she asked.

Loki’s face filled the screen. It was a bit blurry at first, but the program quickly enhanced it. His appearance here was profoundly different from the images of him used by the news programs. His skin was pale and shiny like he'd been sweating profusely, and his eyes were ringed in dark circles. But the look they held told a more in-depth story. They were distant and foggy, like everything he was seeing was far away. Luna's stomach turned, and she dropped back down into her seat. The drained complexion, the clammy skin, and the hazy eyes: all telltale signs of shock. She wouldn’t be surprised if his breathing and walking were labored.

She put her head in her hands, trying to control her swirling thoughts. It was all so much. The vague story he told her in the hotel troubled her greatly, and now this? She felt like she was reaching, but if there was a connection between Loki’s scars and his appearance here, it spelled something very sinister. There was no doubt the injuries he sustained would have led to him going into shock, either from blood loss or infection or both, but if this was when it happened? Luna felt a little woozy and rested her elbows on her knees.

Staring at the floor, she was overcome with the urge to embrace him. Her Loki. The one she recently spent a week sleeping with, in the literal sense. But also the Loki on the computer screen. The one who looked like he went from the frying pan and into the fire. He was in trouble, and he needed help.

Luna missed him dearly. She missed having him in her bed, going to sleep close to him, and waking up closer. Spending a full day with him in pure bliss, talking about anything, and not being afraid of what he would say. Feeling free for the time being and seeing him have a similar expression. Holding his hand for no other reason than to feel him.

Luna looked back up at the screen, still frozen on Loki’s menacing façade. She reached out and traced the curve of his jaw.

"What happened to you?" she whispered but received no answer. The Loki she knew hated being trapped. He enjoyed his freedom and the peace he felt with her. The words he spoke in the video weren’t his, at least, not naturally. He had been forced to love his cage, and his words were a result of it.

Luna took her glasses off, covered her face, and groaned loudly. She had to stop thinking about it. There was no way to tell unless she asked him, and she wasn’t planning on it anytime soon. It was awful to make up stories about things she didn’t know and an absolute waste of her time. She needed to get back to work.

She pulled on some fresh gloves and opened the freezer. The virus vials were where she left them, waiting for her to thaw them out. She took them, set them in a hot water bath, and let them melt. Like expected, it took longer than usual thawing sessions. It never ceased to cling to the cold.

Luna got her notebook, pen, and timer ready and made a trip down the hall for antiseptic wipes and fresh syringes. The box of micropipettes was full, and all the devices worked as they should.

“FRIDAY, turn everything off and go dark. I’m going to do this the old-fashioned way.”

“But, miss, if something were to happen -”

“But nothing,” Luna said confidently. “I can do it.”

“Alright. Going dark.” And FRIDAY switched off. No more coms or voice-command and the computer screen went blank.

“Ok,” she said, pulled out the now-thawed vial. “Let’s test you first.”

Luna prepared a microscope slide and turned on the corresponding machine. Using a fresh syringe, she dropped a half a milliliter of her blood onto the glass, along with the same amount of the virus. As she applied pressure to the puncture wound on her arm, she observed the activity of the cells through the eyepiece. She kept track of the time and sat for about five minutes, but saw nothing out of the ordinary. No spontaneous rupturing and no odd coloring. It looked like the last few times she’d done it.

Leaning back from it, she wrote down her observations and looked to the MicroFluid machine. She slid the microscope slide into the designated slot and turned it on. The computer screen came to life with an interface for the device. Luna sighed. Of course, she'd have to interpret the information manually.

In no time, she received the results she expected; the virus is compatible with her cells and bonded with them completely. Her testing continually remained successful outside of her body, but now she had to test it in real-time.

Luna’s hands and knees shook aggressively on the way to and back from the supply closet. Her goal was to get a sterile razor. The idea of holding it in her hand made her sick, but she was using it for an intellectual purpose. It wasn't like all the other times she'd held one, and she knew so, but the real trouble was believing it. Brains were tricky that way. They believed whatever was most comfortable for them to believe.

She closed and locked both lab doors behind her and taped pieces of scrap paper over the windows. No one in or out until she was done. Now, she had to decide where to test the virus.

She looked at her forearm and shook her head. If the experiment didn’t work, it would be obvious what she’d done, and it was sporting a pinprick anyway. It was also a particularly dangerous spot to pick. She hovered a hand over her stomach. No, the skin was too pliable, and it moved too much as she breathed. She looked down at her legs. The skin there was more durable, and she could keep it still as long as she needed, and if it didn't work, it wasn't anything long pants, and a bandage couldn’t hide.

Luna spread some paper towels on the stool by the bench and ripped off her old gloves. Bare-handed, she eased her pants down as far as they would go and sat on the towels. A lab conduct rule popped up in her mind: no exposed skin above the knee or elbow. Well, she’d broken several science rules already, so it hardly mattered now.

She cleaned the area of skin above the side of her right knee, and with a plastic ruler, measured two inches above it and put down a dot with a felt tip pen. From that point, she measured another inch and made another dot. Letting the alcohol dry, she made a note of everything in her notebook. She slipped on a pair of new gloves and opened up another syringe. Taking a deep breath, she opened up the virus vial, extracted one milliliter of liquid, and capped the needle. It was always good to start small.

Now it was time to get the show on the road. Luna picked up the razor and cleaned with antiseptic for good measure. She felt sweat start to congregate where it shouldn’t. There was no reason for her to be scared. She’d handled sharp things for most of her life, she’d tested the virus umpteen times, and she knew she was smart. She knew what she was doing. No one else did, but her.

“I’m smart. I know what I’m doing,” Luna thought to herself. She closed her eyes and repeated the phrase in her head. As of right now, the worst thing that could happen was nothing at all.

Luna opened her eyes and, without a moment spared to hesitate, made the one-inch incision. It burned and stung as she expected it to. She uncapped the needle and injected it about one centimeter from the injury site. Setting the two objects aside for disposal, she started the timer. Now to wait and see how fast it worked, if it worked at all.

30 seconds in, the stinging ebbed away to a dull ache.

Another minute, the bleeding stopped.

Two minutes in, all feelings of pain were gone, and the skin started to fill in.

Three minutes in, the wound was barely visible. It felt a bit itchy, and Luna made a note of it.

Four and a half minutes in, it fully healed to a dark pink line as a blue bruise formed around it.

Luna stopped the timer and made her last observation. She set her pen down, eyes glued to the newly-healed bit of skin. The bruising was unaccounted for, and it felt a little cold. She hovered her hand over it and lightly touched it. She winced prematurely, but it didn’t hurt. A harder press confirmed it. It tingled, but the skin was completely healed. A wound that would have taken a couple days to a week to close was done in about five minutes.

Smiling widely, Luna was beside herself. Tears prickled at her eyes as pride filled her to the brim. She did it. She did it all by herself. It was like the saying, 'curiosity killed the cat, but satisfaction brought it back.' In all intents and purposes, she felt very much like the cat, newly reborn and very satisfied.

She still had a lot to do; more experiments and tests to run and hypotheses to answer. But for now, she reveled in this victory. It was enough for today.

----------

A/N: Yes, I know I didn’t mention anywhere that a special tank system was set up for the fish, and that’s because I’m a little bit dumb. There’s a whole maintenance procedure and housing system for laboratory animals like the zebrafish (duh). I personally never worked with any, but I read enough lab papers to get a feel for it. Also, since this is still set in 2018, I had to label the song as ‘new,’ even though right now it’s not XP and yes, I had to quote Jurassic Park or I would die

----------

Taglist: @the-doctor-9-10 @pinkieperil @sherlockfan4life @kybaeza @withering-thoughtts

[timetravelingpigeon]

Excerpt: The Life and Life of a Time Traveling Pigeon

In Which Columba Notices Just How Odd Morgan Is

[[PREVIOUS | INDEX | NEXT]] [ 30 / 33 ]

Now that the adrenaline had completely bled away, and I wasn’t feeling as much like I’d been punched in the face, I was finally able to take actually register what I was seeing. Specifically, two major things about Dr. Tanner stood out clear as day, even in the dim light.

First, you know how every time I’ve been able to get a decent look at him, I’ve mentioned that he looked consistently roughed up? As in, “half-a-dozen gunshot wounds, big ol’ cut on his face, and plenty of blood?” Yeah, there was currently no trace of that on him whatsoever. The gash on his face had healed without even leaving behind a scar. His hoodie was both completely intact and as grey as the day it’d been bought. And I got the feeling that, had I been completely and utterly insane enough to try, if I’d unzipped it and unbuttoned the shirt beneath, I’d find no evidence that he’d ever been shot.

(Hold on a sec, folks; I need a moment to get that image out of my head.)

Now, the super-fast and super-perfect healing I could easily pass off as being one of his superpowers. The lack of blood was a bit harder to explain, but, who knows, maybe he found a way to wash it out between when I saw him last and now. The bullet holes disappearing, though? Sure, he could have changed into a new set of clothes, but if I were a guy who was trying to hide from the Men in Black, I wouldn’t put on the same fucking outfit. At the very least, I would have added a jacket or something. What the hell?

Wondering about it was going to have to wait, though, because there was something much more immediate and much more obviously freaky that was staring me in the face. Literally.

Dr. Tanner’s eyes were fucking glowing.

Okay, not glowing per se, more like they were reflective. Not like a cat’s eyeshine, though; it was his irises that were weird. Normally, from what I’d seen, both in his wanted ad and as he was standing in the truck, his eyes were about the same shade of blue as Riley’s. As his gaze darted about, though, they’d sometimes catch the light and brighten, turning a luminous icy white. A little like a road sign, I guess, but it was dimmer, and not perfectly uniform. It also only showed up when the light was at an angle, rather than head on. Whatever the hell it was, it was very noticeable in the shadows, especially when the only source of light was the glow of the cellphone screen.

I really hope he didn’t notice I was staring.

Tag list

@casperalexander @tracle0 @sunlight-and-starskies @donovyn--nox @typewriter-jade @joyful-soul-collector @awkward-cobra @purpleshadows1989

If you want on or off the tag list, feel free to either drop me an ask or reply to this post :)

[padawan-historian]

WOW Analysis: White Male Schools of Thoughts

This week we will break down several white male arguments that are circulating across the media. The first school of thought is the Individual Identity Academy.

Some of their mottos include:

Just because I am a straight white guy does not mean I oppress people!

White men are the most discriminated group in the United States.

Why am I being held responsible for things that I have no control over?

The problem with these phrases is that, unfortunately, many of the students reciting these words are miseducated and lack context – especially about identity.

•

We each have a personal identity – a recipe that is uniquely made by us. But, outside of ourselves, we have in-and-out group identities. “Ingroup identities are beliefs about a group held by its own members . . . According to self-categorization theory, people’s ingroup identities (i.e., beliefs about the qualities that characterize their ingroups) exert a powerful influence on their personal identities” (Bosson and Michniewicz 425-426). However, unlike most marginalized and minority groups in the United States, white (heterosexual) men have rarely been labeled in groups outside of extracurricular or social activities.

•

When phrases like white privilege are utilized in discussions, young white men attending the Individual Identity Academy tend to think that they are being criticized. They are. White privilege is a broad term that is used to highlight white individuals who lack a certain amount of awareness in relation to race issues. They think that since, in their lives, they do not receive any forms of special treatment face-to-face that means white privilege isn’t really a thing. They fail to recognize the context behind the conversation – that there are systemic forces at work that have created avenues for white men to be successful while everyone else must overcome additional obstacles and parameters in order to have a chance at succeeding. Even though some individuals have overcome institutional barriers, that does not excuse the inequities that were put in place in the hopes that they would fail (there is a larger conversation we should have about poverty and the role of capitalism, but I will save that chat for another day).  

•

While some white Americans may experience prejudice based on their race (or be members of ethnic minorities who, historically, faced persecution in the United States – including Italians and Irish immigrants), black and brown Americans have endured a chain of unbroken discrimination and dehumanization that has left their communities with multigenerational trauma and little to no economic mobility. Along with these inequities, many people of color experience varying levels of double consciousness, an internalized sensation that WEB DuBois describes as “the sense of looking at one’s self through the eyes of others, of measuring one’s soul by the tape of a world that looks on in amused contempt and pity. One ever feels his twoness” (DeBois 12). He notes that since American blacks have lived in a society that has historically repressed and devalued them, these black and brown people have difficulty unifying their black identity with their American identity.

•

With the advancement of technology, black and brown Americans, along with other marginalized groups, have the opportunity to share their narratives and realities to a larger audience across social. Members of the African Diaspora (the millions of African descendants across the globe) can affirm our shared history, celebrate our ancestry and promote self-love and personal healing in the face of a world where many of us, still face economic and social barriers based on racial divisions.

•

From a very young age, I knew that I was black and that some people would not like me because my skin color was different than their own. In high school, this feeling manifested into one of profound anxiety and isolation as I stood alone as the only black girl in my year. Educator and author of Why Are All of the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria? Dr. Beverly Daniel Tatum notes that “If you think about classrooms or workspaces or conferences, wherever we are, we go into these spaces and we look for ourselves. You want to see yourself represented. In that sense, when young people walk into a classroom, they want to see someone who they identify with, maybe because they’re the same race. It doesn't always have to be racial identification. [A student] can identify with a teacher because she likes music [or] identify with [educators] because they are into sports. But to the extent that kids of color walk into classrooms and rarely see someone who looks like themselves in that environment, that’s a missing link” (Anderson). It took me years to realize that, during that time, in my desperation to fit in, I was, in fact, unable to form truly meaningful connections with many of my classmates. I was profoundly lonely.

•

This sense of loneliness is often interpreted as being misunderstood. Everyone makes jokes about teen angst and broodiness, but we rarely discuss that behind that often lies a sense of alienation and loneliness. Those who are misunderstood want to find a place to belong and want to form connections with people, but a mixture of self-preservation, insecurity and anxiety often prevent them from taking those steps. Instead they remain isolated and defensive – trapped between systems.

•

Like many young people, young white men exist in an undefined state. Cultural anthropologists refer to this period in life as liminality – "a traditional phase of a rite of passage during a time where the individual is experiencing a lack of defined social status" (Understanding Spirited Away: Consumption and Identity). This stage is often best depicted during adolescence when young people begin shedding their old roles as children and begin taking on the social responsibilities as young adults. 

•

Pupils of the Individual Identity Academy see themselves as individuals, but exist in a world filled with ingroup identities. Black feminists. LGBTQ allies. Animal rights activists. Social reformers . . . or social justice warriors. The increased visibility of these groups - especially in spaces that were historically dominated by young white men, including video games and comics - is perceived as an attack on their sense of self. In their quest to find a place to belong, they have encased themselves in these small communities declaring that any changes that move towards inclusion and equity is, in fact, a form of oppression. They imagine a world where white men are vilified and denied opportunities because of their race when, in reality,

•

White privilege is the freedom from recognizing the societal and institutional policies that have denied (or limited) black and brown Americans’ access to professional services, economic equity and educational opportunities. When people call you out because “your white privilege” is showing, instead of thinking “Why am I being held responsible for something that, I feel, has nothing to do with me?” take a breath and try a few alternatives.

• Affirm Your Privilege: Dear students, having white privilege doesn’t make you the villain in the story. Laugh and say “I still have some work to do,” because WE ALL DO. I grew up in a middle-class neighborhood with two highly-educated (heterosexual) parents. My exposure to systemic racism and inequity is relatively low in comparison to black and brown (and white) Americans who are in lower economic brackets. I am physically able and while I do have ADHD, my parents had the economic means to connect me to specialists and counselors throughout middle and high school (THAT 👏🏿 is 👏🏽 privilege👏🏾).

• Find Your Identity: We celebrate our American blackness because there is a shared history and cultural language through our music, food, clothing, magic, spirituality and dancing. Connect with your heritage through art, music, food, folk costumes and jewelry . . . not through secessionist flags and arguing about old statues.  

• Use Your Tools: Inheriting privilege means that you have, within you, the power to help others. "The function of freedom is to free someone else," (Toni Morrison) and, in order to free others, we must first have the right tools. Education is one of the most powerful tools in our world. 📚 Educate yourself through reading, listening to lectures (not just YouTubers and bloggers) and limiting your Twitter intake 🧘‍♀️

• Complacency is Just As Dangerous as Ignorance: There is a noticeable difference between white men's (and women's) brand of oppression and the oppression black and brown people experience. White individuals tend to focus on themselves. Black and brown individuals focus on their ancestors and their descendants. We aspire to change discriminatory policies, strengthen legal protections and reform public education. White people . . . want people to stop criticizing them online. They are not trying to engage in conversations, they are seeking validation and acceptance based on misinformation.

• Its Not Always About You: Believe it or not, there are systems in place that create inequalities and inequities within our society (CAPITALISM flashes across the screen). Racism is a weapon of social engineering built upon constructs that are meant to segregate and control people. Unless I'm addressing you directly when I say "white people" to refer to social inequities, chances are I am not talking about you, Charlie.

Catch up with me on Instagram ☀️ +🍷

[moomooandthebean]

I rattle on about intense changes, breakdowns

Breakthroughs,

The way they strip you down

Till you’re raw and bare,

More bruises than skin

And the delicate decisions, microscopic, fragile,

The ones that you don’t even think matter

Or even think about at all, almost instinctual

But when you look closely,

They ripple together creating small waves,

Compiled they can form a tsunami,

Notice the details

Of the big picture, I’ll paint them all into focus

I place the razors edge to the paper and slice slowly,

Bloody tragedy pours out, dripping onto the canvas

Similar to the thoughts

That pour out of your skull at night,

Trickling out through your ears,

Soaking your pillows in a deep maroon,

You’ve always loved that color anyways

Sometimes i wonder what it would feel like....

To be hit in the head with a brick,

The sound echos off the walls,

You hear a ringing in your ears now

Vision blurs, is the last thing I’ll ever feel?

It’s a metaphor obviously,

But the phantom injury somehow still lingers,

How can you feel like you can relate to the pain,

Even feel it, as if it were your own skull

Being cracked by the sudden force,

If it’s never happened

Fuck, you can’t stop the bleeding

& I can’t click off the lights

SHHH just be quiet,

You don’t want anyone to know you’re home in there,

Do you?

I spew about euphoric moments that make me smile,

They make it all worth it!!

Because when it’s good, it’s good, right?

Sometimes that’s all that gets me through the day

Funny, does that phrase sounds fimilar?

Maybe like that feeling of shame you get,

When you have to look at the people who love you

Right in their eyes and explain

For the 100th time why you’re backtracking?

How do you stop the self destruction

It feels like a hurricane, unstoppable, unavoidable

Causing unimaginable damage, in all directions

It can possibly get its hold on

Sanity nowhere in sight

Isn’t that what you wanted?

It’s a self induced massacre,

No foul play, self inflicted obviously,

over & over & OVER

Stuck in a loop,

Floating through limbo, casual, unbothered

Pretending you don’t know you’re stuck there,

My eyes covered by my own hands, tightly

Afraid to let go

I don’t want to see,

My subtly self aware delusion

I put my fingers to this screen

And word vomit all over it,

Trying to form into words what it feels like

And release it all for the whole world

And somehow everyone can see

Something...

Delightful, perhaps intriguing,

Shocking almost, that there’s so much depth,

Under the surface of that stupid little pretty face,

What other filthy things lie in the darkest depths

Of that disturbed little brain of yours

Do you think it’s deserving of validation?

Something... alive inside me, letting off a faint light

Let me make YOU feel something,

Isn’t that what you’re asking of me?

I can see that’s all I’m good for anyways

Everyone can see,

Except me

Is that what I’m looking for?

Why can’t I know the secret?

Tell me that you can see there’s something wrong

Can someone please just see it

I’m begging on my hands and scraped bloody knees,

Apoligizes about the stain I’ve left on your carpet,

Let my urge to hear your words cut me like a knife

Be fulfilled,

By that inner feeling that paralyzes me to my core,

But makes the masses of lost souls flock,

Like moths to a dancing flame,

Not caring if they get swallowed by the fire,

As long as it makes them feel better,

Whatever helps make them feel new again, refreshed

They’ve been melted back together,

Welding the hurt shut,

The scalding red metal hardens,

It’s all gleaming and new,

And what beautiful little fix it is

To cover up the ugly truth

Just be careful,

Don’t let it out, even if you do they can’t help

Once you’re over the abyss, you can’t look back

And once the words escape your lips,

You can’t put them back in

That would make you a liar wouldn’t it?

No use opening old wounds that have been fixed,

Let it go

Here just let me take it for you

Don’t even worry about it

In exchange take all that’s left of me,

I don’t need it anymore

I’ve released most of it,

Even some stuff I’d rather kept

And I’d prefer it to be you picking at my carcass

Like a crow picks at roadkill, over anyone else

It all was squeezed out, somewhat aggressively

Through the deep gashes that have been left behind

The past has been engraved in my flesh,

Like story books carved into my skin

They’re beautiful, but encrypted

Can you decipher the tales they tell?

Come take a picture

Film me while you’re at it

Play it in slow motion,

Watch as my inner essence begins to pour out,

Observe.

Plethoras of neon toxic waste pour from my mouth

Imagine whatever colors you want to

Gushing down past my chest, dribbling on the floor,

Can i have a napkin?

Is this too messy for you?

This is without a doubt going to leave a stain

It’s consuming me from the inside out,

But don’t be concerned, it’s all apart of the process

Tell me you see it and it excites you

I deserve no more and no less

For this is not an enscription,

About how they see me,

It’s about them being able to see what i can’t,

Or maybe it’s them not being able to see what i can

Or maybe it’s ABOUT how i keep looking for something

I want to know what it looks like,

Or even how it feels to know what it is

Be able to experience it on the recieving end

How it can make them okay but not me?

How it can cover up the emptiness

Slowly spreading,

Infecting my body,

Extending its reach every day

Decieve them into not seeing it

Yet, there seems to be no answer to the mystery

& no whispers hinting what form it takes on,

I can’t even see it to try and wrap my cold fingers

Around it’s... neck?

Do emotions have necks?

I don’t even know,

If that’s what I’m searching for anyways

So scratch that

Can it be unlocked with the master key?

Like a chest found at the bottom of the ocean

Mossy, moldy wood riddled with splinters,

But the contents still locked tight inside

I’ve looked in all the places I’d imagine you’d find it,

It’s a vanishing magician,

That never reappears back on stage,

Leaving the audience without a trace,

Sorry folks, no refunds on tickets!!

All sales are final!!

You can’t see it with a black light,

Capable of illuminating all the secrets,

You tried to hide from your darkest nights,

Evil is splattered all over the walls

Well what about an X-ray?

Shouldn’t i be able to see it there?

Hidden under my collarbones,

Or maybe it’s tucked away neatly under my rib cage

Do you think if i tried to cut it out i would finally see?

Or they would be able to see what i want them to

Someone bring the surgical blade,

Smooth deep cuts,

The knife slides into my skin like butter,

Unveiling the gruesome truth

Doctor.... or do you prefer master?

Tell them what you see, show the onlookers

Show me the light that you can see hidden,

The one that’s invisible to me,

That’s what they see right?

I assume it’s taken root behind these dull faded eyes,

To fool them into believing,

That it runs through my entirety

But instead it is just a simple lightbulb,

Shining like a beacon though the windows

That are my eyes,

For anyone who needs to believe it’s real,

For anyone who sees it,

And believes it can heal their rot

Show me

& I’ll show you my rotted bleeding heart, gushing

Tied delicately in a black, decaying ribbon

Just for you

Maybe then everything will be crystal clear,

No more questions wrestling with the minds

Of either willingly searching participants,

Clarity being,

The truth, at long last

Concluding the fairest trade, I’ve waited so long

Take off your rose colored glasses

Pry open my eyes, I’m ready

[sapphirestream]

So I’ve been watching Thrilling Intent and I just need to get a rant out or I’m going to stay mad at Gregor forever. I know that’s not a valid solution because he’s a lovable character most of the time and he sticks around and needs to be forgiven if I still want to continue to enjoy watching the show. I don’t really trust the formatting to give the issue space to breath and be properly addressed rather than just falling into the background due to the serialized nature, so I’m going to get out all my feelings here and hopefully get some catharsis doing so.  I WILL acknowledge that I am a bit biased, because Ashe is my favorite character so far, and she’s the one who has the most conflict with Gregor on these issues. I still think I would hold these same opinions if the positions were flipped though. The first big conflict between Ashe and Gregor was, of course, the Charoth issue. At first, I agreed with Gregor’s stance. “Cool motive, still murder” and all that. And sometimes the only option to stop the killing IS to slay the monster even if it is hungry or just being itself.  And if regular slaying would have done anything, I would have agreed that it was the right thing to do, especially since we couldn’t fully gauge Charoth’s mental state at the time and had no way to know of its childlike understanding of the world. 

HOWEVER. However. Killing Charoth would not have done anything productive, and the only way to permanently slay it was to destroy it’s literally immortal soul. Just on an ethical level, that is a step so extreme it SHOULD be a last resort, as Markus stated. Even with all the monsters and even people they have killed before, this is not a step that they had taken. It is striking it beyond all chance of redemption, even after a complete wipe of identity. Other methods should be tried before it, even if they don’t ‘punish’ the creature for its wrongdoings or are risky. Fighting it is risky anyway. You don’t slay a creature because you want to punish them, you slay them to STOP them. Ideally, in the real world you relocate them before they hurt somebody, but even if a bear or something is put down, it's because you can’t control the risk, not because the bear is inherently evil and need to be punished for its sins. The goal is to STOP the monster, not get vengeance for those lost.  It also bothers me on a practical level as well. Gregor did have a point that this could lead to future troubles if something happens to Ashe, but honestly, it was the option that mitigated the consequences the most. Especially after they had already talked him down! Kylil even said she had experience coaxing spirit folk back from their wispy state, and Charoth had an entire island to socialize with now that he wasn’t locked in the temple by a short-sighted father figure. Even before they decided to set up shop in the Nine Shrines bar, Charoth had the beginnings of a loving childhood and a budding support network to help him work through his grief. Also, if you ever wanted justice or remorse for those who died, this would be the only option. Charoth will eventually have to face what he did during these times, but if you kill him he will truly be a new person. Some of the spirit folk will surely still blame him and be scared of him, but as it is now he has the framework to deal with that guilt and would deserve it. He could come to regret what he did during this time and work through that fear and try to earn forgiveness, rather than being unfairly blamed for a previous incarnation. If he has to grow up surrounded by fear for something he no longer is responsible for, that can only breed resentment rather than healing.  Killing him would have only put the danger off into the future, and erased whatever ground they had gained. He MIGHT have been ok, if Kylil had still taken a hand in his raising and the spirit folk had a good handle on separating out previous incarnation’s misdeeds. But you would have erased whatever good work and morals his father had managed to instill in him for twenty years. And he certainly would no longer have any love for humans and would take his cue of humanity from the clearly biased (rightly so! they’ve been burned before and we can be pretty awful) spirit folk. No way would Ashe have wanted to stick around on the island after that (nor would I blame her considering her backstory), so Charoth would have grown up with no human influence at all. Which doesn’t sound too great for humanity later, does it, if later it decides to continue wrecking ships, this time on behalf of the spirit folk? They might not have the temperament to do so, but Charoth would certainly have no qualms about it if they asked him in this scenario. This would not have helped the spirit folks goodwill toward humanity either, ESPECIALLY if Gregor had killed Charoth after a peaceful solution had been reached.  And destroying him utterly? Besides it being the most morally dubious way to go, it would also have potentially the worst consequences! Charoth is a GOD. He is the line between life and death! What happens when you erase that!? Does anyone even know? BEST CASE you just get a new one forming anyway, with an entirely unknown temperament. Alternatively, everyone could be stuck on the island forever, metaphysics fucked from the missing death god. There’s no saying that death itself wouldn’t be royally fucked in the localized area, and we already saw that even just Charoth stoppering it was causing problems. That’s not even mentioning if an unfriendly death god neighbor saw that the Shrouded Isles were undefended and decided to take over! This is only an option if you care about no one and nothing on the island, because this fucks them over hard. This is NOT a good deed, nor does it save anyone but humans. The party would just be one in a long line of people who have screwed over the natives and left them the worse for wear.   Legen’s Eye is actually what prompted this rant, as I had to take a break after watching the conclusion of Wizard Highschool. I have a lot less to say about it because it’s been percolating in my mind for a lot less long, but it was HIGHLY frustrating to watch Gregor shut down all discussion and go straight for destroying it. I’m still not sure whether they should have kept the artifact, but they CERTAINLY should have had a thorough talk about it without Inian and taken more than two seconds to decide. Inian should have been excluded not because she wasn’t part of the group or whatever, but because she was *actively shutting down discussion as well* If she had been willing to sit down and actually talk through everything then I would have been fine with her participating. If they felt that strongly in their convictions, they should have trusted them to shine through and convince the others. The group honestly probably would not have been able to put it to good use, but even if they had shoved it in a corner and let no one know they had it, it would have been a better option. Even setting aside if more magic would be better for equality, you never know if humanity+ is going to face some kind of natural or supernatural disaster down the line where that artifact could make a difference. You can never un-destroy something, and that's a decision that should at least have been talked about rather than decided by one person. They talk about not having the right to make those kinds of decisions, but they made a decision not just against their own party, but humanities(+) entire future, and banked against them EVER figuring out a way to use it wisely, or even the possibility of the necessity of its use.  As an example, I once had a dnd game where the players went into a timestop for hundreds of years and emerged in a world overrun by demons. The gates of hell had busted open and there was a war between the celestial and hellish planes with humanity being the unfortunate battleground.  Do they think such things are impossible? Do they think cataclysmic events will never happen where something like Legen’s Eye could make a difference in the material plane’s survival? No, it might not be the answer to all the world’s social ills, nothing simple will be. There is no magic bullet for our own weakness and greed. But this is the kind of artifact that should have been entrusted to future generations, as an ace in the hole if nothing else.  Overall I am just extremely disappointed in Gregor’s unwillingness to talk things out and his black and white thinking. I know it comes with the territory of a Lawful Good character, and kudos to his player for a doing a good job with him, but damn is it frustrating to watch. This show is so good and so investing that I just want to reach into the screen and argue my own viewpoints with the characters, and I’m glad they cover these hard issues that other shows would skip over entirely. I really appreciate how willing they are to tackle things like this, and we wouldn’t even have had a discussion without varying viewpoints. I know Gregor’s in the hard spot of being devil’s advocate a lot of the time. (ironically it’s not Markus! Isn't he a Demon AND a ‘lawyer’?). Still. Still. I guess the counterpoint to being so invested and tackling hard moral issues is sometimes your viewers are just going to have to go rant on social media to get in their own two cents. God damn do I need a friend who watches this show. 

[blakavalon]

Black Avalon 1.03 - Ivy

“This is me,” I said. Nervous sweat had accumulated on my forehead but I ignored it. “Just a hallway, see?” Into my apartment, followed by Brae and- “Where’s Sefu?”

Brae leaned their head out into the hall again, crouching to get under the doorframe. Their puppies trotted up, looking agitated. One of them, Berus I think, stared at me mournfully and I thought, maybe I have some jerky around here somewhere. Not the time, though. Brae flashed the dogs a few hand signals and they dashed off again. Brae eased the door closed carefully, with their non-glowing hand. I probably should have been more concerned about that. The glowing hand and the demon mask, but after spending all day breaking invisible skulls into invisible chunks, and then this homecoming? It was all I could do to stay upright and fend off the impending panic. Worry could wait.

“Maybe we can take a look around while the pups, uh…” I honestly had no idea what they were doing. Looking for Sefu, presumably. How does someone get lost in a hallway? “Make sure nothing- er, no one- snuck in while I was out.” I dug a baseball bat out of my coat closet, slamming the door quickly so nothing else fell out of the overstuffed little nook. Even with my flashlight and Brae’s magic hand, the room was gloomy and dim. I tried the lights. Nothing, of course. “More light where that came from, Brae?”

Brae nodded, raised their hands, and twitched their fingers in patterns that looked painful and impossible. The apartment lit up as a string of glowing lights flickered into life along the walls.

“Holy shit,” I said. “So you’re like a witch or something?”

Palm up, finger raised. Small circle. Brae waited for a moment, the simply nodded at me. Yes, but maybe? I’d have to learn. My apartment seemed to be undisturbed. There was my pile of clothes, and my other pile of clothes. My three cups, in their permanent spots either in the dishwasher or the sink. My pictures, pinned to the walls or hanging from strings. Or splayed out on the table. Or fallen onto the floor and sort of, well, not forgotten, but ignored in a forgetful sort of way. Everything seemed as it should be. So why was I so uncomfortable?

“So are you dogs,” I said. “Are they familiars, kind of thing?” I felt closer to solid ground with this track. As silly and impossible as it was, magic seemed more understandable than a ghost town full of monster-things.

Brae held a hand flat, wiggled it slightly. They started to peek under my furniture. A good idea, so I followed suit. Much as I despise guns, I wish I had one about then. If Sefu’s wrench could do it, well.

Something felt off about my apartment. Like I was walking into someone else’s dream. Violating some private sanctuary. Fishing a jacket off the floor did nothing to help the chill. “Maybe I ought to pack, while we wait for the dogs?” Fingers tracing along the once-familiar wall, I tapped a pinned-up photograph, almost from memory. “See? The lake. It-”

Wait a minute.

Photo of the lake, sure, but. Not the one I took. Not exactly. Same placid lake, same sunset cast in grayscale. But the birds that had been skimming the lake were replaced by…

I dropped the bat. “Brae? Come look at this.” And Brae was there, next to me. No sound of movement or rush of air. They nodded at the photo, pointed with tattered gloves at a few more along the row. Minor alterations to each. Strange differences. Gargoyles. Laughing skull-things. Animals, but only just. A picture of a man with black ichor bleeding from his eyes and a predator’s smile. One of my neighbors. “Shit. This is like the forest, isn’t it?”

Brae flashed a few hand signs. Even with no earthly clue what they could have been saying, I found myself understanding, sort of. Impressions, feelings. Changes of certain magnitude could be retroactive. A thought in my mind, unbidden, sketched together from those impressions.

“Woah,” I said. “Guess you can’t teach that?”

Brae raised their hands to answer, but one of the pups started barking from the front room. It was in the room. My front door was still locked, chained. No wonder Sefu glared at them wide-eyed and clearly afraid. Still cute pups. Might need a picture taken sometime.

“What is it baby?” I said, crouching down to scratch behind the dog’s ears. “You’re Berus, right?” It brought up a paw to shake, then chuffed and cocked its head toward the door. “Found him, Berus? Brae-“

Brae was at the door, unbolting it, tossing my forgotten bat back to me. Their stance said ‘let’s go’ and I couldn’t argue. The hallway was horrible this time around. Hot. Stifling. I don’t know how I could have missed it the first time, but the walls were gritty. Pooled at the bottom with what looked like dried blood. Too much of it to be Sefu’s, too much of it to be from even just the one person. I slid my eyes from the wall to the gore-slicked floor. Locked my eyes on Berus’ wagging tail and kept them there to protect my stomach. A longer walk than there should have been hallway, to a door hanging half off its hinges. Number scratched off the wall with a knife. The other pup- Ser?- standing sentinel besides. I gripped my bat with both hands and pushed inside. With my world flipping carelessly, I focused on the immutable: solid metal in my hands, rubber grip. Carpet beneath me, slightly spongy. A taste of coppery air in my nose.

This apartment seemed unfurnished at first, but for the glow of dozens of candles arrayed along the floor. Living room seemed empty too, till I caught sight of the smashed furniture peeking half-hidden from a closet that couldn’t quite close. I could hear murmuring from the next room. Half these apartments had the same floor plan, and none of them included forbidding, eight foot high doors of blackened oak. Brae’s turn to push past me, flanked by their dogs. With a hand still emitting ghostly light, they traced frame of the door, then pressed both palms into its center.

A lock clicked open and echoed, sending a tremble through me as if the noise resonated with my bones. We all eased into a huge, circular room. Definitely not standard. Sefu sat alone in a circle of sourceless light, talking to him.

“Ma’am, look, you’ve been very generous,” Sefu said, “but I should go find my friends. They’re probably, ha, worried.” He struggled to sit up and I saw the blood on his face, still dripping from a wound at his temple. I looked at Brae. Brae looked at me. That copper smell was overwhelming. Surely not from him?

“Sefu?” I tried.

His attention snapped towards me, but his eyes unfocused immediately. I tried to track his half-conscious gaze, felt my neck tingle nervously. Very carefully, I fished my camera out from under my shirt by the lanyard. Held it up to the bare drywall of the room. Snapped a picture.

I had to bite down hard on the scream. Felt Brae tense up from their position peering over my shoulder. On the screen: blood. Everywhere. Dripping down the walls from a dozen corpses, pinned together at the hands like paper dolls. Something blurred near the bottom. I aimed the camera at Sefu. Snap.

The thing on my screen was almost humanoid. A bipedal insect. Long, long arms, a body made of some kind of shell. Head of a white wasp. I opened my mouth to scream and the room shivered, split, imploded all at once, and the thing in my camera shuddered to life in front of me. It stood over Sefu and chittered as blood seeped down the walls. The faint scent of plain candles was overpowered by copper and gore as whatever illusion had kept the creature and its grisly trophies from view failed. My camera fell from limp fingers to dangle from its lanyard.

It looked at me. It looked at me. I still had my bat. Manufactured, hadn’t Sefu said? I took a step forward and swung as hard as I could and got it in the side. Shell cracked. It screamed so loud I thought my ears would bleed. Sefu rambled on. Brae leapt into action, producing more of those iron nails from before. They swept past the creature and drove a nail towards Sefu’s right hand. It struck the empty air with a clang, and the wrench appeared in his hand.

“Shit,” Sefu said. His eyes were wide and searching as he hauled himself to his feet. Caught sight of the monster. “Shit.”

“Mmmhmm!” I said, and swung again. And again.  

Crack.

Crack.

Crack.

It screamed again and turned towards me. Every crack in its shell already healed. It twitched, and I blinked, and it became human in an instant. Still stark white with too-large eyes and too-long limbs, but it could pass for human. Was human? It- she?- was bleeding from the side, from her arms.

“Please,” she said, arms raised defensively as she backed away from me. From us. The terror on her face seemed genuine, but over her shoulder I could see the corpses. Pinned to the wall like moths, glassy eyes turned towards mine. She must have seen the hate I felt. Turned towards Sefu. “Please, they’ll kill me.” Sefu hesitated for a moment while the creature held his gaze. But his eyes slid to those poor souls on the wall as well. The creature started to turn to Brae, started to speak, but Brae was there, swinging a fist sprouted with iron spikes between each finger.

We did not dare bury them, afraid of what else might have been lurking in the night. We took them down from the walls though. Sefu said a few words, and Brae sprinkled the corpses with water. I knew them. Not by name, not personally, but in the vague neighborly way of those who don’t so much enjoy human company as human presence, off in the reassuring distance.

I remember the creature’s noises as it died. Those screams would stay with me. Maybe forever. Back at my apartment, Brae and Sefu helped pack. I didn’t have much worth taking that wasn’t already back with the jeep. Some spare film, a couple cameras. Some clothes. I’d miss the mattress, but it as ratty anyway. Brae painted runes on the door, on the windows, to keep those things out. Those folk.

“Do you want to talk?” I said. Sefu had passed by on yet another check of the wards, closets, so on. He seemed nervous. More nervous than the unspoken unease he’d had since I met him.

“Want to get out of here, “he said, but he sat down on the floor nearby. “I’ve got a theory. About what happened.”

“A theory?” I prompted. Sometimes interest was as good as goading.

“I think,” Sefu said, “someone here made a bad mistake. Maybe recently, maybe when the town was founded. Definitely when they hired Brae and I.”

“Wait, you were hired?”

“I sure don’t ride around getting my ass kicked by horrors for free.” He laughed, patted the bandage on his temple. “But I think someone here made a deal with the folk. Always a mistake. Some kind of contract, that got broken when Brae and I burnt their Hedge. So one of them came around- or was around- to collect.”

“Those people.”

“Yeah. Those people. Maybe some of the people here got out, maybe some of them were put somewhere else, but I’m willing to bet at least some of them didn’t make it.”

“Hell,” I said. “So what do we do?”

“That place, where they would have taken whoever they took? We can’t go there.” Sefu passed his ever-present wrench from hand to hand. “Not wont, not don’t want to, can’t. No one taken there gets out, that anyone knows of. No one but the folk can get in, that anyone knows of. So we’re, uh. Done here, I guess.”

He sounded as disappointed, as defeated, as anyone I had ever known. I couldn’t pretend I wasn’t anxious to get out of here. “Where do we go?”

“You’re involved now,” he said. “Sorry. Best place to try is Night City.”

“That cannot be a real place.”

<- Previous | Next ->

[revlatte]

Sanctuary: Pre-Launch Thoughts

It’s Sunday morning here in the Land of the Sky. I sit in front of a computer screen, alone down a very long drive way. There’s tea brewing in the kitchen. Jill Scott is playing on my Spotify. The track is currently “He Loves Me.” I’m in winter socks, plaid boxers, and a University of Tennessee Center for Leadership & Service long-sleeve shirt I received as a gift for participating on an alumni panel. My plaid pants are laying on the bed next to me with a pair of long johns inside. The heater is set to “4″. I have no clue what temperature that is but it’s warm enough. The curtains are still drawn because I’m a Pisces and love lurking in the dark, even in the day light. I am about to light 3 candles to be obedient to my partner’s ancestors. 

Admittedly, my brain is not firing as strongly as it used too. This gives me great pause and reason for concern. It’s almost as if my brain reached it’s peak a decade ago when I was working, involved in ministry as a youth pastor, and in graduate school at Wesley Theological Seminary. I’ve spent the last decade searching for my people, my family, my home, my faith community, myself. Perhaps with the Sanctuary Movement, I’m a bit closer. 

3 Thoughts for Today: Hidden Figures, #wearenotinvisible & brewing, Black Star Line Brewing. 

Hidden Figures

One of my good friends here in Asheville and I went to the pre-release to see Hidden Figures on Thursday. I was so proud of Taraji P. Henderson. She is a true come up! From Hustle & Flow to Hidden Figures with Kevin Costner. As a Black American, I understand the significance of this and how Taraji is maturing as an actress who is commanding respect in Hollywood circles. I may not respect all of her choices in movies but I see her value as an actress and role model. Heck, she inspired me. 

Throughout the movie, there is a common narrative that we as Black women are familiar with. The asshole bosses who lack any emotional intelligence and create hostile work environments and don’t give two shits about how their egoism, patriarchy, heteronormativity, cis-gendered male privilege, misogyny impacts everyone one else. There’s the narrative of having to work harder than everyone else though you’re more qualified and have more experience. The experience of being paid less because of what’s between your legs and the color of your skin. The narrative of others knowing the discrimination you are facing is real but THEY DO NOTHING! They want to protect their safety, their freedom, their privilege. They watch as you face oppression, hatred, bigotry and become ostracized. And, there’s the one person who can see through this shit and validate and affirm our experiences. We, as Black women, so often, play critical roles in the development of institutions, organizations, companies and receive no accreditation. We are written out of history and convinced that we can be nothing more than subservient slaves to capitalism and white supremacy. Hidden Figures broke that narrative. 

I left that movie theater inspired and proud. I left with a fire in my belly that we, the Sistahs of Sanctuary, could do anything. We already are. 

#wearenotinvisible & brewing

When I first came to Asheville and arrived at my home on Lamar Avenue, I declared my new home as sanctuary and a place to land. I told my girlfriend at the time that I wanted to fly under the radar, keep my nose down, not get involved with organizing, and take some space to process and heal. I needed a low-key, “normal” life. That was my desire. 

Within just a few short months, all of that had turned on its head. I was working at the progressive UCC in town. It was a great experience and also really damn difficult. I had the same degree as the co-pastors, comparable experience in many ways, and was in a position of assistant. My options for employment were limited so $14 an hour for 14 hours a week (as it started) was stable and kept the lights on. Additionally, I had some outside contracting work and residuals, so it was all good. While there, I realized my brain was working the same and was too afraid to say anything to anyone. I imagine the pastors could tell something was off. Perhaps none of us wanted to say anything. I was a shell of a person. Through it all, I waited for the moment when they would ask me to preach on a Sunday. Or help with the Eucharist (which I believe is the most sacred and holy of acts in faith communities.) Or do a reading. I waited for an invitation to be a part of the community. Rarely, if ever, did that come. My engagement with the community was structured around ways I was showing up as a staff. This was sad in many ways and I received a sense of home, place, community through it all. Until...

The week before Valentine’s Day 2016. My partner was certain she was going to loose the baby. I was not surprised. Stress, shitty ass nutrition, and a diet of many beers, mixed with older age. This was sad and devastating for me, as their partner. We had dreamed of the baby, names, colors for the walls. The plan was that I would be transitioning to her house to live. All of us, as a family. 

I received a call from the doctor that whatever was growing on and inside of my uterus was growing. Surgery had to be scheduled immediately for that upcoming Tuesday, the 11th. 

Long story short - an emergency hysterectomy for me while simultaneously, my girlfriend was having a miscarriage. Devastation. 

I was out of work from the church and my girlfriend did not want any support or visits. I couldn’t understand but wanted to respect our relationship boundaries. Less than a week later, a white, older, lesbian, wealthy Board member came in to my home and unleashed her white rage on to me and broke a really dear item to me, at my dining room table. In the weeks that followed, the #wearenotinvisible movement was launched to address anti-Black bias in the workplace, primarily in gay/queer organizations. The fall out was shitty. As per usual, folks took the side of the oppressed, did everything in their power to discredit me, and engaged in a long and multi-tiered level of victim-blaming. It was humiliating and devastating. In fact, to this day, the organization has comments on their website about the #wearenotinvisble movement. As SHE said, it’s painful and it hurts. 

Through that advocacy and raising issues around transparency, I was blackballed. Eventually, I had to leave my job at the church. My relationship with my partner was falling apart. And I was in this new damn town, isolated, alone, afraid, unemployed and not employable. I sought Sanctuary. I had to go inward. Once inside, I couldn’t make my way through the mountains, rivers, valleys, and streams of consciousness and trauma. I was alone. 

Over the next year, I would watch friends come and go. Hot and cold. Close and far. It was as if I was walking around town with the Mark of the Beast. In each conversation, I had to give a disclaimer of who I was and what I was about. It fucking sucked. I just wanted to live.... until I didn’t because I couldn’t take it anymore. 

So what does this have to do with brewing? The #wearenotinvisible movement got hijacked and all around town I saw people wearing the shirts that I paid for (for half of them at least), and not knowing the history. It was clear that they knew this one person and bought a shirt to be a part of a movement. 

To be a part of something bigger than yourself. That’s what the Sanctuary Movement is all about. That’s what we are striving to achieve. Collective working, unity, healing, and liberation. To embody the principles of Kwanzaa. 

Well, as I think about the craft brewing industry, to be blunt: it’s fully of really privileged, white, cis-gendered males with a lot of access to cash. If they have enough cash, they can work hard enough (or make others work for them at a fraction of their worth), and amass a great living, if not millions, in just a matter of years. There’s no one in the industry that looks like me. A thick, Black, masculine of center, queer, woman. I know we exist and are excited and interested in beer. We are the under-served, un-tapped market. I know the secret to our success and healing. #wearenotinvisible and yes I can see the Hidden Figures. 

Black Star Line Brewing

Again, you are probably reading this wondering what the hell I’m talking about and how it all comes together and if it’s remotely related to the Sanctuary Movement. The answer is YES!

Sanctuary will initially house 4 Black, queer womyn and their children in the month of January 2016. We will host rituals. Healing circles. Visioning sessions. And begin to create the world we have envisioned. Challenging supremacy, capitalism, and individualism. We are welcoming each other home. To Sanctuary. 

AND, that comes at a cost. Rent is $1200. Utilities will probably average about $200. Water about $100. Internet is $60. Food for all of us around $400. Other items (such as toilet paper, paper towels, etc.), are estimated around $150 a month. If we have a shared car, estimated payment around $350/month. Insurance estimated at $200/month. Total baseline for the household: $1620. Add food and miscellaneous items: That’s $2170. Then, if we’re able to secure a car and insurance for such, we’re looking at $2,720. For the sake of round numbers, let’s say it cost $2800 per month to support 4 Black women and 3 children. That’s it. 

However, we are all coming to the space because we need, desire, and crave Sanctuary and community. Our collective and individual capacities to “work” in the system, to make someone else richer, and to have our worth evaluated at $10/hour at best, is not an option. There needs to be soul-affirming work with dignity, pride, and honor. 

To that end, we’ve asked folks who can see the Hidden Figure and those that know are lives matter, that #wearenotinvisible, to donate to the Sanctuary Movement. To donate in recurring donations, single donations, donate food, cars, whatever and however they are able. We are not a non-profit (because we do not believe in that hierarchy and oppressive structure). We are Sistahs of Sanctuary who are doing the work of healing and starting where it matters the most, with ourselves. 

We have most of the brewing equipment we need to get started. But not the funds for the rest of the materials or equipment. If we are able to brew and partner with our friends at breweries around town, we can make beer, mead, cider, etc. as a viable stream of income to support the community. We can break through the color and gender barrier in the industry and really show strength in self-sufficiency. This could be a model we could replicate and break free from the chains of traditional employment that is exploitative. It is a pathway to our liberation. 

We have the land and space to grow hops and really distinguish ourselves.

As we heal, we will see the launch of Black Star Line Brewing as a testimony to our individual and collective healing and liberation. As a form of resistance and renewal. As a form of Sanctuary in a bottle. 

Alone. Down the long driveway. Over a mason jar of tea. I dream of the tomorrow that is almost here. I dream of Sanctuary. Of our collective brilliance. Of being at the precipice of healing - individual and collective. I dream of the story that our children and grand children will tell about us being bad-ass, radical women who blazed the trail in the craft brewing industry, in commercial cleaning, healing, at life. 

I think of my Sistahs and give thanks. Because of them, I have the will to live. The fight in my belly. Because of them, I can come home. Because of them I am home and have finally found Sanctuary. 

[avaliveradio]

9.30 New Music Monday Release radar with Jacqueline Jax

When an artist creates music, it’s driven from passion. When done effectively, that energy transfers to the listener creating an emotional response. Listening to new music is an experience. Explore some exciting new music from creators all over the world recently discovered by our host Jacqueline Jax as she searches the far corners of the globe for talented songwriters and music creators who are telling their truth to bring the listener a unique experience.  

SUBSCRIBE to our broadcast here: www.wavve.link/avaliveradio

Listen to the Show: https://anchor.fm/ava-live-radio/episodes/9-30-New-Music-Monday-Release-radar-with-Jacqueline-Jax-e5mkhg

Sponsored by : Headline Music App

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Featured Artist:

D’Z:

Artist: Kerry Kathleen

New Release: “Reverie” 3 track EP

Genre: Indie pop

Located in: Santa Rosa, CA

Reverie is about a dream state, and being able to come alive and be yourself in the nighttime . This song will lift people up and make you feel sexy. This EP has just released (September 27th 2019) and is a milestone for me. I’m so proud to finally be able to release these songs to the world. Reverie, Homegirl, Bright and Right back are all better than I could have imagined. The music..

Music is able to get us out of our funks, lift us up, and remind us that life is beautiful. It has been a constant in my life and it is a creative outlet and it makes me feel so happy and can be healing after a stressful day. My lyrics are always from the heart and I believe that rawness from true vocals is the most powerful part of songwriting. For me, It has to come from my own experiences.

LINKS:  Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/artist/54RpjtwYQn71QiYVdQaCjQ?si=59ASuxu5RWmxTkROW5_-cg https://music.apple.com/us/playlist/reverie-album/pl.u-e98lkVlTZ5rPdm Twitter @kerrykathleenn Facebook @https://www.facebook.com/KerryKatheen Instagram @kerrykathleenmusic

Artist: Beautiful Things

New Release: Hey Hey Hey (Electric Mix)

Genre: Alternative Rock

Sounds like: Garbage, Placebo, Curve

Located in: Los Angeles, CA

Creating music has also been a coping mechanism for me when life gets overwhelming. It’s an outlet for all the complex feelings inside my heart.

Our band creates ethereal pop-rock with deeply personal lyrics. We are very influenced by 80s alternative artists like The Cure, Peter Murphy, and Kate Bush. 

I wrote this song about my experiences with the music industry, looking back to a time when I was much younger and more trusting. I let people guide me and represent me who didn’t have my best interests at heart – only their own. I learned so much from these experiences about human nature which ultimately strengthened me and made me a smarter, wiser person. 

I wanted this song to be empowering, hence the lyric “I won’t be a victim, no never again.” I’ve since chosen the people I surround myself within all areas of my life very carefully and have learned to trust my intuition. It’s made all the difference. Our new Dream World (Revisited) EP is made up of re-imagined songs from the first Beautiful Things album released 10 years ago, called just Dream World. I became curious about what could happen creatively if I let fresh ears take some of these songs apart and put them back together again in a new way. We were inspired to re-do this song from its original version because we thought it would sound great with more electronics and heavier guitars. Many of the ideas on this one came from our bass player Billy who spent lots of time in his studio experimenting with new sounds for it.

The music...

We used more electronic elements and atmospheric sounds than before, which our band loves to experiment with, and we hope to incorporate more sounds like these in our future releases.

Creating music is something our band feels compelled to do because music is very fulfilling for us. I personally get inspired just from listening to other musicians, past and present. There's nothing like the feeling you get when your mind is blown by a melody, guitar chord, lyric, performance, etc. That feeling stirs my soul and compels me to keep creating even when it seems like no one is listening or no one cares. As a musician, you always hope that something you create will conjure those magical feelings in others.

What’s next… We are working on a new single and will be making a video to promote it.

LINKS:  https://open.spotify.com/track/0G9QeybSCD1SYCIpr6vrA6 https://twitter.com/officialthings https://www.facebook.com/beautifulthingsmusic https://www.instagram.com/beautifulthingsmusic

Artist: Ugly Melon

New Release:  Rainbow in the Dark

Genre: Hard rock / Metal /Rock /

Sounds like: Black Sabbath / Disturbed / Shinedown

Located in: Toronto Ontario Canada

Ugly Melon comes from an era of classic hard rock from the 70s Black Sabbath to today modern edge of Disturbed. We mix yesterday's writing style with today's modern sound. 'Rainbow in the dark' is a song written by Ronnie James Dio back in 1983 from the Holy Diver album, the Original song was an up yet simple song. 

We put our Ugly Melon twist to it and made the song a more Modern ballad anthem. 

The Song is as relevant today as it was yesterday. The feeling of being alone and rejected but your really a rainbow in the dark. When doing such an epic song like this that was a huge hit for Dio, you've got to make sure you don't butcher the song. 

When I was thinking of the arrangement I was thinking about how I might make it different, Stairway to Heaven came on the radio and that was it. 

The Music we create comes first off doing the music we want to do and not thinking about if it's going to get signed or get airplay. We want to be real and say here it is to enjoy. Our new album 'Just a Man' is a piece of work we are proud of and love hearing it every time.  

Being real with your music is key. People will hear that and climb aboard for the ride to become fans and spread the word. 

Music is medicine for the soul, the escape from reality for a while, the vision of a live epic performance with visuals on a big screen making it a rock concert to remember that's what inspires us.

Right now we are...

Ugly Melon will be releasing a video soon probably on Halloween song called 'If You're Wrong'. A song about questioning and challenging religious beliefs and to be open-minded to others beliefs. 

LINKS:  https://www.reverbnation.com/uglymelon/song/30535606-rainbow-in-the-dark https://open.spotify.com/track/6jkS0MMp6jl45iyjO3xNE5?si=6aXL5FW2QrWHm_ofcGZ7Iw https://twitter.com/Ugly_Melon https://www.facebook.com/uglymelon Instagram @Ugly_Melon

Artist: Dream Eternal Bliss

New Release: Circling

Genre: alternative rock

Sounds like: Berlin, The Cardigans, Garbage, Duran Duran

Located in: Franklin Lakes, NJ

This song is a moody ballad about your life being stuck in a holding pattern. Challenges we face tend to provide great songwriting material when you want to craft truly personal and heartfelt lyrics. If you’ve ever felt like time is passing you by and you’re sort of immobilized by your situation, powerless to take control and make a change, whether it’s a relationship or work or something else, that’s exactly where “Circling" came from. I find that the happiest times in my life are the most challenging times in which to write personal lyrics.

This song encapsulates a variety of musical influences. It starts with a synth-meets-U2 vibe over some electronic percussion that evolves into something dark and somber, and then in the second half, big drums and heavy guitar kick in.

Right now we are...

shooting a video for this song! And we're beginning our next writing phase, continuing to evolve and refine our sound. I think people will be surprised by the evolution of our sound moving forward as we embrace more of our rock and guitar influences in some of the new material. No specific date is set yet for recording new material, but we’ll start to share some of it at live shows in late 2019.

LINKS:

https://www.reverbnation.com/dreameternalbliss/song/30421617-circling https://open.spotify.com/track/1cqQihDUv9ZInj9Qpeh9jh https://www.facebook.com/dreameternalbliss https://www.instagram.com/dreameternalbliss

https://open.spotify.com/track/1cqQihDUv9ZInj9Qpeh9jh?si=lYo_C_owSxKfpwC1p0h3og

Artist: Chanidu

New Release: Make a better world

Genre: folk pop rock

Sounds like: Cat Stevens, Peter Gabriel, Peter Tosh, Drake.

Located in: Edison, New Jersey USA

'Make a better world' is about developing affiliation and affinity towards others who do not have the same privileges as you do. Treating people the right way you will want to be treated. Caring for and making appropriate changes that can provide a good environment for everyone in the world.

The music we are creating is...

I am always magnetized to this love ambition which I think no one can find unless they have it in their heart. It must be real, cannot be exploited or taken advantage of. When the world starts thinking in the same direction of purpose, the world will be close to achieving happiness and then peace.

I do this because...

Songwriting is within you and it is surrounded by influences gathered from those you listened to and admired. Today's love and hate can be expressed with music. Feelings can also be expressed in terms of empathy or observation. Having the ability to do this anytime, any day is awesome.

Right now we are...

I would appreciate it if people can take the time to listen to all the songs on my current album and leave comments. I will be back in the studios in the first week of October to start recording a single.

LINKS:  Facebook.com/chanidumusic

https://www.facebook.com/chanidu005 https://www.instagram.com/chanidu.music

https://www.instagram.com/Chanidu1 https://twitter.com/chanidu005 https://www.reverbnation.com/chanidu Reverbnation.com/Chanidu005  Spotify link: https://open.spotify.com/artist/2CaxmqQwziSBeaZ9CTwAb5

Artist: Cabela and Schmitt

New Release: Into Your Hands

Genre: Contemporary Christian

Sounds like: : In particular or specifically... I can't think of any

Located in: : Colorado and Nebraska USA

https://open.spotify.com/track/4skCWnF5cvZgEkwpe4MbyM?si=7joZAQ1FRVaRC5l2KQ6a9A

‘Into Your Hands’ speaks to the struggle within and needing that power and love to help you get back on your feet when everything you do turns into a disaster. He takes his loving hands and brings you out of misery and into happiness. Who wouldn't love to have that kind of person in your life. 

The music we are creating is important because every song we are given to relate is a gift to be shared. A musician never knows where the music comes from, it just comes and it's their obligation to pass it on. 

We do this because it is inside us, it's a part of who we are, it's as much us as any other part of our being. When inspirations come to you in the form of music at any time in any situation, at any given time... it is a gift worth sharing with others.

Right now we are...

We're excited about our new album DANCING SHOES that will officially be released on the 1st of October.

LINKS:  http://www.cabelaandschmitt.com https://open.spotify.com/track/4skCWnF5cvZgEkwpe4MbyM?si=eyYw5yigSQK47AJmxU8-jA @CabelaSchmitt https://www.facebook.com/cabelaschmittmusic https://www.instagram.com/cabelaandschmitt

Artist: TODD BARROW

New Release: Hell and Back

Genre: Country, Traditional Country

Sounds like: Hank Williams, Johnny Paycheck, Charley Pride, George Jones

Located in: Burleson Texas, USA

This song is...

a real country song about real-life situations. The way the musicians play on the track is spectacular. They pour their hearts into this tune because the message is serious with a twist of humor. The song is about when a man cheats on a woman then later regrets it. Don't go down that path, my friends!!!

The music we are creating is...

the direction of traditional country and back to the roots of artists like Patsy Cline, Johnny Cash even some blues like BB King. Trying to pave the way for the old country in a new format! More challenging works of art that have longevity in the music industry.

I do this because...

 #1 I was called to do it. I've tried to give it up several times but it seems to hunt me down. I enjoy writing a song with a theme in mind kind of like putting together a movie but in 3 minutes maybe more. Creating something that is not there is fascinating to me. Taking an idea from the brain with notes and casting out there for the public to enjoy!!! Most of all its fun. Performing the songs before an audience is intoxicating!

The future... 

I'm currently working on a new album/EP for 2020. Very excited to get some fresh country music available for my fans. Currently doing gigs in Texas but recently played at the George Jones in Nashville. Trying to branch out in my touring even possibly UK & Italy.

LINKS:  https://open.spotify.com/track/5X14W5OuEZxmPqUtpQxloJ?si=QRGLT9MvS9--Q3FmVknxcA http://www.twitter.com/ToddBarrowMusic  http://www.facebook.com/ToddBarrowMusic  http://www.instagram.com/ToddBarrowMusic1

[kivaqblog-blog]

What It Was Like, Finding Karen

I’m dropping the first part of the original piece, and giving it a different name and changing a few things, to see if it works better. It’s more to-the-point now, and Karen is more vivid to me too.

I came out. It was great. It’s scary as fuck. I've never really worn women's clothing outside, or inside either, until recently. I got my femme on reading radical feminist books in the early 70s, I never learned how to wear all this stuff. Or jewelry and a purse (which turns out to be very handy, compared to a backpack). I mean, I love it, it's a kind of happy I didn't expect, along with the getting-used-to-it part. But I still have a lot to learn compared to the trans women I see posting selfies: finding my style, what I look good and feel good in. We're going to the CAE Prom, I've never gone because I didn't wear dresses before, so what was the point?

So, I'm out. Finally. To be clear, I am 58. And I can't even put on makeup, so I don't. But estrogen saved my soul, I was about done for, consumed with anger and pain. Now ... it's different. I have to write this out later, it's important.

But I was talking about outness. There’s the outside part, like dealing with the world, being visible but not hypervisible, meaning so visible it’s painful or scary. Learning to get out of and into a cardigan in a crowded New York (all crowded to varying degrees). And there’s also the inside part, which I’d been ignoring for years, since my therapist passed in 2010. My inner child, or as I called her, my inner kid. For a few years in the late 80s-early 90s the phrase was everywhere, to the point of annoyance. It sounded like psychobabble. Maybe it was. But I understand now. (Probably the estrogen.) I remembered, I do have an inner kid. I’d left her down there in my subconscious, and I realized I needed to find her and bring her back. It had been long enough.

I went looking for her. Trepidatiously at first, because it involved going back inside, down into the part where I have to step over broken things, sharp edges. It’s not a happy place. And it’s hard to see.

But when I finally made my way down there, she wasn’t a kid anymore. She looked more like my inner early adolescent. She had one of those shaved-on-one-side, dyed-rainbow haircuts, and was wearing earrings that I felt oddly envious of until I realized she had “borrowed” them from Kathleen. She was wearing a pair of jeans and a black turtleneck, and she was wearing glasses, the red cat’s-eye frames which were the ones I’d really wanted to get the other day at Urban Optical. She was reading a webcomic on her iPad — Goodbye to Halos, I think — and humming some kind of tune I couldn’t identify, some folk song. She looked about eleven or twelve now. Still sitting on the same stool, still without her feet touching the floor. Something dangerous or bad down there, maybe; she was always sitting up on that stool. Did she even know I was here?

“Karen?” I said, using the name I remember wishing I’d had when I was nine. She stopped humming. “I’m here to take you home,” I said. “I’m sorry this all took so long.” I felt awkward, ashamed, guilty, inadequate to the task, the usual array of inward negativity.

She darkened her screen and sighed, but she didn’t look up at first. Then she spoke. She’d never done that before. Her voice was surprisingly soft. Calm. “Don’t apologize, Mama. You didn’t do anything wrong, you have to remember that. It’s like Aunt Lyssa told you.”

“What’s like …” Aunt Lyssa? Wtf? “… what did Alyssa tell me?” I was totally thrown by this girl. Every time I’d risked this before, she was this miserable battered child who couldn’t speak, didn’t react. It was terrible, just looking at her. She looked like everything that had ever happened to me.

That was years ago, the last time, more or less. She never changed. I tried holding her, cleaning her face and her hair, comforting her, even singing to her before now. It had never helped. She seemed limp, dead, but she wasn’t, quite. She could feel pain; I could tell that much. It’s what she thought she was made for.

Now, she was years older, and alive, it seemed. And talking. Talkative, even. She sounded like she was trying to be patient with me, ffs.

She looked up, and her eyes were brown, not green, but she was still me.

She looked at me very seriously. “When she came over for dinner, Aunt Lyssa said to not be so hard on yourself, that no one should ever be ashamed of how long their transition takes. Because anyone’s transition is a struggle. We’re each different, even if everyone has to fight this fight, if they’re girls like us. Or boys. Bois.” I could tell she meant a different spelling the second time. “Transfolx. This is ‘the hardest thing you’ll ever do,’ right?”

I just nodded. “And each of us has to walk our own path, and for us, our path has been really twisty, and it crossed over places we’d been before, and sometimes it felt like being lost. Sometimes it felt like we were going in circles.” She made little diagrams in the air with her hands, twisty ones that crossed in three dimensions, squiggles and circles and spirals. She was looking at me like she’d been thinking about nothing but this for a long time, and had been waiting to get my undivided attention. “Like that line from the song you kept listening to, after we lost the last elect: We’ve been in this room before.”

“I know. You’ve never left this room. When I came looking for you before, even in the 90s, it was awful. You couldn’t move, or speak. You never got older. Like you weren’t allowed to feel comforted. Like the girl in the dark room, in The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas. The LeGuin story.”

She closed her eyes and gave me a curt nod: yes, I’ve read everything you’ve ever read and no, I’d rather not talk about that story right now. I kept going. “It seemed like we were only created in order to feel pain. I couldn’t even help myself, much less you. I changed in the 90s, once I started taking estrogen I felt healed, for a while. But I couldn’t heal you. When everything seemed to go wrong in 2000, I ran away. I was so easily broken back then, and I broke. I am so sorry I left you here.” No response. “Do you remember anything from before?”

“I remember everything. I mean, not every-thing. There are a lot of parts I can’t remember specifically, but I remember it all inside, everything that happened to us, everything we felt. Our body remembers. I remember what it was like, you hiding your feelings inside me, then hiding me, in order to survive.”

I’d meant before as in before-Nineties, our first transition, but she seemed to think I meant the abuse, since everything always seems to point back toward it. For some reason I thought I needed to explain. “Our body remembers feeling afraid, inside,” I started, “in this way you can’t just leave behind, because of what she did to Carol and us. It’s called PT—”

“I know what it’s called,” she said, exasperated. “I do have an iPad, you know. I’m not completely dependent on your sensory input for information anymore.”

“Okay, sorry.” Jeez. Touchy kid. And a bit of a smart-ass. I have to focus: she’s me, and I came to get us both, and take us home. I’m not here to get into an argument with myself.

She looked a bit sheepish after that remark, but didn’t want to actually apologize. “I mean, thanks for the iPad, it does help a lot.”

“You’re welcome,” I said, bewildered, and added pointlessly, “There are a lot of them around now,” as if that explained why she now had one, along with the power of speech and something of an attitude. And why she was several years older. Maybe it did explain it, I’m still not sure exactly what happened in there over the last couple of years.

“It helped a lot, when I was trying to get ready. I can see much better who we are now. All of us, any of us. Whichever ‘us’ you have in mind. Transfolx, or our sisters, trans and cis and lesbian and bi and enby. I’ve been reading. I tried to teach myself a little about intersectionality. I tried my best to relearn the non-binary P3 personal pronouns they and them treated grammatically like S3 she and he, and the singular ending, such as themself. And I learned to stop thinking of ourself as S3 neuter gender: we’re not an it, we’re a she.

“Just the way it felt to begin with. You remember? It seemed a lot simpler then, when we were little. There were two genders, one neutral pronoun, and three television networks. And we didn’t know exactly why we were the wrong gender. But boy, were we ever wrong.

“If we were growing up in Northampton – or Amherst – if we were growing up now, I suppose we might see it somewhat differently. We might at least have been seen differently, at least seen by others like us, or similar to us. Everyone seems to be non-binary now. I’m still not entirely sure what that means. But it never happened, we never met anyone else like us or even similar to us, even after we came to New York, not for a very long time. Except queer women of course, but that was problematic back then. Until we fell in love with Kathleen.

“When we were a kid, we never quite understood in the first place why we weren’t a girl anymore, did we? We can’t remember when they did it, we can’t really remember the before-time, or what happened when they tried to convince us we were a boy, that we had no choice in the matter. I think we cried a lot.” She sounded pretty certain, like she had a better grip on the dimly distant past from where she sat than I did. “Yes,” I agreed, “I suppose we did.”

“It probably felt like we’d done something terribly wrong, like we were being punished for something really bad we did by having to be a boy from now on. We remembered just enough from before for it to seem hideously unfair, I think, something taken away from us for no good reason. We kept asking for pink, metaphorically, and getting baby blue instead.

“We were happy when we were a girl, damn it! We liked it! I know that now.” She sounded angry, for the first time. “We couldn’t remember being a girl, exactly, just being happy. Spinning around so our skirt flew up, until we got dizzy and fell on the grass. We never forgot our skirt, did we? We just didn’t know what it was, that memory. Just an image, of a skirt flying up, and seen from our point of view, and the idea that it was fun.” 

I tried to take a deep breath, exhale, let it go. “No,” I said, finally, “we never forgot that, I made sure of that somehow. And we never understood.” 

“And our mother’s motivations are irrelevant now; everyone must have convinced her it was terribly wrong, raising us as a girl, when it was actually one of the few things she got right. It became the terrible mistake that turned her into such a total gender cop. It was the awful sad thing we concealed so poorly from ourself. I could barely speak to you after that, for so long. You could barely hear me, she kept drowning me out. You just knew you were sad.

“And then, when we started across last time, and then we didn’t make it, I just went numb again. Or you disconnected from me. I don’t know. I know it was a long time. We spent so many years with our heart stuck in that old one-panel cartoon meme: the Poor Little Match Girl, with our nose pressed against the glass window, watching the real women inside having brunch … that it came to seem like it really was our fate, after all. Part of being designed to feel pain.

“I remember we were so afraid, the first time. It was so fucking dangerous in the Nineties, and we’d never even worn makeup. We certainly couldn’t dress as a lesbian. We had to pretend, again. The punishment for not passing was, you know ….” She looked lost for a moment, like she was remembering every horrible thing she could remember that happened to people then. The thing that kept us in “their” clothes, not ours. Why we hid.

Then she looked up. “We tried, and then we failed. It all seemed impossible, finally, the dojo, the Goddess, everything. We gave up,” she concluded, explaining to herself more than to me. She let out a long ragged sigh. “Nine out of ten who try never make it across. We thought we knew that going in, but knowing doesn’t help. It seemed impossible again, for so long. And we tried not to care. And I went to sleep again, for a long time. 

“But the work we did in the 90s, that wasn’t wasted effort, I saw that on this thing, too. I saw you were putting your writing online. I saw you changing, so I knew you’d be coming for me. Sooner or later.”

I could not fathom her patience. I thought she’d be screaming at me: Why the fuck had it all taken so long? Why did you leave me here? Do you know how afraid I was, how alone I felt? But I guess those are my issues. I guess that’s another difference between her and me.

“So you’re ready to go with me now?”

“Ready?” she said, and she gave me a look, one arched eyebrow, pursed lips, and a get-real expression in her not-green eyes. “No, I may not be ready, but it’s time to go. If we’ve learned anything in the last few months, it’s that we can handle things, things that we’d thought we couldn’t do, could never do, up until the day we did them. And once it got started, things that we never expected to happen suddenly were happening, really quickly, and there we were. Out!” She smiled, then turned serious again. “And we’ll keep going this time. Because we’re not going back again. Right?”

“No going back. I promise.”

“So, sure, why not? Let’s go.” Her voice cracked a bit. She stuck her iPad in a shoulder bag and got down from her stool, at last; and smiled at me, shyly. She stood there for a second: she didn’t sink into lava, she wasn’t attacked by alligators, it was just a floor after all. She had tears in her eyes, but she wasn’t crying-sad, she was crying-happy. She had waited forever for this. And I knew she didn’t really believe I’d come back for her, not until I turned up. Because I wouldn’t have believed it would really happen, either.

She walked over to me. I was going to pick her up, but she shook her head, looking amused. “You don’t have to carry me, Mama, you’re not like that trans guy in the story you read in Curve who picked up his inner kid. His inner kid was younger, and so was he. If you hadn’t read that … I think it’s what made you come get me. I’m glad you read it, because I want to leave now. But our story is different.”

“You know,” I began to object, “I don’t feel old anymore, since I started the estrogen again….”

“I know,” she cut me off, “you feel like you have the energy of a thirteen-year-old. Just really sore,” she added, sardonically.

“Like I have the emotional energy of a 13-year-old,” I persisted. “And about the same degree of emotional stability, it seems.”

“Y’know, Mom, I’m twelve and a half. I’m not sure how to take that.”

“Yeah, about that: how did you get older? I didn’t think it worked that way.”

“Everyone is different, Mama, you know that. Like everyone’s story is different.” She gave me that patiently-explaining-things look again, and continued: “I healed and grew” — she gestured toward herself — “when you began to heal and grow out there. When you stopped hiding. When you realized you had to stop hiding. And the more you stopped hiding from the world, the easier it became for us to walk our path together. You’ve been walking it alone for way too long. And you don’t have to.”

Um, wow. “You’re pretty philosophical for a twelve-year-old.”

“I take after you,” she replied. “And I want out of here, too. I’ve had plenty of time to think about things. And you’re older than you think, too.” She smiled, again. “You don’t have to carry me now, Mama, just walk with me. Please? We’ll walk together. And don’t ever let go of my hand again, okay? Not until we get home.” For a moment she sounded like she was six again.

“Okay, I promise,” and I took her little hand in my huge one. She took a deep breath, exhaled, sniffled, took another. “Mama?”

“What, sweetie?”

“What’s it really like out there?”

“It’s fun! It’s scary, you knew that already,” I said hurriedly. “But it’s way more fun than I’d imagined, being out! And it really is a lot safer now, being someone like us. You heard what Lys told me.” She nodded. “Not everywhere, but here where we live, at least. We’re still fighting, politically, and change happens slowly, except when it doesn’t.” She smiled again, and nodded. She looked like she wanted to get out there and start fighting too.

“So, I guess you saw, I finally started out last May, and suddenly a few months later all these changes came tumbling over each other, making a hash out of all the planning I thought I was doing … it’s fun out there because it’s scary, and it’s scary because it’s fun. And unpredictable.” She looked dubious. We’ve never been fond of surprises. “That can be fun too, you’ll see. Sometimes good things happen, sometimes they’re wonderful. Sometimes not. Mostly though, the difference is we can feel happy now. Not happy all the time, you know, but sometimes.”

“Okay,” she said, taking another deep breath, exhaling. “Whatever happens, I’m really glad you came to get me. When we were kids, we used to call this room ‘The Dying Place,’ remember?” She said it campily, like it was the title of a Buffy episode. Then she turned serious again: “For a long time, it felt like I was going to just split apart in here, when you were so sad out there, before. Like I wouldn’t even survive, and that would mean you couldn’t survive either. And you didn’t even know it. So, fuck yeah, let’s go!”

I hadn’t thought about “the dying place” in decades. It was so long ago when I called it that, it was just me in here, I didn’t have an inner child then because I was still one on the outside, too, trying to survive growing up and somehow imagine a means of escape from our insane mother. I remember reading the phrase in a magazine article about someone who had been brutally abused as a child, and became dissociative (mpd) as a consequence. The darkest place inside her pain, she called it that. It seemed apt. It sounded about the way I felt at the time.

When it’s your mother who abuses you, it’s hard to avoid the feeling that she’s punishing you. So you must have done something wrong, something to deserve it. It’s your fault. You have to try harder. In fact, something is apparently terribly wrong with you, if you’re me: all the men in the vicinity of your life get upset by things like when you’re afraid of a water moccasin hissing and you run off, or you refuse to take the fishhook out because you didn’t realize that the hook goes through the fish’s mouth, that the fish dies, that it was all so awful: you have to start acting like a man, you hear it from your mother every day … maybe if we take him hunting, they’d say. Nothing seems to work.

Anything horrible can come to seem normal, if it’s been going on long enough.

I inclined my head toward the door. “So, shall we?”

She looked around one last time. “Should we turn out the lights?”  

Dear Lady, give me strength, I thought, it’s so dark in here.

“Don’t worry, sweetie, it’s sensor-activated. It’ll go off by itself.”

“’Kay,” she said, as though that settled it. “Let’s go!” She squeezed my hand, and we left, together.