#technically true but also kind of stretching :D

[sarah-dessen-things]

May 21, 2023: The Wrap wrote about book adaptations and the authors who appear in them.

The list isn’t in any particular order and Jenny Han and Judy Blume alongside Sarah Dessen.

[foggyfanfic]

Mirabel's Super Secret Adventure

Chapter Preview: When Mirabel walked over, she realized the big hole was the same one from the walls, and Camilo was gesturing at the ladder he’d watched her carry through the house.

“Well, uh aren’t you glad you won’t be taking the blame for this?” she asked him sheepishly.

Prologue Prev Next Masterlist

13. A New Foundation

After Mirabel and Abuela emerged from the river, they rested on the rocks to allow their shoes and skirts to dry. Mirabel found herself dozing against the rock, yet another cat nap to get her through the next couple hours. When she woke she thought longingly of her bed, then remembered it was gone.

Meanwhile, Tío Bruno and Abuela had been having a hushed conversation, Mirabel only got snips and pieces of it but from what she heard they were talking about their relationship.

“Has it really been so long since I told you I was proud of you?”

“N-not since my and Leandra’s wedding.”

“Ah, well. I am very proud of you for marrying her, that’s true. D-don’t get me wrong, I liked Alberto but-.”

“You knew about Alberto?!”

“Brunito, queirida, I am your mother,” Abuela huffed, “of course I knew. I also noticed when the relationship stopped making you happy.”

“Ay, sí. He uh, he thought that if I could just be, I don’t know, a little more normal, the villagers would see me the way he did,” Tío Bruno snorted, “and us being in our twenties, he uh, didn’t communicate that well.”

“Ay, sí, I should have figured,” Abuela chuckled, “well, you and Leandra have certainly benefited from the extra couple of years you had before you started dating. I liked Alberto, but I like how happy you are with Leandra more.”

“Not to mention the fact that me marrying Leandra means you get more grandkids,” he said wryly.

“Bruno, you and Alberto could have adopted just as easily as you and Leandra have.”

There was a pause, then Bruno said, “Huh, for some reason I never considered that.”

“Would it have made a difference if you had?”

“I… don’t think so?” Without opening her eyes she knew he was shrugging, “T-Technically, Alberto was the one who ended it. Uh, turns out, towards the end there, I was the only person willing to let him treat me the way he was. He, he apologized and tried telling me none of it was my fault.”

“And you didn’t believe him?”

Tío Bruno didn’t give a verbal response, but he must have shaken his head or shrugged again.

“Ay, mijo. I am so sorry I’ve let you bear the blame for so much for all these years,” Abuela sighed, voice cracking, “you-, it is as I said, you remind me so much of your father. Under all of your nervous ticks, there is a brave, kind man, one who is stronger than many realize. It has always felt-, I have always felt-. At some point I forgot that just because you can bear so many burdens doesn’t mean I should allow you to.”

There was a long pause, Tío Bruno’s breaths were as shaky as they were loud. Mirabel had dozed back off before he’d marshaled his thoughts into words.

When next she woke her skirt was dry and the sun was noticeably lower in the sky, she yawned and stretched. Tío Bruno saw her with her eyes open and gave her a gentle smile, before tapping Abuela on the shoulder.

“Looks like she’s awake, we should get headed back,” he said, voice hushed.

Abuela sighed, nodding faintly but not making any move to leave the riverside. She was staring back out at the river, no doubt thinking once more of Abuelo.

“I should have come here sooner,” she whispered, when she finally turned away, “I should have talked about him more.”

“Mama, you were in pain,” Tío Bruno said, gently taking her arm, “y-you’ve been through something terrible, I don’t think ‘should’ enters into the equation. N-not to mention the mountains around Encanto were pr-pretty tall.”

“I would agree with you if I hadn’t allowed my grief to spill over to the rest of the family,” she argued, but allowed herself to be pulled from the river.

“Myeh, you’re not the only responsible adult in the house,” Tío Bruno shrugged, “we should have said something. E-especially Leandra and I, we uh, we’ve been sorta aware of the cracks for a long time.”

“So I gathered,” Abuela muttered, giving him a look, “I take it lying about the vision isn’t the only thing you have done in order to…”

She trailed off, as Tío Bruno held out a hand to help Mirabel to her feet. The silent part of that sentence, the part she was trying not to say was “in order to protect the family from me”, and Mirabel was happy to let it stay silent.

“Um, well, no. B-but we can talk about all that later.”

Abuela sighed, but agreed.

The walk back to Encanto was quiet, and a little awkward. Mirabel spent it wondering what would happen now. Obviously, they needed to build a new house, but what about after. The miracle was gone, what would happen to the Madrigals without it?

Money probably wouldn’t be a big issue, her Papa could still act as a town accountant/treasurer, Camilo and Gabriel could still help the town with childcare, Tío Félix still owned a partial stake in the mill, Tía Leandra still made soap, and Mirabel's Mama was still the best cook in town. The best cook, who happened to have enough medical knowledge to assist the town doctor or act as a spare midwife whenever needed.

Not to mention, Octavia still knew loads about architecture, Isabela was apparently an expert on plants, and Luisa might not have supernatural strength, but she was still a strong and able worker. Mirabel herself had already started planning how much she could sell her embroidery for.

So, they still had skills they could trade. They’d be fine in that regard, at least.

Once they made a new house.

Mirabel watched the crack between the mountains pass around them and tried to imagine this new life. She was used to Abuela spearheading the family, but when she looked over at her Abuela now, somehow she thought things might have to change going forward. So how would they keep everything organized without-.

Mirabel looked again at her Abuela. Had she been miserable this entire time? Or happy but living in constant fear of losing that happiness? Had she felt alone, all these years?

The thought made her want to cry again. So, she turned her mind's eye back to the invisible to-do list in her head.

They would need to come up with a new way to stay organized, something that didn’t involve Abuela being the primary, and sometimes sole, decision maker. And they needed to start taking better care of each other. No more letting Luisa overwork herself, no more indulging Gabriel’s overprotective habits without thinking about what they meant, no more ignoring the cracks.

Mirabel took a deep breath, they needed to change almost everything, and it seemed such a daunting task.

But when she got home and her mother ran over to scoop her into her arms, she felt a little bit better about it all. They had already started, hadn’t they? It was more a matter of keeping the progress going more than anything else.

Things seemed even more manageable when Mirabel looked over and found Dolores hand in hand with Mariano, talking to Octavia and the town architect.

“Juli, Pepa,” Abuela all but whispered, “may I speak with you? Over here, with your brother?”

Questioning glances were exchanged, but her Má and Tía Pepa followed Abuela and Tío Bruno over to a shady clump of trees where some rubble formed a convenient bench. Mirabel watched them for a few seconds, then realized she should give them privacy and turned to the remains of Casita.

Most of her family were milling about, picking through the rubble for anything they could recover. She made eye contact with Camilo, who was standing over a big hole in the ground. He gestured at something in the hole, and raised an eyebrow at her.

When Mirabel walked over, she realized the big hole was the same one from the walls, and he was gesturing at the ladder he’d watched her carry through the house.

“Well, uh aren’t you glad you won’t be taking the blame for this?” she asked him sheepishly.

He snorted, “I’d be even gladder if we still had a house.”

Mirabel winced, “Yeah. This is… this is exactly what I was trying to prevent.”

“Right, you promised you would explain everything to me once it wasn’t possible for me to take the blame,” he gestured at her, “so talk.”

With a sigh, Mirabel launched into the abridged version of the story, “I overheard Tío Bruno and Tía Leandra talking about the cracks, and asked Casita to show me where they were, turns out there was a secret passage in our walls so I-.”

“Time out,” he made a T with his hands, “there was a what now in our walls?”

“Secret passage, like a hallway.”

“What?” his face screwed up in confusion, “Why was there a secret-. How?! How did it get there? How long has it been there?”

“I don’t know, didn’t really seem important at the time.”

“Seriously?! You found an entire secret hallway and you didn’t think to ask why it was there?”

“Camilo, do you want to know what happened or do you want to keep talking about the secret hallway?”

“Well, I kinda wanna keep talking about the secret hallway,” he said honestly, “but since you apparently can’t tell me anything about that, go ahead and tell me about our house falling apart.”

Mirabel rolled her eyes, “Ok, so there was an entire secret passage in our walls, and like three quarters of the way through it there was this giant hole. Which is where the ladder comes in.”

“So you could get into the giant hole?”

“Sí, once I crossed-.”

“Where’d the giant hole come from?”

“I don’t know, it’s probably a sinkhole.”

“Is that why our house collapsed?”

“Honestly, that was what I thought was happening at first,” Mirabel admitted, “but by the time I got past the hole I’d already seen some of the cracks appear then close up by themselves, so I knew it was probably magic.”

“Ok, so, you climb into the hole. Then what?”

“Then I climbed out the other side and kept going, until I saw the cracks Tío Bruno had been talking about. By the way, Tío Bruno is really good at spackling things, which is good because, uh yeah,” Mirabel tacked on, then said, “So! Once I saw the cracks I started investigating, thank you for distracting Gabe by the way.”

“You’re welcome,” he shrugged it off.

“First I tried Luisa, watched cracks appear and disappear depending on how stressed she was-.”

“So, Luisa broke our house?”

“No, hold on, I’ll get there. Then I talked to Dolores because I figured she had to know something, right? But she was being all cryptic about it and told me not to worry about it.”

“She told you not to worry about our house being riddled with magic cracks?”

“Well, she actually said to let Tío Bruno worry about it for as long as I could. But sí.”

“Weird.”

“Right?! Then I went looking for Isabela, because I’d seen the cracks appear around her too.”

“So, Isabela and Luisa broke our house?”

“No! Sort of. But it’s more complicated than that. I found out Isabela didn’t want to marry Mariano and tried convincing her to not throw her life away. She was being totally stupid though, so it didn’t work. I ran into Amada, and she told me to go to the kitchen, so I went to the kitchen and talked to your Má and realized how not good for her it is that she constantly has to control her emotions.”

“Did my Má break our house?” he sounded genuinely worried by the possibility.

“We all broke the house Camilo, that’s where this story is going, it was all of us. Ok?”

“Hold on, I didn’t break the house-.”

“The cracks happened whenever one of us was in pain, so I mean, unless you’ve never felt a negative emotion in your life…”

“Oh please, I was having a great day until this happened,” he said, then, with a shit eating grin, “sorry you guys all got issues, but I’m different.”

Mirabel rolled her eyes, crossing her arms and giving him a flat expression. 

He grinned wider, “So, you figured out the cracks were a manifestation of your many, many issues, then what?”

“You were pretty much there for the rest of the big stuff,” she shrugged, “all the drama with Dolores and Isabela came to a head at dinner. Tío Bruno told me he was just guessing about why I didn’t get a gift, we started checking on-.”

“Mirabel?!” he gaped at her, gesturing emphatically, then putting a hand on his forehead and voice full of dismay, said, “You are a horrible story teller!”

“What? Hey, I think I’m doing-.”

He gripped her shoulders, “Tío Bruno was just guessing?”

“Oh, that, yeah. The actual vision was pretty vague, so he and Tía Leandra went with the theory they thought would protect me the most.”

“What? Are you okay?!”

Mirabel looked around at the rubble of their now deceased sentient house, turned back to Camilo and said, “Been better.”

Camilo also glanced around, “Point taken.”

She couldn’t help but crack a small smile, “Thank you though.”

“Heh, yeah, whatever,” he tried to shrug it off, pulling his hands back.

Mirabel let him, “So yeah, um, that happened. Then we checked on everybody and eventually the only person left to check on was Abuela. S-so I did, or well, I tried to. It uh, it didn’t go well.”

“Did… Abuela break our house?”

She sighed, “It’s a little more complicated than that, but uh, yeah, sort of. Turns out… she’s spent years-. We’ve all been-. Sort of, yeah. I uh, I helped.”

He frowned, but didn’t say anything, which was good, because Mirabel needed time to work through what she was going to say next.

“The entire foundation of our miracle was the most painful moment of her life,” she eventually got out, “it was only a matter of time before something like this happened.”

Camilo slowly nodded, then asked, “What now?”

“We rebuild our house,” Mirabel gestured over at Octavia and the architect, “and try to take better care of each other, including Abuela.”

He nodded, sighing, “I was sort of hoping you would say we all hold hands and pray real hard and then a new house will just, you know, poof.”

“Um, no, I’m pretty sure we’re actually going to have to build one,” she gave him a smile that was meant to be comforting, but felt more sheepish than anything else.

“Will the new house have a secret hallway, too?”

“Ay, forget about the secret hallway, will you?!”

“No. Seriously, had it been there the entire time?”

“I don’t know Camilo, I do not know.”

“Unfortunate,” he said with a huff, then something caught his eye and he was back to grinning, “Hey Gabe! Did you hear? Your issues broke our house?”

“Camilo,” Mirabel hissed, swatting his arm, then turned to yell to Gabriel, “It was all of our issues. Not just yours.”

She grimaced while Camilo snickered, that didn’t come out quite as reassuring as she had wanted it to.

Gabriel frowned at them and walked over so he could speak to them without yelling, “What are you talking about?”

Mirabel opened her mouth to tell the story again, then realized that their yelling had attracted the rest of the familia’s attention. She gulped, and glanced over at Abuela, who was returning with the triplets in tow. Abuela gave her a tight smile and a single nod, so Mirabel stood up a little straighter and explained everything from the beginning.

When she was done, she concluded the tale by saying, “We need a new foundation, we need to get better at talking to each other, and listening to each other. This didn’t happen because of a lack of love, it happened because we all kept our pain buried. We were so focused on trying to be what we thought the family needed, we forgot to be a family.”

“Myself especially,” Abuela jumped in, when Mirabel was done, “I owe each of you an apology, there is so much I haven’t said, so much fear that I passed onto you, so much I tried to bury that I should have shared. I wanted to protect you from the pain I have felt, and instead I hurt our family. For that I am sorry.”

“Ay, Mamá,” Julieta murmured, pulling her mother into a hug. It became the first of many, as soon as Julieta had released Abuela, she had wrapped Mirabel in a tight embrace, “and mija, I’m so proud of you.”

“Gracias Mamá,” she said, even as her cheeks burned.

Over her mother’s shoulder she could see the rest of the family exchanging quiet words, and a few hugs. She couldn’t hear most of what was said, but she did catch Dolores telling Isabela, “I should have told you, but I thought you were happy. I didn’t want to ruin that.”

“I should have told you,” Isabela countered.

Eventually, the quiet wave of conversation passed. For a long time, nobody said anything, they just stood in contemplative silence; then her Má asked Tía Leandra and Tío Félix to help her get dinner started.

The Madrigals gathered around the fire pit somebody had dug, each too tired or too caught up in their thoughts for any more conversation, but sticking together nonetheless.

AN: I know Mirabel was busy, but I feel like she was a little too chill about discovering all that stuff in the walls. Like, girl? You're not at least a little curious about how long that room has been there? Or the big ass hole? One of my favorite genres of Encanto fic is the rest of the family reacting to the discovery that Bruno has been living in the walls this entire time, so of course I had to ask myself how that sort of fic would change if he was using the secret passages but not living in them. The answer is it becomes kind of hilarious.

[brasideios]

[20 Question Fic Writer Tag]

tagged by @findusinaweek - Thank you my dear 🤍

How many works do you have on AO3? 16 atm

What is your AO3 word count? 451,021 words

What fandoms do you write for? Assassin's Creed Odyssey & Valhalla, Stardew Valley, Ancient History & Historical RPF, Thucydides' History of the Peloponnesian War (Yes, I insist this is a true fandom lol), and Hades game (though they aren't on AO3 atm). Oh, I also wrote a AC Syndicate fic ages ago which I still have somewhere.

What are your top five fics by kudos? Snatched Moments (ACV); The Warmth of Home (ACO); Another Turn Around the Wheel (Stardew); Unfinished Business (ACO); and The Gods Only Know (ACV).

Do you respond to comments? Why or why not? Absolutely. I know exactly how hard it can be to leave comments, and I think it's important to acknowledge that - from the single love heart to the genuinely long comments (like several paragraphs) - I want to show my appreciation. Also, I get loads of historical questions, and I'm always so excited to answer those.

What's the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending? Rising to the Surface, hands down... Though come to think of it, The Good Spartan is a close second.

What's the fic you wrote with the happiest ending? Most of them end well, but I think my current fic is going to be the most traditionally happily ever after... probably. If not, then Another Kind of Odyssey wins.

Do you get hate on fics? Not really - though I've had the ol' 'You owe me an ending, I read this far!' before.

Do you write smut? If so, what kind? Yeah, mlm mostly; but I don't think I'm particularly good at it, so the story really has to demand it for me to go there.

Do you write crossovers? What's the craziest one you've written? I mean, technically The Good Spartan is a Thucydides/Odyssey crossover, favouring Thucydides - but unless trying to make a game which is almost entirely historically inaccurate [affectionate] into something accurate is crazy... which yeah, now that I write that, I think it probably is :D

Have you ever had a fic stolen? Not that I know of.

Have you ever had a fic translated? No.

Have you ever cowritten a fic before? No - I have tried writing collaboratively in non-fic projects, but it's not for me.

What's your all-time favourite ship? I could not possibly choose one.

What's a WIP you'd like to finish but doubt you ever will? Crawling Kingsnake, my Hades game fic. I really like what I have so far, but my brain has moved on and I can't see myself getting back into that mindframe again.

What are your writing strengths? So just from what others have said of my writing, off the top of my head, I'm good at: conveying a lot of information clearly and succinctly; drawing out the signficance of small everyday moments; writing non-conformist characters and *waves a hand vaguely* the historical stuff.

What are your writing weaknesses? I have a penchant for interiority in my characters that I have to fight against, or there would be far too much thinking in every chapter. I use 'in a moment' so much I have to do a word search every time and remove a billion instances where it's not necessary; and I don't use contractions naturally, so editing is a lot of fixing that.

Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language for a fic? I mean, I'd do it if I could, but my language skills don't stretch that far. More broadly, I'm fine with it in other work if a translation is provided .

First fandom you wrote for? Assassin's Creed Odyssey technically, if we're talking knowing it was fanfic as I was writing it; though back when I was 6 I wrote a story heavily inspired by Gone with the Wind so... Gone with the Wind, I guess. (Or LOTR when I was in my teens...)

Favourite fic you've ever written? The Good Spartan and Shadow-Twin, maybe?

Tags with zero pressure @krankittoeleven (you knew it was coming lol) @ainulindaelynn @myriath @merelyafigment @softest-punk and anyone else who might want to jump in 🤍

[gaydri]

So many people seem to think a pound of feathers and a pound of steel weigh the same but this is not true and is the kind of shit you should have learned in primary and secondary schools.

Lets start with the basics.

Mass: It also tells you how much "stuff" is in it. Now by stuff I kind of mean atoms and molecules but different atoms and molecules do not weigh the same, so the amount of "stuff" is dependent on the thing we are talking about. It is also a measurement of inertia, which is an object resistance to acceleration (or deceleration). Units to measure mass include but are not limited grams, pounds, tons, kilograms, stones, etc.

Volume: How much room something takes up (3-d space) units include (cubic centimeters, cubic meters, liters, etc)

Density: Mass of an object per given unit of volume this can be found by dividing mass by the volume it occupies. (g/L which is a gram per liter, could also be gram per cubic centimeter,)

Gravity: Caused by mass, all mass exerts a gravitational pull. the more mass the more "gravity" it will have. Gravity is a constant pretty much every where on earth, it does decrease as you increase in altitude by it is negligible, even if you were to stand on top of mount Everest there isn't too much of a difference with the acceleration due to gravity being 9.77 m/s/s, so its negligible unless you are talking about extreme masses, but this difference is not important to the subject at hand

Velocity: Your displacement per unit of time(i.e. seconds)

Speed: Distance per unit of time (i.e. seconds)

Force: I am not talking about Star Wars force, I am talking about physics force. A vector, the product of mass and acceleration, and I mean it literally, multiply mass and acceleration and you get force. Now, gravity causes an acceleration so your "weight" is technically a force caused by the gravity of Earth which in free fall accelerates you by 9.8 m/s/s (9.8 meters per second per second), meaning you speed up by 9.8 meters per second every second. The unit for this is Newtons in Metric and pounds, the imperial units are fucking stupid when it comes to force cause there is stones, pounds (which is also what they use for mass), and slugs and some other shit, I am not going to use them)

Momentum: A product of mass and velocity, found by multiplying mass and velocity.

Now lets get into this, a kilogram of one this is going to have the exact same mass as a kilogram of another thing. Lets look at water and "air" for example. Mass is a measurement of how much stuff is in something and density tells you how much stuff is in something per unit of volume (so you could say how packed in the stuff is per unit of volume). Water is a lot more dense (meaning there is more stuff per given unit of volume, or it is more "concentrated") than air, so you will need less water in terms of volume to get a kilogram than you would air (we are talking about air at at sea level pressure).

Now since they have the same mass they will have the same weight, since gravity is essentially is a constant at any given altitude on Earth, the water and the air will have the same weight because they have the same mass and because gravity is the same. Therefore they would press down on the Earth with the same force as well. So lets go with a scenario of you are holding the objects. To make this example easier to understand lets do this. Lets say we have two boxes that are the same size with no mass, they also don't bend or stretch. Now lets say in one you put in the kilogram of water into it and in the other box you put the 1 kilogram of air into it. Now there is 1 kilogram of stuff air in once box and 1 kilogram of water in another. So now you go to pick up the boxes, they both have 1 kg (kilogram) of mass inside them. That means the will weigh (force caused by gravity) of about 9.8 Newtons which is about 2.2 pounds for those who use imperial units.

Now just fucking substitute steel/lead for water and feather for air and you get the same fucking result.

When idiots talk about which is heavier they talk about which would hurt more if it fells on you. A block or ball of fucking metal versus a clump of fucking feather that not held together in any way and thus would not act as one unit/mass and then turn into a bunch of fucking individual feathers than do not weight 1 pound individually. Now, because of the shape and density of the fucking feather there is a shit ton of drag force (air resistance) acting on those individual feather prevent them from accelerating as fast. If you were to hold them they would exert the same amount of force/weight on hands. If they were to drop on your head they would exert the same force because they have the same mass and gravity is the same everywhere on Earth (for practical purposes). The difference being that if steel/lead fall on your head, it would be a smaller object because it is denser and because it is a single object held incredibly tightly together due to inter-atomic/molecular forces. Compare that to a bundle of feathers not held together, all of a sudden you drop this bundle then all of a sudden they split up because they are a bunch of fucking individual feather that are not held together. They will end up separating then all of a sudden you are hit by a bunch of individual feathers that do not weigh a pound that are hitting you, they are not even accelerating at normal gravitational acceleration because of the drag force (air resistance) acting on. Of course the pound of steel is going to hit fucking harder, its one object that is not being affected by drag (air resistance) to the same degree as the bunch of individual feathers not being held together (much, much less than the feathers). Even if the feathers were held together it still wouldn't hit harder because it is less dense and thus needs more volume to get to 1 pound, because it takes up more space there is more area for friction/drag (air resistance) to act upon thus it won't accelerate as fast in free fall. Just because one would hit hard in that situation does not mean one weighs more than the other because like I said before it is a product of mass and gravity and because gravity is constant and in this situation they have the same as well they will weigh the same. 1 kilogram of steel multiplied by the acceleration due to gravity gives you 9.8 Newtons (2.2 pounds). 1 kilogram of feathers multiplied by the acceleration due to gravity gives you 9.8 Newtons (2.2 pounds). Therefore, a pound (or kilogram in my example) of feather WEIGHS AND HAS THE SAME MASS as a pound (kilogram in my examples) of steel/lead.

TL;DR - If you don't understand that pound of feathers and a pound of steel weigh the same there is no TLDR, you need to read this whole thing. I could make this longer but if you don't understand the basic concept of mass and weight then me making this longer will not do you any good.

Anyone who does not understand this is a fucking idiot and needs to go back to middle school or high school where you should have learned this shit, if you school never taught you this then everyone in charge of the decision making when it comes to curriculum should be replaced with someone who isn't fucking stupid.

Im not reading all that

[jeromepowell]

So many people seem to think a pound of feathers and a pound of steel weigh the same but this is not true and is the kind of shit you should have learned in primary and secondary schools.

Lets start with the basics.

Mass: It also tells you how much "stuff" is in it. Now by stuff I kind of mean atoms and molecules but different atoms and molecules do not weigh the same, so the amount of "stuff" is dependent on the thing we are talking about. It is also a measurement of inertia, which is an object resistance to acceleration (or deceleration). Units to measure mass include but are not limited grams, pounds, tons, kilograms, stones, etc.

Volume: How much room something takes up (3-d space) units include (cubic centimeters, cubic meters, liters, etc)

Density: Mass of an object per given unit of volume this can be found by dividing mass by the volume it occupies. (g/L which is a gram per liter, could also be gram per cubic centimeter,)

Gravity: Caused by mass, all mass exerts a gravitational pull. the more mass the more "gravity" it will have. Gravity is a constant pretty much every where on earth, it does decrease as you increase in altitude by it is negligible, even if you were to stand on top of mount Everest there isn't too much of a difference with the acceleration due to gravity being 9.77 m/s/s, so its negligible unless you are talking about extreme masses, but this difference is not important to the subject at hand

Velocity: Your displacement per unit of time(i.e. seconds)

Speed: Distance per unit of time (i.e. seconds)

Force: I am not talking about Star Wars force, I am talking about physics force. A vector, the product of mass and acceleration, and I mean it literally, multiply mass and acceleration and you get force. Now, gravity causes an acceleration so your "weight" is technically a force caused by the gravity of Earth which in free fall accelerates you by 9.8 m/s/s (9.8 meters per second per second), meaning you speed up by 9.8 meters per second every second. The unit for this is Newtons in Metric and pounds, the imperial units are fucking stupid when it comes to force cause there is stones, pounds (which is also what they use for mass), and slugs and some other shit, I am not going to use them)

Momentum: A product of mass and velocity, found by multiplying mass and velocity.

Now lets get into this, a kilogram of one this is going to have the exact same mass as a kilogram of another thing. Lets look at water and "air" for example. Mass is a measurement of how much stuff is in something and density tells you how much stuff is in something per unit of volume (so you could say how packed in the stuff is per unit of volume). Water is a lot more dense (meaning there is more stuff per given unit of volume, or it is more "concentrated") than air, so you will need less water in terms of volume to get a kilogram than you would air (we are talking about air at at sea level pressure).

Now since they have the same mass they will have the same weight, since gravity is essentially is a constant at any given altitude on Earth, the water and the air will have the same weight because they have the same mass and because gravity is the same. Therefore they would press down on the Earth with the same force as well. So lets go with a scenario of you are holding the objects. To make this example easier to understand lets do this. Lets say we have two boxes that are the same size with no mass, they also don't bend or stretch. Now lets say in one you put in the kilogram of water into it and in the other box you put the 1 kilogram of air into it. Now there is 1 kilogram of stuff air in once box and 1 kilogram of water in another. So now you go to pick up the boxes, they both have 1 kg (kilogram) of mass inside them. That means the will weigh (force caused by gravity) of about 9.8 Newtons which is about 2.2 pounds for those who use imperial units.

Now just fucking substitute steel/lead for water and feather for air and you get the same fucking result.

When idiots talk about which is heavier they talk about which would hurt more if it fells on you. A block or ball of fucking metal versus a clump of fucking feather that not held together in any way and thus would not act as one unit/mass and then turn into a bunch of fucking individual feathers than do not weight 1 pound individually. Now, because of the shape and density of the fucking feather there is a shit ton of drag force (air resistance) acting on those individual feather prevent them from accelerating as fast. If you were to hold them they would exert the same amount of force/weight on hands. If they were to drop on your head they would exert the same force because they have the same mass and gravity is the same everywhere on Earth (for practical purposes). The difference being that if steel/lead fall on your head, it would be a smaller object because it is denser and because it is a single object held incredibly tightly together due to inter-atomic/molecular forces. Compare that to a bundle of feathers not held together, all of a sudden you drop this bundle then all of a sudden they split up because they are a bunch of fucking individual feather that are not held together. They will end up separating then all of a sudden you are hit by a bunch of individual feathers that do not weigh a pound that are hitting you, they are not even accelerating at normal gravitational acceleration because of the drag force (air resistance) acting on. Of course the pound of steel is going to hit fucking harder, its one object that is not being affected by drag (air resistance) to the same degree as the bunch of individual feathers not being held together (much, much less than the feathers). Even if the feathers were held together it still wouldn't hit harder because it is less dense and thus needs more volume to get to 1 pound, because it takes up more space there is more area for friction/drag (air resistance) to act upon thus it won't accelerate as fast in free fall. Just because one would hit hard in that situation does not mean one weighs more than the other because like I said before it is a product of mass and gravity and because gravity is constant and in this situation they have the same as well they will weigh the same. 1 kilogram of steel multiplied by the acceleration due to gravity gives you 9.8 Newtons (2.2 pounds). 1 kilogram of feathers multiplied by the acceleration due to gravity gives you 9.8 Newtons (2.2 pounds). Therefore, a pound (or kilogram in my example) of feather WEIGHS AND HAS THE SAME MASS as a pound (kilogram in my examples) of steel/lead.

TL;DR - If you don't understand that pound of feathers and a pound of steel weigh the same there is no TLDR, you need to read this whole thing. I could make this longer but if you don't understand the basic concept of mass and weight then me making this longer will not do you any good.

Anyone who does not understand this is a fucking idiot and needs to go back to middle school or high school where you should have learned this shit, if you school never taught you this then everyone in charge of the decision making when it comes to curriculum should be replaced with someone who isn't fucking stupid.

Is this one of those newfangled copypastas? Why did you send this to me, Jerome Powell, Chairman of the Federal Reserve of the United States?

[beewolfwrites]

And When I am Formulated, Sprawling on a Pin - Chapter Fourteen: Half-Sick of Shadows

Hello again! This is instalment 14 of my Chishiya x OC/reader fic. You’ll also find it over here on AO3 too. 

Thanks for all the support so far, and all of the people who have gone through every chapter and liked them. It means so much to see that you’re enjoying this <3 

childlikeempress/mercipourleslivres - I have a feeling you’ll get this chapter title :D 

--------------------------------

By the time we made it back to the Beach, Kuina and I were too tired and overwhelmed to bother with the everlasting party. The teenage boy clung to my side, thanking me repeatedly for saving his life. I tried to tell him that there was no need, that anyone would have done the same, but I had to force the words out. It wasn’t true.

In this world, you’re supposed to look out for yourself.

He promised me he’d repay the favour, but I just shook my head and smiled, telling him to survive instead.

I retreated into my room for the rest of the night, and immediately hopped into the shower. The water swirled, washing away the remains of the pinstripe tent, the red water, yellow eyes and leathery skin.

Don’t focus on it. Don’t think about it.

The stained red scrunchie bobbed on the surface of the water as it spun towards the drain.

My legs collapsed beneath me. Sinking to the to the bottom of the shower, I finally wept.

------------------------------------------

The next morning, I awoke with a splitting headache. My eyes were pink from the night before, and my hands stung, irritated from the metal pull of the wire and the weight of the teenage boy. It was tempting to stay in bed and dream away the blood and guts of the Borderlands. But there was something I needed to do.

‘Don’t you want to thank Chishiya?’

Back then, Kuina’s words had been a lifeline, cutting through the fear.

Sitting up in bed, I took the copy of Wuthering Heights out of the bedside drawer, flicking through the pages. It was all in Japanese, meaning it was illegible to me. But there was something else; one of the page corners was turned over. Flipping to it, I found that a line of the text had been underlined in pen.

Did Chishiya do this?

It seemed unlikely, although he could have done it with the intention that I would translate it. It was impossible to tell, since he was such a closed book. But seeing the words acted as a reminder that I still needed to find him anyway.

Kicking back the covers, I got up and dressed, and while I still felt half-dead after the game, I somehow felt more confident approaching Chishiya. When I finally left my room, it was nearly noon, and I had a pretty good idea as to where he would be.

The hotel was mostly quiet as I slipped through the halls, following the same path Kuina had led me just days before. Having memorised every turn, I eventually came to the doors that opened up to the roof. A cold gust of air sent goosebumps across my skin, and rubbing my arms, I spied the hunched figure sitting, one leg bent, near the edge. Just seeing him alive and well was a huge relief.

He didn’t turn or react as I sat beside him. ‘I didn’t see you yesterday. How did your game go?’

There was silence at first, before he spoke, half-teasing. ‘So you’re speaking to me again? I see.’ When he realised the words had no effect on me, he added, ‘Eight of Diamonds – it was nothing.’

For him, it was nothing. Personally, I would have struggled with an Eight of Diamonds. Knowing myself, I’d second-guess every move. Chishiya didn’t elaborate on the game, or even speak at all.

‘Aren’t you going to ask about my game?’

He was idly watching the pool-goers splashing around and having fun, but his expression was apathetic. ‘I already know. Kuina told me everything.’ He glanced briefly at my reddened hands ‘Apparently you saved a boy. It was a stupid move.’

To someone like you, it would be.

‘I disagree. He lived because of it.’

‘And if he dies in his next game, then it was a waste of time,’ Chishiya berated. ‘It’s pointless to risk your life for a stranger.’

I spun around to face him fully, crossing my legs beneath me. ‘Okay,’ I challenged him. ‘What about if it was you down there? You’d want someone to save you.’

The question was shut down immediately. ‘That’s different. I wouldn’t be stupid enough to end up in that situation.’

I pouted. He wasn’t technically wrong. It was hard to picture Chishiya scared and hanging upside down on a tightrope. If anything, he wouldn’t hesitate to cross it. But he did get nervous. That much was clear from the Two of Spades game, when I’d felt his heart thudding as his arms tightened, pulling me into the darkness.

And now, as my eyes traced over his deadened expression and the thin hair that stirred in the breeze like spider’s silk, I couldn’t stop the question from slipping out. ‘And what if it was Kuina?’ I paused, whispering, ‘or me?’

Now I had his attention, as his lips twisted in that cruel, cruel smile that used to make me shudder. ‘Do you really want me to answer that question?’

No.

The answer was already clear, and for some unknown reason, it hurt.

I don’t want you to say it out loud.

I swallowed, instantly regretting bringing the subject up. ‘You were wrong, by the way... about what you said before.’ This prompted him to lift his brows in mock surprise. ‘You did end up in a similar situation. Both in the Tag game… and in the Two of Spades. Your injury… how is it?’

During our argument, it hadn’t been the right time to ask, but better late than never. I unconsciously reached for him, as if trying to make sure he was okay. However, Chishiya’s hand darted out, catching my fingers in a tight squeeze.

‘Don’t.’ His tone was icy, and it was the first time I’d seen him grow so cold.  

It hurt, seeing him so reluctant to let me in. But to him it was a moment of weakness, a reminder that he had lost control of a situation, even if only for a second.

‘At least tell me you’re okay.’

‘I’ve already told you it’s nothing.’ He clasped my fingers harder. ‘It shouldn’t matter to you anyway.’

I pulled myself free, rubbing my fingertips where they’d turned white and red. ‘That’s not true. I care, and that makes it relevant to me.’

For just a second, I thought I heard him begin to call me an idiot. But then he stopped. ‘You care too much about things that have nothing to do with you. You should focus on what’s in front of you.’ It was fleeting, the way his eyes washed over the bruises on my ankle.

I see.

It felt nice, knowing that in his own abrasive way, he was telling me to watch out. ‘You know what’s strange? Niragi hasn’t bothered me again. I thought he’d have killed me by now.’

Chishiya sighed. ‘That’d be too easy, and not as much fun.’

So Niragi did have his eye on me, but he was biding his time before coming after me again. It was a wonder he seemed to think that by attacking me, he’d be getting to Chishiya. Their rivalry had nothing to do with me, and Chishiya had all but confirmed moments ago that he wouldn’t even risk his life to save me in a game. Coming after me was pointless.

But that’s not what Niragi thinks.

‘It’s only a matter of time before he tries something again. You should watch your back,’ Chishiya warned. Then his face stretched into that familiar, all-knowing smile. ‘But you didn’t come up here to talk to me about Niragi.’

He already knew. He must’ve been waiting for me to track him down.

Mixed feelings swirled within me; embarrassment that he’d so easily predicted my behaviour, annoyance over the fact that he’d been smugly waiting, and something else I couldn’t identify.

Warmth, perhaps?

No, that wasn’t the right word.

‘I’m sorry.’ The words came out in a whisper. Grimacing, I cleared my throat and spoke up. ‘I want to thank you for the books, but I also want to apologise. Everything you said back then was true.’ The words were hard to admit, even to myself. ‘I’ve been living in a hole all my life and I got too used to it. And now the world seems terrifying. But if I survive here and make it back, I know that nothing my dad does will be scarier than these games. I’ll try and make my own freedom from now on. So, thank you… but also, I’m sorry.’

I waited for a response, some kind of acknowledgement. Anything. Instead, there was a rustle of clothes as he stood and began walking to the door. My heart froze over, and I blinked at the empty space beside me.

Did I say something wrong?

‘Antiseptic ointment and gauze,’ I heard him say, before the roof door swung shut.

I was alone, with nothing but the breeze and the distant laughter from the patio below. Looking down at my reddened hands, I smiled, finally understanding.

-----------------------------------------

It had been three days since our conversation on the rooftop, and I had been following Chishiya’s advice, using supplies I’d borrowed from the medical room to treat the irritated skin of my hands. The bruising around my cheek, neck and ankle had faded to a fainter yellowish brown. Kuina kept telling me that we’d find a way of getting back at Niragi for what he did, although I knew she wouldn’t want to do anything drastic without Chishiya’s input; she was just as nervous around Niragi as I was.

I spent all my time pouring over the Japanese language textbook and trying to translate the opening sections of The Metamorphosis. Twice, I’d picked up Wuthering Heights and attempted to make sense of the underlined words. But it was hopeless. There were complex kanji I didn’t know how to pronounce, meaning they were impossible to search in the dictionary I had, and Google was no-go in the Borderlands.

Closing the book yet again, I rubbed my temples, trying to ease the headache brewing after hours spent squinting at different characters.

I should just ask Chishiya.

I hadn’t seen him much since the rooftop, as he was always busy with executive work. And even now, with the late afternoon sun beating through the windows, there was no guarantee he’d be free to talk. But it was worth a shot.

That’s it, I’m going to go ask him.

Pulling on my hoodie, I picked up the copy of Wuthering Heights and left my room. The hallways were pretty quiet around this time, as people were either downstairs enjoying the party while they could, or tucked away in their rooms getting some last-minute sleep before the long evening ahead.

Heading down the hall, I tried to remember where Chishiya’s room was. I had only been there once, after Kuina had given me directions, but at the time I’d been nervous and distracted by the argument that ensued. The hotel was like a maze. No, not a maze – a labyrinth. And his room was hidden somewhere behind one of these identical doors.

I’ll know when I see it.

Rounding a corner… I immediately froze. At the end of the hall, Niragi and his thugs were dragging a man by his bloodied scruff. When the man thrashed wildly in their grip, they stopped to kick him in the ribs and jaw, sending speckles of blood up the wallpaper.

Niragi was a sight. The nail marks down his cheek had scabbed over, and beneath his right eye was a faint purple bruise from where I’d kicked him in the face.

My limbs stiffened in place. I couldn’t move.

And even when his eyes lifted, widening with fury as they locked onto me, I couldn’t move.

He began striding towards me, jaw clenched and hands readying his rifle.

Run, run, run…

As if struck by electricity, I bolted back the way I came, shoving past the occasional person I ran into. Niragi’s footfalls were close behind me. He was following fast, and I could hear his growls.

‘You fucking bitch, get back here!’

The words sounded faint and close at the same time. Everything was close but far away, and my legs had turned to rubber. I spied a familiar looking door and threw myself into it, panting hard as it closed behind me. Outside, Niragi’s footfalls grew closer and closer… then further and further away.

He was gone. At least for now. My relief was cut short when it became clear where I was.

Sitting on the bed with open first-aid kit, gauze held delicately in one hand, Chishiya was completely shirtless. His side was swathed in old bandages, spotted with red. And he was staring at me.  

‘Get out.’

[wilted3sunflowers]

characters made for @oznitus​ dorm, ling already knows Mara but now they also get to meet the new group on the block

They all hail from The Emerald Plains 

Mara Malice Species: human Inspired by: Madam Morrible  Height: 5′7″ Age: 21 Favorite Food: salt water taffy Hated Food: Corn [popcorn is the only corn allowed]  Fun Fact: Would have been part an important family but her father ran off with his “true love” in poverty instead of just marrying who he was arranged with. Mara doesn’t know this.  Unique Magic: The Fates Design She can set the goal and things will fall into place, if its further into the future or a very hard to accomplish goal it will take a lot of magic, and even saps magic from her a bit for each day as fate gets rolling into place like she wanted. so shes not seen doing a lot of magic, especially if she has plans going on behind the scenes. Most don’t know her unique magic. 

A teachers assistant that typically while helping grade and work on other things is stationed in Oznitus. Kind of like a baby sitter but not that Crowley would say that. She’s actually earned the nickname ‘mama’ from some more ornery students. As her first year being a teachers assistant she kind of wants to put the best example forward and typically will just say white lies.

“Oh no, Trien sir, i just passed those students in the library. Are you sure that it was them you saw? Come, let’s talk this out, i’d love to help you solve this mystery” taking his arm and leading him off meanwhile the students in question hiding under her desk or throughout the room just out of sight.  Actually has grown close friends with the main Oznitus trio, especially Mika who she talks a lot more casually with and interacting more with him like a best friend especially when off the clock so to say. Gets along well with Evett and Theo too.  Mika started a joke of telling the first years to call Mara and Evett ‘Mama’ and ‘Pops’ because they can be quite the more paternal of them trying to keep everyone in line and orderly 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Viridian Hunter Species: Human Inspired by: The gate keeper Height: 5′1″ Favorite Food: Filet Mignon Hated Food: Chocolate covered Cherries Year: 2nd Age: 18 Class: 2-D  Best Subject: Summoning Club: Light Music - he feels remiss they don’t actually practice their instruments much and a lot of it is just ‘socializing’  Fun Fact: Thinks women are amazing, it’s a common thought from the Emerald plains that the women are the more highly regarded ones. Typically better at magic than the others Though has that actually been put to the test? Where are those stats? How did they test the magic? Seems a bit of just another one of Viridian’s biases  Unique Magic: Lock and Key  He can make anything un-openable but also he can just as easily open anything he wishes with a magic formed skeleton key. He usually can’t open things enchanted though. he’s trying to see if he can though, he wants to see if he can eventually get to that level. 

Met Tsavorite while very young and actually was an orphan the family took in and while they technically adopted him it was very clear he was more of a live in friend because Tsavorite wanted him around. Playing a lot of dress up, playing fun games, telling Viridian to break some rules that were in place that usually would get Viridian so worried and wound up but bending to Tsavorites will to do as she asked and if he got caught Tsavorite would just coolly say “ I told him to.” and that was the end of the conversation. She has surprised him by saying this when he was caught once actually trying to sneak seconds in the middle of the night because he didn’t eat much that day from playing all day with Tsavorite. They sat there in the kitchen with Tsavorite eating with him after the staff made something fresh. It’s one of his most appreciated memories. 

He admires Tsavorite greatly and does anything she asks of him. To him Tsavorite can’t do wrong, he knows rules, he knows morallly that some of the things she does do....isn’t the best. But rules don’t apply to Tsavorite. He learned that one early on. 

He is more akin to a butler and handmaiden for Tsavorite, picking out outfits, getting them clean, making appointments, doing Tsavorites hair, he even bathes her as if she was a genuine princess that gets pampered. Though Berenice was the one to point out that was a bit ‘odd’ before Tsavorite hushed her and told her she could do it if she found it so ‘odd’ which had Berenice not saying another word on the matter. 

Viridian is slightly jealous of the fact Berenice seems to be the favorite, though he does sometimes wonder if it’s actual favoritism considering Berenice does get called ‘Little Kitten’ and petted often as if she was an actual pet and more closely scrutinized by Tsavorite if shes not groomed to the usual expectation and wearing what she told her to. Though he often shrugs this thought off to the back of his mind. After all he was Tsavorites doll first before Berenice came into the picture. Tsavorite cares about those close to her, even if she shows it in...odd ways. He’s sure of it. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Tsavorite Diona Proserpine Species: Human ( ? ) has some fae blood in her Inspired by: The Emerald City Height: 6′ 6″ Favorite Food: Green Apple slices with Caramel  Hated Food: Tapioca Pudding Year: 2nd Age: 19 Class: 2-E Best Subject: Magic Practice Club: Gargoyle research facility  Fun Fact: Doesn’t yet know how to genuinely interact with people on a personable level, even those closest to her don’t get the full her and her emotions she keeps locked tight. Kind of considers those closest to her more like pets or toys with appreciation but it feels there’s not actual thought of them as their own free willed people. She needs to work on this.  Unique Magic: Emerald Spires Creating dazzling green stone columns and working more and more each day to forming them into other shapes and see how far she can stretch them. She has successfully been able to make walls which, if you think about it, is just a horizontal column...kind of. 

Tsavorite Proserpine. A name that strikes fear into those of the Emerald Plains. Those who are smart enough to know who really runs the capital. Coming from a long family who’s said to even started the capital base of the Emerald Plains. Born with a Silver spoon in her mouth and treated more like royalty than just simply someone rich due to the power of both financials and magic prowess her and her family possesses. What Tsavorite wants, Tsavorite gets. 

She knows money and power get you everything and connections are how you strengthen keeping your station. She very much lives by the ‘Keep your enemies close’ rule but it should be no shock that Berenice and Viridian are the closest to her. While it may seem that she treats them as lackeys, those who actually have seen Tsavorite interacting with general working class staff and those who she’s not close to that Viridian and Berenice are obviously more favored by her with more ‘niceties’ given to them. 

Viridian is the one trusted fully to handle her appointments, her outfits, keeping everything organized and in place. He’s trusted enough that she knows he could never do anything of his free volition that would come at her. If something caused him to turn on her, she would no doubt know it was a fake or a spell that caused something like that to change 

Berenice she finds simply adorable, such a predator, such a beauty, Berenice has a lot of physical power but she’s just such a lap cat, its where she should be is what Tsavorite thinks of her. A powerful girl by her side, dressed looking cute how she likes. She thinks the meekness she can have is cute but finds her unique magic the most interesting aspect of her. Such contradictions in Berenice. It’s fun. She doesn’t fully trust Berenice though. Not yet. Not on Viridians level.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Berenice Kelly Lemongrass Species: Lion beast folk Inspired by: The cowardly lion Height: 5′10″ Favorite Food: Seared Ahi Tuna Hated Food: granola bars Year: 2nd Age: 19 Class: 2-B  Best Subject: Flying skills Club: Basketball Fun Fact: doesn’t originally hail from The Emerald Plains, her family moved there when she was 12  Unique Magic: Trapped Her magic inflicts psychological damage trapping people in their minds for a short period of time with fears and horrible memories coming back to eat at them. Rarely used longer than a few minutes, if used longer the victim will pass out, if used too long...they might not be the same person they were at the start. But she hasn’t used it that long and doesn’t know what might happen. 

The supposed Bodyguard of Lady Tsavorite and while she is strong she’s just...not cut out for being that intimidating or strong willed. Often more easily curling in on herself and doing whats told of her. Lady Tsavorite personally decided she’d be her ‘bodyguard’ even if her magic is more impressive than Berenice’s and can go on much longer using it than Berenice as well. Berenice does have genuine power and strength and does her best to keep it up. 

Lady Tsavorite typically calls Berenice pet names, but immediately shuts down others who try saying any pet name to Berenice. Her favorite to use is usually “Little Kitten”. It was Lady Tsavorite who chose how she gets her hair down and expressed to her to wear those cute bows and make up as well and what Lady Tsavorite says, goes. 

Berenice thinks Viridian is the favorite, Lady Tsavorite doesn’t snap at him for his outfits or make up but then again...he’s never out of proper attire or looking ‘sloppy’ or ‘messy’ but also she wonders just how close two people can be. She’d consider them the closest people two can be platonically really that it’s almost admirable but she can’t feel at ease with Lady Tsavorites behaviors sometimes. While its nice having her head pat and ears scratched always needing to be dressed to her standards is kind of tiresome and does get her worried to being a rough around the edges as she can be sometimes as she likes to run and honestly she has a little bit of dramatic flair and has tried out for theatre. She’s quite good at getting into dramatic proses. 

[returnsandreturns]

im so sorry you're not feeling well, hope it clears up soon!! just wanted to pop by and say that I'm rereading hurry up now (it's only getting colder) for the xth time and it's SO GOOD, I'm headcanoning that they start dating after this and Foggy moves in within six months (for the heating ofc) and they're stupidly in love and happy for the rest of their lives together :D

OKAY, i wasn’t planning on writing anything more for this fic because i’m still spinning it off into a novel that’s, like, 100k of slow burn romance at this point but YES, they would be the EXACT opposite of that FOR SURE

Foggy wakes up to the feeling of Matt’s hand brushing hair away from his face, to Matt’s smile when he opens his eyes to see him hovering over him hesitantly.

“Hey,” Foggy says, smiling back.

“Hi,” Matt says. “Did I spoon you so you couldn’t leave last night?” 

“I really wasn’t considering meeting someone like you when I set the alarm to sneak out early,” Foggy says. “I would’ve spooned you first if you tried to make me leave.” 

“Someone like me?” Matt asks, completely adorably reaching for a compliment that Foggy was gonna give him regardless, both because it’s true and it’s just polite when someone puts you up for the night and also fucks you, like, exceptionally well. 

“Well, you surpassed my standards of having a working heater by a lot,” he says, reaching up to curve his hand around the back of Matt’s head to pull him down into a kiss, punctuating each word with another as he continues, “You’re smart. . .and funny. . .and you seem like a functional adult which is just. . .wow.” 

“Functional is generous but I’ll take it,” Matt says, kissing him one more time before he gets out of bed and finds his underwear. “Do you want breakfast?” 

“See? Functional! The only thing I have in my refrigerator is, like, one egg,” Foggy says, sitting up and stretching his arms out. “If that. Maybe half an egg--anyway, yes, I would love breakfast.”

“Grab a shower if you want,” Matt says, standing mostly naked in front of Foggy in the morning sunlight like some kind of ridiculous fantasy of a person. “I’ve got not only heat and food but also pretty decent water pressure.” 

“That’s perfect,” Foggy says, a little too earnestly. “Can I just move in?” 

Matt looks surprised for a second before he laughs, scrubbing a hand over his face. His hair is a mess and his face is a little red when he says, shrugging before he walks out of the room, “Play your cards right.”

“Are you implying I can continue trading sex for a roof over my head?” Foggy calls after him. 

“I think that’s technically prostitution!” Matt calls back. 

“Let’s not get bogged down in the legal details, Matt!” 

Matt’s laugh makes Foggy want to be the one making breakfast for him.

Maybe he can get a date out of this, at least.

[psychedelic-ink]

A/n: So this is my piece for @some-piece‘s AU challenge!! I know that I lost the challenge and that I’m super late but wanted to write this anyway :’D The idea has been stuck in my head for a while now xD  

My choice of characters was: Wiper, Shakky, Sabo, Donquixote Rocinante and Marco! I decided to do the Dragon AU since this idea immediately popped into my head. Enjoy!

Word Count: 1425 k

Genre: Fluff with a dash of Angst. 

TW: Blood (but a little bit)

Summary: You’re a dragon human hybrid that decided to move away from humans but one day a specific human threatens to change your mind. 

You sighed standing in the middle of your room. You called it a room but it was more so of a decorated cave. It was as far away from the city as possible. Your own little sanctuary. 

Throwing your head back you shut your eyes. Pain started to come over you. It started from your toes and reached to your head. You coughed, bits of smoke came from your lungs. You gritted your teeth as your soft skin turned hard and scaly. Hearing your clothes ripping, you felt yourself becoming bigger. Your scream echoed as you hunched over, two white wings spurting out from your back, blood trickled down from your back. Your teeth became long and sharp. Lastly a long tail sprouted from your coccyx. 

When the transformation was over the pain slowly subsided. You glanced around the room, groaning when you saw the amount of blood splattered on to the walls. Then your eyes shifted to the ceiling, a big round mirror hung over you. You stared at yourself intently, your eyes now blue with a catlike pupil, for a monster you truly looked beautiful. Your white scales shined under the moonlight that managed to sneak its way through the curtains. You fluttered your wings, sighing happily as you stretched them out. 

As you were relaxing, getting used to your new skin, you heard footsteps. Furrowing, you exited the room and followed the footsteps. You realized that there was a man at the entrance, you intently watched him, he seemed fairy normal at first gaze. Blue eyes, blond hair, white pants, green shirt and a sword dangling from his waist. But the necklace that had the royal family’s crest stated otherwise. 

With squinted eyes you followed his movements. He was whistling as he explored the cave, his steps screaming confidence. Immediately you knew what he was after, you. Many had come to your cave before, wanting to slay the dragon. They had all failed, you usually beat them up a bit and then send them home. It baffled you that so many wanted to kill you, especially because dragon human hybrids were a thing. 

“Hello?”

Your eyes widening, you jumped back, the cave trembled with your sudden movement bits of the ceiling falling down. The man stood right in front of you, a bright smile on his face as he waved at you in an overly friendly manner. 

“Sorry did I startle you?”

He didn’t seem that sorry to you since he still had a goofy smile on his face. You glared at the stranger before you, baring your teeth you aimed to scare him. He didn’t seem fazed by this. He lifted his hands in a sign of surrender and laughed. 

“Come on don’t be like that. I’m sorry.” 

What was wrong with him?  

“My name is Rocinante,” he said. “What’s yours?”

You tilted your head to the side. He...he knew that you couldn’t talk right? Your eyes widened when he slapped himself in the face.

“Oh right you can’t talk!,” he mimicked you and tilted his head to the side as well. “But you can understand me right?” 

You nodded. 

“I have to call you something…” he thought for a while before his face brightened up. “How about I call you Anemone?”

You stared at him with confusion. You noticed that he started to sweat. 

“You...you know because white Anemone’s are beautiful.” 

Your eyes widened, you were sure that if you were in your human state you would be red as a tomato. Rocinante was different to say the least. Wasn’t he here to kill you? Why was he calling you beautiful? 

“What with that look?” he chuckled. “Hasn’t anyone called you beautiful before?” 

Was this man into dragons?

“Wait, why did you look changed? Why are you looking at me as if I’m crazy?”

And that was how you met Rocinante, the second son of the Donquixote family. 

He would visit you pretty much every night. Rocinante would talk to you for hours, he would tell you about his family, his maniac older brother that loved to think he was the most important person of the kingdom, his fears and his dreams. You listened occasionally gasping in your dragon form. Still, you were confused as to why he came to you in the first place.. or atleast why he continued to come. He told you that his intention was to ease the people of the kingdom about the supposedly vicious dragon. 

Months past and your guilt grew inside of you. This man full heartedly believed that you were a dragon. He had no idea of your human half, that you hated humans therefore abandoned your human half pretty much completely. You only became human when he wasn’t around, that was the only way you could continue to understand human speech. You preferred to be away from humans but you couldn’t stop feeling a certain way towards Rocinante. He was kind, caring and an adorable doof. But if he saw the real you would he even be interested? He might feel disgusted that you were a hybrid? There was also the fact that you had been lying to him for months. 

You shook your head as your daunting thoughts swirled around. Maybe someday you would feel brave enough to tell him but today was not the day. 

“Who are you?”

You froze in your place. Your heart thumped loudly in your chest. Slowly, you turned to face him. He looked confused more than anything. In all honesty it was weird seeing him in your human state, he was taller than you which was something you weren’t used to. His eyes scanned you quickly, despite being an adorable doof he also had a sharp mind. He took a step back. 

“Anemone?” he asked, his voice trembling. 

“Well, technically my real name is y/n.”  

You wanted to laugh when you heard him yelp at the heating of your voice but your pleasure quickly faded when you saw the hurt in his eyes. 

“You...lied to me?” he took in a shaky breath. “You’re a hybrid?”

“I…” you swallowed the knot in your throat. He sounded so hurt that you would rather he cut you with the sword he carried instead. “I am.” 

“Why did you lie to me?”

You opened and closed your mouth. You didn’t know what to say, you took a step forward, reaching out to him, you pulled your hand back when you saw the look he gave you. His brows were furrowed and if looks could kill you would be dead right now. He turned his back to you, you never thought seeing a back would hurt so much.

“I can’t be around you right now Ane-y/n.” 

Your mouth agape you stared as he went further and further away from you. Your body trembled, your eyes started to sting. You couldn’t let him leave. Not like this. Not him thinking you were the worst thing to walk this earth. 

You lurched forward, wrapping your arms around his waist you buried your face into his back. He stumbled but managed not to fall. You were grateful that he stopped. Grateful that he was giving you a chance to explain. You didn’t notice the tears streaming down your face as you began to talk, your voice muffled by his back. 

“I’m so sorry. It was stupid of me to hide this. I shouldn’t have hid my true self from you.” your breath hitched. “I was afraid Rocinante. Afraid that you wouldn’t want to talk to me anymore.” 

You heard him sigh. He turned around and wrapped his arms around you, your face now effectively being buried into his chest. 

“I understand,” he muttered. “You don’t need to be afraid of me not talking to you. I assure you that such a thing won’t ever happen.” 

You peeled your face away from his chest and looked up at him. Rocinante was looking down at you, he couldn’t help but smile as he thought how adorable you looked. Placing a hand on your cheek he wiped away a tear. He raised an eyebrow when a blush started to form on your cheeks. 

“Let’s start from the beginning.” he said, taking you by the hand and pulling you deeper into the cave. “I want to learn everything about you.”

You let him guide into the cave, a sole thought lingered in your head as you followed him, a thought that maybe just maybe all humans weren’t so bad after all.

[whispsofwind]

After talking about it with @nicnacsnonsense, we decided to continue the conversation started here about Brother Francis and Nanny Ashtoreth in the book. Just for fun!

(For context, my thesis is that Francis and Ashtoreth were Aziraphale and Crowley in the book as well, while theirs is that they were originally separated characters who got cut for adaptation purposes. I think both interpretations are valid but it's a lot of fun to argue my point, and a good exercise in English writing too! Obviously this all also apply to Harrison and Cortese, I just didn't want to repeat all the names every time).

Nic, what you said in the last reblog makes a lot of sense, and raises a few points I hadn’t thought about, mainly that Crowley and Aziraphale watching over Warlock is technically a Heaven/Hell sanctioned activity, and therefore it does make sense that they would receive resources to do so. More sense than I thought originally. The fact that they make a big show about Shadwell could simply be because Shadwell is the one contact unrelated to Heaven and Hell. It all makes lots of sense, I admit.

However, it’s still not enough to change my mind, mostly because the inclusion of a middle man makes Aziraphale and Crowley basically superfluous to the narrative.

If Hell was always going to send people to educate Warlock, and Heaven could be so easily persuaded to send people of their own to educate Warlock, Aziraphale and Crowley’s plan becomes a bit too thin for my taste. Yes, it's true that the book is an ensemble novel where they play quite a small part, but if they were just making minor tweaks the the preexisting Heaven and Hell's school programs, they kind of end up doing almost nothing at all.

What I mean is, coordinating each other’s efforts just isn’t much, if Hell is already teaching Warlock Evil, and Heaven is teaching Warlock Good.

And yes, part of the novel pokes fun at how ineffectual Aziraphale and Crowley are, but it just seems so unfitting to me that their Big Plan to Save the World was basically ‘convince Heaven to send their people as well’.

I also wonder why would Heaven and Hell be so eager to actually give their field agents a whole team. Aziraphale and Crowley are already the designated agents on Earth and don’t really need underlings to do this particular job. And while Heaven and Hell both care a lot about obedience, delegating the education of the Antichrist to other people, even obedient people, still seems like a bad move for someone hoping to shape said Antichrist’s worldviews. Including a middle man (or, multiple middle men and a middle woman) seems to complicate things needlessly, and makes it much more risky, I think.

Not to mention, basing their entire plan on the reports and the obedience of subordinates seems a bit of a hazard, when both Aziraphale and Crowley know perfectly well how easy it is to trick your boss into believing you’re actually doing your job. They would have to control every move Ashtoreth and Francis do just to be sure everything is actually going according to the plan, which rather defeats the point of having underlings to begin with.

Plus, there’s the very real risk of Ashtoreth revealing that Heaven is interfering with the Antichrist’s upbringing. I am simply not convinced that Hell was aware of that: wouldn’t they object, even just out of principles? The Antichrist is their business, after all. And Ashtoreth is clearly very aware of Francis's presence. (Ok this one is a bit of a stretch but throwing it out there).

And finally, there's the very simple fact that inserting the Nanny, gardener and tutors to the narrative doesn't really add anything. Their narrative purpose can easily be filled by Aziraphale and Crowley, making these 4 characters completely superfluous. That just doesn't sit right with me, in a novel where even the Four Other Horsemen do have a narrative purpose, a comedic tool that then goes on to show how dangerous and inhuman the Horsepeople are.

The one narrative purpose Ashtoreth and Francis could fill is, I think, the Cold War metaphor, with the two Sides sending actual teams to help their agents out on an important work. But, at the same time, there's a strong sense that Aziraphale and Crowley are the equivalent of two field agents in a very remote, isolated outpost. Sending more people doesn't seem fitting to me, when you have a perfectly good agent already assigned to the case.

The text is very ambiguous though, I’m the first to admit that. I re read those pages, and some vocabulary seems... well, not purposely misleading, but very open to interpretation.

The verb ‘oversee’ when they talk about educating Warlock suggests an indirect role, but then they use the word ‘godfathers’, and godfathers are traditionally supposed to have a hands on approach (at least in the catholic rite, a godfather promises to actively help raise the child and take care of the religious upbringing).

Crowley watches Mary Poppins to prepare himself, which could suggest he was trying to get into the part... or maybe he just wanted to know how to consuel Nanny properly (then again, if Hell is sending another agent for this precise purpose, shouldn't she be better at this than Crowley?)

You have Aziraphale’s line about his “little team”, heavily implying there are different people involved... or maybe it was a tongue-in-check joke about how good an actor he is.

Then there's Rover (good puppy who helped me find the passage), whose simple presence kind of suggests Crowley can't be Ashtoreth, because Crowley doesn't have a Hellhound. But then again, Mary Poppins talks with a puppy, and Hell may have ordered Crowley to expose the Antichrist to a Hellhound in his most formative years.

So, I don't think there's any actual proof in the text. But maybe it’s just me overthinking the joke???

So yeah, to sum it up, I think that for me the deal breaker is the very idea of delegating the raising the Antichrist to others, when there's not a specific need to delegate it, and plenty of reasons not to :D

[lorei-writes]

Fairy Tales for Bedtime

Connected Souls

Kenshin x MC Fantasy AU (Fairy Tale-ish) Choose Your Own Ending*

Hello friends, I think I will be rather busy this week... But, I managed to write this story, even if it was a bit more rough than it usually is ^^” I hope you like it :D 

Content Warnings: none; possessiveness for one of the endings (Nightmares) 

*- Fluff or Angst

What set them aside were their dreams. Whether the thing that connected them was magic or some sort of physical web was uncertain. Many theories were forged to explain the phenomenon, none gaining more recognition than the other.  Perhaps it was to remain a mystery forevermore? Regardless, the truth stayed the same: their souls were grouped into pairs, the first – and every following – dream after the birth of one's soulmate showing their silhouette at the distance that separated them from each other.

Far, far away, in a land behind two mountains and three seas, there lived peculiar kind of humans. It was not in their appearance nor the language they spoke, both being nothing unexpected for the region of their origin. Their cities emerged, grew and developed as those of any other nation, blooming by rivers and lakes, building ports by the ocean, feeding off of meat and entirety of gifts of nature. What set them aside were their dreams.

Whether the thing that connected them was magic or some sort of physical web was uncertain. Many theories were forged to explain the phenomenon, none gaining more recognition than the other.  Perhaps it was to remain a mystery forevermore? Regardless, the truth stayed the same: their souls were grouped into pairs, the first – and every following – dream after the birth of one's soulmate showing their silhouette at the distance that separated them from each other. As such, people dreamt – and they waited, hoping for eternal happiness to reveal itself to them.

It was said that, at creation, a human was split in two, and only through finding their other half one could become whole again. Some would travel the land, searching for this particular person – some would wait in despair, never once getting the dream they so desired. She, however, was neither of the two, instead waiting patiently for the day to come, the person that was meant to be her salvation always appearing to be within the limits of her city. If it indeed was fate, they were meant to meet one day, weren't they?

She worked at her parents' bakery, living with them in the tiny loft above their business. Their days used to be peaceful, filled with simple labour, but also some sort of warm contentment and appreciation. Their shop becoming increasingly less busy, they struggled to make the ends meet. They thought their situation over and over again, finally coming up to a conclusion: they needed to change. As such, they cleared out two rooms and put beds in them, setting them aside to be rented to travellers passing through the city. Only one room remained for their family to live in – and yet, it was a happy life, her parents loving each other and her so very much. She was their only child, after all.

Her days used to be pleasant in their monotony: she would wake up before the sun rose, go downstairs, prepare the dough and return to her bed while it rested. She'd get up after her roughly three hour nap, her father and mother already having started to prepare pastries to be sold on that particular day, their bickering seemingly only ever stopping when they had to put goods in the oven to bake. If no particular orders were placed beforehand, she'd go to the front of the shop and sweep the floors once more before opening it, only then taking her spot in front of the counter. She'd daydream whenever she could, thinking of the person that was supposed to be her soulmate. Had they visited the bakery by any chance? Had she seen them? Had they spoken?

Would it even happen any day?

She couldn’t think of the future anymore, matters of finance trapping her in the present time. At first, she was not concerned – worse periods could happen to any place, she reasoned with herself. Prices did grow occasionally, less people travelled in certain years, people did have to adapt.

Yet, if all of that was true, why did it become so impossibly hard to get up in the morning?

She didn’t have to wake up early to prepare the dough – her father did, no cakes he’d usually make being sold anymore. She’d lay in bed as he exited the room, watching carefully her mother’s reaction.

They were happy, weren’t they?

She’d still take her post behind the counter, even if hardly anybody came around. She could take silence while being alone... Only when being alone. At least she had time to think.

Why didn’t she know what to do?

A tiny bell hung above the door frame rang, the sound initially not registering in her mind. She blinked away the confusion, a practised smile lighting up her face. “ Welcome!” she exclaimed, the man grunting something in reply. He walked over to where they would once display their cakes, seemingly absent-mindedly staring onto the empty counter. “ Excuse me? Sir?” she asked politely, looking over her shoulder to check whether she could count on help in case anything happened. “ Four bread rolls,” he spoke immediately, seemingly coming back to reality. He turned his head to look at her. As if he guessed her thoughts, he added: “ I have money to pay. Don’t worry.”

Coins hit the counter, the man taking his purchase with him to the back of the room. Turned upside-down chairs resting on top of few remaining tables, he lifted one of them up and put it on the floor, soon taking seat in it and beginning to unravel various bundles with food hidden inside. “ Sir...” she started, unsure as to what she should say. He wasn’t technically doing anything wrong. “ Please, miss, “ he replied instantly, the knife in his hand having stopped. “ There is no other place to eat in quiet in this city. Please.” What could she say? She only nodded.

The man came again the following day – and the day after that, and on one after this one as well, repeated over and over again until weeks since him first appearing there began to stretch into months. She watched him, never daring to do anything else, even if it felt awkward at times. Yet, it was enough to satisfy her curiosity, at least for the time being. Without realising it, she began to daydream again, thinking up stories of who he could be. Was he a nobleman? He certainly could be one, if she had to base her judgement on looks alone. She watched him cut bread into slices, always scolding herself for even wondering how could somebody be so graceful while doing something so simple, so ordinary and grey.

Yet, her curiosity only expanded. Seeing that hardly anybody came around just either way, she walked over from behind the counter. The small wooden doors closing behind her, she set two cups down in front of him, taking the other seat. “ Hmm?” he hummed, his brows knitting in confusion mixed with discontentment. “ You always drink from the flask… So I thought you wouldn’t mind using a cup and if you are already doing that, you may just as well share.” “ And why would I do that?” “ Because the next one is on me.” He obliged.

His name was Kenshin, as she learnt. That day, they talked a bit, the man appearing to be in a hurry. She was almost certain she scared him away, that he wouldn’t come ever again… And yet, he did, and she sat with him. They soon began to eat meals together, so many views they shared during them aligning perfectly.

However, there was something more important: he matched her dreams so, so well. Apparently, he had moved roughly around the time she saw the silhouette get closer to her, and was now living three streets away – and although she couldn’t see it quite clearly just yet, she was sure he was the one for her. More time flew by, butterflies rising inside of her stomach. The door to the bakery closed behind them, night streets glowing. Hand in hand, they strolled down the city alleys, searching for stars painted over the sky above them.

Thick coat of darkness enveloped the park. Alike to little children, they sneaked inside of it, his fingers tightening around hers as he put his other hand on the hilt of the sword at his hip. So happy she wasn’t thinking straight, she let him lead her, thoughts of her parents being worried about her having evaporated from her mind long ago. They sat under a tree, hidden from all curious eyes – and, ironically, their own as well. Trying to rid himself of the uneasiness, Kenshin spoke first: “ I have something to tell you.” “ I’m listening then.” “ I think you might be my soulmate,” he uttered, his hand moving to caress her cheek. “ I think it’s you I’ve seen in my dreams.” “ Let’s check,” she replied, unable to hold back the excitement.

His back resting against the tree trunk, he reached towards in an invitation. Nestled against his side, she closed her eyes, breathing in his scent as to calm herself.

Dreams

She finally fell asleep. Expecting nothing more than confirmation, she looked around, the dream beginning to form – and yet, it was not what she could ever expect.

Somewhere off, far in the distance, possibly further away than her home, even if just a little more, she saw a man. Had he left her? No, impossible, too little time had passed for him to walk up to there. She blinked – but how? She was so sure. They spoke for months, they understood each other so well. How was he not her other half?

Worse: whose half was he? Who could he belong to if not her?

Who could understand him better than her?

Jealously beginning to build up in her, she closed her eyes inside of the nightmarish vision, refusing to believe it.

Could she be happy with her soulmate if it wasn’t Kenshin? Could she be happy with Kenshin if he wasn’t her soulmate?

Would he even want to try?

She snapped out of her sleep, sitting straight abruptly as she sit up. Scared, she looked around, few lights of the dawn slowly diminishing the darkness. Her eyes having found his face, so ridden with regret and conflicted, the words got stuck in her throat.

No.

“ I’m sorry…” he spoke, his gaze drifting away. “ It seems we were mistaken. I didn’t mean to put you in this situation.” Was he saying what he was thinking? Was he forcing out the words he should be saying? “ No, I...” she tried, too stunned to form a coherent thought. “ I think we should go. I’ll walk you ho...” he stopped, her hand catching his and pulling him back down. “ Do you really mean all of this?” she cut him off. “ Do you really mean all of this and agree with the consequences?” He didn’t reply. “ Answer me, Kenshin.” Silence. “ Kenshin. Tell me what you really think.” His elbow propped on his knee, he hid his face inside of his free palm, his fingers tightening around hers once more. “ I can’t let it out.” “ Why?” she pushed him further. “ Because I may not be able to control it.” She got closer to him, staring at him intensely. “ Then don’t. Tell me, Kenshin.”

He did, his lips closing around hers in a kiss. Her hands digging into the fabric of his shirt, she pulled him closer, her body pressing against his. If words weren’t an option, she’d let him know a different way – thorough action, through holding him, through not running away. Their lungs beginning to beg for air, they pulled back. “ I don’t care about you not being my soulmate.” “ Being with them would make you...” “ Shh,” she pressed a finger to his lips, silencing him. “ I don’t want anybody else. I can make myself whole by myself. I’m not a part of anybody else, I’m me and only me – and with you, we can be two separate souls put together by choice. I don’t want it any other way.” She saw something glisten within his eyes – a ripple over the surface of the ocean, wind playing over the grassland? She couldn’t quite tell, his eyelids closing too fast for her to think of it longer. His arms reached to hug her, pulling her into his lap in one swift motion. Kenshin embraced her, hiding his head in the crook of her neck. His grip getting stronger and lighter in consecutive waves, she stroked his hair gently, humming into his ear. “ Yes,” he uttered finally.

She knew he was broken – and yet, she couldn’t dream of anything else.

Nightmare

It wasn’t Kenshin.

It wasn’t Kenshin.

It was not Kenshin.

Whoever she saw, they were too far away – and yet, having just woken up, she wasn’t quite sure as to what she should say. He wasn’t either, looking all so lost, so full of conflict and regret.

She said yes, they could try. But how was she supposed to forget?

Kenshin wasn’t hers.  He couldn’t make her whole again. Yet, she smiled, she continued to share her meals with him, to laugh and talk of the future, just like they did before the night that day. Perhaps she could make it work for her.

Was he searching for his soulmate? Did he really want her? How could he?

Did she want him?

No, no, no, it was all wrong to even begin to think in that way. However, she couldn’t stop it either – she embraced it, letting speculations swallow her.

Who was that woman he was looking at? That man? Was it them? He was hers! Kenshin was hers! Was he… Was he having second thoughts? Was he unsure of her? Was he...Missing something? Of course he was, he must have been, he must have missed all the things she didn’t have!

He must have searched for the other part of his soul. What else could he do? She was lacking! She was not enough! She could never be enough! If only she could, she’d cage him, her beautiful little bird…

No, no, no, it was all wrong to even begin to think that way!

She must have been searching for excuses, there was no other explanation – it was never him, it was her! He didn’t deserve somebody like her! And she… She wanted to be made whole. She waned for somebody to complete her, she wanted somebody she could complete! Yes! They were just not matched well!

But why did she want to keep him away from anybody else?

Why was Kenshin looking so suspiciously at her?

She did not have a cage. Not yet, at the very least.

Tag list: @datenoriko, @nad-zeta, @tsubaki3192, @jiyuu-chan, @missjudge-me, @ikemencrossedmyth, @plumpblueberry, @i-sleep-like-napoleon, @nimeryaa, @nuttytani, @thesirenwashere, @milas-imaginarium, @kisara-16, @yukas-clover, @alerialumina , @cheese-ception If you want to be tagged under my future works, let me know (any way works)! ^^ Also, if you have some preferences (for example: you’d rather not be tagged under some series, etc.), please, tell me.  If you don’t want to be tagged anymore - please, do not feel bad about it, just say so :)

[lingthusiasm]

Transcript Episode 44: Schwa, the most versatile English vowel

This is a transcript for Lingthusiasm Episode 44: Schwa, the most versatile English vowel. It’s been lightly edited for readability. Listen to the episode here or wherever you get your podcasts. Links to studies mentioned and further reading can be found on the Episode 44 show notes page.

[Music]

Lauren: Welcome to Lingthusiasm, a podcast that’s enthusiastic about linguistics! I’m Lauren Gawne.

Gretchen: I’m Gretchen McCulloch. Today, we’re getting enthusiastic about schwa and stress. First, we made our LingComm grant goal! We’re now giving out three grants to linguistics communication projects. The deadline for those applications is the 1st of June wherever you are, which is very soon, so make sure to get those applications in. That’s 2020, in case you’re listening from the future.

Lauren: We’re actually giving out four. We are giving out more than we originally planned, thanks to Claire Bowern funding a fourth LingComm grant on a project that looks at minoritised languages.

Gretchen: Those grant applications are due on June 1st, 2020. If you’re interested in applying for that, go to the website lingcomm.org. That’s “comm” with two Ms. You’ll see all the details there.

Lauren: If you’re listening to this deep in the future, you can go to lingcomm.org to see what great projects we funded.

Gretchen: Indeed you can.

Lauren: We now have new Lingthusiasm merch. We have little badges for you to wear through Redbubble, which is really exciting. They’re super cute.

Gretchen: Interesting! I think I would call those “pins” or maybe “buttons.” Whatever you call them, they are round circular things that you can pin on your clothes or backpacks that say fun linguistics things on them.

Lauren: Hm. I’d call them “button badges” as well.

Gretchen: I think “buttons” is kind of ambiguous because you don’t know if that’s a kind of button you use that you sew into your clothing or that you pin into your clothing. Maybe I like “pins”? Anyway, you can get these at lingthusiasm.com/merch along with more sticker designs and other Lingthusiasm merch like scarves with the International Phonetic Alphabet on them and other fun things like that.

Lauren: This month’s Patreon bonus episode is about numbers. We look at different counting systems, different number systems, and what using your fingers to count says about you. You can get access to this and 38 other bonus episodes at patreon.com/lingthusiasm.

[Music]

Gretchen: Okay. I have a puzzle for us.

Lauren: Awesome. I love a puzzle.

Gretchen: I’m gonna give you a few words, then you can tell me what they have in common. Our words are “about.”

Lauren: “About.”

Gretchen: “Broken.”

Lauren: “Broken.”

Gretchen: And “council.”

Lauren: “Council.”

Gretchen: Any thoughts for what they have in common?

Lauren: My immediate thought was I’m sad we don’t have Lingthusiasm think time music.

Gretchen: We do have theme music. Maybe we could play it a bit again.

Lauren: Hm. Ah. “About, broken, council” – they all start with different letters. They all have different letters in them. I’m assuming it’s not something about what they mean. They’re all two syllables long.

Gretchen: That’s true. I should give you a couple more examples that also have this thing in common to see if that helps.

Lauren: Okay.

Gretchen: We have “about, broken, council, potato,” and “support.”

Lauren: Oh, “potato.” The goes my two-syllable theory. Definitely nothing semantic about their meaning. They still all have completely different letters. You’ve actually made it harder with more data, Gretchen. Harder. That’s not useful.

Gretchen: The thing we wanna think about is not just what letters are in them but what sounds are in them.

Lauren: Right.

Gretchen: Is there any sound that all five of these words have in common?

Lauren: If I look at the spelling, they all have completely different vowels. They don’t even have the same vowels. But if I listen to how they’re spoken, think about “about, broken,” and “council,” [Gasp] “potato,” and “support,” they all have schwa.

Gretchen: They all have schwa, which I know is your favourite vowel. I have created this quiz just for you.

Lauren: Excellent. Thank you so much. They all have this /ə/ sound. It’s the coolest little letter that doesn’t exist as a written letter in English. It’s one of the coolest sounds in English. I love it. We’re doing a whole episode. It’s schwa time.

Gretchen: It’s schwa time. So, /əbɑʊt/ has that /ə/ in the first syllable. /bɹoʊkən/ has that /ə/ in the second syllable. /kɑʊnsəl/ has that /ə/ there – /pətɛɪtoʊ/ /səpoɹt/. There’s the /ə/ going all the way through. Here’s your second quiz. There’s a special thing about this particular set of five words. They all have schwa in them, but they all have something else that’s different about them.

Lauren: They’re all spelt with the actual different vowels. When I learnt that schwa was the sound that hid across all of the vowels – it doesn’t matter what one you write, if it’s in an unstressed syllable, and we’ll talk about that, it becomes a schwa – it explained to me why I find writing some words so difficult. If you don’t know how to spell “potato” and someone says /pətɛɪtoʊ/, that could be a P-A, that could be a P-U. It’s really hard to tell. But all of those are written with different vowels but sound the same in speech.

Gretchen: Yeah! You get words like /dɛfənɪtli/, which was one of these words that I didn’t know how to spell for the longest time. It would give me this red underline and I was like, “Why? This looks totally reasonable to me!” Then, I had to learn that the schwa – /dɛfənɪtli/ – the schwa there wasn’t spelled with an A, it was spelled with an I. You really can’t tell in English because every single vowel letter can represent this particular vowel sound, which is really frustrating when you’re a kid learning how to spell and yet is really cool when you’re a linguist because it’s one of these mysterious things that once you notice it, it’s everywhere. Yet, you can go your whole life without noticing it.

Lauren: We talked about all the vowels back in Episode 17 with vowel gymnastics and how, unlike consonants, vowels exist in this space and they all shift around like a multi-dimensional slide trombone. I guess that’s why we went with “gymnastics” as an analogy instead of “multi-dimensional trombones.”

Gretchen: I mean, if someone wants to design a multi-dimensional trombone for me, I’ll take it.

Lauren: We talked a teeny bit about schwa in that episode, but I have been wanting to do an episode all about schwa for ages. Here we are. Exciting times.

Gretchen: I think we should also mention what schwa looks like when it’s written in the International Phonetic Alphabet because it is part of your icon or your whole icon on various different websites, is it not?

Lauren: Yes. If you’ve ever seen the upside-down E looking thing that is the Superlinguo logo, that is the sch – so schwa is interesting in that it has a name. It also has, like all of the vowels, a representation in the International Phonetic Alphabet. That representation looks like an upside-down E. I’m not normally one of these people that has lots of opinions about fonts, but when it comes to how it’s written, it is not an upside-down E. This is something I’m very fussy about.

Gretchen: What is the difference between a schwa and an upside-down lowercase E? Please tell the class because I don’t know.

Lauren: If you turn it back up the other way, it looks really unproportioned. It’s like the top of the E is just way too high up. It looks all weirdly stretched.

Gretchen: So, the thicknesses of the letters and so on are weirdly stretched? Is that the thing?

Lauren: Yeah. The height of that little loopy bit of the E, if you turn it back the other way and try and use it as an E, looks a bit – it just makes it look like the E is gonna fall over. It’s really wobbly.

Gretchen: Okay. I feel like we need to point this out that you know this because you made schwa cookie cutters.

Lauren: Yes. I designed and 3-D printed a schwa cookie cutter a few years ago for Christmas gingerbread.

Gretchen: Then, a very helpful person on the internet said, “Couldn’t you just have used an E cookie cutter and turned the cookies upside-down?” and you were like, “No, no, no, because the thickness is different.”

Lauren: No. You absolutely cannot.

Gretchen: I feel like, historically speaking, it probably was an upside-down E though because I know a lot of the IPA symbols are upside-down versions or rotated versions of existing letters because that way they didn’t have to typeset new letters back in the metal printing days. But I believe you that, now that we have digital formats, schwa can have slightly different line thicknesses.

Lauren: Yes. It has its own representation. It has a name that not many other vowels have names. Technically, it’s a mid-central vowel, which just means it’s just in the centre. It’s not high. It’s not low. It’s not front. It’s not back. It’s not any of these dimensions that we talk about. It’s just the most /ə/ vowel that exists, which is why everything ends up going towards it when it’s not stressed because it’s the least exciting thing to do with your mouth. There’s actually a Wikipedia entry for the mid-central vowel – that /ə/ vowel – but schwa is so iconic there’s also a separate Wikipedia page just to talk about it as “schwa.” This is how strong its brand is.

Gretchen: Schwa’s brand is strong. Especially for the vowels, normally if we talk about vowels, we talk about /i/ or /ɛ/ or /ʊ/. You just say the name of the vowel – or sometimes people say the name of the symbol. Like, “small cap I” or –

Lauren: “Open O.”

Gretchen: “Open O” or something like this. Schwa has got this name that doesn’t refer to the shape of its symbol, it’s got its own name. The thing that’s always tormented me about the name “schwa” is, like, it’s a cool name. I will grant you this. But it doesn’t have schwa itself in the name.

Lauren: This is true and very disappointing.

Gretchen: Other symbols, like “theta” – /θɛɪtʌ/ has a theta in it. Great. We’re doing a great job. Good job, theta. Schwa does not have a schwa in it, and I find that kind of disappointing.

Lauren: Disappointing.

Gretchen: However, I looked up the history of the name “schwa.” Apparently, “schwa” used to have a schwa in it and then it stopped, which I now think is even better. The word “schwa” is from the Hebrew /ʃva/ for which the classical pronunciation was apparently /ʃəwa/.

Lauren: Ah, so before modern Hebrew, it had a schwa in it. It was like /ʃəwa/?

Gretchen: Exactly. /ʃwa/, /ʃəwa/ – maybe we should start calling it /ʃəwa/ because then it would have a /ʃəwa/ in it.

Lauren: Amazing. I think one of the things I like about the name of schwa is that the name itself encapsulates its history.

Gretchen: Yeah. Initially /ʃva/ or /ʃəwa/ is the name of one of the sets of dots that indicates this sound – because Hebrew writing, along with Arabic, are normally written with just the consonants. Then, if you want to indicate what the vowels are, you can add these extra little dots and bits above and below the consonants which, most of the time, aren’t used but are sometimes used for children or for contexts where you wanna be super precise. One of the names of these sets of dots indicating the vowels is /ʃəwa/, which was used to indicate either the /ə/ sound, the schwa sound itself, or /ɛɪ/, which in most languages the /ɛɪ/ sound is written with what English calls a letter E. If you think of the /ɛː/ as in /kæfɛɪ/ or /foɹtɛɪ/, those Es are that /ɛɪ/ sound. This kind of explains to me why it’s an upside-down E and not an upside-down literally any other vowel because every vowel letter can become a schwa sound because in this origin it could be used for either one of these two sounds.

Lauren: Nifty. Even though it’s pronounced /ʃva/ in modern Hebrew, the spelling of “schwa” itself is actually from the German spelling for it. I think this was one of the reasons I like the name “schwa” is that it encapsulates its history being borrowed from Hebrew orthography. Then, in the 19th Century, a lot of German linguists used it for that sound. That S-C-H spelling is the German spelling rather than any other language. Most satisfyingly, it was first used by a guy called Schmeller who has his name spelt S-C-H as well.

Gretchen: Johann Andreas Schmeller, who also used the schwa. Maybe that’s why he liked it.

Lauren: It became big in the 19th Century and definitely by the end of the 19th Century/Early 20th Century it was being used in texts to represent that sound.

Gretchen: Schwa is also very common in German. A lot of words that end in E in German have that E pronounced as a schwa. The name what in English would be Gabe – the German name /gaːbə/ – that /ə/ at the end is also a schwa.

Lauren: It definitely pops up in a lot of languages because it’s quite efficient.

Gretchen: You also get this optional schwa sound with Es at the end of the word in French. You can have /lɔ̃ːg/ but also /lɔ̃ːgə/, which is the word for “long.” There’s an E there that can be optionally pronounced. When it is pronounced, it’s pronounced kind of like schwa. This gets to something interesting because German and French have these schwas that are spelled with the letter E at the end of a lot of their words. English, instead, has these completely silent Es at the end of a lot of its words.

Lauren: The bane of all children learning to read in English – the silent E.

Gretchen: Oooh, “bane.” There’s an example! Words like “bane” and “fame” and “fine” and “bone” and “meme” – that one is not one that I learned when I was in Grade 4 spelling class. There’re all these words that end in silent E in English. The rule that I learned when I was in Grade 5 spelling class was the silent E makes the vowel say its own name.

Lauren: Oh, I like that. I never learnt that. That’s very handy, trying to get your head around the rules of reading English.

Gretchen: Yeah. It’s really nice.

Lauren: I’m really jealous that I never learnt that very efficient way of thinking about what E was doing.

Gretchen: But it’s a rule that’s kind of unsatisfying to me as a linguist now because why should adding an extra vowel to the end of the word change how the vowel in the middle of the word is being pronounced? That’s something that I found unsatisfying as a budding linguist. What sort of process is that?

Lauren: I am going – I mean, I know the answer. But if I had not known the answer, I would’ve taken a wild guess at it being retrospectively attempting to make sense of a historical process by pretending that there’s some kind of reason for it.

Gretchen: I mean, that’s not not what’s going on.

Lauren: The reason why they had to retrospectively come up with this rule is because the E used to be pronounced. It used to be pronounced as our friend schwa. They weren’t just one syllable words. The were two syllable words. It was /banə/ – “bane” – and /famə/ and /hamə/.

Gretchen: Oh, so the schwa actually used to be pronounced there. You’d get, instead of “fine,” like /fɪnə/. Instead of “fame,” /famə/. Instead of “home,” /hoʊmə/ or something like that.

Lauren: Yes. You had two syllables instead of one syllable that we have now for “fine,” “fame,” “home.” Those syllables started with a consonant, ended with a vowel. Then, over time, that schwa comes off at the end. It’s not as easy to always pronounce it – a bit like with the French example. In French at the moment, you can pronounce it, or you don’t have to. It’s starting to erode away at the end of a word. That was the process that happened in English.

Gretchen: Right. This is really interesting because in English and in other Germanic languages as well there’s a difference between the kinds of vowels that you can have in a syllable where there’s a consonant at the end and in a syllable where there isn’t. We have English words “hid” and “hide,” which have /ɪ/ and /ɑɪ/ in them both between H and D. But there’s a word like “hi,” but there isn’t a word in English /hɪ/ or /fɪ/ or /kɪ/ or /mɪ/ even though all of these can be perfectly good as long as there’s another consonant in them.

Lauren: This is where the rules of English syllables interact with the rules of what sounds can go into them. We used to have two syllables in words like “fine” and “fame,” and now we have one. That little E sits there to remind us as a written fossil even though we don’t pronounce it anymore.

Gretchen: It reminds us that the vowel that’s in this first syllable, which is now the only syllable, is the kind that can exist without a consonant after it. Because we can have a word like /hɑɪ/ and not a word like /hɪ/, if there’s that E at the end – you have /hɑɪd/ or something – then that reminds us – and by “us” I mean people who know this history, which is not most modern contemporary English speakers – that this is the kind of word that has the vowel that can exist in open syllables.

Lauren: For the rest of us, it’s just a handy way to spell properly.

Gretchen: There was a special reason why it was schwa that was so easily lost at the end of all of these words like “fine” and “home” and “hide.” That’s because schwa is what’s known as a “reduced vowel.” It’s physically produced for a shorter amount of time than a full vowel like /ɑɪ/ or /i/ or even /ɪ/.

Lauren: It’s what allows us to just sneak it in really quickly in syllables that we’re not really focusing on.

Gretchen: If we produce some syllables faster or quieter than other ones, those faster or quieter symbols tend to also have schwas.

Lauren: This is why schwa crops up in all of these words regardless of what vowel they’re spelt with. I’m pretty sure Lauren who really struggled to spell words because she couldn’t distinguish the vowel because it was being pronounced with schwa when she was learning to spell would’ve said, “Why don’t we just spell all the words with schwa and be done with it?” That wouldn’t be the most practical solution.

Gretchen: The problem is, if we respell English to be consistent and every time we say schwa we write schwa, it works in the short term because we have this transparent relationship between the sound and spelling, which is nice. But the annoying thing – this fact that you can write any English vowel letter for the sound schwa – is also a fact about the structure of English. There are all these words that are related to each other where we can see that relationship more clearly based on the spelling than we can sometimes with the pronunciation. The spelling can help us notice when words are related to each other. If we take up a word pair like “acid” and “acidity” –

Lauren: “Acid” and “acidity.” Well, that -ity bit on the end of “acid” that turns it into “acidity” also changes the vowel to a schwa.

Gretchen: Yeah. /æsɪd/ and /əsɪdəti/ – in the first one we have /æ/ as the first vowel and in the second one we have /ə/. Yet, it still seems pretty intuitive that these words are related to each other. It’s just that when we do have this -ity on the end, we pronounce the main word – instead of /æsɪd/, we say /əsɪd/.

Lauren: It would be inconvenient in the even medium turn to lose the relationship between, say, “courage” and “courageous” just because we have that -ous on the end of “courageous.”

Gretchen: It’s the same thing there. /kʌɹəd͡ʒ/ – the second syllable -age, there’s a schwa. But /kʌɹɛɪd͡ʒəs/ – now there’s a different vowel there. It’s just because we’ve added the -ous on the end. Yet, it’s nice that these two words that are very clearly related to each other still look the same.

Lauren: I guess it’s particularly true as well of those word pairs in English that only differ because of stress. Like /ˈɹɛˌkəɹd/ and /ˌɹəˈkoɹd/ – only different because of stress. Then, we’d be spelling them differently because each one has a schwa in the opposite place.

Gretchen: /ˈɹɛˌkəɹd/ – the schwa is in the /-əɹd/. /ˌɹəˈkoɹd/ – your schwa is in the /ɹə-/. You’d have to /ʃwap/ the – swap the [stutters] /ʃwaz/ – /ʃwap/ the /ʃwʌz/? Wow. That’s really hard to say. Swap the schwas. You wouldn’t know what vowel to recover from the syllable once you started stressing it. It’s the same thing with -ity and -ous. When you make “acid” into “acidity” and “courage” into “courageous,” instead of stressing the /æ/ and the /kəɹ/, you’re stressing the /ɪd/ and the /æd͡ʒ/, if you will.

Lauren: Adding the extra bit to the word shifts where the stress is.

Gretchen: It’s these unstressed syllables where schwa – not every unstressed syllable in English is a schwa, but a heck of a lot of them are.

Lauren: I think we’ll keep the spelling system as it is.

Gretchen: This was something that always used to come up for me back when I used to teach Intro to Linguistics. People would be trying to write things in the International Phonetic Alphabet for the very first time, so they’d go through each word, and they’d say it really slowly and carefully. What that would mean is that instead of saying /əsɪdəti/, they’d say something like /æsɪdɪti/. Okay. Or, instead of saying /kʌɹəd͡ʒ/, /kʌɹɛɪd͡ʒəs/, they’d have /kʌɹɛɪd͡ʒʌs/, /kʌɹɹɛd͡ʒ/.

Lauren: They’ve gone back to stressing every syllable, so the schwas evaporate.

Gretchen: Right! They’d write these words and they’d have no schwas in them all over the place. You’d have to say, “You can say this word like this -- if you’re really saying it slowly and carefully, and you were saying each syllable at once maybe to help someone spell it, you do have the full vowel there some level,” psychologically, for a lot of people, especially because of the spelling that’s influencing you to tell you it’s there. But in normal speech at a regular pace, most of the time you do say schwas a lot. It’s an interesting tension where many of our schwas actually represent a sound that we could recover if you say the word slowly and carefully enough, which is also a reason to keep the spelling where it is because there is some psychological reality to the non-schwa version as well.

Lauren: This discussion is very English-focused, I should say, because it’s something that English seems to do in particular in terms of having this kind of stress and this reducing to schwa on unstressed syllables. In fact, it’s a fairly prominent feature of the English accent. I imagine it’s something that gets transferred when English speakers are learning to speak other languages. It’s probably the closest I’ve come to having the ability to understand what the English accent in other languages must sound like to native speakers of those languages. They must just think that we’re failing to hear vowels all over the place. 

Gretchen: “Why do all of your vowels become the same vowel?” I think the inverse is also the case is that it’s one of the trickiest things for people who are learning English from a language that doesn’t do this, which is most of them, to do is be constantly trying to hit this vowel that I don’t even have. “Don’t you want your vowels to all be very distinct from each other?” Schwa or not schwa is this very English thing. The stress part about it being very important which syllable’s stressed and which part of which word is stressed – that’s also a very English thing. I find the most interesting place to notice how important stress is in English is when it comes to poetry.

Lauren: Sure. Because a lot of poetry relies on having certain numbers of syllables. Using stress is one way to explore the rhythm of a poem or a poetic construction.

Gretchen: Right. Some of the oldest English Mother Goose rhymes, nursery rhymes, have a consistent number of stressed bits per line rather than a consistent number of syllables. If you have something like “Hickory dickory dock, the mouse ran up the clock.” There’s three stress bits per line, but the number of syllables is quite different. The same thing with limericks in English, it’s not that there’s the same number of syllables in each line, it’s that the stress pattern is you have to have three stressed syllables, three stressed syllables, two stress, two stress, three stress. You can do that with a varying number of actual syllables in it. Something like, “There once was a man from Nantucket,” three stresses – “once,” “man,” “tuck.” Nine syllables. But “A tutor who tooted the flute,” also three stress – “tu,” “too,” “flute.” That’s eight syllables. And “A wonderful bird is the pelican,” ten syllables but still three stresses.

Lauren: It’s funny. My brain is so tuned to listening to the stress in these, I actually found it hard to count the syllables as you were going because I was so tuned into the limerick structure of stress.

Gretchen: A lot of very English-y poetry styles, as long as you get the stress right, you can really mess with the syllables because English pays a lot of attention to the stress. Whereas, in French, they don’t have this individual, unpredictable stress at the word level the way English does at all. There’s no /ˈɹɛˌkəɹd/ versus /ˌɹəˈkoɹd/ in French. Everything just gets a bit of stress at the end of the phrase or sentence or utterance or whatever you’re saying. You might say something like “Bonjour,” but you could also say, “Bonjour, comment ça va?” and you just stress the “jour” or the “va.” You don’t have to go anywhere in between and stress anything else. This means that French poetry can’t do this stress counting thing because there’s no stresses for them to count.

Lauren: Ah. Normally, I spend a lot of time going, “Oh, poor English speakers. They’re missing out.” But poor French speakers! They’re missing out on limericks.

Gretchen: I really don’t know how you do a limerick in French. I think you’d have to pick a number of syllables that is approximately equivalent and just do that.

Lauren: We talked about this schwa-syllable relationship being very English-focused for this episode, but it’s not the only language in which schwa appears and is a little bit easy to drop once you have reduced the pronunciation of schwa. French was one example you had. In Indo-Aryan languages as well – these are the languages of the same Into-European family as English but they’re over on the Indian subcontinent, so Hindi. I know about this because I had to learn Nepali. They have schwa as a vowel. A bit like the Hebrew writing system, for this vowel in particular, they just don’t write it down. You have to know when to pronounce this vowel by memorising. For some languages in the family it’s just gone altogether. It’s another example of how schwa in some languages can be really eroded. But not in all languages.

Gretchen: This is actually true in Miꞌkmaq as well, which is an Algonquian language spoken in Eastern Canada. In their writing system they use the apostrophe to represent the schwa sound, but the apostrophe is only added when the schwa is quote-unquote “unpredictable.” If you can predict the schwa, then you just put in the schwa where you know it’s supposed to go because as a speaker you say it. Of course, I am not very good – I don’t speak Miꞌkmaq so I’m not particularly good at predicting where it goes.

Lauren: Unpredictable schwa is almost cooler than unstressed schwa.

Gretchen: You can kind of predict it. Speakers actually know how to do it properly, but it’s not always represented in the writing system which is, I guess, something it has in common with Nepali.

Lauren: Schwa has so many cheeky personalities.

Gretchen: Schwa also shows up in English – speaking of being cheeky – as the vowel sound that people end up producing, if you’re an English speaker, when you’re trying not to make any vowel sound at all. If you’re trying to say the sound that the letter B makes, but you don’t wanna say B, you just wanna say that sound by itself, you probably end up with /bə/, which is still a vowel, it’s just schwa. Because that’s the least vowel you can make.

Lauren: Just adding a little bit so you can get that /bə/ across.

Gretchen: Yeah. It also shows up sometimes in people’s names. I knew somebody called /ksɛnjə/ and a lot of English speakers couldn’t pronounce that /ksə/, the KS, at the beginning of her name, so a lot of people ended up saying /kəsɛnjə/ by inserting a little schwa between because that was how they were able to keep both the K and the S.

Lauren: Very handy. Although, I like unpredictable schwa in Miꞌkmaq, one of the best things about schwa popping up in the particular context of unstressed syllables in English means that schwa is set up for being just a really great source of jokes because, when it comes to English, schwa is never stressed. I think that’s a life motto we can all get behind.

Gretchen: This means that there are people who’ve made t-shirts saying, “I want to be a schwa, it’s never stressed.”

Lauren: There’s a great photo from Sandy Abuadas who has made cookies for her students with schwa on them so that her students’ finals will be stressless.

Gretchen: I love it! It’s so good.

Lauren: It was very cute.

Gretchen: I think the stress part – in the technical sense, there’s this very tempting pun with the stress part in the vernacular sense.

Lauren: I think because it’s a sound that is everywhere and ubiquitous but, until you study linguistics, you don’t know that it is all around you. Not only is it around you, but it has its own symbol and it has its own name. I think that’s why it’s a classic linguist iconography to have fun with.

Gretchen: I hope that learning about schwa has not been stressful!

[Music]

Lauren: For more Lingthusiasm and links to all the things mentioned in this episode, go to lingthusiasm.com. You can listen to us on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, SoundCloud, or wherever else you get your podcasts. You can follow @Lingthusiasm on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and Tumblr. You can get IPA scarves, IPA ties, and other Lingthusiasm merch at lingthusiasm.com/merch. I tweet and blog as Superlinguo.

Gretchen: I can be found at @GretchenAMcC on Twitter, my blog is AllThingsLinguistic.com, and my book about internet language is called Because Internet. Have you listened to all the Lingthusiasm episodes and you wish there were more? You can get access to over 30 bonus episodes to listen to right now at patreon.com/lingthusiasm or follow the links from our website. Patrons also get access to our Discord chatroom to talk with other linguistics fans and other rewards. Recent bonus episodes include synaesthesia, numbers, teaching linguistics, and a robo-generated episode of Lingthusiasm. Can’t afford to pledge? That’s okay, too. We also really appreciate it if you could recommend Lingthusiasm to anyone who needs a little more linguistics in their life.

Lauren: Lingthusiasm is created and produced by Gretchen McCulloch and Lauren Gawne. Our senior producer is Claire Gawne, our editorial producer is Sarah Dopierala, and our music is “Ancient City” by The Triangles.

Gretchen: Stay lingthusiastic!

[Music]

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

[linskywords]

Updated Hockey Writing Guide

Thanks to everyone who offered corrections on the original post! Most of this is unchanged, but there are a few tweaks and additions. There are probably still things I’ve gotten wrong, so feel free to let me know.

For context, this was originally a response to an ask from someone who was writing a hockey story on short notice and didn’t have time to watch or read widely. Watching games and reading about players (or just reading fic about them) are still the best ways to learn things, especially since this doesn’t touch on the details of particular teams. But hopefully it will be helpful to some of you!

The schedule:

The hockey season starts in early October. It goes until early April. Training camp is mid-September, and then there are a few weeks of preseason games before the season starts, where everyone doesn’t play every game; the teams are trying to get a look at prospects and see how players gel, and longtime vets may not play. Prospect camp or development camp is July-ish, but you don’t go to that if you’re a returning player.

Players don’t really get a break during the year except for the All-Star or Olympic breaks, if they happen. In the last year or two (I think?) each team has started getting one bye week of five days off per year. This year it looks like they’re all overlapping with the All-Star break, which sucks for the players chosen for that game. Other than that they might get a day off at a time but not usually much more than that – maybe a few days at Christmas, depending on the game schedule.

There’s a game roughly every other day, but it’s not quite as regular as that. I usually write with the Wikipedia or hockey-reference.com page open for that team’s season. I tend to assume the team has practice or some kind of skate pretty much every day, which may or may not be accurate for any given team. There’s also media stuff and team events, so true days off are rare.

Players take naps in the afternoon before a game. It’s an important sports performance thing.

Half the games will be at home and half will be on the road. Some teams tend to fly home late at night after their last game on a road trip, and others choose to fly back the next day.

Sometimes road trips are pretty long, like if they’re going to play a bunch of teams far away. Some teams have an annual long road trip when some other group is using their home arena (e.g. the Blackhawks used to have an annual circus trip in November). They fly on private flights and will take a bus to and from the hotel and the rink.

Playoffs start a few days after the regular season wraps up. 16 teams qualify, based on their number of wins (2 points per win, 1 point per overtime loss, 0 points per loss in regulation). Non-qualifying teams are usually mathematically eliminated in late March or early April, depending on how badly they’ve done that year. There are four rounds of playoffs: two rounds within their conference, then conference finals, then Stanley Cup finals. Each round is the best of seven games and stops after one team has won four.

Teams play other teams in their division most often, then teams within the other division in their conference, then teams in the other conference. Divisions and conferences are organized geographically, so this makes sense for ease of travel.

In the off-season, players rest up, train, see the people they don’t get to during the year, and play a lot of golf (they’re jocks, but they’re prohibited from playing dangerous sports by the terms of their contracts, so golf is one of their few refuges). Sometimes they’ll try to bulk up because it’s hard to keep weight on during the season. They usually take at least something of a break from training right when the season ends, and they won’t start skating again until partway through the summer. A lot of them go to special training camps or work with professional trainers.

Worlds happens during the Stanley Cup playoffs, so players who aren’t in the playoffs, or who get knocked out early, will go represent their countries. Junior Worlds is around Christmastime. There’s sometimes a World Cup of Hockey, which is in theory every four years but has been irregular. It happened in 2016, but the 2020 tournament was cancelled. When it does happen, it’s in September, just prior to the start of the season.

The game:

If a player earns a point, that means they’ve gotten a goal or an assist. An assist is when they passed to someone who scored (a primary assist) or passed to someone who passed to someone who scored (a secondary assist). Goals are better than assists but both are good, and both are worth a point in terms of player stats.

A point per game average is very good. If a player’s at a point per game, he’ll be very happy. Your top players probably do a little better than that. Of course, this is an average; it’s very rare to score in every game, and players have point streaks and also stretches where they’re held scoreless. There’s a LOT of randomness in hockey.

Shots on goal is another good stat: how many times did a player have a scoring opportunity where the goalie denied him?

You get three forwards, two D-men (defensemen), and one goalie on the ice at a given time. The forwards are organized into four lines of three: one winger on each side and a forward. The D-men are organized into three D-pairings. Defensemen will usually play for more minutes per game than forwards because of this. Your top line (of forwards) will play close to or just over 20 minutes per game. Your bottom line might play more like 10. The top D-pairing might be more like 25 minutes or even higher.

Play starts with a faceoff, where one forward, usually the center, faces off against a forward from the opposing team. The ref drops the puck, and the two players in the faceoff both try to knock it back toward their own players. The one who succeeds wins the faceoff. Sometimes a player will move toward the puck before it’s legal to do so, and the ref will throw them out of the playoff circle and one of the other forwards will have to take the faceoff.

There are a bunch of penalties you can get for stuff like illegal checks, high sticking, holding, tripping, hooking, delay of game (e.g. if the ref thinks you deliberately knocked the puck out of play). If you commit a penalty, you go into the penalty box and your team is on the penalty kill for two minutes, meaning they’re down a player. The other team is on the power play. If the team on the power play scores, the power play is over and the offending player is released from the penalty box early. If the team on the penalty kill scores, it’s called a shorthanded goal, and the power play continues. How often a team scores on the power play is a stat people talk about – sometimes teams have stretches where their power play is terrible, and they never manage to convert (score).

The two-minute penalties mentioned above are called minor penalties. You can get a five-minute major for fighting, or you can get thrown out of the game or suspended for multiple games for really bad stuff.

There are three main parts of a hockey rink (there are probably technically more, but eh): each team’s offensive zone, where the opposing goal is located, and the neutral zone between them. You can’t take the puck into the offensive zone if there’s another player from your team already there; if you do, it’s offsides, and there’s a stoppage of play and a faceoff in the neutral zone. That means you can’t pass to someone deep in the offensive zone. Because of that, sometimes when players enter they dump the puck, meaning they shoot it deep into the offensive zone even though there’s no one there to receive it. They might do this if they need to buy a little bit of time for a shift change.

They might also try to buy time for a shift change by shooting the puck deep into the offensive zone from behind the center line, but it will not work, because this is called icing, and results in a stoppage of play. The team responsible is NOT allowed to have a shift change, and there’s a faceoff in their own defensive zone. You can get some really long shifts from this. (The exception is when you’re on the penalty kill, when you are allowed to ice the puck.)

Shifts are usually about a minute long. When players aren’t playing, they’re on the bench. When it’s their turn to play, they go over the boards.

If a player gets the puck and has no members of the opposing team between him and the goal, it’s called a breakaway.

If two players have the puck and are facing one member of the opposition, it’s called a two-on-one.

There are three twenty-minute periods divided by two fifteen-minute intermissions. If at the end of the game, play is tied, they go directly to one five-minute overtime period, which for the past few years has been three-on-three (three players plus a goalie, usually two forwards and a D-man) and is very exciting. If no one scores in overtime they go to a shootout, where the players take turns shooting on the opposing goalies. Overtime rules are different in playoffs, where I believe they keep playing regular twenty-minute periods until someone scores.

If one team is down by a lot at the end of the third period, they’ll often pull the goalie so they can have another forward on the ice without going over their six-player limit. If the other team scores while there’s no goalie, it’s called an empty-netter.

Players wear a ton of pads but still get a lot of bruising. Which can be fun for writers. 😆

The team and the players:

There are up to twenty-three players on a team at a time. Twenty can dress for a given game, which includes the goalie and the backup goalie.

There’s usually a captain and two or three assistant captains (A’s). They have general leadership responsibilities among the players. The captain wears a C on his jersey and the A’s wear an A.

If a player gets injured, he might be put on IR and someone would get called up in his place from the minors (the AHL, or American Hockey League). There’s been a particular focus on concussions in recent years, since a lot of players have had major problems with them. There’s a concussion protocol players have to go through if one is suspected. Players still, unfortunately, lie about their symptoms to try to play through concussions sometimes.

The NHL has a CBA (collective bargaining agreement) with the NHLPA (the NHL Players Association) that determines a lot of player treatment, salary, etc. When a given CBA runs out and the NHL and players can’t agree on terms, you get a lockout, like the 2004-2005 lockout that lasted the whole season and the 2012-13 lockout that shortened it.

There’s a cap to how much salary a team can pay out to its players in a year. This can get very complicated so I’m not even going to try.

When players are first signed, they go on a three-year ELC (entry-level contract) which is capped at I want to say $895K per year, but I don’t think that includes bonuses. Again, this is complicated stuff and I’m not even going to attempt the details. Players on ELCs aren’t guaranteed their own hotel rooms, so you get road roommates. Good times for us fic writers! After their ELC runs out, they’ll negotiate a more lucrative contract with their team; there are also some limited ways in which they can choose to go to a different team. Later in their career they’ll become free agents and can choose which team to sign with.

Players get drafted at 18 or so, or older in rare circumstances. Draft picks are determined by a lottery that’s weighted by how badly your team did this year. Again, you can look up the math on this – it’s a limited number of teams that have a shot at a first overall pick. The draft happens in a bunch of rounds where each team gets a pick, but sometimes teams trade their picks in advance as part of complicated trade deals. The first round of the draft is televised and the players go up onstage and shake their new GM’s hand and get a jersey.

Players often come up through Major Juniors, which is the CHL (Canadian Hockey League, though a lot of the teams are in the U.S.). The CHL has different divisions: the OHL, the WHL, and the QMJHL. Players get paid and are considered professional, so they become ineligible for top-tier college hockey in the U.S. There are scholarships offered to CHL players at Canadian universities; I don’t know the details of that. While they’re playing Juniors they often live far away from their families with billet (host) families. Junior teams are limited in how many players they can have who are over 18.

Other places players might come from: American colleges; private prep schools or even public school systems; the U.S. NTDP (National Team Development Program); or many places overseas.

Most draftees don’t start playing for their NHL team right away, if they ever do. They might stay in Juniors for a year or two, or play for the A (the AHL) once they’re old enough, or go to college first.

NHL players in their rookie year often billet with an older player or sometimes even front office staff. Partly this is because they don’t want to invest in long-term housing until they get their housing letter, which is the team saying that they plan to keep them around. Partly it’s because they’re only technically not children anymore.

Players will each have an agent who negotiates contracts and does other stuff for them.

The teams each have a head coach and a bunch of other coaches, a lot of them specialized. I don’t have a lot of detail about this. There’s also a front-office staff, headed by a General Manager, who reports to the owner(s). The GM makes staffing decisions as well as draft and trade decisions.

Teams usually have an official arena where they play home games and their front office has their actual offices, and they’ll also have a practice facility which may be theirs or may be something local that they rent.

There are a bunch of awards players can get: the Art Ross for the most points in a season; the Hart for MVP; the Conn-Smythe for MVP of the playoffs; the Calder for best rookie. (There are a bunch more that you can look up.) These are given out at the NHL Awards in June. And of course what everyone wants to win is the Stanley Cup. If your team wins, you get a specially designed cup ring with your name and number on it (possibly everyone in the front office does, too??), and you get to spend a day with the Cup during that off-season. Players usually throw a big party for all their family and friends.

Players get nicknames and this is super fun! If you’re writing about existing players, they probably have nicknames already, but you can also make up hockey nicknames (like if you’re writing about obscure players, or making the players up) by taking the whole or partial last name and added -y (or -ie) or -er. Sometimes just -s. Sometimes it’s the first name. And sometimes they get more creative, like Soupy for someone with the last name Campbell. There is much potential here.

Other general stuff:

These boys are kind of dumb in general and specifically about emotions. It’s one of my favorite things about writing them, honestly. It also means you can go as bro-y as you want with the language.

The NHL is pretty deeply homophobic. Its official position is not homophobic, and there’s an organization called You Can Play that’s fighting to eradicate homophobia, but there are no out players, which speaks for itself. It’s pretty much like all major male American sports in that way. The homophobia is something I really enjoy exploring in some of my stories and in other stories just elide entirely if I feel like imagining a better world. You definitely have flexibility there.

Watching is definitely helpful but also I didn’t watch a hockey game until at least two stories in, soooo you can get away with a lot by just reading fic. :)

Reading fic is especially helpful because honestly the stuff I’ve laid out here doesn’t even touch on the details of a particular player’s life or a team’s traditions and history and dynamics. You can Google some of that, but the prior research done by other fans is going to be so helpful.

On the plus side, if you don’t know much about how something works, you don’t have to go into a lot of detail about it. I’ve written some stories where I’ve gone into a bunch of game details and others where you wouldn’t even know they played hockey if it weren’t for their spending a lot of time changing next to other men. Feel free to stick to the parts you know.

Another thing you’ll get from fic, which I’m not even going to go into here, is the plethora of tropes that are popular in hockey fandom. Or fandom in general, of course – you can always import new tropes, or make them up from whole cloth. AO3 is your oyster.

Again, please let me know if there’s anything I should correct, and feel free to make additions of your own. Happy hockeying, everyone!

[multifics-canary]

Marinette's New Shield ch. 2

Ch.1

A/n: guys, thank you so much for your interest in my first posted miraculous story!!! I do have others that I play around with(literally wrote one while at work) and might decide to post those in some near future. This is a little longer than the first one. And I might make a little chapter series. I don't own miraculous ladybug!! And please dont steal this :D

°·°·°·°·°·°·°

Plans are simple, especially if you do it accordingly. Lila's plan was easy to see through. Make a few little lies about your life to get people's attention, shed a few tears to get what you want, make sure no one stands in your way.

Things seemed to have backfired with Marinette, so Lila made sure to spin those lies towards Marinette. Little bullying antics and maybe one or two threats. Ruby doesn't like amateurs, especially ones like her who take advantage of others. It's also the class's fault for believing things that could be checked online.

In the few weeks she's been here, she knew everyone's name and other information. One surrounding factor was that Marinette has helped all of them and has gotten nothing in return. Genuinely, that's what a good person does. But in Marinette's case, they take advantage of her kindness. And since Lila arrived, they've ignored all the good things she did for them and thought the young designer was a jealous bitch.

Be confident in yourself. She told the designer before leaving that day. There's a complexity to making plans. The crucial thing is that it doesn't backfire. Somehow, Marinette trusted Ruby to make things right. And Ruby would make sure to rightfully deserve that trust.

Alya's friendship with Marinette was more or less normal at first, a friend trying to encourage the other to be more confident and stand for herself. It worked wonders. Then Alya starts accusing Marinette of not having facts when she should have them first. She's the journalist, not Marinette. And yet, believed those lies a pretty Italian was spilling. Hypocrite.

They would regret doing losing Marinette. Ruby would make sure of it.

"Rubes!" The girl in question looked up at her name being called, seeing Alya walking towards her, Lila next to her. She had a scowl on her face but quickly changed to a smile when Alya turned to her. Your reaction times are pathetic.

"What can I do for you ladies?"

"We're having a picnic later at the park and we were wondering if you wanted to join us. The whole class will be there!" Alya says excitedly. Ruby had a feeling it two certain people weren't invited, however, she didn't say anything.

"I'll have to check if I'm able to. A family member of mine asked for a small photoshoot session and I promised I'd be there on time."

"Oh Wow!" Alya's excitement seemed innocent enough, her interest viewable from miles around. "You're a model like Adrien?" Lila seemed interested in the conversation, seeing as she looked up in surprise.

"Not really. I pose for a few photos, but I'm more the one behind the camera. Well that's what I'm still learning anyways." She replied watching both girls reactions. One of pure excitement and the other of skepticism. If Lila didn't believe her, that's her problem. Even her uncle Gabriel was impressed with her skills, so she had no interest in impressing a common liar.

Her beginning plan is simple, befriend the class to get to know them. But not get close to any if them but Marinette, who needed the most support. That was step one. Lila already has the mindset that Ruby could be planning, but that was the point. So the liar could be aware of what was to come, just not know how much. And how Ruby loves it when they don't know.

"What else do you do?" Alya states excitedly, bringing the girl out of her thoughts. The 'reporter' had her phone out, filming her.

"Nothing special really. I write for a small media company. They're helping me with getting both my informative and creative pages out there. I have friend editing a small book I'm writing in English as we speak."

"In English?! What a scoop! You have to give me details, girl!" Alya practically screamed, her eyes shinning brightly. Surprisingly Lila hasn't said anything, but Ruby had no doubt the girl would make up a lie that related to what she heard.

"Maybe later. There's some things I have to do. As well as homework." Ruby stated, leaning back on the bench she was at in the first place. Alya deflated a bit but understood, both girls waving goodbye before leaving. Lila looked back at Ruby, glaring a little at her, but the girl wasn't worried. She raised an eyebrow before rolling her eyes, taking out her phone to study.

°·°·°·°·°·°·°·

True to Ruby's word, she was the one behind the camera. But she wasn't alone. One of the model's that works for Gabriel Agreste himself was there, along with Adrien, his photographer, Gorilla, Chloe, and Marinette. Ruby invited the girls and ran into Adrien who wanted to talk with Ruby when they both got breaks.

The photo shoot was going well, both Marinette and Chloe impressed by the professionalism Ruby had.

"You lied to Alya and Lila?"

"Technically I didn't. This model is actually a close friend, almost family. And Adrien is a family member, so only you guys know this. But what they don't know, won't hurt em." Ruby replies, when they get a small break to stretch before another shoot.

"And yet it could if they see us here." Adrien says, walking up to the three girl's. Guess it's time. Adrien glanced at Marinette before turning back to his cousin, his eyes telling her everything.

"Guys I'll be back. Me and Adrien are going to talk for a bit." Marinette and Chloe shared a look before nodding, watching as the cousins moved away.

"I know what I said to her was wrong," Adrien started, not waiting Ruby to speak. "Taking the high road isn't really ideal, but I want to help her. The smile I used to see is so fake now, and I can see she's hurting." Adrien had small tears in his eyes, and Ruby saw something shift in his shirt.

"Rubes, I don't know what to do." The blonde boy said and he looked like the same 6 year old who wondered why his father barely had time for him. Silently, she stepped forward and gave her cousin a hug, feeling him wrap his arms around her. They stayed like that for a little bit, before she pulled away and ruffled his hair.

"Admitting that is already progress. All you have to do now is talk with her. Apologize and listen to her side of the story. These so called akumas may target Lila if she gets found out, yes, but that would also make her a willing target. I heard from Marinette that she has been akumatized 3 times. You have every right to not join in me taking down Lila, but as long as you're there for Marinette, that's enough." Ruby spoke gently, patting her cousin's blonde little head. He smiled brightly, his watery green eyes shinning.

"Thank you Rubes. I don't know what I would do with you."

"You'd mope around the mistake you made until it was too late." She deadpanned, and the blonde laughed.

°·°·°·°·°·°

Not far from where the cousins were, two girls watched in shock of what was happening. Alya quickly took out her phone and recorded, all while Lila fummed next to her. Adrien is mine!

"Lets ask them! Maybe Ruby's a rival." Alya said, wiggling her eyebrows at Lila, who quickly changed her facial expression to shock. The blogger grabbed Lila's arm and dragged her over to the two.

"...of course I love her, she's family you idiot. And one of the best female models around. Unless we got Marinette to join. She gives off two tones, I'm surprised you havent noticed."

"Well you do have a special sense for these things." Adrien shrugged lazily, wrapping an arm around her shoulder.

"Well she gives off a type of flower princess for one. Think about it. She already has flower designs, I've seen them by the way, and with her modeling one of those outfits and you with your title as sunshine child? The fans will go wild! But underneath that flower princess is a storm. Like a female warrior naturally leading everyone to peace." Ruby ranted off, fully aware of company they were gonna have.

"I never thought about it that way. I mean yeah, I call her our everyday ladybug, but flower princess makes more sense. Actually--"

"Hey guys!" Ruby and Adrien turned to see Alya with her phone out, loosely followed by a dragged Lila, who glared dangerously at Ruby.

"This is Alya coming to you with a new scoop! This is Ruby, she's a new student at out school and have we got news! She's a photographer, a model, and a writer! Granted, she hasn't traveled or given us a bunch of stories like my best friend Lila, but she's already up in the charts. And look at this!" Alya turned the camera to show Ruby and Adrien hold each other rather intimately. "Could they be a couple? Or is Ruby a rival to famous Lila?"

"Wait what?" Ruby raised an eyebrow, glancing at her cousin, who practically wanted to facepalm.

"Come on, girl! We know Adrien is the ultimate heartthrob with his sweet personality. Now, spill. Do you guys like each other? This is another rivalry between two well known people?" Alya said, practically shoving the camera at their faces. Ruby frowned deeply, moving the camera out of the way, much to Alya's confusion.

"I don't like cameras so close to me, thank you very much. And second me and Adrien are friends, we've known each other for years." Ruby stated, growing annoyed with Alya.

"But even friends become couples! If I didn't think Lila had a chance with Adrien, you guys would make a cute couple!" Apparently, that was the wrong thing to say. Ruby watched as Lila fummed even more, her eyes now on all three of them. Alya blissfuly unaware while Adrien slowly backed away, Ruby standing in front of him.

Lila radiated so much negative energy, Ruby knew it was only a matter of time before an akuma came. True to her thought, she spotted a black butterfly fluttering over to the Italian girl. Somehow, as if sensing it, she turned, spoting the akuma before smirking. Thinking quickly, she pushed Adrien back and dashed past Alya, just as Lila was about to grab the akuma.

Ruby grabbed her wrist and with her other hand, let the akuma flutter to her family bracelet. Everyone stared in shock as Ruby let go of Lila and fell on the floor, holding her head. She vaguely heard Alya and Adrien yell out her name in concern.

Not far from where they are, Marinette felt her purse shift in the direction where the cousins had left and turned, gasping when she saw Ruby holding her head as Adrien, Alya, and Lila --in her case pretend-- to calm Ruby down. She saw the purple outline and dashed towards them, Chloe right behind her.

"Hmm, you are not ms. Rossi. No matter, your protective anger of wanting to help a friend is powerful. White knight, I give you the power to protect your friend from a manipulative liar. In return, I want Ladybug's and Chat Noir's miraculous."

"No." Ruby said loudly, her eyes snapped open as she slowly stood up, wobbling in her place. No one touched her, but stayed close in any case. "You made a mistake, Hawkmoth. Because I know now who you are." She said quietly, a hunt of saddness in her voice. Everyone around her was freaking out, but Marinette just kept staring at Ruby, slowly inching toward.

She wrapped her fingers lightly on Ruby's akumatized bracelet, and the girl snapped her head to the young designer. "Have fun trying to get your akuma back, Hawkmoth. I'm keeping it until Ladybug comes to purify it."

"You insolent girl! Give in to your anger!" Hawkmoth practically yelled, sending a wave of pain to her. She winced, closing her eyes tightly as she felt Marinette grab both of her wrists, grounding her.

"I have no anger. You're trying to give me yours. Now if you'll excuse me, I have things to do." Ruby calmly stated, severing the connection between her and the villain. Once it was gone, she groaned, falling forward. If it wasn't for Marinette holding her, she would've collapsed.

"Rubes can you hear me?" Marinette says quietly, Chloe trying to shush the growing group around them. Ruby blinked a few times as her eyes began to focus on blue eyes.

"H-hey maribug." The girl finally said, watching as Marinette let out a sigh of relief. She let Ruby lean on her, keeping a careful eye of the akumatized item.

"Ruby thank you so much! I would've been akumatized if you hadn't saved me." Lila spoke first, smiling brightly at her, though her eyes held a dangerous glint. Somehow the whole class was there, thanking her and asking if both she and Lila were okay.

The girl just smiled weakly, still feeling the negative effects of the akuma. It took a while bit eventually the class left, having a picnic to go in another area of the park.

Only Alya and Lila stayed behind, one filled with worry while the other was filled with silent anger. "Ruby, you sure you're okay?" Alya asked, warily glancing at Marinette, who was still holding on to the girl.

"I'm fine. Marinette can take care me. It's not like I have anything against her." Ruby deadpanned, before quickly relaxing so the akuma can't turn her. Alya seemed shocked by the statement, and had no time to respond, feeling Lila pull her away.

"Chloe, help me get her out to a more secluded area." Marinette spoke, the blonde nodding. Adrien had disappeared, probably getting something or going back to the photo shoot.

Both girls helped Ruby to the back of the bakery, which was the closest. Marinette left, saying she'll bring some water and cookies. So Ruby stayed with Chloe, who for some reason was having a mental breakdown, though she hid it well.

Ruby closed her eyes and leaned her head on Chloe's shoulder, waiting for Marinette or Ladybug.

Only after a few minutes, both Ladybug and Chat Noir arrive quietly, not wanting to startle the girl. Chloe-- who had a red face, Marinette would talk to her later-- gently woke Ruby up, and saw saw the heroes in front of her.

"Are you okay?" Ladybug asked softly, chat helping her sit up.

"I'm fine, Ladybug. Just a little tired. The akuma is in my bracelet." She holds up her arm, and a darkened bracelet practically glares at the heroes.

"Chat Noir said that he saw you were keeping the akuma, and not being akumatized is very brave of you." Ladybug smiled, removing the bracelet and handing it to Chat Noir.

She summoned a lucky charm, catching it and staring in confusion at the item. It was a phine that had a picture of Chloe, Ruby, Adrien, and Marinette. Chloe face was red while Ruby held her possessively, and Marinette and Adrien were smiling in satisfaction.

Later. The heroine thought to herself as Chat Noir destroyed the bracelet and she caught the akuma, purifying it and throwing the lucky charm in the air. The little ladybugs fixed the broken bracelet and Ruby practically relaxed against Chloe.

"Do you know how the akuma came to you anyways?" Chloe said after a while, her face beet red.

"Alya thought me and Adrien were flirting with each other. Which one, gross, and two we're cousins. And even if we weren't related, he'd be like a little brother to me. So the reporter, who really doesn't know what she's doing, kept saying all this stuff that made me seem like a big deal and could rival Lila. Obviously she didn't like that. Then Alya said that if she didn't think Lila and Adrien would look good, I'd look great with him." Ruby said, rolling her eyes while Ladybug pinched the bridge of her nose.

"Ridiculous. Utterly ridiculous. Ladybug, you need to do something about lie-la. And the supposed 'ladyblog' that is filled with lies." Chloe huffed, watching Chat Noir nodding a little in agreement.

"Actually. I have a plan, and I could use your help." Ruby stated, smirking at the heroes.

The Paris saviors looked at each other, the black clad hero nodding at his partner. Turning back to Ruby, Ladybug smirked, a hand on her hip.

"We're listening."

°·°·°·°·

Requested tags: @ezio-demon @ignorantly-apathatic @marilee98 @tinybrie @kuroko26 @claaydoh @mewwitch @taleeuuhhh @starrosecolors @zebrabaker @miraculously-quality-content @slytherinqueen2432 @rayray384 @starberry-mina @royalchaoticfangirl @book-r-the-best (I was generous and did 16)

General tags: @the-wlw-cafe @mcgrathandwives @imagine-lcorp @baked-bean-bekah @natu123 @wlwhc @nobodyfamousposts @gale-of-the-nomads @miraculous-of-salt

[c-is-for-circinate]

“What the Fuck is Up with the Elves” (or, more worldbuilding for C’s D&D game)

So the thing is, I call myself an ecologist, and I am, really, or at least I’ve been working as one when I’m not working as a general all-math-and-science teacher for the past ten years.  But that’s not, quite, technically, what my degrees are in.  Technically, as per my master’s thesis, I’m an evolutionary biologist.

Which means that when I run a D&D game?  We start from a place of hominid evolution.

Gnomes and dwarves evolved on the continent of Nokomoris, where most of our game takes place.  Some 50,000 years ago, humans came up out of the neighboring continent (which has a dozen different names, but we can call it Kekiris, that’s as accurate as any) and joined them, and together the three races learned to master fire and metalwork and gods and demons and the four Great Schools and the two Minor Schools of arcane magic (for those were the days before the elves, before the discovery of abjuration, when it was thought that only the gods could conjure and transmutation was limited to minor tricks and divine crafts).

Elves, and their cousins the orcs (though no elf alive today would admit that they are cousins in truth, and the orcs themselves have all but forgotten it) evolved side by side on the continent of Priyl, a fifteenth the size of Nokomoris and isolated in the middle of the ocean, beset by storms and reefs on all sides.

Well.  The elves of the Ascendancy call it Priyl, and so does everybody else, these days, in respect to them.  The orcs and half-orcs remember that it was Getirka, and still is to those of their brethren still living there.  The people of Nokomoris have all but forgotten the days when they called it Thidoris, when it was nothing more than a myth.

(There are other continents, beyond those three, of course--but time enough for that later.  Nobody on Nokomoris remembers the continent of Calladia these days, and that might be for the best, for now.  But we’re getting ahead of ourselves.)

Six and a half thousand years ago, the continent of Priyl, called Getirka by the orcs and Thidoris by the gnomes and humans and dwarves, disappeared from the ocean.  Five hundred and twelve years it appeared again.  And that was enough to change the world.

.

Priyl, then, because we’re talking about elves.  Priyl is such a small continent, really, surrounded by such very storm-like oceans, full of so much desert and so many mountains and so very, very many things with sharp teeth and venom spines.  The spiders and snakes can kill a beast a thousand times their size.  The fish on the reef around the continent, who look like stone or coral or sand or squirming tentacle-beasts, have spines and teeth with venom that can kill ten times faster than that.

Half of Priyl is worn thin between planes, or at least it was so many hundreds of thousands of years ago, when lithe thin agile elf-ancestors took to the trees and the mountains to run from their fierce unstoppable orc cousins.  They were barely more than beasts themselves, either of them.  The elves were perhaps a little more clever, but perhaps they were only quicker, lighter, lither in the branches of trees.  The orcs were more determined.  They invented fire first.

Fire doesn’t mix well with trees, particularly not in the long dry drought of a Priylan summer, and the elves died, and died--and survived, some of them, always.  Through trickery and luck, some elves always survived.

And the fey noticed.

There are a thousand different ways planes can brush up against each other; a million years later, in the present day of 512 HA, the scholars of Nokomoris will have names and categories for half a dozen.  One of those is what they call a seep--a place as small as a few square yards, as huge as a dozen square miles, where two planes wear as thin as over-used linen cheesecloth next to each other, and ooze one into the other in bits and pieces and fragments of magic over years.

It’s not meant to be possible, for an entire continent to be a seep, but many things that are not meant to be possible are nonetheless true.  Priyl was thin before the elves and orcs even came to be there.  Fey roamed the lands, called them home, before they ever took forms with two legs and two arms and a face that could speak a language of people.  They noticed the thin little cousins-of-orcs fleeing through the trees, and they saw the invention of fire and the forests that burned, and a few of them decided--well.  There’s a game worth playing.

Half a million years ago, the fey taught the first True Elves about magic.  Nothing has ever been the same since.

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Fifteen thousand years ago, when dwarves and humans and gnomes were only just learning to turn stone tools into plowshares and turn goats and sheep and aurochs into tame animals, the elves of Priyl had cities that stretched halfway to the sky.

They made war, of course, of course they did.  They waged it against each other, because nothing else was worthy of their conquest.  Ten generations of orcs could live and breed and die before an elf could even count themself arrived at adulthood.  The world beyond Priyl was strange and distant, far beyond notice or care.  The vast universe of the planes, and beyond--that drew the elven attention far more than anything on the world of Onde.

There were in those days two kinds of elves, or perhaps three, or perhaps a thousand.  In fact, perhaps the easiest way to divide the elves of that time is by how many sorts of elves they themselves believed existed.  In that case it was the three-sort elves who were correct, which makes their fate even more dark irony in the end.

They were the Day Elves, the Night Elves, and the True Million; High Elves and Bad Elves and those fuckers in the woods, I guess.  They were, according to a third of their number, the elves of Sun, Moon, and Twilight; and this is how the self-styled Moon Elves would explain the difference:

During the day, with the sun bright and desperate overhead, it is easy to believe that light and dark are opposites, the only two options.  It is easy to believe in sun and darkness and no other in-between.  It is easy to believe in Your Own and then also The Rest Of Them.  It is easy to believe in your own power.  And so the day elves, the sun elves, as silver and gold as though no other color existed in the universe, studied the foundations of their own powers and ignored all else.  They were wizards and full of magic, and they built the cities that towered to the sun, and they wrote the laws and warred each other, and they gave polite nods to the fey if they passed but they did not bow to them, for they accepted only the opposing ideas of Subservience and Mastery, and they refused to be servants.

At dawn and dusk, with all the shadows grown long and small lights flickering from every direction, it is easy to confuse lies and honesty everywhere, to lose sight of any firm reality.  It is easy to believe that nothing is quite real in the first place and anything is as good as anything else.  It is easy to believe in tricks and riddles, and to toss aside that belief a moment later, to cling to nothing but artifice and bargains and boundaries on trust.  The twilight elves, the wood elves, red and green and brown and gold and silver and white and black and gray, ran with the fey who’d once taught and married their ancient ancestors.  They were warlocks and full of trickery and half-truth, and they studied math and logic and ventured from city to city slipping in between the bounds set by the daylight elves as though they had not spotted them in the dark.  They wrote contracts and twisted reality around themselves, for they believed in everything and nothing, just like their masters, and could not see far enough to grasp the reality of anything.

At night, in clear moonlight, it is easy to see the truth: there is light, and there is dark, and there is everything in between.  There may be master and servant, and that may be firm and unchangeable, no matter how the shadows hide it--but for every servant on his knees in the dirt, there is always one more, lower still than them.  Every master lording over her servant has yet another master.

So it was that the moon elves discovered the gods.  Priyl was not a good land for gods, with the blurring of its boundaries, its fade between reality and not.  They did not often feel welcome there.  Still, in the middle of the night, with one or two or all three moons full and bright overhead, they could find their way down.  Even the fey had to be overmastered by someone.

There were three gods that the Elves of Night found, as they searched and studied and prayed, there in the moonlit dark on the continent of Priyl, where the smallest creatures were full of venom and might.  They found the queen of spiders, and the king of serpents, and the prince of fish and tentacles and uncharted depths.  The elves of the moon went to their knees and prayed.

.

In those days the elves had boats, of course.  They had not quite mastered the art of teleportation that would join their cities in the future, and they did not most of them quite care about the world beyond the boundaries of their reefs, but curiosity has always been an elven trait.  The moon-elven worshippers of the god of the sea, and the twilight adventurers whose fae patrons implored them to spread chaos and wonder, they learned to sail and venture forth.  They mapped the world of Onde while the humans and gnomes and dwarves of Nokomoris were still just learning to put stylus to clay and charcoal to tanned leather, while the humans of someday-Calladia were singing their sky-song and building empires of ritual and sound.

(Orcs invented boats first.  Orcs have been on Nokomoris for tens of thousands of years, coming few by few, interbreeding with humans until barely any sign of them was left to meet the next ship to arrive.  Few enough of them ever made it back over the reefs to return to Getirka, even before the High Elves Ascendant erected the Stormwall.  But we’re getting ahead of ourselves again.)

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Here is the thing that every elf known on Nokomoris today will say, to anyone who asks them, about their history: 6,703 years ago, by the calendar reckoning of humans, gnomes, and dwarves, the Elven Ascendancy rose to shepherd all of the elves of Priyl, and closed the continent away from all the world to protect--

And that’s where the story will pause, because what protection could the elves ever have needed from the rest of the world?  The elves appeared in Nokomoris five hundred years, and shook the world on its foundations.  Every kingdom on Onde was tumbled before their power.

‘To protect you all from us,’ so many elves would say.  They would be correct, of course, and altogether wrong, all at once.

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Spiders are not evil.  Neither are serpents, or stonefish, or krakens.  Neither are the gods of them.

They shed their skins, though, all at once or piece by piece.  And sometimes they demand the world do the same.  Sometimes they demanded apocalypse and rebirth.  It wasn’t such a very far stretch, really, after all.

The dark elves of black and white and gray believed in nuance as an article of faith.  They also believed in duty, and truth, and fortitude across an ever-changing night.  They believed in a lot of things.  That was, a little bit, the point.

It took a thousand years of war for the cities of Sun Elves to come together to agree, at the very last, that even should it take all their power they must see the Night Elves driven entire from the continent of Priyl.  They must see it done, and they would unite themselves to do it.  It took another century of war first, with all the united might of the Elven Cities bent against the god-worshippers, the moonlight elves with their huge pale eyes and their unglowing skin.  It could be their only salvation, before the gods of venom and rebirth called for the destruction of everything they loved and knew.

And so it was, 6,602 years ago, that all of the very most powerful wizards of the Elves of Day, the Sun Elves, high and ascendant and triumphant, joined their power as one to join nature and force and illusion all bound together in one great wall.  The Stormwall, sixteen thousand miles long, encircling all of Priyl in its arms.

(Did the Wild Elves, the twilight elves, the forest warlocks, did they help?  Oh yes, my friend.  Oh yes, of course they did, for the Sun Elves--they only ever saw two sides, don’t you remember?  Two sides, dark and light, and the twilight elves trapped on the in-between--well.  They always did know how to deal oh-so-very carefully with a master that little bit stronger than them.  So the wild elves helped, and the Stormwall--the Stormwall worked perfectly, to keep anyone outside of Priyl from venturing in.)

6,703 years ago, the Empyrean Ascendant became the very first sovereign on the seat of the Elven Ascendancy.  6,600 years ago, the elves of Priyl found peace.  More or less.

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And what became of the moon elves, the night elves, the elves of the dark?  What became of them, and their spider-queen, serpent-king, fish-prince?

They went to Calladia, of course--though it was called Thiel then, once upon a time.  They went to Thiel-that-would-be-Callida, and Thiel found itself unmade.

There is a great deal to say of old mythical Thiel, and the lands it became and then unbecame again, and again, and again, cycling once and twice and more and more over the thousands of years between now and then.  There is a great deal to say, and some of it is about the elves that live there, and some of it is about the humans they found when they arrived, and some of it is about the changelings that sprung up between them, faceless shapeshifters learning to live just as everyone else.  Right now, in the year 512 HA, five centuries after the fall of the Storm Wall, the continent is nothing but a thousand-island archipelago.  It remembers, barely, that it was Callida nine centuries ago, and had merchant ships and commerce to the east and west, with Nokomoris and Kekiris and beyond.  It remembers being shattered to pieces in hopes of rebirth.  It does not remember that it ever was Thiel, not in the deepest dimmest history, save in the oldest of records.

There is a great deal to say, but what I will tell you now is this: the fish around the continent that once was Thiel do not sting with venom spines that kill in the space of a breath, and the tentacle-armed creatures that swim their bays are small and soft and cannot kill at all.  There is very little for the Prince of Depths to do here, little space for him to make himself known.

There are frogs here, instead.  They do not bite except ants and flies, but they glow bright, red and yellow and violet and blue.  They poison nobody except the unwary hunter who does not leave them as they sit.  (The unwary hunter, they will kill.  The wary hunter learns to use them, instead.)

They change, from fish-spawn to frog-grandmother, to eggs, to spawn again.  It’s easier to believe in the Frog Daughter (who is also the mother of all, wide-mouth frog devourer of all) than any unfamiliar lord of depths and venom.

The Frog Daughter is, perhaps, a kinder god than her predecessor-brother.  There’s some kindness in all three of the dark elves’ gods, if you know where to look.  They’re all three of them gods of transformation, and that can always be a kindness, for some.

.

And what of Priyl, then, in their absence?

The Ascendancy has held strong for six thousand years and nearly another thousand after that.  Eleven elves Ascendant, after the Empyrean, each of them chosen and sworn to the good of all before more than two centuries of life have passed them by, each of them sworn to rule for a thousand years if they can.  Each of them have made that oath, and under them the Ascendancy has flourished.

Throughout Priyl, throughout its mountains, there are the Cities of the Ascendancy, and each city is vast and towering, halfway up to the skies, and each city is within itself world and shining garden.  Each city is full of sparkling crystalline fountains and waterfalls, parks and fresh water to drink, home to a thousand sparkling silver fishes that are art and food and life all at once.  Vines climb up the dazzling towers from terrace to terrace and grow fruit and berries and grain.  Shimmering pigeons of red and purple iridescence bred for perfect accent color beauty soar between golden bridges and balustrades, and lay their eggs, and nobody in an elven city ever goes hungry.

(And what became of the twilight elves, then, when the sun elves rose up on high and claimed their world?  They retreated to shadow and stayed in the in-between, of course, just as they always have.  Their feytrap labyrinths deep in the mountains and deserts and woods of Priyl are sprawling and inescapable temples to artifice and knowledge and math, and their acolytes strike deals and take powers from their Lady Whispered and Lord Gloaming, and their children grow in the shining towers of the cities of the ascendancy and pay their dues to the elves on high.  The warlock elves, the fae-friends, the elves of the woods, they have always understood the needs of survival.  They remember the dark elves.  They remember the price of loss.  Even if the high elves themselves won’t.)

And so it was for six thousand years, until the Halcyon Ascendant rose to power, five hundred and twelve years ago.  And the Halcyon Ascendant, who was wizard and diviner, who was young and brave and as wise as she was clever, who looked into the world and saw the future--

the Halcyon Ascendant said, it is time to lower the Stormwall and venture forth to know the world.

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Nobody knows, exactly, why the Halcyon Ascendant gave such an order.  Few elves know exactly what it cost to fulfill it.  Fewer still would ever admit it.

What is known, by everybody on Nokomoris, is this: the elves appeared on their great silver ships out of nowhere at all, five hundred years ago, and changed everything in the world.  Cities and nations rose and fell.  The elves knew magic nobody had ever heard of before.

The elves brought transmutation and conjuration and abjuration that could be studied and learned from books instead of summoned from gods and the incomprehensible overwhelming power of nature.  They brought potions and alchemy and science.  The elves brought to Nokomoris the very first teleportation circles (and Nokomoris as it is now, with the Nine Cities and their reign, could not exist without teleportation circles.)

Today, the elves live in every major city on the continent.  They live west of the mountains of the Western Wall, and in cities on the continent of Kekiris.  Always in sweeping, curving, tall shining towers, in their own elven enclaves, part of every city but not beholden to it.  Always full of wonders to sell, perhaps, if their leaders in the Ascendancy deem it proper; always rich with the wealth of their nation, which is free to all elves, and nobody else.

There are elven advisors and elven investors and elven ambassadors.  There are elven students in the universities, and professors there, as well.  There are no elven kings or governors or lords, of course there aren’t--no elf could truly be a citizen of Nokomoris, not honorably.  Every elf born is a subject of the Ascendancy. 

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And finally, here is what the orcs know of elves.  The orcish story is their own, and long and varied and rich, the orcs of Getirka-called-Priyl and the orcs of New Gettik on Nokomoris, and it is also long, full of diaspora and resilience and art and culture and many, many thousands of generations of twins.  It is another post for another time.

But what the orcs know of elves, for they do come from the very same land, from its opposite sides, is: there are whole universes beyond what the elves consider worthy of their attention.  It’s true that no ship or desperate swimmer arrived on the continent of Getirka or Priyl for all the six thousand years that the Stormwall soared.  It is not true that no ship ever left.

The orcs say it, and the orcs know.  The orcs of New Gettik and Clure, here on Nokomoris, know it especially.  They were here before the elves arrived.  Even the rest of Nokomoris realizes that.

Every gnome, dwarf, and human on Nokomoris knows that all elves everywhere in the world belong to the Ascendancy.  Every orc knows that there are worlds below the elves’ notice, that they forget about conveniently, that they pretend not to see.  Some orcs may think to wonder whether they’ve forgotten about other elves, too.

[seapandora]

Sky High

Part 1

Summary: Y/N, an angel of the Lady. She is beauty, she is grace, but she will punch a demon in its face. 

A/N: A part of the writing challenge @buckysknifecollection made. It is going to be a series, and I´d love to hear from you guys on what you´d like me to change and what not. I really hope this will be a good one, I love the prompt and I just had a lot of fun writing this even if it probably doesn’t make any sense XD. Anyways, enjoy guys!

Warnings: Swearing (I swear a lot, okay), sexual innuendos (later chapters), alcohol, mentions of death/killing, mentions of religion(s), angst (future chapters), fluff (future chapters)

Steve x fem!reader

Words: 1778

Prompt: Angel/Demon AU

Y/N: Your Name

Y/Ns week had been awful, more so than usual. She hadn´t been able to be around her favorite humanoids and she had been away on mission after mission to species who didn’t appreciate her help and in the end didn’t pray to or for her, meaning her grace was draining slightly. It made her grouchy and really not very pleasant to be around. Natasha had already pointed that out to her, but Y/N had just grumbled and asked for another whiskey. It was the only way she would be able to get through the week in her own head.

Monday

Everyone hates Mondays, why should this one had been any different? It really wasn´t. It all started with Y/N getting her mission. A population of Welmus. An aggressive species who had no beliefs and were therefor hard to control. Welmus weren´t large, but they were many, reproduced faster than regular humans and could be a real pain in the ass unless controlled. Normally the younger angels would handle them, in more or less good ways. But in the past few months they had had a bit of an upproar which ended in the entire population having to be wiped out. Y/N didn’t like the work, but she didn’t want someone like Tony to have to do it. He took it more personal than Y/N did. She just did the job, she didn’t want to loose her wings. It seemed to be painful. So yes, she had commited mass-murder, in the name of Maria. In the words of sir Ian McKellen, in the Da Vinci-code, as long as there´s been one true god there has been killing in his name. Maria was god now. So while the Welmus-species wasn’t huge, standing at a height of 50 cm, they were very very aggressive and didn´t go down with a fight. Y/N had earned quite a few scars from that battle. In the end she had did what needed to be done though and she had wished for no more mission for the day, but as per usual, she never got what she wanted. Maria had given her another mission, this one to sort up another rebellion. She wouldn’t need to take anyone out, but she was supposed to take those responsible, into custody to let them stand in the court of holy law to have their fates determined. What a Monday it had been.

Tuesday - Thursday

Tuesday she had gotten her third mission of the week. To get to earth and make believers pray and atone for their sins. Yay, her favorite. Oh how she hated humans. They were ungreatful, needy, whiny, cruel, and disrespectful. They didn’t appreciate her help and didn’t pray for her after she left. All angels had a specific area they took care of Y/Ns was peace and she had visited earth with the mission to calm people down. The least they could do was to pray for peace no matter what religion they belonged to. Anyways, she had been busy trying to keep forces separated and her mind had been working non-stop to convince the leaders of the two forces to retreat and squash the dispute. What good was it being the good guy if she couldn’t use her powers. The whole ordeal had just taken so much energy out of her and Thursday night she just cured up under the stars and let herself regenerate a bit of Grace. It was exhausting to end fights and make sure everyone behaved, humans were particularly hard to deal with. And would you know, Friday would be even worse.

Friday

Whats worse than having adult humans not believe in peace? Having a child believe in peace but have to take them out because their future shows them to be horrible humans. The world didn’t need a new dictator. Her day had hence started with just studying the child, and eventually talking to the child and lastly taking the childs hand and guide him to Maria. Yes that meant the child moved on to the after-life. Yeah, Y/N job really wasn’t glamourous or fun sometimes. Her Friday didn’t end with that though. Maria sent her to collect three angels from hell, or the underworld rather. It was the same place for all religions who believed in a hell-like world where you were punished for your sins. Y/N liked the underworld, well she didn’t mind the dark and silence down there. Unlike heaven she never felt crowded while she was down there. The angels had all been captured by demons but had now been traded for demons that were kept in heaven. Y/N didn’t really know why they had all been captured, she didn’t really care, she just did her job. The angels had been returned safe and sound and Y/Ns week had finally been over. Well work for her was never over, but she took the weekend away from her boss, so close enough.

Angels and Demons, good and bad, light and dark, blah blah blah… Y/N had heard it all by now. She was the good, light, gracious and angelic. She was beautiful as few and carried her aura with pride. Well according to what most people thought anyways. She hated it, every second of it. Being an angel wasn’t something she had chosen. She had died, it was quite dramatic and all, but she had long forgotten how she died. Someone had seen into her sould and whipped up some hefty spell. And she oop… was an angel. Yeah yeah, it wasn’t that simple, but she didn’t know the process, just that she went through it. A few years into her… holiness… angelness… angelship, she got a wessel. She was to do the Lords work on earth. Y/N hadn´t been a believer before she died, doing the Lords work felt hypocritical to her and she had rebelled in a sense. Her rebellion had led to the exchange of theLord into a very lovey lady, Maria. Okay, she wasn’t lovely but, Y/N disliked any kind of authority. She did her duties as she got them in exchange for not being disturbed inbetween her missions. Her reach stretched beyond Earth, more than the human species believed in a power, and she was one of a number to make the higher powers work. Y/Ns favorite species to help were the Sofwas. They are small humanoid creatures, about 2 inches tall and despite that they’ve got quite the vocal range and Y/N always felt humbled by them. They were vocal, but kind, mostly. Y/N would often volonteer to help the Sofwas and she was respected and prayed to by the creatures. It was important to be that respected by at least one species. If she wasn’t she would fade, her wessel would devour all of her grace and she´d become a mere shell walking across the worlds praying on angels. Now lets not confuse a corrupted angel with a demon. A demone was a completely different thing, as unpleasant and disgusting of course, well almost all demons were awful.

Natasha wasn’t awful. She was a demon Y/N had worked with a few times by now. Angels and demons didn’t always have opposing goals. Most demons knew who Y/N was, they knew her story with heaven and often thought they could ger her to join their cause, or side, or whatever youd want to call it. Those attempt only pissed Y/N off, they were futile. She didn’t want to be on anyones bad side. She had, first hand, had to rip angels wings off because of their disobediance and failure to hide it, or make up for it. She had, first hand, had to kill demons, as they strayed too far off their path. All she really wanted was some peace and quiet. She had no interest in the disputes between angels and demons. She just didn’t want to be bossed around. That was her problem. If she refused orders she´d be discarded, she´d be killed. She was stuck in her situation really. Now back to Natasha, she ran a bar Y/N often visited. They had the more potent stuff that would get angels and demons alike, a good buzz. Y/N was a frequent visitor. Her work was hard and in the bar she didn’t have to think. A few of her collegues came with her occasionally, Tony mostly, but also Rhodey, and T´Challa. They usually met up in the bar to discuss their latest missions. The other three however werent as keen on demons as Y/N was. They were all technically younger than her and had a lot of faith in their boss Maria. Of course they knew about Y/Ns rebellion, but they hadn´t been around for it. At the bar they could talk freely, while there Maria couldn’t summon them. Natasha had made sure that the bar was a free haven.

The bar wasn’t only for them though, no no no, Natasha would never have been able to put up with them alone, there had to be at least two demons in the bar to balance it out. This didn’t always fall well with Tony and Rhodey. T´Challa was more relaxed around the demons even if he didn’t trust them or wanted to talk to them. There was however one demon neither of them wanted to talk to and Y/N wasn´t too fond of him either. He went by The Captain or The Nomad Captain, and he was the leader of the demons. He was the, so called, devils right hand. No one really knew his real name, well of course Y/N knew it. She knew a lot. She got around enough to understand who he was. The captain had a few friends Y/N actually spent some time with every now and then. It was mostly at the bar, but occasionally out in the real world as well. A demon Y/N really enjoyed spending time with was Sam. He was fun, and didn’t judge Y/N for being an angel. Unfortunately Sam spent most of his time with The Captain and his other associate. Y/N wanted to say the two were friends, but she didn’t know if demons could even have friends. Hell, she wasn’t sure she had or could have friends. Yes she had her collegues but they weren´t her friends. Currently the bar was empty apart from herself, Natasha, Natashas friend Wanda, and The Captain and the person Y/N had realized was closest to him, James. It was weird being the only angel in the establishment, but Y/N didn’t care too much. As long as The Captain and James didn’t pick a fight she would be fine.