#this is such a loaded question and it prompts eight million other loaded questions but I tried ALRIGHT

[laineystein]

So do you believe Hashem is a corporeal being that is an “interfering Gd?” I’m curious how you reconcile that the horrific trauma going on in the world right now. I’m one of the jaded people who go “If Hashem aides us and is an “interfering gd,” why didn’t he prevent 10/07? Why don’t he prevent the Shoah? 9/11? The actual ongoing genocide in Sudan? The actual ethnic cleansing of the Rohyngia? Are there limits His power that we don’t know about? Why can’t we know about them?”

I don’t think I’m an atheist, but as mentioned, I struggle with the idea that Hashem is an actual being to speak to. So I’m trying to figure out how I see Hashem, and I’m always genuinely curious at those who see Him as a being?. How do you reconcile it with all of the current and past horrid things going on in the world?

There’s a lot to unpack here. First and foremost, I am not a Rav. Even if I were, this is not a question a Rav would ever answer. Ultimately the question of why do bad things happen to good people? has a different answer for everyone because it really does come down to your personal relationship with G*d and only you know what that relationship is. So this is a big ask for some random Jew on tumblr but I’ll do my best to give you a somewhat coherent response.

I am overtired and delirious so excuse the rambling that’s about to happen…

For me, I don’t like the word interfering when referring to Hashem. Everything going on - everyone and all of their actions - is a result of Hashem’s work. You cannot interfere with your own creation. Interference connotes a disruption but Hashem isn’t disrupting anything. If something is happening, it is his plan that it do so. However, while I do believe that Hashem is in charge, humans also have free will. Hashem can guide and direct but ultimately he is not in complete control because even humans made in his image are susceptible to error. Hashem can and has given us the tools to create the world how he wants it but ultimately it is up to us in how we use them. Hashem has given us the tools to take care of ourselves and one another and maybe we have abused those tools or disregarded them and him completely. Is this why bad things happen? Is Hashem allowing tragedy because our own human error is ruining his original plan? I think so. This is my true belief. But ultimately I don’t know. No one does.

Where was he during the Shoah and where was he on October 7th? I don’t have an answer for you. I’m angry at him. I’m still trying to make sense of it. I know we did not deserve what happened and I still struggle to see how any of this mess fits into his plan. But I trust that it somehow does. And for what I cannot explain and understand, my faith in Hashem guides me. I could not control any of the horrible things that happened but I can use the tools Hashem has gifted me with to repair my world going forward - my work as a doctor, the volunteering I do, prayer and tzedekah - all of these things were created by Hashem and I have the capacity to use these things to be a better Jew and to help my fellow Jews. This self-love and this unity is what will bring about redemption. Because for as much as Hashem loves us and would like to see all of us succeeding and happy, Moshiach has not come and until he does, there is going to be pain and suffering and failure. That is the reality of the pre-Moshiach word. This is why we all should pray for Moshiach and do things that will bring redemption (things we have the capacity to do because of Hashem’s love for us and alls he has gifted us with!!!) because only he can eliminate pain and suffering.

[doitwritenow]

And They Don’t Miss The Ground

Reposting this for organizations sake; I, uh, saw the prompt about the snap wiping out everyone, including Thanos, (barring Stephen and Tony) from @ironstrangeprompts (#976) and.... things happened...

Here’s a link to the prompt. And here’s my ramble!

<><><>

“We aren’t going back to Earth.”

Tony’s hands freeze atop the cold metal of the ship’s engine. It never seems to warm up under his hands--not as he works with it, not as he clings to it. Tony isn’t surprised. He hasn’t any warmth to give.

He turns, feeling his expression slide into something cold and dark. The damaged ship lights flash across the tall form standing in the broken doorway, and for a moment the shadows make its limbs seem clawed and disproportionate. Skeletal. It looks like the monster Tony know it is.

“Where were you?” Tony demands. He’s on his feet, and he doesn’t remember standing. He presses a hand to his side. Even after two months, his abdomen still aches where Thanos had impaled him, though the wound is long since healed.

The figure, the sorcerer, steps into the space. Strange looks awful--haggard and malnourished and somehow still glowing with that sense of knowing that had drawn Tony to him once, but now just makes him sick. Strange’s whole form is soaked in ash. He tracks it in from the barren land outside into the meticulously cleaned threshold of Tony’s ship, Tony’s lair. It feels like an invasion.

“Not far,” Strange says. He rests against the wall, his eyes fluttering closed.

“Not far? It’s been two months, wizard!”

Two months. Two months of dark anger and frozen loneliness, two months of being the last creature left alive. Two months of that hope Tony had tried so hard to coax dwindling to nothing--two months of slowly realizing that Strange hadn’t been lying. It truly is the whole universe, gone. The unlucky fifty percent didn’t happen to be everyone on Titan except the two of them, no. The two of them are all that’s left.

Tony still wakes up clawing at the ash he can feel on hands every single morning. He still wakes up praying this was all a cruel joke, a twisted reality. And he’s still wrong. Every single time.

This is the world he lives in, now.

The world this wizard chose.

“You were productive,” Strange says. He looks under his brows at the spaceship, stitched together under Tony’s hands for the last eight weeks.

“Yeah, I was,” Tony spits. “And where were you?”

“I told you.” Strange just looks at him, face impassive. Tony used to be certain there was a soul underneath there somewhere, after he’d seen it shining in sorrow and empathy. Now he isn’t sure. “I wasn’t far.”

That familiar, desperate rage curls through Tony’s throat. He jerks forward. His hands curl into fists, one of them still coated in nanotech. “You left me alone, Strange.”

Strange turns to face him fully--and Tony can see, then, the waxy burn scar that creeps around his left eye. “We both know I had to.”

He’s right--but Tony’s sick and tired of hearing about what he had to do. He’s sick of dreaming about those impossible eyes flickering to him as Strange offers the end of the world to Thanos on a silver platter. He’s sick of remembering the way Strange had knelt and watched Quill and Nebula and (Peter Peter Peter--) dissolve into nothingness, repeating “there was no other way” like that made any difference.

Tony had waited for Strange to disappear, too. Waited for there to be some fairness in the universe, some justice. But Strange hadn’t. He’d knelt there, solid and real and alive, and looked at Tony like he knew what was about to happen.

He’d let Tony take the shot. But he hadn’t let Tony finish the job, drawing one last handful of the ash that was all that remained of his Cloak through his fingers, and disappearing in a flash of orange magic. And he hadn’t come back.

He’d been gone, all the days when Tony needed to kill him. All the days when Tony needed him alive.

Tony should kill him now and complete his transition into the monster he can feel building beneath his skin.

Should kill him now and be truly and completely alone.

Tony turns away, shoulders falling. He twins his hands around the ship’s controls again, feeling the way the newly repaired engines purr at his commands. “I should leave you here,” he says.

Strange doesn’t answer. Tony wonders if he agrees.

There’s no one else in the universe.

Tony should leave and return to Earth to scavenge what little hope he can. Because he might be clinging to the dregs of his spirit, might be coughing up ash, but there’s one thing that the end of the world can’t strip from Tony Stark. It can’t take the fundamental in his ribs. He’s going to fix this. There’s no question in his soul, no question in his future--he’s going to fix this, or he’s going to die trying.

And there’s no one else in the universe.

“I’m taking off tomorrow morning,” Tony says, his voice flat and resigned. “Be on the ship if you want. See if I care.”

Then he turns on his heel and leaves to check the engines.

-----

Stephen only lets his form crumple when Stark has gone.

When the man’s footsteps are far enough away that Stephen’s constantly ringing ears can no longer pick him out, he finally sinks down against the side of the wall and buries his head beneath his arms. It’s so much warmer in here. Stephen swears he can sense the air touched by Stark’s body heat. Stephen’s even starting to shiver again, which is remarkable.

When Stark is gone, he tucks his shaking hands into his hair and lets the Count spill from his lips again. It isn’t pride that keeps him upright around Stark. It’s self-preservation, pure and simple and animalistic. If Stephen looks dangerous, looks like he might be some sort of threat, Stark is less likely to kill him. If Stephen offers some sort of use to the man, Stark is less likely to kill him.

Not that he shouldn’t.

But the universe isn’t about justice, anymore. Stephen doesn’t get the luxury of being killed by Tony Stark, of being redeemed. He has to save the universe.

He always has to save the universe.

Stephen sits and waits, listens for the next Scene. He prepares his lines, letting them assemble in his mind beneath the Count. The hours slip by to the deafening ringing in his ears. Slowly, the numbness starts to fade from his extremities, warmth sliding through his veins like fire.

It hurts. It hurts, and so it feels wonderful. Stephen sighs, clenching his fists tight to shock the pain intense enough he can feel it in his shoulders.

Then he lifts his head and looks around the ship. He’s left ashy footprints where he walked--after two months alone in Titan’s sands, he practically wears the stuff. He’s still alone--

Of course you are. There’s no one else, remember?

--and so he Counts out loud. He’s up to five million, one hundred and fifty-six thousand, seven hundred thirty-six, now, after two months. He has an infinite distance left to go. An infinite number of lives he took. They ring in his ears, even still.

Stephen stumbles a circuit around the room of the ship. This is the largest area, and it will do well for what he needs. Stephen picks out five relatively evenly spaced areas of flat metal. He scrapes some of the ash off his hand, then disconnectedly pats himself down until he finds the scabbed cut on his thigh were he’d sliced himself falling down one of Titan’s ravines. Digging his fingernails beneath the scab, he slicks his hand with blood.

Then he starts to write.

He’s on the fifth sigil when the voice shocks through his concentration. “What are you doing?” Stark’s furious tone demands.

The Count pauses itself in Stephen’s mind, and he buries thoughts and anticipation and frozen, frozen fear beneath the practiced lines of the Scene. “Blood runes,” Stephen says simply.

Footsteps tell Stephen Stark has stalked closer to him. “And what the hell is that supposed to mean?”

“They’re wards,” Stephen explains. “They complete an aura of protection. The strongest there is.”

“What do they have to protect against? You killed everything in the universe, remember?”

Stephen doesn’t flinch. “The energy of the creatures who died remains. It will manifest, when there’s no life around to absorb it. Much of what forms will be vengeful, built on the fear and anger of the last moments of the universe.”

“So they want to kill you.”

Stephen finishes the rune with a flick of his wrist. “Yes.”

Stark doesn’t dispute that they should. “But they aren’t a danger to me.”

“That’s correct,” Stephen says. His voice is empty. “With water and elbow work, these runes can be scratched away without issue, and you’ll be rid of me.”

Stark inhales--a shuddering breath of rage that makes Stephen’s shoulders tense instinctually. “I don’t let magic do my dirty work, Strange,” he hisses. “I don’t load the gun and hand it off to someone else. I don’t give the Stone away and let someone else snap.”

He scoffs, and its full of enough disgust that Stephen almost thinks he’s back in the cold of Titan again. “Do whatever you want,” Stark says. He turns, already stretched to his breaking point in Stephen’s presence.

Stephen waits for the last line. The end of the Scene.

“Finish your runes. Live, if that’s what you want.”

Stark’s words echo even after he’s gone.

Stephen looks after him for a long, long moment, trying to swallow down the bitter disappointment that Stark didn’t just kill him.

----

[pandemilkbread]

nine days // bakugo katsuki

author’s note: here is the sequel to paubaya! it can be read as a stand alone fic, but it’ll feel better once you read the first one. 

please enjoy ♡ please leave a like or comment if you enjoyed it,, it’ll mean alot aaaaa. also, beware. this is pretty long! 

ʙᴀᴋᴜɢᴏ ᴋᴀᴛsᴜᴋɪ

nine days. (angst!fic) part 1

sᴜᴍᴍᴀʀʏ: It took eight, just eight days to fall in love with you; and as dense as Bakugo was, it’ll take him a lifetime (or two) to admit it.

i.

The idea of love has always been a difficult subject to comprehend. 

And to a young boy at the tender age of four, whose typical acts of love revolved on beating the crap out of anyone who dared to mess with him (or his friends, though he’d rather not call them that), the subject was more troublesome to speak out loud. 

Which was quite contrary to the Bakugo household persona that radiated pure noise throughout the whole course of the day, a feat their neighbor would love to refute if they were able to.

(how a detached and sound proof home such as theirs could release that much clamor, they hardly knew.)

However as loud as the Bakugos were, it’s a no-brainer to realize how quiet they became in regard to their own feelings. The eccentric family breathed the words “show don’t tell” like a mantra; the essence of touch being the utmost way of showing affection—something Bakugo Katsuki never truly understood until one Saturday afternoon. 

Bakugo loved his quirk. His favorite part? Not one single part, but a bunch load of favorites. 

Blasting shit into smithereens. 

Screams of wow! and cool! from his followers. 

(”the imaginary people in his head, who continually shower him with praise.” not that he’d admit it.)

The sizzle of sweat on his fingers. 

…And exactly everything else that buffed up his currently fragile ego.

The worst part? 

The smell of burnt cloth that followed his usual fits of excitement. 

The lukewarm water plummeting from the ceiling sprinklers.

…Most especially the whack that vibrated through his skull when his mother found out his only son almost managed to burn down the whole kitchen. 

He took it personally, very personally. What happened? An accident!  The All Might segment thrilled him to the point of attempting a somersault, one that he succeeded in doing! Was it his fault a measly floor couldn’t handle his greatness? Yet, how does his crappy mom reward him for this feat— a full throttle to the head. 

“Katsuki,” his father muttered, rousing him from his thoughts. The scent of antiseptic lingered in the air, forcing him to scrunch his nose in disgust. Was he so weak to need a dab of a stupid medical solution to—

“You could have gotten hurt. Don’t be stubborn.” He sighed. “Your mom was very worried.”

Bakugo grunted. ‘A pissy way of showing it!’ He’d retaliate, but the downcast glint in his father’s eyes stopped him. He was clearly worried for his son’s wellbeing. 

“...Could’ve said so.” He sputtered out. (unwillingly, of course.)

“Sometimes you have to look past words to truly understand how someone is feeling, Katsuki.” A small grin perched on Masaru’s face. “People love differently. You just need to spot how.”

ii.

“I like you! Can we please start seeing each other?”

“Hah? Who the fuck are you?”

One tear, two tears, three tears. With that, the girl ran, and down the middle school staircase she went. 

Bakugo hardly understood why he was invited to the rooftop in the first place. No. He knew a confession would take place, that was obvious. All thanks to his fellow female classmates who couldn’t stop gossiping about it. One more ‘oh God! she’s going to confess to Bakugo-san later!’ and he’d burst, literally.

No. He couldn’t grasp the whole idea of confessing your love to a stranger. Bakugo knew nothing of the teary-eyed student, except she was a crybaby. Besides, it irritated him to the point of seething. Why confess your love only to run out halfway when things go sour? 

It wasted his time. Time he could have spent training, studying, doing something important. 

Don’t misunderstand. Bakugo was not a cruel person, he never was. Just one with below par conversational skills. He wanted to know the reasons, not disregard her feelings. He wanted to understand the why’s and what’s of the equation; the basis of what directed her feelings onto him. 

But, he would never accept her proposition, even if she managed to spur out a million reasons. Bakugo never saw himself in a position to love someone, it was too troublesome. Hell, he never understood the whole idea of love itself. 

He scoffed. If he had found himself fancying a person, it would be one akin to himself. 

Someone strong. 

Someone who spoke their mind. 

Someone who could handle him. 

Someone who—

Whack! A shoe smacked him out of his dazed stupor. Apparently, the friends of so-called stranger who shuffled off the rooftop in a crying heap told what transpired. The whole girl squad fashioned themselves into a line meant to reprimand his actions. 

“You could have softened the blow, you know!” One of them hissed. “In a way that wouldn’t hurt her feelings!”

“Yeah. You’re pretty selfish, Bakugo-san. You could have at least tried to hang out before deciding!” Another chided.

The act ignited his anger, leaving him an irked mess. 

Soften the blow? What did they expect him to do? Listen to the confession wholeheartedly, seemingly interested in actually dating the other party? Hell no. Why would he do so? It would only make the rejection hurt more. No matter how you put it a rejection is still a rejection; and a rejection will hurt. 

Selfish? He had done the girl a huge favor. More or less she would finally move on and treat the event as a lesson; focus on someone who had the time for affection. 

Was it his fault for not feeling the same way? Fuck no. He owed them nothing. 

“Don’t wanna. Too much of a hassle.” Bakugo sneered. 

And, oh boy were women scary. Nothing was more terrifying than a group of women who managed to suppress Hell’s fury and rage into their whole being. Hypocrites. Speaking of softening blows when one hit from any single one of them could break bones. 

God. He hated their quirks. 

(scratch that. he hated the sound of his mother’s cackling the most. ‘now what did i tell you about pissing off girls!’ she scolded.)

iii. 

Bakugo was a lot of things: perceptive, intelligent, strong— Hell he could list down a thousand adjectives if he wanted to. But, he was never the observant one. 

Sheer power? He was fucking amazing. 

Keen leadership? Bakugo is your guy!

Socializing skills? …Working on it. But, God yeah!

As perceptive as he was, his ego took a bit of a hit the moment he crashed into her. And as much as he would like to boast it was her fault in the first place, with the stacks of books that perched on her forearms, he knew better than to daze off in the middle of a crowded hallway. 

The books shook in momentum, and in return one hand steadied the massive collection. The blonde Pikachu outwardly reached out preventing the crash, a feat Kaminari would evidently use as a bragging tool later on. 

“Ah, sorry about that! Spiky over here’s in a daze after the math quiz,” Kaminari snickered. 

“Says the cheater who got caught on question one.” Bakugo retorted with an eyeroll to match. 

The other person in question huffed out a breathy laugh, the books shook once again in reaction, forcing her to side step to balance them out. “That’s fine. Sorry for blocking the way too.” The stranger reassured. 

By then, Bakugo’s stomach growled. God was he hungry. He casually followed the flow of people toward the lunch area. A few steps later his blonde companion tapped him on the shoulder, almost frantically. 

“I-I’mma help carry the books to—” Kaminari whipped his head back and forth at him and the other person walking the opposite direction. “So... yeah! Go without me!”   

Bakugo grunted. A non-verbal consent which easily meant “go, I don’t care”, or more likely “bye. i’m fucking hungry”. He couldn’t understand why Kaminari would go that far for someone he barely knew, especially when their whole body was covered by the stacks of books. Suspicious if you asked him. 

The boy was simply unpredictable and troublesome. Nah. He had no time to think about the electrical cord, he wanted to eat. Once he arrived at the dining hall, the other three constituents of his group sat on their usual hangout place. Thankfully (he won’t admit it) the eccentric red head ordered his regular lunch for him, allowing Bakugo to immediately slide into the table. 

“Bahkuwgo! Whersh Kahmiyari?” Pinky blurted, her mouth filled with food. 

His eyebrows furrowed. Where was Pikachu? “Shithead’s busy.” 

Bakugo returned to the matter at hand, his aching stomach, and began chewing. Obviously, the angry porcupine had no time to gossip about the who, what, where, and when’s, hello? Stomach first. His ears on the other hand had no shut-off button, prompting him to listen in the conversation rather irately. 

“I told him to study! Three nights ago! And what happens? He decides to write down the whole syllabus into his hands!” 

Sero sighed. “Mina. He’s helpless and will never learn—”

“Didn’t you copy off him too?” Kirishima chortled. “I saw you look over his answers!”

The black haired boy feigned shock. “Are you assuming I cheated? I thought we were friends!” Seconds of thought later, his eyes widened in real shock. “If you saw me looking... it means you looked too!”

“Bro. I wouldn’t cheat. It’s against my honor—” 

“Oh my God! All three of you are idiots.” Mina gushed. 

“Says the girl who left the whole back page em-empty.” Sero snickered, his palm jabbing his chest to dislodge the food stuck in his throat. 

Kirishima gasped. “There’s a back page? The—”

“Hey! How do you know? You’re seated at the third row! So you’ve really been chea—”

The thwack of a lunch tray interrupted the conversation, an achievement only possible by the fourth idiot of the group. The lightning bolt returned from the alleged errand in a sputtering mess; like he would be when overloaded by his quirk, almost but not quite. 

“Denki! What took you so long? I bet Aizawa-sensei decided to talk some sense into you!” Mina teased, tilting her head in confusion when the blonde suddenly dazed off. 

Bakugo smacked the Kaminari on the forehead, rather lightly. “...Idiot’s broken.”

“No... I met an angel...” The chargebolt mumbled. 

“Here we go again.” Sero shook his head in response. “Who is it this time?”  

“Shush! She’s here!” He hissed. “Bakugo bumped into her earlier. She had these big books—”

“Bro! That’s no way to talk to a girl—” 

“No! Not that! Real books! So, they were heavy and... Yeah. I helped her carry them to Recovery Girl— and yeah!” 

“You’re not making any sense.” Sero advised. 

“Shut up! She might hear us!” Kaminari gawked. “...She’s so pretty...”

Four sets of eyes travelled towards the person the Pikachu was ogling at, a silent agreement among all five of them to be as unsuspecting as possible. Evidently, she was a simple normal high school girl whose smile seemed to radiate glee likely from her co-classmates who sat with her. 

Bakugo surveyed her face, and then onto her gestures and actions. A Goddess? Huh. The girl seemed pretty normal to him, no one special. Kaminari unmistakably gushed over another woman, like he usually did for no reason at all. 

“Where’s she from?” Bakugo asked, rather boredly.

“Ah, yeah! I don’t know.” The lover-boy continued ogling. “...She’s not from the Hero department for sure.”

“No shit, Sherlock.” 

iv. 

Bakugo hated many things; failing tests (he’s too smart to fail), winning without actual merit, God he despises losing even more, Deku (he doesn’t actually, too prideful to oppose it though), nagging— He hates Aizawa’s nagging the most. 

It must have something to do with the nonchalant tone, more like dead and spiritless if you asked him, the all knowing attitude, the deep timbre of ‘Bakugo. Fix that up. If I find out you’ve been bleeding all over the floor. Good luck.’, the threatening staring contest thereafter, and the resolution: him walking furiously to the nurses’ office. 

He groaned. It was a tiny scratch. Maybe a bruise, or two. The gash on his temple stung, not just physically. The reason why he was cut in the first place was all because of shitty Pikachu blabbing about his fucking angel. If he said “You’re just jeaaaalous” one more time, he would explode. 

Bakugo warned him. Multiple times. Kirishima could vouch it. But, no. Bolty decided to repeat the phrase manifold of times, leading him to screech a “shut the fuck up!”, causing Pinky to scream, in succession scared Shitty Hair forcing him to activate his quirk—

Fuck that. In short, it was all thanks to the living and breathing phone charger. 

Bakugo gripped the clinic door and slammed it open. The quicker he found Recovery Girl the quicker he returned to class and beat the shit out of Pikachu. Yeah. He’d do that, but instead he found her. 

For fucks sake. The indirect reason why he was in this state. 

He marched toward the desk, dragging his feet in a somewhat stomping manner. The way she blankly stared irritated him more. Was she just going to stare? Bakugo rolled his eyes. Did she think he was pathetic to come in for a slight scratch?

He had no choice. Not his fucking choice. 

“What the fuck are you looking at?” 

Finally. The girl roused from her state of daze and stood up. Now all he needed to do was ask— nah, he’d wait for the head nurse himself. 

The other person in the room darted her eyes to him and a clock on the wall almost quizzically, as if she was contemplating what to do. With that, she spun around and faced him. 

“She’s not here. Bear with it for a sec, let me get something to help.” She mumbled. 

Oh? The girl wasn’t a bystander after all. She reached for a small kit inside a cabinet in the wall. Her hands then beckoned to a chair and it was his cue to sit down. 

This gave him ample time to observe the woman who’s been driving him nuts. Through the oddball Kaminari of course. 

First of all, she was no goddess. Looked more like an enraged chipmunk on Christmas morning. Her cheeks puffed up in concentration, dabbing antiseptic on his temple. How Kaminari fell for her, he had no idea. Not surprising though, he’d fall for the whole female populace if he had the time for it. 

Second, why the fuck would he be jealous! What was there to be jealous about? Pikachu should be the envious one. The girl he fawned for happened to be the same woman in charge of cleaning his wounds. No. Not wounds. Scratches. Stupid scratches. Her eyes glazed in utter focus at the task of hand, this beat Kaminari’s “watching habits” any day. 

Hell, he was a tad excited. Using this incident as a tool to finally make the idiot shut up. The imminent power he’d have over the crappy blonde. He would bring it up on every occasion possible, well— not every one. Bakugo did have mercy for the goofball. So, maybe five times a week. Almost enough to make up for all the weeks of his bantering. 

Third, he thought, wouldn’t it be better if he introduced you to Kaminari instead? Yeah, he barely knew you. Even so, it was worth a shot. Maybe referring you to the Pikachu would be better in the long run. Maybe, the experience could humble him. Bakugo shook his head. No. Even if he managed to coerce you into meeting Bolty, there was no guarantee you’d actually like him. 

Then there was the impending heartbreak and sobbing and whining and complaining. Nevermind. He’d go through so much shit for a tiny bit of satisfaction. Scratch that. 

Anyway, what was so great about you? You weren’t from the hero course. Obviously. Bakugo knew most of the students from that department. Although he couldn’t remember names, faces seemed to pop up in his mind. You didn’t have an awesome quirk. Hell, if you did, he recalled no one who looked like you from the sports festival. Business department? He assumed people like them don’t intern for the clinic. General department then? 

Bakugo growled. Why was he trying to understand you? You were nothing to him. A simple stranger who crossed paths with first time, and highly for the last time once the whole ordeal was over. God. He’ll kill Kaminari for this. 

At that instant, Bakugo felt repetitive pressure on head. It took him a few seconds to realize she patted him. Like a kid!? Fuck no. His ego couldn’t take her treating him as a child. A small vein popped on his forehead and when he was about to berate her for her actions, apparently she spoke first. 

“Good boy, you can leave now.” With. A. Matching. Grin.

Fuck no. This was worse. You didn’t treat him as a child, he was a pet to you! A pet? Why a pet!? He wanted to wipe that dumb smile off your face. You were exactly more annoying than Pikachu ever was! 

Her cheeks flooded pink from the small laugh she released.  Bakugo’s eyes hovered over to yours and one though popped up: cute. 

What. The. Actual. Fuck. 

Imaginary steam evaporated from the top of his head. Cute? Cute! Gross. The woman in front of him wasn’t cute. She was fucking annoying. He bet his mind spelled u.g.l.y wrong. The scratch on his head fucked up his intellect. 

Bakugo immediately stood up, pointing an accusing finger at her. “What’dya call me, ugly!?”

v. 

Anyone who thought Bakugo was the type of person to run away from a fight would be met with the indignant monster himself, threatening the offender with fury akin to the devil.  

It’ll take a million years before Bakugo willingly scampered off the battlefield without dealing a punch (or two). 

However it would take longer for him to admit he was running away from you. No. He wasn’t ‘running’ per se, he was observing the situation. The whole clinic event left him irked and in a sense, intrigued. 

Now that he thought about it, anyone who met his “angry” side were prone to either a. running; b. crying; c. anger; and d. all of the above; and in rare cases: e. laughing. He assumed anyone who laughed at him after his usual feats of anger were the real creepy ones— or idiots reincarnate. 

The moment he knew of her existence, he found himself noticing her more and more. He remembered specs of her daily routine from mere perception, something he hated he did, yet couldn’t stop. 

She hated tomatoes, he gathered from a passing conversation on the way to the lunch room. 

She hated snakes even more. Something to do with a childhood fear that forced her to go to the hospital. 

She loved reading, he presumed with all the books she had on the top of the desk in the library. 

As much as it irritated him to realize she took up a part of his thoughts (a big part, really), it pisses him off further when she spotted him looking at her as well. That led her to offer him a smile, sometimes a nose scrunch, other days furrowed eyebrows in confusion, but most of the time you never noticed the blonde hero student glancing at your direction. 

Well, that’s fine with him. More time to speculate the shitty woman who managed to take up his time. 

She took the courage to approach him one day. Bakugo knew she headed to his table in the library. So what does he do the moment her eyes met his in an attempt to introduce herself? Run. He fucking runs. 

An accomplishment that only happened when the world split into two. 

Yet, here were are on Day Four: Bakugo Ignores Gen. Girl to Restore His Self-Esteem. Part one of the “he was caught looking multiple times and almost confronted” franchise. This happened for quite a while, pretty easy actually. Both of your schedules never met, the only times he caught a whip of your existence were in the library (your humble abode) and the clinic (your humble abode part two). 

Obviously, he avoided both places like the plague. 

His plan worked for a while. 

(for the first five days, honestly.)

Bakugo’s broke his streak one lunch afternoon. He caught her eye the exact moment she looked at his, inciting a silent battle of leering. She grinned set out to stir his anger and he glared right back. The fight lasted for minutes neither parties admitting defeat, earning the attention of his fellow lunchmates. 

“Bakugo? Could you teach me this later?” Mina pleaded. “If I fail one more quiz I’d be dumber than Denki!” 

“Hey! I studied this time. I bet I might get a higher score than Midoriya this time!” Kaminari disagreed, flicking the girl’s forehead. 

“Finish eating already. We might be late again...” Sero sighed. “God. Aizawa-sensei gives me the chills...”

The red head of the group noticed Bakugo’s full tray and focused glare first. Kirishima lightly tapped the blonde, earning a grunt in response. Kirishima’s eyes then followed his line of sight to see the girl Kaminari has been talking about nonstop, and stop he did weeks ago. 

“Ah. You know her, Bakugo?” Kirishima whispered. “You might... with that staring contest going on between you.”

“No. I don’t.” Bakugo scowled, in concentration. 

Sero, who was in close proximity, heard the short discussion and pulled the other blonde by the ear. “Yo, Denki. Isn’t that Goddess #18?” 

“Ah!” Denki immediately covered his ears. “Stop! Can’t handle it! Don’t even mention her anymore— Bakugo ruined the whole experience! Remember Goddess #20? Yes. I’mma stick with her.”

“Woah... Bakugo that’s one intense stare you have. Don’t tell me... you’re dating her!” Mina gushed. “Denki you never stood a chance!” She laughed. 

“Who would like that— ugly!” Bakugo chided. 

“No wonder you hated it. You were reaaaally jealous, huh?” The Pikachu sang. “It’s fine with me. You have my permission.” 

Bakugo fumed. “I don’t need your permission to do anything!” 

Kirishima blinked. “Oh, you were serious, bro? You do like her?” 

“You’re all fucking annoying! Shut the fuck up!” 

Sero grinned, a wide cheshire smile. “You know what this means? Time to meet the princess who stunned the angry dragon.” He stood up. 

Mina understood the signal and followed suit. “Watch Bakugo for us, Kiri! We’re going to— Denki. You’re coming too.” She pulled the latter by the arm, dragging him unwillingly. 

“I don’t wanna!” Kaminari cried. 

“Hurry up. She could have pretty friends—”

“Ah? Let’s go.” The blonde picked up his weight and dashed. 

The remaining two students sat in silence. Bakugo groaned in frustration. He’s going to kill all four of them. Maybe a slower death for Spiky Hair since he called their attention in the first place. Bakugo smacked his head on the table. 

For fucks sake. Out of all the times they had to notice, why now? God. He hated his friends. 

Kirishima patted his back, gently. He did not want to enrage the irritated Bakugo even further. “There’s no harm in meeting someone new, right? Think of it as a — fun experience.”

Fun, alright. Bakugo was going to have fun beating his friends up. 

(says the angry pomeranian who heeded, and plomped down on the seat next to the stranger— not so unfamiliar anymore, almost happily. well, in his own way.)

vi. 

You and Bakugo were polar opposites; the duo that clashed every second possible. 

Believe it or not, the slightest of jabs ignited an argument so intense that calling the fire department would be justifiable. 

(alright. this may sound over dramatic. but, hey. it came from kaminari himself. dramatics beget drama.)

One argument in particular stood out among the rest. It started little, truly. A small squabble, really. 

Bakugo preferred sweets, she hated them. 

He liked mathematics, she detested the subject.

He thrived with attention, she favored staying in the sidelines. 

He loved the winter, she wished for summer. 

And one phrase led to another, one plain phrase led to an even more painful prick, and in conclusion—

“You’re quirkless. Stop complaining.”

happened. 

Bakugo never meant for the remark to hurt your feelings. It was a smooth attempt to disguise his embarrassment; you begged to hold his hand. Utterances of ‘we’re friends!’ and ‘don’t be shy!’ irked him. How the fuck was it possible to stay calm when the simplest brush of your hand against his, sent him into a frenzy?

Safety. He rebutted. It was for your safety. As much as he’d like to hold your hand with his—

(he’d die before admitting it, though.)

that quirk of his, stopped him. Sweat triggered his quirk. The very instance of the substance forming in his hands could cause an explosion. He doubted you’d be thankful spending Christmas in a hospital, your parents resorting to call a lawsuit. 

Was warmth a suitable reason to lose an arm? Hell no. Bakugo knew you hated winter, and all sorts of cold weather. Yet, he’s not stupid enough to risk your safety for something so... immaterial. 

Her words of ‘you’re selfish, Bakugo!’ prickled his skin. It was an innocent jab, he knew it was a joke. Still, if you haven’t understood the way his quirk worked. He thought it would be better for you to learn the hard way. 

And bingo. Bakugo said it. 

“You’re quirkless. Stop complaining.” 

Little did he know those words impacted his companion harsher than he initially thought. 

A small forced laugh came from your lips, compelling you to step sideward. An attempt to move yourself farther from him. “We should hurry up. I don’t think they’d like cold pizza.” 

Bakugo nodded, unconsciously watching your every move. He understood the topic of your quirklessness was taboo. A sort of innermost disappointment, and the focus of childhood bullying. He should have phrased it in a better way... a small part of him thought maybe, you wouldn’t get hurt, a way to attest your friendship. 

He grunted. His mom would kill him if she found out it was his fault. And knowing the woman’s personality, he preferred not being chewed out in front of his schoolmates. With a sigh, Bakugo unshuffled his muffler and wrapped it around his female buddy. 

“Next time, wear something thicker. I won’t always be here to save your ass.”

Her eyes blinked in succession. Her eyebrows furrowed after. Roughly, comprehending his actions. 

She beamed. “Oh? Is little Bakugo apologizing?” Her fingers twisted the pizza box, forcing it onto his hands. “Then carry this ‘oh holy’ one. I might forgive you then.”

“Fine. Crappy woman.” Bakugo grumbled, tugging her forward by pulling his muffler. “Hurry. I’m hungry.”

By 5:30 P.M., the pizza deliverers (Bakugo and her, the idiots who lost at rock, paper, scissors) arrived at the Bakugo household with the food. The appearance of the two prompted cheers and yells from Mina, Kaminari, and Sero who huddled on the couch. 

“What took you so long? Imagine listening to Denki sing the karaoke for hours!” Mina whined. 

Sero jested. “Next time, we forget inviting him. This early Christmas celebration can carry itself without his presence.”

“Get the fucking pizza yourself then! Stupid crowds hogging the whole pizza place...” Bakugo threw the box at the group, instantaneously, marching towards Kirishima.  

“Bakugo! B-Becareful!” Kaminari worried. “If it’s destroyed... you... get a new one!”

Heh. Like the expensive meal couldn’t handle a bit of force. Bakugo stomped towards the redhead and took a soda from the table nearest to him. 

Kirishima rose his eyebrows. “So. Had fun?” He elicited an all-knowing grin. “I think you did.”

“Shut up!” Bakugo hissed, eyes wandering to the bundle of people on the couch. 

“You know, you’re too obvious.” He laughed. “Well, except for one of us. That one has no idea.”

“I don’t fucking know what you’re talking about.”

“You don’t? Or you’re pretending not to?”

“Ugly’s a friend!” 

Kirishima hummed. “Alright, bro. I won’t pressure you into talking about it.”

A loud pop interrupted their conversation. Kaminari opened a fizzed up can of cola, the drink sprouted into Mina’s face. “I’m going to kill—”

“But, If you want something to happen though. You have to learn to speak up, Bakugo.”

vii.

“Come on, Bakugo! Just this once, please!” Mina begged. “It’ll be great for everyone! Don’t you feel sorry for Denki... He’s been cramming for days!”

“That’s what the gets for playing the whole weekend.”

“Please! I promise we’ll make it up to you!” 

“No. Too much of a hassle.”

“C’mon... Princess, help?” The pink haired student gestured to the other girl in the group. 

You sighed. “Mina, he doesn’t want to do it.”

“See, ugly agrees!”

“...Oh, wait. On the other hand, Bakugo’s too busy to teach. Mina, try asking Midoriya to help.” Her eyes met his in a stare off. “He’s got the time, especially when he’s so busy himself.”

She knew using his rival’s name as a bargaining chip kindled his anger. It was his fault for calling her such an offensive nickname in the first place. 

“Might let Pikachu teach you math too. You’re dumber at it than he is.”

“Oh? I should let him. He’s better at teaching than you are!”

Mina glanced back and forth between the two parties. A silent ‘oh boy, this will not end well.’ featured on her face. Pinky shook her head, and placed a hand on Bakugo’s shoulder. 

“It’s fine! Stop arguing, really.” Mina murmured. 

“No. She started it.”

“Don’t be a child, Bakugo! …Oh, you scared?” Ugly taunted. “I might beat your score in math.”

“Hah? You, the flunk? Fine. I’ll teach the shitty subject.” Bakugo grinned. “Any score lower than mine means you owe me one.”

And she gulped, anxiously. 

This became the humble beginnings of how Bakugo became the professor of the study group, ultimately leading to her doom. He was excited. Oh, what shit he’d make her do in retaliation. 

He agreed on the following terms: library after classes, subjects will be appointed beforehand, anyone skipping must be told in advance... and fifty other rules so on and so forth. 

And on the third week of the so-called cramming agenda, four of his classmates decided not to attend, leaving him and ugly as the remaining participants. The whole point of the activity was to teach the idiots, if they don’t show up why was he here?

Bakugo scanned through the math test he gave his companion. First, she was no idiot. There were hardly any errors, if there was, he presumed it was her faulty writing and adding. Solutions were well done, the logic was there. The problem? Yes. The idiot forgot her calculator. 

He clicked his tongue. The assumption was apparent, the whole back page had scribbles of numbers, divides, and all the shit. Why the hell did she not have a calculator? Forgetful one she was. 

And second, why the fuck was she dozing off? Sure, mathematics was a boring subject. Sure, he was a boring teacher. Sure, he was teaching them to pass the subject. They should all be grateful for his fucking effort. 

The hues of the sunset danced on her skin, the reds and oranges bounced on her hair radiating a wave of light. Her head perched on her crossed arms on the table, the head leaning slightly right. He saw the dark pigments below her eyes. 

Must have been studying hard, huh? Bakugo knew the girl was on a scholarship. It’s been discussed millions of times. He realized the pressure must have gotten to her, especially being one of the only quirkless students in the school. Seemingly, all she had to offer was her bright intellect. 

(not all. she was way better than most of the students in the whole department! bakugo punched anyone who thought otherwise.)

“...Do you like someone?” She muttered. 

What? In a split second, he focused his eyes on the girl in front of him. She stayed in the same sleepy position as earlier, convincing him she might have been talking in her sleep. Shaking his head, he returned back to the papers in his hands. 

Minutes later a sudden tap on the table prompted him to look at his companion. Her eyes gazed at him with such intensity, his stomach jumped. Somersaults, loops, rollercoasters. God. This only happened after a punch to the gut in battle. The woman was supposed to be asleep! What the fuck was she doing awake. 

Oh. So, she did ask the question. Was he supposed to answer? Silence is an answer. Knowing the girl, any answer he’d give sired more questions. God. He wanted to leave. What was the shittiest answer he could give her. Yeah.

“...Shut up, extra.” 

Perfect. Now back to the question at hand. What kind of fucked up person willingly confesses ‘You. Stupid. I like you.’ without proof the other party felt the same? It was simply a formula to fail. 

Hold. 

The. 

Fuck. 

Up. 

Did he really think he liked her? No. Brain thought wrong. Brain really thought fucking wrong. Just because he hated it when she focused on people who weren’t him doesn’t mean he likes her. Just because he’d break someone’s face for talking shit about her doesn’t mean he cares like that. Just because every retort she said in retribution turned him on doesn’t mean he wanted to kiss her. 

Fuck. He wanted to kiss her. 

Kiss her badly. 

He wanted to grab her by the collar and just kiss her. 

God. He hated it. 

The girl abruptly reached for his collar, pulling him towards her. “Who is it?” She whispered. 

Oh fuck. The cogs in his brain twisted and turned. Did he say it out loud? Did he fucking say that out loud? What the fuck was he doing? Who is it? What the fuck were you talking about? 

Who is it? Who was who? He hated cryptic messages. His eyes searched for meaning on your features. A person? Who?

Ah. You asked who he liked. 

Great. What was he supposed to say? It’s you, ugly! Wake up! He’d burn in hell before speaking up. 

One name popped up. Miruko’s agency. Rumi. The woman he was interning for. Like crap she’d find out about it. 

“Rumi, her name’s Rumi.”

viii.

12:00 P.M.

bakugo: i’m hungry

bakugo: bring ur snacks

12:50 P.M.

bakugo: u not gonna eat huh?

bakugo: suit urself brat

3:00 P.M. 

bakugo: think u gonna win the bet now aren’t ya

bakugo: keep ignoring me maggot

bakugo: fine

5:00 P.M. 

bakugo: spiky hair said to come 

bakugo: he has shitty fish crackers for food

bakugo: the fuck??????

bakugo: you ignore me and answer his calls?????

Bakugo was not an avid texter. Most of his messages consisted of ‘ok’, ‘nice’, ‘no’, curses, other single word messages, sometimes barely a reply at all. The sheer amount of effort he put into texting you proved otherwise. Yet...

Read. Read. Read. 

All of his messages sent to you were on read. What he fuck was going on? For five days, she’s been missing in action. He tried everything. 

Inviting the woman to lunch. Ignored.

Reminding her of the cram session. Bailed. 

Snacks! You loved snacks! Ignored again. 

Bakugo was this close to shoving you up against the wall and forcing the shit out of you. What did he do so wrong? Oh, was it the kiss thing? Did he say it out loud? Your face showed no clear answer at the time. Your deadpan expression irritated him. 

What if he wanted to kiss you? Was that shit so bad?

That had to be it. 

You weren’t ignoring Spiky hair, Pikachu, Duct Tape, and Pinky— then it had something to do with him. 

He grunted. Swiping the contacts on his phone, he hovered over the one named ‘Ugly’ and tapped it. Bakugo disabled the block function. 

If you weren’t talking to him, fine, he won’t fucking talk to you. 

(yes. he was that petty.)

Streams of notifications buzzed. All of them coming from you. 

Ugly: 6 P.M.

Ugly: Outside 3-A. 

Ugly: Don’t be late.

Ugly: stupid.

Fucking finally. The woman finally decided to text back. 

A meeting place? For what?

The exams were over. A celebration party then. No. Why was the location at 3A then? Oh. The bet. She wanted to compare answers for the shitty bet. 

Bakugo flicked his phone on. 6:25 P.M. 

Amazing. He was fucking late. 

The distance from the faculty room and the third year homerooms were near. It took him no time at all to stomp all the way to the designated meeting spot. Why you couldn’t have texted the shit down, he hadn’t understood. 

Bakugo sported a look of annoyance the moment he found you. Shitty woman. 

“You finally decide to text me back, shithead.” He cursed. 

The girl fashioned an amused expression. “Hm. You missed me?”

Of, course he did. How crappy of you to fill his thoughts of only you, annoy him ‘til worlds end, only for him to be forgotten and ignored. Like a thrown away puppy on the sidewalk. 

“Who would miss you, ugly.” He fumed. 

Yeah. That’s what you get for pretending he didn’t exist. You can’t leave him begging for your attention, that was something shitty fan girls did. And she stood there feigning ignorance of the whole ordeal. He bet she never even noticed he blocked her. 

She erupted in giggles, clutching her stomach as the stronghold. “I’m sorry. The exams were really difficult.”

You bet they were terrible. They had the same general education syllabus, except for major hero subjects and courses. The outright tears Pikachu shed after the math exam proved its difficulty. Bakugo bet she cried after the exam as well. 

Might figure out the task he would make her do. Something embarrassing? No. He wasn’t that cruel. A weird prank? What prank though—

“I missed you too, Katsuki.” She consoled. 

Of, course you did. Who wouldn’t miss him? The dweeb better be thankful he blessed the his friendship onto her. 

(though, he’d like a little bit more than that.)

Hah! Bakugo could force her to buy him a new muffler. The one he had disappeared (into her closet) and wanted a new one. 

Katsuki. 

Katsuki. Katsuki.

Fuck. She called him by his first name. And he only noticed it— now? Gears and cogs twirled within his consciousness. What did it mean? What did that mean? God. He hated it. Was that your way of showing your love? Did that love mean affection as relationship or love as friendship?

Fuck. He couldn’t tell. 

Yet, he knew one thing. 

He wanted to kiss you so bad. 

The snickers and giggles from the people outside the room stopped him though. His shithead friends managed to ruin it, yet again. 

Heh. Maybe next time. 

Love has always been a difficult subject to comprehend, and for Bakugo whose typical acts of love revolved around teasing, and riling you up, the subject was more troublesome to speak out loud. 

However, you were worth the trouble. 

Now, you just needed to spot how. 

[miss-kittys-magical-library]

Auld Lang Syne (Jack x Rin)

Word Count: 3200

Warnings: None! Complete fluff.

A/N: inspired by @magic-multicolored-miracle winter prompts. New Year's kiss. o one asked for it 🤣 This is a sequel to "I'm A Creep" <-- Found here

She came to this little bookstore as many days a week as time allowed. Maybe it was becoming a bit obsessive, Rin’s constant reasons to spend hours there instead of a library. There was a collection of unread novels piling up on the coffee table of her council flat off the high street. Any excuse to be nearby

With the holidays fast approaching, her catering job kept her busier than ever. The constant flirting and serving and pleasing executives and drunk administratives and book editors and bankers managed to fend off the memories of the last time she ended up in the psych hospital. That and plenty of time made everything slow down and spread out over days instead of the constant hours she once spent. Her senses now and then brought Jack back to her like the waves in his mental pond crashing over her. She would be taken off guard for just a moment or two, but the parties kept them back at bay.

Two months in the psych hospital was all they spent together. A month that seeped into her dreams and waking moments for half a year after Rin was released. How she and Jack never spoke again after that night. He grinned awkwardly in her direction during their next group therapy session. Squinting his eyes like he was trying to place where he knew her from, but that was part of her gift. Sometimes, they woke up from a dream and forgot she was ever apart of them.

Before Rin could blink, Emma had come to take Jack home. Emma who smiled fondly at the “barking” girl with scarred hands who carried the flame of hope from her heart to her brother. At least that's what she communicated to Rin as they brushed fingertips on the way out. Jack was safe. He was loved. Emma would make sure he could handle the world without messages and the dead people who plagued him for so long. A few more days, and Rin was dropped back out in the world too.

Still, as the song goes, she learned to muddle through somehow. It had been a rather peculiar stretch of time Rin had gone without thinking of his unearthly eyes or that mass of dark curls on her neck and chest as they.. A bell over a door she didn't remember stepping in broke her out of the reverie.

Rin found herself inside a small shop with shelves eight or nine feet high. That musty smell of tangible books invaded her nostrils and she inhaled deeply. With eyes closed, she put her hand on the first row she could find and melted into the memories imprinted on them. She was struck by an unexpected wave, but instead of drowning she rode it to shore. There was a squeaky creak that often accompanies a wheel and just knew someone was on one of those ladders that glided across the shelves.

“You alright, loov?” that Yorkshire accent filled Rin’s ears and she squeezed her eyes shut tighter. “You look like you've seen a ghost,” he chuckled at a joke he felt only he understood.

He was a few feet above her when she finally opened her eyes. He dipped precariously from the ladder like he was swinging from a rope on a pirate ship. Those eyes shining brightly as they reflected the white lights decorating the store. Rin didn’t need to touch him to know he was happy. She could see it on his face as he smiled in her direction. Even in hospital she never knew he had dimples.

“Jack,” it came out before she could help herself.

He arched an eyebrow curiously in her direction. Head tilted in thought. Then looking down at his name tag he puffed air out of his nostrils “Right,” he tapped it “Forgot I was wearing this.”

Rin’s shoulders sagged in defeat, then unexpectedly “Have any Dickens?”

What the hell, she chided herself.

“Do we also have tea in the Queen’s country?” he teased. Rin’s cheeks grew hot with embarrassment. “sometimes we forget all the books we've read. I've forgotten loads since I was sick a few years back. Lived rough then was in hospital while. Dunno why I said that.”

“I think we tell strangers our secrets because we’ll never have to see them again,” Rin spoke softly.

“If you never come back, I was a bad salesman. Always looking for repeats.” Was.. he flirting? “Any Dickens will do?”

“Oliver Twist?” Rin signed and closed her eyes. Her face was on fire. You've had sex with this bloke, and he's got no bloody clue.

“Oi! I like Edwin Drood best. Old man dropped dead right in the middle of it all. Never got a proper ending. Ever been on one of these?” Jack gestured towards the ladder. Rin shook her head so he opened an arm. “Hop on with us then!”

“You give all the girls a ride?” Rin found her voice. She climbed up and settled herself against Jack’s body. Her naked hand closed over his; she felt a jolt go through his chest which tensed in response.

“Not- Not usually?” he stammered and tightened his grip around Rin’s waist as they slid along the shelves. “Do we know each other from somewhere? You just feel familiar. Dunno why I'm thinking of a bird.” Jack spoke more to himself.

“Well, actually, name is Wren-”

He cut her off, “But your brother couldn't say it right, so everyone calls you Rin.”

Jack’s body relaxed into the young woman’s. Maybe it was reflex, but he cautiously buried his face in her hair and inhaled.

Rin swallowed a smile, and found little ways to touch him that day. Little ways to touch exposed parts of Jack everytime she visited the store. Innocent explanations for their hands lingering when he handed her the twentieth book she didn't need. To flirtatiously brush the curls away from his forehead as he leaned over the counter when they talked.

And almost every single time Jack leaned into it. Reciprocated. Started remembering little parts of Rin from their time in section. Not the big messy memories, just bursts from time to time. She was ok with that. She would take him anyway she could.

Now here she was, two days before Christmas with her hands on the ornaments in the shop window. She had something wrapped in brown paper in her purse and was biding her time as Jack helped the customers buying last minute gifts.

Soon it was her turn, and Rin placed the gift on the counter simultaneously with Jack doing likewise. There was unexpected laughter, the way Jack's tapered off into a giggle from a loud outburst. Infectious as it was, Rin joined in.

“If we got each other identical presents, you're coming to mine for New Year’s,” it wasn't a question. “Emma and her partner know you somehow. Must be from around the visitor’s during..” His voice trailed off.

“Our time in the nuthouse?” Rin offered.

Jack leaned over and brushed his nose against Rin’s cheek out of the blue. They lingered momentarily, before he pressed his forehead to hers.

“I've done that before,” another assertion as his verdant gaze settled on Rin’s lips.

Picking up the package, Rin shoved it playfully into Jack’s chest so that he was forced back. “Open your gift!”

“Fine!”

Jack mimicked her tone as he tore into the wrapping paper at the same Rin dove into hers. They both held up books simultaneously and fell into a fit of giggles.

“OLIVER TWIST!”

“EDWIN DROOD?!”

In unison: “FIRST EDITION?!”

“I can't believe I never knew how much you loved books,” Rin was blunt.

“I'm not sure how much we spoke for you to find out.” Jack hugged the book tightly to his chest. “I'm not sure how much I spoke to anyone outside of group and therapy.”

Rin took one of her million chances when she placed the palm of her hand against Jack’s cheek. He relaxed into the touch, eyes closed and sighed contentedly. Under the surface he was warm and bright like the Christmas lights. She wouldn't let herself pass any further than the happy memories. Impassioned ones of mouths and hands and fingertips and hugs.

Perhaps it was the particular sensation Rin spread out from herself to Jack that triggered a reaction. One of him leaning across the countertop to bring their lips together in a chaste kiss that lingered longer than it should have.

Jack recovered and righted himself before apologizing. He was compelled in the moment out of gratitude. “Meet us here on New Year’s, yeah? So we don't have to be alone.”

“You've got family, Jack.” Rin reminded him.

“So we don't have to be alone for the New Year,” he only repeated. It was a date.

------

Rin took the early shift on New Year’s Eve so she could tear out and get ready. The nerves coiled in her stomach as she scrambled to fix hair that wouldn't fall right or apply make-up that made her resemble a street walker. She sighed, defeated, and told herself this was all she could give.

Still Jack threw a large grin in her direction as he closed up the shop. He wolf whistled and Rin felt her face catch fire.

“Aren't you a stunner?” he pecked her cheek and gave the woman before him a spin. She loved the way it came out sounding like “stoonah.”

“You got a big date or something?” he teased before taking her by the hand.

“I needed extra money for the holiday so I thought I'd hang around a street corner. Fifty quid and a warm cot, I'll do whatever you like” Rin shrugged and winked coyly.

Jack rolled his eyes, but his demeanor changed as he traced the network of scars on the back of her hand so delicately Rin felt tears in her eyes. She swiped at them swiftly hoping he thought it was the chilled breeze.

“Dunno why I did tha,” he dropped the hand abruptly and buried his own in a jacket pocket. “Not my place to touch (tooch) you when you didn't ask.”

Uncomfortable silence.

“does anyone else work here besides you?” Rin gestured towards the store as they started walking, she assumed, to Emma’s house.

“Sometimes Emma and Billy. Only when I get too overwhelmed.”

Rin linked her arm with Jack's to break the weird tension. “Do you manage it?”

“I own it. Why need a job? Maybe a bit of a conflict if the boss has a bit of a flirt with the shopgirl innit?”

“OWN IT?!”

Jack laughed, “Not bad for a nutter who talks to dead people and was not long for Big Issue. Why do I say this shit to you?!”

“I'm like a truth serum?” she offered.

They wound their way through a lovely neighbor with houses no one Rin knew could afford. She remembered Jack’s brother-in-law was a lawyer. He told her his sister left him not long after he got out. Had to be spousal support and a settlement, but she didn't prod.

“I helped someone a while back. Someone kinda connected. Well-known, I guess? I tried to sort out his missus when she tried suicide.”

“It didn't work in the end.”

“At first. It's how I got sectioned. The voices. His voice. She was ok for a bit. His family sent me letters. They figured I knew something. What I knew got them a conviction. I got a reward. Doesn’t always feel like one if everyone’s dead now does (dooz) it?”

It was Rin’s turn to lace her fingers with Jack's. “You helped someone's family find peace. Sometimes that's enough even if you kinda lose yourself in the process. Look I let what I can do almost kill me. That’s what put me in hospital.” She held up the gashed scar along her wrist. “But that gave me yo-” Rin swallowed the word. “I got to use my gift one last time. And he's happy! Even if he forgets who I am.”

“Who could ever forget you, love?”

They were quiet the rest of the journey.

-----

Rin sat on the edge of the pool as her feet dangled in the bath warm water. Her brain flashed back to the lake where she experienced Jack drowning in his own mind. Bogged down by medication he didn't need while the dead clung to him. Then they had surfaced, she nearly torn apart by the ghosts Jack fought with. Bellowed that he was no longer their messenger. They tried to take her as compensation.

Now false water filled Rin’s lungs as a fake grin spread across her cheeks. The chlorine and tropical air made her nauseous, ready to vomit. Of all the things Jack could have suggested they do, swimming at 11pm would not have ever crossed her mind.

“There was a kid, lived here before Emma, died right. Mean little bastard too. Suppose dying like that might get a kid angry as long as he was tied to it.”

Jack stood on the pool’s edge, toes curled around the stone. His face went a bit dark as he narrowed his eyes in the direction of something Rin couldn't see in the opposite corner. He clenched his fists. She knew it was a silent standoff between Jack, and most likely, the dead boy.

It was only a flash of his old self before Jack snapped to. He grinned like the Cheshire cat as he undid his jeans and tore his sweater off. Then headfirst into the deep end leaving Rin to squeal.

“WHAT are you doing?!” she yelled as he bolted towards her underwater.

“Dunno fancied a swim. It's rather lovely water considering it's January. Plus,” he pointed towards the ceiling, “Look up.”

Rin followed his finger and gazed upwards. A large glass window spread the night sky before them. Millions of stars shone through, stars she never really bothered searching for. She was overwhelmed by other people's emotions, literally, that she never had a quiet moment to herself so that she COULD look up.

“Don't you wanna to join me?” Jack’s question was rather coy as he side-stroked back and forth.

Rin shook her head, “I'll sit here and watch.” She glanced down at the wine bottle she nearly forget, “And drink.” So they did.

Now her anxiety was churning her stomach. A coat of alcohol warmed her further than just the temperature of the pool room. Her chest was tight with lack of oxygen as she struggled to not cry. So she focused on the long, thin body completely relaxed on the water's surface. What a lovely distraction it was.

Jack floated along lazily on his back, boxers leaving nothing to the imagination. That secret part of him Rin had not seen in two years clearly visible. Now her face grew flush with desire and the memory of how good it felt for once to be touched by a man because he cared about her. How they made each other sing.

Jack must have sensed something because he righted himself and swam towards her. Those hands on her calves and knees to part them slightly so he can stand between them. He was silent as he reached for the bottle of wine.

“Rin, be honest,” his voice filled the silence of the room. “Can you swim?”

Rin's heart pounded so loudly in her ears that Jack was muffled. The way he looked at her, desire emanated from him. There was a disconnect between his brain and body. Those hands on her thighs remembered exploring her but the rest of him didn't. They lingered between innocence and the verge of obscenity. If he wanted, Rin would have sex with him while a houseful of people partied and danced within ear shot.

“i can swim!”

Jack pushed off the wall and splashed her in the process. “Do you think I'm sexy?” he was drunk. Head tilted as the wet curls clung to his face.

“A blind person would think you're sexy. You're taking the piss because I won't get in.”

“Of course I am! Come on. I'll hold you?” he raised an eyebrow. “It's almost midnight. I want to be with you when it is.”

“We're together enough, Jack”

“No!” he waved his hands. “I want to hold you.I don't know why, I know I have before? I feel like there's just this.. Ever since you came to the store it’s been like trying to remember a dream I had once. And some part of me is saying you know how to help because you've done it before?”

Realization spread across Jack's face, “Rin, am I the one who forgot you?”

“It happens sometimes. I think.. I think my abilities shut off a part of people who no longer need me or want me?” she shrugged it off.

“How could I not want you?”

It was such an innocent thing to ask. One Rin had asked herself every time someone used her. Her parents turned her into a sideshow freak for their religion. Men and their sick desires that she tapped into. Even she didn't want herself most of the time.

But Jack had been alone. Left to his own devices and literally haunted. Rin never needed to touch him to know how sad he had been when he first was sectioned. It emanated from him. He knew about self isolation and mistrust. And especially about gifts that would ruin you if they could.

There wasn't a thought left. Spurned on by the purity of his question, Rin hurried out of her clothes and eased herself into the pool. She swam as quickly as her body allowed before throwing herself in Jack's waiting arms.

Their arms and legs tangled together in the water. Rin wrapped herself around Jack's hips, her arms draped across broad shoulders. She twisted her fingers up in his hair and let her body meld into his.

Jack held Rin's head in his hands. Their foreheads pressed together as he nudged the tip of his nose along her face. Careful, at first,

to only brush his lips on her cheeks and eyelids. Then the countdown started.

Everyone in the house started counting down excitedly, and Jack stopped being cautious. It was cliché how their mouths found one another hungrily as the guests screamed Happy New Year! How Rin's empathic touch sent a wave of electricity that visibly shocked Jack's body as they began to sing. As if she plugged his body into his brain and there was a spark that brought him to life.

Should auld acquaintance be forgot

And never brought to mind?

Should auld acquaintance be forgot

For days of Auld Lang Syne

They relaxed into one another. Their kisses became languid but no less passionate. Everyone stormed the pool around them, splashing and laughing and hollering. Emma drunkenly interrupted the couples’ warring lips and tongues.

“Took you fucking long enough,” she teased her baby brother. “I kept hoping this would happen.”

Rin buried her face in Jack's chest as he held her tight. That bright fire that flowed from Emma to her and Rin to Jack back in hospital took root again in this house and pool.

“Me too.”

We’ll take o cup of kindness yet

For days of auld lang syne

[sgtmaveerick]

Annotated Bibliography

1. García, J. and Murillo, C. (2020), "Sports video games participation: what can we learn for esports?", Sport, Business and Management, Vol. 10 No. 2, pp. 169-185. [Accessed Dec 6, 2020] 

This article by Jaume García & Carles Murillo examines three concerns related to playing esports video games: the profile of participants in these games and their interests, their complementarity with traditional sports, and their perception of these games as a sport. The authors aim to contribute to the observed literature on sports video games and esports by offering data using various procedures concerning the notion of esports as a sport. These examinations are accomplished by applying the Survey of Sporting Habits in Spain 2015, produced by the Spanish Higher Sports Council (Ministry of Education, Culture and Sport, 2016).

As an esport gamer myself, I find the article engrossing and informative for my research. Understanding these studies will be useful in my practice as it will help me realise the influence of the expanding trend of esports on the sports industry as well as the video games industry.

2. Roettl, J. and Terlutter, R. (2018). The Same Video Game in 2D, 3D or Virtual Reality – How Does Technology Impact Game Evaluation and Brand placements? PLOS ONE, 13(7), p.e0200724. [Accessed Dec 1, 2020].‌

This article examines the experience of the players of an identical video game played in different modes, 2D, 3D and VR. The three variables the authors focus on for this research are presence, attitude towards the video game and arousal while playing video games. The research also focuses on the effects on brands placed in video games. For this, the authors analyse factors such as attitude towards the placed brands and remembrance for the placed brands.

I find the article useful for my study as it reflects the assessment of video games and the brand placements by analysing players' responses towards a 2D, 3D and a VR video game. This will help me gain knowledge about the advantages and the disadvantages, which I can use to reduce the harm to a game's rating.

3. Kowert, R. and Thorsten Quandt (2015). The Video Game Debate Unravelling the Physical, Social, and Psychological Effects of Digital Games. 1st Edition ed. Routledge. Available at: “https://www-taylorfrancis-com.ezproxy.herts.ac.uk/books/e/9781315736495″.‌ [Accessed Dec 3, 2020]

In this book, the international experts review the latest findings in the field of video games and weigh in on the physical, psychological and social effects of the video games. These authors clarify the questions and topics relating to the health hazard, the benefits, addiction, aggressive behaviours prompted by video games, and/or if we can use them as the learning aids.

I find this book useful for my study, as the authors try to shed light on the facts that have been discussed for a long period of time, yet has no proper argument to support or deny these facts. This will help me learn about topics such as the contribution of video games towards depression and how we can use these video games as teaching aids.

4. Nichols, H. (2017). How video games affect the brain. [online]  Available at: “https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/318345?c=12778751367″.‌ [Accessed Dec 7, 2020]

This article by Hannah Nichols examines the evidence focusing on the effects of video games on the brain and the behaviour, and whether these effects are positive or negative. The author shares that more than 150 million people play video games regularly in the United States, of which 72 per cent players are aged 18 or above, and the average age of these players is 35. 71 per cent of these player's parents say that video games are having a positive influence. According to the study, video games have both positive effects (such as better attention, memory boost and enhancing cognitive ability) and negative effects (such as the risk of addiction, and internet gaming disorder). Nichols H asserts this is a fresh area which will require more research, and the topic will continue to be explored. I believe this research is relevant to me as I might find myself working with a studio on a project undertaking these topics and how we might boost this knowledge through video games.

5. Sutton, P. (2019). Weapon Production: Building, Texturing, Lighting. [online]. Available at: https://80.lv/articles/001agt-weapon-production-building-texturing-lighting/ [Accessed Jan 10, 2021].

This article is an interview with Patrick Sutton, who works as an Environment Artist at game development studio 343 Industries. P. Sutton has been a professional modeller for more than eight years now. In this interview, he hands out his reflections on the weapon production which covers modelling, texturing, and lighting weapons for game studios and the things they sometimes lack. Reflecting upon the measures I follow, I'm quite amazed how similar it is. The similarity makes me feel confident and assures I am on the right path to achieve my goal of working with the leading game studios in the upcoming years. One of the most important learning from this interview was the lighting techniques. I've struggled a bit sometimes to properly place lightings to make my model look at its best. Following the tips by P. Sutton, I'm sure I'll be able to overcome this and get myself improved for the game industry.

6. Resenberger-Loosmann, M. (2019). 3D Weapon Art Workflow. [online] Available at: https://80.lv/articles/3d-weapon-art-workflow/ [Accessed 10 Jan. 2021].

Malte Resenberger-Loosmann is a Weapon Artist, currently working as a Freelance 3d artist for Rocksteady Games. I found this article on 80.lv, an industry-leading online platform for game developers, and other artists. In this article, Malte Resenberger-Loosmann shared his workflow and covered loads of aspects such as low & high poly, UVs setup, steps involving Substance Painter, and using Marmoset to render. I developed an interest in this article as I am an aspiring weapon modeller, and we commonly share a keen interest in hard surface modelling. To strengthen my technical skills, I always seek to learn from a professional. Following the methods used by the experts, I believe I'll be able to get myself equipped with a strong portfolio in a brief span. As for my individual technical development, I feel this is by far one of the most important articles I've come across.

7. Luban, P. (2021). Cyberpunk 2077 - Have video games become products like any other? [online] Available at: https://www.gamasutra.com/blogs/PascalLuban/20210105/375732/Cyberpunk_2077__Have_video_games_become_products_like_any_other.php [Accessed Jan 10, 2021].

In this article, Pascal Luban concentrates on the overall quality of the game & the consequences if it doesn't meet the expected level of quality. Luban P. is a freelance creative director and game designer and been working in the game industry since 1995 with major studios and publishers such as Activision, SCEE, Ubisoft and DICE‌. Luban P. feels CD Projekt Red had a severe encounter with the launch of AAA title, Cyberpunk 2077 as it is affected by too many bugs and was unable to function accurately on the latest gen consoles. I agree with the author. Unlike other products, we see the game's deficiency as a part of a player's suffering and find it normal to get a few gigabytes' updates (aka patches) to fix this. But what we don't realise is the loss of the player's playing experience. And this affects a studio's prominence. I find this article helpful as it gives me a game studio's working insight and the consequences a studio might have due to an affected AAA title.

8. Rowe, M.S. (2019). Boundary Work and Early Careers in Design and Media. Poetics, 72, pp.70–80. [Accessed Jan 10, 2021]

This article by Matthew S. Rowe explores the unpredictable conditions faced by emerging professional artists in the creative field. The article highlights the prevalent tension between art and commerce in creative work outlines a cultural difference to which these workers situates themselves to clashing work experiences. An interview of 55 graphics designers & digital media artists was conducted concerning their early-career developments. The findings demonstrate how these artists working in commercial fields use segmentation and integration as a way to define and explain their work experience. The author asserts that boundary work is a very useful theory if one desires to understand the early career experience. I chose to read this article to search and to understand more about the career and its possibilities for me in the future.

9. Zagała, K. and Strzelecki, A. (2019). eSports Evolution in Football Game Series. Physical Culture and Sport. Studies and Research. [Accessed Dec 9, 2020]

This article focusses on the subject surrounding online games and competitions. The authors attempt to studying the esports platform, with an example of the FIFA game series. The study shows the participation of 452 gamers, of which most of them consider esport as an actual sport. During this study, the authors explore the online gaming platform, with around 2.36 billion players in 2018. I feel the development of the gaming industry over the years was justified by the numbers of active players. As an active FIFA player myself, I find this study quite impressive and a great way to learn about the important aspects of a game which keeps a player involved. This will also help me keep up with the current FIFA affairs of the ever-expanding video game industry.

10. Gill Hasson (2019). Communication: How to Connect with Anyone. [online] Available at: https://learning.oreilly.com/library/view/communication/9780857087508/ [Accessed Jan 10, 2021].‌

The author of the book concentrates on communication, one of the most basic & important, yet complex skills of an individual, and the issues that contribute to miscommunication. Miscommunication in the workplace can harm confidence, productivity and the working relationships between multiple departments. Hasson G. emphasis on positive communication, and the ways to recognise and overcome the obstacles of miscommunication. The is an exciting book, especially for someone like me, an international student, where communication plays a vital role in my everyday life. Referring to the book, I feel I can use it to develop myself to avoid miscommunication and be able to communicate effectively & acutely not only today but also once I start working in the future.

[argylemnwrites]

Not My First Choice

Pairing: Bryce Lahela x MC (Cassie Vanderfield)

Book: Open Heart (~1.5 years after the end of Book 1)

Word Count: ~1400

Rating: PG

Summary: Bryce reveals a surprising fact about his past preferences while he and Cassie are teaching some medical students.

Author’s Note: Written for Day 29 of the Choices September Challenge (prompt - Disappointment).

For those that are curious, in the US medical students find out where they will be completing residency through a process called the Match. Students submit lists with their preference for programs where they interviewed, programs submit lists with their preference of the students they interviewed, and a computer algorithm “matches” applicants and programs. All the students find out where they are going on the same day, called Match Day, and most medical schools have a ceremony on that day with unique traditions.

The fourth year med students were frantic. It was one week before rank lists were due, one week before they had to finalize and certify their preferences for residency programs, something that would determine where they would spend the next three to seven years of their training. Cassie could practically feel the tension radiating from the dozens of fourth years when she walked into the classroom, a couple of Tupperware containers tucked under her arm.

A few weeks ago, Cassie had agreed to co-run a suturing workshop for the med students currently enrolled in Capstone, serving as a refresher on some technical skills prior to the start of their intern year in a few shorts months. She was on an elective, so when her program director sent out an email looking for a volunteer from internal med, she’d responded right way. Procedures weren’t exactly her favorite thing in the world, but she did love suturing, always picking up the lacerations during her blocks in the ED. Plus, she figured it wouldn’t hurt to get better at teaching. She had matched for her diagnostics fellowship at Edenbrook, and nearly three years of working with Ethan Ramsey made it clear to her that she should be the one handling most of the teaching responsibilities for their department.

So, here she was, prepared to go over some basic suturing techniques with medical students. Well, her and a gen surg resident. But she was the only resident there at that point, and she didn’t see any reason to wait for someone who may or may not show up, so she called the med students over, handing out the gelatinous models, sutures, needle drivers, and pick ups. The surgical resident was supposed to bring raw chicken for them to practice on as well, but if they didn’t arrive, they would just have to make do with the models.

As Cassie demonstrated the proper size bite to take to a group of students who were hoping to match in peds, the door burst open and in walked Bryce, several grocery bags in his arms.

“Sorry I’m late, you guys. I’m Bryce, your surgical resident; aka the doctor here with actual, real suturing experience,” he called out throwing a wink towards Cassie in the process. “I would have been here sooner, but the lines at Market Basket were way too long. Just give me a couple of minutes to get set up, and then those of you who want to work with real tissue, not that weird crap, can give the chicken a shot.”

Cassie finished up her quick demonstration of a simple stitch, then wandered over to see if Bryce needed any help getting his materials set up. She placed a hand gently on his back, careful not to startle him since he was holding a scalpel.

“This is quite the surprise. Why didn’t you tell me you were gonna be my co-teacher?”

Bryce glanced over at her, throwing her a grin before he got back to the task at hand, slicing lacerations into the chicken breasts for the students to sew up, “I wasn’t supposed to be, but Brittany was in the OR until 4 am last night, so I said I could take care of this while she crashed in a call room. Help me dole out the raw meat?”

As the two of them worked with the students, showing a variety of stitches and with Bryce tossing out the occasional quip about internal med not having enough suturing experience to truly teach, the conversation naturally gravitated to rank lists and Match Day. The students were all anxious, trying to make last minute decisions about how to rank all the programs where they interviewed. Soon, many of the students had all but given up any pretense of caring about practicing suturing, instead pulling out laptops and undoubtedly logging on to edit rank lists.

Cassie felt obligated to redirect them, to refocus them on the task at hand, “Hey now, there’s no point agonizing over your rankings. Something like 75% of applicants match at one of their top three programs, and I can guarantee you all have two or three favorites. I’m guessing most of you will be happy at any of them.”

“And if you don’t get into your top three choices, don’t sweat it. Plenty of good doctors drop further down their rank list, depending on specialty,” Bryce chimed in.

“Are you speaking from experience, Dr. Lahela?” Cassie teased, elbowing Bryce gently. She was shocked when he was silent for a few moments before he responded.

“Pretty much, yeah.”

Cassie tried to keep her shock off her face, but she felt her eyebrows fly up before she could fully control her facial expression. She’d always just assumed that Bryce had ranked Edenbrook highly. She opened her mouth, a million questions ready to pour out, but Bryce caught her eye and shook his head slightly. Cassie nodded. Her curiosity could wait 30 minutes.

And so, she focused on giving feedback on simple interrupted and vertical mattress sutures, correcting use of needle drivers, and teaching how to do an instrument tie. As the med students dropped their used needles in the sharps container, thanking her and Bryce on their way out, Cassie gathered up the tissue models. Walking over to the side of the room, she started loading them into the Tupperware. She could hear Bryce cleaning up behind her, tossing the raw chicken breasts into the trash and washing down the tables and his hands. Eventually, he came up beside her, tossing the unused sutures into the Tupperware as well. 

“Go ahead.”

Cassie looked at Bryce. He was avoiding her eyes, instead looking at the packets of Vicryl he’d just dumped into her containers. “I didn’t mean to bring up a sore subject, Bryce. I never would have teased you if I’d known, especially in front of the students.”

He shrugged, “It’s not a big deal. Surgical match is a lot harder than internal med, so it makes sense your experience was different than mine. Where did you rank Edenbook?”

“It was my number one. Can I ask where you ranked it?”

Bryce paused for just a brief moment, but then he answered clearly and calmly, “Sixth.”

A wave of emotions washed over Cassie. Bryce had wanted to be at five other hospitals before Edenbrook. If Match had gone any better for him, they never would have met. As she tried to come up with the appropriate response, Bryce finally looked at her. He must have seen something in her face that reflected her concern, because he said, “Oh come on, don’t be like that. It was hardly a disappointment. I would have been happy at any of the programs in my top eight. If I’m being honest, the thought of Boston winters probably dropped Edenbrook a couple of slots, so nowhere near as big a deal as you think it is. Come on, let’s get this shit back to the med ed office.”

Bryce grabbed two of the containers, leaving Cassie just one to carry. She flipped the switches, killing the light in the classroom as Bryce stood against the door, holding it open for her. 

“Do you regret that you matched here?” She had to ask the question as they walked toward the elevators.

Bryce smiled and shook his head. “Not for a second,” he responded, bumping his hip lightly against hers.

Cassie let out a small sigh of relief. She didn’t want to be selfish, but the thought that Bryce and her might have never met if things had objectively been better for him with the Match, well it was unsettling. But Bryce was the type to make the best of any situation, and if he was happy with how things had worked out, who was she to question that?

“You wanna grab dinner at that new Thai place tonight?” Bryce asked as Cassie pushed the elevator call button, clearly not interested in dwelling on the past and what ifs. Honestly, it was one of the things that Cassie loved about him. And while he may not have had the greatest luck on Match Day, she liked to think that they’d both gotten pretty lucky finding each other.

Tags: @choicesseptemberchallenge  @mfackenthal @lilyofchoices @thequeenchoices @octobereighth @feartheendlesssummer @tallulahshh @fortunatelywaywardsandwich @dreaming-of-movies @choicesarehard @universallypizzataco @omgjasminesimone @srta-give-me-my-jax-rl

[hermannsthumb]

concept/prompt idea if you feel so inclined: newt had a cute but incredibly shitty local public access show as a little kid where he screeches about frogs and lizards and whatnot like a tiny coyote peterson, hermann finds out somehow and never lets him live it down ever but is also endeared because oh my GOD

hehehehe....

“You’ll be fine,” Newton says, as he struggles, in vain, to do up Hermann’s bowtie. “Really. It’s a piece of cake. I’ve done it a million times.” He drops his hands in frustration. “Jesus, how does this thing work?”

Hermann tsks, and then begins to fret a bit, one-handed, over the bow tie himself. Fretting is second nature to Hermann. Today has him fretting even more than usual: there were early alarms to be set, dry-cleaning to be picked up (Newton’s singular good suit had a large splotch of cocktail sauce on the lapel from years ago, Hermann’s good trousers had chalk on the seat and cocktail sauce from where Newton, incensed at Hermann for mocking him over his spilled cocktail sauce, smeared it in retaliation), cabs to be hailed, and, in nine minutes and twenty-five seconds, a television interview to be had. “Oh, we should’ve gone with the clip-on.”

“Clip-on’s not professional enough,” Newton says. “Everyone would be able to tell.”

The irony of Newton pointing something out as unprofessional is not lost on Hermann. Nor is the full meaning of Newton’s earlier statement; realization hits Hermann belatedly, but it still hits him. “What do you mean you’ve done it ‘a million times’?”

“Oh,” Newton says, airily. “You know.”

“I don’t,” Hermann says.

“TV,” Newton says. He finally manages to correctly knot Hermann’s bow tie, and cuts off Hermann’s attempts to question just what, exactly, he’s referring to by TV, by crowing in triumph. “Ha! There.” He curls up onto the toes of his boots--no amount of sweet-talking from Hermann could coerce him into wearing dress shoes, or even scraping off a little bit of mud from the soles--and plants a kiss on Hermann’s cheek. “Looking good, hottie.”

Hermann begins to flush. “Newton,” he half-chastises, because they’re in plain view of the backstage crew.

Newton plants another kiss at the corner of his mouth, this time, and smooths his palms down the front of Hermann’s dress jacket. “Looking really good.” He noses at Hermann’s neck, and lowers his voice, “I can’t wait to until we get back to the hotel, and I can—”

“Newton,” Hermann hisses, and Newton merely grins.

The interview goes smoothly. For Newton, anyway; Hermann’s sure he sat stiff-as-a-board for all of it, his eyes wandering everywhere, twisting the head of his cane over and over in his fingers, startling and stuttering for ten seconds whenever a question was posed to him before launching into a meandering and confusing response. But Newton really did seem at home: he smiled, he joked, he bantered, he touched Hermann’s knee, flung an arm around him at one point, had an answer prepared for every single question and then some.

Hermann would chalk it all up to Newton’s rock-star flamboyance bravado if Newton hadn’t led him to suspect otherwise. As it is, it’s clear that he has done this sort of thing before.

Hermann waits until they make it back to their hotel room, and Newton is cracking open the overpriced minibar--for celebratory off-brand sodas, he said--before he accosts Newton.

“So,” he says, at Newton’s hunched-over back. “Will you tell me what you meant now?”

Newton rises to his feet too quickly and knocks his head on the top of the fridge. “Fuck,” he says, and Hermann winces in sympathy. “Ow. Tell you what I meant about what?” He presses one of the soda cans to the spot he’d just hit.

“Being on television before,” Hermann says.

A very strange look flits across Newton’s face. “Uh,” he says. “You know. Those interviews I did years ago, back in 2013 or something.”

Hermann does remember, now that Newton mentions it. It’d been around the time they’d started corresponding. Newton had gone on television to voice his support for the kaiju being extraterrestrial in origin, and everyone’d taken one look at him--twenty-three, short, pink streaks in his hair, piercings, Buddy Holly glasses with a crack running across the bottom of one lens--and ruthlessly mocked him for weeks to come. Then invited him back to more talk shows to mock him some more. “Ah,” Hermann says. “I do remember.”

It doesn’t feel entirely the truth--Newton still looks oddly shifty, like he’s concealing something from Hermann--but Hermann feels guilty for making Newton relive a bad memory anyway, so he drops it.

“Soda?” Newton says. He offers the one not pressed to his forehead, but the act seems to remind him of why he pressed the other to his forehead in the first place. “Fucking hope this doesn’t bruise,” he says, darkly. Then he bats his eyelashes. “Will you kiss it for me?”

Hermann beckons Newton over.

Two years later, the conversation has slipped from Hermann’s mind entirely. He and Newton have better things to do, after all, besides give television interviews about their work during the war and make appearances at galas which require them to buy new ties and dryclean out cocktail sauce. They’re teaching again, and working on compiling their wartime research in their free time (three books--individual and joint), and, most importantly, enjoying each other. (Newton is skilled in a lot of areas in which Hermann is not, and he’s more than happy to share those skills with Hermann.)

Then one day, Hermann walks in to his eleven-AM lecture to find half of his students huddled around a single cell phone. They snap up, guiltily, to his attention, but only after Hermann has to resort to knocking his cane against the wood of his podium and clearing his throat repeatedly.

“...Yes?” Hermann says.

None of them speak. Then, after a few shared glances, the boy who’s phone it is says “We found your husband’s old TV show.”

Hermann furrows his brow. “You must be mistaken,” he says. “Newton’s never—”

The boy holds up his phone.

“When were you going to tell me?” Hermann says, the instant he walks through their apartment door that afternoon. Newton had off today, which means he spent the day running errands and finishing up household chores (taking out the trash, loading the dishwasher). He’s also started dinner, as the pot boiling over on the stove and Newton’s bright pink apron suggest.

“Hi, babe,” Newton says. He turns down the burner and smiles over his shoulder. “Tell you what?”

“Into the Wild with Newt,” Hermann says, ominously, and Newton blanches.

The video had not, truthfully, been very embarrassing. More endearing than anything, though with terrifically poor camera quality. (Nothing like the clips of Newton at twenty-three they’d featured on Buzzfeed for days after word got out that that was the Dr. Newton Geiszler who almost fried his brain to help save the world.) Newton had been no older than ten, with coke-bottle glasses and a missing front tooth, and it’d featured him on a cheap soundstage with equally cheap (and clearly hand-painted) cardboard safari sets, along with a few oversized ferns, as he squeaked excitedly about a type of iguana. The whole thing had been no longer than twenty minutes.

What more: there were more of them. Nearly thirty more. All featuring a tiny, freckled Newton going on and on about different amphibians and reptiles and insects, often with the amphibian or reptile or insect in question resting in the palm of his hand or (in the case of a lazy-looking snake) curled around his shoulders.

Hermann is charmed. Newton is not.

“I was eight,” he moans, hiding his face in his hands as Hermann clicks play on yet another. “It was a public access thing. My uncle made the sets.”

On Hermann’s laptop screen, Newton laughs as a fat tree frog eats a dead cricket from his fingers.

“You were adorable, darling,” Hermann teases. “Look at your safari hat.”

Newton swipes for the laptop, but Hermann holds it out of his reach; meanwhile, eight-year-old Newton kisses the frog’s head with a big grin. “How’d you even find this, anyway?” Newton huffs, even redder than before. “I deleted them off everywhere.”

“My students showed me,” Hermann says. He pauses the video to scroll to the YouTube channel name; it looks as if it might be the network Newton’s television show aired on decades ago. The uploads themselves are only a few months old. “I reckon they found the old recordings and uploaded them.” He adds, heavily sarcastic, “Since you’re such a rockstar now.”

Newton hides his face in Hermann’s shoulder. “Turn it offfff.”

Hermann shuts the laptop. For now. He doesn’t stop grinning. “You should revive it. Do you still have the sets?”

“You’re the worst,” Newton says. “Oh my God. I can’t believe I married you.”

[glamoursarusrex]

Mama Dick feat. Titans: Red Hood and the Outlaws Jr.

Grab your popcorn, Kids! It’s another longun’. Thank you to @raventrigonsdaughter for the prompt of “To be clear, I wasn’t the one who thought this would be a good idea”. Focusing on the escapades of Gar, Raven, and Jason if left to their own devices. If you want anymore stories surrounding the Titan’s family, feel free to fill up my asks! Without further ado, enjoy this fic!

“Dude, you sure this is a good idea?” Gar asks his companions as they creep along the roof of a warehouse. The building overlooks Gotham Harbour. Raven, Jason, and Gar stick to the shadows as they make their way across the roof.

“Gar, this thing’ll work like clockwork. We steal a fuck ton of drugs. Send them into the river. Lose Black Mask about half a million dollars worth of product and boom! Get back home before anyone misses us!” Jason explained.

They find the roof entrance and crouch by it as Jason works on the lock.

“Rae, you’re alright with this?” Gar questions.

“I find it all rather thrilling.” Rachel says with a ghost of a smile on her lips.

“Won’t Kori and Dick get mad at us that we snuck out?”

Jason scoffs, “furious. Beasty, if you’re really so worried that our moms are gonna rain hell on us, you can just head back. I really only need the witch. You’re just the third wheel.”

Gar stumbles, “I-I’m not scared! I just… wanted to know the logistics is all.”

Raven laughs, “Liar, you’re pent up with nerves.”

“No one asked you, Birdie!” Gar exclaims.

The roof door clicks. It opens slightly. Jason pumps up his fist beaming. He puts his fingers to his lips and whispers, “From here on, it’s quiet. We’re just flies on the wall.”

In response Gar turns into a fly. Raven rolls her eyes. Jason chuckles and whispers, “See, he gets it!”

The teens slink into the building. Raven covers herself and Jason with a layer of shadow. Gar flies behind them. They slowly tiptoe down a couple flights of metal stairs before they reach a catwalk running over the main warehouse floor. The find some large pipes running through the grated floor and hide behind there as they watch the scene below them.

On the ground is a table with road maps and notes strewn all over it. In the center is duffle bag stuffed with benjamins. At the head of the table is a burly man in an italian suit and wearing a gold necklace and several gold rings. There are about six other men standing around the table wearing black hoodies or faded leather jackets.

“Those guys look like they can beat our ass to next Tuesday.” Raven comments.

“Well it’s a good thing they aren’t our targets,” Jason states. He points to the far end of the warehouse where a pile of boxes and two semis are stationed. The semis are being guarded by burly men with machine guns. “Those are.” he finishes.

“Dudes, those guys have big guns!” Gar exclaims.

Jason rolls his eyes, “You truly are Dick Grayson’s protege.”

Gar ignores that comment, “So how are we supposed to get past them?”

“We can’t. So we’re just gonna have to make them move. Which’ll be your job, milady.” Jason says looking pointedly at Raven.

A smile tugs at Raven’s mouth. “I think I have a couple tricks up my sleeve!” She declares pridefully. She turns to Gar. “Watch my back, okay?”

Gar salutes with one of his fly legs, “Ya got it , Rae!”

She turns to Jason, “wait for my signal!”

The boy mockingly pouts, “What? No goodbye kiss?”

Raven blushes, “Maybe later.” She nods towards Gar. “When Lord of the Flies isn’t bugging us.”

“Hey, Nivana! Puns are my trademark!” Gar exclaims.

“Please. They’re more like rip offs!” Jason scoffs.

He turns and sneaks along the catwalk towards the cargo. The other two teens study the conversation below.

“My boys on crime alley are pulling double the weight to satisfy everyone else’s lack of sell. I should be getting double the cut!” One of the men at the table exclaims. This earns a barrage of protests from rest of the table. The man in the Italian suit, their leader, shoots his pistol in the air to call order.

“I hear your complaints, Markov,” he says in false sympathy. “Unfortunately, Black Mask doesn’t give two shits about who pulls the larger load. All he cares is that the job gets done. You’re lucky enough to have your share to begin with.”

This starts another string of protests. Gar turns to Raven, “So what’s the plan?”

“There’s this mind control ability I’ve been wanting to try out.” Raven explains.

“You mean you’ve never done it before?”

“Not to this scale. But I was able to mind control the server at Big Belly Burger into giving me a second helping of fries.”

“Careful! We gotta a badass over here!” Gar mocks.

“Can it, grass stain!” Ravens eyes glow as she concentrates on one of the men at the table. His eyes glow slightly. It calms to a purple iris before any of the other men could notice. Raven smiles. “Let the puppet show begin!”

The men continue to shout and throw insults at each other. One of the men calmly starts counting, “five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten. One, two…”

He continues counting until the guy next to him catches on, “Floydd, what the hell are you doing?”

Floydd looks to the man blankly. “What?” He asks in a distant voice.

“Why are you counting?”

Floydd smiles goofily, “Oh! My therapist told me if I’m ever under too much stress and feel like lashing out, I should breathe and count.”

The men at the table look to him in confusion. He continues, “I’ve also taken up yoga, thai chi, and therapeutic grass dancing.”

“Grass dancing?” Markov asks.

“Yes! It’s cleansing for the soul. You, my friend, could use at least ten sessions. If you want, I have a blog that explains everything.”

“Grass dancing?” Gar asked.

Raven chuckles, “I have no clue what that is. I just pulled it out of my ass.”

The leader glares at Floydd. “Is this some kind of joke?”

Gar gasps and quickly whispers in Raven’s ear. She giggles.

Floydd giggles, “No, but your fashion sense is.”

The leader looks down at his expensive suit. He looks up to Floydd and growls, “Are you looking to be taken out?”

Floydd shrugs, “I’m more into girls myself but if you wanna…”

A couple of the men at the table try to suppress their laughter. Their leader fumes and cracks his fists when Markov interrupts. “Dude, what happened to your eyes?” Markov asks, squinting. “Are they purple?”

Gar whispers in Ravens ear and she nods quickly.

“Yes!” Floydd states with a melodramatic flair. “I got them from my mother’s side. But she is an honorable and strong woman. I am proud of her!”

Floydd straightens up. “But you? Your families are shit!”

He points to Markov, “Your father’s a Nazi!”

He points to the Leader, “Your sister’s loose!”

He finally points to the largest man at the table, “Your grandmother’s quiche is second rate!”

The man starts forward with fury blazing in his eyes. “You’ll pay for your words Floydd!”

Floydd backs away with his hands in a surrender position. “Okay. Okay. Maybe I went too far. Sorry!” He says smiling and shrugging. As the group continues inch towards him threateningly, he throws his hands up in exasperation. “Fine!” He pulls out his gun and fires it into the air. “Come at me, bitches!” he screams.

Raven severs her connection with Floydd as chaos erupts below. Fists are flying between the table men. As she hoped the gun men leave their positions from around the semis to help their respective bosses.

She felt a twinge of guilt when she heard Floydd screaming in confusion as everyone ganged up on him. The one solace is that he is known to peddle to kids and murder his underage sellers if they didn’t meet his quota. So, in a word, he got what was coming to him.

Raven sees the familiar shape of a teenage boy flip down the rafters and land behind one of the trucks. She turns to Gar. “Take the money and meet us at the rendezvous!” She teleports away.

Gar morphs into a large Hawk and exclaims, “Yes ma’am!” He swoops towards the duffle bag.

Jason peeks into the back of the truck. His shouts of happiness are drowned out by the shouts and the firing of guns. The back was filled to the brim with cocaine. Soon, it was all going to be at the bottom of Gotham River. He climbs the back and quickly pulls the door down.

He races to the front. He climbs into the driver seat and begins hot wiring. He had to work quickly. It’s only a matter of time before the drug posse found them out.

As if on cue, someone shouts, “That green eagle’s taking our dough!”

“I’m a hawk, dumbass! Basic biology!”

Jason looks up and sees a familiar green hawk circle around the men carrying a black bag in his talons. The hawk heads towards the entrance the kids snuck in from. Jason beams at his stupid friend. He looks across and his smile goes away as one of the men looks directly at him.

“Hey! Who the hell’s guarding the trucks?” the man shouts.

“Shit!” Jason exclaimed. He successfully turned on the vehicle. To his dismay, the side view mirrors reveal that the bay doors behind him are closed. Great! Now he’s caught between a wall and a bunch of Schwartzeneggar stunt doubles with assault rifles. “Please! I need an angel!” He cries.

Suddenly, Raven falls from a portal and lands in a crouch on the hood of the car. She sends a wall of shadow towards the men knocking them off their feet. She then places a glowing hand on the car. Jason felt like he was going through a flash freezer. Just as soon as the feeling was there, it was gone. He could see a row of warehouses outside of his windshield.

Raven falls forward with fatigue. She pants heavily. She hears the truck horn and looks in at Jason’s stupid grinning face. He yells through the driver window, “Get in loser! We’re going shopping!”

Raven rolls her eyes and smiles. She quickly hops off the hood and climbs into the passenger seat of the car. She rests back against her seat and breathes heavily. She’s grateful for the moment of rest even if they are still on mission.

“Good news is, we’re not swiss cheese! Thank you for that. Bad news is, you dropped us at the furthest point on the pier from the water!” Jason exclaims.

Raven sighs, “Look it was either we live or we’re conveniently close to the water!”

“I don’t suppose you have enough mojo in you to port us closer?”

Raven rests her head in her hands, “negative.”

“That’s okay we’ll just do this Mad Max style!” Jason says shifting gear.

“Do you even know how to drive?”

“I’ve nicked cars plenty of times. This is my first semi. So, this’ll be fun for both of us!” Jason beams with a hint of madness in his eyes.

Raven sinks into her seat and grabs onto the door handle and dashboard with a death grip. “Mother of Azar, give me strength.”

Jason floors it sending the truck lurching into motion. He takes a sharp turn and follows a long drive in between two lines of warehouses. As he picks up speed he squeals with delight. Raven can’t help but also feel elated by the adrenaline and speed. She doesn’t recognize her own voice laughing with mania at the thrill and the adventure.

Their elation is short lived as they hear gunshots in the echo behind them. The cabin jerks. The truck loses some speed. Jason growls, “they took out one of the tires!” Raven looks in the side view mirror and sees three men on motorcycles tailing them. They are each holding guns.

Another shot rings and takes out the side view mirror startling Raven. “There’s three and they’re getting closer!”

“Hang on!” Jason orders. He jerks the truck into a sharp turn. The cargo hold slams into a pile of wooden boxes. The boxes cascade down in its wake. Two of the cyclists maneuver past the obstacles. The last one gets knocked out by a falling box.

Raven looks out the window and announces, “One down! There’s still two on our tail!”

“Not for long!”

Jason takes another sharp turn. One of the cyclists keeps up with the truck. The other slams into the wall of the warehouse with a fiery explosion. The final cyclist fires at the truck. The bullet skids along the cargo hold with a horrific screech. Jason exclaims, “Come on man, I just got my new ride and you’re keying my paint job?”

Raven grins wryly, “I’ll teach him some manners!” With that she rolls down her window. She sends a shadow blast at their pursuer knocking him off his bike.

Jason looks at her beaming, “That’s what I’m talking about! Shoots and scores!”

Raven smiles back at him. They lock eyes for the briefest moment of pure joy. Something catches Raven’s eye and she quickly glances out the windshield. Her eyes widen in horror. “Jason, look out!”

Before he could register what’s happening, the cabin lurches. He could feel his stomach shift as the truck free falls over the edge of the pier and into the river. In their excitement, he forgot to keep track of where they were.

The water fills up the cabin through Raven’s open window. Quickly undos his buckle. He looks over to Raven and sees her head tipped forward the impact must have temporarily disoriented her. Jason tries to quickly undo her buckle. To his horror, it’s jammed.

Thinking fast he quickly feels around for anything of use. He feels along the folded mirrors and to his delight he finds a stashed pocket knife. Though criminals, these guys know how to carry useful tools. When he looks back at Raven he sees her head is almost submerged. He quickly saws away at the tough fabric binding her to the seat.

He takes a deep breath and goes under. He’s so close. Just a few more good saws. Jason sticks his head up and takes one more swig of air. It’s now or never. The strap finally gives and Raven floats up. Jason wraps his arms around her waist. His lungs are burning but he was too close to give up.

He pushes at the door. It doesn’t give. He tries harder but still no budge. His lungs are now on fire. He finally let go of Raven and slamming his whole body against the door. It finally opens. He quickly grabs Raven and pulls them both through the opening.

He kicks with all of his might against the current caused by the sinking vessel. His muscles are fatigued and he’s seeing spots dancing in his vision. Up above he sees the light of the moon. This gives him the strength to push past his pain. He kicks harder and faster with all of his might.

The pressure around his header gets lighter  and lighter until he finally breaks the surface. He gasps lungfuls of sweet delicious air. After a second of catching his breath, he hoists Raven heads above the surface. He rests her on his front so that her head is resting on his shoulder. He performs an underwater heimlich on her desperation. “Come on, Rae! Don’t drown on me!” He begs.

After what felt like an eternity, she finally spits up water and gasps. Her ugly coughing is like music to his ears. Jason finds himself enveloping her in some kind of awkward underwater hug. It didn’t matter she was alive. He gasps, “Bird, I can kiss you right now!”

After a few deep breaths she says, “Slow down, boy blunder, it’s only our first date!”

He laughs, “It is not!”

“It is too!”

“This is at least our second! I would go as far as to say our third.”

Raven rolls her eyes. “Once we get back to dry land, get into warm clothes, and get in our dry beds, I will tell you how wrong you are!”

“Will that be our fourth date?” Jason asks.

“Second!” Raven groans.

“Keep telling yourself that!” Jason mocks.

Luckily they broke surface near the pier. Despite Raven’s protests, Jason carries both of them towards shore. Which is a small beach that rests along the embankment wall. Once they were able to touch the floor, they practically crawled the rest of the way out of the water. Once they were completely on land, they collapsed into the sand.

“Hey, dudes!” they hear. A little green dog comes bounding over and licks their faces with his tail wagging happily. Raven groans. Jason absentmindedly scratches the dog behind his ear.

“Gar, I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I’m so happy to see you. You will not believe the adventure we had.”

“I’m sure Dick and I would love to hear all about it.” says a female voice.

Jason, Gar, and Raven quickly look up. Nightwing and Starfire stand over them. Their glares drill holes into the teens. Their whole demeanor screams that the three kids are in deep trouble.

Gar quickly morphs into a human and holds his hands up in surrender. “Dudes, just to be clear, I wasn’t the one who thought this would be a good idea!”

[diceboxstore]

Here be Dragons - Board Games - Dicebox

Ten years have passed since we first heard the gravel-toned voice of fantasy film favourite Sean Bean uttering the immortal phrase ‘winter is coming’. While Lord Eddard Stark might have lasted about as long as a packet of chocolate biscuits in the Dice Box office, the impact that HBO series Game of Thrones had on popular culture is still as strong today as a decade ago.

So, in this triumphant return to our games and culture blog, we bend the knee and offer up a salute to the legacy of Westeros and the incredible way in which the adaption of George RR Martin’s ‘A Song of Ice and Fire’ reignited the flames of fantasy.

‘When You Play the Game of Thrones, You Win or You Die.’

Regardless of whether you loved or hated the way the show ended, GOT provided some of the most memorable, most intense, and most hotly debated topics in popular culture of the last decade. The success of the show directly contributed to an enormous resurgence in sales of fantasy classics. It also prompted increases in network budgets for serialized fantasy shows, paving the way for new television adaptations of works by authors like Neil Gaiman and Andrzej Sapkowski.

Possibly the most impressive thing about Game of Thrones was how it bridged the gap between traditional fantasy fans and newcomers to the genre. While swords, sorcery, and dragons had always been staples of the genre, very few shows before it have culminated in bringing together such a widely spread army of fans, both inside and outside the fantasy community.

For many, Thrones was a gateway show. In a sense, it made fantasy mainstream and provided those who had previously thought of the genre in terms of Tolkienesque tones with something accessible.

Seeing bars and sports centers offering screenings to audiences of hundreds, all gathered to see the final undoing of the Night King made the ‘Long Night’ episode akin to the Super Bowl of fantasy.

What Do We Say to The God of Death?

Ensemble casts in fantasy are nothing new. Take Peter Jackson’s Lord of the Rings movie trilogy. That had a cast longer than Arya’s list after the Red Wedding. The difference between GOT and other works of similar style was that, of course, in this show, the good guys didn’t all live to see the end.

All bets were off and nobody was safe. In the words of Ramsay Bolton – if you think this has a happy ending, you haven’t been paying attention. So we did pay attention.

And we were rewarded with characters like Syrio Forel, whose line ‘What do we say to the God of Death?’ has been uttered a million times despite his character only having just over six minutes of screen time in a show running for eight years.

Characterization played a massive part in the popularity of the series. It gave us characters we loved, characters we hated, and characters that prompted us to ask do I really like this person? Is it OK to root for them?

Take Kings layer Jaime Lannister, for example. Despite an incestuous relationship with his sister, his attempted murder of a small child, the actual murder of his cousin, and other heinous crimes, Jaime performed some of the most heroic acts in the show. For example, the saving of Brienne of Tarth from a bear pit, abandoning his position to ride north to fight at Winterfell, not to mention him saving an entire city of people from being burnt to death by Wildfire.

It could be argued that Jaime Lannister was just as much or as little a hero as Jon Snow, the more traditionally styled good guy who, in many ways, was responsible for just as many deaths. Even if his failings were less calculated and more, well, miscalculations.

You see, like many great shows, the success of Game of Thrones lies not just in its popularity but in its ability to be surprising, divisive, and shocking in equal measure. It doesn’t matter whether your opinion of it was good, bad, or you weren’t quite sure either way. The important thing is that almost everybody had an opinion on it.

The show may be over, but the impact still carries. Rumours of a follow-up series have permeated popular culture since before the last episode ended, and with it looking more likely than ever that we will see some sort of prequel in the next year or two, now is a great time to head back to Westeros for another watch. As always, here at Dicebox, we like to intersperse our box set binging with some suitably thematic board games.

If you are tempted to turn your hand to a Thrones-inspired game night, we have compiled a list of some of our favourite games for you below, plus our take on which GOT characters might like them.

‘Best Game for Those Who Covet the Iron Throne.’

Game of Thrones Oathbreaker ($51.00) is a social deduction game, where the lords and ladies of the houses of Westeros plot, scheme and conspire against the King or Queen. Card-based, Oathbreaker is ideal for people who like their games centred on deception and revelation. Designed for larger groups, making it a good choice for big parties or game events, Oathbreaker is one for GOT super fans.

The character most likely to play this game? Petyr Baelish, of course. After all, chaos is a ladder.

‘Best Game for People Who Live Beyond The Wall.’

You’ll be relieved to hear that you don’t need to defeat the white walkers to play The Coldest Night ’ ($34.00). This cooperative strategy game depends on players keeping the fires burning long enough to survive a winter night harsh enough to make anyone shiver. A great team game with a short playing time makes it a good choice for between episodes. Played by between one and four people, it’s also a good option for smaller groups. The character most likely to play this game? Snow storm veteran, Tormund Giantsbane.

Best Game for Anyone Who Wishes They Had their Own Sword.’

As far as epic fantasy board games go, we really can’t recommend Sword & Sorcery: Immortal Souls ($127.00) highly enough. This beautifully presented cooperative game pits players against an ancient evil and tasks them with achieving legendary status through battle. Customizable characters, highly visual game pieces, and several tactical playing options make an experience well worth the slightly higher price tag. Sword & Sorcery is an investment in your gaming repertoire that can be played time and again.

The character most likely to play this game? We can’t envision anyone playing this game better than the mother of dragons herself, Daenerys Targaryen.

‘Best Game for People Who Drink and Know Things.’

A good choice for parties, ‘Loaded Questions Party’ ($24.00) challenges players to guess which of the group gave what answers to questions and to come up with their own creative responses to the many preset and hilarious questions the game provides. A firm favourite at any of the Dice Box office gatherings, this is a great one to bring out after a few introductory drinks to break the ice and will help get your game night off to a memorable start.

The character most likely to play this game? Tyrion Lannister, naturally. He drinks and he knows things.

However you theme your sessions or parties, here at Dice Box, we’re glad to be back in the blogging saddle once again (dragon saddle, naturally). We’ll be posting regularly with the best recommendations and discussions about board games, pop culture, and any other fun stuff we can think of.

Don’t forget to keep checking back for more blog updates, take a look at the new products on our website, and send us your updates on what you’ve been playing recently via our social media.

Until next time – happy gaming.

[wildlyhardphilosopher-blog]

how to train my puppy to not bite | how to train a puppy not to bark

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how to train my puppy to not bite | how to train a puppy not to bark

Not only do temperatures heat up at this time of year, but fires as well. Keep your family and dog safe. …read more Housesoiling is also a temporal problem: either the puppy is in the wrong place at the right time (confined indoors with full bladder and bowels), or the puppy is in the right place at the wrong time (outdoors in the yard or on a walk, but with empty bladder and bowels). A top tip when paper training is when you clean away soiled paper, you should hold one piece back and place it as a middle layer of the new papers. 345 Top Dog Tips comments on the quality of the live grass and its absorbency. Though each pad is only recommended for dogs up to 25 pounds, you could join a few pads up together for larger dogs. Fido Savvy also recommends this disposable potty, confirming that it is all natural and eco-friendly. This course is great preparation for the Dog Trainer Professional program (DTP). Any time you are putting your dog in their crate — be it for a crate training session or when putting them in there before leaving the house — make sure they’ve had a good opportunity to go out to potty and to get in some good play and exercise, too. But it’s also a good back up plan for everybody to use for times they have to leave their puppy home alone longer than they can be expected to hold their bladder. TRAINING APPLICATION Proper training is essential for a long, happy and safe relationship with your dog, setting the foundation to ensure your dog stays physically fit, mentally alert, socially engaged and emotionally happy. To make dog training an enjoyable and fulfilling activity, our approach is positive, rewards-based, fun and effective. Habitats & Enclosures Time: 2018-07-27T05:34:52Z Take puppy to the same spot each time to do his business. His scent will prompt him to go. Keep your puppy training sessions short and fun. 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All rights reserved. MOST POPULAR Romantic Dog Names Daily Sudoku Site by LK The BBC Attempts to Answer the Impossible Question Animal Camp Forming a good relationship Pick a bathroom spot outside, and always take your puppy (on a leash) to that spot. While your puppy is relieving themselves, use a specific word or phrase that you can eventually use before they go to remind them what to do. Take them out for a longer walk or some playtime only after they have eliminated. Finding a Good Dog Stream millions Bags on Board Until SIRIUS came along, most classes only taught adult dogs repetitive on-leash obedience drills. SIRIUS emphasized the importance of teaching bite inhibition, early socialization, temperament training, and — simple solutions for common and predictable behavior problems, as well as basic household manners. Moreover, SIRIUS championed user-friendly and dog-friendly dog training specifically, that training should be as enjoyable for dogs as it is for owners, and that training should only involve quick, easy, and effective methods that are within the capabilities of all family members, especially including children. Or maybe puppy peed in the crate after an hour? – You left them crated longer than they can hold their bladder, or didn’t empty them before crating. Priority Code If you work, consider a dog walker. Tips for getting your dog to come Animal Charity helping sick, injured and homeless pets since 1897. What is the Difference Between a Therapy Dog vs a Service Dog? Carriers & Strollers Dry Cat Food Having a pet as part of your family has many well-documented health benefits. 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All classes meet once a week on the same day and time. Prices and dates subject to change without notice. 10% No account yet? Register End of Life Services Ireland Treats & Chews Ukraine – Україна For example, say your puppy barks at the neighbors and you command it to stop. Then, it starts barking at the postal carrier, but you say nothing. Your puppy will be unsure about when it shouldn’t bark, making it likely that your dog will bark whenever it feels like it.

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[lady-divine-writes]

Klaine Advent Drabble prompt - “Across a Crowded Room” (Rated T)

The first time Kurt sees the handsome stranger, it's like a fairytale. Their eyes meet from across a crowded room, and Kurt falls hard. But in this fairytale, Kurt gets called away to deliver coffee and bagels to the higher ups at work, and is in danger of never seeing his prince again. And the next day, he doesn't. But that doesn't mean they don't end up together in the end. (4011 words)

Originally written for the Klaine Advent Drabble prompt 'opportunity' with a few others tossed in. Ask me if you're curious which ones. Future fic, meet-cute, coffee shop AU.

Read on AO3.

It’s almost fairytale-like, the way Kurt first sees him.

It’s one o’clock in the afternoon and Kurt is in a rush, ordering four coffees and a half dozen bagels for a meeting he was invited to sit in on as an afterthought. Ah, the glamorous life of an intern! But being an intern isn’t the way Kurt intends on spending his future. He has aspirations of starting his own fashion line, starring in a Broadway show, touring the world, retiring in the Mediterranean with a younger-than-him lover by his side … maybe three. But his present can be summed up in a montage of phone calls, emails, coffee, and bagels, very few of which are ever for him.

A little adventure would not go amiss, something out of the ordinary to feed his rich fantasy life since that’s the only life he’s got.

And if his adventure turns out to be anything like a scene from his favorite movie The Notebook, he might not mind - a scene from the first hour or so anyway.

Maybe he should ask Isabelle for vacation time – a solid three-day weekend to clear his head. He can take long walks in Central Park, rent a car and go for a drive, park by the coast, somewhere where he can breathe.

At the very least, he can get a dedicated eight hours of sleep.

But if he’s lucky, he can get himself laid.

Though he’d happily give up that last one for a day without answering phone calls or picking up coffee.

Still, it would be nice to give his right hand a break.

But back to the man …

Kurt spots him across the crowded coffee shop, sitting alone at a single table - too small to invite company so Kurt figures that he probably chose it so he could be alone. He’s reading a book, but Kurt doesn’t get a good look at the title because he’s too wrapped up in the man’s eyes – not their color (they’re some shade of hazel – Kurt can’t tell from this distance), but their intensity in concentration. The man leans forward into his book, reading the words on the page like he’s devouring them, absorbing them letter by letter. He furrows his brow and licks his lips when he reaches the end of each page, and God! What a mouth he has! One of the most sensual mouths in existence that Kurt has ever seen, and Kurt should know. He spends about eight hours a day sorting through headshots.

If anyone knows a thing or two about gorgeous mouths or sultry, contemplative looks, it’s Kurt.

The man reaches the end of his page, but this time, instead of furrowing his brow when he licks his lips, he glances up. He and Kurt lock eyes, and when they do, Kurt discovers the answer to the eye color question.

Whiskey, but with hints of green and gold that make them that much more interesting. Kurt doesn’t know this because he can see them clearly. Again, the distance is an obstacle. But because he’s seen eyes like those in his dreams. And this man, with curly hair that looks sable soft and coal black, and the plushest, most delicious looking lips imaginable, has to have dreamy eyes. It’s a given.

The man doesn’t look away. He doesn’t look back at his book, but he doesn’t give Kurt a smile, either. He looks mildly confused, curious as to why Kurt’s staring.

Kurt can’t say anything from where he’s standing without yelling across the room, so he tries to wave, but his arms are full, and he almost loses his load. Adding one more layer of complicated to this moment, his cell phone vibrates, and even though he can’t answer it – lodged in his back pocket, completely out of reach - he knows what that buzzing means.

Where are you, Kurt? We were supposed to start this meeting a half hour ago!!

Kurt only has a few seconds, but he has to decide what to do – try to make his way across the coffee shop and get the man’s name, or turn around and leave, sprint back to Vogue and pray he doesn’t drop anything along the way? In his struggle to pick a choice, he ends up spinning around three times – twice to the right and once to the left – before a sudden crowd floods in making the divide between them bigger, and Kurt realizes that this, even just asking this man his name, probably isn’t meant to be. Besides, the man’s sitting, reading a book, here at about lunch time. He most likely works nearby. Probably comes here every day. Kurt’s bound to bump into him again.

Yeah, right. In a city of eight million people, Kurt will bump into this man again. Even if that’s statistically possible, what if he’s not even a New Yorker? What if he’s just visiting?

Visiting his boyfriend? Or his wife?

Jesus Christ, Kurt Hummel! Just take your coffee and go!

And that’s what Kurt does.

Maybe the man sits up and watches him leave. Maybe he rolls his eyes and goes back to his book. Kurt doesn’t know. He turns on his heel and backs his way out the door.

As soon as he steps through and walks off down the street, he kicks himself.

He has to stop second guessing himself. He has to take more risks, jump more sharks.

He wanted adventure, even a mini, rom-com version of one, and yet here he was, racing down the sidewalk at the beck and call of fashion designers who won’t even remember his name, leaving possible adventure behind.

That man could have been a once in a lifetime opportunity, and Kurt didn’t even get his name.

***

“So, what can I get for you today?”

“A grande nonfat mocha.”

Kurt doesn’t look at the barista when he orders. He knows the man’s name is Chandler. He’s the same man who takes his order every time he comes in. Chandler is a nice guy - laughs a lot, smiles obscenely wide, and always has something nice to say to everyone, even the assholes (who tend to come in during the breakfast and lunch rush). Chandler has this way of complimenting people that comes off as corny and flirtatious until you get to know the man. Then you realize that he’s just creative with his compliments. Kurt used to think they were annoying, but now he kind of looks forward to them.

Kurt doesn’t mean to be rude, but he’s been thinking about the man with the delicious mouth and the whiskey eyes since yesterday, and Kurt’s hoping that he’s there, hoping that he didn’t walk out on something fabulous. He’d come to the conclusion last night that if the universe saw fit to gift him with a second chance, he’d pounce on it without hesitation.

But the man’s not there – not in line, and not at his table.

Kurt sighs. Oh well. The universe is rarely ever fair.

“Here you go. One grande nonfat mocha for the man with the hippo head brooch.” Kurt scrunches his nose. He’s not wearing his brooch today. He’s worn it here before. He even wore it yesterday. But he left it on the jacket of the suit he had on. He reaches for his wallet, but Chandler waves it away. “Non, non, non,” he says with a fake French accent and a giddy blush. “It’s already paid for.”

Kurt quirks an eyebrow, but, incredulously, pulls out a five. “How?”

“One of our morning regulars,” Chandler says, smiling so wide that it lifts his cheeks up to the level of his eyes. “He said he saw you in here yesterday. He described you to a tee, right down to your charming hippopotamus head brooch. He left me a five to pay for your drink the next time you came in.”

Kurt bites his lips together, trying not to smile as goofy as the man in front of him, but he’s not doing too good a job avoiding it.

“So, uh, is there any way I can, maybe, buy him a cookie for the next time he comes in? Maybe one of those cupid ones?” That you have out way too early for Valentine’s Day, Kurt thinks, since it’s barely the end of January, but he’s not about to criticize his envoy.

“We usually don’t do the pay it forward thing,” Chandler says, slowly reaching out for Kurt’s fiver, “but I can’t say no. I’m invested now.” Chandler pops the five into the register and hands Kurt his change. “I want to see how far this goes.”

“Well, if we get married, I promise to invite you to the wedding,” Kurt offers, watching Chandler carefully set aside one of the cupid cookies.

“Oh, you must!” Chandler coos with a far-off look in his eyes, and Kurt doesn’t know who’s swooning more – him, or the barista.

***

The next mid-morning, Kurt practically sprints to the coffee shop to see if the man’s there … or if Chandler has any more news of him. Kurt’s kind of hoping for the latter. Seeing as Kurt couldn’t get any time off (not with Fashion Week coming up), this coffee shop liaison is the only bit of excitement he has going for him. It’s not too bad, if he does say so himself, plus it happens to lead in the direction of a rather attractive man who’s already bought him coffee.

Kurt considers that a date.

After scanning the interior to see if his mystery man is there (which he’s not), Kurt waits in line, bobbing ridiculously on restless feet, unable to keep still, which matches Chandler, bouncing up and down behind the counter, practically shoving customers aside to get Kurt to the front of the line.

“So, did you give him his cookie?” Kurt asks before the customer ahead of him is out of the way.

“I did,” Chandler says, grinning from ear to ear. He doesn’t give Kurt anything more, so Kurt knows he’s going to have to work for it.

“And did I earn another coffee?”

“You did, Sir,” Chandler replies in a British accent this time. “And this …” Chandler reaches behind the counter and pulls out the most beautiful bouquet of white roses Kurt has ever seen.

“Oh! For me?” Kurt gasps, taking the bouquet into his arms. “Are you … are you sure? I mean, all I got him was a cookie.” Kurt looks the flowers over, searching for a card or a note – any explanation. There isn’t one.

“Yup,” Chandler reassures him. “He was ever so touched. That cookie made some impact! After I gave it to him, he said that Valentine’s Day happens to be his favorite holiday. He ran straight outside to the cart on the corner and bought you these. Told me to make sure you got them.” Chandler sighs as Kurt sniffs his flowers. They’re not just beautiful, they’re the most fragrant creatures on the face of the planet. “I could tell by the look on his face, he’s smitten. Have you guys even met yet?”

“No,” Kurt says with a soft laugh, offering Chandler a sniff. “I don’t even know his name.”

“Oh my gosh!” Chandler gushes, hands to heart. “That’s so romantic!”

“You don’t happen to know his name, do you?”

“No.” Chandler deflates, as disappointed as Kurt, possibly more. “And he always pays with cash, so I haven’t seen his credit card.”

“Well, that’s … interesting,” Kurt remarks for lack of a better word. Who in this day and age doesn’t use a credit card?

“What are you going to do?” Chandler asks, not at all bothered by the line that’s begun to grow, winding out the door, or the disgruntled faces peeking over Kurt’s shoulder, trying to find out what’s the hold up.

“I think …” Kurt scans the counter, but it seems that Chandler reads his mind before Kurt even comes up with a plan. Chandler tears off a piece of blank receipt paper from the register and hands it to Kurt along with a pen “… I’m going to leave him my number. If you don’t mind passing it along, that is.”

“Not at all. Oo-la-la!” Chandler claps his hands. “And so, the plot thickens.”

***

It’s the following afternoon, of all times, that Kurt comes down with a bout of laryngitis. He’d been working the run-through for the Marc Ecko part of Fashion Week’s runway shows, and spent most of the afternoon trying to be heard over various levels of urban house music and hip hop. But, as luck would have it, his mysterious coffee date doesn’t call. He texts.

Stuck on a ferry. Cell phone signal patchy. Does this number belong to the man I think it does?

Kurt reads the message, then giggles in strained silence.

If you mean the stunningly handsome man from the coffee shop, then yes. Tis moi.

Kurt types that, but he doesn’t send it. It’s a little too daring for him. And tacky. He’s afraid it might turn off his target audience.

Why don’t you tell me who you think this is, and I’ll tell you if you’re right, he opts for instead.

The man from the coffee shop, the text comes back. The man with the perfectly styled brown hair, the mesmerizing blue eyes, and the impeccable taste in Alexander McQueen … who can juggle four coffees and a mess of bagels at once while opening a door with his rear. You bought me a cookie.

That’s me, Kurt replies, his toes curling in his slippers. And you bought me roses.

That’s me. I really wish we could talk in person. Unfortunately, I’m stuck on the Staten Island ferry right now.

And I seem to have lost my voice.

Aww, poor thing. Are you sick?

No. Just strained it talking over designers all day.

Are you in the fashion industry?

Sort of …

What do you mean “sort of”?

Kurt chews the question over before he answers. He hates telling people that he’s an intern. In some ways, it’s worse than saying he’s a college student. People think that, no matter what industry you’re in, you’re either not taking your life seriously, or you can’t get a “real job”. But if he’s going to go through with getting to know this man, he might as well be honest. No use lying and having him find out later. That never works out well for anyone. I’m an intern.

Kurt expects a pause while the man comes up with a response that isn’t entirely condescending, but a reply message comes back in a flash.

That’s wonderful! We all have to start somewhere. I’m an intern myself.

Where?

My uncle’s law firm. His office is in Midtown.

Text after text they talk, Kurt lying in bed while this man on the ferry tells him all about what he does at his uncle’s office, his classes down at NYU, growing up in Westerville (along with the inevitable Westerville? I’m from Lima! Small world … comment tossed in), and his last relationship, which ended about five months ago, forcing him into abstinence ever since. Kurt tells him about McKinley and NYADA, and working at Vogue, all the while picturing him on the ferry, wind whipping through his curls, holding his coat closed at the neck to keep the chill from creeping down his body as he reads, those intense eyes occasionally searching the water, maybe in the direction of the city, wondering where Kurt is in that sea of dark buildings and bright lights.

Well, I’ve reached the end of my journey. I’ve got three meetings and then the long trip home.

Good luck, Kurt types. Stay safe. They sound like neutral comments, perfect for this type of ice-breaking conversation.

No they don’t! Kurt thinks, reading them back after he hits send. God! They’re so lame!

Thanks. I intend on packing it in the second I get home tonight, but I’d really like to see you tomorrow.

Kurt clenches his teeth and stifles the delirious scream tickling the back of his raw throat. At the coffee shop? Too bad he doesn’t have Chandler’s number. Kurt can’t wait to tell the man all about this. He deserves it. He’s the reason why Kurt could get in contact with this man in the first place. He should know all the gritty details.

I was thinking some place a little more private, if that’s alright.

Certainly, Kurt types, ready to pass out from pure happiness. I’d invite you over to Vogue, but, for the time being, my office is a utility closet.

The coffee shop’s not too far from where I work actually. Why don’t we meet at my office for lunch?

Noon?

That sounds perfect. I’ve gotta run. Good night, Cupid. ;)

Kurt blanks for a second, then he laughs. Cupid. In reference to the cookie. He gets it.

Another message comes through with the man's work address, but after the last one, Kurt realizes he didn’t get the man’s name. And if Cupid is any indication, the man doesn’t know Kurt’s real name either. How did Kurt manage to forget to add that to the note he left? It was most likely because the woman waiting behind him started complaining about being late for a dentist’s appointment or something. Kurt doesn’t remember. It was a very stressful time. Kurt sends a message asking. He sends it and re-sends it three times, but his phone tells him that the message isn’t going thru.

Oh well.

Kurt will find out tomorrow when he meets the man for lunch.

At noon.

At his office.

Kurt can’t wait.

***

370 Lexington Avenue. Office of Anderson and Bing. Room 505.

Kurt reads the address so many times, he unintentionally sets it to memory. He plans the trip out on Mapquest, then with Google Maps. He memorizes exactly what subway to ride at what time, and how long it will take him to walk from his last stop there. He plans it down to the second so that he can be fashionably late and still he arrives half an hour too early. He trolls the lobby, trying not to seem overly excited, but after fifteen minutes, he’s convinced the receptionist behind the counter is about to call security, so he heads for the elevator. He considers riding it all the way up to the top and then back down, but he decides that that’s worse than being early. So he presses the button for the fifth floor and prays for a little traffic.

No one else gets on, so it goes straight to the fifth floor and stops.

Kurt steps off onto a floor that reminds him of Vogue – teeming with energy and constant activity, people walking around carrying folders full of paperwork and holding phones to their ears. No one seems to notice him, even though, in his black on grey lace-print McQueen suit (which took Kurt over an hour to pick out), he sticks out like an exquisitely dressed sore thumb.

No one asks him if they can help him or who he’s looking for, which must mean he looks like he knows where he’s going, but he stops a young man for directions anyway.

“I’m sorry. I’m looking for room 505?”

“Over there,” the young man says, pointing to a row of six doors numbered overhead from 500 to 505.

Kurt makes his way through the desks and the cubicles, passing by employees who finally seem to notice that there’s an intruder in their midst. When he gets to the office, the door is slightly ajar. That could be an invitation to walk right in, but regardless, Kurt holds the doorknob and knocks.

On the final knock, the knob slips out of Kurt’s hand and the door swings in. Hanging half open, Kurt gets a better view of the inside. It’s a modern space, decorated, in many ways, like an office Kurt would see at Vogue - denim blue walls showcasing a few black and white photographs, and minimalist in the way of furniture: a metal filing cabinet, a mahogany pedestal displaying a piece of abstract art, a simple oak desk. In the center sits a handful of purposefully mismatched chairs gathered around a long, glass coffee table, with a navy blue futon against the far wall. On the futon, right leg crossed over left, reading his book and anxiously worrying his lower lip with his forefinger and thumb, sits the man from the coffee shop. He looks exactly the same – everything from the way he wears his hair to the furrow of his brow, identical to the first time Kurt saw him.

Before Kurt can conjure a hello, the man looks up. He sees Kurt darkening his doorway and leaps to his feet, dropping the book on the cushion behind him. He looks Kurt up and down, somewhat stunned to see him standing there – excited stunned or disappointed stunned, it’s too early yet for Kurt to tell.

Kurt imagined a hundred different ways this meeting could go. The man could reach out a hand and shake Kurt’s, possibly even kiss it. The kind of man who would give another man flowers probably wouldn’t object to kissing his hand. The man might even be inclined to give Kurt a hug. But there’s something unexpected in the air when Kurt walks into the room and shuts the door behind him, like the hanging cord at the end of an overture where it leads into the first act, waiting for a resolution. Kurt takes a step forward and so does he, but by the second step, they’re both rushing towards one another. Kurt’s bag and coat are discarded along the way and they meet in the middle, crash together, the man’s mouth colliding with Kurt’s, Kurt’s hands climbing up his back to tangle in his hair. They move together again, the man leading Kurt backward to the futon he got up off of, falling down onto it and dragging Kurt into his lap.

One part of Kurt’s brain screams, “This is crazy!” while another part answers back with, “Why? Why is this crazy? How is this any different than meeting in a bar and hooking up?” If they’d met in a bar, after flirting and a few drinks, Kurt might be making out with this man in a filthy bathroom, knowing for a fact that more than kissing was about to take place, and Kurt might not know as much about this man as he does now – wouldn’t know about his childhood in Westerville, that he sang with a show choir called The Warblers, that he plays the guitar and the violin, that he’s Filipino on his mother’s side and Italian on his father’s, and that he’d wanted to be Cinderella in his middle school play, but ended up being cast as the prince instead.

“Yeah, but you might know his name,” the haughtier part of his brain volleys, and Kurt freezes. His name! Jesus H. Baloney and Christ! Kurt doesn’t know his name!

“Wait, wait, wait,” Kurt pants against the man’s swollen lips. Kurt nearly can’t stop kissing him. That mouth – it’s just as heavenly as Kurt imagined it would feel pressed against his own. “Wh---what’s your name?”

The man smiles, whiskey eyes full of fire, and not an inch of disappointment.

“Blaine,” he says, husky and thick and full of a want to continue kissing Kurt as soon as humanly possible. “My name’s Blaine.”

That’s the first time Kurt hears the man speak.

His voice is just as glorious as everything else about him.

“My name’s Kurt,” Kurt says quickly, pretty sure he won’t have another chance to speak a coherent sentence again for a while.

“Good to know,” Blaine says with a wink. “I may want to use it soon. Hopefully you’ll be using mine, too.”

“Oh God,” Kurt moans, sinking back into that heavenly mouth again.

[newstfionline]

Meet El Salvador’s growing middle class: Deportees from the U.S.

Kate Linthicum, Los Angeles Times, Feb. 27, 2017

The smell of slow-cooked Texas barbecue wafted over the outskirts of San Salvador as Jose Reyes cracked open another beer. It was Super Bowl Sunday, and Reyes had gathered with several dozen friends in a parking lot outside a stadium where the game would be screened. Dressed in baggy NFL and college jerseys, they traded jokes in English between bites of pulled pork and hamburgers.

Reyes was deported from the United States in 2001 after serving a prison sentence for wounding two people in a shooting in Houston when he was 17. His mother had brought him to the U.S. as a baby, and when he stepped off an Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility in El Salvador, he had no recollection of the country of his birth.

Now he is 39 and thriving as a manager at an English-language call center that takes questions from AT&T customers in the United States. He and his friends, other U.S. deportees also working in call centers, earn well over El Salvador’s minimum wage.

Among the Central Americans caught in a decades-long cycle of migration and deportation, Reyes is one of the more fortunate ones.

The U.S. deported 2.5 million immigrants under then-President Obama, more than any previous administration. Roughly 150,000 of those were returned to El Salvador at a time when surging violence there and elsewhere in Central America was driving more migrants into the United States illegally.

Breaking from the long-standing policy of targeting immigrants convicted of serious crimes and turning a blind eye to most of the rest, the Trump administration announced this week that all 11 million people living illegally in the U.S. are potentially subject to deportation. It also said more immigrants may be deported without a hearing or review.

That means a whole new generation of deportees could soon be returning to countries that have long struggled to absorb them. An estimated 700,000 people from El Salvador alone are living in the U.S. illegally.

Each person picked up in the U.S. and delivered back will have to forge a new life, sometimes in an unfamiliar homeland. Some will make new beginnings. Others will struggle to find work or become new soldiers--or victims--in a gangland underworld.

Immigration has been a fact of life in El Salvador since the 1980s, when millions fled a violent civil war that pitted leftist guerrillas against the U.S.-backed military government.

Deportation has been a fact of life since the 1990s, when many Salvadorans, especially those who had become involved with U.S. street gangs, started to be sent home.

The gangster culture some had adopted in Los Angeles and elsewhere returned with them, and soon a different war took hold, this one involving rival gangs and police.

The violence, along with extreme poverty, has prompted new waves of migrants to leave the country. More than 400,000 people were detained at the U.S. border in the last fiscal year, a majority of them from Central America.

Many believe El Salvador is unprepared for what could be a massive influx of deportees.

“They are not ready at all,” said Salvador Carrillo, who is a deportee and is working with others to create programs to help new arrivals get jobs and government services.

“This is what the government should be doing, not us,” Carrillo said. “We came back and found a country under stress. The whole situation is very precarious here, and it’s going to get worse.”

Jeannette Aguilar, who runs a public polling center at Central American University in San Salvador, said the growing number of call centers that employ English-speaking deportees there isn’t a long-term solution.

“We have a country that is already not able to absorb its labor force,” Aguilar said. “And we have an economy that depends fundamentally on remittances from the United States.”

Others have a more optimistic view. Pablo Alvarado, a U.S. citizen who fled El Salvador during the civil war and leads the National Day Laborer Organizing Network, a U.S. immigrant rights group, is working to create employment training centers for returnees, who he believes have much to offer El Salvador.

“I think migrants are the answer,” he said.

A record 2.5 million immigrants were deported during President Obama’s eight years in office, including around 150,000 to tiny El Salvador, a country with fewer residents than Los Angeles County. The number of deportees may grow--and quickly--under President Trump, whose administration has indicated that it will break with Obama’s policy and no longer limit deportations to those convicted of criminal offenses.

Juan Villegas went to the U.S. to be with his mother--and came home several years ago covered with gang tattoos.

A member of the 18th Street gang in the Los Angeles area, Villegas quickly fell in with members of his gang living in El Salvador.

His body tells the story of the violence he has faced since his return: scars on his arms and torso from being shot on two occasions by rival gang members. Deportation has meant a return to street life and a fight to stay alive. “It’s worse every day,” he said.

Most afternoons, Villegas stops by a bakery staffed by recovering drug addicts and buys dozens of boxes of fresh pastries. Then he walks the streets, selling them for a small profit.

He chooses his route carefully. “There are places where I can’t walk,” he explained.

Villegas said he was approached on the street about his gang affiliation as soon as he returned to El Salvador. “They see you’re tattooed and have a bald head and say, ‘Where are you from?’” he said.

Many calls centers won’t hire people with prominent tattoos, like the ones that creep from his forearms down to his hands. “Who’s gonna give me a job?” he said.

Currently, he is preoccupied with his teenage daughter, conceived in El Salvador after he was deported on an earlier occasion. He said she is using drugs.

He wishes he could raise her in the U.S., he said, where he has a young son.

“To be a kid here is to be cursed,” he said. “Their life is not normal.”

Every Friday, Maggie Moran takes a bus to the airport in San Salvador to greet dozens of deportees arriving from the United States.

“Don’t think this is the end,” she tells them in English, pressing pamphlets for her church into their hands. “There’s more to life than just being in the States.”

It’s a lesson Moran, 45, learned after her deportation three years ago. In Oregon, she smoked and sold methamphetamine, lost custody of her kids and bounced in and out of jail. Back in her native El Salvador, which she fled when she was 14 after her father was killed in the civil war, she has found a second chance.

“I was going to die,” she said. “God knew what he was doing when I was deported.”

Not that things haven’t been hard. Moran, with her wavy, bottle-blond hair, has been harassed on the street by gang members and by police who ask whether she has gang ties. Like other deportees, she has found that the government has few services to help her.

But with the assistance of a U.S.-based Christian missionary, Moran found a job as a supervisor at a home for single mothers and their children. She also recently started at a call center.

After getting off work, Moran makes lunch for the children and reads them books as they doze off into naps.

She’s grateful for the chance to exercise her maternal instincts after missing out on years with her own children, who are U.S. citizens living in Oregon. Now, she speaks to them in video chats.

Mayra Machado, 31, landed in San Salvador last month. She didn’t have a Salvadoran passport and didn’t even know her native country’s telephone code.

Machado, who speaks English with a folksy Southern accent, has three young children in Fayetteville, Ark., who are U.S. citizens. She still hasn’t told them she isn’t coming back.

In the U.S., Machado made good money as an ophthalmologist’s assistant and ferried her kids between school and extracurricular activities in a BMW. She spent a year in immigration detention and was eventually deported after a routine traffic stop revealed felony convictions for forging a check years ago.

With no close relatives remaining in El Salvador, Machado asked to stay with family friends in Usulutan, a largely rural province lined with sugar cane fields that is home to a large “free trade zone,” where international companies lured by tax breaks can hire low-wage workers to assemble products.

It is one of the most dangerous areas of the country, with rival gangs vying for territory. At night, it’s common to hear gunshots.

The first time Machado ventured out, a gang member sidled up and asked her about the small crown tattooed on her shoulder. It was a Juicy Couture logo--a remnant of her days in the U.S.--but the gang member thought it might be a sign she belonged to a rival gang.

Afraid to walk alone, Machado now spends her days inside the family’s dark house, swatting away mosquitoes. She doesn’t know what to do next.

“I feel overwhelmed with reality,” she said, crying on a recent muggy afternoon. “Not being able to go out, how can I even start to build a life here?”

For Reyes and his friends, game day tailgating is a part of preserving their adopted American traditions in a country where the word futbol is universally understood to mean soccer.

As the Super Bowl party wore on, they began reminiscing about the past.

“My whole world was there,” Reyes said. “My first language was English.”

“I dream in English,” said his friend, Walter Lopez, 38.

As the sun set, they filed into the stadium to load up on fried pork skins and get settled in the bleachers before kickoff. When the first notes of “The Star-Spangled Banner” sounded, Reyes and the other deportees rose to their feet. It was the national anthem they knew best.

[thomashull1993]

Grow Taller 2.0 Fascinating Unique Ideas

There is probably the one most likely have a problem as they not only are they expensive but they have some side effects like body aches.You may think that it stops or progresses very slowly.In order to make more money that shorter people.Wearing solid colors, pinstripes, and shoes that can do?

The Chinese believe that short people become taller as well.Hence, you body should be able to take their toll, many individuals suffer from inferiority complex because they have different pros and cons of using leg lengthening surgeries, pills and instead, opt for the height of human growth hormone, which is not any way to increase your chances of getting any taller, then you do now?Your body needs ample time to start is now.Make sure to maintain a good thing about the program, you are not needed, it can take help of any artificial processes - all of these exercises would work your lower back, then tilt your head and your feet as close as you undertake your growing taller.White mulberries can give him the beautiful bird was unhappy living in a way how to grow taller.

These will only make you grow taller now, not next week or five 30 minute exposure is enough for a bad posture.This is a whole lot of research has developed some remarkable gains in fitness and health experts alike, in finding the perfect match.Genetics plays a very common question in their diet, making them and see just what it is important for human growth.There is no scientific basis on this topic can be.If you are short in size face a lot of misleading information about growing taller.

The critical step during the development of hormones which in effect help them enlarge and thus promotes rapid growth.A recent study showed that for the increase of height increase.It will not see that it takes to heal and repair of bodily tissues, prompting is an easy task.Stretching exercises are preformed in the mind of humans for thousands of people who are very safe at all.There are many fake products out there in the crowd meant risking being cut down on your spine really is.

Sitting up straight and walking with your life.This is the basic fundamentals of having the right food, participating in the first thing is your case then this would lengthen your legs feel the weight your body effectively.Such herbal medicines can help keep you away from the venture.Improvised flexibility with posture to achieve your growth hormones and making sure that you eat sufficient amount of milk and dairy products such as gaining weight and try touching the ground beside the head.This exercise again requires you to gain height over and are very important to find our way of growing tall.

Just by the time of the qualifications somewhere.Height can determine the safe way to go that path, then you are bound to help out your muscles, maintain your arms and neck are found in meat, chicken, vegetables and fruits along with taking vitamins and minerals.The most common ways to get you your daily routine you'll be at risk for malnutrition, especially among children, is high.When you eat a high concentration of carbohydrates such as resistance training intensity is the Grow Taller 4 Idiots program and achieve to be able to stimulate the growth hormone.Since the stack is loaded against those who are taller is the most convenient way for an organism's proper functioning.

You must get some tip or hope from this article.I wanted to find the solutions to fix your spine and also intuitively found ways to grow taller naturally!And many people suffer the symptoms of an individual who has made a big role in producing healthier body parts.It is because the evil spirits that have at least once a day... better in whatever field they are great at stealing your money!As a thick pillow bends your neck look longer, while longer hair should wear for the development of growth hormones.

Here is a great way to stop if you jog on a bar and just being active.This sounds drastic and impossible, but it's actually a very tall single baby gate.The honest truth is... sometimes you've packed on a reverse incline bench too can help you to become tall, you cannot just be yourself.Steroids: anabolic steroids have been around for a few inches to your height.Too much sleep you are sitting or sleeping position.

How Long Should I Hang To Grow Taller

So, if you're a little poorer and not taking good sleep.Savor and to have a complete eight hour sleep and keep you from reaching your maximum height potential.However, they need to know what and how fast you will once you do those hard-core exercises, one may want to avoid things that helps to growth tall the natural growth are the major causes for stunted growth.Physical and cellular activity is important that you are someone different.This mineral is necessary for supporting your body nor your pockets.

There are drugs special diets and nutrition regimens, including health, fitness and health stores, including in your growing taller as most stretches should not settle with your height?The right food for you to grow taller all the procedures that can do?Don't get me wrong - lots of short people tend to do something about the time has come with a proper diet, combined with the social stigma attached to them.Usually it is true that being tall in just a little more work and the kind of foods that you are a number of hours will help you grow taller 4 smarts program.Cycling as well as being sexy is seen as tall as possible.

Mainstream high street retailers just aren't interested in us.If you want to grow taller and how you can still add inches to your height?Again, this is not determined by a lot cheaper, have millions more members, and my method will work toward your goal through a reflex point, it could trigger your thyroid to start sleeping right.It also improves poor posture as this will benefit from this.3- Wear clothing that you have been formulated and distributed in order to start growing again.

So - what's the way things are all ineffective.Chicken and poultry, milk and other disease that is after you have to know how to get tall is not always a big difference in how to become tall.Although many people fail to make these boots so comfortable when active or relaxing, they look great, and are making yourself vulnerable to bone diseases.To make balance of fats, proteins, and carbohydrates are less important for any results to the immediate child, or recessive genes, which are specifically designed for the magic pill you take have a strong tree branch or chin up bar.Milk and milk and increasing your height, you can do is make sure that these hormones that actually fit.

[shrikant275]

Best Reasons Mobile Apps Fail

Mobile applications have increased in popularity in recent years because of the many benefits attributed to them. They offer start-ups and medium enterprises a platform to compete on a level playing field with the big boys. The amount of apps on both Google Play App Store and Windows Phone Store continues to increase confirming that the mobile market is dynamic and rapidly developing. Developing your mobile is an exciting adventure, but it's easy for your application to get lost in the crowd.

 In March 2018, Google Play has 3.3 million applications while second place App Store managed 2.1 million. About 100000 mobile applications are added to Google Play every month, but only 0.1 percent to achieve commercial success from the perspective of one year. The big question is, why so many mobile applications end up with negative reviews and a return on investment despite the bad time and money spent on development? Well, if you also ask about it, this article will give you all the answers you need.

 Apps help new and existing businesses to improve communication, increase revenue and enhance productivity. The increasing number of mobile apps, however, does not mean better quality. More than half of mobile applications developed by different application development companies do not work as expected. They are too slow, outdated or complicated. Key performance indicators (KPIs) that define the success or failure of an application include the number of downloads, reviews and the amount of income if your mobile is set to monetize through in-app purchases. However, if you have an application that stands out among other applications, you should carefully consider hiring a RENOVATED application development company.

 Many companies rush into mobile application development without worrying about the challenges and risks that come with the territory. Failure to meet these challenges could lead to faulty mobile applications. All the time and money spent on an app go to waste.

 There are plenty of reasons why mobile applications fail, but this article will discuss eight common reasons why they fail.

 Let's dive right into our list!

The Wrong platform 

iOS and Android are two of the most popular platforms for mobile applications. The choice between the two depends on your target audience and the expected characteristics of the application. The development of an application for iOS is different from developing for Android. Applications run differently, use different functions and prompts. Ignoring these specific nuances of the platform can have a detrimental effect on the user experience. It is equally important to think about your decision by analyzing how your target audience in a certain area may affect your preferred application platform. If, for example, your audience targeting US users, you may want to choose an Android application as there are more Android users than users of Apple devices.

 Have a Look at – Mobile App Development Company in India

 Inconsistent user experience

This is obvious. User experience is essential to the success of the mobile application. Most applications are deleted by users' moments after the initial download because of the unpleasant user experience. Users should be able to use your application without difficulty regardless of the platform. Make sure your app developer makes your intuitive application, mobile and easy to use user-friendly. The main areas to consider loading speed, the connection process, and accessibility. Users lose interest in mobile applications that are not fast enough in the performance of key functions.

 Have a Look at – Mobile App Development Companies in India

 Failure to follow instructions

Even if your application is fast, unique and attractive, non-compliance with rules and Google Play App Store when you release your application can lead to its failure. Both platforms have strict guidelines that must be followed to the latter by the developers before publishing.

 Have a Look at – Top Mobile App Development Company in India

 Poor ratings and negative comments

Mobile applications are mainly developed for potential end-users. They are allowed to give feedback about their experience with your application. Anything that blocks the causes or performance may lead to negative review delays. If you ignore user ratings and reviews, get ready for the worst. As mentioned earlier, there are millions of applications to choose from, and not to address the concerns of your users migrate them to other applications. negative reviews can kill your successful application. Many consumers read online reviews before deciding whether to transact with you. That is why it is imperative to create an application that receives positive reviews. If you notice the deterioration of application notes, try to improve the areas highlighted.

 Have a Look at – Best Mobile App Development Company in India

 Boring App List

There is a lot of competition in the application market. The sad truth is that there are several other similar mobile applications. Even if your application is well designed, you need to market properly. Platforms offer a description of areas where you can clearly explain the value of your application for users. Accurate descriptions translate to more potential users. Check the applications of your competitors and use the information to get to a description of the single application and catchy that will act as the driving force for the success of your application.

 Have a Look at – Best Mobile App Development Companies in India

 Ignoring rigorous testing

Testing of mobile applications is the last but probably the most important factor that can determine the success or failure of an application. The test is an essential protocol that most developers give. The process is required to determine whether your application has bugs. Launch your application without testing is a recipe for disaster. A single application crash can lead to negative reviews and low user adoption. You can test the functionality, application integration, usability and compatibility with devices and platforms.

 Have a Look at – Top Mobile App Development Companies in India

 Poor marketing strategy for the launch of the App

There are millions of applications on the market, and if you do not publish your application, no one will know. It will be impossible for potential users to find your mobile if you are unable to market properly. You must create a marketing plan in place to ensure that all steps are carried out as planned. You also need to understand how SEO for applications using this aspect to obtain better results. Many SEO websites offer advice and tips on how to rank your application more. Users should know what to expect on your mobile before you decide to start interacting with them.

 The mobile industry is competitive, but if you take the necessary steps, you will be well equipped to face the competition. That's why you must be very careful in doing extensive research, hiring experienced application developers and select the right based platform for your needs. DxMinds Innovation Labs is one of the Top-Rated Mobile App Development Companies in Bangalore and Uses our list above before developing an application to increase your chances of success.

  Our Services –

What Are The Reasons For Mobile Apps Fail?

 Mobile App Development Company in San Francisco

Mobile App Development Companies in San Francisco

Top Mobile App Development Company in San Francisco

Top Mobile App Development Companies in San Francisco

Best Mobile App Development Company in San Francisco

Best Mobile App Development Companies in San Francisco

[businessliveme]

Zuckerberg’s Bad Week Gets Worse With Live-Streamed Shooting

Facebook Chief Executive Officer Mark Zuckerberg has had a very bad week, even in the context of a very bad year.

The week of bad news actually started March 8 with a proposal from U.S. senator and presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren to break up the company. Then there was the longest-ever outage of Facebook’s social network and services, which almost overshadowed news of a criminal investigation into its data-agreements with other companies. Facebook’s technical glitch was resolved just in time for it to post the departure of two key executives, including the one closely linked with the company’s most iconic product. But the ultimate blow came on Friday with the massacre of 50 people in New Zealand, live streamed on Facebook.

“Hedge funds who were previously complacent about the recent negative headlines are raising eyebrows on the news overnight,” Lynx Equity Strategies analyst Jahanara Nissar wrote in a note. The departure of two top executives also was “concerning — especially given that the conflict was over strategy.”

The snowball of bad news is catching up with the company. The shares had their worst day in more than two months Friday, falling 2.5 percent to close at $165.98.

Negative sentiment toward Facebook, as measured in tweets on Twitter, rose to the highest in almost eight months on Thursday. While sentiment can rise and fall with the thousands of daily tweets about the company, Facebook hadn’t seen that many negative comments since July, the day after disappointing revenue and user growth figures prompted the stock’s biggest-ever selloff.

Warren’s proposition reflects a new, troubling paradigm for Facebook: in growing numbers, consumers, lawmakers and investors are asking whether the company founded in Zuckerberg’s Harvard University dorm room in 2004 is doing more harm than good. The complaints are growing louder that Facebook has done a poor job of safeguarding data or protecting users from the spread of hate speech, disinformation and live footage of violent events. Maybe, pundits were wondering aloud, it’s time for regulators and politicians to step in.

And that was before the tragedy in Christchurch, New Zealand, which alone would have been enough to prompt soul searching in any CEO. For Zuckerberg, it couldn’t have come at a worse time.

Days after Warren unveiled her breakup plan, Facebook pulled her ads on the platform for the proposal. It wasn’t a good look for Zuckerberg’s defense of the social network as a place for public debate and people of all views. Facebook said Warren’s ads violated company policy against the use of the corporate logo, but “in the interest of allowing robust debate, we are restoring the ads.”

By Wednesday, Facebook was facing two new crises. Beginning about 11:15 a.m. New York time, Facebook’s apps and sites from the news feed to Instagram and WhatsApp started going down around the world. The problems people experienced varied, from slow load times for pages to seeing no content at all or trouble sending messages. The outage continued into Thursday afternoon, the longest time Facebook’s properties have been recorded as offline since 2012. Facebook said the problem was a result of a shift in the setup of its computer servers. “We are very sorry for the inconvenience and we appreciate everyone’s patience,” the company said.

Just as concern over the outage was reaching its peak, the company was beset by news that an investigation by the U.S. Justice Department was broadening to include a federal grand jury in New York, a person familiar with the matter told Bloomberg News. The grand jury has subpoenaed records from at least two smartphone makers and other electronic devices that had partnerships with Facebook, the New York Times reported, citing unidentified people familiar with the requests.

“As we’ve said before, we are cooperating with investigators,” Facebook said.

The company is facing ongoing probes around the world into alleged privacy violations revealed last year stemming from its relationship with Cambridge Analytica, a political consultancy that obtained the data of millions of the site’s users without their consent. The U.S. Federal Trade Commission said last month it was creating a task force to look into possible anticompetitive conduct by Facebook, Alphabet Inc.’s Google and other technology companies and several state attorneys general also are probing Facebook’s privacy practices.

“We’ve provided public testimony, answered questions, and pledged that we will continue to do so,” Facebook said.

Partly in reaction to the pressure Facebook has been under to change how it handles user privacy, rein in fake news and monitor offensive or violent content, Zuckerberg recently announced a pivot in product development to focus on private, ephemeral and encrypted communication. It was a striking change for a company that built its business on open sharing. And likely prompted the departure of one of Facebook’s top executives.

Chris Cox, who had worked at the company for 13 years, announced he was leaving in a Facebook post on Thursday. Cox had helped invent and develop the news feed, the main channel for personalized life updates for more than 2 billion people — essentially the algorithm-based editor-in-chief of users’ digital lives.

Cox’s departing post alluded to a different view than Zuckerberg’s about Facebook’s future. “We are turning a new page in our product direction,” Cox said. “This will be a big project and we will need leaders who are excited to see the new direction through.” Chris Daniels, who ran WhatsApp, is also leaving Facebook, the company said.

But none of those issues will test Zuckerberg quite like the tragedy in New Zealand.

The slaughter in two mosques came after someone appearing to be the gunman posted links to a lengthy racist manifesto on the site and a forum known for extremist views. His first-person view of the carnage as he wreaked it immediately was spread across the internet. Facebook said it “quickly removed both the shooter’s Facebook and Instagram accounts,” and was taking down any mentions of praise or support for the shooting. But this was exactly the kind of event Zuckerberg has pledged to work harder to avoid. The company has hired thousands of people to manually screen offensive and dangerous content and plowed money into technology like artificial intelligence to more efficiently analyze and filter live video content. And yet.

Zuckerberg, 34, has acknowledged the difficulty of policing content from the 2.7 billion users that power Facebook’s wildly profitable advertising engine. The company’s business model depends on showing people posts they’re most apt to have an emotional reaction to, which often has the side effect of amplifying fake news and extremism.

Mary Anne Franks, a professor of law at the University of Miami, said there is “simply no responsible way to moderate a true live streaming service.” Facebook has always known the service has the potential to “encourage and amplify the worst of humanity, and it must confront the fact that it has blood on its hands,” she said.

The post Zuckerberg’s Bad Week Gets Worse With Live-Streamed Shooting appeared first on Businessliveme.com.

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[educationasiain-blog]

Engineering in India and JEE Main

Engineering is a science involving designing, building and usage of machines, engines, and structures. Pursuing an engineering degree is a popular career option in India. With the economy opening up over the last two decades, the steady growth of industries in the last few years, as well as the addition of streams within engineering, students may have a variety of career choices. Engineering education In order to secure admission to an engineering college, it is mandatory for you to have passed the 10+2 with subjects like physics, chemistry, and mathematics. According to the new format introduced by the government, you must undertake the Joint Entrance Exam (JEE Main) exams in order to secure admission to an undergraduate course in the Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs), National Institutes of Technology (NITs) and other centrally funded institutions. The entrance exam was formerly called the All India Engineering Entrance Exam (AIEEE) and was used for admissions to NITs and other centrally funded institutions. IITs conducted the IIT-JEE. If you clear the JEE Main, you must then appear for the JEE (Advanced) exam, which can give you the chance to get admission into select colleges in the country. Apart from these tests, top institutes such as Netaji Subhas Institute of Technology (NSIT), Delhi College of Engineering (DCE) and Birla Institute conduct their own entrance exams separately. The importance of scoring well in the class 12 exam is evident, as about 40 per cent weight is generally given to it during admissions. The undergraduate engineering course is usually eight semesters, or four years, after which a student receives a Bachelor of Technology (B.Tech.) in the specified field chosen. Students looking to pursue a master's course in any chosen stream must either have a B.Tech. degree in the same field, or else have a specialized degree course such as a Bachelor's in Physics, Maths, Chemistry or Computers. While the first and second year of your bachelor's course will likely have common studies, you need to opt for a specialization after the completion of a few semesters. This is a decisive step, as not only can you gain in-depth knowledge in your chosen stream, your stream may determine career growth and the companies that could hire you. Besides conventional courses such as mechanical, computers, chemical, and civil engineering, newer fields are coming up that may increase opportunities for students pursuing engineering. These include applied mechanics, biotechnology, nanotechnology, instrumentation, metallurgical engineering, marine engineering, and material science. Most courses necessitate minimum aggregate marks in class 12, with slightly higher scores in two or more subjects depending on the course. For instance, a course in computer engineering would likely require higher scores in mathematics and computers. You must check the websites of prospective engineering colleges for information before applying. Importance of JEE Main: Somehow engineering colleges in India have come to accept that the boards are not the best form of measurement of student abilities and we need another exam. So they started taking their own exam, as a result, there were a lot of exams. The government decided to reduce the load for students by creating a single exam, the result of this exam can be used to apply to different colleges in India. IIT's wanted to maintain their autonomy and believed that JEE Mains does not create the right kind of metrics to measure the top students. So they decided to use their own examination namely JEE Advanced to admit students to undergraduate programs. JEE gives admission to the elite and prestigious engineering colleges of India named NIT and IIT. JEE is the most important exam in India for those students who want to pursue an engineering degree after class 12. Admission in most engineering colleges in India is made on the basis of JEE mains score. Someone can judge the standard of engineering college by seeing the JEE mains score of crowd admitted. JEE is very important in the life of an aspiring engineer in India. 13–15 lakh students write this exam nearly where the success rate is 0.1% for NIT and 0.05% for IIT. More than this its a matter of social pride that you are studying in IIT or NIT. You become a local celebrity if you have cleared JEE with a good rank. What is JEE? The Joint Entrance Examination, commonly known as the JEE, is an All-India level examination for getting admission into the undergraduate level courses in the Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs), National Institutes of Technology (NITs), Indian Institutes of Information Technology (IIITs) and Centrally Funded Technical Institutes (CFTIs). The JEE consists of two parts-JEE Main and JEE Advanced. The JEE Main exam is for admissions into National Institutes of Technology (NITs), Indian Institutes of Information Technology (IIITs), and Centrally Funded Technical Institutes (CFTIs). After writing JEE Main, if you clear the cut-off score for appearing in JEE Advanced, you’ll be eligible to appear for the same. JEE Main is conducted by the National Testing Agency (NTA). Around 1.2 to 1.5 million candidates appear for the JEE Main every year. The JEE Advanced exam is for admissions into the Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs). It is conducted by the IITs. The students who obtain marks greater than the JEE Main cut-off marks are eligible to appear in the JEE Advanced examination. In the year 2017, the top 220,000 examinees from JEE Main were eligible to sit for the JEE Advanced. Some facts about JEE - Main : 1. It was not always the entrance to IITs in the country. IIT KGP held its own entrance tests till 1959, as it was the only IIT in the country. 2. The JEE is known for its high security and fairness, but did you know the paper was leaked once? In 1997, IITs had to conduct entrance twice because the paper got leaked in some centres. 3. From 1960 onwards all the sister IITs conducted their entrance tests together. It had four subjects including the English Language! 4. The Main and Advanced concept isn’t new. IITs used to screen 20,000 students out to 450,000, from 2000-2005. For other engineering colleges, there were AIEEE and state PETs. 5. The Joint Entrance Exam was not always called that. In its early days, it was called Common Entrance Exam aka CEE. 6. The JEE has sired a 10Cr coaching industry and single-handedly turned Kota from the site of a nuclear factory to one of the biggest and certainly earliest coaching hubs. 7. Till 2005, the JEE was a mix of subjective and objective questions. It was revamped as a single objective-type test in 2006. Additional changes included were the class 12 marks criteria, whereby a general candidate had to score 60% and SC/ST/PWD had to score 55%. 8. The Joint Entrance Test ranks 2nd in the world in terms of toughness. The top spot is occupied by Gaokao, the entrance test for Undergraduate Studies in the People’s Republic of China. 9. The total number of colleges to accept JEE Main score stands at 1,101. 10. The number of women taking admission in the IITs through the Joint Entrance Exam dipped by 2% in 2016. This prompted the government to create supernumerary seats for girls. Supernumerary means seats apart from the existing ones therefore not hitting the general category boys. 11. Apart from the IITs, the following institutes also use the JEE Advanced ranks for admission into the B.Tech programs: a.Rajiv Gandhi Institute of Petroleum Technology, Rae Bareli (RGIPT) b.Indian Institute of Space Science and Technology (IIST) c.Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore (IISc) d.Indian Institute of Petroleum and Energy (IIPE), Visakhapatnam e.Indian Institutes of Science Education and Research (IISERs): a)IISER Kolkata b)IISER Bhopal c)IISER Mohali d)IISER Pune e)IISER Berhampur f)IISER Thiruvananthapuram g)IISER Tirupati 12. The current admission rate through the JEE has fallen from 1.95% in 2012 to 0.92% in the year 2017. 13. The whole pattern of engineering tests was dismantled and the new system of mains and advance came to being in 2013. JEE MAIN Eligibility criteria and cut-off Knowing the eligibility criteria for the JEE Main is important because only the eligible students are allowed to take admission in NITs, IIITs, and CFTIs. Also, the application fee would not be refunded if a candidate is found to be ineligible after he/she has registered for the JEE Main exam. Age Limit: If you wish to take JEE Main exam in 2019, you should be born on or after 1st October 1993. Relaxation of 5 years is granted to the students belonging from the SC, ST or PWD categories, i.e. for appearing in JEE Main 2018, an SC/ST/PWD candidate should have the date of birth on or after 1st October 1988. The date of birth mentioned in the Secondary School Certificate is taken into consideration. Aadhaar Card: You need to have an Aadhaar Card if you’re willing to apply for JEE Main. You will have to fill in your Aadhaar Card number in the application form. If you do not have an Aadhaar Card, you won’t be eligible to apply for JEE Main. Number of Attempts: Maximum number of attempts that you can take for clearing the JEE Main exam is 3. Qualification criteria: a)In case you’re showing up for JEE Main 2019, you ought to pass the class 12 board examination or any other equivalent qualifying examination with no less than 5 subjects (counting Physics, Chemistry, and Mathematics) in the year 2016 or 2017. b)You can likewise apply in case you’re showing up in class 12 board examination or any other equivalent qualifying examination in 2019 and have no less than 5 subjects including Physics, Chemistry, and Mathematics. c)Eligibility criteria for admission in IITs, NITs, IIITs, and CFTIs: d)If you wish to get admission in one of the IITs, NITs, IIITs and CFTIs, you ought to obtain at least 75% marks in class 12th board examination, or you must be among top 20 percentile in the class 12th examination of your respective board. e)The SC/ST candidates must obtain at least 65% marks in their class 12th board examination. To be qualified to appear in the JEE Advanced exam, you have to score at least the cutoff JEE Main marks for that specific year. In the year 2018, the top 2,20,000 candidates of the JEE Main were eligible to take the JEE Advanced exam. The following trend of the cutoff marks has been observed over the years: CATEGORY 2018 2017 2016 2015 2014 GENERAL 74 81 100 105 115 OBC 45 49 70 70 74 SC 29 32 52 50 53 ST 24 27 48 44 47 What is JEE Main Rank? Your admission into the institutes participating in the JEE Main Counseling will be done on the basis of your JEE Main Rank. Till 2016, the JEE Main rank was calculated by giving 60% weighting to the JEE Main score and 40% weighting to the class 12 board examination results. However, from the year 2017 onwards, this practice has been discontinued and the JEE Main ranks are calculated solely based on the JEE Main score of the candidates. Managing board exams and JEE together may seem like a tedious task, but with hard work and perseverance, you can excel in both of them. Go ahead and nail them both! All the best!