#unfatigue

[butchdykekondraki]

i am so so so fuckin tired. this is a nightmare.

[water-mellie-seeds]

Finally slightly unfatigued enough to make this post

Going to conventions just completely opens your eyes to how stupid queer discourse and identity discourse in general is. There were people talking casually about their many partners, tons of people with canes and other mobility aids, therians, otherkin, furries, it/its users, people open about having f/os and no one bat an eye at any of it! Being around fellow 'weird' queers and 'freaks' offline really just means everything.

[mellowwhumps]

Whumperless Whump Event Day 15: Passing out | Exhaustion | “I’ve got you, let’s sit down, I’ve got you.”

OCs: Twelve, Ida (AU)

@whumperless-whump-event

——

It’s wrong, the way they wake up. Cold. Normal. Not sick. They weren’t supposed to wake up.

It takes a long time for them to be conscious enough to register their surroundings, and even then, they don’t recognize where they are. They don’t remember. A blur of calm clouds their mind, foggy yet peaceful; a state they were more than used to.

Rubbing their eyes, they scramble to sit up. There’s so much energy in their limbs, unfatigued. The only thing that refused to cooperate was their voice, a choked, small little thing. 

Not that anyone ever knew what they were saying, whatever foreign language they were using. Not that they knew what the others were saying, either. That was why everyone thought they were a lost cause.

The place looked sterile enough to resemble the hospital, at least. A large pod lies in the corner, dormant, the only anomalous thing here they didn’t recognize. 

“Hello. How do you feel?”

They understand that. They understood all of that. Wrong accent, perhaps, but undoubtedly unrecognizable. The calm dissipates in no less than a second. They scramble to put both feet on the floor, taking a cautious step back.

Their knees buckle. Their legs give out. Their breath hitches, and for a moment, they wonder if they’ll breathe in again. The person speaking rushes forward in a burst of energy, catching them as they stumble, muttering something foreign.

They thought it was over. Lying on the table, waking up, they felt well. They thought they could—

“Let’s sit down, I’ve…I’ve got you, okay? You don’t just—” Something else unintelligible to them. “Context. I’m not going to hurt you. This isn’t where you were. Remember me?”

At the very least, they recall that. The volunteer back there, the one that took interest in them. They don’t really know what to say, so what comes out ends up being more of a squeak rather than the question, “Why?”

The other understands. He hesitates for a while, hand to his chin in thought, before answering, “I don’t know. Felt like it.”

“Nobody cared about me. Why should you?”

“Helped you, didn’t I? Took me months, sure, but you should feel fine right now, if my method worked. Even if your muscles need time to get used to it. Would you rather I lie to you or you stay back there—”

“…Months?” Months. Months of an unknown. Even with fairly photographic memory, they remember falling asleep yesterday and waking up today, not…not months. Everything about this was wrong.

Their head throbs; piercing, sharp, familiar. Distantly, they think the person says something, yet their own thoughts overwhelm them, chasing his voice away from their cohesion.

No, they think, hanging on to that final shred of strength as their eyes grow heavy. They don’t want to fall asleep. They don’t want to see more of that nothingness ever again. 

Yet, slumping over and feeling the not-stranger’s soft touch, they find themselves not resisting the fading of their consciousness.

[the-hem]

"The Ratiocination." From the Annapurna Upanishad, the Exploration of the Mysteries of the Queen of Foods.

Now the Upanishad says to compare everything outside the mind to what is happening inside the mind after it has been completely quietened:

V-112. The repudiation of the objective manifold is the doctrine of the Shastras setting forth the Spirit. Here is neither avidya nor Maya; this is the tranquil Brahman, unfatigued.

V-113. One is inevitably tranquilized in the clear sky of the Spirit, known as Brahman whose essence is quietude and equability and which is resplendent with all powers.

V-114. Giving up everything, be wedded to an immense silence, O sinless one ! Plunged into Nirvana, lifted above ratiocination, with mind attenuated and intellect becalmed.

Every problem facing man has a solution that can be found in the intellect. We are as a rule, however, choosing to act out, to be emotionally labile and irrational instead. All the wars, gun violence, lack of compassion and decency are signs our brains are being underutilized.

The newscast featuring those Mormon boys in Gaza who wanted a selfie with a man whose arm they had decapitated with a grenade should have prompted an highly intellectual response from the White House, but nothing was said. The Republicans and Donald Trump who are responsible for this are still witting pretty, waiting for the Debates, hoping to make a fool out of Joe Biden who has done nothing wrong during his term except to allow them to live.

If we were to plunge ourselves, as the Upanishad says into a detailed and fact-based analysis of our options we would know we can legally put a stop to all of this and do so rapidly. The Republicans are Pro-Life and have enacted an illegal Abortion Ban, which has caused a wave of infant and mother mortality, the very thing legal abortions are supposed to prevent.

The Republicans and the Supreme Court Justices that caused these deaths need to be arrested and put in prison. Chief among these is Donald Trump who has threatened more restrictions on abortion and same sex marriage. Both are examples of apartheid, which is illegal in the United States of America.

There is no need for a Presidential Debate with persons who should be reading the Bible in prison, preparing for his execution instead. Once we recognize we have underestimated the threat all this drama has caused us, we will be sad but we will discover we have all we need to provide a tenable way of life to all Americans without further hassle. All we have to do is silently, effectively, promptly, enforce the law.

[bigjoe11]

Rethm Maarga Loudspeaker $12,900 Review

https://www.audiophilia.com/reviews/2023/1/11/retime-aarka-loudspeaker Jacob was very proud of the responses he received with regard to the treble/mid performance of the speaker; unfatiguing and transparent. I can attest to this. The speaker, for all its demonstrative visuals, plays nicely with your room and presents a relaxed, musical picture from any repertoire. So the strings on the Argo…

[daaedoodles]

living my house m.d medical mystery moment with my ridiculously low cortisol levels which could be because of an autoimmune disorder,,, the real question though, is it lupus? /j

[aion-rsa]

The Silence of the Lambs and Clarice’s Lifelong Battle Against the Male Gaze

https://ift.tt/3tKs3GZ

Special agent Clarice Starling is breathing heavily as she forces herself to turn the next tight corner. Between deep breaths, she knows somewhere in the back of her mind that she’s being watched. And she can assume those invisible, cold male eyes are making a judgement of her five-foot and three-inch frame: She’s in over her head. Yet she pushes past any condescending skepticism, and she perseveres  through the proverbial dark.

At a glance, this could apply to the climax of The Silence of the Lambs, Jonathan Demme’s masterful psychological thriller which finishes with a cat and mouse game of Starling (a peerless Jodie Foster) crawling through the dungeon created by Ted Levine’s Buffalo Bill. In that blackness, serial killer Bill most certainly watches her, playfully (mis)judging her aptitude for handling his house of horrors. Yet all of these elements are also evident in Silence of the Lambs’ very first scene.

On a sleepy late wintry morning in Virginia, we’re introduced to Starling already overcoming another manmade trap meant to exclude her. At the FBI’s Quantico obstacle course, we witness the quiet and earnest determination which defines Clarice as she ascends up a rope line and when she flips over a cargo net. She’s acutely aware that the deck is probably being stacked against her behind her back, but she remains unfatigued and undaunted. She doesn’t even wince when the FBI instructor who emerges from the shadows to summon her down to the office mispronounces her name: He calls her “Sterling.”

It’s only a few minutes at the top of Silence of the Lambs, but it’s shot with Demme’s signature attentiveness and subtlety. While the director never draws direct attention to his filmmaking and blocking techniques, his visual language is pristine and unmistakable.

From the jump, Clarice is in a maze, a labyrinth of manmade systems and challenges that appear to reject her very presence. And she never once steps away from their course. They’re with her at the finale in Buffalo Bill’s portal to hell, but they also manifest in the bureaucratic cages and then literal holding pens Dr. Frederick Chilton (Anthony Heard) ushers Clarice through as a power move—a brusque display of authority and arrogance after Clarice rebuffed Chilton’s sleazy pick-up line a moment earlier in the film. “See what an important man you missed the chance of getting to know?” he projects through a curdled sneer.

Chilton is, of course, taking Clarice to meet the man he calls “the Monster:” Dr. Hannibal Lecter (a mighty Anthony Hopkins who demonstrates the eviscerating power of stillness). And one doubts Dr. Lecter would disagree with that title. It’s easy to imagine the disgraced cannibal psychiatrist musing that if Clarice’s life is a series of mazes and evaded dead ends, then her lifetime amounts to a single, titanic struggle against a minotaur—the ultimate monster of Greek mythology who devoured young men and women fed into his maze.

Yet in Silence of the Lambs, the all-consuming Dr. Lecter is hardly the only monster in Clarice’s life, even if he is the creature at the center of Chilton’s labyrinth. Rather the real Monster (with a capital “M”) pursuing Clarice is just about every man she meets. Among them, Dr. Lecter is but an urbane drop in the ocean.

This is again foreshadowed during the film’s opening moments when, after coming down from the obstacle course, Clarice loads onto an elevator with a half-dozen other FBI trainees, each towering over her by at least a foot. Once more, Demme’s simple but eloquent framing of Clarice’s universe is devastating. In a snapshot, we can understand the white bread, buttoned up skepticism of the patriarchal institutions she’s attempting to join and improve. After all, in the next scene, her new boss Jack Crawford (Scott Glenn) admits she caught his attention when she grilled him in a classroom over the FBI’s sordid history in the civil rights era.

Crawford welcomes Clarice’s earnestness and repudiation of the good ol’ boys’ club in law enforcement. Still, he only picks her for this assignment because he sees her as a proverbial honey pot meant to entice Dr. Lecter—a pretty face meant to appeal to the lonely and incarcerated cannibal. Hannibal takes it a step farther too when he asks if Clarice has considered that the kindly Jack Crawford is attracted to her? Dr. Lecter relishes planting the idea of Clarice’s boss fantasizing about her in the young agent’s mind. How else would Crawford think to pick her to interview the monster?

But these taunts, which are intended to embarrass, are rooted in Lecter’s two most powerful weapons: acute observational skills and the ability to speak uncomfortable truths. He uses them again during their final encounter before his escape, when Hannibal asks Clarice, “Don’t you feel eyes moving over your body?” Don’t you feel the male gaze objectifying and defiling?

One of the most remarkable things about Silence of the Lambs 30 years later is its intelligent and (much like Clarice) frank way of addressing the overt sexism and misogyny in society. This is not done in the sometimes ham-handed way of modern media, with didactic speeches and easily defeated abusers who get their deserved comeuppance. Instead this problem is shown to be the uncomfortable truth of our reality, and a truth that’s sadly changed little in three decades.

Even before Dr. Lecter verbalizes the oppressiveness of the male gaze, Clarice and the audience know it’s there in the elevator, and perhaps also with Crawford’s more smiling friendliness. It’s sometimes not even unwelcome, as when Clarice flirts with the gawky bug specialist at the Smithsonian (he even gets to attend her Quantico graduation later); but it’s constant, and mostly insulting if not outright predatory. Whether in the gaze of all those criminally insane patients whom Hannibal shares a cell block with or in a dozen hard stares from a West Virginian sheriff’s department, it is always menacing Clarice.

It’s fair to wonder whether it was harder for special agent Starling to draw a gun on Buffalo Bill or for Clarice to tell all those country bumpkin deputies to take a hike earlier in the movie so she and Crawford can examine the body of one of Bill’s victims. When she entered the funeral home with her boss, once again all these other law enforcement types had a foot above her in height, and their eyes closed that distance to cover her body. No one says an outwardly sexist or sleazy remark; they don’t have to. In fact, the only cruel word comes from her own boss when Crawford preemptively bends to the local prejudices by marking Starling as soft and lesser by virtue of her gender while chatting up the sheriff.

Later Crawford offers a halfhearted apology, saying he only did that to ingratiate himself with the regressive rube he needed information from. But Clarice is never one to let the right thing go unsaid.

“Cops look at you to learn how to act,” Clarice respectfully but assertively pushes back. “It matters.” Crawford smiles and shrugs, “Point taken,” before dozing off. But obviously the point is not taken, and the patronizing tone of even a decent man like Crawford belies his kindness. It demonstrates why the insidiousness of patriarchal double standards persists. Hence how at the end of the movie Crawford gets to go on the ill-fated raid of where the FBI thinks Buffalo Bill is living—leaving Clarice behind to actually crack the case on her own.

Even from his cage, Dr. Lecter can see this perpetual struggle within the moment Clarice steps before his plexiglass. She is, after all, a woman trying to advance in the FBI. Not that Hannibal is immune from this nastiness or is some kind of “ally.” In the same scene that Lecter asks about men’s eyes, his own stare attempts to consume Clarice whole. Long before Demme’s camera puts Foster in an extreme close-up, Hopkins’ baby blues are dominating the whole screen as Hannibal demands to know about the screaming of the lambs. Unblinking, they’re like the eyes of a deity. Or a devil.

And yet, Clarice can at least appreciate Hannibal’s bluntness and honesty about it, as well as the fact he always shoots straight with her, even when he lies or obscures the truth beneath word games. He’s the only man who admits to the double standards, and he points her in the right direction to capture Bill, albeit by leaving Clarice to put the clues together herself.

At the end of the day, Silence of the Lambs is Clarice’s story. Sure, Hopkins is spectacular as Hannibal, but even with her Oscar win for the role, Foster is often overlooked for her contributions as Starling. It’s a role that’s been imitated a thousand times since 1991—including with several other actresses playing Clarice—but it’s never been duplicated. There is a steadfast resilience here, sure, but also a quiet awareness that’s just as observant as Hopkins’ supervillain. She sees everything, including her own insecurities. Dr. Lecter brings them to the surface when he extracts the story of the screaming lambs from her memory, but she already knows what the crying lamb sounds like. She hears it almost every night.

Read more

Movies

Hannibal: Did Author Thomas Harris Try to Destroy Dr. Lecter?

By Don Kaye

TV

Clarice Review (Spoiler Free): No Hannibal, No Problem

By Tony Sokol

It’s all there in Foster’s own eyes, which is what gives her steely determination to overcome staying power in our minds. By the movie’s end, subtexts become text inside Buffalo Bill’s dungeon. For here is a basement that a man retrofitted into a torture chamber for women, members of the gender he covets and despises. As with the obstacle course, Clarice enters this space brazenly and defiantly, finding its labyrinthine center where Bill has turned off the lights.

Hidden behind his night vision goggles, the killer thinks he’s master, and Clarice is his next victim. One more sacrifice to feed upon. Finally, the male gaze we’ve spent the whole movie dreading from Clarice’s vantage is flipped, and we watch her through Bill’s green tinted voyeurism. This is the metaphor taken to its most extreme, with the camera sharing headspace with a serial killer. Yet it’s not too far removed from the Monster that’s stalked Clarice all her life. The grossness of Bill’s hesitant attempt to touch her hair, to take possession of Clarice’s body and personal space, is a reach every male in the film, save for Clarice’s father (the only other male the camera shares eyes with in a flashback), has made.

When Clarice once again turns the tables on this assumed authority and shoots Bill dead, she’s slayed one version of the minotaur and earned her perch in a system that’s resisted her. We see her triumph via the graduation at Quantico. Now she is a celebrity among the FBI. We also see it in Crawford’s genuine affection and admiration for the young woman.

Nevertheless, the maze he helped maintain persists, and the Monster takes another form. Thus even in her success, Clarice ends the film still framed in tight shadows, hanging onto the words of Dr. Lecter, who’s just put down the phone. She has the respectability and authority Hannibal lost long ago, but he can still move through this world in a way more liberated than any path Clarice has ever known.

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The post The Silence of the Lambs and Clarice’s Lifelong Battle Against the Male Gaze appeared first on Den of Geek.

from Den of Geek https://ift.tt/3rDUWT8

[sroloc--elbisivni]

[transcription: well. What really attracted him about manual labor was the picturesque male images it called up. “To be lean’d and to lean on,” is quite an unfatiguing use of the seven-pound felling axe. Then there is his robust aspect. President Lincoln’s exclamation on first seeing him—“Well, he looks like a MAN!”—is much quoted by biographers. But masculine appearance]

Some dude in the 1910s wrote a whole pamphlet full of evidence that Walt Whitman was gay and there are some very obnoxious bits but there’s also this exchange which even if I hadn’t known about Abe Lincoln’s romantic friendship/bed sharing with his law school buddy would have made me go ‘oh?? liked men???’

[vickyxc]

i could go for a really nice, long, warm, cozy, peaceful, soft nap after which I wake up feeling unfatigued, or on the better side of normal, for at least a few consistent days.

[uzchis]

“Go to bed” to tiny! Suen

@chidoricry

“Go to bed”

   “nuh-uh!” smiles accompany his small declaration and bright eyes don’t falter regardless of the stern, and tired gaze of his father. every-time his papa was going to stay at work for the night, he deemed it appropriate to have sleep-overs in his parents room and unlike his bed, theirs was gigantic. unfatigued with sleep unlike the other, small frame climbs atop the others chest and he’s grinning a contagious grin at the unamused features of his father. then he clasps the older’s face and squishes his cheeks so as to make a smile out of him. “you go to bed, mr. grumpy. ”

[land-of-brains-and-chocolate]

letting your drafts sit is a good idea because sometimes you only see mistakes with an unfatigued eye and sometimes it takes you a while to find out the poet you very vaguely referred to was, in actuality, just a sick fuck

[unknownuser209]

At the same time, I wanna hug you

I wanna wrap my hands around your neck

You're an asshole, but I LOVE YOU

And you make me so mad I ask myself

Why I'm still here, oh, where could I go?

You're the only love I've ever known

But I hate you, I really hate you

So much, I think it must be

True love, TRUE LOVE, it must be true love

@unfatiguing <3

[impatentpending]

Kill The Lights: Chapter 4 - Logan Wishes he was that Microphone

AO3  Chapter One

Trigger Warnings: - smoking and alcohol - swearing - mildly sexual content  - character death

The first thing Logan Sul saw upon entering Ego was Viper Salem cooly stepping from a darkened side room labeled utilities, smoothing her hair as a man with rumpled clothes stumbled out after her.

She shot him a dismissive side glance, and he quickly scampered off.  

“Mrs. Salem.”  Logan greeted her with a cool nod.  “I've heard so much about you I'm starting to wonder if any of it is true.”

“Only the bad stuff.”  She smirked. “Mr. Sul, isn't it? Charmed.”

“The pleasure’s all mine,” he lied, a habit as easy as breathing.

“I understand you were talking to my husband earlier.”  She lifted a hand to her face and examined her nails, frowning at a tiny smudge of filth under one.  “Nothing too interesting, I hope?”

“Simply a few business matters; all tedious, I assure you.”

She huffed an ironic laugh.  “Yes, he does love to keep his affairs in order.”  At his arched eyebrow, she smiled complacently, ire wiped from expression.  “Then again, I’m just as meticulous.”

The band struck up a dramatic chord, and her eyes lit up, head snapping over towards the entrance to the showroom.  “If you’ll excuse me, Mr. Sul.” She didn’t bother waiting for him to return the farewell before she merged into the steady stream of people swarming into the club’s main floor.

He didn’t follow, instead stationing himself to the side, scanning the crowd.  It was a remarkably varied group - all skin colors and genders and adult ages mixed together to see their Prince.  A low thurm of voices mixed with the music, adding in a low bass to the melody, drifting alongside the cigarette smoke and sound of laughter.  

A blur of gray and blue zipped from one end of the crowd to the other, bringing with it a cheerful barrage of puns and laughter.  Logan neatly stepped forward to intercept it.

Patton Parker looked the exact same as he had earlier that day, completely unfatigued from bouncing around and tending to patrons.  “Oh, hiya!” He smiled distractedly, eyes darting over the visitors. “Mr. Logan Sul wasn’t it? So glad you showed up for the performance.”  He giggled.

Logan took a moment to breathe deeply and remind himself that he had been through war, puns really weren’t that bad.

“Your presence is such a gift!”  Patton laughed, shoulders bouncing.

Fuck this, Logan was going back to France.

“What a warm welcome,” he said dryly.

“I like to make sure all of my kiddos are taken care of!”  Patton grinned, bouncing on his heels. “Do you need anything? Can I help?”

“I’d like to have a quick word about Mr. Torres, but if you’re bu-”

“Roman?”  Patton’s restless movements stopped immediately, gray eyes snapping onto Logan.  “Is something wrong? He’s okay, right?”

The change in tone was such that Logan had to stop for a moment, blinking at the club’s owner.  “Yes, he’s quite” - seductive, enchanting, attractive, confusing - “fine. I merely wanted to chat.  That, however, can surely wait until you aren’t as preoccupied.”

“Aw, thanks, Lo!”  Patton grabbed onto his arm and squeezed it.  (Hug? Was that a hug?) “You’re the sweetest! I’ll get to you right after the show, okay?”

“Splendid.”  The word barely fell from Logan’s lips before the club owner launched himself back into the crowd, good-naturedly fussing over customers and laughing with the regulars.  Virgil was in the corner, dark eyes flitting suspiciously over the newcomers, but as Logan crossed the room to join them, they slipped away into the showroom.

Logan stepped into the stream of people and allowed himself to be carried inside.

Ego took on a different atmosphere when filled with patrons, the air thick with heady excitement.  The salaciousness of it all was a thrill, resulting in random bounds of excited giggles, exits being checked every few moments (just in case the police showed up), and liquid courage being knocked back by the bottle.  Patrons jostled against each other for seats nearest the stage and its runway, but Logan was able to secure a spot near the end, opposite the wall with Remy Salem’s box, by casually musing about the half-off drinks the bar was offering.  Smirking, he sat as the club-goers trotted like they sheep they were over towards the bar for their non-existent cheap booze.

He reclined languidly, crossing one leg over the other, and became aware of the distinct feeling of eyes on him.  Casually, he tilted his head from one side to the other, as if to crack his neck.

There.

In the darkened hallway leading to the booths, Dorian Arya was watching him.  Logan forced a smile and nodded cordially, but the other man didn’t return his greeting.  The private eye frowned, realizing Dorian’s eyes were trained somewhere over his head. He slowly stretched around to see Virgil Avery stationed against the wall behind him, glaring back at Dorian with something unreadable in their expression.

Before Logan could draw any conclusions, the lights flared dramatically, and Dorian made to go down the hallway, hesitated, and sat in the back of the showroom, disappearing in the crush of people.  Virgil entered a door hidden behind the thick velvet curtains and disappeared.

“And now, ladies, gents, and all our beloved guests” - Patton Parker stood on the stage of his club, smiling at the patrons - “please welcome the star of this and every hour - Mr. Roman Prince!”

The audience broke out into cheers, quickly quieted as the lights dimmed, and a singular spotlight shone against the thin gossamer curtains, revealing the shapely silhouette of a man.  “In olden days, a glimpse of stocking was looked on as something shocking,” he crooned into an upright microphone as the curtains slowly drew back.  “Now heavens knows…”

Logan’s mouth went dry.

Roman’s black-rimmed eyes snapped up to meet his, and his red-painted mouth twisted into a smirk.  “Anything goes.”

He sauntered forward to cheers and whistles, red-sparkling pants slick against those long legs.  “Good authors, too, who once knew better words,” he purred, leaning his torso, encased in a white shirt with golden rope accents, against the wall, “now only use four lettered words.”

The pants clung like a second skin, muscles visibly shifting as he prowled across the stage, blowing kisses and winking at his captive audience.  “Writing prose, anything goes.”

Logan began mentally sorting through the list of his sins that had probably landed him in this exact spot.  Sure, he had shot a few people, broken into a couple places, poisoned that guy a week ago, was more than a bit of a jerk - okay maybe he did deserve torture.

“The world’s gone mad today.”  Roman’s hand trailed suggestively up and down the stand of the microphone, long fingers wrapped needily around it. “Good’s bad today. Black’s white today, and day’s night today.”

He detached the head of the microphone, curling the cord around his wrist.

“And all the guys today that people prize today!”  Roman rolled his eyes playfully as he sauntered down the stairs, reaching down with his free hand to run those long fingers across the jawlines of a few lucky patrons.  “Are just silly gigolos.” He leaned in on a person with flushed cheeks and wide eyes, grinning as they squirmed under his gaze. “Anything goes,” he crooned, tapping their nose lightly with the tip of his finger.  They almost fainted.

A curdle of envy shot through Logan’s system, burning twice as much as the whisky and nowhere near as fun. He found his lip curled back, revealing his eyetooth, and he shoved it back into place, cursing himself.  His hand curled into a fist, fingernails biting into the calloused flesh of his palm. Objective.

He had to remain objective.

The song picked up tempo, and Roman lit up with excitement, swaying to the beat.  “If driving fast cars you like, if low bars you like!” He was drawing farther away, towards the thickest part of his audience.  Roman didn’t even seem like he was walking towards them, drifting, instead, on jazz and adrenaline and the love of the crowd.

“If old hymns you like.”  Roman caught his eye and grinned, abruptly veering towards him.  The slow, sultry saunter transformed into a determined march, and Logan’s heart stuttered in his chest.  Surely Roman wasn’t going to do what Logan suspected he was going to do?

“If bare limbs you like.”  It started with Roman circling his chair, fingers gently trailing across the back of Logan’s neck, drawing goosebumps.  Then he was there before him, a hand on each armrest. He reached up to run the back of his hand across Logan’s cheek, touch blazing.  

“If heading west you like,” he purred, wrapping his arms around Logan’s neck as the audience whooped in delight.  “Or me undressed you like.” With a sudden tug, Roman was in the plush velvet seat with Logan, straddling the private eye.  He burned against Logan, like a match struck in the darkness, and they were pressed stomach-to-stomach, and Roman was warm and solid there in Logan’s lap, and this was definitely how Logan was going to die.

“Why, nobody will oppose.”  Logan’s heart hammered frantically against his chest as Roman smirked down at him, reaching up and toying with the brim of Logan’s fedora.  “Darling, don’t you know?” Roman leaned closer, closer until his breath brushed Logan’s lips. Then he quickly grabbed the hat and slipped off of Logan’s lap, grinning wickedly.  “Anything goes!”

Logan sputtered, trying to regain control of his heart rate, as Roman, reclining on the stage and drawing the hat across his chest, made eyes at some hapless pip in the first row, crooning all the way.

Logan swallowed deeply and reminded himself that it was Roman’s job to flirt with the audience.  A guy had to make a living, after all. He forced his eyes away from the stage and towards Remy Salem’s box, discerning a form pressed against the glass, staring, as they all were, at Roman.  Remy’s outline was a vague shadow against the one-way mirror, but the hunger in his stance was unmistakable.

The stab of jealousy that sliced between Logan’s ribs surprised him.  He grit his jaw and scanned the room for anything else. If Remy Salem was able to leave roses in Roman’s dressing room, it only stood to reason that he had some way of getting into it between the end of the show and Roman’s return.

Cataloguing the exits, Logan counted four he knew of - the entrance to the main room, the mouth of the hall leading to the private boxes, the door Virgil had disappeared into, and, presumably, a stage door.  He hadn’t seen Virgil reemerge yet, so it stood to reason there were at least two, possibly more, ways to get to the inner workings of the club.

The music built, and Logan realized he was missing the grand finale.  Quickly, he turned back towards the stage, just in time to see Roman replace the microphone head.

“And all the pains you’ve got.”  Roman sighed exaggeratedly, tugging his shirt collar just enough to reveal his collarbone and the edge of a white undershirt.  The audience whooped, and Logan shifted in his chair. Roman turned his head, just enough to catch Logan’s eye. “If any brain’s you’ve got.”

Logan couldn’t help but huff something that almost passed for a laugh.  Roman remembered. “A quarter, at least,” he murmured to himself.

“From those little radios,” Roman crooned, bringing up his hand and placing Logan’s fedora on his head.  It slipped down, almost covering his eyes, and he clung to the brim, lips curling wickedly. “Anything goes.”

His eyes blazed from under that dark brim, pinning Logan into place.  The Private Eye knew that, logically, they were in a room with masses of people, all clinging to Roman’s every note, but at that moment, with the fading spotlight casting shadows across Roman’s face, his grin red and dangerous, it was as if they were the only two people in the room, the building, the world.

Roman seemed to know his thoughts, smirk sharpening.  Slowly, discreetly, he nodded - five hundred micrometers of acknowledgement of this bond between them.  “Anything goes.”

It sounded almost like a warning.

The spotlight faded entirely, and the curtains swung closed, Roman’s last note echoing through the showroom.  There was a collective hush as it died, no one quite wanting to be the wretch who broke the enchantment. Then, someone started clapping, than someone else, then another, until it was a wave, a roar, a howl of something raw and feral.  Music couldn’t tame the savage beast when it ended.

The band picked up the pace, launching into a song everyone but Logan sang raucously along to. The song melded into another, and another, but Roman still didn’t reappear.

The band faltered as three songs rolled into four, then five.

The audience stirred, restless, and Patton came back on stage, red-faced and smiling anxiously.  His cuticles were ragged; he had been chewing his nails. “Now, now, kiddos, we’re having just a little-bitty technical difficulty backstage, so hang on a bit, okay? In the meantime, the band is taking requests!”

The pianist did not look particularly pleased about this, but gamely launched into the opening verse of After Hours at a shout from the audience.

The music managed to quell the crowd until, perhaps five minutes later, Roman sauntered back onto the stage, smirking.  “Sorry, darlings,” he purred, making wide, innocent eyes at them. “Just had to make sure I looked okay. After all, a prince has got to slay!”

The audience cheered as Logan slipped back into his seat, settling in for the rest of the show.  Even he, who was decidedly not a purveyor of the arts, could readily see the appeal. Although, it may have been less the performance and more the performer that held his attention.  Roman held the patrons in the palm of his hand for another six songs, toying with them playfully as his hips swayed in those infuriating pants and his dark, smooth voice raised goosebumps on fevered skin.  Fortunately for his cardio health and unfortunately for the part of him responsible for making poor choices, Roman didn’t favor him in anymore songs, keeping his flirtations to generalized provocations and coquettish, light touches of random audience members.

Eventually, however, the final song came to a crashing halt, and Roman stood on the stage, damp with sweat and grinning triumphantly.  “Thank you, beauties and gentle beauties!” He blew a kiss. “Come see me tomorrow, alright?”

The curtains fell to thunderous applause, but Logan paid it no mind.  Discreetly, he stood as the audience gathered their things, and prowled across the room.  Glancing around, his eyes narrowed, trying to piece the timeline together. Did Remy place the roses during the performance or after?  Would he be out now?

There was an echo to his footsteps as he traversed down the long, dark hallway and Logan sighed.  “Are you going to utter ‘hello’, or do you merely intend on striving after me?”

Virgil Avery slipped out of the shadows, dark eyes narrowed.  “What are you doing back here?”

“I merely thought I’d have a little chat with Mr. Salem, if you will permit it.”

They tensed, lip curling back.  “I’m not sure I’m comfortable with you harassing the clients, Mr. Sul.”

“Be that as it may, Mx. Avery” - Virgil inhaled sharply at the title, spine straightening - “I assure you Mr. Salem will not mind.”

“How’d you know to call me that?” they demanded.

“Mr. Torres informed me of your identity. I see no reason to use a malapropism, especially in terms of referral.”  Logan tilted his head towards the door of box five. “Now, if you don’t mind?”

Virgil stared at him for a long moment, jaw working under their dark skin and fingers tapping on their side, before slowly nodding.

“Splendid.”  Logan tapped lightly on the door.  “Mr. Salem? It’s Mr. Sul. Might I come in?”

There was no response, and he shot a look at Virgil.  “Is he out?”

They shrugged.  “I haven’t seen anyone come out this way since the show ended.”

“Mr. Salem, it’s Mr. Sul.”  Logan rapped again, but there was no response.  A twinge of annoyance hit him. “Mr. Salem, please, I know you’re in there.”  Still, nothing. Logan grit his jaw and backed up. “Have it your way.”

The doorknob crunched satisfyingly under his kick, sending the door flying open.  Logan made a mental note to reimburse Patton, pointedly ignoring Virgil’s ‘that cost money, you know’.  

“Now, Mr. Salem,” Logan sighed, adjusting his tie and strolling into the booth with Virgil begrudgingly at his side, “if you don’t mind, I’d like to discuss-”

He saw the knee first, jutting out at an awkward angle from behind a chair.  The hands came next, bound with golden rope. Then the face, purpled and stil.  Then the neck, encircled by a furious red mark.

Remy Salem was dead.

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[born-to-serve-the-light]

This is Who We Are

“Not them, Vadim.” His voice remained soft as his gaze drifted over the clusters of refugees they were escorting, as well as their fellow Risen. “Us.”

The civilians were cooking, telling bedtime stories to their children, making sure the elderly took what little of their medications that had been brought in their escape. One had even produces a balalaika, and was beginning to play.

The Risen were unfatigued, seemingly less bothered by the Winter cold. They stood at their assigned posts, Weapons in hand, mostly unspeaking, almost unmoving, staring into the forest for the slightest whisper of a threat.

“They are progress, liberty, peace, and love. We are War. We are Light, ordained to muck through the deepest Hell so that they can achieve these things. This is who we are.”

@lightvoices

[hwang-jeany]

1

a night at my native country

It has been a decade since then and Bernice, sitting beside the window of the old, dainty house of a subdivision has been waiting for the arrival of an aunt and her friends. There were no better words to describe the peace and beauty of silence under the moonlight, than that of a heart anticipating the arrival of a beloved in the comfort of her own home.

Her mother is certainly unfatigued and eager to prepare for her her sister who is to come, and her grandmother, though she may not much convey, is visibly very happy as seen on her face. Energy is regained, strength is regained when they knew of the visitors coming (and it is not just any visitors) and with motherly speed cleaned every part of the house and prepared the beds.

Every rooms, previously unoccupied, normally seen, not given that much notice, is now an object of every care and attention. As Bernice think and look at it, her heart is delighted to feel in the sheets already those who will occupy it.

She was waiting a van to pass by, each second is serenely spent while looking at every houses, feeling the wind, thinking of other things that may occupy her later, the next day, and so on. But it is lightly thought of, it was delayed, as her heart was occupied for the arrival of her aunt.

'Here they are!' her eyes said. As the vehicle stopped in front of their home, and she was certain the moment she heard of the car door sliding to open, and a voice needing not much to call its dwellers to come out, for even it is near the sleeping time, the newly arrived person and her friends is anticipated.

[thejokersenigma]

Loki Laufeyson x Reader - F**ked up - Part 7

Hey guys, so here’s the next part! I think I vaguely know where I want to go with this fan fiction.... Vaguely....

Hope you enjoy it!

Let me know if you want to be tagged in anything!

REQUESTS ARE ALWAYS OPEN!

MAIN MASTERLIST

F**KED UP MASTERLIST

Loki easily dodged the knife that was slashed towards his face, immediately bringing one of his own blades up to counter the next attack. “You don’t hesitate.” He observed, completely calm despite the onslaught of attacks on his person.

“I wouldn’t in a fight.” [Y/N] pointed out as she lunged forward again, “so it’s unrealistic to do so in training.” She gasped, seeing his side now vulnerable and aiming for this. Loki easily saw her move though and caught her knife with his own, then deflected it away.

“The speed is commendable,” He noted, striking back now so the girl had to quickly bring up her weapon in defence. “But do not fight in the very moment,” He instructed, breaking the contact between the knives, “you need to be focusing what to do in two moves time.” He then somehow smoothly spun the knife in his fingers and – before [Y/N] could even comprehend what he was doing - made a sharp, striking movement towards her throat, stopping just short, the blade millimetres from her skin.

“See?” He grinned triumphantly, mischief in his eyes and still holding the knife to her.

She scowled up at him. “Do it again.” She demanded, dropping the arm she had instinctively brought up at the attack – though it had been nowhere near quick enough to stop him. Loki smirked and dropped his weapon as well.

The two continued on like this for a while in the brightly lit training room. Loki would show [Y/N] a move and then make her repeat it multiple times until he was content the action was sooth and had no hesitation. After enough of this, he would make her string everything together into a sequence.

Finally, Loki - somehow still looking pristine and unfatigued despite the many hours of work – called an end to the demonstrations and, instead, suggested a freeform fight - he would give no instructions, [Y/N] would have to make the moves she saw fit to try and win.

“Bring it.” [Y/N] panted from where she rested, crouched with her back against one of the walls of the room, a water bottle in her hand. She looked hot and tired – not surprising as it was the early hours of the morning and she had yet to sleep - but Loki could see the determination in her eye that told him she could not refuse his challenge.

“Ready?” He asked after a few moments, taking a step back into position. [Y/N] nodded, pushing herself up and drawing her knives once more, taking up a fighting stance.

“Begin.” Loki instructed.

It was clear [Y/N] was exhausted. She was slower, her stabs weaker, but Loki had to admit that for a Midgardian she was holding up well.

However, she eventually seemed to reach her limit, managing to block Loki’s attack at her waist, but a strong shove from him finally spent her falling onto her back, completely out of breath.

[Y/N] dropped her knives at her sides and held her hands up in defeat. “Ok.” She panted with a weary grin. “You win. Have mercy.”

Loki almost found himself smiling back, but his good humour drained away when [Y/N] pushed herself up onto her elbows and something caught his eye. There was a red spot on the floor just behind her.

“Can I get a hand?” [Y/N] smirked, throwing up a hand to Loki, not noticing how he had seemed to stiffen. When he showed no response to her gesture, she sighed impatiently. “Fine, I’ll get up myself.” She scowled playfully, scrambling to her feet. Loki studied her face, not missing the slight wince she gave as she moved.

“Turn around.” He commanded suddenly.

“What?” She asked in surprise.

“You’re bleeding.” He said bluntly, his eyes travelling back to the floor where the red smeared remained.  

“Oh?” [Y/N] followed his gaze, glancing back down at the floor where she had been a minute ago. “Oh.” Her face fell at the sight. “Uh – you must have just caught my back at some point I guess - I’m sure it’ll be fine.” She dismissed breezily with a wave of her hand.

“I never touched your back.” Loki stated, frowning darkly at the deceit.

“Ah…” [Y/N] hummed, “Maybe it’s just a scratch that’s reopened.” She shrugged, “I’m sure it’ll be fine.”

“Let me look.”

“Oh I don’t think that’s neces-“ Before she could finish, Loki had taken the few long strides he needed to stand right next to her. “Turn around.” He growled lowly in her ear.

She scowled but did as he said. Loki felt his throat tighten at the sight – the material covering her back already stained with a considerable amount of blood. [Y/N] didn’t protest when he reached for the bottom of her shirt, but he felt her tense - already well aware of what Loki would see when he pulled her top up .

[Y/n}’s back was horribly marred with a series of scars. They littered her skin, some small and discreet, others large and proud, many of them now sluggishly oozing blood.

“Would you believe me if I said that I’m shit at guarding my back?” She joked weakly, barely glancing over her shoulder at him. Loki’s silence told her his answer to that. “Could you – uh –“ She muttered, now stepping away from him and self-consciously pulling her shirt back down, cheeks hot.

She turned to him, his eyes holding the question that he wasn’t asking. She dropped her eyes, “Old injuries, from old jobs.” She said vaguely, bending down to pick up her knives, sheathing them as she then made her way back to the side of the room where her water bottle sat on a table that held a variety of daggers she had been trying out.

Loki watched her stained back. “Those need tending.” He pointed out rigidly.

“I’ll sort it out.” She dismissed, gulping down some much-needed water.

“They need tending now.” He stated more firmly. “Or else they will become infected.”

[Y/N] rolled her eyes at his persistence. “Fine.” She grumbled, putting the water back down and squatting down to reach under the table. Loki noted how her face scrunched up in pain until she straightened up again, a first aid kit in her hand.

She opened up the kit and examined the contents as Loki watched on. [Y/N] took a wad of gauze and poured some alcohol onto it, lifting a corner of her shirt to apply it to an open scar close to her hip. She gritted her teeth at the pain.

She continued to tend herself for a few minutes, but it was clear she was struggling and would be unable to reach most of the wounds, the contortion required only adding to the pain.

“Would you like some help?” Loki asked, suddenly seeming to appear next to her.

[Y/N] jumped slightly but then sighed, dropping her hand from her back and nodding reluctantly. “Thank you.” She mumbled.

Loki slid the kit away from her. The options available were largely foreign to him, but he recognised something similar to his idea of bandage material. “Turn.” He commanded. [Y/N] gritted her teeth but turned anyway. “Take your shirt off.” Loki instructed.

She laughed weakly, “I’ve usually had a few drinks first.”

“It will make it easier.” Loki said. [Y/N] frowned at his poor humour, but did as he instructed, glad that she was wearing a half decent sports bra.

Loki had a clear view of her back now and he studied each mark. “There’s some alcohol in the bag.” [Y/N] said, taking his silence for uncertainty, “Wash the wounds out with that and –“

“I know what I’m doing.” He growled and [Y/N] bit her lip to stop herself retorting, instead waiting for the agony of the alcohol on her back. When it came, she hissed through her teeth, cringing away from the contact.

“Old jobs?” He asked conversationally, pausing in his work until [Y/N] relaxed back again.

“What can I say – ah,” She hissed, as he continued his work, “some countries don’t appreciate my interference and – uh – ah,” She winced at a particularly painful scar, “some still have some rather – uh – primitive punishments.”

“You were whipped.” It wasn’t a question.  

“Multiple times in multiple countries.” [Y/N] confirmed, rather nonchalantly.

Loki viewed the deep wounds again, now replacing the alcohol in the kit. What she said was mostly true – Loki knew the typical signs of a whipping victim – but it still wasn’t the complete story. Some of the wounds on her back were irregular and unusual angles - odd for a flaying pattern.

Another secret of hers.

“Do you ever speak any truth?” He scowled lightly, moving to pick up the bandaging material. He almost found it humorous now.

“That is true.” She defended stubbornly.

“Parts of it.” He agreed.

She let out a short bark of laughter. “Ok, you can have this truth.” She conceded as he began to wrap the bandage around her back and chest, placing padding over the cuts that bled. “You know the night of the party? When you dropped me at the house?”

“Quite well.” He muttered as he worked.

“Well… I broke into that house…” She confessed.

Loki paused in his work, frowning. “I’m guessing that is not because you forgot your keys.” He muttered, padding out a large scar.

“No.” She snorted in laughter. “I – well I didn’t have a place to stay in the city – had no money for a hotel.” She explained, lifting her arms as he began to work further up her chest. “Didn’t take much to research a house whose occupants were currently on holiday.”

Loki reached for a new roll of bandages. There were only a few open scars on [Y/N]’s upper back, those under her sports bra already sufficiently protected by the material, so it wasn’t necessary for him to wrap that area too. “And you couldn’t just stay in this tower?” He questioned, focusing back on the conversation.

“No.” She shook her head firmly, “Not that night. I was – I – I just couldn’t.” She said, her voice sounding almost vulnerable.

There it was again. Her secret. Something that meant she couldn’t stay the night at the tower. Something that made her commit a crime and break into an empty house.

And yet she had arrived at the tower the next day seeking accommodation for an unknown period of time.

It didn’t make sense.

And it frustrated Loki.

[Y/N] worried Loki was judging her from his silence. “Tony says I’m fucked up.” She mumbled out of nowhere.

Loki’s work faltered again for a moment before he finished tying off the material at the top of her back, frowning at his fingers - he knew enough of Midgardian language to known roughly what ‘fucked up’ meant.

“With your father, I am not surprised,” Loki remarked casually. “But I’d say you’re just obtuse.” He observed with a small smirk, his voice uncharacteristically gentle.

[Y/N] smiled weakly, turning to him as he finally finished the bandaging. Loki ignored this, moving back to the first aid kit, tidying the contents.

“Go rest.” He instructed, not looking at her. “Try not to move too much.”

“Thank you.” She said genuinely, and Loki wasn’t entirely sure what she was thanking him for. He glanced up at her as she headed for the door. She stepped out into the corridor, then paused, leaning back through the doorway. “You know you really are a gentleman!” She called back at him.

Loki’s glared at her, jaw tensing. He reached back, grabbing the knife nearest to him on the table and then sharply flicking it across the room. The metal blade embedded itself in the door frame next to [Y/N] but she didn’t even flinch, just continued to grin widely at him, before blowing him a kiss and then vanishing out of the door.

tags: @spac3unic0rn @lillyrosegirl @shanetoo @aqswdefrgthzjukilop @hakuoyuki @sheldonsherlocktony@jemjem-chan@white-chocolate-mocha-fan