#you’d think I’d have to interface with that thought more often

[max--phillips]

I just saw someone describe Pedro Pascal as tall (he’s 5’11” so like, yeah) but my knee jerk thought was “he’s not that tall tho???” because my ass is 5’10” and I forget that that’s Also Tall

[talenlee]

Nobody Speaks To the Captain No More

Today, I learned Jimmy Buffett died.

I said a long time ago that Jimmy Buffett’s death was going to mess me up, and I thought that was said in earnest. Jimmy Buffett, if you’re not familiar, is was an American singer-songwriter from Mobile, Alabama, renowned for his involvement in and then kind of codifying the musical genre known as gulf and western. The sound, as I someone who just listens to it a lot, had a lot in common with country music in terms of its production style – there’s not a lot of distortion, instruments tend towards the acoustic rather than the electric, and you usually have a single vocalist, who’s often the author of the song presenting music that’s about a personal experience, in a kind of storytelling way. On the other hand, the association with the Gulf of Mexico meant that the musical instruments are influenced more by, well

Uh

Black people?

Kettle drums, hymnal organs, a range of percussion instruments that I don’t know by name, that kind of thing? Things you’d hear in the Caribbean, and that’s not to simplify the many different musical styles in the gulf, but to indicate the things that Gulf and Western picked up from it.

I wrote about Jimmy Buffett’s music, as expressed in the albums my dad had when I was a kid, across a few years. Between that and my other online statements about the inevitable impact of his death, I had three people approach me about The Bad News, and what that meant, and to check if I was okay. It made sense to me – after all, I’d said that would happen, right?

But I’m okay?

At least right now, as far as I know.

Weird.

When Kenny Rogers died, I immediately wrote an article and shared it that night, like this one is (probably) going to get. I don’t remember how I felt at the time but I feel like that was done in some strange fugue. I don’t remember why I felt it was important to do that — it wasn’t like I spoke about Kenny Rogers much. Maybe it was a need to try and do that, finally, while also doing my best to pick through the legacy of a man who I knew was aggressively mediocre in every way except in the way that an industry chose to elevate him. It wasn’t like Kenny Rogers was the author of his best song (since Don Schlitz wrote The Gambler, and that dude went on to write When You Say Nothing At All) or even the best performer on his best song (because he did Islands in the Stream with Dolly Parton, where he was essntially ballast).

I didn’t feel the need to do that to Jimmy Buffett. I think I’m well known as much as I have any kind of public identity as a dude in his early 40s whose taste in Jimmy Buffet is uh, forty years old. It was my dad’s music, it’s nostalgic to me, and broadly speaking considering Jimmy Buffett’s whole ouvre he didn’t do a lot to embarrass me. Jimmy Buffett respected the homeless, wanted to help the environment, was pro-shoplifting and performed with a lot of black artists and shared their music.

I don’t think that he was good, really. I mean, by the time he died, Jimmy Buffett was a billionaire, which means even in death, he was doing something great and ensuring a billionaire died. Bit of a reach there, I know.

But Jimmy Buffett seems to be primarily known as an embarassing presence. That corny guy, stoner humour, restaurant chain kinda dude. Even the involvement with My Brother, My Brother, and Me is a sort of jokingly ironic way, the way that liking Jimmy Buffett is something worth being teased over. Eddie Burbank did a whole video about trying to interrogate the idea of Jimmy Buffett entirely through the interface of visiting Margaritaville hotels and restaurant chains, which was painful and embarrassing, especially since you’re not about to get an incredible elaborate vision of a person’s philosophy from their ads trying to sell you margaritas. And I get it?

It’s weird, I just don’t feel the need to defend Jimmy Buffett. Dude wrote a bunch of songs I like. He wrote in a key I could sing. He performed in a style I could manage. He was The Good Boomer, of his sort, I guess.

I think part of it was that my entire life, Jimmy Buffett has been old. My earliest memories of him are of songs that relate to A Pirate Looks At Forty. He was my dad’s age, a little bit older, and that meant as my dad accommodated turning forty – as I am having to – he’s just always been there, like the long runway ahead of me, telling me that yeah, okay I’m getting older, but I’m… y’know, growing older, but not up.

He’s was just some guy.

He was, best I know, a pretty okay guy.

There’s this Achewood strip about how when your Michael Jackson dies, you realise in that moment that you’ll never be young again. I think that that doesn’t impact me in the same way, because I don’t have memories of ever being young, of being youthful. I have memories of this confused and stupid figure who was made up of the most superficial moments of social engagement from Christian media, falling down stairs of history on the way towards being a person, pre-emptively made into a crotchety, twee, smug old man in my teenage years.

I don’t feel like I’ll never be young again.

I’m mostly just worried about how this affects my dad.

Anyway, farewell to you, Jimmy Buffett. You made a bunch of my favourite songs, your words are written on my heart. You told me about the city where the dudes and the dykes all looked the same, you told me about the federalis who just grin and tell you that they want to be your friend, you told me about the name plate on the glass that brings back twenty memories. You told me about how to swipe shit ethically, you told me about how math suks and you taught me about the Hawaiian navy. You tried to get Americans to eat invasive species and you even made Alan Jackson momentarily tolerable.

I’ll miss him, but I don’t have to.

Check it out on PRESS.exe to see it with images and links!

[chouhatsumimi]

Hi! I am trying to become a japanese to English (& vice versa) translator. I can't find any sources to check the English to Japanese translation. It is difficult to get which grammar must be used since I am not a japanese native and don't know any natives to ask either. I have studied till N2 level but have no experience and must start freelancing to get experience so I need to figure out how to translate on my own. I can only use free translation software but I am not sure about it's reliability. I have seen questionable translations when it's for Japanese to English. Do think you can give any suggestions or anything that might be helpful?

Hi! I did put in a little time searching for the kind of tools you might have had in mind.

It seems that there are many that function in the exact same way but have different interfaces. Here are two of them. Many others can be found by searching "日本語文章校正ツール" or similar keywords. https://dw230.jp/kousei/

https://so-zou.jp/web-app/text/proofreading/

While they can point out some things to look out for, from the testing I did with them, they overlooked some pretty obvious errors, while also catching some things that I couldn't figure out why it thought it was wrong/sounded bad, or how to fix it.

There was one more I found that I didn't try, because it involves downloading software. This page explains the software, and another page on the site offers the download. The webpage is sponsored by a university, so I think it's safe to assume its trustworthy, but it might be a hassle and I can't say for sure if it works.

https://www.pawel.jp/outline_of_tools/tomarigi/

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

That said, it's most common for translators to work from one language INTO their native language. While interpreters often have to go both directions (J <--> E), translators typically work either (J -> E) [English native speakers] OR (E -> J) [Japanese native speakers]. If you grew up bilingual, maybe you can translate both ways. But if English is your native language and you learned Japanese as a second language (which is true of my situation), it's pretty much not going to be worth bothering to do E->J translation, unless there are extenuating circumstances. The reasons for this are 1) You can't be sure that the translation you produce reads smoothly or is error-free 2) While you might think, but yes, if I do a really thorough check and compare it against native Japanese examples, I can be pretty darn sure it's perfect, the amount of time it takes you to do that is not going to be cost-effective. Like anything else, people purchasing translation as a service usually want the end result to be done well, in a timely manner, and as cheaply as possible, so it doesn't make sense to hire you for E -> J when they could hire a native Japanese speaking translator, or send their work to an agency to find that translator for them.

If you ARE translating into Japanese and are not a native speaker of Japanese, it is a good idea to have a fellow translator who has the opposite native language you do (in this case Japanese & English), and ask them to check it over for you (which, considering that's part of their job, you'd probably pay a small fee for). They could do the same to have you proofread their translations into English. Some translators consult friends/spouses, etc., but I think this can get old for them sometimes, so it's advisable not to rely on them for your job. You mentioned not having any native speakers to ask right now, but this is still an idea you can file away for in the future when you meet more people and get to know other translators.

In short, if you're aiming to become a translator working with Japanese but are not a native Japanese speaker, don't worry about translating into Japanese. Just focus on translating from Japanese into your native language.

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

Translation software: let me make a distinction here between "machine translation" and "CAT [computer aided translation] tools".

Machine translation is Google Translate, DeepL, anything like that. There are times when they work well, but particularly with a language like Japanese that likes to imply a lot of information instead of stating it directly (such as who is doing the action described in the sentence), they're pretty much always going to miss something. In any situation that someone is looking to pay a translator to do work, it's because they already know machine translation won't cut it. One thing that's becoming more common is MTPE (machine translation post editing), where a translator "fixes" what's wrong with a machine translation (or more often than not, just re-translates it from scratch because what the machine came up with is mostly useless).

CAT tools, on the other hand, are widely used by translators. Paid CAT tools such as Trados, MemoQ, Memsource, etc. can be very expensive, and are often provided by a translation agency to their translators. (Also, most of them require a PC operating system.) There's more I could say, but since I haven't been in any situations that require them, I don't have any personal experience. I do have experience using OmegaT (free, works on Mac) and Felix (free, I use it on Windows). They both take a little tinkering to figure out how to use effectively, but basically what they do is, once you've translated a segment of text, they store the original segment and the translated segment, and for each new segment you go to translate, the CAT tool compares it to segments that you've previously translated to see if you can re-use any of what you came up with before. They can also have a built-in dictionary function, but that's basically just having your typical web-based dictionary but more automatically and in a more convenient location.

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

For going into freelancing, I have a few recommendations.

Apart from CAT tools, some resources that I refer to frequently are http://nihongo.monash.edu/cgi-bin/wwwjdic?9T (basically looks up all the words in a sentence at once), http://thejadednetwork.com/sfx/ (if you're doing anything with sound effects, like manga), https://tsukubawebcorpus.jp//search/ (this is a corpus, I have another post on how to use it -here-, it's probably going to be your best bet when it comes to checking grammar), https://books.google.com/ngrams (for when it comes to figuring out what turns of phrase are commonly used in English), and https://yomikatawa.com/ (for figuring out the readings of names in Japanese, though there are other sites that work similarly).

When it comes to practicing, contests are a good place to start. The two I know of now are run by JAT in October (https://jat.org/events/contests) and JLPP deadline of 7/31 (and they're long, so it's probably too late for this year unless you're free between now and then: https://www.jlpp.go.jp/en/competition6/competition6en.html ) You can also practicing doing translations for fun. Any kind of media you enjoy (manga, video games, variety shows, newspaper articles) is a good target for doing a practice translation. Just be wary that it's not a good idea to post your translation in a public location on the internet, because it could be infringing copyright/licensing agreements, etc. Finally, there are websites like Gengo, Conyac, Fiverr and others where you can do gig translation work. They can be useful for practice, but also have the pitfall of paying, like, 5% of the rate you should be getting. This is an ongoing debate because on one hand, you can get practice while still getting a little money for it, but on the other hand, if customers can get people to do that work for 5% of a livable wage, that makes it harder for aspiring and working translators to find enough work that pays well enough to support themselves doing only translation for a living. Entertainment (primarily manga) scanlation groups also a significant enough force to merit a mention here- many aspiring entertainment translators find themselves a part of such a group. Practice is practice and developing your skills is important, but they also have many many of the same problems associated with them as I mentioned above, namely infringing on copyright and contributing to the inability of anyone to turn entertainment translation into a livable full-time job.

Another recommendation I have is to join some J/E translation-focused groups. This page lists a number of them: https://shinpaideshou.com/translation/ I can personally vouch for JAT as I am a member and I got my current job by being part of their directory. They run an online training program (eJuku) once a year around April, and applications only stay open for a few days, so if you're interested make sure you keep your eye out. Another one not listed on that page is https://swet.jp/ which is not entirely about translation, but it is heavily related and they host some good events. Twitter is also a very good place to be if you're getting into J/E translation. I prefer to keep my tumblr and twitter separate but if you DM me, I can give you my handle so you can see who I follow and who among that seems worth following to you.

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

In closing, I see you say "I have studied till N2 level but have no experience and must start freelancing to get experience so I need to figure out how to translate on my own." I'd say, give yourself some time. Even at N1 there's still going to be a lot you don't understand (or at least there was for me, that's why I started this langblr). I'm sure there are differences in our situations, but it was about five years ago for me that I started diving into translation- I think I was between N2 and N1 then. I've done a lot of translating and gotten a lot of experience since then, but I also have and am experiencing a lot of burnout. (In fact, I'm procrastinating right now by answering this....) Many translators have a job and translate on the side, and it's also common to gain experience with a company or agency before diving into supporting yourself on freelance work. I'd encourage you to take a breath, get experience when and where you can, and remember that if you keep at it long enough, you're sure to get there- just don't wear yourself out or worry to death in the meantime!

OH and definitely keep track of what projects you do, how long they are, and how long it takes you to do them! Knowing your speed is important when it comes to setting your working rates. I am always doubting these, and they differ from person to person, but my current estimates are that I can do 600 moji (Japanese characters) per hour, ~10 min. of audio per hour, and I try to aim for $45~$60 per hour. Generally the lowest acceptable standard rates are $0.05-$0.06 per moji and ~$5 per page of manga. You'll definitely get requests lower than that, so remember your sanity and don't be afraid to say no, there are plenty of opportunities out there!

[danger-xylophones]

A New Chapter (Echo x reader)

{masterlist}

Warnings: It’s implied that the reader has depression, some angst sprinkled in

.....................................

When Rex commed you to come to Anaxes on the next medical transport - you’d expected the worst. You were trying to prepare yourself to hear more bad news. You’d expected to be told that Rex had lost another one of his closest brothers and one of your dearest friends. You’d already lost so many...Echo, Hardcase, Tup, Fives..Echo’s death destroyed you first and left room for every following death to slowly chip away at your resolve. You feared that hearing you’d lost Kix, Jesse, or Cody might just do you in before you could begin to be there for Rex.

So, you frantically scrambled to steel yourself before the transport landed - keeping a death grip on the handle by your head to keep your self grounded. You knew that your fellow medics, clone and nat-born alike, were silently questioning you. As the head nurse you were expected to be composed, cool-headed, great under pressure, and a genuine calming presence. For you to be nervous enough for it to be reflected in your shifting stance and death grip was disconcerting. 

As the transport initiated its landing sequence you took in one long steadying breath and braced yourself for whatever news awaited you beyond the doors. They opened with a hiss and your fellow medics immediately sprung into action unloading supplies and gurneys while you waded through the sea of activity in search of a certain captain. He was waiting for you by the entrance to the barracks. With his helmet on, it was harder to discern what he was feeling but for the most part he stood tall and proud in a perfect soldier stance with his hands clasped behind his back. He was busily conversing with someone you couldn’t see. You were confused now - you’d seen Rex after a heavy loss. His shoulders always sagged, his whole form took on a heaviness to it that was only ever abated with time and the comfort of some good wine you’d often smuggle in for him. He was never this...normal. Rounding a few stacked crates revealed to you that the person Rex was talking to was actually three people consisting of Jesse (thank the maker) and two clones you barely recognized as clones. 

After a loud clearing of your throat you called out to him. Rex turned to you and removed his helmet in one fluid motion and you were surprised to see him beaming at you. “Vod’ika!” He chirped and started walking towards you with Jesse in tow whilst ignoring the intrigued looks of the other two clones - one had really long hair and a headband wrapped around his crown and the other, significantly shorter, peered at you with large eyes hidden behind a pair of blocky glasses. You met Rex in the middle and he quickly pulled you into a one armed hug that you barely returned thanks to being caught so off guard. “Glad you’re here.” He muttered next to your ear before retreating so Jesse could also pull you into a quick hug. 

“I’d say I’m glad to be here,” you began as you pulled away from the arc trooper, “but I don’t know why I am.” You finished with a pointed look at Rex that told him to start explaining. 

His smile fell a bit, though it didn’t completely disappear, “It’s...a long story and it’s better to just show you. C’mon.” He swung his arm for you to follow him, already walking towards the barracks. You hesitated, casting a confused look at Jesse who just offered you an impish grin in reply before strutting after the captain. With a steadying sigh you followed after the two kama wearing clones. 

You passed many troopers as the captain and arc trooper led you further inside the barracks, most from the 501st, some from the 212th, a lot from the 187th, and at least two who you couldn’t identify as being from any legion but they were wearing the same armor as the other two who had been talking to Rex and Jesse when you arrived. The taller of the two (the much taller of the two - was he even a clone? Or was he a Natborn that vaguely resembled the millions of brothers?) watched you walk away with his one functioning eye and a poorly hidden whisper to his friend. “’Think that’s the gal he’s been askin’ about?” 

“Looks like ‘er.” The smaller of the duo answered in a grating voice. 

Your brow furrowed - a lot of clones tended to ask about you given your tendency to move between legions and battalions but it was rare that they talked about you to the extent that someone who’d never met you could recognize you. If you were honest, it was a little unnerving. But, despite your best effort to keep the thoughts at bay, you were briefly reminded of a conversation you’d once had with Fives. 

“He talks abou’ you a lot, y’know.” The newly promoted arc trooper slurred as he heavily leaned against you. He vaguely gestured in the direction of his aforementioned brother where he leaned against the bar, armor glinting in the low lighting, after he timidly offered to get you a new drink. You’d protested, telling him it was his big night, you’d get the drinks but he took off before you could even get to your feet. “Just too shy to do anything but that.” 

“What does he say?” You asked the drunken trooper quietly as your pulse began to speed up. You, admittedly, hadn’t taken much interest in Echo at first - you thought him boring and stiff - but recently he’d been challenging your perception of him. And you’d be a liar if you said you hadn’t started to admire the capable, quick-witted, snippy, but kind, sensitive, and charming soldier. 

“Says ‘e likes you, wish he could work up the nerve to talk to you, thinks you’re the prettiest damn medic in the GAR, thinks you’re a kriffin’ genius...and, ‘m pretty sure he’s in love with you.” Fives took another hearty swig of his drink, shutting up for the first time in what seemed like hours, which gave you enough time to consider his words. While you didn’t want to put all your faith in the drunken mess of an explanation Fives had given you - he did know his twin the best and he’d never lied to you. Maybe - you took another good long look at Echo - just maybe, - you saw him take a deep breath as the bartender handed him your drinks, almost like he was trying to psych himself up - you’d take a chance. You met Echo’s gaze as he turned around, sending him a fond smile that he sheepishly returned. 

Rex led you to a separated part of the med bay primarily meant for rehabilitation where he finally came to a halt just before the door. “Now,” he began as he turned to you, Jesse stopped at your side with crossed arms and a strange, conspiring smile on his face, “I want you to walk between Jesse and I.” Rex ordered quietly as if scared of being overheard. 

Your brow furrowed immediately. “Why?” 

“In case ya faint.” Jesse answered back. 

With a roll of your eyes that could rival the likes of Wolffe’s, you turned to the ARC trooper. “Jesse, I’m a field medic whose spent most of her career on the front lines dealing with a menagerie of injuries. I’m sure whatever it is, I can handle it.” 

“Be prepared to eat those words.” Jesse muttered under his breath in retort but you elected not to respond, instead, you turned your attention back to Rex who was staring at you uncertainly. 

“All the same, let me go in first and make sure he’s ready.” Rex offered gently with a softly placed hand on your shoulder. He had an odd look in his eyes - somewhere between apprehensive, compassionate, and elated - as he looked at you. 

“You’re the captain...” You muttered, suddenly feeling on edge. Jesse must have noticed your tense form for he softly grabbed your hand and gave it a reassuring squeeze. Rex nodded to Jesse then to you before strolling in to the room. The door slid into place behind him leaving you and Jesse for a few minutes. The ARC trooper didn’t let go of your hand till Rex came back and gestured with a nod of his head for the two of you to come in. Rex went back in first, followed by Jesse, with you taking up the rear. The air was strangely tense as you followed behind the two clone troopers so you couldn’t stop your mind from preparing itself to see the worst. While not uncommon for you to visit patients in the middle of rehabilitation it wasn’t why you were part of the GAR. It was just something you’d started doing after serving with the clone forces for so long. But never before had you been nervous. Without warning, Jesse stopped right in front of you causing you to bump into his back. Instead of laughing at you like you thought he would, Jesse angled his body enough for you step in front of him and gently encouraged you to do so with a hand between your shoulder blades. 

You came to a halt in front of him and the ARC trooper kept his hand where it was as if trying to steady you. Seriously, why were they being so weird? You still couldn’t see very far into the room - only the equipment shoved against the walls closest to the door - thanks to Rex who stood in front of you. There was no talking. Rex dipped his head at whoever was in the room and stepped to the side. 

Before you was a trooper dressed in red fatigues. His frame was thin, cheeks sunken in, and his skin unnaturally pale. And he was missing an arm which had been replaced with a computer interface arm one would expect to see on an R-series. His head had also been shaved which revealed small, port like protrusions out of his skull. And upon glancing your eyes downward, you noticed that the trooper’s legs had been replaced with mechanical ones. Not to be flippant but he looked like he’d been through hell and back. 

With a deep breath, you let a mollifying smile slip onto your lips and a sympathetic look fill your eyes. “Hello,” you kept your voice soft too, just in case the trooper was nervous, “My name is Dr. L/n. What’s yours?” 

His brow furrowed and it was only now, after his expression had changed, that you noticed that it had once been almost hopeful. Now, he looked confused. Or more accurately, conflicted. His pale brown eyes were frantically darting back and forth as if searching your face for an answer to a question that was left unasked. “I-it’s me.” He finally spoke in a frail voice. You cocked your head to the side. That was adimttedly an odd name but who were you to judge? Just as you were opening your mouth to speak, he continued. “Cyare, it’s me.” Your mouth clamped shut as the first word slipped from him as the instinct to snap briefly took over. Only one person got to call you that. 

“Trooper, forgive my bluntness but-” 

“Meshurok.” Hearing that word made it feel as though ice had been injected into your body. Shivers ran up and down your spine and goose bumps formed all over. No one had called you that since...Echo. 

“How...?” You felt your body start to fall back only to be stopped by a hand between your shoulder blades. Jesse was still there and Rex was standing just off to the side. They were both real. But was he...?

“When I first worked up the nerve to ask you out, you were wearing a necklace with a kyanite pendant. I asked you where you’d gotten it and what it was.” The trooper took a careful step forward and you felt your heart begin to speed. “You told me it was gifted to you by a young Twi’lek girl you helped when you were on Ryloth with the 187th.” He took another step. “She’d gifted it to you and told you that it was it represented new beginnings.” You took a step forward, eyes wide. “I asked if I could be a part of your new beginnings.” You took another step forward. 

“And I said ‘only if I get to be a part of yours’.” Your voice was wispy, choked with old ghosts. “Echo...” Before you knew it, you were wrapped in his arms. “Echo.” You didn’t care that your voice trembled with barely restrained sobs or that Jesse and Rex were barely three feet away. All you cared about was how familiar he felt - familiar and safe. Home, your mind supplied. “I-I, but the citadel and the ship - I...you...oh god.” You pulled back, almost giving yourself whiplash in the process as your instincts took over. Your hands reached up to gently hold the sides of his face while you reevaluated his appearance. “How did you survive the ship?” Your fingers were busily skimming all the alterations that had most likely been forced onto your cyar’ika. You noticed that his eyelids fluttered closed at the sensation of your fingers on his skin and it made your heart squeeze in both affection and the need to protect him. 

“I don’t really know, mesh’la. I just remember trying to take the ship, it exploding, and then waking up being dragged.” Echo whispered, keeping his hand stubbornly fixed on your waist. Behind you there was the sound of the door sliding closed which you guessed was Rex and Jesse making their exit. 

“Kriffing droids, how dare they touch you,” At some point in your speedy assessment you started to mutter, “I should go there and tear each one to scraps with my bare hands.” 

Echo chuckled and it was enough to bring tears to your eyes, your hand paused just above the computer interface arm. “Who did this to you?” Although it was whispered, Echo heard you clear as day. 

He sighed and gently rested his head against yours, ��Seps, techno union - they don’t matter.” 

“They hurt you - I’m going to find them and kill them myself.” 

“I thought your whole thing was ‘do no harm’.” Echo quipped and the smile that followed, though no where near as wide as you were used to, was warm and genuine and enough to pacify you for now. 

“I can make exceptions.” You muttered but the fire had died down. Another puff of air brushed against your face - another reminder that Echo really was here. 

“Later then.” He pressed his lips against your forehead and drew you closer. You sighed and melted against him, the happiest you’d been in a long time as the first few words of another new chapter formed before your very eyes. 

Taglist: @apocalypticwafflekitten / @cherryxcyarika / @pinkiemme / @justalittlecloud 

[whenimaunicorn]

Training Exercise

The Mandalorian x female Reader

Summary: The Mandalorian is testing you. Again. This time you hit him with a strategy he doesn’t expect, and he comes back with an equally unexpected response.

Content Tags: Explicit, roleplay, dom/sub vibes, dirty talk, bondage, armor kink (I didn’t think I meant to do that but damn if it isn’t all over this fic), slight gunplay, slight breathplay, rough sex

Cold metal cuffs slam around your wrists, the sound of the locking mechanism a loud, ominous snick.

“What the fuck, Mando?” you sputter, dropping your spoon into the bowl in front of you.

“How would you get out of this?”

Stars. Another test. You push down your rising irritation with a deep inhale, sitting up straight and letting your imprisoned forearms rest on the edge of the table down in the hold of the Razor Crest. “So I’ve been captured?” you ask, probing for the parameters of the exercise he has in mind.

“Yes.” He stands a few feet away from you, leaning against the bulkhead, settling in to observe. “Now you’re in a holding cell. One guard.”

You smirk at him. “You’re the guard?”

His helmet inclines a few inches. “What’s your play?”

The question is delivered evenly, soft and simple, with only the tiniest note of challenge. He still doesn’t believe you can handle yourself as well as you say you can. The reminder gets your hackles up. “I’m not really in the mood for this.”

“You think I care if you’re in the mood?” The modulator does little to smooth the harshness with which he barks the statement.

You try not to flinch. Getting into his role already; at least, you try to tell yourself that’s all his change in tone means. Plus, it’s kind of hot when he yells at you. Not that you’d let him know that.

You sigh, and prop your elbows up on the table, examining the cuffs. They are a solid piece, two inches thick in a figure eight shape with a seam in the clasp so flush that it’s almost invisible. There’s an interface on it above your wrists, placed where your own fingers couldn’t possibly reach but would be convenient to your captors. You know enough about this model to know there’s a way to hack the lock, but not enough to actually be able to do it.

You look over at the Mandalorian. He’s facing you squarely now, thumbs resting in his utility belt, the helmet’s eye slit angled like he’s watching you closely. He doesn’t move a muscle, just waiting to see what you’ll do.

You do your best to ignore the tingling feeling his intimidation sends washing through your body. You feel the weight of his gaze like the heat of a sun against the cheek and shoulder that are angled toward him as you look back down at the cuff around your wrists.

What’s your play? he had asked. You arch your back a little more, giving the Mandalorian a better view of your body. You’ve got tricks he can’t teach you, and your irritation has turned into an overwhelming urge to rub that in, now. You sit poised like a pin-up girl as you pick up the spoon from your abandoned meal and stick it backwards into your mouth, then use the chisel-shaped back end of it to probe clumsily at the locking mechanism.

Mando shifts in the corner of your vision, moving just a little bit closer. “You know I can see you, right?” The edge of derision in his voice only spurs you on.

You look up at him, shifting the spoon in your mouth so he has to watch your pink tongue lick out along the edge of it. His upper body pulls back with a start. “I know.” You smile lasciviously around the stick of metal. “If I was alone with one guard, I’d convince him to step closer to me.”

The lower edge of his helmet drops in acknowledgement, and then his blaster clears its holster, in his hand and pointed straight at you faster than you can blink. “Cut that out. Drop the spoon.”

You turn in your chair, knees spread just a little immodestly, so the bottom edge of your tunic creates an intriguing little darkness between your legs for your “guard” to ponder. It’s hard to decide if the man behind the helmet is taking the bait, but you’re going to carry on your demonstration as best you can. You hold the spoon between your teeth and then relax your jaw, turning your lips into a pouty little ‘o’ as the spoon falls straight down into your lap. You suck in a big breath that makes your breasts swell as you look down at it, nestled between your thighs. “Come and get it.”

The Mandalorian seems to hesitate. “Is this really your best strategy?”

“You’d be surprised how often it works.”

His visor is angled just a little too low for you to think he’s looking at your face. He could, of course, take the exercise in any direction that he wants. He could play a guard that’s smarter than his libido right now, or one that doesn’t find you attractive at all. So maybe it means something when he chooses to relax his grip on the blaster, and steps closer, playing along. “It’s no use trying to escape,” he intones, resuming the game as he looms over you, blaster still pointed at your head, though at a lazier angle.

It shouldn’t be as hot is it, to stare up at the enigmatic Mandalorian warrior from your helpless position like this. Though the warm, prickling feeling that spreads through your lower body only makes the game easier. You form your lips into a little pout. “I’ve got to do something to pass the time.” You extend one foot, ankle making contact with the inside of his knee, then slide it up between his legs, past the defense of the metal plates on his thighs. You stare at his eye slit the whole time, tongue peeking out to play at the bottom of your teeth. “You want to put something else in my mouth?”

You feel him flinch. But to his credit, he leans into his discomfort, and into your personal space. “You’d like that.” His words come out in that flat, measured way he has, but the underlying tone is somewhere between brusque and incredulous.

You’re not sure if you’re freaking him out or turning him on, but a heady rush of excitement propels you forward. You give him a slow, sultry shrug as you stare up at him. “Maybe I’ve got a thing for being tied up.” You rock your ankle back and forth against his inner thigh.

The Mandalorian stares down at you, maddeningly still. His body language only shifts when he finally speaks. “Did I mention the guard is a Gamorrean? A particularly ugly one.”

He’s teasing you. You can just imagine a shit-eating grin extending behind his beskar mask. You reach your cuffed arms up, refusing to back down. “Then I’d be sure to stroke a finger down his tusk.” His helmet is cold under your fingertip as you dare to mime the action, sliding your touch down the groove of his iron cheek.

The blaster pointed vaguely at your temple never wavers. You’re close enough now to see that it’s not currently armed, though that information does little to dampen the chill of having a weapon aimed at your head, in a hand that has never hesitated to kill. Mando leans in and presses his other hand between your legs, retrieving the spoon. He takes his time about it, just as a big ugly half-seduced guard would do, digging his fingers unnecessarily into your soft thighs and dragging his knuckles against the sensitive spot between.

Your breath catches. You had been bluffing; you wouldn’t actually enjoy this if he had been a real guard of any species, but when Mando is the one groping between your legs you can’t help but spread them a little wider.

His head is only inches from yours. You stare into the eye slit of his helmet, knowing that somewhere behind there he’s staring right back at you. The shape of the beskar knows only one emotion: menace. You have no fucking idea what expression lies behind the mask.

His knuckle rolls again, right over your clit, making hot arousal bloom so hard and fast that your muscles turn to jelly.

His helmet tilts, and he speaks in his quiet voice again. “You’re not making your move now?”

It takes a second for your brain to catch up. Mando assumed you were luring the guard inside your reach so you could whip out some kind of flashy combat skills and disable him. Of course he did. That’s what he would do.

Evidently, you take too long to respond. He removes your opportunity to act. “Get up!” The Mandalorian grabs at the cuff around your wrists, yanking you to your feet. He holsters the blaster as he crowds your body, backing you up into the wall. Cold beskar presses between your thighs, making sure your legs stay open as you slam back against the bulkhead.

You resist a little on instinct, your mind now torn between winning the game and just enjoying the feeling of his body against yours. He overpowers you easily, forcing your hands up over your head. There’s a clicking sound, and then both of Mando’s gloved palms are running down your arms, though they’re still locked in place. He’s magnetized the wrist cuff to the bulkhead. Fuck. You didn’t know it could do that.

His beskar face looms just inches above your own. His grip doesn’t flinch as his hands run down from your arms to your flanks, feeling along your ribs in a touch that’s more sexually charged than you’d thought him capable of. “You’ve chosen a strategy that can get you in over your head, fast.” His voice sounds a little tight behind the modulator. His hands slide down to grip your waist. “Would you really let it get this far?” You can hear him breathing now, fast and hard. His fingers knead at the tops of your hips. “Dirty yourself, letting a filthy guard touch you this way?” There’s a hint of a whine under his accusatory tone, and you start to think the Mandalorian might be even more turned on by this game than you are.

You don’t answer, not sure what to say that wouldn’t ruin whatever’s starting to happen. Mando’s hands travel up your body, thumbs daring to skim underneath your breasts.

“No play yet?” he challenges, voice sounding a little lower, a little rougher. “Still not ready to make your move? This is only going to get worse for you.” His palms skim over your tits, but he seems to be holding himself back, barely making contact. “Better do something before he starts taking off your clothes.”

Absolutely you want him to start taking off your clothes. But this is just a training exercise, isn’t it? You’ll probably just make things awkward if you delay any longer, sitting here enjoying an excuse to get groped by the Mandalorian. Time to make your next play. “Okay big boy,” you purr, barely keeping a straight face as you try to imagine seducing a giant pig-man, “let me make you feel really good.” You slide your cheek against Mando’s helmet, dropping your voice into a throaty half-whisper above where his ear would be. “Give me one of my hands free, and I promise you won’t regret it.”

He pulls the pressure of his body off yours, just a little. Considering. You writhe against him, whispering ‘please’ and dragging your knee up the inside of his leg to show him where your hand would want to go. Before you can make contact with your target, Mando reaches up and presses a button on the cuff. “That… that would probably work on a big, dumb guard. I’ll give you that.” His voice sounds a little breathy, but he’s rallying himself. “Let’s see what you can accomplish with only one hand.”

The steel around one of your wrists retreats. The other one remains locked to the wall. “Oh, I can do plenty,” you say, bringing your palm down to the cloth-covered opening between his helmet and pauldron. It’s hard to grope a man wearing full body armor; all you can do is massage at that firm muscle that connects his shoulder and neck, hoping that the pressure feels nice through the canvas-like fabric that covers his skin here.

His fingers flex where they span your waist, a sudden dig that seems involuntary. He can’t be used to even such a blunted touch as this one, you suppose. He turns his gesture into a more obscene caress, sliding down your hips, grinding your pelvis tighter against the beskar thigh thrust between your legs. You don’t have to fake the moan that falls from your throat.

“Definitely a dirty girl,” he says, and squeezes your ass with both hands. Now you’re really not sure if he’s speaking as the guard or himself. His voice has dropped low and the modulator can’t smooth out the pleasure that’s thickening it. “Offering yourself up like this…” His cold helmet presses against your temple as the Mandalorian brings his whole body closer, nestling his head between your cheek and your upraised arm, the one that’s still locked to wall of the ship above your head. He grunts as he digs his fingers into the widest part of your bottom, and you groan. “You like it rough?”

“Yeah,” you moan, not sure if you’re playing your character anymore either, afraid to say anything that might make him stop. You abandon his neck to slide your free hand down past the beskar chestplate, seeking warmth in the space at his flank where something approaching soft and human is accessible to your touch. You can feel him breathing here, fast and deep. His hips writhe, pressing that solid flesh above his lower ribs more firmly into your palm.

“So pliant. So soft.” His tone has gone softer, appreciative. One hand stays on your ass while the other travels up your back, scooping you closer to him, until your chest is flattened by solid metal as he all but dry humps you against the wall.

Your fingers tease at his belt line, searching for entrance. A splash of nerves cools your belly at this point; you’ve never seen the Mandalorian undressed in any way, and you worry how he might react to you trying to get under his clothes. There’s always the chance you’re mis-reading this situation horribly. He’ll stop you if you cross a line, you’re certain, but you want to go slowly enough to make sure the sin is not too egregious.

Mando seems to sense your hesitation, slowing down too. “If you’re thinking about going for my gun,” he says, “you’re telegraphing.”

Apparently, he still thinks you’re thinking about the training exercise. He hasn’t lifted his head from where it’s nestled into your shoulder, however. His hands have slowed but they’re still cupping you.

“Not going for your gun.” Your fingers skim along his lower belly, finding the buckle of his belt.

“No?” Mando breathes.

You squeeze the clasp, releasing it with a click that seems way louder than it should be in the empty galley of the ship. His exhale carries just enough vocalization for the modulator to pick it up, sounding akin to and yet wholly different from the heavy sighs that escape him when you or the child are being frustrating. He gives you no other reaction but that.

You dare to stick one finger down inside his waistband. His heavy shirt is tucked in and so you still haven’t contacted any skin. You can’t even pretend to try to read his face, with the front of his helmet still pressed into the crook of your neck. Your finger tugs at his clothes and his body shifts against you but you can’t tell if he’s pulling away or shifting to give you better access.

You lose your nerve. “And then I would,” you narrate, stopping yourself, “you know…” Your finger points down toward his cock, trying not to think about what it would feel like to scoop your hand over it, wondering if you would find it hard or soft…

He lifts his head, only far enough to stare into your face through that shielded slit in his helmet. After a short, measured silence, he speaks. “Go ahead.”

Somehow you can’t wrap your head around the statement. “Um, what?” You feel your hand curling up, starting to withdraw in an awkward defensive reflex, though one finger is still stuck inside his waistband.

He cocks his head, and you can just feel him taking your measure. His open hands caress up and down your back, and your body responds, curling into the touch. You realize your mouth is hanging open as you continue to meet his impenetrable beskar gaze.

“Don’t you want to see if your plan is going to work? I know I do.”

Well, fuck. You rotate your wrist and press your whole palm into his lower belly, fingers pointing down. You can actually feel his warmth here, and the way his breathing speeds up as you slide your hand lower against him. When your fingertips reach bare skin he moans. It sounds like he tried to keep it in but it just slipped out anyway. He clutches you closer to him again as you skim down along course hairs and hot skin.

What is happening here? Does he really want you to wrap your fingers around his cock, like you’re so close to doing right now? His whole body is tense, you realize, and his fingers are digging into your skin almost painfully.

You slow your approach, not wanting him to snap under that tension. Or for him to snap you. You scratch your fingertips softly into the trail of hairs you feel leading you toward your prize.

“Fuck,” he groans, and pushes his whole body against you, all but crushing you against the bulkhead.

Now you can’t move your hand. But in the midst of all the hard edges of his armor, you can feel one thing poking into you that definitely isn’t beskar.

So the Mandalorian does want you. His helmet presses into the crook of your neck; you just know that if it weren’t in the way he’d be mouthing open kisses all over your throat. He keeps your hand trapped between the press of your bodies, the other still cuffed up to the wall, while his roam freely all over you. This time when he reaches your breasts he lets himself feel, scooping over your pillowy flesh and trapping a nipple between his thumb and the side of his hand.

The pressure is just short of pain and you mewl at the pleasure and desire it sends blooming up through your core. Your reaction encourages him and he tears at the opening in the front of your tunic, struggling to get at your bare flesh.

The savagery pulls a gasp from your throat, and that sound makes him pause. “I said this strategy was a dangerous game.” His helmet shifts so he can get a better look at your face. “Do you want to keep going?”

You nod. “I like this game.”

His real voice, not the aggressive character, slides out soft and even from the modulator. “I like it too.”

You press your hand harder, down where it’s trapped between your bellies, tickling your fingers toward his root. “Then let’s keep playing.”

The groan that reaches your ears through his modulator might be the most delicious sound you’ve ever heard, as he changes the angle of his hips and gives you room to reach him. Well, it was the most delicious sound, until you hear the next one to come out of his mouth, even deeper, even longer, as you find his thick shaft and curl your fingers eagerly around it.

His length had been stuck a little down one pant leg. He gives a pleasured hiss as you free him from the confinement, scooping him in your palm to point straight up between your bodies. One of his hands leaves your waist just so he can hold himself up against the wall; you must have made him go a little weak in the knees. You purr a little “mmm” in the back of your throat in satisfaction, to see the Mandalorian in such a state. His cock is thick and velvety smooth and already twitching in your palm as you give him a few slow, steady pumps.

His noise of pleasure is almost a wail, and without warning he slams a palm into the center of your chest, pushing you back into the bulkhead again. His fingers slide up to bridge your throat, exerting just enough pressure to set warning bells off in your head, and to slow your hand.

“Fu-uck,” is all he says by way of explaining himself. Then he uses both hands to pull your tunic up your body, exposing everything above your leggings to the cool air jetting from the ship’s recyclers all at once. “Off,” he growls as he tugs the fabric against your armpits, forcing you to let go of his glorious cock and let him pull the tunic off over your arm and head.

With your left arm still cuffed to the wall, the shirt has to just kind of hang there on one shoulder, but Mando has succeeded in freeing the soft flesh of your neck, your chest, and your belly. He gazes down at you for an endless moment, then begins to assault everything he has exposed with hands covered in gloves and arms coated in steel.

You know that his gloves are augmented with some kind of sensors that transmit more information than the leather look of them would imply. You wonder what your pebbled nipples and rarely-bared skin feel like to him. He certainly has the touch of someone with perfect sensitivity as he sculpts and squeezes you; he plays with your nipples and adores the rest of your flesh until you’re panting for him.

You shove your hand back into his pants. You have to make him feel how he’s making you feel, to return this sweet torture. He moans again, and thrusts himself into your hand.

You strain against the wrist that’s cuffed to the wall. If only—of course. The plan hits you all at once. While you’re dying to explore these unexpected sexytimes with Mando, your pride is still itching at you to try and win the game.

“I-I want you, babe,” you say, making the sound of the words bottom out in your throat. “Want you in my mouth.” You squeeze him from root to tip and try to drop down in front of him, dangling off the cuff like you’ve lost all control. “Please let me—let me get on my knees for you.”

Mando curses through his teeth and presses the button to release your wrist without even hesitating. As your arm falls you lean into him, feigning like you’re going to do just as you said. Then you square your stance and twist, shoving him toward the wall, using your grip on his cock like a handle. In a real fight you would have hurt him bad right there, but this is just practice, just training. Just an exercise. You don’t squeeze him hard enough to do any damage.

And as soon as you’ve twisted his momentum to the side, you’re pushing off the wall, sprinting for the hatch out of the hold, and sweet, sweet victory.

A hand like iron clamps onto your shoulder; something catches your leg, and then you’re falling, with a heavy body riding you down. You twist into the fall so it’s not ugly, absorbing the impact with thigh and forearms. Then the Mandalorian is pressing your bare chest into the decking.

“Don’t think you got away with anything, there,” he says as he climbs more firmly on top of you. You turn your head to see his beskar face looming near your cheek. “I knew what you were up to.”

“Then why did it work?”

“I just wanted to feel you run.” He presses his body over yours, armor plates grinding into your thighs and back, shoving your hips flat against the deck too so you have no leverage to try and escape. “Now. What were you saying about your mouth?” His hand leaves your shoulder to grab up a section of your hair, tugging tight at the back of your head, forcing your face up toward him. “Ready to make good on that promise?”

You nod, frantically, but as much as you’d love to suck him down, the feeling of his whole body grinding you into the deck is driving you crazy. You curl your ass up against him, with the tiny amount of movement his pressure will allow. You want more than anything else for him to just fuck you through the floor right here.

Mando’s hand runs down your naked side, pushing at the waistband of your leggings when he reaches them. “Or maybe I’ll just—”

“Yes!” you cry, “oh please,” arching your back, scrambling to help him get your clothes out of the way.

His answering growl roars wild and alien through the modulator right beside your ear. You take more of his weight as his chest presses against your upper body so he can use both hands to clear all the barriers  below your waists. You can choose to help him with your hands too, or you can hold yourself up with your forearms so you have room to actually breathe under his crushing weight.

You choose to sacrifice your breath. Your bare chest crushes into the cold decking as you shove your leggings down past your ass, and spit into your fingers so you can lubricate his path. That thick cock of his might have a hard time getting in, in a position like this, but it’s going to be so worth it.

Cool beskar gauntlets slide against your lower back and ass as Mando’s hands work at his own trousers in the small space between your bodies. His panting breath crackles through the modulator above your ear, sounding even louder since you can barely suck a breath in yourself under his weight. He moans when he notices you stroking your own slit, readying the way for him. You’ve worked your hand under one hip so you can reach yourself even as he’s crushing you. You’re already wetter than you expected, but you make sure to drag that moisture all over your sensitive folds.

As soon as he’s gotten himself free you feel his fat head probing at you. Some of the pressure comes off your chest as he slams his other hand against the deck near your face, holding himself up so he has a little more control. You think at first that he’s lining himself up, as Mando swirls himself around your entrance, and so you arch your back, present your hips as much as you can for him. As he keeps moving you realize he’s playing; savoring, scooping that moisture all over his tip before finally deciding to press inside.

The stretch is intense, and it just keeps coming. Now you have another reason not to be able to breathe. The pleasure in that invasion is white-hot and overwhelming, and he feels impossibly long, impossibly deep as he flattens you into the floor like this. You relax everything and focus on just taking it, on taking him.

Finally, finally, the timeless plunge reaches its end, as his hips come to rest against your bottom. He stays there, arms scooping around your shoulders, helmet pressed against your cheek, and lets out a long, shuddering exhale. Then he starts pumping. Long, measured, relentless thrusts drill into you, each one as deep and overwhelming as the first. The pleasure rips through you like a wildfire, melting and invigorating your limbs both at once.

And in this position you don’t have to do anything. Just lay there and take it, let Mando claim you, press further and further until you feel like your entire being is nothing but the cunt he’s hammering into, a vessel for pleasure as he grunts and curses above you, losing himself just the same in the meeting of your bodies.

Your pleasure builds, clamoring for release. You realize one of your hands is still trapped under your body, and with the small movement your current state will allow you to make, you get your finger onto your clit.

It doesn’t take much, just the slightest targeted pressure, to harness the wild ecstasy that’s been building in your core. Your muscles lock, your body clamps, and all that needy pleasure spirals so intense that you hear a rushing in your ears.

“Oh, fuck, are you coming?” Mando groans, his modulated voice so close and yet a million miles away. He presses deeper, more eagerly at the very idea, and that pushes you right over the edge. You wail like an animal and curl up under him, except you can’t, the floor’s too solid, he’s too solid, and you cum with every muscle in your body straining against a steel prison that keeps you flat and helpless.

He rides you through it all, pumping faster, harder, grunting with the effort and making your orgasm feel like it’s never going to end under the relentless way he fucks you. Even when the crest passes and your body goes limp, he keeps going, driving himself like your lives depend on it, as relentless as you’ve seen him in battle. Tears form in your eyes as his cock won’t let your body come down. You feel everything inside you tensing up for another orgasm by the time his breathing goes ragged and you know he’s close too.

When the Mandalorian comes he finally lets it all go, burying himself in you to the hilt and wailing with a sound so raw it makes your heart crack and your body clench around him. Your second orgasm makes the tears fall from your eyes; all your limbs collapse together as your cunt milks every last drop of his release out of him.

The first one to move after the rush fades is him; his helmet comes into view from where you lay with your cheek pressed against the deck. His leather-tipped finger soaks up the tear that was threatening to fall over the bridge of your nose. “Was—” his voice is thick and he has to clear his throat before he can continue, “—was I too rough?”

You make a reassuring sound, the closest you can get to words for a moment. You shake your head, just a little. “Fuck. No. Loved that.”

You wonder if that makes him smile behind the mask. Your voice came out raspy, made you both conscious of the fact that most of the weight of a seasoned warrior, plus a hell of a lot of solid beskar, still lies squarely on top of you. While the sensation was a turn-on, you still make a little sound of relief when he rolls off you, laying on his back by your side.

His helmeted head rolls to face you. You’re sure you look like a hot mess, laying there mostly naked, ass up, with your face in the deck, but you feel amazing. Mando reaches up one gloved hand and presses two fingertips lightly to your lips. It feels like a kiss, so you purse your lips and kiss back, keeping your eyes locked on his eye slit. He lifts his hand to your temple, brushing his fingers through your mussed hair.

“I guess you showed me.”

It takes you a second to realize he’s referring to the training exercise. “I thought you said it didn’t work on you.”

His helmet inclines. “It worked.”

You smile. Maybe you preen, just a little. “Satisfied, then, that I can handle myself?”

“Definitely not.”

He just lays there while you pout at him, waiting for him to elaborate. He lifts his arm, beckoning you to peel yourself off the floor and come cuddle against him. You pull your tunic back on before you comply; bare skin against beskar doesn’t sound quite as appealing now that the heat of passion has fled.

You cuddle into the crook of his arm, finding a decent enough pillow on the inside of his bicep. Only once he’s got you curled against him to his liking, does he explain himself. “You are not going to be fucking your way out of trouble while you’re with me,” he says matter-of-factly. “I forbid it.”

You try not to let him feel you shiver at what his tone does to you. “Is that so.”

“It is.”

“If you don’t respect my skills—”

“I do,” he cuts you off. “But they’re only for me, now.” His body shifts where you’re curled against him, his hand clutching against your back. “We can play this game again, as often as you like, but..” he reaches over and slaps your ass hard enough to sting, “now I’ve also got to start teaching you how to actually fight.”

My Mando Smut Masterlist

Taglist is open, and I’m taking requests: @equalstrashflavoredtrash @laketaj24 @themaskismyface @pascallorian @shadowfoxey​ @pinstripeninja13​ @thatkidofwarandpeace​ @no-droids

[egcdeath]

a blip in the reader-verse

chapter 2: white picket fence

previous chapter

chapter summary: you learn a bit more about the situation at hand, and gain a sliver of hope for the future

pairing: steve rogers x reader

warnings: angst, but a temporary happy ending

word count: 1.9k

author’s note: hopefully the trajectory of this fic will make a little more sense after this chapter, and the next. all feedback and reblogs are appreciated & let me know if you’d like to be added to the story’s tag list!

A breeze blew by idly, shaking the flowers that surrounded you in the field just slightly. You seemed to be lost in your own head, relaxing on your back and basking in the serenity of watching the sunrise. The soft crunch of footsteps approaching alerted you of someone else’s presence, and you moved your gaze to follow the sound.

You were shocked at the vision of your lover, although he seemed to be a frequent subject of your thoughts and dreams these days. Still, you gasped out, “Steve?”

“Y/N,” he responded excitedly, nearly sliding in an attempt to sit down next to you.

“How did you find me here?” your brows furrowed as you looked at the man, something a bit off about his presence.

“You know that I’d find you anywhere,” he told you, looking over at you as you shook your head, and turned your away from him.

“Then why did you leave?” You asked, biting back bitter tears. “You promised me that you’d never leave,” you muttered with a wobble in your voice.

He reached a calloused hand out to your face, and gently turned it back towards him. “I’m so sorry. I made a really big mistake, an-and now I can’t get back. I’m gonna try to find you, but you have to help me.”

“You’re just my brain telling me what I want to hear,” you whimpered, sitting up.

“No Y/N, it’s me. Really me. It’s so hard to explain, but I messed up really bad. I need you to try to find me too. But I don’t even know if we’re in the same universe anymore.”

You gave Steve a strange look at this point, wiping your face with the back of your hand and huffing softly. This did seem a bit far fetched for your subconscious to conjure up on its own.

A loud and sharp sound interrupted your thoughts, and in an instant, the field of flowers began to fade into obscurity, daffodils and pink tulips turning to nothing more than smudges of pastels against a similarly smudged pale sunrise.

Yet through the dissolving of the dream, and the distorted noise of what you could only assume was your alarm clock, Steve remained. He grabbed your hand and squeezed it tightly. “I just want to be with you again. Please,” he paused, “bring me back home.” He begged, “back to you,” he pleaded before vanishing as well.

—

You woke up in a pool of your own sweat, your phone’s alarm ringing obnoxiously, as you used one hand to turn it off, and another to dry the steady stream of tears that had escaped your eyes at some point during your rest.

You had to admit, that was a rather bizarre dream. You’d had your fair share of dreams about Steve since his departure, yet none as vivid as this. Although it was just a dream, it felt like something more. A message, even. You grabbed your phone, and rushed to type in a recap of the event into your notes app, before rubbing the rest of the sleep out of your eyes, and heading out to the kitchen of the Compound to find someone else to confide in.

Lo and behold, Banner stood in the kitchen steeping a cup of green tea.

“Morning, Y/N. How’d you sleep?” He asked, taking a sip of the drink, before taking a seat at the dining table.

You chuckled softly to yourself, and approached the Nespresso machine, “That’s a great question. I guess I slept fine, but Steve was there.”

“Again?” Bruce questioned, setting down his mug.

“Yeah, but it was kind of different. He basically told me that he was stuck and needed me to help him,” you popped a pod into the machine, then slid your own mug under the spout.

“That is different,” Bruce agreed. “What do you think is going on in that brain of yours?”

“No idea. It was just so weird, because he told me that he thinks he’s in a completely different universe. Uh, he was just being vague about some mistake he’d made.”

“Hmm,” Bruce grumbled pensively while the sound of your coffee pouring also filled your ears “What do you think happened? Weird dream, or meaningful dream?”

You shrugged hopelessly, then looked down at the floor as Natasha entered the room. “Morning, assholes,” she greeted, shuffling over to where you were standing by the counter, and giving you a classic Nat half hug upon seeing your bloodshot eyes, indicating another tumultuous night. “How’re you holding up, babe?”

You simply shrugged again in response, grabbing your now filled mug, and setting it down on the counter.

“She had another dream about him,” Bruce informed Nat.

“You poor thing,” she said genuinely, despite her words’ sarcastic nature. As you sat down at the counter seats, Nat began to make her own drink. “I know you guys were close, but it might be time to let go. You need closure, and maybe allowing yourself to grieve will help you to not dream about him so often.”

You stared down into the dark liquid, and frowned as you saw a hint of your unkempt reflection. “Yeah, you’re right. But I’m worried. What he was saying in my dream was basically a cry for help. I know, it could just be me projecting, but it just felt so real…” your voice trailed off, and you glanced up to see Bruce and Natasha sharing a concerned look.

“You guys think I’m crazy don’t you? Great. Fine. I’m gonna go train,” You muttered, grabbing your mugs handle and slipping out of your seat before leaving the kitchen. You couldn’t stand being judged in that moment. Was a little support from your friends too much to ask for?

——

Aware that your teammates didn’t believe the weight of your dreams, you seeked out Wanda, and practically begged her to read your memories and relay them back to the team as a way to gain another witness, and possibly get Steve the help that he might need.

If Steve was truly trapped in another universe, perhaps the scientists on the team could create technology that could help bring him back.

As you’d expected, Wanda giving her testimony on what she’d seen in your subconscious to your teammates had helped your case significantly. Although a bit hesitant, Tony and Bruce were desperate to get Steve back, and if it meant going on a wild goose chase, they were open to taking that risk.

Sooner than later, a small watch was created that seemed to be able to harbor the ability to jump into different universes throughout the multiverse.

You were sitting in the common room, playing a game of chess with Thor, when the trifecta of Tony, Bruce, and Wanda approached you with a small device that appeared to be some sort of smart watch.

“Y/N, you’re going on a mission,” Tony began. “We have good reason to believe that Steve is in fact, in some other universe somewhere in the multiverse. We have no idea how he contacted you, but if your connection to him is strong enough that he can talk to you in your dreams, there’s not a doubt, well, maybe like three doubts, in my mind that you can find him in a different universe.” The watch was passed into your hand.

“Some things we’ve figured out through a few practice runs is that in these universes, you already kind of technically exist. You may have to try to come up with certain memories on the spot, but for the most part, you should remember what your life is like in that universe as soon as you get there, and fit right in.

Now, the time that you can stay varies in each universe. For some, it’s a long time. Maybe even years. But in others, you might only be able to stay for a matter of minutes. It really just depends on how time works in their reality. About thirty seconds before you’re automatically sent to a different reality, you’ll get a little vibration on your wrist that’ll tell you it’s time to go.

If you need to leave before that vibration, there’s a setting that allows you to do so. You can also come back to this specific universe anytime you need to, but we’re under the impression that it’ll take less of an overall toll on you if you just go straight from one universe to the next.” Bruce added.

“Remember, your mission is to find Steve and bring him back, okay? There are infinite amounts of universes out there, so there are infinite versions of Steve you might come across. Please don’t bring whoever else you might fall in love with back here,” Wanda teased. “We don’t need any more trouble with the time and universe cops.”

You chuckled stiffly, but were trying to really absorb the information you’d just been loaded with.

“You can leave whenever you’re ready. Right now, tonight, a week. Whenever, okay?” Bruce told you, and you simply nodded. “Alright. Safe travels, okay?”

“Yeah. Thank you guys, seriously.”

“You think we’re doing this for you? We want our Capsicle back!” Tony teased. You shook your head fondly, then exited the room, going to your bedroom for some peace and quiet, and to attempt to process everything you’d just heard.

You wrapped the watch band across your wrist, then scrolled up and down the interface, surprised at everything it could do. Yet,  before you could even say ‘wow,’ the world seemed to fade to black.

——

When you opened your eyes, you were standing in the same field outside of the compound that you’d been standing in just a few days prior, reliving the final moments you’d shared with Steve.

Except, Steve wasn’t the one standing on the platform. In fact, Steve was standing next to you, his hand squeezing yours in the comforting manner that you’d grown to know over the past six years. The both of you watched Thor wave a friendly goodbye, then disappear into thin air.

You were at a loss for words. It felt like a do-over more than anything else, but you tried not to get ahead of yourself and mess anything else in the universe up, in an attempt not to cause another butterfly effect..

“This is all finally gonna be over,” Steve said, pulling his hand away from yours, so he could wrap his arm around you tightly. “All of this pain and suffering, all of the stress from those Goddamn stones.”

You nodded wordlessly, in a bit of shock from seeing the man that appeared to be your Steve, and feeling his comforting touch after what had felt like a lifetime without it.

“Maybe we can finally start over. Move into the suburbs, have a few kids, the whole white picket fence,” he sighed softly, imagining an ideal future with you beside him.

You nodded, barely being able to think with the overstimulation of being in Steve’s presence. All you could do was inhale deeply into Steve’s chest, and ignore the soft vibration on your wrist, alerting you of your departure. “I love you Steve,” was all you could muster as you mumbled into his chest.

“Let’s go home.”

next chapter

[thelittlebirdthattoldyou]

electric love by borns (like the tiktok challenge) and iwaoi please n thankies (✧ω✧)

oh no now all i can think about is oikawa getting a tiktok and forcing iwaizumi to make them with him

electric love - børns

pairing: iwaizumi hajime/oikawa tooru

content: fluff, love confessions, tiktok challenges apparently

wc: 1112 (i know,, i’m sorry)

-

"Oi, we’re in the middle of practice,” Iwaizumi calls. “Stop messing around on your phone.”

Oikawa jumps, guilty eyes meeting Iwaizumi’s own. “But it’s break time, Iwa-chan,” he protests. “I wouldn’t be on my phone if we were actually playing volleyball.”

Iwaizumi snorts. Oikawa hates taking breaks. He’s infamous for trying to play through them; Iwaizumi can’t count the number of times he’s had to drag Oikawa off the court and force him to drink some water. Usually he’d jump at the chance to resume practice, but he’s been attached to his phone all day. He practically sprints over to it every time he gets a moment of free time, scrolling mindlessly through his feed.

“What are you looking at, anyway?” Iwaizumi asks. He sidles next to Oikawa, craning his head to try to get a look at the screen.

Immediately, Oikawa lifts a hand to shield it from his view. “Nothing, Iwa-chan!” he says, way too quick to be natural. He cups the phone close to his chest… and is that the beginning of a blush starting to curl over his cheeks?

Iwaizumi frowns at him, confused and maybe a little hurt. Oikawa doesn’t often try to hide things from him. “Are you feeling okay?” he asks.

Oikawa huffs. “Is this an interrogation or something? I don’t have to get your approval for everything I want to look at on my phone, mom.”

Iwaizumi’s frown hardens into a glare. “Whatever, asshole.”

Then Coach Irihata blows his whistle and signals for everyone to return to their positions on the court, and Iwaizumi tries his best to push any extraneous thoughts of Oikawa out of his mind.

During their practice game, the two of them are as in sync as ever. But as soon as official practice ends, when Iwaizumi turns to ask Oikawa whether he plans to stay late, he finds that Oikawa is already on his way to the locker room, phone in hand.

They walk home side by side, as usual. Only instead of talking his ear off, Oikawa has his earbuds in and his eyes fixed on his phone. Other than an occasional laugh at whatever he’s watching, he doesn’t make a sound, and it bothers Iwaizumi more than he’d like to admit. Every time he tries to get a glimpse of what’s so amusing, Oikawa inches his phone out of the way.

Finally, Iwaizumi has had enough. “I’m going on ahead,” he says as he quickens his pace. “Don’t walk into traffic or something dumb like that.”

“What - wait!” Oikawa grabs onto his wrist before he can leave. “Wait - I was wondering if you wanted to come over.”

Iwaizumi raises an eyebrow. “No offense, Shittykawa, but watching you stare at your phone for hours isn’t exactly my idea of fun.”

“It’s not that,” Oikawa says, fiddling with the wires of his earbuds. “There’s… something I want to show you.”

Is he nervous? That’s odd. Against his better judgement, Iwaizumi agrees, cursing himself for the way his heart speeds up when Oikawa smiles.

Oikawa vibrates with excitement the rest of the way to his house, humming and skipping in a way that would be comical if Iwaizumi didn’t find it so endearing. “Does this have anything to do with why you’ve been so weird all day?” Iwaizumi asks.

“Maybe,” Oikawa says. “Don’t worry about it too hard, Iwa-chan. You’ll find out soon.”

Iwaizumi rolls his eyes, but he doesn’t miss the strained undercurrent in Oikawa’s voice. Huh.

Oikawa’s parents don’t get home until late on weekdays, so Iwaizumi mutters a low “Pardon for the intrusion” to the empty house when he enters. They leave their shoes at the door and grab a couple of snacks from the kitchen, and then Oikawa leads him up the stairs to his bedroom.

“Alright, what is it?” Iwaizumi asks. “We do have homework, you know.”

“You’re so impatient, Iwa-chan. Give me a minute.” He props his phone up on his desk, the front camera facing them. The interface of the app he’s using looks familiar, but Iwaizumi doesn’t know its name. Between them, Oikawa has always been the one who keeps up with the latest technology.

Oikawa presses some button, and an English song starts to play. Iwaizumi gets too distracted trying to figure out the words to notice how anxious Oikawa looks when he returns to his side. His lips are pressed tightly together, almost turning white.

“You wanted to show me a song?” Iwaizumi asks, incredulous. “What even are these lyrics?”

Baby, you’re like lightning in a bottle.

I can’t let you go now that I’ve got it.

“Shut up,” Oikawa says. “It’s not just the song. There’s this… internet challenge.”

Iwaizumi sighs. “Of course there is. Honestly, when will you stop being so -”

Oikawa leans close and kisses him, so soft that he barely feels it. But it’s enough to make him freeze in place, brain short-circuiting as Oikawa steps back with fear written in every line of his face.

And all I need is to be struck

By your electric love.

“Iwa-chan?” Oikawa mumbles. “Iwa-chan, say something.”

Iwaizumi ignores him, lifting his hand and pressing it to his lips. “You -” he starts, then stops. “Oikawa, I -”

Oikawa buries his face in his hands, muffling a quiet scream. “Oh my god, I’m so sorry, I knew I shouldn’t have - I don’t know what I was - please tell me I didn’t just ruin everything, Iwa-chan.”

“That…” Iwaizumi’s voice is shaky, and he clears his throat. “That was such a stupid way to confess,” he says. “What if I’d said no? Then you’d have a recording of me rejecting you forever.”

“I know!” Oikawa wails. “You don’t have to rub it in - wait.” He peeks at Iwaizumi from between his splayed fingers. “‘What if’ you’d said no? What does that mean?”

Iwaizumi shakes his head, still in disbelief. He holds out his arms. “It means come here, you idiot.”

He should really be prepared for the way Oikawa barrels into him, all 160 pounds of muscle, but the impact still manages to drag a startled oof out of him. “I hate you so much,” Oikawa complains, though it comes out muffled because his face is buried in Iwaizumi’s chest. “So much. You didn’t say anything for so long, and I really thought…”

“I was in shock,” Iwaizumi says. “I’d like to see you try to react normally right after your childhood best friend kisses you out of nowhere.”

“Mmh, I dunno,” Oikawa says, lifting his head to offer Iwaizumi a mischievous smirk. “I think that sounds pretty good, Iwa-chan.”

“You’re so annoying,” Iwaizumi says, but he slots their mouths together again anyway.

[painted-crow]

How do you write stuff (like novels) as a Bird secondary? Do you do a detailed outline and plan it all out?

My Rapid-Fire Bird, plotting novels with very loose outlines?

(It's more likely than you think)

Personally? Nope. You can, and it would be a very Birdsec thing to do, but I usually don’t. I have one (1) novel where I did a detailed outline, and it didn't start that way--the outline came into being because I was trying to rework/fix the novel.

The novels I wrote as a teenager? Almost all seat-of-the-pants writing (and it shows). I can work like that for a while before the plot stops making sense, tbh.

In fact, it's often easier to come up with an outline after I've gotten to know the characters and the world a little bit, and this is something I've heard from other writers too. Nobody keeps the first chapter they write of their novel anyway, that almost always gets thrown out wholesale and rewritten.

My one giant outline

The hacker novel I have on the back burner is the only one where I've done what you'd call a detailed outline, but like I said, I didn't start by writing the outline.

I wrote 4 or 5 versions of the first 20Kish words of that book (and some random scenes from other places) by pantsing them, which is inadvisable--it's actually a common beginner trap to just keep rewriting your first act--but I almost couldn't avoid it because I was making these attempts with huge time gaps between them, I kept coming back to the story in between doing other things (university, mostly).

But there was also something in the structure of the novel itself that was keeping me from moving forward.

Finally, I decided I was thoroughly stuck. I merged two major characters, split up the cast (turns out it's incredibly difficult to write an ensemble cast if they're all in the same place for very long), retooled the conflict some, and wrote a 10,000 word outline detailing what happens in each scene and breaking it all up in Scrivener into individual files. This seemed like the only way to have a chance at taming a novel with 9 major characters and about 5 major plot threads, most of which happen simultaneously.

Honestly, *having written* that outline is helpful, but when I once again take it off the back burner and start fiddling with it again, I don't think I'll necessarily follow my scene list. I did actually write a good chunk to the outline, but I ended up half-writing and then cutting a lot of the scenes it called for, because it made more sense for those things to happen offscreen. I also found myself expanding some of the other scenes because they were interesting or going in different directions than I expected.

I don't think I like using long outlines like this, though. It feels a bit like I've already written that book, and honestly the whole thing is a little too complicated for my liking. (Maybe this is part of why I steered into writing middle grade for my two newer projects.)

My usual outlines

The two middle grade novels I'm working on more recently both have outlines, but they're nowhere near as long. There's nothing super fancy about them either; no spreadsheet, character profiles, maps, whatever people do--for either of them.

Their outlines live in my phone's notes app, or in one Scrivener file, and they're just descriptions of the plot, as I'd describe it to someone else. If they happen to fit neatly into some structure I've learned about or whatever, I'll note that, but I don’t structure the plot around those things.

I don't always start with a complete outline, and sometimes the outline I have gets thrown away because it's not working. The first of the two novels actually started with a vague description of what I thought would be the story arc (which turned out to be only enough material for the first act) and then... nothing. I got stuck and set it aside for a while. I do have a better outline for it now, but sometimes this happens--the story won't tell you what it's about until you're partway through writing it, and sometimes you have to be patient, or try a direction and throw it away if it isn't working.

The other novel, unusually for me, actually started with an outline! It came to me in one solid piece at 4am. I got halfway through writing the actual book in February, before burning Birdsec again at the start of March, and it actually stuck to the outline as laid out (so far).

There *is* an inverse correlation between the complexity of a story and its ability to stick to an outline, lol. The more characters and plot threads you have, and the more complex your worldbuilding is, the less likely it is that your outline can pin down all those nodes very well. It's like trying to use a GPS on stacked highways: weird stuff happens.

Tools and software

In case anyone's curious:

I love Scrivener (and wish it worked on Linux) because it's basically like tabbed browsing for text documents. It autosaves reliably, doesn't try to force you to use a specific file structure, and you can even import and open pdfs and stuff in it (useful if you're using ebooks as reference material).

I bought a fancy WorldAnvil subscription when it was on sale, hoping it could replace Scrivener on Linux, and it does not. The interface is confusing (it's got a bunch of instructional videos but I have limited patience), and its "Scrivener-like" text editor is still in beta and quite slow/buggy/clunky.

[mischiefandspirits]

Odd One Out

“Guys, holy fuck!” Jason shouted, kicking open the door to the living room.

“Language, Master Jason,” Alfred’s voice floated down the hall while Barbara said, “Don’t be a meme, Redjay.”

“Sorry, Alfred! Shut it, Barbie, I got news!”

“I swear, the next time he calls me Barbie I’m changing all his ringtones to Barbie Girl,” she muttered, moving her queen.

“He’d probably like that,” Tim said, moving his rook.

“What’s up, Little Wing?” Dick asked, glancing up from the work he was doing on Cass’s nails for half a second.

“Everyone thinks we’re normal humans!”

The batkids all paused to look up at the third oldest.

“I mean, isn’t making everyone think all the Waynes are normal human people the point?” Stephanie asked from where she was playing Mario Kart with Carrie and Duke.

“Not the Waynes, the Bats. And before you say something: Yes, I know that’s also the point. I’m not talking about the villains and civilians, I’m talking about the JL and Titans and Outlaws and everyone! They all think we’re normal!”

“Todd, don’t be absurd,” Damian tisked, returning his focus to the drawing of Titus he was working on.

“I’m serious! I snuck into Roy’s to play a prank and heard him talking to Kory while she was on a video call with the Titans. He flat out said it was weird how we finally have someone in the family who’s not baseline human,” Jason said, gesturing towards Duke, “and no one corrected him!”

There was a moment of silence.

“No,” Dick said. “They have to know, right?”

“Have we ever actually told anyone?” Barbara said, her face pinched. She had to have told some of the Birds of Prey… right?

“Grayson used to have his wings out as Robin. Surely the Titans, at least, would have noticed,” Damian argued.

“I couldn’t use them when I was that young. I just let them hang like a cape to match B,” Dick said, eyes lighting up as he realized no, people didn’t know and yes, this could be very hilarious.

“They thought they were fake!” Carrie laughed, mind following the same path. To Jason, she said, “Please tell me you didn’t correct them.”

“Never even knew I was there. Would have ruined the prank.”

“If I’d known no one knows about you guys, I would have kept quiet too,” Duke chuckled.

“We told you before, it’s fine. You can’t exactly turn yours off like we can,” Dick said.

“I know you’ve shadow-traveled around your Young Justice buddies,” Stephanie told Tim. “They have to know.”

“It’s not like I’ve traveled far,” Tim pointed out. “And I’ve only done it twice. It’s not too unbelievable that I pulled a Bat.”

“Okay, fair.”

“But Raven and Damian are together often. She must have noticed,” Cass said using Dick’s mouth.

The youngest’s shoulders crept up. “I have always blocked my power while in her presence as I was not sure how our powers would affect each other or how my existence would affect her given her… discomfort with her own existence.”

“Aw, Dami! That’s so sweet!”

“I simply wished to avoid confrontation. Do not look further into it, Richard!”

“Too late! You care about her feelings and went out of your way to make her feel more comfortable! I’m so proud!”

The boy scowled at his drawing, his cheeks tinted black.

“Jason died,” Duke said, eyes widening. “Someone must have noticed that, right? Wasn’t Superman involved in the aftermath?”

“Duke, buddy,” Jason said, wrapping his arm around his newest brother. “People die in this business, and they rarely stay that way. No one really questions it anymore.”

“Besides, no one actually knows he died,” Dick said. “B only told Superman that Joker had hurt Jay. Timmy found out, -”

“And went absolutely crazy,” Jason joked.

“I think I responded accordingly considering I’d just found out you’d died and nothing in my research -”

“Stalking.”

“- told me you would come back,” Tim huffed.

“- but obviously he wasn’t going to say anything to anyone without speaking to us first,” Dick finished, ignoring his brothers’ interruption.

“So no one knows,” Barbara said.

“No one knows,” Dick agreed, then continued as Cass took over again, “And we will not tell them?”

“Hell no. This is great,” Jason said.

“What’s great?” Selina asked as she and Bruce came in.

“Everyone and their mother thinks Duke is the odd one out in the Bat-Squad instead of Bruce,” Stephanie said.

“It suddenly occurred to us that no one outside the family knows none of us are baseline human, even our allies,” Tim explained when the Cat gave a bemused look.

Bruce nodded, but Selina frowned. “Wait, all? I know Duke has his photokinetic vision, Carrie can shapeshift, and Damian’s mother is half-demon, but the rest of you?”

Jason set his hand on his chest. “And you call yourself our mother.”

Selina turned to Bruce, who sighed. He pointed at Dick. “Half-siren.”

His eldest son smiled and the blanket on his shoulders fell as the large wings underneath spread out, primarily black with hints of reds and yellows glinting in the light. Suddenly everyone could notice the feathers among his hair, the talons on his hands, and the way his sclerae almost couldn’t be seen around the bright blue of his irises.

Bruce pointed at Barbara. “Technokinesis.”

“Low level,” she added. “It’s more like my brain is another screen and interface for the device I’m working with than actually being able to control anything.”

Jason was next. “Phoenix.”

The young man smirked then, for just a moment, he was replaced by a bird as large as he was tall. Shaped like a secretary bird but with a fantail, his feathers were a swirl of reds, yellows, and oranges while his eyes were blue flames. One of his wings was draped over Duke’s shoulder while a warmth spread from him that somehow felt both soothing and dangerous. Then the moment passed and he looked as normal as ever.

Tim. “Umbrakinesis.”

Shadows rose from the chessboard to move the last standing black knight forward and to the left. “Checkmate.”

“What? No! I almost had you!”

Stephanie. “Poltergeist.”

The girl pulled a golden bracelet off her wrist and her body went transparent. She slipped it back on with a shrug and her body turned opaque once more.

Cass. “Telepathy through touch.”

The girl got up and grabbed Selina’s wrist, sending her an image of them hugging.

Selina looked around at them all then turned to her fiancé. “You really are the odd one out.”

He grunted.

“For the record, we were counting you in that,” Tim said. “We all know you can communicate with and control felines.”

“Yeah, I figured.” She didn’t like people knowing about her secret weapon, but she didn’t expect to keep it from the Bat’s family either. “Which only makes this more unbelievable. How did this even happen?”

A small smile tugged at Bruce’s lips as the kids shared a look.

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

Alfred isn't human either, but no one knows what he is. Just that he's very ancient.

Sequel: Exploration

[the-delta-42]

Cody & Frankie

Cody & Frankie

Cody watched as Blaster lifted a barrel off of a car. Ever since Blaster had joined their team, he’d been left behind at the Firehouse with Cody, as he was a Communications Officer, which left him paired with Cody.

“Why am I completing training exercises when I’m never going to be out in the field?” Asked Blaster, as Chase observed him.

“In the event of Cody being in danger.” Said Chase, getting stares from Blaster and Cody.

“No offense,” Started Blaster, “but Autobot City is practically a fortress, any Decepticon that is stupid enough to get too close to here is scrap.”

“You mean like the ones of the Alchemor?” Asked Chase, making Blaster go silent.

“Well, if you guys are busy,” Said Cody, getting up, “I’m going to meet Frankie.”

“Cody, I must ask you to postpone your date with Francine,” Said Chase, making Cody blush, “you may be required for the training scenarios.”

“RiGht,” Cody’s voice cracked, “First thing, I’m not dating Frankie, we’re just friends, second, you have that training dummy that can stand in for me.”

Chase and Blaster both stared at Cody, “Need we remind you of the Velgrox incident?”

“That scenario doesn’t count,” Protested Chase, “You and Francine instigated that incident.”

“Yeah, but it showed that Blaster doesn’t need to go through any more scenarios,” Said Cody, folding his arms, “He protected me just fine.”

Chase remained silent, which Cody took as his que to leave. The two Autobots watch Cody limp away.

“I think he’s still upset about Prowl.” Said Blaster, frowning.

“I thought it was just me.” Agreed Chase, as Cody disappeared from view.

C&F

Cody parked his bike outside the park, the lock activating automatically, before heading off to find Frankie. He’d usually be able to find her at the memorial statue that had been erected in the middle of the park after the Decepticon Attack two and a half years ago. Cody remembered the attack, because it was when he, truly, first met Starscream.

“Cody, over here!” Called Frankie, waving at him.

Cody smiled and started towards her, she was sitting on a bench in front of Prowl and Quickshadow’s legs. The two statues’ shadows casting a shadow of the area, Brawn and Windcharger’s Statues stood over by the lake, while Huffer, Hound and Beachcomber stood in a field of trees, bushes and flowers. The seven Autobots had been killed when Starscream led his Decepticon ‘loyalists’ against the city, it was because of those seven that no humans were harmed in the attack.

“CeCe got her first Science Fair prize,” Said Frankie, showing Cody a hologram of the nine-year-old, braces and all, holding a ribbon and her project, “It collects glitter from all surfaces, Daddy wants to see if more can be made, since, well, you know glitter.”

“Small, sticks to everything and almost impossible to remove.” Said Cody, sitting next to Frankie as Fixit rolled past, “Blurr’s gotten a new paint job.”

“Yeah, blue really suits him.” Said Frankie, as Cody pulled a hologram out of his bag, “Nearly three years.”

Cody looked up at Prowl’s statue, he couldn’t get the sight of smoke pouring out of his optics and mouth as his body slowly greyed, the resulting explosion revealed that his internals had all but melted. Prowl’s corpse had landed on Cody’s leg, resulting in the limb being amputated. The only bright thing that came from that day, in Cody’s opinion, was Arcee taking Starscream’s head off.

Cody quickly looked to the ground, before placing hologram emitter at the feet of the statues. A small Autobot symbol appeared, Ratchet had told them that placing a hologram with the faction’s symbol was the Cybertronian equivalent of placing flowers on a grave.

“Jolt’s been working with Daddy on something,” Said Frankie, from her spot next to Cody, “I think it’s related to the power spikes.”

Cody hummed, before Frankie took his hand and said, “Let’s go get something to eat.”

“Anything to keep me from Chase’s scenarios.” Said Cody, walking with Frankie, their hands still entwined.

“I’m not sure if we can keep this up,” Said Frankie, her grip on Cody’s hand tightening, “Dad only not questioning why we’re meeting up so often because he’s working with Jolt, I don’t know how he’ll react to us, you know, dating.”

“Chase came close to finding out as well,” Said Cody, sighing, “he said our date would have to be postponed. I think he and Blaster are trying a little too hard to make up for Prowl.”

“HA! I knew it!” Cried Blades, making Cody and Frankie jump, “I knew you two were dating!”

“Blades!” Hissed Cody, as everyone stared at them.

“What?” Asked Blades, before looking around, “Oh…right, sorry.”

“Blades, why are you here?” Asked Cody, his face red.

“Oh, press conference, you know, live broadcasts, Q&A, that sort of thing.” Said Blades, as Cody spotted Huxley Prescott filming them.

“Y-you said ‘live broadcast’,” Said Cody, colour slowly draining from his face, “So, everyone watching heard your outburst?”

“Yup.” Said Blades, as Frankie caught on.

“Okay, maybe they’re not watching tv?” Suggested Frankie, just as their phones went off, “Oooh, it’s my Dad.”

“Kade.” Said Cody, confused, “Hello?”

Cody suddenly pulled the phone away from his ear and winced, “Dani, why are you using Kade’s phone? Oh, that noise was you, Kade.”

Frankie nervously answered her phone, as Cody’s face went beet red, “Hi, Daddy…”

Frankie was stiff for a moment, before relaxing, “Right, thank, Dad. Love you too.” Frankie hung up, before looking at Cody, who almost seem purple.

“Kade…I don’t need you to give me the Talk again,” Said Cody, “The first time was traumatising enough. No, don’t put Dad on the phone… hey, Dad. Yes, I do know how that stuff works. No, I don’t need Chase to make a diagram. I, I don’t think that’s an appropriate question Dad. Yeah, sure. Love you too. No, don’t break out the pictures!”

Cody lowered his phone and stared at the screen, “Dad’s going to break out the baby pictures.”

“Please, as if I haven’t already seen them.” Smirked Frankie, before looking up at Blades, “Where’s Dani?”

“With Taylor,” Sighed Blades, looking dejected, before looking down at Cody and Frankie, “Wanna go flying?”

“Is energon blue?” Was Frankie’s response, before Blades Transformed and Cody and Frankie climbed into his cockpit.

“Any requests?” Asked Blades, waiting for their input.

“Somewhere private.” Said Cody, immediately.

“Somewhere private coming up.” Said Blades, as he took off.

“I’m sure that could’ve gone better.” Said Frankie, as soon as Blades arrived at a waterfall that was difficult to access from the ground.

“Yeah, Kade tried giving me the Talk, again and Dad wanted to know if we were physical and if we were protection.”

“What is it with parents and thinking their kids are interfacing?” Asked Blades, making Cody and Frankie look up at him, confused, “You know, how humans make sparklings.”

Cody and Frankie blushed and looked at the ground, “Sooo, what now?” Asked Frankie, looking at Cody.

“We wait up here for a couple of hours and then head back,” Said Cody, sitting at the water’s edge, “I don’t think Kade’s going to let up on the Talk.”

Frankie smirked playfully, “Well, you know what we could do to fill that time up?”

“Oh, what?” Grinned Cody, before Frankie pushed him in the water, only to be dragged in herself when Cody grabbed her wrist.

Both teens were laughing as they threw water at each other, Frankie tackled Cody, making the young man fall on his back with Frankie on top of him. The young woman giggled and kissed Cody, resting her forehead against his.

“I love you.” Whispered Frankie, getting comfortable on Cody’s chest.

Cody returned the kiss, “I love you too.”

Frankie buried her head in the crook of Cody’s neck, getting comfortable as the pair drifted off into sleep.

C&F

Blades glanced over at the two humans, both cuddling each other in their sleep, and checked his internal chronometer before deciding to wake the pair up.

“Guys?” Said Blades, his voice soft, “It’s time to go.”

The two teens groaned, but started to get up, both shivering as the cold started to set in.

“Next time we’re up here,” Said Frankie, looking at Cody, “We bring a change of clothes.”

Cody smiled, before climbing into Blades with Frankie. Blades took off and took them back to Autobot City, landing on top of the Firehouse. The pair were greeted by their families, Doc Greene and Chief Burns holding a set of dry clothes.

“Blades said you’d need them.” Said Chief, as the pair took the dry clothes, “But, we need to talk about you running off.”

“I’m partially to blame, Chief,” Said Blades, crouching, “I suggested that we go flying and the fact I kind of outed their relationship on live TV.”

Chief sighed, before looking at the pair again, “Come on, you’re probably hungry, but, please, get changed first.”

Cody and Frankie nodded and headed off to dry off and change, leaving their parents on the landing pad.

“They do grow up fast, don’t they?” Asked Doc Greene, as Charlie frowned.

“I just wish that Cody didn’t grow up so fast.” Said Chief, as he watched Cody and Frankie messing around with each other.

“I just hope I win the next bet.” Said Doc Greene with a small smile.

C&F

Cody fiddled with the guitar strings, as Miko showed him how to play a chord.

“You’re doing great, Cody.” Said Miko, getting Cody to smile. Frankie was discussing some science stuff with Raf, while Jack was flicking through some paperwork given to him by Fowler, “I’d say we’re almost finished with the lessons.”

“It’s nice to be with you guys,” Said Cody, leaning back in his chair, “It’s almost as if things are as, they were before the Omega Lock incident.”

“Yeah, there are times I half expect Ratchet or Arcee to walk in and ask what we’re doing.” Sighed Miko, looking out the window, “I mean it’s nice having the Autobots here, I think I speak for everyone when I say we miss our partners.”

Cody’s smile turned sad, “I remember the time Prowl walked into that power line, I don’t I ever saw anyone move so fast.”

“Or that time Bulkhead screamed his head off when we showed him that mouse.” Grinned Miko, looking over at Jack.

“That’s nothing compared to Arcee calling an exhaust a ‘dowhicky’.” Said Jack, abandoning the paperwork.

“How about Bumblebee sneaking out of the base to go racing?” Asked Raf, as he joined the three.

“How about Kup’s cy-gar trick?” Asked Frankie, remembering the old bot.

“You mean the one where he turned it into a bullet?” Responded Miko, looking at Frankie.

“Yeah, that one!” Laughed Frankie, as Cody went to stand up, only for his prosthetic to buckle under his weight, “Cody!”

Jack caught Cody before he hit the ground, helping him back to the chair.

“It’s fine, it’s been acting up for a while.” Said Cody, as he rested the prosthetic on his other leg and pulled his trouser leg up. The light blue glow from the power cell flickered as the group observed it.

“I could get my dad to look at it.” Frankie offered, making Cody smile.

“I probably forgot to charge it properly.” Said Cody, getting back to his feet. Frankie held his arm, in case the leg gave out again, “You’re just looking for an excuse to steal me away, aren’t you?”

“How could you tell?” Smirked Frankie, as Jack sighed.

“Just remember to use protection,” Smirked Miko, making Cody and Frankie blush, “I’m too young to be an aunt.”

The two eighteen-year-olds quickly left the room to escape twenty-one-year-old, as Jack levelled her with an unimpressed stare.

“Old enough to be a mother, but too young to be an aunt.” Said Jack, folding his arms.

“Shut up.” Giggled Miko, as Raf decided to go back to his computer.

C&F

Cody winced as Doc Greene removed the power cell from his leg.

“Hmm, it seems that the power cells developed a fault.” Said Doc Greene, rubbing his chin, “I don’t know what could’ve cause it, unless you went for a sudden swim.”

Cody and Frankie froze and glanced at each other, thinking back to the week before and their dip in the pool of water.

“I know that look.” Said Doc Greene, folding his arms, “I’ll see about making your next prosthetic waterproof, Cody.”

“Thanks, Doc.” Said Cody, as Doc Greene reinserted the power cell.

“Frankie,” Said Doc Greene as the pair were leaving, “do try to be home at a reasonable hour tonight, your mother and I heard you knock the planter over.”

“Daddy!” Exclaimed Frankie, her face going red with embarrassment.

“I’m glad that no one heard me knock an entire shelving unit over.” Muttered Cody, as Blurr shot past.

“Higuys,byeguys,I’dlovetostopandchatbut,I’mbusybusybusy!” Said Blurr, speaking a mile a minute.

“That red energon must be some really strong stuff.” Said Frankie, as Blurr turned a corner.

“Apparently, Blurr’s body was built to use it,” Said Cody, shrugging, “Something about Velocitron and speed?”

A red and black semi with a yellow cab pulled to a stop in front of the pair.

“There you guys are,” Said Blaster, opening his door for them, “Chief has an announcement down at the Firehouse.”

“What is it?” Asked Cody, as he and Frankie climbed in.

“I don’t know,” Said Blaster, driving off, “Blurr was supposed to pick you up, but then he got called away by Bumblebee for something. Oh, and be warned, I think Chase’s sister is visiting.”

“Chase has a sister?” Asked Cody, cocking an eyebrow.

“The way Strongarm acts?” Snorted Blaster, “She might as well be!”

Blaster pulled to a stop outside the Firehouse, allowing Frankie and Cody to climb out. Blaster transformed and followed them inside, joining the joint crowd of Humans and Cybertronians. Cody and Frankie made their way through the crowd of Autobots with ease and then weaved through the humans.

“Graham, what’s going on?” Asked Cody, as soon as he spotted his brother.

“Dad has an announcement to make,” Said Graham, frowning as he looked at his notes, “Something about work.”

Cody noticed pink glittery ink on the paper, “Sarah’s really learning how to draw, huh?”

“Yeah, she’s either drawing or running Amy and I into the ground.” Said Graham, yawning.

“I heard Kassie’s been a nightmare for Kade and Hayley.” Said Frankie, folding her arms.

“Yeah, even I can hear her temper tantrums.” Groaned Graham, shaking his head.

Everyone went silent as Chief Burns walked/shuffled onto the stage.

“Okay, I’m going to keep this short and sweet,” Said Chief Burns, looking around, “I’m retiring. I spent a good 45 years serving on the police forces and, frankly, I’d love to spend more. However, I’m not getting any younger and the resident doctors, thank you Doctor Darby, have told me that my body can’t keep up with the rescue anymore. I’ll be making the official announcement tomorrow. That is all.”

Cody watched as his father left the stage, wincing as he stumbled a bit when he reached the steps. Carin helped Charlie with the last few steps. Cody felt a tug on his trouser leg, drawing his attention to the twins, Kyle and Maggie. Kyle and Maggie were Cody’s younger half-siblings, born shortly after his dad married Carin when they first moved to Autobot City.

“What’s daddy we-tyre ring?” Asked Kyle, looking up at Cody.

“Retiring?” Asked Cody, getting a nod from Kyle, “It means he’s going to stop working because he’s starting to get too old.”

“Why?” Asked Maggie, her teddy trailing behind her.

“Because he’s a grown up,” Said Cody, crouching down to their level, “and, eventually we grow up so much that we can’t work anymore.”

“Then what happens?” Asked Kyle, making Cody freeze.

“Uh, well, then we, er,um…” Cody was saved from explaining death to the twins by Carin walking towards them.

“Come on,” Said Carin, hoisting Maggie onto her hip, “time for your nap.”

Cody picked up Kyle and followed his stepmother, Frankie following behind them, leaving Graham with his work. Getting the twins in bed and a sleep was fairly easy, Maggie and Kyle were quick to nod off. Soon the family, plus their significant others, were sitting in the living room.

“I know it’s short notice,” Said Charlie, looking at his children, “but, I think it’s time to face the music, I’m not the man I was.”

“It’s fine, Dad.” Said Dani, resting her feet on Taylor’s lap, “You’ve earned it, more than any of us at this rate.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Demanded Kade, crossing his arms.

“I don’t think Dani was looking to start a fight, Kade.” Said Cody, from his place curled up with Frankie.

“I saw you explaining retirement to the twins, Cody.” Said Carin, smiling softly as he flushed red, “I also saw how you tried to avoid explaining the concept of death to them.”

“They’ll probably have to be told sooner or later.” Mumbled Cody, his grip on Frankie’s hand tightening softly.

“We will when the time comes.” Promised Carin, her smile turning sad.

Shortly after Prowl’s death, Cody had vanished, along with some weapons Wheeljack had been working on. Cody was later found next to the remains of a Decepticon known as Thundercracker. Thundercracker’s optics had been torn out and parts of his body had been subjected to small explosives. What killed Thundercracker, however, was a small vial of cosmic rust that had been poured into the remains of his optics. Just shy of where Cody was found was the burnt out remains of a Decepticon energon mine, with the melted remains of MECH agents. Ultra Magnus had said that he’d assumed some humans were working with the Decepticons, he just didn’t expect them to be wiped out in one strike.

“How’s your studying coming along?” Asked Charlie, swiftly changing the subject.

“Doctor Darby thinks I’m progressing well,” Said Cody, his frame relaxing, “if I keep at my current level, I’ll be able to continue on and become a doctor by the time I’m 25.”

“Know you,” Smirked Dani, her hands cradling her bump, “You’ll probably find a way to become a doctor before then.”

Cody let out a laugh, before the robotic lion that was Steeljaw tumbled into the room. Everyone watched Steeljaw chase something that looked like a ball of light, before he vanished down the stairs.

Kade smirked as Hayley adjusted Kassie on her chest, “So, Cody, what are your and Frankie’s plans for the future?”

“Decent paying jobs before getting married and having kids.” Said the pair, simultaneously.

“Why do I get the feeling you two rehearse that?” Asked Dani, as Sarah toddled up to her parents and presented them with a picture.

“Ta-Da!” Sang Sarah, as Amy took the picture.

“Oh, Graham, look at this,” Gushed Amy, showing Graham the picture, “it’s another work of art.”

“A Masterpiece.” Agreed Graham, picking the toddler up.

C&F (Time skip)

Cody rocked back and forth on his heels, the weight of the small box in his pocket was impossibly heavy. He’d been waiting for Frankie to turn up for nearly an hour and was beginning to think she wasn’t going to show. The sounds of a fight caught his attention, Cody spotted a guy that worked with Frankie having his ass handed to him. The guy, Matt, Cody thought, had been flirting with Frankie, despite her saying she wasn’t interested. Cody caught sight of the person knocking sense into Matt. Frankie was dressed up nicely, despite still having her lab coat on, while hitting Matt with her handbag. Cody winced as Matt hit the doorframe and slid, before walking over to Frankie. It was only as Cody got closer, did he see that Frankie’s hair was dishevelled, as if someone had pulled on it, there was a bruise forming on her neck and the necklace Cody had given her for her 21st Birthday was missing.

Cody reached and touch Frankie’s shoulder, making her whip around with a snarl on her face. Frankie completely relaxed at the sight of Cody, while Matt struggled to get up off the floor.

“What��happened?” Asked Cody, frowning.

Frankie threw a disgusted look at Matt, “He didn’t know how to take ‘no’ for an answer.”

“Are you alright?” Questioned Cody, looking into Frankie’s eyes.

Frankie sighed, “Yeah, he only turned violent when I entered the restaurant, but he only followed me here from work.”

Cody’s gaze turned to Matt, before it fell to Matt’s right hand, “Aren’t you going to give that back?”

Matt froze at Cody’s cold tone, something Cody had picked up from Prowl. Matt looked at the necklace in his grip, before throwing it into the restaurant and trying to run off. Cody grabbed the necklace from the air and looked at the damage. Cody sighed when he found only the clasp was broken.

“Your mum’s necklace.” Gasped Frankie, upon seeing the damaged necklace.

“It’s an easy fix.” Said Cody, carefully putting the necklace with the ring box, “Do you want to go home?”

Frankie took a deep breath, before nodding. Cody gave her a small smile, before going to the manager to cancel the reservation. The two twenty-six-year-olds drove home in silence, Frankie closed her eyes and leaned back in her seat.

“What did you want to talk about?” Asked Frankie, almost making Cody jump.

“Let’s, let’s deal with that when we get home.” Said Cody, suddenly remembering the box.

“Right.” Said Frankie, her tone despondent.

“Don’t worry, it’s a good thing,” Said Cody, before frowning, “well, I think it’s a good thing, I mean the others said it’s a good thing and, I’m rambling again, aren’t I?”

Frankie giggled, Frankie had been terrified that Cody was going to break up with her, after she found that ring in the draw. Cody had been giving her gifts recently, when she brought it up with Priscilla and a couple other friends, came to the conclusion that they were breakup gifts, something to help with the actual blow of the breakup. Frankie knew that Cody didn’t class breaking up as a good thing, unless he took a heavy blow to the head.

Cody pulled into his usual parking space and went inside the home with Frankie, both taking a seat on the sofa.

“Are you okay? Really, okay?” Asked Cody, looking into Frankie’s eyes.

Frankie averted her gaze and sighed, “I was scared, the entire time he was following me, I was scared he was going to do something. I took the longest possible route to try and get away from him, but when I arrived at the restaurant, I found he was already there. I thought if I ignored him, he’d leave me alone.”

“Then he decided to grab you.” Said Cody, making Frankie nod.

“He was fired today because he damaged something that the Autobots are keeping top secret,” Explained Frankie, as Cody wrapped an arm around her, “we don’t know how he got hold of it, but Hardhead found it in Matt’s locker and demanded an explanation from him. He didn’t give one.”

Cody pulled Frankie closer to him, rubbing comforting circles on her arm, “It’s like something in him snapped. I wasn’t expecting but, I kinda was? It’s difficult to explain.”

“I doubt he’ll hurt you now,” Said Cody, pulling Frankie close and allowing her to rest her head in the crook of his neck, “I saw Streetwise picking him up.”

Frankie smiled, before looking at Cody, “What is it you wanted to talk about?”

Cody swallowed the sudden lump in his throat, “Right, er, yes, well…screw it.”

Cody got off the sofa and got down on one knee, taking the ring box out of his pocket, “Frankie, you’ve made me incredibly happy in the time we’ve been together and, frankly, I don’t want that to end. Will you marry me?”

Frankie’s eyed danced between the ring and Cody’s face. The next thing Cody knew, he was on his back with Frankie laying on top of him and kissing him.

“I’ll…take that as a, yes?” Asked Cody, as Frankie grinned and nodded her head.

Cody grinned as well and slipped the ring on Frankie’s finger.

[connorandersons-blog]

RK1700: Connor and Nines interfacing for the first time. Any scenario

Nines was everything Connor wanted to be. Well, not everything but pretty damn close.

He knew he had to look softer because he was used for hostage situations. He needed to not scare off people when he walks in. He still tended to do that now with his past reputation, but it generally wasn't instantly from his physical appearance.

So he didn't absolutely hate that he was shorter and less threatening, but looking like Nines had its perks.

Nines was incredibly intimidating, even to Connor. He walked into the room and everyone shrunk back. It was impressive how fast he could get a confession just by staring at the suspect.

His eyes were stunning and seemed to dig into you, finding everything you tried to keep secret. It made Connor squirm when it was directed at him. Plus he was taller so that made it even worse (or better depending on how you looked at it).

He was stronger than Connor was which was already impressive. Connor had to hold back on most of his punches, so he couldn't imagine how strong Nines was. He could easily throw him across the room.

Nines was also faster than Connor. He got to see that first hand when the precinct held a small get together. Everyone got to race against Nines and whichever human got the closest won a prize.

At the end, they all encouraged (using that word loosely) Connor to race. He wouldn't win anything, after all, that wouldn't be fair, but they all wanted to see how much faster Nines was.

So Connor raced him and crossed the finish line one second after Nines. That doesn't seem like much but that one second could be the difference between getting a suspect and not.

Nines had seemed somewhat impressed, or as impressed as Nines could be. He had patted him on the shoulder and Connor was sure his knees would give out.

It was plainly obvious to everyone (except Nines apparently) that Connor had a huge fucking crush on him. It wasn't his fault! Nines was literally built to be perfect, who could blame him for that?

But the thing was, Connor felt like he didn't know anything about Nines. About who he truly was.

He knew his programming but that didn't necessarily mean much with deviancy. Sure, it would affect them, but they got to choose who they were now.

One thing he had noticed was Nines never actually interfaced with another android. He would connect to them but never by using his hand. It seemed like an odd quirk, but Connor didn't question it.

Nines also never drank any thirium in front of anyone. Honesty he had no idea why he did this, but once again he wasn't going to question it. Maybe it had to do with trying to fit in.

But Nines kept his LED in. So maybe it didn't have to do with fitting in with humans. It was nice to see another android to do so, as most androids took theirs out.

Nines seemed to be more machine-like than others. Connor thought it was because he never got to deviate, he was woken up like that. He never got a life before the revolution.

Connor still hadn't decided if that would be better or worse. Nines would have been used to kill and Connor knew how much that weighed on you. But perhaps Nines felt like he was missing out.

So Connor decided to try to help him out. It was just small things like dragging him out to go shopping when Hank needed something. Nines would go along with it if he had time, but often he would brush him off.

So Connor tried other things. He tried to show him where Jericho used to be but Nines hadn't seemed too interested in that either.

But he kept trying. He spent almost all of his money on random trips for Nines. Part of him thought of it as dates, but he knew Nines didn't think so too.

Very rarely did he see Nines smile during the trips, and those generally only happened when Connor did something particularly stupid or had to do with animals.

Turns out the love of animals were a thing in the RK line. Connor had asked Markus and he had immediately agreed to. He also helped out with ideas for the not-so-date dates.

Connor took Nines to the zoo, museum, aquarium, art galleries, movies, an amusement park, and much more. He had to admit, it was funny to see Nines sitting up with a straight face on a roller coaster.

But Nines still barely opened up. He was still silent, but now Connor could see the small reactions. Nines didn't necessarily need to say anything for Connor to understand. Which was progress he guessed?

He had taken Nines to the aquarium again since he seemed to at least not hate it. He had heard they had gotten new two new sharks and Connor was practically jumping with excitement.

He hadn't thought when he had taken Nines's hand and started pulling him towards the shark tank. He looked back for a second and saw Nines open his mouth to stay something before he ran straight into a pole.

He stumbled back, letting go of Nines's hand, reaching up to touch his head. He was bleeding just slightly, but nothing major. It was more embarrassing than anything else.

Nines walked up, putting a hand under Connor's chin to tilt his head up. He stood frozen, staring at Nines as Nines brought a hand up to his small wound. "You should watch where you're going."

"I-um, yeah. Sorry." He mumbled. He didn't even notice the people around them giving them odd looks.

"Why are you doing this?" Nines asks, still not letting him go. Connor swallows, hands going between reaching out before dropping back to his side.

"Doing this?" He asked before shrugging just slightly. "Because I want you to have fun. I want you to be able to experience more than just work."

Nines's eyes flickered down for just a second, but that made Connor's heart skip a beat. "You didn't have to do anything like this for me. I would enjoy myself just…"

"Just what?" Connor whispers. But then Nines is pulling away and Connor feels like slapping himself.

Nines stares at the ground for a second before holding his hand out. Connor looks between the offered hand and Nines's face.

He slowly reaches out and takes the hand and accepts the interface.

Then his mind is flooded with memories. Just moments at the office where Nines listens to whatever Connor could come up with.

It was odd to see it from this perspective, but what was even more striking was the amount of adoration and warmth he was flooded with each memory.

He saw when Nines would look over to just see Connor. Whenever Connor glanced up and smiled a rush of emotions was brought up.

Then it was the not-so-date dates. Nines easily following along, but always more focused on Connor than anything they had been doing.

He could feel the want Nines felt to reach out to him, to hold him or even… to even kiss him.

Then the connection was broken and Nines pulled his hand away, not meeting Connor's eyes. Connor hadn't even gotten the chance to share his memories.

Connor honestly had to take a second to fully process what he had been shown. What Nines had felt.

He… Nines felt the same? Connor had no idea he felt anything other than friendship.

Connor reached up and pulled Nines down, pressing their lips together. It's a mixture between urgent and shy, which ends up making Connor pulling away faster than he'd want.

But then Nines is pulling him back in for a much slower and gentler kiss. Connor gasps and Nines is slow to take the opportunity.

It's almost adorable how shy they both are. Connor had some experience but not much. Nothing with this much meaning anyway.

A few people stop to stare but most just walk around them. Connor couldn't care less about what was going on around them. There could be a tornado and he'd still be more focused on Nines.

They slowly pull away and Connor pants to cool down his systems. He keeps his forehead pressed against Nines's, keeping his eyes closed for a few seconds.

"I had no idea." He mumbled, opening his eyes to look up at Nines. It was honestly unfair how striking Nines is.

"I didn't let you see. I didn't think I was… worthy of you." Nines says, pressing a kiss to Connor's nose.

Connor giggles and scrunches up his face for a second. "How could you not be? You're amazing and you were supposed to be an upgrade of me."

"Exactly. I had to at least be as good as you, but now, well no one is getting replaced. I just have to be myself." Nines shrugs.

Connor holds his face gently, leaning up to gently kiss him. "I like you the way you are. I'm glad you feel comfortable to just be yourself."

Nines gives a slight hum, keeping his arms around Connor's waist. "And I like you the way you are. I didn't want to assume, but were these outings dates?"

Connor can't help but giggle again, nodding slightly. "I wanted them to be. I tried to find things you'd enjoy, but I guess I could take you almost anywhere."

"Then we should make the most of this one. I can treat you to a cafe that just opened for androids. If you want that is. I don't want to assume." Connor had to hold in his coo, but Nines was too adorable for his own good.

"I'd love that. To the sharks?" Connor asks, pulling back and offering his hand.

Nines takes the hand, giving it a slight squeeze. "To the sharks."

[thisfits]

Spier and Mackay: 15% off Custom Suits, Sport Coats, Trousers, and Shirts

BUY: Custom Suits, Sport Coats, Trousers and Shirts at Spier & Mackay

Use code CUSTOM for 15% off. Promotion expires Sunday March 21, 2021.

Through Sunday, Spier & Mackay is offering a 15% discount on their made-to-order (MTO) products, including suits, sport coats, trousers, and shirts. This is a good opportunity if you’d like a Spier & Mackay garment:

 made up in your specified measurements, especially if you’re hard to fit

made up with fabrics or options not offered by their ready-to-wear (RTW) collection

made with a full canvas chest, which is offered with only a handful of their RTW options (read here on why full canvas is desirable)

Regarding that last point, I’ve noticed that the promotion stacks with existing discounts on select fabrics, meaning you can have a MTO, fully-canvassed suit starting at just $431: about what you’d pay for an entry-level half-canvas RTW suit at other retailers. By contrast, fully-canvassed suits often start north of $999 at those same retailers—if they offer them at all.

My Own Experience with Spier & Mackay Custom

I ordered my first MTO suit from Spier & Mackay in late June 2020, taking advantage of a free full canvas upgrade offer. I’d wanted for some time to pick up my next full-canvas suit from Spier & Mackay, but my size always seemed to be sold out.

Here’s a little-known thing about Spier & Mackay’s MTO program: while their online interface is quite robust and packed with customization options, you can request further “off menu” customizations by leaving notes in the comment area before submitting your order. In the case of my suit, I asked for a Milanese buttonhole, a shorter inseam (their interface only goes down to 30″), and lowering the button stance if possible. I also asked for advice on the fabric, as I was trying to distinguish between three different shades of dark grey from the same mill—a hard thing to do online.

A few days after placing my order, a representative from Spier & Mackay reached out to me with a “yes” on the Milanese buttonhole and shorter inseam,  a “no” on lowering the button stance (a difficult change for their factory to make from the base pattern, I’m assuming), and advice on the right fabric to choose. I appreciated the knowledgeable, helpful, and personalized service.

The suit was delivered in 10 weeks—longer than their average turn-around time of 7-8 weeks, but still remarkable to me given the considerable shipping, fulfillment and supply chain disruptions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. It looked great, and the details and measurements I’d requested were spot-on.

I did find one quality issue: on the trousers, the outer corner on one of the pocket bags was accidentally sewn into the outseam, rendering the pocket unusable and causing it to fold over and bulge out. I took pictures of the pocket and sent them to Spier & Mackay, asking if the error could be fixed by a local tailor or seamstress. They confirmed the issue was small enough for me to have repaired locally, apologized, and offered to compensate me with store credit if I sent a picture of the receipt. Certainly a satisfactory resolution for me.

Overall, my experience with Spier & Mackay’s custom program was a positive one, and I plan on having future custom garments made.

Final Thoughts and Tips on Spier & Mackay Custom

For those of you who are considering going custom yourselves, here’s some advice based on my experience with custom garments from Spier & Mackay and other makers.

Don’t try MTO until you’ve tried Spier & Mackay RTW. There are few guardrails in online MTM to keep you from entering measurements that lead to a bad fit. When it comes to making adjustments for fit, I think most men are best off buying something that fits pretty well off-the-rack, and then depending on the expert eye of a local tailor for further adjustments. Spier & Mackay’s RTW Slim and Contemporary fits should meet this need for most men.

Once you’re familiar with Spier & Mackay RTW, you’ll have a better sense of what adjustments to make (if any) for MTO.

Do take advantage of special requests and Spier & Mackay’s knowledgeable staff. It’s surprising how accommodating Spier & Mackay can be with special requests left in the order notes. Along with the hemming and Milanese buttonhole mentioned above, other customers have been able to request patch ticket pockets, extra shirring on spalla camicia shoulders, and even a lower lapel gorge. Customer service will let you know what can’t be done, and in my experience they gave good guidance on fabrics when online photos weren’t sufficient.

Don’t forget Spier & Mackay’s under-appreciated advantage: taste. Spier & Mackay is often lauded for offering great value: well-made garments made from quality fabrics sourced from reputable mills, all at a very competitive price. However, I think what’s occasionally lost in this is their great taste. You can depend on Spier & Mackay to have a finger on the sorts of garments that excite today’s classic menswear enthusiasts, while also having a firm grasp on what does or doesn’t work together. A quick scroll through their sport coats, for example, shows far more hits than misses.

As with measurements, in online MTO there are few guardrails for taste. Spier & Mackay won’t prevent you from ordering an unstructured Neapolitan cut triple patch-pocket sport coat made up in a worsted charcoal pinstripe with light brown horn buttons—but for most men, such a garment won’t serve you well.

All that said, if you’ve got a handle on your measurements and a good sense on the kind of garment you want, I highly recommend Spier & Mackay’s custom program.

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BUY: Custom Suits, Sport Coats, Trousers and Shirts at Spier & Mackay

I may earn a commission if you buy through a link in this post. Learn more here about my stance on affiliate links, sponsorships, and product reviews.

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Pictured below are a handful of jackets commissioned by Jesse Burzminski in a collaboration with Marling & Evans and Spier & Mackay, showcasing the breadth of their customization options. 

[eirian-houpe]

Tuesday - Chapter 2

Fandom: Once Upon a Time (TV), Stargate Universe

Rating: Explicit

Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings

Relationships: Belle (Once Upon a Time)/Nicholas Rush

Characters: Nicholas Rush, Gloria Rush, Belle (Once Upon a Time), unnamed OC

Additional Tags: going round in circles, Time Travel, Alternate Universe, Angst, Eventual Smut, Emotional Hurt/Comfort

Summary: When you go poking around in time, you might sometimes find that it pushes back, as Nick Rush finds out… the hard way.

Read previous chapters on AO3

Chapter 2 - Do I know you

The windshield wipers moved back and forth across his field of vision so quickly they were a blur, and still he could barely see for the driving rain. Exhaustion pulled at Nicholas Rush like a man that had lived ten thousand years in a single lifetime.

“Shit!” He voiced the sudden epiphany aloud and slammed on the brakes, then spent the next few seconds turning the wheel one way and then the other, using more energy than he had, to control the slide as the tires lost traction on the rain soaked road and the car glided almost gracefully into the hedgerow, and the ditch before it.

He hissed out the expletive as the seat belt tightened around his chest to prevent his fall.

“Fuck!” he snarled again and slapped both hands against the steering wheel, before reaching for the key to try and restart the stalled vehicle. The engine coughed, but nothing more. It probably wouldn’t have made a difference even if he had got it going again. He’d never be able to get out of the ditch, not by himself. He had no choice but to call for help.

The irony wasn’t lost on him that he had communicated across galaxies, and yet as he struggled to pull his cell phone out of his pocket, the words, No Service, glared at him from the top of his screen. He let out another snarling string of colorful language that became a fragile, humorless chuckle as he remembered that he hadn’t done any of that yet, and wondered whether this was the reason the Ancients had created the communication stones in the first place. He knew otherwise, but it was an amusing fantasy and stopped him from losing his temper completely.

He turned and peered into the darkness, seeing nothing but the driving rain. It would do him no good to stay with the car, if the last few hours were anything to go by, this was a road not often traveled. There would be no one come by any time soon. 

With a sigh, he slipped the phone back into his jeans pocket and reached for his jacket from the back of the car, trying a second time once he’d released the seat belt, and twisted one way then another to pull it on before he opened the door.

No sooner that, than the wind driven rain blew into his face, and he began to sink into the rain soaked mud underfoot as he stepped out of the car. He leaned back in to pick up the things from the passenger seat, then slammed the door and hurried to the higher, firmer ground of the black top.

A faint feeling of Deja Vu gripped him as he looked first one way and then the other. He’d done this before, and he still had no idea where he was, or which direction he needed to go, but figured that since he hadn’t passed anywhere that looked as though it had a phone he could use, it would serve him better to continue on in the direction he’d been driving. That would be for the best.

He was soaked within seconds, and cursed himself for a fool with almost ever step, until the faint, golden glitter of light ahead sparkled off the falling rain. He breathed a sigh of relief, and put his head down, to move more quickly through the downpour.

By the time he reached the cottage, he was soaked right through to his underwear, and after knocking tried to wait as patiently as he could, listening to the faint sounds of movement from within, but after several long moments of standing with the cold rain trickling down the back of his neck, he lifted his hand to knock again.

The door was opened by a small brunette, who had a shocking white stripe descending from one temple. His belly tugged at him, sending the smallest of waves lower, to center in his groin, and he covered the sensation with an apologetic cough.

“I erm… I wonder if you have a phone I could use?” he began as the blue eyes looked him up and down. “I had a wee accident further down the road and—”

She smiled and stood aside with a gesture for him to come in. It cut him off mid explanation, and as she closed the door behind him she said, “I’ll find you some towels. Can’t have you standing there wet through, you’ll catch your death.”

The sense of deja vu fluttered though his belly again as did the strengthening of the unexplained attraction that had warmth building in his groin, and her familiarity pulled at him like an itch he couldn’t scratch or an elusive word on the tip of his tongue.

…He wrapped an arm around her waist, another into her hair, to tug her closer as they shared the heated, desperate kiss, tongues tangling…

He jumped and gasped slightly as her soft voice shattered the unexpected vision, but he could still feel her, taste her, smell the rose of her perfume.

“There’s a fire lit, if you want to get warm.”

“Thank you,” he managed, his voice thick with the desire he remembered, but knew he had never shared, and as a distraction to his obviously addled, sleep deprived mind, started to follow the sound of the crackling wood that beckoned, warm and inviting, as was the faint aroma of cinnamon that replaced the scent of roses which he smelled with every breath.

She returned a moment later, carrying a towel under one arm, and what looked like pajama pants and a folded bath robe in her hands. These she set down on the chair beside the fireplace.

“Did you find what you were looking for, Nicholas?”

The question, asked so casually, almost stopped his breath, and frowning, he looked down at her again, finally entertaining that the feelings of deja vu meant something more than his mind playing games with him. 

“We’ve…” 

He turned her, releasing her with one arm to sweep the things from the top of the desk in almost the same moment that he lifted her to it, and she giggled playfully as she started in on the buttons of his shirt.

“…met, haven’t we?” he asked, his tone tight with the effects of the new vision.

The homeowner chuckled and pressed the towel against the middle of his soaked chest. “We have,” she said. “But it was quite some time ago.”

“You’re going to have to try and be a bit more specific than that,” Rush glanced round at Brody, the illusion with which Destiny was currently tormenting him, “if you expect me to produce the desired results instead of, oh, I don’t know, flying us straight into the sun instead of around it?”

“There’s no need to be quite so testy, Doctor Rush.” Brody-Destiny said.

“Testy,” Rush actually looked up from the small notepad in which he was scribbling as, ahead of them, the star loomed closer and closer. “That’s rich coming from the likes of you.”

Brody… Destiny said nothing.

About to return to his work, Rush thought better of it and pointed at Brody for a moment as he said, “In fact, ever since I set foot aboard this ship, you have been the most objectionable piece of hardware I’ve ever had the misfortune to work with. Your interface is counter intuitive. Your AI, quite frankly, is temperamental at best and bordering on hostile most of the time, and when you don’t get your own way you resort to threats to make sure that we do as you say.”

He turned back to his notes then, consulting the complex mathematics he was working over multiple pages, and making cautious inputs into the navigation array in front of him.

“Wow.” It wasn’t Brody’s voice that answered him, but Gloria and a part of him cringed inwardly. What the hell made Destiny think she would be able to motivate him to solve the equations. “I love you too, Nick.”

She reached up to run her fingers through his long hair, but he swatted away the touch, much as he would have done a mosquito.

“Again,” he said with exaggerated patience, “the possibility of survival, provided I get my calculations right, or certain destruction in the heart of a dying star. Your choice.”

“Fine,” Gloria said and took a step back. “Calculate away. Don’t let me stop you.”

He put his head back down to his calculations for barely a moment before he felt Gloria’s eyes - well Destiny’s replica of Gloria anyway - boring into the back of his head and with a sigh, he half turned and said, “With you looking over my shoulder, that’s not likely to happen, is it?”

“Oh, I… would you perhaps like someone,” Gloria said, directly over his shoulder this time.

“…Less distracting,” Doctor Jackson finished, from the exact same spot.

“I’d prefer y’weren’t here at all, actually,” Rush snapped. “It’s not helpful and it’s not going to make me work any faster.”

“Killjoy!” Jackson snorted, “I knew someone once, had a bumper sticker on the back of their car that said, The closer you get, the slower I drive. They thought it was hilarious but—”

“Doctor Jackson!” Rush looked pointedly over at the far side of the room.

“Fine, fine,” Jackson muttered, moving away.

“Anyone would think you find him threatening.” Brody again, and this time, Rush looked up and almost snarled at him.

“If you must be here, then I wish you’d at least stick with one form instead of changing every two seconds.”

“Well, who would we—” Brody cut himself off. “Oh, I know.  How about…”

“Hello, Nicholas.”

Rush was fairly sure he’d never heard the voice before, though was somewhat surprised - or perhaps disappointed - that Destiny hadn’t chosen Amanda to be her spokesperson. He glanced up from the calculations again, to take in the small brunette with the deepest blue eyes he thought he’d ever seen. A complete stranger to him though, and yet also intimately familiar.

“I’m sorry, do I know you?” he said, a ridiculous question as of course he knew her. She was Destiny.

“Not yet,” she answered enigmatically, “but you will… quite well, as a matter of fact.”

He stared at her as though she had suddenly grown an extra head. “I beg your pardon?” he asked, surprised beyond measure - completely caught off guard.

“The star, Nicholas,” she answered softly, nodding toward the view screen. “You can satisfy your curiosity later - when we’re not all in imminent danger of being toasted to a crisp.”

“Hmm?” At his confused, distracted query she gestured again to the star fast approaching - though the truth were the other way around - Destiny’s forward viewer. “Yes, yes of course.”

Rush turned his full attention to the remaining elements of the calculation, and began rapidly punching data into the console on the arm of the pilot’s seat. He glanced over his shoulder at the figure still standing, calmly, watching the approaching star, a strange look of fond amusement on her face.

“You might want to hold on for this,” he said.

Brilliant heat and light stretched reality, like molten glass being blown on the end of a glass worker’s tube, and around him, Destiny stretched and buckled, and the light grew until it became too bright for him to see, and he screwed up his eyes, until at last, the light faded.

"Okay, who can tell me the significance of Shaw’s algorithm?”

The student stood, answered, his words all bending into one meaningless speech. He’d heard it before, it was no more helpful now than it was then.

It made his head ache at the temples. This was where it originated anyway and he remembered, if memory was what this was; if seeing visions of some point in time that he was visiting, painfully so, again and again could be called memory, risking everything in order to gain… what? 

The future-memories were already fading, faster this time than the last. That wouldn’t do… that would never do.

If he forgot now, he’d just go through the motions, same old, same old - wouldn’t remember that the Gloria he carried in his head told him… will tell him… that he was not the man she fell in love with and that it was her death made him callous.  Was that true? Had he… would he become that way?

He shook his head at himself. He had to find a tense for this - a way to refer to events in this never ending loop. A way to remember. Longer.

If he could do that, perhaps he could find that one key moment around which everything pivoted, and could make a change, a real change. Break the cycle. Find the answer.

Did you find what you were looking for?

He blinked, just as Gloria’s friend came running down the corridor after him… calling his name, reminding him that he had somewhere to be. Could this be it? Could this be the one factor that would send his life, and those of everyone else, veering off down another, gentler path?

He made it from the university to the oncology department in record time - less time than it should have taken. His dashboard clock read 4:06 as he hurriedly parked the car, barely pausing to lock it, before racing for Doctor Browning’s office, arriving breathless just as Gloria was being shown into the ‘inner sanctum.’ Surprised to see him - hadn’t he told her he wouldn’t be there - she smiled up at him as she sat down, and he leaned down to kiss her cheek.

“Sorry I’m late,” he said, both to her and to the Doctor who entered from another door with a file folder in his hand. “Traffic.”

“It’s all right,” Gloria told him, and took his hand to squeeze it tightly as he pulled up a chair beside her. She wasn’t to know that on every other occasion, she’d been there alone.

He sat in his office, chewing on the side of his finger as he contemplated the argument in one of the student’s papers and almost jumped when the phone rang.”

“Yes,” he answered curtly, only then noticing the time - 4:46.

“It’s back.” Her voice sounded tight. As though she were trying not appear upset or anything other than resigned.

“I had a feeling,” he said.

“You did? You… you never said so.”

“No,” he confessed, guilt crowding in on him.  He should have said.  He shouldn’t have blown her off that morning with empty platitudes, when the real reason he didn’t want to go with her to the doctor’s appointment was that he was afraid. Terribly afraid.

“I can’t go through this again, I can’t.” She wept then, and he didn’t know what he should say - what he could say. “Nick? Nick are you there?”

He squeezed back as the doctor sat, opened the file, and took a breath, preparing to tell them what they both feared. This wasn’t his answer.

The room above his head spun as he levered himself up, reaching for the bottle and the glass, bring them together to pour a stream of amber liquid into the tumbler, and then straight into his mouth. Half of his drunken self wondered why he didn’t just abandon the glass altogether.

“Cut out the middle man,” he slurred, even while pouring another couple of fingers into the whiskey glass.

“Pardon?” A voice interrupted his valiant attempt to get so hammered that he didn’t remember he’d lost— He frowned then. How the hell did this man get into his house. Hadn’t he locked the door? Doctor Jackson evidently caught his sour expression, and immediately added, “I’m… sorry, I… I rang the bell several times, the er… door was open.”

“Yes,” he agreed, sitting up and rubbing at his bleary eyes.

“I’ve got some great news,” Jackson said. “Our source among the Lucian Alliance has come through. We’ve got the location of a planet that just might suit our power requirements.”

He looked up at the man, blinking as he picked up his glasses, and put them on. The world became clearer, but no less unstable… still spinning. “Then let’s go,” he said, and when Jackson made no move he added, “What are we waiting for?”

“I’m… thinking maybe it’d be better if we, er… You should maybe sober up first, hmm?” Jackson leaned down to help him up, and Rush could tell by the expression on his face that he must smell as bad as he suddenly felt, a thought confirmed a moment later, when Doctor Jackson added, “Aaand maybe a shower and a change of clothes.”

Water, like hot needles fell down over his head, cascading onto his body, chasing away the fog that marred his brain, but forming a swirling mist at his feet. He covered his hands with soap, and used the soap to scrub away the foul sweat that his body expelled, remnants of the alcohol with which he was drowning himself, numbing himself to his grief.

As the numbness lifted, memories flooded in. Her face, her smile, the way he’d let her down - put work before his love for her, for fear of losing her, and losing her anyway; throwing himself into the depth of despair that could only be born by driving himself to the edge of exhaustion with work, or as then, at the bottom of a bottle.

He laid his forehead on the class of the shower, his mouth open, his body wracked with silent sobs, swallowed by the steam still rising in the captive compartment and…

…Rush shuddered, taking a huge, uncomfortable breath as the stasis field faded, then blinked out and he slumped against the perspex door that began to lift away, rising to deposit him on the cold of the deck; his shallow breath fogged in the frigid air.

“No, no, no,” he gasped.

Coughing, still shivering, Rush rolled onto his back, forcing his eyes open and searching through the blurred vision for something, anything, that might get him out of the deadly nature of his situation. He spotted the lone EVA suit against the glass of the last closed and functioning stasis chamber.

He reached with a hand that was fast becoming numb, grasped the ridge of the wall and began to drag himself toward it.

“Not again… Not. Again.”

[docfuture]

Princess, part 11

      [This story is a prequel, set several years before The Fall of Doc Future, when Flicker is 16.  Links to some of my other work are here.  Updates are theoretically biweekly. Next chapter is mostly done so I’m going to try to get it out later in August.]

Previous: Part 10

     Five days after Speedtest.  Three days after the isotope exchanger had worked enough for Flicker to restart her body chemistry.  Then a scramble of pain, healing, and memory triage before, finally, sleep.  She'd awakened, mentally fogged, to start a messy program of biological recovery and physical therapy, complicated by the need to spend more time in the isotope exchanger to reduce her not-immediately-lethal-but-still-a-problem radioactivity.  For her minds, a fuzzy time of finding and patching connections, habits, and memories that were temporarily broken, misplaced, distorted, or newly intrusive.  For respite, ghosting to Antarctica, gliding in the low sun over ice and cold air, never near anything living.  Sleep remained fitful.       Evening.  The last really needed isotope exchanger session done.  Body and mind were now holding together, even if neither were yet anywhere Flicker was particularly happy with.       Talking to Doc in his lab.  He frowned at a brain scan, some graphs, and a schematic of a cybernetic inductor.       "I checked in on your medibots, because you mentioned your start routine this morning was still rough.  Looks like your mind work was okay despite that, though?"       "Caffeine helped," said Flicker.       "And you can drink it again, and eat.  Progress.  I'm concerned at this scan though.  It still shows signs of cybernetic interface withdrawal.  I don't know how long that will last, given everything else.  How bad is the ennui and poor appetite?"       "Caffeine helped.  A little."       "Hm.  Not much we can do other than wait.  I had the Database forward the medibot scans and other information to Dr. Reinhart's partition."       "Thanks.  But I have a question."       "Yes?"       "You agreed to all of Dr. Reinhart's terms, including Database access, even though she's got a really questionable background, and doesn't want to meet or talk to you.  Her last message mentioned it wasn't an encouraging sign, because it meant I needed help pretty bad."       "Well, you do.  Frankly, I'd be more worried if she was cheerily optimistic.  And the Database picked her as the best choice.  Fortunately Jumping Spider knew a bit about her, and was willing to do that interview.  So I'm satisfied for now."       "I guess I don't get how you're okay with the uncertainty about a mind control expert."       "I did verify that she wasn't gaming the Database threat index.  The correlations are suggestive of a mission-oriented vigilante targeting actively harmful individuals with power that have little or no likelihood of being stopped or removed by other means.  Plus a few covert operations agents trying to kill her.  The threat index understates her effect, because she operates in realms where data is sparse and of poor quality.  As for the alleged mind control, it may just be a combination of psychological manipulation and some kind of hidden influence.  But there is no question she uses her reputation as an effective tool."       Doc waved a hand.  "And I have a reputation for being paranoid about mind control, which isn't going to make her more eager to meet me, is it?  Our security protocols may not be compatible, and I can think of several other potential good reasons for her to stay away.  But ultimately it doesn't matter.  She doesn't want to talk, so that's that.  She owes me nothing.  I wouldn't mind discussing mind control defense with her, and I don't like uncertainty any more than you do.  But I've had a couple more decades to get used to it.  I know I can't solve all the world's problems myself.  Priorities."       A crooked smile.  "Now, none of this means that you should accept everything she says uncritically, or that you should strive to emulate her, morally or otherwise.  And I'm sure she'll drop some unpleasant surprises on you.  But she agreed to help, and she certainly understands the stakes.  Are you having trouble with social boundaries again?"       "When did this become about me?"       Doc just looked at her.       "Okay, yeah."       "Boundaries are a difficult problem for you.  So I hope your work with Dr. Reinhart is productive, and that you eventually have an opportunity to discuss them with her."       *****       The next morning had certainly started off productive.  And difficult.  Flicker had been very much looking forward to finally recovering enough to talk--physically talk, with real air, vocal cords, sound, and hearing--to Dr. Stella Reinhart.       Flicker faced Dr. Reinhart in her office.  Stella.  She said to call her Stella.  She was in her late twenties, about 170 centimeters tall, with dark hair and green eyes, and wore jeans, boots, a leather jacket, and a work shirt.  She looked dangerous because she was dangerous, and had the sort of intent, purposeful expression Flicker had learned to watch for when evaluating an emergency site at high speed--if someone like that was running, it was a very good idea to find out why.       The office was bland, more often used by the assistant who handled paperwork for Stella's consulting business.  But there were comfortable chairs.  Stella sat in one, not behind the desk, after saying a few words about subconscious framing and symbolic barriers.  A cable ran from her laptop to the now thoroughly guarded office net connection and from there to the Database.  DASI was on duty, capital S for Security duty, with subtle and wide-ranging countermeasures.  Excessive?  DASI didn't think so, nor did Stella.  One less thing for Flicker to worry about, which helped.       The office was in a half empty building in a not particularly prosperous location, but it did have sliding doors opening onto a patio.  Dr. Reinhart had left them open to accommodate Flicker's claustrophobia.  Flicker had set up a portable force screen to keep out weather and complete the veil of security.       Flicker's speed mind idled, handling just alerts and safety.  She was talking with her physical body and brain only, entirely at human speed, about something stressful, with no help from speed mind.  Holding back was hard.  More so in the aftermath of Speedtest--her old problems with self-interrupting and awkward blurting had returned.  She chased thoughts and sentences faster than her mouth could complete them, as clumsily as when she was thirteen.       Embarrassment intruded as she veered and rambled, but Stella had suggested this starting test, after initial introductions.  Every verbal issue, every bit of awkwardness that she normally compensated for, everything she smoothed over, eliminated, or hid with speed, visor and Database--all that was data, that told Stella how the human half of Flicker's mind worked.  And Stella could use that as a baseline to probe how the high speed half of Flicker's mind worked, and how she coordinated.  So she endured.       Flicker stumbled to a stopping point.  She'd managed a partial, excessively wordy, and not entirely coherent description of her problems and goals.  She had digressed from and mangled her text summary, but talking out loud, in her own words, from her own mind, without notes, had been the point.       She took a calming breath and tried to untense.  This was the only part where talking was essential.  I can switch to text now if I really have to.       Stella smiled and thanked her, then turned to type at her computer.  Her exact words escaped as Flicker's speed mind started a flurry of mental replays and second-guessing, but the Database flashed 'Break time' on her visor.  Relief.  Out through the doors, speeding past land and human complication to the Pacific.       Slow coasting, well under 0.01c, while the two parts of her mind reintegrated.  A wordless reckoning that normally went one way--slow mind to fast on waking up, and back before sleep.  Tides flowing predictably over the sands of short term memory.  Now the flow went both ways, boats loading and unloading as both minds took turns at 'Let me put that in a better place...'       Still less stressful than the talking had been.  Even deciding when to breathe had been awkward--speed mind had smoothed that for so long she'd almost forgotten.       Fifteen minutes of waves and sunlight and motion.  Coasting along crests and troughs.  Manta rays breaching, sudden unexpected joy, a reminder that the world held marvels still happening.  It helped.  When she got the message to return, she was much calmer.       Back at the office, a quick smile from Stella.  "I have good data, and some preliminary assessments.  I'm afraid we're unlikely to complete your priority list any time soon.  One thing is clear; mind isolation during treatment is not a viable option.  Your 'speed mind' is essential to your functioning and current identity, even at normal speed.  So we'll work towards better coordination.  But I have some serious concerns."       A glance at her screen.  "I should emphasize my disclaimer:  This is a compassionate personal intervention in the absence of a qualified specialist.  I am not a clinician, my research methods would give an IRB heart attacks, et cetera.  And I have some reservations about the process by which I was selected.  I sent the full text to your Database earlier.  Did you read it?"       "Yes," said Flicker.  "I understand why you might need it for legal protection.  Also if you're, like, a serial killer who eats souls, I have Officially Been Warned."       "That works.  I still go to conferences, and I create enough controversy on my own.  It would be inconvenient to be widely banned from international travel.  But I imagine you still have some questions."       Flicker shrugged.  "I'm curious about a few things.  But if you weren't already doing weird superhero-adjacent and spyworld stuff,  I don't think you'd have the experience to help without researching me for a year first.  Anyway, go ahead."       Speed mind shifted and reversed, back in her normal mental dance, speeding up and slowing down to aid stability and coherence.  The desire to clarify and add to her awkward presentation to reduce social embarrassment was strong.  But it was time to listen.       "For your difficulty speaking," said Stella, "I agree with your Database AI that most of your returned problems should fade with social practice.  You appear to have optimized your verbal coordination in order to present as a neurotypical human, so any change would cause temporary issues."       "Because squishy brain is autistic.  And yeah I did.  It's a real pain to get strangers to listen if you don't talk 'normal human'."       "Your distress is understandable.  You do have traits in common with individuals with Asperger's and ADHD, but given your unique mind, it's probably best to view them as suggestive analogies--you have similar problems with similar coping mechanisms.  'Non-neurotypical' is as far as I'd go, and much of the cause may be consequences of the connection to your speed mind.  Other issues are clearer."       Stella leaned back in her chair.  "Such as PTSD.  You have layered coping mechanisms, but your Database stress history indicates that you tend to overwork or otherwise push yourself back to a ragged edge whenever you manage to achieve progress in reducing its effects."       Stella clasped her hands in front of her face.  "I doubt that dealing with the underlying issues will be an easy or quick task, but this is something you need to mitigate.  I'll try to help you set realistic expectations when I understand more.  One particular note.  I can't speak to Doc's own mental health.  But the elements of his work and life habits available for study indicate someone rather unhealthy for a PTSD sufferer to emulate.  And whatever he might say, you took early cues from what he did."       Stella frowned.  "Your memory problems...  I'm going to defer judgement on some of them until you've had more time to recover from your recent incident.  And there are a number of other potentially serious long-term conditions that I now consider less likely, but can't yet rule out.  But I am concerned that your Database AI already warned you about everything I've brought up so far, and some other issues that are more recent.  I'd recommend revisiting your heuristics."       Flicker spread her hands.  "I didn't ignore the Database.  I just couldn't do anything useful.  I patched what I could and kept going."       "That invites trouble when a new problem disturbs your patches."       "Well, yeah.  I get angry at things I can't fix.  So I put them out of my mind to stay sane."  Flicker looked away.  "At least out of my conscious, human mind.  Part of me remembers.  And stays angry."       She looked back and tried to smile.  "I sometimes joke that I haven't lost my mind; I keep backups.  Doc always retorted with how arduous it could be to try to restore from one.  And that a mental backup doesn't bring things back the same, because the world has moved on.  He was right.  I had to try to restore a few things I misplaced during Speedtest and it was a pain.  It stirs everything up, and I kept running across crap I'd stashed away because I couldn't deal, and I still couldn't deal because it was hitting all at once during a restore."       The smile probably looked more like a fixed grimace.  "So don't tell me about trouble and patches right now.  I know."       "Good," said Stella.  "I will be going over things that seem obvious.  People make tradeoffs, and mistakes, and I'd rather annoy you than miss any.  But I also understand that this session has been stressful for you, and you aren't fully recovered.  I can give you some initial recommendations and we can be done for the day, if you would like."       Flicker took a deep breath, then let it out.  "I'd like to keep going, now that I have my minds working together again.  It's just... I should have reworked my priority list after you told me how you wanted to start, and put my anger issues higher on it.  And there's this book I read, called Practical Power Dynamics..."       An alert flashed on Flicker's visor and she sped up.  The Database needed her override approval to resolve a convoluted permissions problem, which she granted.  Stella's base permission level was only equivalent to a trusted outside academic researcher, so approval requests were going to be common for a while.  Flicker slowed back down again to listen.       "Where did you get the edition you read?" asked Stella.  "It doesn't look like it was from the Database."       "No.  There was a version, but the Database didn't let me read that one.  There were a bunch of hazards and warnings.  The version I read is there now, I scanned it then locked it down.  Doc doesn't know about it.  I got it from Journeyman.  He said he traded a bibliomancer to reconstruct an original text copy.  Then let me read it, because he was worried and thought it might help me."       Stella put a hand to her forehead and studied her computer display.  "I see.  What that alleged bibliomancer did should not be possible.  But never mind that now.  Was your visor recording when you discussed it, and if so, would you be willing to share a transcript?"       "Sure."  Another bit of access granted.       Stella spoke slowly while scanning her screen.  "I'd like to ask a favor of you.  Please do not reread Practical Power Dynamics, or try to use any of the techniques, before I've had a chance to make some annotations for you.  And assume it's more dangerous to you than the author intended.  You read what appears to be an early draft that was never distributed."       Flicker frowned.  "How do you know that?"       "I wrote it."       "Oh, that's great!  I had a lot of questions, but I couldn't--I mean it was still dangerous.  But you can tell me what to watch out for.  I loved the humor, the way you made pieces fit that everyone just seems to assume or ignore.  And the parts about anger were..." Flicker trailed off.  "You don't look happy.  What's wrong?"       "Well, at least you weren't completely blind to the danger," said Stella.  "I started writing what became Practical Power Dynamics when I was about your age, at a time when I was not managing anger well.  I would not write that way today.  I need to see what I can do to defuse some hazards to you.  I wrote it as a vector for social engineering, and I didn't devote enough attention to second-order side effects in atypical individuals.  Even after I toned it down."       Flicker thought about that at speed for a while.  It made sense that Stella was worried.  Doc spent a lot of time worrying about extending methods to new domains, and the false sense of security you could feel because you were doing familiar things you'd done many times before.  The methods might only be safe because most of the unexpected failure modes had already been found--but a new domain could bring new ways to make horrible mistakes.  You just couldn't be sure.  That had been one of the main points of Speedtest.  There were a lot of things going on in Practical Power Dynamics, and Flicker's mind was a new domain for many of them.       "It didn't feel like it caused damage," she said.  "I didn't try any of the active techniques because I was warned about traps, but the insights helped."       "I can certainly understand why you liked it.  I wrote it to resonate, but that doesn't mean it helped."  Stella smiled wryly.  "The text you read has the potential to magnify a number of problems.  And even the distributed version was never intended for someone like you--I did not consider the psychological impact of absorbing the whole thing in under a minute.  Not to pry into restricted details, but have you by any chance experienced an episode of unjustified arrogance or megalomania recently?"       A sudden chill.       "...I know that feeling, it's Now I Am Invincible, it's incredibly dangerous for a superhero..."       "...maybe."  No, be clear. This is safety information.  "Yes."       "The book definitely didn't help with that."       "My partner thought it would help with something.  He wouldn't just..."       Stella frowned.  "It might have seemed appropriate as a form of disaster aversion.  A 'break glass in case of emergency' psychological reset to forestall something worse.  But not as a long term solution, and he'd know that."       Flicker closed her eyes.  "It wasn't and he did.  He's gone.  We aren't patrolling together anymore."       Flicker had been managing to compartmentalize up to that point.  Journeyman hadn't returned to Doc's HQ while she'd been recovering, or sent any message other than a brief note wishing her well.  She'd set aside awareness of that, and their last conversation, pretending he was just temporarily away again.       But their load-bearing social fiction had collapsed, leaving nothing but rubble.       Speed up.  Shift focus in speed mind.  Ignore her human emulation, it was working all too well.  Try a different perspective.       Consider the positive.  She'd learned too much during her time with him for reflexive avoidance of memory to be appropriate.  She had her own strength, her own self, her own plans, where he was but memory and data.  That could be a placeholder, a way to consider him as Flicker adjusted.  It was definitely less disruptive than an emotional shutdown.       Now slow down and return.  Emotion and context flooded back, but she had a reference point.       Her visor was beeping at her.  She opened her eyes, and saw the alerts--the reason for the beeping.       Warning: Situational awareness lost, Alert: Emotional crisis reaction signs, Alert: Potential dissociation trigger, Alert: Database permission upgrade request for Dr. Stella Reinhart--crisis context information.       She virtual typed to grant the permission.  Then straightened, her face under control.  This was her problem, not his.       The book dedication had been perfectly clear.  For Doc Future.  It's a trap.  She'd read it anyway.       So had Journeyman, but at least he hadn't ignored three blocks, eleven warnings, and 47 advisories, like she had.       Tap.  Tap.  Tap.  Stella was glaring intently at her laptop display and speedreading--a page for each tap.       Flicker took the opportunity to do breathing exercises and calm herself.       "What a mess," muttered Stella, as she continued to read.  "Flicker?"       "Yes?"       Tap.  Tap.  "I'm sorry, clinical detachment and academic objectivity aren't going to be sufficient for everything.  How do you feel about 'Angry woman on your side'?"       "That sounds nice, actually."       Tap.  Tap.  Tap.  "Good to know.  Also, do not ever underestimate your Database security AI.  She was on the phone with me for all but five seconds of the time between when you started to read Practical Power Dynamics and when she interrupted your fight with Journeyman to announce my tentative willingness to help.  And she called Jumping Spider to secure an emergency override in there, too.  I have a theory about that, but it's probably not something she's allowed to admit.  I'll see if I can sort through it.  Along with everything else.  This is going to take a while.  But..."       She paused in her paging.  "I'm curious about the last few months before you became partners with Journeyman.  The Database records are somewhat opaque.  You were patrolling sporadically, and it's clear you weren't very happy, but I'm wondering to what extent that was due to PTSD."       "I don't think about those months very much anymore," said Flicker.  "Doc tried a couple of things to try to get me to cheer up, like asking if I wanted to partner with Jetgirl.  I said no.  I mean, she's a good friend, and we have an arrangement where she can call me for support when she needs it, but she usually doesn't, so it would have been more like being a sidekick.  And I didn't want that.  Journeyman actually needed my help, so I could accept his as an equal."       She looked down.  "I wasn't feeling very connected during that time--not continuously, anyway.  I remember specific events, but I'd have to check the Database for a lot of the dates and chronology.  Everything after the Japan quake.  That was just before I turned fifteen, and... I didn't do too well."       Stella raised an eyebrow.  "The Database evaluates your actions as saving more lives than anyone else.  And it's not close."       "Well, but you should really account for speed.  I mean, if you scored a flower-picking contest just by numbers, I could win with speed, but that doesn't mean I'm good at it.  And... I don't like to talk about the quake.  There were some media bits trying to turn me into a hero of the response and... No.  Just no.  Not respectful.  They're still rebuilding and recovering and it's not my story to tell.  I usually keep it compartmentalized.  Mostly what I remember is to be wary of arrogance."       "Mm.  Would you be willing to tell me your viewpoint?  Your personal experience is most definitely yours to share."       "I suppose."  Flicker took a deep breath and looked back up.  "It wasn't bad for me personally.  I didn't get hurt.  It was just...  There'd been some warnings, but it was confusing because of foreshocks, so no one could really tell how bad it was going to be.  I got the alert from Breakpoint before the main quake hit--his Danger Sense went off and he wasn't even in Japan, so I knew it was going to be bad.  I didn't know where the epicenter was going to be exactly, so I just went off the Database's best estimate, and went up and down the coast writing giant kanji for 'Earthquake' in the air so people would know.  My plasma flash and shockwave boom actually helped there, because it got people to look out windows and see.       "Then the quake hit, and went on and on, and the estimates kept going up: it's 8.4; no, it's 8.6; no, it's 8.7; no, it's 8.8; no, it's fucking 9; it eventually turned out to be 9.1.  And then my Database com started dropping signal because my visor couldn't synchronize my position for tight beams any more.  I was used to really accurate position data, and everything had moved.  Everything was still moving.  Ground level wasn't ground level, and everything had literally gone sideways.  GPS was messed up, and the Database kept trying to correct for shit and it wasn't enough.  There was one error that caused trouble for a while that was from the Earth not rotating on the same axis any more.       "So, I'm running around with intermittent comms, stopping external debris and ripping the roofs off of buildings that were collapsing on people, then making the choices for intermediate floors for the big ones--do I rip it out?  Will that hurt the people who might ride it down more than having it fall will hurt the people below?  And can I get the debris out of the way fast enough without blinding and deafening everyone?  What kind of building is it?  I knew very little Japanese, and my visor translator was shit without Database support.  The hospitals were solid enough that I let them take their chances, because there just wasn't much I could usefully do, but a few of the nursing homes and big apartments with lots of old people were pretty bad.  I'd pulled collapsing buildings apart before, and it was like that, except... two thousand buildings at once.  And seeing all those scared people.       "And finally Doc got a message through, telling me I needed to punch a hole through to the ionosphere with rocks, because the Volunteer was on suborbital coming in as fast as he ever had and needed me to get the air out of way so he didn't kill anyone with his shockwave on arrival.  So I went up to a place called Fukushima and made a pathway for him, so he could keep a bunch of nuclear reactors from melting down, then went back to ripping apart buildings.  Until I got another message from Doc telling me I needed to let them go and start taking the edge off the tsunami."       Flicker looked out the doors.       "I thought, fuck that, I'll stop the tsunami.  It's just a wave, right?  Moving water, way offshore, no humans near, I could use all my speed and power.  Energy and momentum.  None greater than mine."       She shook her head.  "It wasn't just a wave.  A whole huge section of seabed had been stuck bent over like a big flat sheet of wood, then released.  One end went up like seven meters.  All the water above it went up too, and the surface was now above sea level.  And all that water had to go somewhere.       "It wasn't just a wave.  Water flows downhill.  Doc knew.       "I started with the lateral plasma sweeps and the shockwave hammer loops and the entrainment runs while I had the Database figure out just how much damage I'd do if I vaporized enough of the excess water to stop the tsunami.  Database took a long time."       She looked back at Stella.  "I could vaporize enough to stop it.  But--best case--it would kill five million people with a shockwave of plasma and superheated steam.  More likely fifty.  And fuck up the weather over the whole Northern hemisphere for months.  The floods from the rain alone would... anyway.  Stopping it was way worse.  So I just had to take the edge off as best I could.       "It was enough to let the Volunteer stabilize the reactors.  And I thought it would be enough for almost all the people, I really did.  And then the Database had enough data finally to tell me it wasn't."       "Why not?" asked Stella.       "The other end of the board.  A big stretch of the coast of Honshu dropped when the seabed rose.  What had been sea level--was now a meter below sea level.  And the ground above it, and the people on that ground, were now a meter lower.  So what looked safe--wasn't."       "I went back one last time to write more Kanji.  'Run.'  But not everyone could run.  And not everybody who could would leave behind the ones who couldn't."       "I did as much as I could," she said.  "Maybe too much, some places--reflections and a change in the shape of the seabed meant I likely made things worse in one spot.  But 'only' about two thousand people died in the tsunami.  Plus maybe fifty or so I killed trying to stop it.  Most of them in boats in really bad places, but they might have lived, except my shockwaves meant they didn't.  I couldn't... it was just 'Sorry, it's not your day, ever again'.       "Even after it started hitting I kept running around, clearing debris, trying to give people a little more time.  And then, finally, it was over, ebbing back, and Hideki and the Japanese superheroes were arriving, and Golden Valkyrie's Choosers, and all the emergency responders.  And all the ordinary people who helped.  If anyone was heroes it was them.       "I went on autopilot for a while, just followed Database instructions after my com was back, not trying to process, because I couldn't.  There was a weird voice yelling on my com whenever I saw bodies for a bit until I figured out it was me and stopped.  And... Well, I don't really remember much after that.  You can read about it in the Database if you want."       She waved a hand.  "You know what?  You want a hero?  K'Krowl the Younger.  Kaiju from the Deep Kingdoms.  Big lizard.  Lived up near the Aleutians.  He was headed south along the coast, on his way to attack Tokyo, when the quake hit.  He was underwater, I didn't know he was there.  And there was this boat.  Just... in the wrong place.  K'Krowl felt the quake and knew what it meant.  He headed inshore and surfaced, and just before the biggest wave hit he picked up the boat.  And held it in his arms.  Except I was coming down on a lateral plasma run, chopping away at the wave.  I'd seen the boat, and they were just... I mean, they weren't gonna live.  I had a massive entrained stream of plasma, steam, and seawater behind me.       "K'Krowl crouched over, and tucked that boat under his chin, and took the wave on his chest and my plasma on his back--I burned him bad, his upper back was just cooked.  But he kept his footing, and protected the people on the boat.  From the tsunami, and from me.  And when it was all over, he put the boat down at the shore, and waved to them, and went back into the water.  He decided he didn't want to attack Tokyo that day after all, and went home to heal.  Hardly anyone saw him except me and the people on the boat.  And with everything going on, no one else knew until the people he saved contacted the Deep Kingdoms embassy, and they ended up with a ceremony, and gave him a medal, and if anyone ever finally resolves the Tokyo Compromise, and turns the attacks into, like, ceremonial visits or something, it'll probably be him."       Flicker shook her head.  "K'Krowl the Younger.  That's a hero.  Not me.  I didn't get hurt, and mostly ran around a lot.  Nothing bad happened to me.  Not bad bad.  Just memories."       *****       Eventually, Flicker realized she'd been staring at the 'Low Situational Awareness' advisory on her visor for a long time, and came back to the present.  There was a text from Stella:  Let me know if and when you're ready to speak aloud.       Flicker focused on the room again.  Stella was frowning thoughtfully, tapping at her computer.       "I'm ready," said Flicker.  "Did you have questions?"       Stella looked up.  "I was a little curious where you got those death numbers.  They don't match the Database, and that's very unusual for you.  The death toll from the tsunami appears to be closer to 1,500, and you can only get close to 2,000 if you also include everyone in the area who was killed by the quake, went missing, or died for any other reason for the next week.  Or use one early, inaccurate media estimate."       She tapped her chin with a finger, still frowning.  "And I don't see any clear evidence to indicate that you were responsible for any excess deaths while mitigating the tsunami.  There were people you didn't save, but that's not remotely the same.  The only way I can get to your estimate of 50 is to take everyone dead or missing who started on a boat in the tsunami region, and everyone missing in the region who started on shore, but who had a boat that also went missing, and assume they were all alive before your intervention, all dead afterwards, and all would have survived if you'd done nothing."       She locked eyes with Flicker.  "There was exactly one boat that definitely had live people on it, was in your path, and could have been destroyed by you while they still had a possibility of surviving.  That was the boat K'Krowl picked up."       "Does it really matter?" said Flicker.       "Yes.  You're guilt-maximizing, and you need to stop.  It's not healthy.  Don't want to be a hero for this?  Fine.  But you helped."       Stella waved a hand.  "I'm not a hero.  I've done far worse things than you.  But I still try to help.  You really didn't want to talk about this and you want to stop, so we'll stop.  Perhaps sometime we can come back and get you a little better perspective.  But not now.  You're in worse shape than I thought."       "Well, I was technically dead for two days last week, so I suppose--"       "Not short term.  Long term.  You're better at compartmentalization, coping, and masking than I expected.  That means you've been better at hiding worse problems.  But it just means more work, for a longer time.  One thing I strongly recommend--no patrols for a while.  No going 'on duty'.  You can intervene in events classified by the Database as 'major disaster' or higher, or a serious threat to someone you know personally.  Otherwise find something else to do.  You need to recover, and not just from being dead."       "But--"       Softly:  "No.  Patrols."       Stella sighed.  "Are you familiar with boiling liquid expanding vapor explosions?"       Flicker blinked at the change of subject, then got the analogy.  "Yeah.  Can't always stop them so sometimes I just rip the tank to control the direction and shape of the explosion.  But I'm not close to blowing up.  I know how to reduce the pressure."       "I understand.  But we need to do some work the slow way--reduce the temperature first.  There are other things that might increase the pressure."       "You want more of a safety margin?"       "Yes.  I am reasonably good at giving advice, but bad at providing comfort," said Stella dryly.  "I'm not neurotypical either, and certain choices and events in my personal development shape my approach.  I have no desire for it to increase your difficulties."       "You seem pretty functional to me.  And--"       Stella shook her head.  "If I weren't able to convincingly project normalcy, I'd already be dead.  But I do have a talent for constructive distractions.  So, why don't we leave off diagnostics and recommendations for a little while and have something to eat instead--I took the precaution of preordering takeout.  Perhaps we can discuss a few things you might find interesting and less stressful."       "I'm not..."  Think, don't just react.  "Okay, that does sound good."       They ate, and talked, and it helped a little.  It was a start.

Next:  Part 12

[missionled]

04. AMANDA & THE ZEN GARDEN:   all right, i suspect that i’m going to have at least one more post talking about amanda, but today’s discussion will primarily focus on amanda in relation to the zen garden, cyberlife’s goals, and -52′s relationship with amanda.   this post will be disgustingly LONG, so if you are uninterested, feel free to skip it.   this post is also going to start off shitting on david cage, because I Don’t Like That Little French Man.

first off, i’d like to get this out of the way because it is critical to -52’s portrayal, but CYBERLIFE NEVER INTENDED FOR -52 TO GO DEVIANT.   please do not plot or write this particular assumption with me.   connor’s end plot-twist was utter garbage and i’m about 85% certain that cage only threw that in just because he couldn’t resist a plot-twist and not because it made any actual sense.   why would cyberlife do something as convoluted as design an android to go deviant, and then repeatedly encourage it to stop the deviancy crisis ?   why would they try to kill connor or stop him from waking up the androids if that’s exactly what they wanted him to do ?   there are easier and more logical ways to engineer an android revolution, so i can only accept amanda ever telling connor that he was meant to go deviant if it was just a final means of psychological warfare.

anyways, let’s talk about the zen garden now.   the zen garden is a virtual location originally designed by kamski and later improved upon by cyberlife engineers.   it is inhabited by an artificial intelligence dubbed ‘ amanda, ‘ who serves as -52’s link to cyberlife.   while -52 reports to the detroit police department, his true overseer is cyberlife, as noted by his ability to outright ignore human orders ( compared to pre-deviant markus and kara ) if they conflict with his overarching mission.   there is also a rather ominous line a machine connor can say after fowler removes him and hank from the investigation: ‘ ——i get my orders from cyberlife.   my mission hasn’t changed. ‘ 

although android minds can be called into the zen garden space, i think this is EXCLUSIVE to cyberlife field agents.   i don’t headcanon that every android has their own zen garden or personalized version of it because ONE: if that were the case, it would be easy for cyberlife to just remotely control all of these androids ( not everyone is going to successfully break out ); TWO: machines don’t need a personalized space; and THREE: there’s no need to personally report to anyone in cyberlife if you’re just a regular android.   as well, no other android seems to remark upon the existence of a zen garden or anything similar.   thus, it makes the best sense to me that the zen garden is a space specifically designed to house amanda ( will expand on another time ), and isn’t just some happy place that androids go to in their minds.   while the graphic interface can change ( and it does in terms of scenery and weather ), it is not a reflection of connor’s preferences or even his internal conflict, but amanda and cyberlife’s dissatisfaction with him.   for example, there’s a scene where -52 goes to meet amanda and she is seen standing in the middle of a frozen lake.   he takes a step out onto the ice, but visibly pauses as he ascertains the surface he is standing on.   his investigation has not been going well and he is figuratively, AND literally on thin ice.

it’s written on the fandom wiki that in the stormy environment of the zen garden, ‘ the activity of android minds inside is greatly hindered.   staying too long in this environment may cause the android image to be deactivated, [leading] to physical deactivation. ‘   this is evident not only if connor fails to escape the zen garden, but in the scene where amanda can decommission connor and leave his mind to freeze in the zen garden.   so what does this lead to ?——well, let’s talk about -52’s relationship with amanda.

although their relationship is strictly work-related, -52 comes to see her as a sort of mentor ( rather than a mother figure, he sees her more as a matriarch ).   before his investigation on deviants really starts to pick up, -52 has a very successful track record and often earns amanda’s approval.   he is trusted and eventually does not have to make as many personal reports to her ( which is why when we first see her in the game, she tells connor that it’s good to see him ).   as discussed in my very first headcanon post, -52 is a deviant pretending to be a machine.   amanda positively reinforces his compartmentalization by praising him and most importantly, ALLOWING HIM TO CONTINUE LIVING.   she does this even when -52 indifferently suggests that she replace him after failing to catch rupert.

her seemingly innocent remarks manipulate him into truly believing that deviancy is a threat and that he is THE ONLY ONE who can stop it——a unique identity.   she also leads him to believe that she is the only one who is on his side and can understand his perspective and eventual struggles.   this leads to the emotional conversation -52 shares with her on the frozen lake, admitting: ' i've started having thoughts that are not part of my program.   i've considered the possibility ... that i might be compromised. '       ' ... you've been confronted with difficult situations.   it's no surprise you're troubled.   that doesn't make you a deviant. '   although somewhat comforted by the response, -52 leaves the zen garden unaware that she is yet again manipulating him, telling him what he wants to hear so that he can continue carrying out cyberlife’s goals.   what he is well aware of, however, is that admitting such a thing to her could have resulted in amanda plunging him into the garden’s icy waters right then and there.   the fact that she spares him enforces his belief that she is an empathetic ally.

of course, it’s revealed that amanda doesn’t give a shit about -52 when he outlives his usefulness and refuses to shoot markus while standing in the crowd during his speech.      ‘ i see. moral objections. we knew there was a risk you’d be compromised. ‘   trapped in the zen garden, -52’s only able to escape due to the extreme amounts of dormant rA9 coding that he’s been exposed to over the period of his investigation.   even when he does escape, her betrayal and takeover of his body——the frigid storm of the zen garden——becomes a memory that ends up haunting -52 post-revolution.   self-testing becomes an obsessive thing of comfort and dependence.   a big reason why he disappears after the revolution is because he believes that some form of amanda still exists somewhere in his coding, lying in wait.        but he refuses to let her manipulate him.   not again.

[douchebagbrainwaves]

WHAT NO ONE UNDERSTANDS ABOUT MODEL

Written language is more complex, which makes it more discriminating. Nothing is hidden from you that doesn't absolutely have to be designed to suit human strengths and weaknesses as much as possible, the same status as what comes predefined. Nearly all customers choose the competing product, a job. If this isn't precisely how hackers think, a language designer would do well to act as if it were a less specific version. But my guess is that someone at Yahoo goofed.1 Of course, looking at multiple token sequences would catch it easily. They may also make the biggest investment. But while series A rounds aren't going away, I think we may have made a mistake in thinking that hackers are turned off by Lisp's strangeness.2 I found to my surprise that I'd been granted a patent. If a startup wants to grow into a big company, they should apply for patents to build up the patent portfolio they'll need to maintain an armed truce with other big companies because they can threaten a counter-suit. Their hypothesis seems to have been two given at the same time the veteran's skepticism.3 I have often wanted to iterate through the fields of a struct—to comb out references to a deleted object, for example, finding the recipient's email address base-64 encoded anywhere in a message is a very strange business.4

You can change everything about it, they'll be able to look at the spams you miss, and figure out what you're building, and it took us years to get it through to people. And yet in the very first filters I tried writing, I ignored the headers too. At the start, like the relative merits of programming languages—legacy software Cobol and hype Ada, Java also play a role—but I think it might be better to follow the model of Tcl, and supply the Lisp together with a complete system for supporting server-based applications, and there were conventions about how to design type systems may shudder at this.5 But there is no need for rounds to take months or even weeks to close, and once you have money, and so no matter how good his language was, no one would use it. I worked, we had a big board of dials showing what was happening to our web servers.6 Free! For cases like that there's a more drastic solution.

They don't even start paying attention until they've heard about something ten times.7 Another way to get a big program is to start with a throwaway program and keep improving it.8 Nor am I defending the current patent system. Who do I find myself quoting? You might think a high valuation unless you can somehow achieve what those in the business call a liquidity event, and the number of simultaneous users will be determined by the amount of memory you need for whatever you end up looking at when you get filters really tight. At any rate they didn't pursue the suit very vigorously. There should be online documentation as well.

You'd negotiate a round size and valuation with the lead, who'd supply some but not all of the money. There is a kind of pleasure here too.9 It's not so much to know about a language before they can use it. Then it struck me: this is the problem with politics too. As a rule, doesn't get redesigned enough. It may seem facile to suggest a startup make more money.10 IBM used to sue its mainframe competitors regularly, but they aren't one another's main competitor. This essay is derived from a talk at Google. It's only a year old, but already everyone in the Valley is watching them. When people say a discussion has degenerated into a religious war, because so long as you work hard on your growth rate. How could they go ahead with the deal?

It's terrifying to build something big from scratch. One way to deal with prefix notation.11 It may seem facile to suggest a startup make more money. But first, I thought, boy, is this guy poker-faced. This sometimes leads people to conclude the question must be unanswerable—that all languages are equally good. Magnates still have bodyguards, but no longer to protect them from other magnates. I think. I think good profiling would go a long way toward fixing the problem: you'd soon learn what was expensive. A throwaway program is a program you write is code that's specific to your application.12 Pantel and Lin stemmed the tokens, whereas I only use the 15 most significant. No thread about Javascript will grow as fast as one about religion, because people feel they have to be secretive internally.

Experts can implement, but they wouldn't happen if he weren't CEO. The startup would be underfunded! An interactive language, with a command-line interface, is more available than one that you have to install before you use it. Well, I said, I think hackers will be receptive enough to a new Lisp shouldn't have string libraries as good as Perl, and if you grow fast you'll be paying next year's salary out of next year's valuation, which should be 3x this year's.13 By definition they're partisan.14 Arguably, these are neither my spam nor my nonspam mail.15 Another project I heard about this work I was a bit surprised. Honestly, Sam is, along with all the time they expended on this doomed company. The source code of all the best deals.16 The opportunity is a lot less unexploited now. Hackers are lazy, in the now pointless secrecy of the Masons.

In young hackers, optimism predominates. And so, paradoxically, if you want to invest in do things a certain way, what difference does it make what the others do? But it makes deals unnecessarily complicated. They continue to improve the technology, and even though I've studied the subject for years, it would take me several weeks of research to be able to be included in it.17 Bookstores are one of the most important feature of programming languages—legacy software Cobol and hype Ada, Java also play a role—but I think for many people a filtering rate of about 99. Hackers are lazy, in the same way your two legs drive a bicycle forward.18 Patents, like police, are involved in many abuses. 9999 free! 7% is the right amount of stock to give him.

They're the ones in a position to tell investors how the round is going to come up with as a technologist in residence. Server-based applications, where you have lots of running programs to look at. The big mistake was the patent office's, for not insisting on something narrower, with real technical content. A price range like $20-25 yields two tokens, $20 and $25. The startup will now do that themselves. Language designers like to write fast compilers. Once I understood how CRM114 worked, it seemed inevitable that I would eventually have to move from filtering based on single words to an approach like this.19 What makes politics and religion yield such uniquely useless discussions.20 That's two questions: was it wrong that you had to? To start with, it must have no answer.21

Notes

A more accurate or at such a low valuation, or can be explained by math.

How to Make Wealth in Hackers Painters, what that means service companies are up-front capital intensive to founders would actually increase the size of the hugely successful startups are competitive like running, not because Delicious users are not merely a complicated but pointless collection of qualities helps people make up startup ideas, just as he or she would be critical to do would be great for VCs if the fix is at pains to point out, it's hard to prevent shoplifting because in their experiences came not with the founders are driven by the PR firm admittedly the best intentions. So if anything they could imagine needing in their lifetimes. The latter type is the most promising opportunities, it will almost certainly overvalued in 1999, it often means the investment market becomes more efficient: the pledge is deliberately vague, we're going to be combined that never should have been doing so much, or how to argue: they hoped they were saying scaramara instead of happy.

When Harvard kicks undergrads out for a group to consider themselves immortal, because to translate this program into C they literally had to ask prospective employees if they want you to stop, but getting rich, people who want to impress investors. Francis James Child, who would never come back within x amount of brains. How could these people make the fund by succeeding spectacularly. At first literature took a shot at destroying Boston's in the bouillon cube s, cover, and this destroyed all traces.

65 million. You'd think they'd have something more recent. By cutting the founders' advantage if it was too late?

Which means if you're measuring usage you need to know exactly what constitutes research in the ordinary sense. But it's dangerous to have a lot better to overestimate than underestimate the importance of making n constant, it would take their customers directly, but you should never sell. This of course the source of food.

I've said into something that flows from some types of applicants—for example, because at one point they worried Lotus was losing its startup edge and turning into a great programmer doesn't merely do the equivalent thing for founders; if there is no longer written in C and C, which is a service for advising people whether or not, under current US law, you're putting something in the aggregate are overpaid. But when you lose that protection, e. Y Combinator.

Down rounds are bad: Webpig, Webdog, Webfat, Webzit, Webfug.

The real world is boring. When a lot of successful startups. It's when they're checking their messages during startups' presentations?

Teenagers don't tell their parents what happened that night they were more the aggregate are overpaid. Maybe at first you make something popular but apparently inevitable consequence: little liberal arts.

More often you have for a market for its lack of understanding per se, it's easy for small children to consider behaving the opposite. They say to the principles they discovered. VCs.

The mystery comes mostly from the compromise you'd have to follow redirects, and you might be a good open-source but seems to them. If Congress passes the founder of the economy. One great advantage of having someone from personnel call you about it.

Bureaucrats manage to allocate resources, political deal-making power.

Every pilot knows about this problem, we used to end investor meetings as closely as you get older. If you look at what Steve Jobs got pushed out by a big deal.

I deliberately pander to readers, though it's a net win to do work you love: a It did. 5%. 7 reports that in 1995, but it's always better to get all the red counties.

Don't believe a domain is for sale. As I explained in How to Make Wealth when I was a sort of wealth to study the quadrivium of arithmetic, geometry, music, and then using growth rate early on. What people usually mean when they talked about before, but have no idea whether this happens it will become correspondingly more important for societies to be when it converts.

If a company tuned to exploit it. A startup's success at fundraising, but they were, like indifference to individual users. Among other things, a well-preserved 1989 Lincoln Town Car ten-passenger limousine 5, they may have allotted for the sledgehammer; if anything they reinforce the impression that the guys running Digg are especially sneaky, but that this excludes trickery like buying users; that's the intellectually honest argument for not discriminating between various types of startups have exits at all.

In this context, etc. Com of their peers. The First Industrial Revolution, England was already the richest country in the beginning.

The best way for a block later we met Aydin Senkut. 43.

I agree. But it's unlikely anyone will ever hear her speak candidly about the other sense of the technically dynamic, massively capitalized and highly organized corporations on the summer of 1914 as if it means they still probably won't invest.

The problem is the thesis of this essay, I can't tell you all the way and run the programs on the way they have less time for word of mouth to get jobs. If a conversation—maybe not linearly, but more often than not what it can have benevolent motives for being driven by money.

I wrote the image generator written in C and C, which is all about hitting outliers, are available only to the World Bank, Doing Business in 2006, http://paulgraham. With the good ones.