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cherrynojutsu · 3 years

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Title: Like Silver

Summary: A companion series for Like Gold.

It’s challenging to finish up discharge summaries and operative reports when one’s vision keeps blurring, as it turns out. And when one keeps pressing fingers to their lips in disbelief. A poetic sort of procrastination, indeed.

Blank period, canon-compliant, Sakura-centric, some expanded plot points from Like Gold, fluff and pining, eventually becomes a smut fest with feelings.

Disclaimer: I did not write Naruto. This is a fan-made piece solely created for entertainment purposes.

Rating: M (eventual nsfw-ness)

AO3 Link - FF.net Link - includes beginning/ending author's notes

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Chapter 2/?: A Poetic Sort of Procrastination, Indeed

Sakura saunters home late in the evening, admiring the stars above her in a daze of spring air and clutching her tote bag to her shoulder as if her very life force is tethered to it.

In the flurry of emotion, she completely forgot about returning her library books, but she doesn’t give a damn.

She drudged through her entire pile of paperwork, though it was an almighty effort requiring every ounce of her discipline. Even after Sasuke left, she kept tearing up and just gawking at the impossibly beautiful gift he’s given her, affection requited bubbling up inside her ribcage and unleashed into the air she breathes like some sort of ambrosial perfume she can finally afford to bask in. She has always known there is a softer side to him, that there is much more beneath the surface than he lets on with his laconic demeanor, but this is something else.

It’s challenging to finish up discharge summaries and operative reports when one’s vision keeps blurring, as it turns out.

And when one keeps pressing fingers to their lips in disbelief.

A poetic sort of procrastination, indeed.

She hangs her tote on its entryway hook and carefully removes the box inside once she reaches her apartment. After she’s padded her way to her bedroom, she flips on the two lamps before placing it tenderly on her bed.

Sakura briefly contemplates taking the lid off then and there, but she knows she really should shower first, because otherwise the evening is going to quickly spiral away from her, whirlpool of tender feelings that it already is.

It’s the quickest shower she’s ever taken in her life; berry-scented soap floods her body and seems to take forever to rinse clean in her haste, although it can’t actually be more than a minute or two in reality. It’s also the quickest she’s ever toweled off and changed into pajamas, scurrying back to her room and grabbing the first pair she lays eyes on from her dresser drawer.

Once she has shimmied them on, she opens the box again, and just looks.

It still exists - it doesn’t disappear or dissolve as a figment of her imagination - so she picks it up with careful hands.

It is so, so pretty, exquisite in a way that makes her heart hammer relentlessly against her sternum, a catharsis in her chest sweeter somehow than anything she’s ever experienced.

It’s unavoidable; her eyes well with tears again, because he said he had it made for her. Not found in an antique shop off the beaten path or some happenstance market who knows how many miles away. Not just something that reminded him of her.

Made for me.

Which means he thought of this himself. Silk that shifts colors like the Uchiha crest, fastidiously stitched petals, and a cherry blossom tree, carved light wood that is startlingly similar in tone to the accents here in her bedroom.

And the way he looked at her, after, a storm of silver and obsidian that took her breath away.

And he kissed her.

Sakura doesn’t know how she’s supposed to fall asleep tonight, deliriously happy as she is, or how she’s going to spend any of her free time from here on out not staring at this supernal treasure. She strokes the wood with careful fingers, bringing the carving upwards for closer inspection. Every inch of it is gorgeous; she is especially enamored with the pink and pearlescent stitching, coruscant in the low light. She assiduously counts the slivers of bamboo, too, and follows the rivulets of fine branches stretching upwards to the boundaries of the framework. Upon her inquest, she notices an impossibly tiny etching, faintly whittled on the interior of one of the slats of bamboo. Tai Ro, it says; she assumes that must be the craftsman’s signature. She wonders where it came from, which far-off land Sasuke traveled through to commission something so resplendent.

She has never seen anything so bewitching, except maybe silver flecks.

Tearing her gaze away from the fan, Sakura eyes the vanity by her balcony door, an idea brewing.

It’s an aged piece, of a bygone style featuring small drawers on each size and a sunken point in the middle, from which rises a large circular mirror. A framed copy of their original Team Seven portrait sits pushed against the framing, right in the center. She placed it there because she enjoys seeing it as she gets ready for the day. It’s a good memory, one of her favorites, sentimental in a way that makes her heart swell, after everything. A pale wooden hairbrush also sits perched atop its surface, given to her by her mother forever ago while she was still at the Academy.

“I found it in the market today, just after swinging by to pick up rose food from Ino’s mother. It’s old, an antique, but I think it suits you, my dear,” she’d said, ruffling her hair, still long at that point and chattering a mile a minute in the overbearing way she has always tended to. She’d brushed her already combed locks in the manner that Sakura thinks all mothers must with their daughters, even when they are starting to become too grown for that sort of thing. “What I wouldn’t give for your hair! So unique; you should have something lovely to brush it with. You’re already such a pretty girl, but someday you’re going to bloom, and when you do, heaven help the boys.”

There’s a cherry blossom on it, too, adorning the back simply with five perfect petals.

When Sakura moved out of her parents’ house, she chose the tones of her bedroom accents, inclusive of the frame, with it in mind; she’d been using it for years by then, and had developed a fondness for pale wood rooted in familial nostalgia. Most of her actual furniture in the room is secondhand, of an older variety and painted with a white stain to make them somewhat match - she prefers things with a little bit of history, has since her mom gifted her that hairbrush - but the few frames and wall-mounted shelves are lighter washes of wood.

Many of the surfaces in her apartment are cluttered with books and other knick knacks she has accumulated through the years, but she tries to keep the vanity’s top clear, almost like an altar, an ode to the things she finds lovely atop it to give her hope with which to greet the day.

Still clutching the gift tenderly in her hands, Sakura ventures over to it.

She holds the fan close to the frame as well as the brush, comparing the color, near an exact match, a fresh memory making her heart swell in a completely different way, a way she had previously thought was maybe unrealistic.

She’ll get a stand for it, she decides, and display it in the spot the frame currently sits; it would look perfect there, the curvature echoed above it in circular looking glass, a hairbrush of a similar stain beside it. Then she’ll be able to gaze at it every morning and evening. There is no way something this precious to her could ever be stored away in a box and only seen on special occasions; it’s the same reason she struggled with the idea of hiding his letters away in one.

No, Sakura is resolutely sure that admiring it will be a daily ritual.

She can relocate the photo frame to her bedside table, maybe, next to An Introduction to Electrocardiography , or perhaps to her living room, though it doesn’t really match the wood out there.

That gets her thinking. We’re... together now, right? He’s kissed her, and she really hopes he will again, surprisingly soft lips against hers, an aroma of woodsmoke, and butterflies unleashed in her stomach. Maybe she should put the frame on the shelf in the main room. He might come over, sometime; it would be good to have it visible, situated in a place where he can see it.

With the utmost care, she lays the fan on the surface in front of her. Sakura combs through wet locks, coaxing out tangles with an old gift and appreciating a new one with watery eyes. When she’s finished, she carefully clutches it again and admires it atop a lavender comforter for the better part of an hour, alternating between mentally mapping its fine stitching within the confines of her hippocampus and paging through her book of Sasuke’s letters in a way that is more than fond, affection freed from her chest after so very long. The jubilance crests to a sense of omneity as she does so, moon glow filtering in by way of the gauzy white curtains that shield the balcony’s glass door.

She absolutely can’t wait to see him tomorrow. She sincerely hopes she’s not dreaming all of this.

She is so enamored with it that she doesn’t even drink her customary evening tea, her being warmed in an entirely different manner she is as of yet unaccustomed to, better than earl grey or some variety of dessert. It’s immensely difficult to pry it from her own hands when the time comes to do so.

Always is the last word she thinks of before she succumbs to slumber, curled up in soft colors and hoping he has found somewhere comfortable to sleep. Treasured memories emanate from objects old and new, brewing together before a looking glass where she’s placed them for safekeeping and admiration.

XXX

When she awakens in the morning, Sakura jerks upright in bed, turning to her vanity to ascertain if it was all a dream, cozened in by her subconscious as she slept.

It wasn’t. The fan is still there, precious and so enchantingly beautiful, dawn flavoring the memory of Sasuke’s return just as sweet as it had tasted yesterday with his lips on hers.

She brushes her hair again, working at the task way longer than necessary and trying not to cry out of sheer happiness. She feels so light, as if being pulled upwards by a latterly existent force of gravity, theoretically possible in terms of relative physics and with the right circumstances, but never actually experienced.

Birds are singing on the balcony when Sakura finally steps outside, snacking on seeds from her bird feeder as she gives her fledgling plants a drink before leaving for work.

It is such a lovely morning.

XXX

Sakura makes it through work as if encapsulated in a brand of inertial navigation system, floating as if she’s a bizarrely sentient cloud from patients to test tubes. She feeds the mice and records the brief observations she usually does on Wednesdays, and then a Genin is being brought in with a linear fracture in their tibia, twisted wrong and impacted during training. She gives instructions to nurses, too, taking care of smaller tasks in between, part of her feeling like she is barely there.

Well, not barely. She still keeps her wits about her and heals people; she takes pride in what she does. She just… daydreams a little, too, sage, smoke, and silver occupying her spare moments, flitting in between the corridors of her head as she flits from exam room to exam room.

She’s sitting at her desk, eating an early dinner and working on a new pile of paperwork before her next appointment arrives at five thirty, when one of Naruto’s clones bangs on her window.

Her gaze shifts to the glass at the familiar boisterous whining of her name - “Sakura-chaaaaaaan!” - and she rises to open it the rest of the way, allowing him entry into her office, an easy grin coming to her lips.

“Naruto!” A million thoughts run through her head. He has to know Sasuke’s back at this point, right? Has he seen him? He must be so happy.

Cyan bores into her, and he grins as he steps down. “Sakura-chan, teme’s back! Can you believe it? Though I guess you knew since yesterday.”

Sakura’s cheeks warm at the implication of that, wondering how he knows this information, but her friend is plowing onwards.

“Anyways, wanna have an original Team Seven reunion dinner on Saturday night? Or maybe Sunday night? Kakashi-sensei said Saturday would be better for him, if it works for you. And we should also make it a housewarming party for teme, but Kakashi-sensei says DON’T tell him that, or he won’t agree! It’s a surprise.”

Laughter erupts from her chest, rich and joyful, because it is crystal clear in that moment that Naruto is as elated at Sasuke’s return as she is - okay, maybe not quite on the level that she is, but close - even through a clone. “Of course, we should! I don’t have anything planned for Saturday night.”

Her teammate grins, all infectious happiness in the way that is so utterly characteristic of him, eyes crinkling at their corners. “Good, great, awesome! Be sure to mention it to him when you see him at seven. I’m sure if you suggest it, he’ll definitely agree.” Sakura blinks in surprise, cheeks staining darker. “Man, this is gonna be so great! Team Seven is fucking back ! I can’t wait to get a mission! It’ll be just like old times. I gotta tell Hinata-chan, too!”

She can’t help it; she smiles so wide that it hurts her face, tears paying her another visit. Sasuke’s back. He’s really back. And-

“Well, anyways, I’ll leave you to eat your dinner, Sakura-chan, but we have to force him to be social. I can’t wait to spar! But also, we gotta have a picnic, and no tying me to the pole this time. We could even challenge Kakashi-sensei to get off his ass and give us another go at the bell test. And, and! We should have a movie night. And go drinking! I’ve never seen teme drunk. I bet he’s a lightweight, and he’ll probably say all sorts of embarrassing shit! And-” Naruto’s clone’s expression turns unexpectedly serious, blue eyes suddenly narrowing in a way that is all-seeing and a tan finger suddenly pointing at her accusingly.

“-I mean social outside of you and him, Sakura-chan! Don’t think for a second that you’re gonna escape my questions later, when my brain isn’t fried from staring at that stupid scroll Kakashi-sensei has me slaving over. I want answers. ”

And then Naruto’s clone disappears in a puff of smoke, leaving her blinking in a strange combination of bewilderment and somehow, shyness, too.

And ebullience. Mostly ebullience.

She stands there grinning like an idiot for a long time. She can’t wait to see him at seven.

#naruto #sasusaku #ssfanfiction #cherry writes #like silver #fanfiction #labor day weekend = finishing things

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ml-pnp · 4 years

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incorrecteragonquotes · 5 years

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Eragon Movie Recap Part 7: Raiding Party

Prepare yourself for something shaped vaguely like a daring tale of adventure, rescue, and camaraderie.

We pick up where Part 6 left off. Eragon knows a nonzero number of things about magic. The Ra’zac are dead. Brom was a Dragon Rider back in the day. It seems that our team is finally making some good progress.

We begin back at Durza’s fort. He’s sitting at his desk, casually reading a nice, big book. We aren’t told what it is, but we do get to see a couple of pages, and there’s definitely at least one pentagram in there.

A party of Urgals enters the room, lead by that one guy whose foot Durza stabbed before putting him in charge of the operation. Presumably, they’re here to report on the failed ambush at Daret, but Durza speaks first - he already knows what happened. He is just that spooky. And he is not pleased.

Durza expresses his displeasure by poking the lead Urgal with a fingernail and waiting for him to drop dead. I would like to take a moment to observe that Durza’s fingernails bear a very strong resemblance to Galbatorix’s. Maybe they share a manicurist, or they taught each other their favourite nail care techniques over a long weekend? It seems that Durza likes to use his fingernails as an offensive magical weapon, though whether he does this to use magical fingernail properties or simply for the aesthetic is unclear.

After a few moments, the lead Urgal does indeed drop dead from the fingernail poke. Not one to waste time, Durza promotes another Urgal to team lead. The Urgal accepts this change, but is clearly nervous about being addressed directly by the spooky man. Ultimately, the Urgal just stands there looking tired.

Durza is also tired. He is tired of waiting for Eragon to die. He is tired of other people’s failure to force this event. So Durza takes matters into his own hands. Or rather, his own fingernails. He visits Arya on her table and gives her a Magic Poke Of Doom.

Meanwhile, far away, Eragon is sleeping. Suddenly, he experiences a vision of Arya unlike any he’s seen before. She’s meandering oddly around a misty, green-tinged, dream-like forest. Then, cementing this vision as different from all that came before it, Arya addresses Eragon directly. She asks him for his name and he answers, entranced. She takes a moment to inform Eragon of her plight and adds some additional infodump details for good measure. But wait! Unbeknownst to Eragon, Arya’s entire appearance was staged by Durza. With his intel planted and trap set, Durza ends the transmission.

Eragon wakes up from his info session and immediately begins preparing to leave on his new quest to rescue Arya. Brom, holding his trusty sleep knife, wakes up at the commotion. Eragon knows more now than what Brom has told him, and Brom recognizes this straight away. He questions Eragon, and tries to hold Eragon accountable for his dodging of the question, but is met with predictably poor results.

Brom tries to explain the gravity of the situation and the magnitude of the decision Eragon is making. They’ve nearly reached the Varden, but Arya is being held in Durza’s fort in Gil’ead, which is in the opposite direction. Eragon is worried that Arya will be killed if he doesn’t rescue her, but Brom reminds him that as a military operative she is prepared to die for her cause. He makes a compelling argument - all of the Varden’s sacrifices up to this point have been for Eragon’s sake, so Eragon’s plan to walk into Durza’s fort jeopardizes everything the Varden has worked for.

Eragon, naturally, fails to listen to Brom’s concerns in any meaningful capacity. Saphira tries to vouch for Brom, but is met with no more success. Eragon throws a few scathing remarks at Brom, including a claim that Brom has forgotten what it means to be Dragon Rider, before departing with Saphira, leaving Brom behind as they fly towards Gil’ead.

After soaring speedily over the countryside, our dynamic duo touch down on a rocky hill with a good view of Gil’ead. It’s unclear how long the flight took, but from the editing I’m willing to guess it was one long day of flying, which isn’t actually all too bad. What is bad is the fact that Eragon and Saphira are still disagreeing. Eragon has done some scheming, and he figures that he has to do the infiltration at night, alone. Saphira protests - after all, they can’t be much of a team if they aren’t both there - but Eragon spouts some nonsense about strength and ends the discussion.

Under the cover of night, Eragon disguises himself in a very loosely-fitting cloak and tries to blend in. Perhaps one does indeed simply walk into the enemy base. Things are going pretty smoothly, but Eragon is semi-subtly being stalked by another dude in a loosely-fitting cloak. But wait! We’ve seen him before. This is the mysterious stranger from Daret! What’s he doing? His presence here can’t be a coincidence, but does it really matter what Cloak Man is doing if Eragon consistently fails to notice him?

Before we move on, I would just like to take a moment to appreciate that Eragon’s walk into the fortress is one of the best atmospheric moments in this movie. The fort is this looming, menacing entity filled with mystery and danger. As our hero passes the point of no return, he comes to understand the meaning of this place - the lines of chained prisoners drudging their way through the corridors, the cloaked figures staring and whispering behind their masks, the torchlit hallways filled with the echoing commands of the prison wardens. It’s a very intriguing setup, and it would be amazing if only it had a little payoff.

Walking through the fortress, Eragon finds a big, circular hallway-room. He’s alone in here, so he decides that disguises are for chumps and takes off his hood. He wanders around for a bit before activating dragon-o-vision to locate Arya. What a pleasant surprise! They actually did use it more than once! Eragon draws his sword, uses magic to open to open the cell door, and is immediately greeted by Arya telling him that he really messed up.

Durza walks in and confirms Arya’s warning. He insults Eragon for a bit, talking about how underwhelming the new Dragon Rider is, and then he and Eragon begin to fight. It is immediately clear that Eragon is thoroughly outmatched.

Eragon fights with both sword and magic, but Durza fights with smoky Shade teleportation, magically flying weapons, and magically flying weapon racks. Understandably, Eragon can’t keep up. When Eragon begins to show signs of magic fatigue, Durza mocks him before dramatically launching a spear at the now-defenseless adversary.

Before the spear makes contact, however, Brom dives out of a hallway and into the spear’s path, saving Eragon by taking the blow himself. This raises a few questions. If Gil’ead was so problematically far out of the way, how did Brom get here on horseback nearly as quickly as Eragon and Saphira? They had a ludicrous speed advantage because of their flight. And surely a resourceful, experienced fighter like Brom would have a better method than this for deflecting a single spear. Why was this his first choice? This action made sense in the book because the lack of alternate options was justifiable, but this isn’t the case here. As such, Brom’s injury here strikes me as very contrived.

Eragon tries to salvage the situation by throwing Brom’s sword, Zar’roc, at Durza. Durza deflects the projectile easily and quips about Eragon’s incompetence, but wouldn’t you know it! Eragon did something smart! Eragon uses the quip time as a distraction, readying his bow and shooting Durza in the face. Defeated for now, Durza dissipates, smiling. This impressive maneuver wasn’t performed by Eragon in the book, but I guess the guy has to look useful somehow.

With Durza no longer a threat, Arya is free to move from her rock. She and Eragon support Brom as they struggle towards an exit. Soldiers are coming from every direction now, and there’s no use in attacking them. But just when things are starting to look dire, Saphira saves the day by weaponizing the ceiling. Most of the soldiers are taken out by the falling rubble, and Saphira deals with the remaining few herself.

As Arya and Brom get ready for flight, Eragon looks up to see Cloak Man on a balcony, aiming an arrow in his direction. But don’t worry! He was only aiming for a stray soldier immediately behind Eragon, not Eragon himself.

At Cloak Man’s suggestion, Saphira leaves with Eragon, Brom, and Arya. Cloak Man stays behind, but he seems to have the situation under control. Guards fire arrows at Saphira & friends as they leave. Eragon makes a big deal out of how they need to climb higher, Saphira makes a big deal out of how she can’t carry this much weight, and none of the arrows hit anyway. And so, our heroes fly out into the night, hearts heavy with their bittersweet victory.

That’s it for Part 7! This part covered about 9 minutes of screentime. So much happened this time! We got to see our first Shade Showdown, Arya got to do something new, and more exciting changes are on the horizon. As always, thank you for reading, and in particular I would like to thank you for your patience - it’s been a while, but I’m thrilled to finally be able to share this latest part with you all. And in case the sparse update schedule has you worried, I want to make it clear that the Recap will eventually be completed - I have no intention of abandoning the project early, life just gets in the way of things sometimes.

Remember to tune in next week when we visit such questions as “are evil fingernails part of the standard villain kit?”, “does Cloak Man know the secret to teleportation?”, and “who’s responsible for replacing the weapon racks in Gil’ead?”. See you then!

#eragon #inheritance cycle #eragon movie #is it just me or does half the cast know how to teleport #eragon movie recap #eragon shadeslayer #durza #brom #arya drottningu #saphira #murtagh #long post #sorry mobile users #mod zar'roc

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mojave-pete · 4 years

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qm-vox · 5 years

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We’re All Friends Here - Speakeasy & the Shining Metropolis

There are elements that make something what it is. Who would believe in a French person who could not speak French? No one, least of all themselves. A mammal must have fur and produce milk (and Arcadia, oh yes, Arcadia is the land where a coconut is a mammal), a scientist must be learned and reasoned, the moon must be changeable, bright, and shining. We know these things. We expect them. It is part of the Contract between reality and humanity, a Contract we call Name. We can give something the wrong Name, or sometimes assume the wrong things about a Name, but to Name the thing is to understand it, and to understand it is to have power over it. This is the Contract. This is the agreement.

In the Fairest of Lands, there is a Keeper who knows the Contract of the Name, and the Name that flows from her lips is known across both sides of the Thorns and within them as City. When she speaks it, she has power over it, for hers is the rarefied lore of Comprehension, and with it Power.

They call her Speakeasy. She’s good to her friends. You want to be her friend, right?

The Master - Speakeasy & the Speakeasy

Speakeasy is a hard Fae to talk about. So much of what she is seems to be wrapped up in implications and impressions that some of the only solid knowledge shared between her former servants is that she is feminine of aspect and that her voice has a smoky, comforting quality that puts most in mind of an older, more confident friend who’s here to help. Animalistic qualities are common in the recollections of her “friends”, with many seeing her as a rat-woman, a humanoid weasel, a snake-woman with oddly “cute” features, or occasionally something large and out of place - a panther or lion, a bear, a jackal - with a half-shredded collar hanging from her neck as if she’s escaped from somewhere. Speakeasy’s outfits change but tend to be one of the more agreed-upon parts of her: she dresses to the height of 1930′s American fashion, alternating between a cut-price high society look with skirts and dresses made of prettied-up street refuse and discarded currency from a hundred nations, and a hell-in-leather aesthetic more at home on a motorcycle or maybe firebombing Nazi headquarters.

More certain is the Speakeasy, her home. Occultists are uncertain if there is a difference between the two, though among those who make Speakeasy their specialty it is commonly agreed that something prevents her from leaving the seat of her power. It is a secret bar the size of the fucking Mall of America, with thirteen floors and enough space on deck to let a small army drink, fuck, and smoke itself under the table. Somehow, despite every entertainment, bar, and dining room always having at least a few patrons, the Speakeasy is never raucous and never rowdy. Those who flaunt Speakeasy’s hospitality find themselves facing one of the Lords and Ladies at the heart of her power and the end of her patience. None have survived.

The layout of the Speakeasy is shockingly consistent. Lost come home with maps of it slashed into their skin or inked, painstakingly, onto parchments; sometimes they meet one another, or seek one another out, and they are always shocked to find agreement between their writings. Is this, too, part of the Contract of the Name? It would track, in a way. When it comes to the Wyrd, there’s no such thing as a free lunch.

Speakeasy does not kidnap her own slaves. Guests come through her door with desires and needs, and sometimes they express a need - or a desire - to leave their current service for one that is more understanding of who they are as people. Most of these become her Friends, double agents who act in Speakeasy’s interest against their current Keeper for the promise of rewards up to and potentially including their freedom. Some - the lucky, the desperate, the cunning - ask Speakeasy for a job, an offer she is bound not to refuse, and become her Staff. It’s a double-edged sword. Her Staff is less likely to be abused, assaulted, or murdered, but Speakeasy deeply resents being forced to employ a Lost simply for their asking, and few of her Staff ever see the mortal lands again.

The Land - The Shining Metropolis

It is the nature of the Speakeasy that each of the doors that lead into it (and out of it), though finite in number, leads to a great many places. Anywhere there is a City - the mortal realm, the Hedge, the Fairest of Lands - there is at least one door to the Speakeasy, because it is the nature of a City to have hidden places where the underworld gathers, the nature of a City to have laws and those who break or flaunt those laws, the nature of a City to have someone on the down-and-outs and, further, a lord of the downtrodden. Speakeasy speaks the Name (”City,” she croons, “your lover is lonely.”) and somewhere, somehow, where you can reach it if you’re clever or desperate or lonely, the door opens. But though one might expect that in the nature of these things the Speakeasy is nowhere at all, a place in itself, it actually exists somewhere, because the Name flows both ways. To be Named is to exist, and to exist is to have a location, and the Speakeasy itself can be found, if one goes looking, in the Shining Metropolis.

Why here of all places? Some people say that Speakeasy has a thing for the Fairest (sexual? Aesthetic? Sympathetic? It’s hard to tell) but that doesn’t jive with the way she takes people otherwise destined to be Fairest and turns them out another way. Among those who escape the Speakeasy and come together afterwards to swap notes about its mistress, the idea that the Shining Metropolis has her contempt has more traction. It is a singularly utopian Domain in aesthetic, but the misery and slaughter endemic to its existence gives lie to that claim. In situating the Speakeasy there, Speakeasy brings to life the reality that to be named City is to have crime, and the disaffected, and the dissatisfied. She gives them a home, and they give her their loyalty.

It’s a laid-back sort of place, the Speakeasy, with a smoky vibe and a tendency towards colors the human mind knows how to handle. There’s always a drink to hand and the bartenders will even tell you if something you’ve ordered will kill you. Speakeasy entertains her visitors here, and lets her Staff do the same. Her Friends arrive in their droves, to collect payment or look for work. A few take keys or Tokens from Speakeasy and fade away, vanishing into the Hedge on their route back towards their mortal life, but not many. Most work for years, seven-times-seven, to earn such a privilege and suffer greatly from the jagged, disconnected edges of Time between the Speakeasy and all of the places to which it connects. As the Domain between the cracks of things, it can be unkind, and unmerciful.

Friends In Need - Lost of the Speakeasy

The striking and alluring ranks of the Fairest make up a bare plurality of Speakeasy’s Friends and Staff. They come wandering in from the Shining Metropolis and many become brave enough to seek all sorts of favors: clip the circlet from their head, assassinate their Keeper, bring them photographs or news of their loved ones, buy their debt. Speakeasy nurses a soft spot for these poor wretches and treats them with something akin to kindness, sheltering them beneath her (wings? whiskers? paws?) in exchange for adding to the ambiance of the Speakeasy and performing the favors their charms can buy her. Many of the Lost who purchase their freedom from Speakeasy outright are Fairest, for better or worse. Playmates, Dancers, and Shadowsouls are especially common results of service to Speakeasy or in the Speakeasy, though the mistress of the place always makes sure to keep some Tellurics around to enforce last call when she’s of a mind to let time pass in her realm.

Darklings compete with the Fairest for Speakeasy’s favor. She adores her cored, hollow Friends and the way they seem to drive the powers-that-be in the Shining Metropolis insane. She makes them out of would-be Fairest who phrase requests unwisely (”make me unable to feel this pleasure,” is a common plea that ends in sorrow and rage), and out of those who slip into the Speakeasy and try to survive without being caught partaking of her hospitality. Speakeasy sends out Whisperwisps posing as Fairest to do her bidding, sometimes teaching them enough Separation to pass as Fairest, and retains Razorhands as bouncers and the occasional Lurkglider for “loss prevention”. Too many would-be escapees from Speakeasy’s kindnesses feel a sharp impact and a fatal pain between their shoulder blades as their final sensations in the Fairest of Lands.

Speakeasy seems to almost resent the Beasts and Ogres in her care. She makes none herself, but something about the Speakeasy, or maybe Speakeasy herself, compels her to offer them her hospitality and her assistance, free of charge, when they come into her care. Some ask for jobs and end up as bouncers, performers, or cooks, but for the most part they take their bewildered half-freedom and try to figure out what to do with it. Most are eventually either quietly murdered by Darklings who realize (correctly) that it will bring them Speakeasy’s favor, or else find a door out and wander into their Homecoming. Most arrive, memories shredded, with a powerful feeling of confusion and obligation; it’s only later, when they spot an oddly familiar door, that they remember to whom they owe their freedom.

Wizened form the hidden backbone of the Speakeasy, as they do in many Domains, and they serve all manner of jobs. Drudges clean the guest rooms, Brewers man the bars, Artists haunt the place doing repair work, tattooing Staff and Friends, and changing the aesthetic in slow waves that suit Speakeasy’s decades-long tastes. Like the Fairest, many, even most, of the Wizened are rescues who become Speakeasy’s Friends, leading to networks of Soldiers and Miners who report on the goings-on of other Keepers and corrupt Chatelines who smuggle products and people into and out of the Domains they have compromised. Many are unendingly grateful to their new mistress; often, Speakeasy’s Friends rescued them from torments that were far worse.

Elementals are the rarest of Speakeasy’s Friends. They tend to be an unholy bitch to smuggle into or out of her Domain, and they always seem to cause a certain amount of havoc and property damage before they remember that they were human people at some point. Still, you’ll find some Woodbloods among her Staff, working alongside her Wizened Woodwalkers to keep the kitchens in stock, and the rare rescue from a Domain of mixed Seemings makes themselves known. Legend has it that a Fireheart in need can escape any bond, flee any prison, forsake any oath, if they agree to serve as Speakeasy’s hearth for seven years and seven days. Among those who know, it can be an awful temptation during low points.

Street Rats - Sample Lost

Dodger used to watch too many movies for her own good. She ended up in the Shining City when a passion for fifties-style chrome futures met a roleplaying career that met an aggressive, all-abiding need for control and adulation. When she loftily claimed to be the Queen of Golden Spires, the real Queen stole her away to serve as an unwilling sex slave and learn a lesson in humility that she has yet to forget. When she found the Speakeasy, its mistress agreed to purchase her debt if Dodger could pay back seven-times-seven its worth, and for once, Dodger’s hubris paid off. Today she makes her living as a street magician and pickpocket, putting on the smiling masks her Fairest training and torment has made her so good at and vanishing just as easily with a change of clothes and demeanor. There’s a real girl there, somewhere beneath the masks. Isn’t there?

There was a boy named Tristran Lockewood and sometimes, he would Talk. And Talking was Tristran’s great trouble, because his tongue moved a lot faster than his mouth - delighting his lovers in many ways, but getting the shit kicked out of him in seven shades of color in many others. When the more legendary parts of Tristran’s tongue got him sent to the Shining Metropolis, he tongue-walked his way into partial freedoms that got him into the Speakeasy, and then tongue-walked his way right into being unable to feel physical sensation at all. It cored him in ways he’s still not come to grips with, and these days the young Darkling has turned to books and erudition to try and fill the void in his life that is his dull skin and useless nerve endings. It never works. He keeps trying.

C14Y-M0R3 isn’t from around here. The hulking, metallic Ogre came from someplace else, where lithe Greys tortured abducted humans for fun and made abominations out of the survivors, and she doesn’t like to think about it. Speakeasy sent one of her Friends to start a revolution, and C14Y-M0R3 rallied everyone she could in a mass exodus. The bar put them up for awhile, healed their hurts, and eventually even showed them the door. The gratitude in her heart could be mistaken for loyalty to a Fae. Maybe it even is.

The lass now known as Brie Larson spent her teenage years as a mouse. Not exactly a literal mouse, but close enough to count; one minute she was fourteen, the shivering captive of a True Fae, and the next she was pushing twenty-three and awakening to her own mind in the Speakeasy, with the sour-sharp scent of Budweiser in her nostrils making her think of her home and her family. She’s gone back home now, not entirely certain what happened, how she got here, or who benefits from her returning. On her back, still oozing blood, is a gouged-out map of the Speakeasy in a languge Brie can’t read and doesn’t know. It won’t scab or heal over. It won’t scar. And some nights, she stays up with her pillow between her teeth, screaming in pain, because the map is changing and updating itself. She’s had to turn away two people already with the insane idea to go back. What’s going to happen if they won’t stop?

#Changeling: The Lost #rpg #keeper #arcadia #domain #abuse #fanfic

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ill-be-istj-if-no-one-else-is · 6 years

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hi! can you pls explain the shadow functions or whatever they're called (those functions that come after your 4 first) and how functional they are and their roles etc... thanks!

Hi anon,

I don’t personally hold by shadow function theory, and I’m not a huge fan of socionics, and those are two different 8-function theories, so I am probably the wrong person to ask regarding the level of functionality and roles but I can provide some background.

Socionics is a separate theory that like MBTI draws from Carl Jung’s original proposal of human cognition being broken down into 8 cognitive functions. MBTI was developed in the United States in the late 1940s whereas socionics was developed in the then-Soviet Union in the 1970s. They are not interchangeable for a couple reasons but most notably while they both have a basis in Jung’s work, neither adhere exactly to his original structure. Notably:

Neither use his exact stacking system, which was less evenly balanced between introverted/extroverted functions.

Jung’s system defined 8 functions but stated that people have stacks of 4, which is also true of MBTI. It was created to explain differences in people, and to translate how those differences can color our interactions, but has always had an undercurrent of individualism (unsurprising given its US early Cold War origins)

Socionics states that people have 8-function stacks, and combines Jung’s work with that of Polish psychiatrist Antoni Kępiński (who focused on information processing), both major deviations, but arguably is truer to the Jungian definitions of the functions. Also unsurprisingly it takes a more Soviet approach in that originally it was meant to describe people’s places in society.

Shadow functions are part of John Beebe’s 8 function model and are also derived from Jung’s model. I haven’t looked into this nearly as much, and I find most people sort of treat this as either an expansion pack of MBTI, or alternately an westernized version of socionics, or if they’re really fucking things up, they already kind of treat MBTI and socionics interchangeably and just throw this in as well. Don’t do this. Anyway, the idea of the Beebe 8 function model is that you have both your top four function self and a shadow self - the hero and the animus. This seems very much in the spirit of Carl Jung if you ever had to read about his more collective unconscious/archetype stuff, but personally speaking I find it poetic but impractical.

So: MBTI doesn’t have these functions. Anyone who says it does is mixing up MBTI with either socionics or the Beebe 8 function model.

The stacking, for either socionics or the Beebe 8 function model, is as follows:

First four functions have the MBTI logic.

Your 5th function is the introverted/extroverted flip of your dominant function. So to use me as an example, my dom function is Si so the 5th function would be Se.

Your 6th is the introverted extroverted flip of your aux function (my 6th is therefore Ti since my aux is Te)

And so on (so my 7th Fe as the flip of my tert Fi; my 8th is Ni as the flip of my inferior Ne).

In socionics, as I understand it:

5th function: you’re not good at it but you like it; however you can easily be manipulated with it.

6th: you’re sort of unconsciously good at it on a regular basis, which, you’d think at that point you’d notice, right?

7th: this is where I get fed up with socionics because Wikipedia says it’s complex but unconscious but the socionics websites, all of which kind of look like if someone put a 2006-era Facebook theme over The Drudge Report as it was recovering from a Russian DoS attack, say this is the point of least resistance and you’re very bad at it (and this is like, the one socionics thing that I agree with and like). So...one of those two options.

8th: You’re totally unaware of it but it’s strong? I have no clue.

John Beebe, meanwhile, sort of just pits your 5th function vs. your 1st, your 6th vs. your 2nd, and so on although maybe your 8th is also just trying to destroy you overall? Again, not entirely sure.

So the takeaway here is if you want to read up on either socionics or the John Beebe 8-function model, have at it. I do not.

Now, as a side note, I do think that one can observe behaviors that look sort of like the shadow functions but they’re actually just your other functions working together, ie, my Si and Te working in concert can come up with similar results as someone with Se and Ti would, but the cognitive process was still different.

#mbti #socionics #shadow functions #is today ask me good questions that idiots will reblog day #i think it is #Anon ask #answered asks

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doncartwright1 · 6 years

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Every woman has the right to be believed!!! …unless you were RAPED by Bill Clinton, Killed by Ted Kennedy, Groped by Joe Biden, Groped by Al Franken, Groped by Cory Booker, or beaten by Keith Ellison. H/T

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politacs7 · 2 years

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deblala · 2 years

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https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2022/03/former-drudge-report-editor-launches-off-press-news-aggregation-site-readers-clearly-starving-common-sense-conservative-alternative/

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drudge-political-influence-blog · 5 years

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Closing and Bibliography

The success of the Drudge Report cannot be ignored. Drudge single-handedly managed to swiftly change the history of American politics by being the first news outlet to publish the Lewinsky scandal, and ultimately paved the way for Bill Clinton’s impeachment. The unchanged and timeless design of the Drudge Report has remained current for the over two decades and no other news outlet can claim that title. Even though the Drudge Report may have influenced click bait, fake news, and even Trump, Drudge has successfully managed to create a colossal platform where Drudge holds the illuminating power to chronicle information like no other news site can.

Bibliography

Bannister, C. (2017, May 23). Monica Lewinsky: Drudge Forged 'Our World of Cyberbullying'. Retrieved November 18, 2018, from https://www.cnsnews.com/blog/craig-bannister/monica-lewinsky-drudge-forged-our-world-cyberbullying

Chasmar, J. (2017, August 10). Matt Drudge explains new black-and-white format: 'We have clearly entered a historic era'. Retrieved November 19, 2018, from https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2017/aug/10/matt-drudge-explains-new-black-and-white-format-we/

Drudge, M. (2018). DRUDGE REPORT 2019®. Retrieved November 19, 2018, from https://www.drudgereport.com/

E. (2018, October 23). Matt Drudge. Retrieved from https://www.britannica.com/biography/Matt-Drudge

Fried, J. (2008, November 19). Why the Drudge Report is one of the best designed sites on the web. Retrieved November 19, 2018, from https://signalvnoise.com/posts/1407-why-the-drudge-report-is-one-of-the-best-designed-sites-on-the-web

Hod, I. (2018, July 20). Drudge Report Passes New York Times in Web Traffic and Engagement in First Half of 2018. Retrieved November 18, 2018, from https://www.thewrap.com/drudge-report-passes-new-york-times-web-traffic-engagement/

Kurtz, H. (2001, May 02). Clinton Aide Settles Libel Suit Against Matt Drudge -- at a Cost. Retrieved November 19, 2018, from https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/lifestyle/2001/05/02/clinton-aide-settles-libel-suit-against-matt-drudge-at-a-cost/2c79eeaa-4eff-4994-979a-ac310352de5b/?utm_term=.caacf9dd7e81

Pilkington, E. (2018, January 24). How the Drudge Report ushered in the age of Trump. Retrieved November 18, 2018, from https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/jan/24/how-the-drudge-report-ushered-in-the-age-of-trump

S. (2008, March 1). Profile: Matt Drudge. Retrieved November 18, 2018, from https://web.archive.org/web/20080329154002/http://scotlandonsunday.scotsman.com/comment/Profile-Matt-Drudge--Webmaster.3834340.jp

Thompson, R. (2017, December 30). Whatfinger is a Drudge Alternative for the New Year -. Retrieved November 19, 2018, from https://therevolutionaryact.com/whatfinger-drudge-alternative-new-year/

Washington, T. H. (2008, February 28). Matt Drudge: World's most powerful journalist. Retrieved November 18, 2018, from https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/1580164/Matt-Drudge-worlds-most-powerful-journalist.html

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