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ka-ffxiv · 3 years

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But It Wasn’t An Accident

(( @rodarin-calrise ))

The thick, liquid pearl sloshing in the fountain caused him to fancy it as congealing blood. Blood fresh from his victim's mouth, slightly foamy, but hardening into brown flakes. Blood seeping from where the ceruleum charge had launched it when it made contact with the soldier’s abdomen. The ichor from the body's stomach was even thicker, more in tune with the consistency of the fountain. The outer layers had congealed and darkened, becoming almost rubbery in texture like extra surprise giblets that coated the entryway to the man's-

A hand grabbed his shoulder, and the pout that formed over his deliciously purposeful feminine lips portrayed his disappointment with the manners of the equites here as he was force fed greetings of, “Welcome to Westmoore~ I'm Rodarin Calrise, the mayor of Westmoore. Come -- let's get you settled in. ”

The man's manner of dress did nothing to save him from the posh Viera's judgement. It was disheveled, poorly done, and basically an afterthought. Ka turned and bounced his travel bag up the touched shoulder slightly, also meant to dislodge the mayor's hand. A perfect smile played over the previous pout and he masked his voice with effeminacy, “Hello there, pumpkin. I'm here to inspect the scene.”

“Ahh, yes, yes, right away, but first let's get you settled in!” The mayor left little room for protest as he moved off down the path, but protest Ka did.

“I only have this little satchel. Hardly a reason to fuss over room and board,” he mentioned sweetly, if not saccharinely.

“Nonsense, nonsense!” Rodarin replied as he seemingly sped up even more, “Guests are welcome. Yes. Very welcome.”

The darkness closed in with no more candles to hold it at bay as Ka followed the man until they reached a crossroad, one sign pointed at Westmoore, and another at someplace called Devil's Edge. It was the latter that Rodarin chose to head down. “We aren't going to Westmoore?” he asked with a chipper lilt that cloaked an abrupt nausea.

“Oh no, no -- we need to get you settled in first,” the mayor replied with a stare devoid of thought.

One of Ka's ears folded over itself in disgruntlement, but -- the smell of the moist earth was so thick and rich the mosses growing over it could be visualized, shoving their image to the forefront for observation. It was nice, thick and green, but -- cold, cold, cold. He shivered. Arms wrapped tightly about himself as his nose bobbed nervously and his ears swiveled for any purchase on reality.

Rodarin was gone. There was no road. There was no sky. Only a forest. Another forest come to further mangle the remnants of his sanity.

He froze at the sight of a light, paused, thought, and then cautiously approached with arms still about himself trying to calm the shaking.

What the light illuminated left his head slightly slack from confusion. That was clearly his gorgeous self on the ground. His androgyny would be near impossible to replicate in the exact portions he had sculpted for himself. His eyes moved from where his skull had caved to the hole in his torso where the slightest hints of organs were visible -- what did his insides look like? Sheer curiosity overpowered anything else. The faceless, waxen monstrosity sampling his corpse didn't phase his mindset. It would just be a bothersome detail until it acted as something other than decoration.

The monster looked his way and Rodarin appeared from about a tree, “Welcome back to Westmoore. I hope you enjoy your stay. Try to avoid the Woods next time, won't you?” He was all smiles and sugar, displaying the points of his teeth. A new detail. And then he began letting out howling laughter, and not the sort you would release towards an ally in such a predicament. Not if a shred of empathy existed, anyway.

Ka stared at him as his mind did a few simple calculations that lead back to the conclusion that no action he would take would have any meaning. In summary, he was either already dead or this wasn't real. Either way nothing he could do past this point would ever matter, and so Ka did as he pleased-

-and gave a quick succession of jabs at the Mayor's gut, the same sort a rushed chef gave a chicken prior soaking it in spices. The previously unseen dirk was quick and to the point. It conveyed all he wanted to say to him, really.

While he aimed towards the gut, something else stabbed him in the heart. Ka's fist squeezed the wooden handle as the stream of pain hit and nearly brought him down. Without break, another torrent of searing ice in his chest forced him to his knees and his response was to release a steady tone, lips pulled back into some combination of a smile and a snarl. The tone raised, hit a new note, and continued in song. Even as the agony tore at his innards and brought him flat and blind, he sang gently until his mind joined the void with his other senses.

At least, until he woke up. It was the roof of his wagon he serenaded now. A ball of sheets had been bunched into a fist and clammy moisture dotted his gooseflesh afflicted skin. His expression quickly dulled with voice falling to silence, nose bobbing slightly, and he muttered to himself with disdain, “That's what I get for drinking myself to sleep.” And he'd do it again tonight.

#rodarin calrise #Westmoore #public prompt #the nightmare before endwalker #I actually have no idea how to use tumblr

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ffxiv-angora · 3 years

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>> Original prompt post by @rodarin-calrise <<

(( Sorry for the double post! I went back to change/fix a few things and decided to just repost this on its own. It's still basically the same thing. Just changed up the ending lol ))

If it weren’t for the inquiry and promise of a substantial amount of gil sent to her by the Thaumaturge Guild, she wouldn’t be here. Stuck on this damn boat surrounded by equally curious strangers on their way to the mysterious island that had appeared overnight. It’d only been a sun or so since she’d met with others in the Shroud to discuss the matter of all the strange occurrences in Eorzea. That storm, which had something called The Arrival hidden at the center according to The Whispers, had only just formed. Now it had parted to reveal something that definitely didn’t belong. Large landmasses don’t just form out the aether like that. Angora couldn’t deny that she was curious. At least this trip would possibly give her something to take back to the rest of the group along with lining her pockets just a bit.

At least that’s what she’d hoped.

“Ah- My apologies!” Where did that old man come from? Her mask did have blind spots and she’d been deep in thought. The man was gone before she could try and apologize further. Angora shrugs, turning back to the ocean. Westmoore, was it? That’s the name she’d heard whispered by others who had visited ahead of her. This port they were coming to was Candlelight Cove. Odd names all around. But she supposed she’d heard worse.

The ship’s sudden lurch and halt did catch her off guard just enough to cause her to stumble. Angora hissed more than a few profanities under her breath as she inspected her hand. It’d only just been healed up after her encounter with The Children and now here it was bleeding again. Lovely. Her ears pinned back slightly and she did what she could to wipe the blood off her hand before clenching it into a fist in an attempt to stop any further bleeding. It was quickly forgotten once the ship’s ramp was set out so they could go ashore. Angora paused long enough to give the town a quick glance and raise her hood up over her head before disembarking.

Candlelight Cove was...interesting. It certainly lived up to its name. The oddest thing of all was the fountain. Angora couldn’t help but just stare at it. There was no way the substance pouring from it was water. Yet it seemed to be liquid. It was thick. Certainly not something she was willing to shove her hand into. She did start to reach a hand out to see if she could sense any sort of aether within this liquid pearlite substance.

Until a hand on her shoulder about had her jumping out of her skin, that is.

Angora’s ears pinned flat against her head as she spun to face the new arrival. How had he managed to sneak up on her so quietly? The sight of him was unnerving. Everything from his distant stare to that uncomfortable smile. She hardly had a chance to question him before he’d introduced himself. He was the mayor?

“...Pleasure to meet you, Mr. Rodarin. I don’t know about getting settled in yet. I’ve only just arrived- h-hey!” She hardly had a chance to finish her statement before the man had already turned and started walking away from her. How rude. Alarm bells were already ringing in her head. This man was already strange enough. Now he’d just started walking off to lead her to gods know where. Surely he couldn’t be trusted. But...if he is the mayor of Westmoore, perhaps he could at least show her to the town proper. Angora sighs, double-checking she still had her linkpearl and weapons with her before hesitantly running off to catch up with this Rodarin. At least her wooden mask did a good job of hiding her confused expressions.

Angora made a habit of glancing over her shoulder to keep a mental check on how far they’d walked from the port city. Every step was counted and tucked away for later. Just in case. When they came to the fork in the road, Angora stepped closer to squint and read the writing.

“Westmoore and Devil’s Edge? The latter sounds quite ominous. I suppose we aren’t too far from your” -she blinks when she notices the mayor had changed course to head in the opposite direction of the city he was supposedly in charge of- “We.. aren’t going to Westmoore?”

“Oh no, no–we need to get you settled in first.”

“I-I…” Angora shifts her mask slightly so she could press a hand to her mouth. Why did she feel so sick all the sudden? Had the trip over really upset her stomach so much. She eyes the retreating back of Rodarin warily. Perhaps this ‘Devil’s Edge’ was the name of their housing district? Like the Mists? Her ears pinned back once again but she eventually jogs after the mayor to catch up with him. Those alarm bells from before were still going off and yet...they seemed much quieter. Distant. Even as she walked beside Rodarin down the path she found herself only focusing on putting one foot in front of the other. Her head felt...so fuzzy. When had she let herself give in to being so careless?

When she does look back up again, her pace quickly slows. Where were they? How long had they been walking? They were heading towards...where? This forest looked different. That wasn’t right. No matter how hard she pushed to try and think of answers, nothing was there. Her ears droop underneath her hood and her tail curls anxiously around one leg. Her heart feels like it’s going to beat right out of her chest. She’d forgotten. How could she have forgotten?

Wait. Where was the mayor? Angora spins around until she spots the light. Perhaps he’d gone ahead to light the way? It was fairly dark in this forest. The cloak around her shoulders is pulled closer as the temperature drops. It was supposed to be enchanted against extreme temperatures. How was she so cold? There were so many questions swirling in her mind that were going unanswered. And yet...she pushes forward. When she arrives at the tree, she really wishes she hadn’t.

Once again, more frantic questions fill her mind. How? How was this possible. That...person on the ground was her. Or at least looked eerily similar to her. That couldn’t be true simply because she was perfectly alive and standing before it this instant. Yet there she was...on the ground with her skull bashed in and chunks missing from her torso. She stumbled back a few steps with a startled gasp when she saw the strange creature. It seemed to be made of some kind of wax. This was something she’d never seen before. An unfortunate theme with this whole ordeal.

Why wasn’t she running? She should be running. Right? But where would she go? She couldn’t even remember how she’d ended up in this forest. Her mind drifts to the linkpearl that she’d brought along with her. She needed to call someone. Anyone. Let them know where she’d gone. So that they could find her if she died- No. No, she wouldn’t die here. There was far too much on the line. Too much was waiting for her back home.

All the fear that had been building up in her chest immediately flared into a rage when Rodarin stepped out from behind the tree. Him. This was his fault. He’d brought her here. Her anger only continued to surge when he spoke.

“Welcome back to Westmoore. I hope you enjoy your stay. Try to avoid the Woods next time, won’t you?”

“Welcome back? What in the Twelve’s name is that supposed to mean?!” she hissed. “I’ve never been here before...” What he said rang a few distant bells in the back of her mind. The Whispers.

“They have always been fond of you. This result is unsurprising."

That is what it had told her about The Children. It spoke as if these events had happened before. But they hadn’t! Surely she would have remembered something like this. Her memories of her unfortunate childhood and life before the Calamity were fuzzy at best for some cycles, but she couldn’t have forgotten this-...this fear.

“What is the meaning of all of this, Rodarin?!” Her tone wavered between anger and desperation. “What do you mean by next ti- Argh!"

Angora had felt all sorts of pains in her life. She certainly had the scars to prove it. Everything from paper cuts to being run through with a sword. Slashed open. Each of those times she’d managed to press on, be it because of sheer stubbornness or adrenaline. But this? This was different. Her legs immediately gave out from under her while she desperately clawed at her chest. That wooden mask she’d been wearing up to this point fell into the dirt. The pain was cutting through every fiber of her being. Even having a voidsickess eat away at her very aether hadn’t been so agonizing.

She needed help. Someone. Kowa, Yera, Caspian, the group from the Shroud….The Whispers. Anyone. Please. Angora takes a shuddering breath. She needed to stand. She needed to fight. Dying here was not an option.

Faintly glowing, furious eyes made their way up to rest on the laughing Mayor. One had shifted to claw at the ground beneath her. A vicious growl ripped its way out of her and a few tears stained her cheeks. Angora fought through the pain the best she could to try and summon her aether forward. To lash out at Rodarin with fiery claws. But it doesn’t move fast enough. The few embers she’d managed sputter out as the world spins and falls into darkness.

No. Please, no. Not here. Not yet. The look on the face, her face, was burned into her mind.

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

When she does finally wake again, it is not peaceful. Angora’s body lurches and she jolts up into a sitting position with a startled scream. She was...alive? How long had she been out? What had happened? She blinks a few times, her head still swimming as she tries to look around to see where she’d ended up.

Was that rain? Angora squints, slowly leaning back to look up at the stormy sky. This wasn't the forest from before. She flinches when her back hits something solid. Not trusting her legs just yet, Angora rolls onto her knees to see just what was behind her.

It was the crossroads sign.

How in the world had she managed to get back here? Had she even gone into that forest in the first place? A flash of the distorted face on her "corpse" has her heaving. Surely that hadn't just been some sort of nightmare. The pain had felt so real. Her hand still stung and her chest burned from where she'd been clawing at it. But here she was, sitting on the soggy ground soaked to the bone as if she'd been sleeping there for bells.

Angora hisses, grabbing the post of the roadsign to get some leverage and slowly force herself to her feet. Her very bones creaked and her limbs felt like they were made of lead. That wouldn't stop her, though. She makes an attempt to brush some of the mud from her pants and her withering gaze shifts towards Westmoore. Her discarded mask gently floats up from the ground to rest in her waiting hand.

Not yet. Westmoore could wait. For now, she needed to return home to speak with the others. Her mask is slipped back on and she pulls up her hood as she starts on her way back to the port in Candlelight Cove. This place clearly had many secrets and things were personal now.

#ffxiv #ffxiv rp #ic things #angora #The Nightmare Before Endwalker

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thefuckingsun · 6 years

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@westmoore-province ‘s Mayor Rodarin Calrise

#portrait #The Children #Westmoore #sun scribbles #my art #he's a creepy dude #@_@

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techcrunchappcom · 4 years

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New Post has been published on https://techcrunchapp.com/covid-19-news-live-updates-the-new-york-times/

Covid-19 News: Live Updates - The New York Times

Key data of the day

Deaths in American correctional facilities surpass 1,000, as cases rise to 160,000.

The number of known deaths in prisons, jails and other correctional facilities among prisoners and correctional officers has surpassed 1,000, according to a New York Times database tracking deaths in correctional institutions.

The number of deaths in state and federal prisons, local jails and immigration detention centers — which stood at 1,002 on Tuesday morning — has increased by about 40 percent during the past six weeks, according to the database. There have been nearly 160,000 infections among prisoners and guards.

The number of deaths is almost certainly higher because jails and prisons perform limited testing on inmates, including many facilities that decline to test prisoners who die after exhibiting symptoms consistent with the coronavirus.

A recent study showed that prisoners are infected by the coronavirus at a rate more than five times higher than the nation’s overall rate. The death rate of inmates is also higher than the national rate — 39 deaths per 100,000 compared to 29 deaths per 100,000.

The Times’ database tracks coronavirus infections and deaths among inmates and correctional officers at some 2,500 prisons, jails and immigration detention centers.

The nation’s largest known coronavirus cluster is at San Quentin State Prison in California, where more than 2,600 inmates and guards have been sickened and 25 inmates have died after a botched transfer of inmates in May.

“It’s the perfect environment for people to die in — which people are,” said Juan Moreno Haines, an inmate at San Quentin.

Children across the U.S. have faced chaotic school reopenings, and New York may be next.

With the planned first day of school in New York City rapidly approaching, Mayor Bill de Blasio is facing mounting pressure from the city’s teachers, principals and even members of his own administration to delay the start of in-person instruction to give educators more time to prepare.

Mr. de Blasio has been hoping to reopen the nation’s largest school system on a part-time basis for the city’s 1.1 million schoolchildren on Sept. 10. No other big-city mayor is attempting reopening on such a scale, and many smaller districts that have already reopened have had to change course significantly almost immediately after students returned.

In Arizona, where the virus surged earlier this summer, many students started school on Monday. But classes in the J.O. Combs Unified School District, about an hour outside of Phoenix, were canceled through Wednesday after a significant number of teachers and staff members called in sick to protest in-person classes, and it was unclear when and how the school year may start there.

Near Oklahoma City, an infected student at Westmoore High School attended class last week before his quarantine period was over, NBC News reported, saying the child’s parents told the school that they had “miscalculated” the timing. Twenty-two students who came in contact with that student or another at the school who tested positive have been quarantined.

And in Cherokee County, Georgia, which by the middle of last week had nearly 1,200 students and educational staff ordered to quarantine, a third high school closed to in-person learning this week after 500 of its students were quarantined and 25 tested positive.

Still, the closest comparison to New York may be Los Angeles, the nation’s second-largest school system. There, public schools on Monday began a sweeping program to test hundreds of thousands of students and teachers — even though, for the time being, the Los Angeles Unified School District will begin school online.

If New York is able to reopen schools safely, it would be an extraordinary turnaround for a city that was the global center of the pandemic just a few months ago. Schools are the key to the city’s long path back to normalcy: opening classrooms would help jump-start the struggling economy by allowing more parents to return to work and would provide desperately needed services for tens of thousands of vulnerable students.

But the push to reopen on time is now facing its most serious obstacle yet: The city’s principals are questioning the city’s readiness.

“We are now less than one month away from the first day of school and still without sufficient answers to many of the important safety and instructional questions we’ve raised,” Mark Cannizzaro, president of the city’s principals’ union, wrote in a letter last week.

New York City has a virus transmission rate so low that it is closer to that of South Korea than to the rates of many other American cities, and there is agreement among many public health experts that the city’s infection rate is low enough to reopen at least some schools.

The city’s public school principals say they do not know how many of their students will report to buildings on the planned first day, because there is no deadline for families to switch from hybrid learning to remote-only. So far, about 30 percent of city families have said they will start the year remotely, but that number could change significantly.

That has made it all but impossible for principals to plan their class schedules, and to determine how many teachers they will need to staff remote instruction, in-person learning or both.

And though the city has begun to ship personal protective equipment and cleaning supplies to schools, and has made strides in preparing many of its aging buildings for reopening, there are lingering questions about how many classrooms will have proper ventilation, and about how frequently staff and students will be tested after buildings open.

The coronavirus entered Cherry Springs Village in Hendersonville, N.C., quietly, then struck with force. Nearly every staff member and resident of the long-term care facility would become infected.

They needed help — fast — and the county responded: It sent in a “strike team” of medical workers, emergency responders, clergy and others, in what is becoming a new model for combating Covid-19 in residential care centers.

Nurses and doctors from hours away came to aid sick residents and replace staff who had contracted the virus. They set up oxygen and IV drips, to avoid sending residents with milder illness to overburdened hospitals.

Covid-19 strike teams apply an emergency response model traditionally used in natural disasters like hurricanes and wildfires to combating outbreaks in long-term care facilities. Composed of about eight to 10 members from local emergency management departments, health departments, nonprofits, private businesses — and at times, the National Guard — the teams are designed to bring more resources and personnel to a disaster scene.

“Calling emergency management made sense, because it was a disaster,” said Dr. Anna Hicks, a local geriatrician who helped coordinate the Cherry Springs strike team. “It felt like being in a natural disaster.”

Coronavirus outbreaks spread like wildfires in long-term care facilities, which house medically vulnerable residents and staff in relatively small spaces. So a growing number of states are treating them like one.

More than 40 percent of all coronavirus deaths in the United States have been tied to nursing homes, according to a New York Times analysis.

“Desperate times, like a pandemic, call for a different way of thinking,” said Dr. Timothy Chizmar, the emergency medical services director for Maryland. “The idea has roots in trauma settings, where it’s just not possible to take everybody off the scene — sometimes you need to take some medical care to them.”

Though initially coordinated at the top, with governors and state health departments sending the National Guard to the scene, strike teams are now being replicated on a much smaller scale in counties and local jurisdictions, including in states that were hot spots for the virus, like North Carolina.

At least seven other states have sent strike teams to long-term care facilities with outbreaks, including Florida, Texas, Massachusetts, New Jersey, Ohio, Wisconsin and Tennessee. Other states have proposed but not yet adopted them.

The radical disruptions in the rhythms of American life caused by the pandemic continued to ripple through the business world this week, with big retailers like Walmart and Home Depot reporting booming sales, and aerospace giant Boeing planning further job cuts as the airline industry continues to suffer.

Walmart, the nation’s largest retailer, saw its second-quarter sales rise 9.3 percent, driven by continuing strong demand for food and general merchandise, the company reported Tuesday. The company’s e-commerce sales alone grew 97 percent, more than double what the company had been averaging in recent years. And despite rising costs related to the pandemic, the retailer also generated larger-than-expected profit.

It was one of the clearest signs of the consolidation in the retail industry triggered by the pandemic, as many other retailers have struggled or failed in recent months.

Homeowners with time on their hands for renovations appear to have also given a boost to Home Depot, where same-store sales rose more than 23 percent in the quarter from May to July. The home-improvement and hardware retailer also saw an increase in profits, earning $4.3 billion in the second quarter compared with $3.5 billion during the same period last year.

But a homebound nation continues to cause trouble for the commercial air industry. On Monday, Boeing’s chief executive said that the company would offer a second round of buyouts, adding to the 10 percent cut the company announced in April.

Mr. Calhoun did not specify how many jobs Boeing was hoping to cut. The new buyouts will help limit involuntary layoffs and will be offered to employees who work in parts of the company most affected by the pandemic, like Boeing’s commercial airplane and services businesses.

While recent federal data shows air travel is recovering again after stalling in July, the number of people flying each day is still less than a third of what it was a year ago. Industry executives expect that figure to remain depressed until a coronavirus vaccine is widely available.

A large federal study that found an antiviral drug, remdesivir, can hasten the recovery in hospitalized Covid-19 patients has begun a new phase of investigation.

Now researchers will examine whether adding another drug, beta interferon — which mainly kills viruses but can also tame inflammation — would improve remdesivir’s effects and speed recovery even more.

So far, remdesivir, an experimental drug, has received emergency use approval from the Food and Drug Administration to treat hospitalized Covid-19 patients. In a large clinical trial, sponsored by the National Institutes of Health, remdesivir was shown to modestly shorten recovery time, by four days, on average, but it did not reduce deaths.

The additional drug, beta interferon, has already been approved for treatment of multiple sclerosis, which takes advantage of its anti-inflammatory effect.

The U.S. trial, called ACCT, is designed to move quickly. Known as an adaptive trial, it is a race between treatments. It tests one treatment against another, and, when results are in, the drug that won becomes the control drug for the next phase, in which it is tested against a different drug.

The new phase is the study’s third. A total of 1,000 patients will receive either remdesivir and a placebo or remdesivir and beta interferon.

Interferon is given as an injection. Remdesivir, made by Gilead Sciences, is given as an intravenous infusion.

Faced with a recent resurgence of coronavirus cases, officials in France have made mask-wearing mandatory in widening areas of Paris and other cities across the country, pleading with people not to let down their guard and jeopardize the hard-won gains made against the virus during a two-month lockdown this spring.

The signs of a new wave of infection emerged over the summer as people began resuming much of their pre-coronavirus lives, traveling across France and socializing in cafes, restaurants and parks. Many, especially the young, have visibly relaxed their vigilance.

In recent days, France has recorded about 3,000 new infections every day, roughly double the figure at the beginning of the month, and the authorities are investigating an increasing number of clusters.

Thirty percent of the new infections are in young adults, ages 15 to 44, according to a recent report. Since they are less likely to develop serious forms of the illness, deaths and the number of patients in intensive care remain at a fraction of what they were at the height of the pandemic. Still, officials are not taking any chances.

“The indicators are bad, the signals are worrying, and the situation is deteriorating,” Jérôme Salomon, the French health ministry director, told the radio station France Inter last week. “The fate of the epidemic is in our hands.”

France has suffered more than 30,400 deaths from the virus — one of the world’s worst tolls — and experienced an economically devastating lockdown from mid-March to mid-May. Thanks to the lockdown, however, France succeeded in stopping the spread of the virus and lifted most restrictions at the start of summer.

The course of the pandemic in Europe has followed a somewhat similar trend, with Spain also reporting new local clusters. But important disparities exist among countries. In the past week, as France reported more than 16,000 new cases, Britain reported 7,000, and Italy 3,000, according to data collected by The New York Times.

New research emerges on a rare immune syndrome that strikes some children with the virus.

Multisystem inflammatory syndrome, the severe illness that strikes some children with the coronavirus, is distinct from both Kawasaki disease and from Covid-19 in adults, according to a new study.

Most children infected with the coronavirus have mild symptoms, if any at all. But on very rare occasions, some develop so-called MIS-C, characterized by widespread inflammation in the heart, lungs, brain, skin and other organs. In the United States, there were 570 confirmed cases of the syndrome and 10 deaths as of Aug. 6.

The study, published Tuesday in Nature Medicine, analyzed immune cells in 15 boys and 10 girls, aged 7 to 14 years, with the syndrome.

When the children were acutely ill with MIS-C, these immune cells behaved much like those in adults with Covid-19. They produced vast amounts of certain disease-fighting molecules, as the adults did, and researchers saw declines in the B and T immune cells that are important for fighting the coronavirus.

But another type of immune cell, called neutrophils, increased in the affected children. These cells seem unaffected in adults with Covid-19. The pattern differs from that seen in Kawasaki disease, a similarly rare inflammatory condition in young children.

Only 17 of the children with MIS-C had detectable antibodies to the coronavirus, and these children were more likely to have gastrointestinal symptoms, pneumonia and aneurysms.

As of Aug. 3, children account for 7.3 percent of coronavirus cases in the United States, but make up about 22 percent of the overall population. The actual proportion of infected children is likely to be higher, because testing is still focused primarily on adults with symptoms. The figure for children has been increasing steadily as access to testing improves.

GLOBAL ROUNDUP

Hong Kong, a global shipping hub, faces an outbreak among dock workers.

Hong Kong’s latest coronavirus outbreak appears to be tapering off, but the port city’s enhanced coronavirus testing has revealed a new cluster among its dock workers.

As Hong Kong deals with a third wave of infections, it is ramping up testing of workers whose jobs place them at heightened risk of infection. As of Monday, 57 dockside laborers were among 65 cases linked to the city’s Kwai Tsing Container Terminals.

Some workers fear that cramped conditions in the dorms, some of which hold up to 20 people, could accelerate the spread of the virus.

Two of the Hong Kong dock workers who tested positive this week had been living temporarily in cramped port dormitories fashioned from shipping containers. They were trying to avoid traveling to their homes in Shenzhen, a city in the Chinese mainland — a trip that would have required them to quarantine upon their return.

On Monday, the Union of Hong Kong Dockers called on container companies to expand their accommodation for employees and to hire workers directly instead of outsourcing recruitment to smaller firms.

In 2016, Hong Kong reported that its maritime port industry employed 86,000 people and accounted for 1.2 percent of its gross domestic product.

After battling back two waves of coronavirus infections, Hong Kong kept its new cases in the single digits for months. But cases began to spike again last month, to more than 100 per day, in part because officials had exempted seafarers, airline crews and others from mandatory quarantine.

The city has since reimposed strict social-distancing measures, and health officials have reported fewer than 100 infections a day for more than two weeks.

In other developments around the world:

Officials in New Zealand on Tuesday pushed back against President Trump’s assertion that the remote Pacific country was “having a big surge.” New Zealand, where the national election has been delayed from September to October because of a growing cluster in Auckland, has reported 22 deaths and fewer than 1,700 cases during the entire pandemic. “I’m not concerned about people misinterpreting our status,” Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said.

After a surge in infections in the past week, South Korea tightened social-distancing rules in the Seoul metropolitan area, banning all gatherings of more than 50 people indoors and more than 100 outdoors and shutting down high-risk facilities such as nightclubs, karaoke rooms and buffet restaurants. Prime Minister Chung Sye-kyun also said that churches must switch to online prayer services.

Greece has locked down two facilities for migrants where new infections have been traced, after another overcrowded reception center was put under lockdown last week, the government said. The infections are part of a recent spike in the number of cases in Greece, which has weathered the pandemic relatively well so far, with just over 7,200 confirmed cases and 230 deaths. But the authorities this week introduced new restrictions to address local outbreaks and have warned of more measures if the upward trend continues.

Countries putting their own interests ahead of others in trying to ensure supplies of a possible coronavirus vaccine are making the pandemic worse, the director general of the World Health Organization said on Tuesday, Reuters reported. “No one is safe until everyone is safe,” the agency’s leader, Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, said during a briefing in Geneva. The organization also said the pandemic was now being driven by young people, many of whom were unaware they were infected, posing a danger to vulnerable groups.

U.S. Roundup

Sororities and fraternities pose a virus-fighting challenge for colleges.

At the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, officials abruptly called off in-person classes on Monday after identifying four clusters in student housing facilities, including one at the Sigma Nu fraternity.

The New York Times has identified at least 251 cases of the virus tied to fraternities and sororities at colleges and universities across the United States.

At the University of California, Berkeley, 47 cases were identified in a single week in early July, most of which were connected to the Greek system. In Mississippi, a significant outbreak in Oxford, home to the state’s flagship university, was partially blamed on fraternity parties. At the University of Washington’s Seattle campus, at least 165 of the 290 cases identified by the school have been associated with its Greek Row.

As students return to campus, there have been virus outbreaks at residence halls and other university housing as well. More than 13,000 students, faculty and staff members at colleges have been infected with the coronavirus, according to a Times database of cases confirmed by schools and government agencies.

But fraternities and sororities have been especially challenging for universities to regulate. Though they dominate social life on many campuses, their houses are often not owned or governed by the universities, and have frequently been the site of excessive drinking, sexual assault and hazing. That same lack of oversight, some experts say, extends to controlling the virus. Even on campuses that are offering online instruction only, people are still living in some sorority and fraternity houses.

“Fraternity and sorority homes have long functioned as a kind of ‘no-fly zone’ for university administrations,” said Matthew W. Hughey, a professor of sociology at the University of Connecticut who has studied Greek life and social inequality on campuses. “The structure that’s already been set up makes them harder to control when it comes to the transmission of disease.”

In other news from around the United States:

Democrats opened an extraordinary presidential nominating convention on Monday night, offering a vivid illustration of how both the pandemic and widespread opposition to President Trump have upended the country’s politics. Perhaps the most searing critique of Mr. Trump came not from an elected official but from Kristin Urquiza, a young woman whose father, a Trump supporter, died after contracting the virus. Speaking briefly and in raw terms about her loss, Ms. Urquiza said of her father, “His only pre-existing condition was trusting Donald Trump, and for that he paid with his life.”

The young people crowded into the pool, standing shoulder to shoulder, as they listened to a D.J. No one was wearing a mask, and no one seemed to care.

The scene would be incredible anywhere but was especially so in this case. It was in Wuhan, the city in central China where the coronavirus pandemic began late last year.

A series of photographs and videos posted by Agence France-Presse captured the moment on Saturday night, when hundreds of people attended a pool-party rave that would have been unthinkable only months ago.

The images seemed to touch a nerve in a world where lockdowns remain in place, where fear of public spaces and entertainment venues remains high, and where the idea of wading into a public pool is tantalizingly off limits to millions of people.

It was also another example of how life is slowly returning to normal in China, even in its hardest-hit city, as other countries — even those that coped well with the first wave, like South Korea and New Zealand — struggle with new outbreaks.

Shanghai Disneyland reopened in May, while movie theaters reopened across China last month. The step-by-step return of the country’s cultural life has not ignited any significant new outbreaks, though the government remains extraordinarily vigilant.

China on Tuesday reported no new locally transmitted cases of the virus on the mainland for the second consecutive day.

The pool party in Wuhan took place at Maya Beach Water Park in conjunction with a musical festival at an adjacent amusement park called Wuhan Happy Valley. They reopened in June, two months after the city’s 76-day lockdown was lifted, although in a nod to coronavirus precautions, the parks have limited capacity by 50 percent.

The parks have been holding Saturday night concerts since July 11, featuring some of the country’s biggest performers, including Panta.Q, who performed in Happy Valley last Saturday. Up next Saturday: The singer Big Year.

Help yourself be more productive.

You don’t need to finish everything to feel productive. Satisfaction can and should come from the smaller accomplishments in your day. Here’s how to refocus your attention on your smaller wins.

Reporting was contributed by Alan Blinder, Alexander Burns, Stephen Castle, Choe Sang-Hun, Nick Corasaniti, Hannah Critchfield, Brendon Derr, Claire Fu, Thomas Fuller, Trip Gabriel, Rebecca Griesbach, Amy Harmon, Ethan Hauser, Ann Hinga Klein, Jennifer Jett, Niki Kitsantonis, Gina Kolata, Théophile Larcher, Jonathan Martin, Tiffany May, Constant Méheut, Steven Lee Myers, Norimitsu Onishi, Frances Robles, Eliza Shapiro, Michael D. Shear, Daniel E. Slotnik and Mark Walker, Timothy Williams.

#covid #World

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rodarin-calrise · 3 years

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Call me suspicious all you'd like, ser. But I must ask...what reasons would we have to trust you and yours right now with everything going on? Though maybe the real question is -should- we put trust in you to begin with?

"Quite honestly, dear? I don't really give a fuck what suspicions you have, what you think you should do, or how you go about doing it, so long as you don't fuck with my people."

Those golden eyes lifted from the letter he was currently in the middle of penning, shifting them off to the side as his lips pursed a bit in thought. "...Mmm, that sounded a bit harsh, didn't it?"

With a tired sigh, his body shifted back — the weight of his torso pressing at the backrest of his rather lavish chair, while his arms lifted to fold behind his head.

"Look, point is, it doesn't really matter to anyone except you. You choose to either trust, or distrust. Goddamn, is this what that Whisper-fucker feels like? Tellin' it straight, and still gettin' the side-eye anyway? Well, not like he has feelings t'hurt anyway."

With a lazy drum of his fingers over his desk, he could only offer the woman a light shrug of his shoulders before he went back to his work.

"Do or don't, Westmoore lives on so long as I'm breathing. If you can't remember any of this shit for yourself, means you already lost before. Clearly, we haven't. But no hard feelings if you choose not to. Just means I'll be seein' ya again next time. And the next. And the next. Until you finally pick a new way t'play."

#Rodarin Calrise #Mayor of Westmoore #Answered Asks

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rodarin-calrise · 3 years

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[OOC Post] - AMA for Rodarin Calrise

It’s time for another AMA, this time focused on the ‘Good Mayor’, Rodarin Calrise, or otherwise general OOC questions!

#OOC Post #The Nightmare before Endwalker #AMA Day #Rodarin Calrise #Mayor of Westmoore

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rodarin-calrise · 3 years

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From Eorzea's perspective, Westmoore has popped up out of empty ocean. So then, from your perspective, where were you before this? have you had trade with an Eorzea before?

"Westmoore's what you might refer to as 'a universal / systematic constant'. If you don't know what that means, or implies, I'm sure there's something you can ask for a bit of clarification. Star's shining in the sky now right? I'm sure it's out and about by now then. Don't get an answer right away, try knocking a few times first."

"Anyway, sure, we've traded plenty of times. Plenty, of times. With loads of places. Guess if you forgot again, means y'fucked up again. Ah well, this surprises no one I'm sure. Anyway, it all looks the same regardless. What's another Eorzea to the mix?"

#Rodarin Calrise #Mayor of Westmoore #Answered asks

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rodarin-calrise · 3 years

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“Simple enough to answer, friend. Westmoore’s lands are rich in metals, minerals, and exotic reagents. Simple food is a bit of a harder ask. We make due with our fishing, livestock, and what few remain of our last trades. But I’m sure my people would like some variety on their plates.”

“Smiths and Alchemists tend to prefer our exports the most, given our abundance of materials for their crafts. But aside from that? Knowledge. Assistance. Safety. These are troubling times, aren’t they? Horrible things clawing at the door, ready to bust in at any moment. Have you tried warding against them yet? Banishing them? Burning them?”

“Well, when all that fails, come see us. We’ll show ya how it’s done. For a proper trade, of course~”

[ @snackerston ]

#Rodarin Calrise #Mayor of Westmoore #Answered asks

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rodarin-calrise · 3 years

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If I ask nicely will you bend me over your desk?

The papers rustling on his desk immediately silenced at the question, that vacant stare lifting from the pages to settle upon the stranger who had been ushered into his office.

"...Look, we all can appreciate a hot n' meaningless lay now and then, right? But it's going to take a bit more than a polite question to get me goin'. Where's the tease? Where's the foreplay? Respect the game a bit at least, anticipation is key."

"Turn around, head back out, come back n' try again when you've got a game plan. I appreciate the thought though, always nice knowin' I can still turn a head or two despite my age. But if you fuck it up again, you're gonna be begging for your life instead."

Despite the playful tone, those pointed teeth that peeked out from beneath his smirk begged to differ. Lifting his head up, he called out to his receptionist. "Send in the next!"

#Rodarin Calrise #Mayor of Westmoore #Answered Asks

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rodarin-calrise · 3 years

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It Was An Accident

You didn’t mean to bump into the man — an older fellow, only managing to keep from toppling over thanks to his well-planted cane. He scuffled along at a faster pace, obscenities most likely what was muttered under his breath as he passed you by. While you may have been at least somewhat sorry for burdening the elderly man’s day, you were far too focused on the journey ahead. Candlelight Cove, the main port town of the Westmoore Province. You had heard tales, from strange to downright cautionary, of Westmoore and its surrounding locales. But from where you heard them seemed to constantly elude your memory. While Candlelight seemed to be the most tame, it carried most of the warnings being the entryway to most’s adventures into Westmoore — mainly being, don’t go. It was the first stop — and therefore, it was the first mistake. Stay away from Westmoore. Turn back. L̻͖̮͈ͅe̳̬̤̙̫̹a̡͕v̶͈e̸̤͉̥͓̣.͈̺̝̭͔̭̘.

It was an accident — the sudden lurch of the boat tugging against its anchor as it docked caused your hand to catch at some loosened wood on the deck’s railing. A long, albeit shallow scrape now stung at your palm — but ignoring the light throb of freshly broken skin, you stepped foot onto the dock. It was just as dreary as the stories foretold. A light, gentle patter of sprinkling rain kept the stone roads slick and shiny enough to reflect the grey, cloudy overcast. As you and the remaining fresh arrivals stepped into town, others hurried to leave — plenty seeming far too eager to return to La Noscea. Casting your doubts aside, you gave the small town a quick glance — and true to its name, ever-burning candles decorated anywhere the rain couldn’t reach. Windowsills, lamp posts, the crooks of sheltered alleyways. It was ominous, in an eerie sort of way.

It was an accident — you must have spaced out while you were fixated upon the fountain of liquid pearl. How was that possible? Could pearls even be perfectly liquefied like this? It was a smooth, ever-flowing cascade of pearlescence — rainbows shimmering within the milky whites and shimmering silvers as the flowing substance caught the flickering candlelights. It didn’t even seem like water. It was dense and viscous, like some sort of runny syrup — and for some reason, images of blood beginning to coagulate and clot were filling your mind as you studied the fluid. Your fingers were so close to dipping within the fountain’s falls, but the sudden hand on your shoulder startled you away. A few splatters of your blood speckled against the hypnotic substance, quickly mingling into the pool below as the falls continued. “Welcome to Westmoore~” chimed a rather mountainous man. He was dressed in a finely pressed suit — but although it was clean and wrinkle free, he seemed to have clothed himself in a hurry. The buttons were loose, his inner shirt askew. The collar was half unfolded, and his tie was loose and lopsided. Dark hazelnut-brown hair was swept back in messy curls, while golden eyes stared into your own. They were empty, vacant, as if staring straight through you to the ground below — accompanied by an equally emotionless smile, as if his lips were simply plastered that way. His voice was low, rich and smooth — flowing effortlessly like honeyed whiskey as he introduced himself. “I’m Rodarin Calrise, the Mayor of Westmoore. Come — let’s get you settled in.”

It was an accident — before you knew it, you were already leaving the faint glow of Candlelight Cove in the horizon, coming upon a signpost that waited at the T-shaped ending of the road. To the left, Westmoore. The right, Devil’s Edge. And right you turned, following the self-proclaimed Mayor the opposite direction of your intended destination. "We.. aren’t going to Westmoore?” You finally managed to ask, fighting the sudden wave of nausea that tried to prevent the question from being asked. “Oh no, no–we need to get you settled in first.” Rodarin replied — his stare and smile as glazed and absent as ever, as if in a haze. A haze you soon felt buzzing over the back of your mind as the road descended towards the thick treeline of the woods by the side of the road. Everything became.. calm. Numb, even. All you could focus on was the smell of moist bark and the crunch of the stone road you absently followed.

It was an accident — at least, you think it was. When did you arrive in the woods? You think back, brows physically straining as they knitted together in struggled contemplation. You.. couldn’t remember anything. All you could recall was walking on the road — Rodarin saying ‘you needed to get settled in first’. You can’t remember how you got here, when you got here, how much time had passed, where Rodarin was, where you were — nothing. The canopy of pine made it impossible to tell if it was night or day within these woo — wait.. canopy? You recall the woods by the road you had walked upon earlier — their branches were barren. This.. wasn’t right. None of this was right. And the more you thought on your situation, the stronger your stomach knotted and shakier your hands became. The air was somehow chilled, yet humid at the same time — and it was taking its toll quickly. You could already feel your skin prickling in defense against the cold, your teeth quietly chattering to prevent from locking. But a shimmer of hope soon sent you running towards it — the gentle glow of light flickering against the trunks.

It was an accident — surely, this had to be an accident. A mistake. A prank — anything to explain what you were seeing here. It was you, slumped against the trunk of a pine on the cold, damp ground. Motionless. Pale-blue. The left side of your skull was caved in, while a large gaping hole was missing from the right side of your torso — a few pieces of meat still clinging desperately to the blood-stained tips of what ribs remained. A single lit candle was held in your hand, your knuckles whitened and blood dripping from the base as if you had held onto it for dear life. The light danced upon a white creature crouched by your corpse. It held no features, its figure resembling the basic shape of a humanoid structure — like a cheap doll that sat in the children’s stores in Limsa Lominsa. Stumpy arms and legs, and a large rounded head — where blood stained and dripped over the area a mouth should be. Your blood, no doubt. Its ‘skin’ was constantly rippling, like waves upon a disturbed lake — ending in thick streams and globules of its white composition to fall and spill over the ground. The scent of a charred candlewick filled your lungs — and that’s what it was. It was wax. A golem, perhaps? Some sort of animated waxen puppet?

Your guesswork was interrupted as it seemed to look back towards you — it was hard to tell with the absence of eyes. Rodarin appeared from behind the tree your body rest against, his vacant smile now replaced by a grin of absolute pleasure — his teeth all sharpened into fine points. “Welcome back to Westmoore. I hope you enjoy your stay. Try to avoid the Woods next time, won’t you?” he said before bursting out into laughter--though whether it was out of amusement or malice, it was hard to tell. And then, pain. Your hands clawed at your chest, desperate to remove whatever white-hot dagger was digging itself into your heart — only to claw at your own flesh. You gasped for air, falling to the ground and curling involuntarily in defense against the crippling pain — its intensity so powerful it caused you to gag. Your eyelids fluttered as your eyes rolled back, staining your mind with the last image they saw. Your corpse, staring back at you — grinning so widely and gleefully that the corners of its lips were beginning to tear and bleed. And then, the world went dark.

I̡̹̼̳̞̭t̞̬̗̱͚͙̩ ̯͈̻̗̾̋ͫ͐̑̽w̭̤͖ͯͣa̡̹̞̥̬͑̑ͨs̤̗͔͗̆̿̽̅ͯ̀ͅn̷̖̖̙̼̰̱'͏ṭ̶̓ ̸̦͐͐̐̎̅ͅȃ̠̥͗̐n͖͍̞̥͚̋͊̌ͅ ̶̘͎͍̤̤a̵̞͖ͨͭ̾͌̚c̳ͯ̐͂c̀̋̄ͮi͛̽ͣ̑̃d̼̐͆̚͠e̝͚̼̮̟͈̙͊̀̑͑ͧ̚n̪̪̯t̲̞͟ͅ.ͬ̀ .

#Rodarin Calrise #Westmoore #Candlelight Cove #Public Prompt #Use this as you wish!#It's time again #The Nightmare before Endwalker #FFXIV RP #Crystal LFRP #Mateus RP #Balmung RP

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