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aesthbaby · 4 years

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Ghost

Summary: Do you remember the episode Demonology where we learned of Emily’s past? What if I told you, you were apart of it. After years of silence on her end, you end up meeting her again.

Pairing: Emily Prentiss x Fem!Reader

Prompt: here

Warnings: Cursing | Sadness | Typos

Word Count:

Masterlist

An: Dedicated to my hundredth follower. Ahhhh I'm too hype about this! I also made a slight change to the prompt but everything else is the same :) Anon, I hope you enjoy.

Indignation

The screaming crawls up the walls of her oversized, child hood home to shake her ear drums. The thunder only adds fuel to the fire that is the rage possessed by both Prentiss’ as they continue their screaming match.

“Don’t you dare walk away when I’m talking to you!” Elizabeth’s voice matches the rain. The way she stomps behind her daughter looks almost comical.

“Back off mother.” She mumbles this more to herself than her mother.

She stops walking, planting her feet firmly on the Brazilian Chestnut flooring. “I will not ask you again.” She comes to a stop, takes a breath, and slowly turns to her mother. Not meeting her eyes, of course, because it’d hurt too much to see the hate in her eyes. “Look at me.” The mother growls. She slowly moves to meet her mothers eyes and finds nothing but rage there; energy matched to the thunder and rain outside. “You will not see that-” The derogatory term gets caught up in her throat.

Taking a step towards the elder, “What?” Daring to ask the question to which she already knows the answer. “What do you want to say mother?” Her jaw tightens, a sign that Emily knows all too well. “Spit it out.” Its taking everything in her not to raise her voice again and spew the word out for her mother.

Elizabeth takes a breath of her own before replying. “You are not to see that girl again or so help me, I will make sure she goes back to where she came from.” Before Emily could object, she speaks again. “That is final Emily.” Her voice holds strong, and suddenly the storm ceases its assault.

All is quiet in the Prentiss house yet the tension remains; so thick that you could cut it with a knife.

Disregard

The next morning you arrive to school earlier than usual, but for good reason. Some random college hoodie wrapped loosely around your torso and a dainty neck tucked under it. Your school uniform has never fit you quite right because of how late in the year you transferred, you know...left overs. Phone is going absolutely crazy in your shirt pocket but now isn't the time, you’re looking for somebody. You’re looking for her. Mr. Ricci’s voice can be heard on your left, telling a group of guys its time for class. Emily...where the hell are you?

As the day progresses you still see no sign of the brunette until now. “Emily!” Running up to her you deliver a swift punch to her shoulder. “Where the hell have you been?” When her eyes meet yours they puffy, like she’s been crying. “Em- I-”

“First of all, ouch. Secondly, I can’t right now.” She turns to walk off with her lunch in hand, but you quickly pull her back by her elbow.

“You ‘can’t’ right now? What the hell is wrong with you?” Its taking everything in you not to become overtly emotional. “And where have you been?”

“Y/n I’m sorry but I really can’t right now.” She pulls away from your grip. Leaving you more confused than before.

You scuff at her wording. “You never calls me by my first name...” Its always been her thing, starting with a joke about how she has another friend by the same name as you so she had to call you something else. The next day was the same, avoiding you at all costs.

But it didn’t stop there.

It felt as though you were left on a physical manifestation of ‘read.’ Her name with the red heart emoji attached, did not pop up on your phone for what seemed to be months but in reality it had only been a few weeks. If she were to simply pick up the phone you would have been able to tell her about your unforeseen departure time. Due to sudden changes in international studies, you had to leave and the academy needed their student back. The one of which you exchange places with in January. Tears spring to your eyes at the thought of leaving. Not only are you leaving her, but also leaving this city you got to call home.

Sunny days always seem to appear at the wrong time, your departure day. She’s not here to see you off, hasn’t been around for a while. Can you really blame her? She doesn’t even know you’re leaving because she wont pick up the fucking phone. It doesn’t matter anymore, your time is up and so is her’s. A line of black and white kittens sprint across the cobblestone streets and that right there is what makes you break down in tears. Seeing the delicate kittens run after a mouse while tripping over their own feet. Random yellow flowers peaking through the stone which you’ve never known the actual name of. That one girl in Chem that would bake cookies for the class on Fridays. Your host dad taking you to his favorite café that served an increasing number of Cuban smokers. Going to eat gelato after homeroom with that one guy who would always make Golden Girls references. Then there was Emily, the girl that gave you a dainty gold necklace for valentines day. The girl that got a random jock to stop harassing you. The person whose lap you’d lay in on Saturday mornings at the park, is the same person who randomly started to ignore you. Maybe you could have fixed things with her if you had more time. You were supposed to have until June but suddenly everything shifted and all you were told is that you needed to come home, promptly. You couldn’t wait for her any longer, not even sure why you thought she’d come in the first place. Casting one last glance over your shoulder before stepping into the buzzing airport.

At least meet me half way.

Hereafter

"I don’t think so.” You laugh at your friend’s proposition to set you up on a blind date. “I am absolutely content with the way I choose to live my life.” Shifting a bit on the new couch that hasn’t been broken in, resulting in the stiff cushions.

He lets out this weird scuffing noise. “No you’re not. Remember last weekend when we tried to pull an all-nighter but your sleep deprived brain betrayed you?” At your nonchalant shrug, he continues. “You started rambling about just wanting to find some well educated, fun loving, female in this world full of bureaucratic straight men. Your words, not mine.” You throw a pillow at him but he swiftly doges it. “But you couldn’t have said it better.” These recent years have been a series of unfortunate dates that have ended in you lying about having to leave early for something.

“Don’t you have a girlfriend you should be getting home to?”

“Not tonight, I’m all yours. Apparently she has her knitting circle tonight.”

“That's what you get for dating an older woman.”

“Its a five year age difference! What is wrong with you people?”

You hold your hands up in defense. “Nothing, as long as you’re both legal and she’s good to you, its fine by me.”

“Shut up!” He screeches. “Oh shit, don’t you have a meeting in the morning?”

“Yes sir.” He stands to take your glasses and plates in the kitchen but you object. “Leave it,” At his confused expression, you continue. “Cleaning helps me relax so I figured I’ll wake up early so I can do that and reduce my stress levels by at least ten percent.”

“Dude, you’re seriously weird.”

“Say another bad thing about me and I'm sending you home.”

Throwing him a few pillows from the hallway closet and a comforter just for him to scream, “Its too hot in this cottage core apartment!”

Its not even cottage core themed?? Its just cozy with a plant or two. Am I expected to live in an ice cold home? I feel like he’s just saying this because I’m gay.

Your prepared outfit hands on the back of your bedroom door, mocking you. Making you reconsider the entire thing and simply not go but it feels as though you’d regret it if you didn’t. Maybe not, who knows?

And with that as your final though, you drift off to sleep.

You wake at the amazing time of 6 A.M to see your guest gone with a note on the couch:

I cleaned up the mess from last night and I also did the dishes in your sink. Not sure how u slept through all of that...I made a fruit salad for ur breakfast and a normal one for lunch.

Good luck with your meeting!

And one of those old fashioned emoticons at the bottom corner. Idiot.

You eat the food he left from the fridge, brush your teeth with the news playing in the background, and continue on with the normal morning routine.

Gathering your lunch and the little items you feel like you’d need, phone, charger, paper work, and keys; you know, the works. Finally heading out to your destination with nothing but ambition, you run into a slight problem.

Overlapping breakfast with an old friend of yours. “Hey, babe, I am so sorr-”

“Absolutely not, I don’t want to hear your excuses.” The positive voice rings through the phone like velvet sheets after a cold shower. “You missed our reservation!” Have to admit hearing them whine is pretty entertaining. “You had one job. One!” You guys met some years ago over some random online forum, arguing over some random movie. You don’t talk as much as you’d like but breakfast is always on the menu--mostly in February.

“Quick question, am I allowed to apologize?”

There’s a beat of silence on the other end, “Yes you may, but only in fruit baskets and coffee.”

“I got you, next time though. I’m on my way to something right now.”

“Something...” In comes the teasing undertone. “Does this ‘something’ have a name?”

Bursting into a fit of laughter at what is implied and replying, “Definitely not, its a work thing.”

“Speaking of work, I have to go. Ciao!”

Just in time to end the call, you pull into the designated parking deck from the email. Going through all of the security procedures was hell but blatantly necessary; the rest was gravy. Floating through the rest of the building gave you a slightly stressful feel because of all the men walking around with perfect suits and casting no glances your direction. When the glass doors labeled BAU appear, you take a deep breath and walk in with confidence. Taking in the buzzing sound of agents at work all around you. Agent Hotcher’s office is glaringly obvious: higher up than the rest, perfect overview of the hive, and in direct eye sight of the entryway doors.

Delivering a swift knock to the office door you hear a faint invitation from the inside. Walking in with a smile and straight back you are greeted with a man in a dark navy blue suit and a stoic look to attached to him. It first starts with the small talk of your experience, early life, skill sets, and what not.

“Agent Hotchner, might I speak out of line for a moment.” He gives you a skeptical look before nodding. “I understand the nature of this meeting but I am not completely sure why it was conducted.” His furrowed brown is not a good sign, making you correct your structure a bit. “Right, well,” God his stare is fucking intense. “What I mean to ask is, why am I here?”

That was bold.

“Agent, are you not aware that this is a Career Analysis Assessment?” As it slowly sinks in an O-shape forms with your mouth. Now you feel like a complete idiot in front of this prestigious, tight suited, man. “You were unaware? Its fine if you were,” You let out a sigh at the confirmation. “I have a tendency to write my emails with an excessive amount of four syllable words so one could see where the confusion originated.” You let out a nervous laugh at the realization that this is basically a job interview.

“I see that you’ve spent time studying abroad.” Indicated by the recommendations from your Italian Psychology teacher. “Why not join the CIA?”

“Dare I say, they make me nervous?” He cracks a small, very subtle, smile at the admission.

“What made you want to leave Human Resources?”

“I got tired of analyzing decisions with nothing but dead bodies and messy crimes and having my primal focus be the agents and not the victims or perpetrators. Using what I’ve learned as material for agents in training when I could have prevented it from happening.”

“Well said, but I need to be completely transparent with you.” This can’t be good. “I will admit that I have serious reservations about adding a Human Resources officer to my team.”

Shit let me stop him before this spirals. He thinks I’m a spy. “Sir, with all do respect, I have no intentions of being a bureaucratic spy. I’d also like to point out that I wasn’t that high on the HR totem pole to the point where I had an explicit say on what happens to agents, who is hire, fired, or how they’re trained. I analyzed and compromised while expressing my findings to an unbiased extent. If I wanted to be a spy I would have joined the CIA.” Besides, Head Quarter’s is the one that does all of that internal investigation stuff, not HR.

He doesn’t say anything or make any sudden movements for a good minute. I fucked up. That spy line was too far. “I’d like to offer you a position on this team, so long as you can start immediately.”

“Yes, of course I can! I don’t have much office supplies besides a pen or two and-”

“Its fine,” He stands from his seat and straightens the dark blazer. “I’ll have one of my agents show you around.”

From across the bullpen you spot a familiar blonde. “Oh my god!” The file in her hand falls to the floor. “Its you!” She practically squeals.

“Penelope, I didn’t know you work here.” You give your old friend a tight, unapologetic hug. She said she worked as a tech analysis but you always assumed it was for an activism group or a tech firm, not the FBI out of all things. Despite having such interesting jobs, you never talk about work with each other. She knows you work for the government but not which. Although knowing how good she is at uncovering people’s secrets, there’s a good chance she already knew you work for the FBI too.

“What are you doing here? Like physically here. I thought you were in Florida.”

“I have to get back, can you take care of Agent Y/L/N for me?” Hotchner says before rushing off without an answer.

And there she goes with the snooping. “Actually, I left the Florida office and went to California.”

“Oh.” Her face twists a bit. “And now you’re here?”

“I thought you were the woman behind the curtains, the all knowing.”

“And wonderful!” She points with her perfectly painted finger.

In comes a slim man with a messenger back, making a click in your mind. “Now where have I seen him before...” Turning slightly to follow his trail.

“That’s our resident genius Dr. Spencer Reid.”

Unbelievable. “He’s twelve.” The young agent’s head snaps toward you and Penelope, “Does he have super human hearing too?” She introduces you to the Doctor who is, as expected, socially awkward in many ways. A man named David Rossi of whom you’ve met at least once during a few Bureau seminars; last you heard he had rejoined the BAU after retirement. Jennifer Jareau is gorgeous with a nurturing nature about her, she immediately recognizes your name from exchanged paperwork but that’s about it. The introductions are brief, everyone seems to be busy with their own things. “Penelope your team is kind of small.” You quietly mention to her.

“Oh!” Guess the realization that two people are missing, finally clicks in her head. She starts walking in the direction of a staircase so you automatically follow her. “This is Derek Morgan.” Standing in front of a round table is a tall man with a really toned body. “Derek, this is Agent Y/n L/n from Human Resources.” His eyebrow arches up in suspicion.

“Oh no I’m not here for anything bad, I’ve actual been transferred into the BAU. Working behind a desk and watching as others do the work I can’t, wasn’t working out for me.” Definitely won’t trust me until I save his life or something. “I’ve heard of you, one of the Academy trainers has shown a few videos of you.” He smirks at the implied compliment and finally holds his hand out for you to shake.

“Where’s...” Pen trails while looking around.

“Oh she’s getting coffee.” The darker man points behind himself.

“Who’s getting coffee?”

Reconciliation

Maybe we wouldn’t be so short handed if they sprung for better coffee. Emily thought to herself while stirring the flavorless, dark liquid. What if they attach a coffee shop to the building? Imagine how much money the shop would make off of overworked agents. But then I feel like we’d start developing a true addiction to this stuff. Her thoughts are interrupted by the approach of foot steps. She meets Derek’s figure and smiles at the resident goofball of the BAU. Followed by Penelope’s pink centralized outfit with feathers. Then there’s you, just as beautiful as the last time you saw each other. If not more. Your hair shines amongst the florescent lights, paired with the perfectly tailored outfit and jewelry. The same eyes that would brighten her day as they met. An almost unnoticeable bounce in you walk, same as it were years ago. As you step towards her there is a flash of gold on your wrist that sends a ping to Emily’s heart, its the necklace I gave you in high school.

Intersect

You would have know about Emily’s transfer here from a few years ago, had her paperwork gone through the HR department but apparently it went straight to the top because this is definitely a surprise. Once you realize its actually her you stop dead in your tracks. Can’t be.

“Y/n,” She stutters out your name in disbelief. “What are you doing here?”

“Emily, I work here.” Ripping the band-aid off like this is an every day encounter; seeing your unofficial ex who you were never actually with in the first place but had the same characteristics as a high school couple. Yeah...that.

She also blurted out a ‘no you don’t’ before Garcia interrupted. “How do you two know each other?”

You both snapped your heads to her simultaneously. “We don’t.” Also said that part at the same time.

“Right.” She drags. “I’m sensing some unresolved tension...”

“What are-” Em tries to object.

“So we’re going to go.” The tech analysis grabs the sleeve of the darker man and practically sprints off in the opposite direction. Morgan having a dumbfounded look on his face.

It feels like you’re at a stalemate, who will make the first move. What will the emotions be? Are they going to fly? Because I’d like to throw a few verbal punches her way. Who does that to someone? I thought I was over it but clearly the wound is still open. Great now watch her blame me for X, Y, and Z,

“I’ve missed you.” She barely whispers, sounding a bit broken yet insincere. Its like she’s detaching herself from the narrative. So unexpected that you almost think you’re imagining this. Why would she say that? This is not the Emily you remember.

Anger bubbles up in your throat ready to unleash upon her entirety. Instead of bursting into flames right on the spot, in the middle of your new place of employment you take a deep breath. Words of disbelief dance on your lips before speaking. “You did not.” She tilts her head like a curious puppy. Who am I even talking to?

“What do you mean?” And just like that she’s whisked away by a guy in a suit of whom you do not recognize. Your jaw clinches in a desperate attempt to keep your cool, wondering what the hell is going on.

Realization

Besides the surprise of seeing Emily, your first day went great. Everyone kept checking up on you and you couldn’t tell if it was because they were trying to be friendly, excited to have a new teammate, or nervous of your background. “She used to work for the FBI Human Resources Branch.” You heard the skinny one tell Morgan when they thought you weren’t listening.

JJ and Penelope invited you out for drinks but all you really wanted to do was lay in your bed with a face mask and a bag of chips. Waving a farewell to the blonde women and head to your car, but a few feet away you feel a presence. You quickly loop around in search of the energy with your hand on the top of your gun. “Woah woah.” Emily holds her hands up in surrender.

At the realization of who it is you take a breath and clip your gun back in place. You give her a “what the hell look” before straightening your outfit.

“Were you going to shoot me?”

She’s met with wide eyes from your end. “Maybe?! Who sneaks up on someone with a gun?”

“I didn’t ‘sneak’ up on you.”

“Emily, you wear all black and walk like a feather. What were you expecting?” The buried anger is starting showing through.

“Okay,” She does a weird hand movement that kind of looks like she’s trying to calm you down. “I’m sorry. I just thought we could talk.”

“Talk...” You’re not really following.

“Yes, I’d like to talk.”

“Emily what are you asking? I’m lost.”

She take a moment to figure it out before answering. “For a second chance, I’m asking for another shot.”

You uncross your arms at the admission, letting them lazily fall beside you. “Em- I-” She can’t be asking what I think she is. “Its been years. More than a decade has passed since-” The words suddenly die on your lips

“I know,” And it looks like there’s a slight glimmer in her eyes, implying the presence of suppressed tears. “I’d just like to explain.”

“Explain?” You bite, tasting the bitter flavor of annoyance.

“Yes, I at least owe you that.”

And that’s how you ended up here, with her. In a cozy, minimalistic loft at nine in the afternoon with a coffee table separating the two of you.

“I’m sorry.” Was the first thing to break the silence, and this time it actually sounded sincere. “If I could have explained everything to you back then, I would have.”

You lean forward, closer to her and push the rather large vase off to the side so she has to be vulnerable with you. Nothing to help her hide from herself. At her confused face you lean back in your seat and nod for her to continue.

“My mother was always a difficult woman and although she has gotten better over the years, things were at their worst when she found out how much time I had been spending with you.” The brunette takes a minute before admitting the next part. “She was responsible for your early departure. I tried to stop her, give you more time but she’s relentless.” She waits for your reaction but when met with nothing, she continues. “She threatened me by putting our connection on the line, which in retrospect I now realize was impossible to save. She had already made calls to get you out of the country by the time I could sever what we had. I never wanted to hurt you or end what we shared.”

“And what did we share, Emily?”

Her tongue darts from between her lips, doing that weird little biting thing she’s always done since we’ve known each other. It sparks something in you that you haven't felt in a while. “I think you know. The fact that you still wear the necklace I gave you, bracelet, means you never really forgot.”

“I liked it where I could see it, but Em you could have called, texted even.”

“I couldn’t I was scared. Then after you left I started to distance myself from everyone and everything was really going downhill.”

“How so?”

“I got mixed up with peer pressure and boys.” This doesn’t sound good. “At one point I did anything I could to fit in.”

“What does that mean?” There’s a moment when a tear wells up on one of her eyes, but not dropping. “You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to.”

“I-” She tries to speak but nothing comes out. “I couldn’t tell my mother and the church wasn’t happy with my actions.” It suddenly dawns on you, like a smack in the face. You want to make her stop and just hold her but this needs to come out. “I couldn’t call you because it would hurt too much. I hated myself at that moment more than I ever have.”

“And you haven’t dated since?”

She sniffles and lets out a little laugh at that. “God no, I’ve dated people but I haven't dated another female since. It felt wrong, like I was replacing you or something.”

“You owe me nothing. You were just trying to protect me and I see that now.”

“I knew better, its been so long and when I heard you joined the academy I-”

“Wait, you knew and didn’t say anything?”

“Y/n I couldn’t bring myself to do anything other that attempt to move on.” Silence fills the room and its not the comforting kind. Its the tense, I need to do something, kind.

“Do you feel anything?” You dare to ask.

“What do you mean?”

“You know what I mean. Were your feelings lost in transit?”

“They froze the day you left, and thawed the day I saw you again. Today.”

“So its not over.”

She appears to contemplate your statement. “No, its not over. We have a chance to start over.”

What now?

.｡.:*･゜ﾟ･*★*･･*･'･*:..:*･゜ﾟ･*☆*:. .｡.:*☆

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zirkkun · 3 years

Text

I can't sleep so I'm gonna ramble for a minute here about. uh. 2020 i guess lol everyone else is so might as well jump on the bandwagon.

Be aware this is really really fucking long so it's a commitment to read it lmao sorry i just cannot sleep and i guess i had more on my mind about this year than i thought. I also did not proofread this at all. I just started writing and didn't look back lol

This year was... Weird for me. It started out with me feeling my best in January, comfortable and positive as I did my nth playthrough of DBH with friends and finally having enough alts of my boy Alfonse in FEH to have a team of Just him to fight with. (Priorities, right?) February hit, and things were still going good. I met Ray Chase and had him sign a print I did of Roy and Alfonse in some casual outfits for a scrapped au I wrote years ago. (And I gave him one 😊). Hell, like, covid was just coming around when me and my friends went to the con that weekend and a breakout of it hit the city just south of where the con was like a week before, but I was genuinely so excited for it that like I was like "Yeah, if i die, i die. Whatever happens happens." God, at this point, the Alfonse gc I was in was still alive and I still didn't talk to anyone in the group outside of that gc. Lowkey miss it tbh. But oh well. Things move on.

But that con was like... Stressful. I usually have fair amounts of stress at cons, being around so many people, I fear theft, unwanted contact, y'know, the standard; but my friend group was so filled with tension that it was absolutely painful. We'd been split most of the weekend, and if the two groups came together, it was hell, because it just caused unwanted arguments. I felt really bad cause I didn't want them to be upset, yknow? But i also wanted to hang out with my friends all at once. So i swapped between the groups a bit over the weekend. And blew WAY more money than I should have and lowkey it kind of fucked me over for the rest of the year cause I haven't had a job all year outside of, like, a local church job that pays at a rare max of $100 a month ;w;

I'd been struggling in school the previous semester already, about halfway through having just stopped going to classes altogether, yet still somehow managed to pass everything with B's and A's. The next semester rolled around, and I thought at first the distraction and inability to do anything was because of the con, and as it persisted after, I thought it was just post-con depression. But, as it turned out, no, it's just been my biggest relapse of depression since the end of high school, and frankly, it's only gotten worse since. I can't sleep rn because I'm between not wanting to do anything because I have a lack of emotions and motivation and not feeling deserving of sleep lol. I checked out of school on February 28th, however, I was convinced I was merely demotivated by my surroundings -- at this point, I was studying Japanese, and one of my friends at the time was a (although probably unintentionally) complete braggart about how much he was studying and how he was improving... not to mention he was textbook example of "This is an Actual Weeaboo, don't Fucking Do this." (One of many reasons i said friend at the time lol) it was just... So draining being around him, and I had to see him in class every day of the week. I barely scraped together assignments last-minute and never studied under the idea of "What does it matter if I'm not putting in my 100%?" So I checked out, with plans of transferring for the following semester.

Well, then March hit. Y'all know how March went down lmao.

I pretty much locked myself in my room at all times during March, going between Animal Crossing and BOTW (which actually racked up like 200ish hours i think according to the nintendo year in review i had lmao). I started making a bit closer online friends at this point, notably @levitumbling who decided to take me in as his channel designer for YouTube and I've been ever since! But. Of course. My first task? A Sans meme. My payment? One Switch copy of Undertale because he considered it a disgrace that I'd never played the game before.

Now, let me tell you. I was fuckin scared to play this game. I held onto it for weeks between the fear of "My friend bought me this and i should play this" and "I told myself I'd never touch this game with a 20 mile pole because of how much it's been shoved down my throat over the years." So, one day, I don't remember when, early April, I said, fuck it, I'll play it for a little bit, just enough to say "hey i played it for a bit!" and then never go back.

The only thing that stopped me from beating the whole thing in one sitting was it was the crack of dawn when I passed out, extremely tired and extremely frustrated by the fact I couldn't beat Muffet. Yes, I got that far in one sitting I intended to play for 15 minutes tops.

Now. Let me fuckin tell you. About my first playthrough of Undertale. I haven't gone into a game knowing ABSOLUTELY NOTHING about it like... I think ever. Usually I know what style of game it is, the genre, the main plot premise. I knew nothing other than the existence of Sans (and, as it turned out, I'd heard some of the soundtrack pieces before, notably Bonetrousle I heard this cover of it in a radio livestream a while back and never really looked it up, but was always excited when the radio looped back around to it being on; and I'd heard Dating Start! because that's Alpharad's go-to sponsorship ost lmao.) But anyway. I was completely in the dark. Do yall mind if i just go through some highlights of my favorite memories? This is supposed to be a summary of the year but I mean, I think this made a big enough impact on me to really like. Discuss it a bit.

I watched the whole opening cutscene, started a new game under my old screenname, "Yoru," since in naming the "Fallen Child," I assumed they were dead. Well, I was a little surprised to just be that child, alive, two seconds later, but whatever, I rolled with it.

I genuinely trusted Flowey right away. Like no shit. He told me run into the "friendliness pellets" and I didn't even fucking question it. And when Toriel came in? And she said to follow her? I straight up was like "Why the hell should I trust you?? That guy just tried to kill me what says you wont?" I followed only because the game made me but i was Wary the whole time. It took me a LONG time to warm up to Toriel.

Now. Let me tell you how stupid I am as well. The game says over and over right, "Don't fight. Spare. Have Mercy when names are Yellow." Well, I took this literally. I didn't understand the Act mechanic most of the time, and when something didn't work I just said, fuck it, and fought them. If their name didn't turn yellow, I just fought them. "They don't want Mercy if their name isn't yellow, right?" After a while, I'd started getting bored of fighting and would just run away, but like, I came to a point where I was like "I have a really low level, I'm really going to regret this later on if I don't grind for a while."

I don't know when I stopped but. I think I was only one or two kills away from a genocide run accidentally my first playthrough, based on how I think I was LV 3 and looking at genocide playthroughs, you're LV 3 or 4 when you fight Toriel. Like. Holy fuck. I can't imagine what I would have thought of this game if that happened lmao.

Speaking of Toriel, still didn't trust her, at all. When we got to Home, and after I did Every Single different phrase she says when you go downstairs before you talk to her reading about snails; I did not Hesitate to ask "cool uh when the fuck can I leave?" When we got to the Ruins exit I was like, ah, here it is. The betrayal from her I was expecting, where she tries to kill me. Well, nothing on the Act menu worked, right? So... I fought and killed her. I didn't really care, actually. I just kept going.

Then meeting Sans and Papyrus happened. I lost my fucking shit at this part, mostly when they were talking, because every time Sans made a pun it would zoom in on him and do a rimshot. The puns were not funny and I was definitely on Pap's side of "oh my GOD shut up." But that fucking zoom in and rimshot was just so fourth wall breaking and unexpected. Fuck, it still gets me. Anyway. Game continues. I again lose my shit at (insane spinning in random directions) "OH MY GOD! IS THAT A HUMAN?" "uh, i think that's a rock." "OH. WAIT! WHAT'S THAT IN FRONT OF THE ROCK?? (IS IT A HUMAN??)" "(yes.)" "OH MY GOD!!!" and still think these two moments in the game are Peak comedy. Oh, and let me tell you, I did not like either of these two at this point. Sans I was like, okay, hes kind of a dumbass in a funny way, but Papyrus is a dumbass in a way that just annoys me. Genuinely the archetype that misses social cues and therefore has miscommunication usually just annoys me to no end. (Mostly for the miscommunication. It's my least favorite trope and makes me unreasonably angry.) But yeah. Wasn't really a fan. But out of everyone so far? Definitely found Sans to be the most tolerable. But that's about all I thought of him lmao.

Getting to Snowdin, with the Papyrus battle, remember how I said I didn't like Papyrus? And yes, this was something I genuinely thought at one point, I genuinely hated Papyrus, imagine that. What a wild world that is. But anyway. You know how his Act menu has the "Flirt" option? I, for no reason, gunned it for the Flirt option, even though I did not want to. Then when he was like "WE'LL GO ON A DATE! LATER!!" i was like yea sure okay lmao. Again, couldn't figure out the Act menu to turn his name yellow, so I fought him, and he was one or two attacks from dying (miraculously) when he ended the battle. I spared him here cause, well, he spared me, it was only fair. Then this guy again is like "ILL BE AT MY HOUSE WHEN YOU WANT TO GO ON THAT DATE!" and i was like haha funny but still turned around to go on the date. Like why? I have no idea. I think I was more like "haha hes probably not gonna be there and its just cause i picked that option and lo and behold there was an actual fucking date. Oh my god. I have never in my life been on a video game date where one party was convinced I was infatuated with them and im here on the other side of the screen like "oh my god make this end i can't stand being around you.???" But still. The date was. Really fucking funny. I wish I could experience it for the first time again like holy shit. There are few playthroughs I did after this where I didn't go on the Pap date, even if I just spedrun through it.

So then you get to Waterfall and Sans is there like "hey wanna go to grillbys" and i was like sure why not so we go there and my choices were fries & ketchup (so i did not get the legendary scene where he chugged a bottle of ketchup, but i sure did my second playthrough, and let me tell you, i was disgusted). But like. This whole experience at grillby's like, the whoopee cushion, him using a comb on his bald ass skull, him just fuckin unapologetically scratching his ass for no reason?? Bro i was like "why the fuck is this guy part of the Tumblr Sexymen™ group ??? He's so ????? Gross???????" and like i still have this question tbh lmao. But like. Okay so he asks you "what do you think of my bro?" And my genuine answer was "uncool" and he was like "hey man sarcasm isnt funny" and can i just mention how like inheritly manipulative sans actually is like fuck he does things like this where he throws your answer the other way a few times and Every time it actually swayed me the other way. Because right here I went. "Oh. Maybe Papyrus is better than I thought." Like holy fuck maybe i should be more aware if something like that can sway my opinion so easily LMAO.

Anyway waterfall i genuinely was very bored of the whole time. I spent like a genuine 20 minutes figuring out the puzzle where you have to talk to a wall and I actually didn't realize you could move the telescope around. What helped me solve it is my friend's advice before I played it. "Inspect everything. Even talk to walls. Trust me." And literally thats how I solved it. But pretty much everything in Waterfall otherwise bored me. I did think it was pretty though, and did enjoy reading the lore, but when it started talking about monster biology my one fear had been realized: oh god, oh fuck. My original species for my own series also has physical Souls and die by turning to dust because they're made entirely of magic. God fuck. My luck, it has to be something popular, so now everyone's gonna think I'm a ripoff. But, at the same time, I do think it helped me understand monster biology (and it helped me come up with the ULR biology) better, because I've put in a lot of thought to existence of a species that exists only by magic and a Soul (which, mine only actually have half a Soul, as a full Soul makes a being immortal, which was also similar to the boss monsters in a way). It definitely made a lot more sense for like, the skeletons n stuff for me, because like my characters are wholly shapeshifters but usually take human form, and while they have "organs" in the places humans would have them, they don't operate. They're just placeholders, because they just live with their Soul. So I've always thought the same with UT monsters, since the skelebros can live without organs, that means so do the rest of the monsters, even if they have animal-like appearances.

Off topic lmao. Back to UT. So, the Undyne fight was kind of the turning point for me. She was pissing me off so much during this whole game and like I was like "if theres another fucking part where I have to run away from her im going to scream." Well, once again, her name wasn't yellow, so I wasn't going to spare her... and, actively, I made the decision to kill her, because I didn't want to deal with her still chasing me later on in the game. It took me a long time to beat her, and when I did, I texted my friend (@cheshiregrinnbuttoneyes ) in excitment like "YES I FINALLY KILLED UNDYNE" and she texted back like "YOU DID WHAT?????" and i was like "i.... Killed Undyne????" she replies, "YOU DONT HAVE TO OMFG WHY" and im like "I DIDN'T HAVE TO?? THERE'S OTHER OPTIONS?????" and shes like "YES OMFG THAT'S LITERALLY THE PREMISE OF THE GAME" and im "WHAT."

So then. I get that call from Papyrus like. "HEY! YOU ME AND UNDYNE SHOULD HANG OUT SOMETIME!"

oh my god the guilt i felt.

alphys on undernet being like "omfg i forgot to watch undyne fight the human. ah ill ask her about it later she never loses <3"

bro. i nearly fuckin cried. i was like. Not to mention I'd gotten the crush question right for Mettaton's quiz in answering Undyne (bc i was like "plz be gay plz be gay") so it fucking cut like a knife what I'd done.

I don't remember when I let myself get passed it. But I do know that the whole story arc between Alphys and Mettaton went way over my head. Like, i know im probs the minority on this, but I adore Alphys, I have since I first met her in game, and like, when Mettaton was like "ALPHYS HAS BEEN LYING TO YOU!" i just went "...nah."

Also, I didnt like mettaton at this point, cause I thought he was being really obnoxious, and then the turn around to betray Alphys really kinda pissed me off.

But like.

Oh my god.

Remember how I said I swapped my opinion on Pap earlier bc of Sans's comment? Yeah that was a pretty fast turnaround, but it still took me a few times.

But the second i saw mettaton ex

I was like

"HIM. HE. HE'S THE ONE I LOVE."

Like, full turnaround from Undyne, I actively refused to kill him. All times I thought he was an asshole? Forgotten. Me thinking he's a selfish prick? Gone. Nada. Nothing. Pure adoration. Suddenly every flaw he had was pushed aside purely from how hot I thought he was. Also, fuckin, im really glad i played this when no one in my house was awake, because I still didn't understand the Act mechanic here, and every time you attack mettaton he has this like moan he does and im like oh my god. stop. omfg.

At the end, too, when there was the calls and everything, when he had his big turnaround, I was just so happy for him I genuinely cried. Also, I had to do his battle probably the most out of everyone's in the game (not including genocide), so when it came around to his battle during the (glitchless) speedruns i did, i was more invested in how fast I could rack up points, cause you need 10k rating points to pass, and I actually did get that before he lost his legs, but apparently he needed to lose those too before you passed lol. Unfortunate.

Anyway after Alphys talked to you and everything, i genuinely went to see if Mettaton was still there, but he wasn't :( so i just went to New Home. I was very ill prepared for the fight against Asgore and the only reason I struggled with it so much was because my only healing items were like. Something that healed like 10 or 12 hp and the snowman piece. I was LV 9 when i finished the game, so like, my HP was pretty high, but i didnt have the G to buy items, so i was pretty much fucked. Yes. I had to eat the snowman to win.

Oh speaking of terrifying shit though. Photoshop flowey? My god. I haven't been afraid of a video game boss so much since I was a little kid. It was like 3 am and i was not prepared for him to just delete my save file and then kill me on repeat, glitching and breaking everything as he pleased. Bruh i was genuinely scared. Like, not even just, "oh yikes :(" or something. Like, crying scared. Lmao im an emotional bitch by nature.

I of course had to restart from the beginning again to get the True Pacifist ending. I was very careful to never touch the Fight button literally ever. And, it actually took me a while to reset, because I hate erasing my original save files, yknow? But, well, as it turned out? While technically New Game+ by naming, resetting doesn't erase everything you did. It wasn't a new file. I was a little confused at first to be honest. Toriel saying things were familiar, remembering things I said, Papyrus and Undyne both recognizing me, like. It was unnerving.

When I got to the end, i had to look up how to get Alphys's date (since my friend told me the way to unlock TP was to go on all the dates, but Alphys's was definitely designed in mind of you turning around from New Home and going back to talk to people rather than a new reset. So after unlocking it, getting through Alphys's date (i still remember being like, verbally, "omg alphys you look so nice??" When she came out with the dress on and then had a thought to myself like... since when do i care about what people look like? since when do i compliment people? At that point, while I didn't consider myself to be a rude person, I definitely wasn't exactly all that concerned about others for anything. Sure, I cared about others' lives, but I tended to be a bit more judgemental internally, and just. Didn't really give a fuck about what people did in the most negative sense possible, unless it involved me. Yet, it rolled off my tongue like it was something id say normally to anyone. I really wonder if this is the true turning point for me this year.)

Getting to the end, with everyone cheering me on. Hoo boy. This was the start of many tears to come. Papyrus's "DO WHAT I WOULD DO! BELIEVE IN YOU!!" sticks with me the most. I wasn't surprised by Flowey's actions, but what fucking threw me for a loop was like. When Flowey was revealed as Asriel, I was genuinely jaw-drop shocked. I was like. Holy fuck. I thought he was dead. What the hell. To this day, though, i still think Hopes and Dreams hits me the hardest out of all the boss battle themes. It doesn't super bother me, bc like, difference in opinion is whatever, but like. Whenever I see Megalovania at the top of someone's ost list for Undertale I'm just... Why? Maybe it's because I'd overheard it meme'd to much before I played the game, but like, i dunno, it's not a bad song, but it's not the most emotional provoking piece for me, so it's pretty far down my list. Hopes and Dreams will still remain my #1.

I really did feel determined during this battle. I really felt a lot of emotion. I felt excited. I felt frightened. I felt ambitious. Asriel's battle is probably still the hardest for me, and yes, I'm counting genocide this time. I can't grasp his magic patterns at all, and I more so played it as a "okay, how much damage can i take? Whats his next move?" As i healed every other turn. It took me a very long time to beat him (though no 11 hours like Sans, this was more like, 2 or 3 max) and when I got to the part with the Lost Souls, most of the characters just said their "we hate you" piece and i was like "nope you're controlled" right.

But then there's Sans's "just give up. i did."

I genuinely had to stop. I set down my controller and just sat for a minute. I'd mentioned before how much I've been struggling with depression for years now, and it's at the worst it's been since high school. Maybe you'd think when I saw that, I was like "sure, maybe I should give up." But... It's really the "i did." that hit me like a rock to the stomach. While I do know a couple other people with depression, the most discussion we have with it is "haha i wanna die" kinda jokes yknow? Nothing really serious. And, well, I've always been the type to lean to fictional characters for support more than real people, since I've just been so disconnected from a lot of friends growing up and was too scared to talk about anything with my family.

So seeing someone else say "just give up. i did." hit me so fucking hard that I just started crying. I had already been in a real sappy mood cause the whole scene was so emotional as it was, even if merely the cliche of friendship will save all, y'know what? Its a good ass fuckin trope and makes me emotional lmao.

So, naturally, I was more hyperaware of Sans's implied depression from here onward. The conversations with everyone post-battle left me crying. God, so did the hug with Asriel. I was just fucking bawling.

Oh god. I didn't even mention. "Despite everything, it's still you." Another line that just hit me and I had to pause.

So admist my crying mess, I was telling my friend I'd beat Undertale again. He asks me "so... you gonna play the genocide route?" And I already had from the beginning. I always want to play every available route in a game. I see no point in paying for something and then not playing it all. I'd consider myself a completionist who doesn't ever actually finish anything lmao.

I definitely put my emotions aside for genocide. The absolute hardest kill for me was Papyrus, though. And i was absolutely fucking heartbroken when he said he still believed me as his last words. But I forced it aside. I didn't want to reset. I wanted to beat it to have it under my belt that I had. I was pretty sure the Sans battle would be here, since I hadn't heard Megalovania in the game yet, and I was aware of how hard the battle was, despite never seeing it.

Undyne's battle I'm more emotional about in retrospect than I was at the time. At the time, I didn't care, didn't like the theme much, and the dings gave me a headache. Undyne isn't exactly my favorite character (though definitely not my least favorite, that role is given to Frisk with Toriel not close behind ahdhsb im sorry), so I really wasn't concerned about it. Not to mention, I don't know why, but all of the battles I struggled with EXCEPT Undyne's I ended up liking the character more as a result. Maybe it was the dinging lmao.

Bro you shoulda seen how prepared I was for Mettaton NEO's battle to be hard as fuck. I was like sitting upright, took deep breaths before hitting fight, then when he died in one shot i just kind of "wh...what." Still very disappointed lol but I guess that's kind of the point of the genocide route.

Then came the Sans fight. As I said, I spent 11 hours on this. I genuinely didn't pay attention to what he said after a while, but I do remember the first time I read it, I was fucking terrified. Usually, sarcasm, hatred, and sass is very hard to convey through pure text, especially when it's said in the same tone as his usual talking. But the absolute harshness, the coldness, and the lack of any fucks given Sans had at that point was so plainly transparent through everything he said that it fucking scared me. Toby Fox's writing here was fantastic. I can only dream of being able to write like that. Frankly, I love his writing in general. Actually, fuck it, I love all of the artistic takes of this game. This is gonna sound weird but... The "childishness" of it just is so good. Like, there's no rules. Every socially accepted rule of art, writing, character design, speech patterns, and even basic grammar are thrown aside. He didn't just think outside of the box, there literally was no box. I call it childish only because like, children also create with no rules. They have no rules to restrict their creativity. And seeing that embraced in Undertale in every form possible just blows me away.

Anyway. The battle. It. Was hard. Thats a given. I spent about two weeks playing it on and off, and it's probably the most healthily I've treated myself in recent memory, because when it became too much for me to handle, I set it down and took a break. I would retain what I memorized and use it for the next time I picked it up. Frankly, it came to a point where every time I opened up Undertale to play, it was more just cause I wanted to see him lmao. The guy hated my existence at this point and it's not like i disacknowledged that. But it just felt like every time i opened the game... Idk. I don't know what I felt. I can tell you for sure this isn't the time when Sans started slipping into my favorite character spot over Mettaton, that didn't come until the development of Act to Flirt's first demo, which was a month or so later lmao.

I was very excited when I beat Sans.

But then, after it was over, I felt very empty.

I didn't feel good about beating genocide. I still don't. I want to play the boss battles again, cause they were really fun, despite how hard they were, but I can't bring myself to.

When I got to Chara, and everything went to black, I just wiped my save and started fresh. I think this was the first time I used the name "Willo" for anything. I just picked a random name to use, and Willo was the first thing that came to mind.

I beat neutral again many times, trying to unlock as many secrets as I could. I accidentally spent like, way too long trying to get Sans's room, because I couldn't figure out how to do it... which is when I started speedrunning the game, because I was just so used to going through it all. I timed myself once, and I got somewhere around 1:20:00 ish, which puts me at the very bottom of the NG+ Glitchless runs by like 30 minutes, but hey, it's still not too bad all things considered.

I'd started working on Act to Flirt sometime in between the speedruns. I was playing Papyrus's date again, and I had this thought of. What if Undertale... but all boss fights are instead like Papyrus's date?? I pitched the idea to my friend who was like "thats definitely been done before lol" and immediately I almost shut down the idea. But then I still had that glimmer of hope that, maybe, since I haven't made it yet, people would like my game because it was by me. Besides, quarantine was getting to me. I needed some way to spend my time. So on May 6th to May 7th, I spent the whole 24 hour period making the first proof of concept for the game, which was UI setup and Flowey's tutorial date. I hadn't made any of the art yet, so it was a black background with Flowey's undertale sprite. I originally was going to make everything more visual novel like in the sense that, so like on Papyrus's date, you could make choices like "unwrap the present" "dont unwrap the present" or "you look great" "you look terrible" and getting the ending would involve pretty much just saying the right things at the right times. But this alone was... Yknow, already done before, and part of what makes Undertale so great is that it's, despite its many outside influences, very unique in its gameplay. So I decided to make the dates more like puzzle-solving RPG's, and frankly, since doing that, I dont know if I want to go back to making other visual novels lmao.

After making the first demo and releasing it, I hit a creative funk. I wanted to make the next demo right away, but I forced myself to stop (since i was working 16+ hour days to finish it in exactly a week. I didn't eat much and i slept very little during this time too. Dont do this lmao). I didn't know if the game would be received, and frankly, I'd had many failed projects in the past due to lack of support. I lost a lot of support in the past due to the dropped projects I kept starting and quitting because I had such a small audience, and that made me lose a lot of interest and motivation to work on them. So I posted the first demo and waited. I was very shocked to have a YouTuber with over a million subs play it that weekend. Dantekris I think was her channel name. She speaks Russian, and I never understood a word she said, but I've still watched her let's plays because I enjoy seeing her reactions. I hate that YouTube keeps deleting my responses on her videos, probably because they're long and in English so it's marked as spam on a comments section full of purely Russian comments yknow. But it makes me feel like such an ass ;w;

Mairusu is the next large YouTuber who played it and my god I love seeing when he uploads a new update for my game because I genuinely have no idea what to expect from him. I don't know what it is but he's just so absolutely funny to me. He also seems to be the most common breaker of my game though. Stop making your own bugs!! I try to testplay to find the bugs he gets and it's like.... what did you do.... how did you skip that whole date im so confused thats not supposed to happen..... He accidentally skipped all of Muffet's date because of this too and hers is supposed to be the hardest in the game right now so I'm very upset by it;; i dont know how it happened, it never happens for me.

But like. I was definitely struggling a bit with the direction I wanted to take AtF. I wanted there to be a core message, like with Undertale and many other of my favorite things. When there's a core theme to write about, it makes things a lot easier to compose than if you have a plot with no meaning to it. It ties it all together for a common purpose. But, as I started diving more into the fandom around this time, finding not only it being still alive but still enormous and filled with passion.

Passion. Hm. That's familiar. That's the trait I gave the player character, rather than determination. While it was intended for giggles "haha dating game u have passion wink wonk," it started becoming more than that. It started becoming a manifestation of what I really felt upon finally soaking myself into the deep end of this pool I'd once been too afraid to step into. Passion. Everyone here is so driven by their passion for this game, the characters, its story. Everyone is so inspired and creative. That's it. That's what I wanted Act to Flirt to be.

A game made for those who have already dived deep into Undertale. A game made for those who have the same level if passion I've wittnessed. A game that someone might stumble upon, merely wanting any Undertale content they can find, and a dating sim leaves them grasping at straws, only to find it's a game instead deeply rooted in how much they care about this world and its people. You have a Soul of Passion, because your passion for Undertale brought you to this game. That's what the core message is. Every ending is supposed to depict different kinds of empathy, and True Passion shows you truly cared the most you could for all of these characters. Sans is so blocked from it because, well, how can he really believe it? "if we're really friends, you won't come back," right? But here you are. Again and again.

And Heartbreak. Whose heart is really the one breaking here? Taking the Hopes and Dreams of every single character you've grown to care for and crushing it beneath your feet... who is the one suffering in the end?

I just... I'm very excited. I've written that game with the player as the main character. Not Willo. Not Frisk. Not anybody else. You, the player, are the main character. I've honestly done a lot of looking around in the DDLC code to make this game as 4th wall breaking as I can (without like. Disrupting it as a game experience like ddlc is, with monika deleting things and stuff). Just enough to leave the player unsettled and confused. Like. "Me? Are you talking to me?" Yes. You. Directly to you.

I started sketching out designs and ideas for ULR around July. I genuinely loved Underlust after finding out about it, even though it was posed to me as an insult about the contents of Act to Flirt. I was both like "uh... Act to Flirt is nothing like this. Maybe in reversed roles at best but..." and also "okay but this? This shit is good. Thank you." But finding out it was discontinued and wanting more, well, that's when I decided to make ULR. I presented the idea to my friends, who were like "please stop making aus," and then continued onward. I told myself I wasn't going to work on it though until after I finished Act to Flirt... Then after the next demo came out... Then it turned out I was working on it too much and it resulted in me rushing my release of the 3rd demo of AtF because I'd been so distracted I was going to miss my release deadline of the end of August, before school. I... Still kinda regret that a lot. It's still very buggy. Though I hope I got them all for the next demo...

But speaking of school .... ha... Remember when i said i was going to transfer to another school? Well, I did, and for the first few weeks it was fine! Then I started skipping assignments I didn't want to do. Then I started panicking about my low grades. Then I started getting behind on assignments. Then I stopped going to classes. Then I lost all motivation to work on anything at all. I just locked myself in my room and did next to nothing with the occasional drawing here and there, for weeks. It came to the point where I was like "I just have to get through this semester, then I'll drop out." But if I ever wanted to go back to school, having all F's on my last report card would not bode well for my acceptance. Which lead to more stress. I didn't want to fail, but I also didn't have any motivation to work. I would do one assignment here or there, feel good about myself, then realize I was still months behind on work and suddenly oh god oh fuck finals are next week. And my solution? I just. Fuckin dropped out. Oh my god. It was such a relief to just get that weight off my shoulders that I'd been carrying for months on end, preventing me to do anything I wanted to work on.

Well. Then my car tires died. So that's a thing. But good news! Between commissions and gifts, I have enough money to get them replaced! I don't think I've ever like... Been so excited about that before.

And, well. Now I'm here, pretty much. God, I just went through my entire year summary, and it feels like it was both forever long but also not long at all. I don't get it. 2021 still feels like a far off future, despite the fact I'm now 5 hours into it. Yes, I spent 4 hours writing this. Whoops. Oh well. I couldn't sleep anyway, so it's not that big of a deal.

All in all though... Despite being locked inside, away from my friends, unable to talk to anyone about the things i was enjoying, and living in fear of getting sick at all ever with anything, 2020 definitely fuckin changed me for the better. It was a hellhole of a year and I'd never do it again or wish it upon my worst enemy, but I came out a better person... I think. I hope.

It seems cliche to bring back but fuck it. Undertale? My friend insists its core message was that anyone can be a good person if they just try, which I mean, it definitely probably was intended that way. But that never was the message I felt while playing it.

What lesson I took from it was "things aren't always as they seem."

Flowey betrays you immediately, but then you find out he's just the remnants of a boy who died years ago and is still grieving over the loss of his best friend, whomst, despite how much he cares for them, recognizes they weren't good to him and he'd been manipulated and used by them.

Toriel is a kind and caring woman, a still grieving mother over the loss of her children, who seems to have kindness to no end, but is actually filled with such hatred and depression that she regularly gets drunk, swears, and still, without resilience, hates her ex husband.

Sans is a playful character who is full of puns, a gross atmosphere, and decided to break physics just because he can. He's the embodiment of a comic relief character. But at the same time, he's suffering, struggling, in constant pain and worry. He's lazy, but quick on his feet. He's harmless but will kill without hesitation if need be. He's both caring and the least caring of them all.

Papyrus is like... a self-centered asshole in a way, when you first meet him. He prides himself and everything he does. Yet still, he's actually quite open and accepting and loves everyone. He loves talking with and being with other people, even if maybe sometimes he has a different interpretation of social interaction from the "norm."

Undyne comes off as cruel and deadly, such even being emphasized in many points. But, deep down, she's extremely caring for those who are close to her, and her only cruelty is dealt to those who have wronged her in some way.

Alphys is a sweet and nervous wreck who comes off as helpful and lacking a filter due to her tendency to ramble. She seems to be merely anxious due to likely social anxiety... But you eventually find out that she's a liar who merely wants to create a world to be a better place, and by doing so, she pretends all the bads do not exist.

Mettaton comes off as an absolute self-centered asshole. Like. There's no way around that. He seemingly has no regard for other people with only full intentions of helping himself. But, deep down, he actually cares a lot for other people, especially his family and friends, and just tends to get caught up in things while he's in the moment.

Muffet seems to be greedy with how much money she begs people to give her for the spiders, but, as it turns out, she's flat broke and drops no G when you beat or kill her. She merely needs the money to help the spiders.

Asgore, too, is built up to be this ruthless killer throughout the whole game, and when you finally meet him, he's an incredibly sweet guy who's only filled with regret, and because of his past decisions, has decided to put aside his hopes for the sake of his people.

I...

Didn't see any of these characters for who they really were right away. Why would I? Few of these archetypes are explored much in a lot of fiction lately, or at least what I've been consuming; and is more focused around how someone can change their flaws into something positive... Not how to accept someone for who they are, despite the wrongs they may have committed or the lives they lead. Everyone's different. Everyone's grown up differently. Everyone has a reason for what they do.

And it took me playing this game to realize such a simple concept that I probably should have learned years ago.

That's why I really think 2020 changed me for the better. I made a realization that I should have had many years ago, and it's made me a lot more confident in expressing myself, accepting people for what they do, and seeing the brighter side to everything. I say that, sitting here filled with nothing and void of all emotion whatsoever... But it's a conscious thought i have. My emotions are so weird... They're either on full blast or I feel nothing at all. But yet I have... Thoughts of what i should feel? It's weird. Idk. This is why I'm getting therapy LMAO

But yea. 2020? Fuck you. But also thank you. But mostly fuck you and good riddance lmao

#zircon rambles #a lot #lol #its very long im sorry #i spent way too long writing this too #also please don't reblog this

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exit-path · 3 years

Text

My Upcoming Personal Demon List

Hi guys! Huh, I guess GD has really been bleeding into this blog. Well I thought about getting all my GD demons I’m expecting to beat down on a Tumblr post, so here it is.

You might be wondering what a “personal demon list” is, and where it deviates from the “Demonlist”. And that’s a good question.

The Pointercrate Demonlist is the list of the hardest levels in the game. It’s the Main Thing™. People come here to see what the hardest levels in the game are, or to find extreme demons to beat.

[Image Description: a screenshot of the Pointercrate Demonlist. The top 4 hardest levels are visible, as well as a list of list moderators.]

On the other hand, a person’s “demon list” is their own personal list of demons, once they get skilled enough to do that. While most people know about the Demonlist, few people have one of these personal lists.

It’s usually a spreadsheet, where some people only put the demons they’re planning to beat or have heard of, while others (like this person) just have a list of all the demons in the game and mark them in green once they’re done.

[Image Description: an example of someone’s demon list. This one is by Wod.]

For my list, I’m only going to say levels I’m definitely going to try and beat in the future. Before we continue, here are some useful timeframes of the game:

Update 1.6: early 2014

Update 1.8: late 2014

Update 1.9: 2014–2015

Update 2.0: 2015–2017

(the current update is 2.1)

So without further ado, let’s go!

1. “Twilight Step V2” by blackPS2full

youtube

A 1.6 insane demon, “Twilight Step V2” was made by blackPS2full, the same person who made “Alphabet X”. In fact this level is supposedly harder than Alphabet X (although to me it doesn’t feel that way).

It’s a remake of another 1.6 level called “Twilight Step” by ZenthicAlpha, although that was a medium demon and this is an insane demon. Twilight Step V2 fell off the demonlist in June 2016, after staying on it for two years.

I actually picked this level up two weeks ago, and I’m SO CLOSE to beating it. I got 98% three times. Expect a 100% post coming somewhat soon. It’s not even that hard. (Sorry SrGuillester from 2015, no offense)

2. “Rupture” by Jekko

youtube

This is the first hard level that actually feels menacing. “Rupture” is a 1.9 insane demon by Jekko. Paradoxically, it’s the easiest one on this list, having fallen off the demonlist in January or February 2016.

It’s most well-known not for the level itself, but for the insane reactions by the player “Cold”, who beat the level as its second legit victor. (Warning: take caution if you watch this video and you sympathize easily, as it will make you feel lots of despair.)

3. “XYZ Step Infinity” by Orca SN

youtube

This is a really weird level. For its difficulty, “XYZ Step Infinity” by Orca SN is pretty unknown, and is actually the most disliked insane demon at over 10K dislikes.

That might be because it’s a remake of an easier demon, “XYZ Step” by Cole. Compared to that popular easy demon, this 1.6 level is unrelenting and annoying, having been updated sometime in the last 4 years to its current buffed state.

4. “El Dorado” by LmAnubis

youtube

“El Dorado” is a 2.0 insane demon by LmAnubis that’s really menacing because although it doesn’t get fast, it gets really fucking tight. It’s a top-tier timing demon.

It’s also themed too, where you wander through an overgrown jungle until you reach the famed golden “El Dorado” kingdom. This level fell off the demonlist in March 2016.

5. “Acropolis” by Zobros

youtube

“Acropolis” is a 1.9 insane demon by Zobros that’s the original slow, tight menacing demon. I get claustrophobic just looking at this. It’s a high-quality timing demon that still holds up today, just like the previous level.

Speaking of which, starting with “El Dorado” I think I get to chill. Because compared to some of the other demons I’ve beaten, El Dorado is supposedly easier than “Alphabet X” or even “Endorphin”, not to mention Acropolis should be even easier than that.

6. “Necropolis” by IIINePtunEIII

youtube

Now we’re getting into the harder levels. “Necropolis” is a 1.8 insane demon by IIINePtunEIII that’s known for its menacing aura, how old of an update it was built in, and its famous creator.

Themed around death, this level didn’t fall off the demonlist until October 2017. That’s so long in the future that the demonlist was extended to 100 demons by the time this fell off.

7. “Creeper Force” by CreeperMILK

youtube

I might beat this level. MAYBE. I might skip this level and go straight to the next one, but in case I’m doubtful, I might beat this level to assure myself that I have enough skill to beat the next one.

“Creeper Force” by CreeperMILK is named after exactly what you think it is. In respond to Minecraft hitting its cultural peak in 2013–2014, RobTop decided to add a creeper icon in Update 1.8 as the reward you get when you beat the newest 16th level, “Hexagon Force”.

In 2014 someone grabbed the “CreeperMILK” username, and they built one of the hardest levels in the game with it. This 1.9 insane demon just so happened to use the song “Hexagon Force” as well. Creeper Force fell off the demonlist in May 2018.

8. “ICE Carbon Diablo X” by roadbose

youtube

This is it. The ultimate goal. This isn’t just one of the of hardest demons in the game—it was the hardest level in the game, from November 9, 2014 to January 3, 2015, the day Cataclysm was released.

“ICE Carbon Diablo X” is a 1.6 EXTREME demon by roadbose known for being once the hardest level in the game. And it is my ultimate goal—if I can beat this level, then it will be the hardest thing I ever beat. I cannot beat anything harder than this.

By now this level is not even close to being the achievement it once was. This fell off the demonlist in June 2018—ridiculously close to the modern day. But at the time of its release there was almost no doubt about this being impossible.

[Image Description: a screenshot of the GD Fan Wiki article on ICE Carbon Diablo X. A section of Trivia is highlighted which reads, “This level was once thought to be borderline impossible until Update 1.9 when Riot completed it.”]

Well, that’s my personal demon list for now. I’ll make mental changes to this list as they come and go, but for now, until next time! 👋

#peysi talks #geometry dash #long post #flashing tw

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pochapal · 3 years

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rank every year of the 2010s from best to worst i want some pochapal lore

[warning for discussion of my fucked up mental health and my myriad traumas. we’re really opening the pandora’s box here gang]

ok time for me to overshare on the internet again! super long post because i can’t shut up and you asked for it. anyway, by objective ranking:

#1: 2012 - halcyon era, my personal peak. spent the whole year writing hunger games oc fics with my deviantart fanfiction besties whom i still think about all the time and always hope are having the best possible day. if you were here for this era understand i still hold you so closely and dearly in my heart <3.

#2: 2013 - god i was such a good example of a human being back then. was the year my writing like actually took off and i had a healthy balance between creative stuff and a social life (said social life consisting of spending lunchtimes at school breaking into classrooms and discussing fandom shit with five other people. reading homestuck updates in the music room on one person’s really shaky mobile data...legendary). highlight of the year and maybe my life was in the april of 2013 when i got out of failing to submit a hard deadline essay by telling my english teacher i wrote a whole novel over the two week break and then producing said novel. god i wish i had that level of like. fucking confidence back me back then knew what i wanted and how to get it.

#3: 2010 - the last year of childhood. i was 12 and played pokemon all the time with my friends and went places and had a moderately successful youtube channel and it didn’t matter that i was bullied so badly at school because i was basically high off life. summer of 2010 was so good specifically. i’d used to get the bus with a friend and go see movies and break into historical sites and get into normal childhood mayhem and maxed out my pokewalkers twice a month and i was buzzed because i had two (2) whole friendship groups to choose from and that was such a huge deal to me the terminal social outcast. it was so simple and carefree and even though everything and everyone involved in this era grew up to suck except for one specific person i kinda really miss it.

#4: 2018 - this was the first year i wasn’t depressed to the point of nonfunctioning. it was 20gayteen, i was on antidepressants, i was as close to thriving as i got at uni (going into town with people once a week, attending art and culture events, getting good grades across the board), i started to write for fun again, i got my cat whom i love dearly, i was exhibited in my uni’s city’s literature festival, GOD i actually nearly attended a pride event that year can you imagine. this year was basically my life’s second peak. miss getting the 8am train and daintily sipping on a cherry coke to keep me from passing out. wish this time could have lasted longer.

#5: 2019 - kinda absolute middle of the road year not for lack of anything happening but because the overwhelming amount of good and bad things cancelled each other out. so like there’s the fact that i was at the top of my uni game this year, was basically making the first steps into a professional writing career (covid i will never forgive you for killing all that dead </3), finally saved up enough to buy myself a gaming pc, and the summer after the homestuck epilogues, but equally 2019 was the start of the Pochapal Gender Fiasco which is by far the most horrible thing i am still currently undergoing and i burnt myself out mentally about halfway through the year (being stuck overnight in a hospital for a panic attack absolutely horrible horrible irredeemable) and then got like super death plague flu that i was sick with for three months (literally recovered less than a month before rona hit. god’s cruel karma.). so like...it kind of averaged out? the good shit was good but not as great as other years and the bad shit was awful but nowhere near as terrible as it could have been. gotta give a shoutout to 90% of my current mutual cohort for following me in 2019...omelette route gang make some noise !!

#6: 2014 - oof. this year essentially marked the start of a four year long downward mental health spiral because everything fell into awful alignment. i’d just turned 16, finished secondary school, had all my friends up and ditch me at once, was home alone for a whole summer, and was hit with Sudden Intense Body Image Issues that i couldn’t explain until uh. after very recent developments lmao. this one goes out to the me of july 2014 who did nothing but lay in bed and listen to the same two marina albums on a loop because fuck i’m attracted to men and also my facial and body hair are really starting to come in and if i think about this for too long i will literally kill myself because oh god i can’t handle getting older which is clearly and definitely the issue going on here. my brain fucking broke super hardcore and it’s a miracle that an overeating disorder was like the worst thing i walked away with.

#7: 2015 - downward spiral year two!! i was so volatile this year it was such a mess. i was totally socially isolated after a brief stint of falling in with a group of people at the start of my first year of sixth form until january where in quick succession a) it turned out every single one of these people was friends with the person who sexually assaulted me whom i obviously had a lot of complicated feelings towards and b) baby’s first crush came out as bisexual but in the “women and also trans women” kind of way which tore me up so terribly in ways i couldn’t begin to understand. no words for the experience of seeing a girl kiss a boy and crying so hard at night you threw up because you could never be her no matter how much you wanted it. actually kinda get the sense what was going on there was bigger than just some crush lmao. then after that i was so mentally ill i basically attended school less than half the time and it was the only year in my life i failed my exams. i ended up having to resit my entire set of first year a level exams because jesus christ was i in such a bad way it was a miracle i even showed up to them. all i did was either have anxiety attacks or enter bedbound depressive slumps for weeks at a time. but it’s okay because it gets worse.

#8: 2016 - downward spiral act iii: the spiralling. prefacing this by saying that i actually had two whole good months (april - may) in that i was functioning enough to do my exams and finish school with decent grades. the rest was super extra mega terrible. my school attendance for year 13 dipped below 65% and literally the only thing that kept me from being kicked out was the fact that i was naturally smart at the subjects i took and also because the school would have a lot to answer for after letting me get to that state despite having a hefty file on how damaged i was. keep in mind every single part of this was fully untreated btw - i was just floundering around and letting it all fester. i spent three solid weeks going to school but locking myself in the bathroom all day every day and having mental health episodes then going home like nothing else happened only to continue the breakdown that night. then things got kicked into fucked up overdrive when i moved out to uni and was cut off from what little support structures i did have. it was so bad all i did was cry all the time and never went anywhere to the point where three separate sources recommended me to the wellbeing and crisis counselling service that i stopped going to after two sessions because i was fucked up in ways cbt techniques could not even touch. at least i tried to make an effort for the first two months of uni which like. good for me?

#9: 2017 - what lieth at the base of the spiral. helltrench year. i was at literal rock bottom. i stopped going to class, i didn’t hand in a single piece of work. i lied to my parents and would book trains each day only to go back to my student flat and sit there and contemplate suicide. like i would just slump on the floor in a catatonic state and vividly contemplate one of four or so ways i could end my own life. i only didn’t because i wanted to wait until the summer to collect my last student loan and transfer it to my parents as an apology for my death which obviously didn’t end up happening. honestly i can’t remember much of the first half of 2017 that’s how bad it was. i remember taking a gender studies class and the teacher made it Weird that i was the Only Male Student in the room and then she sent me a scolding email after i walked out halfway through a class and never returned. apparently i got into a lot of online discourse in this year but i don’t remember anything other than being put on a blocklist by the milkfic author over ace discourse which is funny if you have the context. mostly i just baited terfs and weirdo freaks to get them to say horrible things to me as what i guess amounts to some kind of digital self harm. anyway breaking point came in late august when i got kicked out of university and then nobody could ignore it any more so there was no choice left but for me to seek out help and recover enough to function which luckily i did. i really Do Not remember 2017. you could tell me anything about that year and i’d probably believe you.

#10: 2011 - extra circle of hell for this little fucked up gem of a year. on the surface it wasn’t actually that terrible, until the Summer 2011 Domino Effect Of Bad Shit. up until like may/june it was a pretty all right year! i was 13 and had a surprisingly successful youtube channel uploading pokemon soundfont remixes to an audience of i think ~350-400 subscribers at my peak? anyway then i got hit with the early summer triple combo of childhood friends moving away, cute and quirky sexual assault at the hands of a person in my friend group, and then having some Really Great and Super Appropriate interactions with adults on deviantart. like obviously there’s the actual ptsd-inducing event which totally disrupted and killed the person i was right up until that moment and reshaped every facet of my life for better or worse (there’s an alternate timeline where that didn’t happen and i got into electronic music and/or coding instead) but really it’s the events that followed in its wake which were kind of more fucked up. so like all of a sudden i was super aware of my body and me growing my hair out and being mistaken for a girl in class suddenly became this Less Innocent thing and i ended up spending hours overnight going to transgender questioning forums and looking up hrt timeline videos and having the wikipedia article on tracheal shaving saved because it was a life raft to me whose voice was imminently gonna deepen and i was simultaneously reeling with constant trauma flashbacks and the whole thing was so so fucked up. then i was on deviantart and i don’t remember exactly how but a small group of furry guys ten to fifteen years older than me started messaging me and encouraging and requesting me to produce nonsexual fetish stuff for them and talking to me about stuff like if i’d ever thought about growing up to be gay and i didn’t think anything of it for a long while because they called me a very talented writer and it felt so good to have someone be nice to me after being so alone and isolated for months on end. anyway the only reason i got out of that before it got bad was because they invited me to one of the big furry sites and i was weirded out because i thought it was a porn site and thinking about sexual stuff was a huge trauma trigger so i just ended up blocking them all and pretending like it didn’t happen. at the time half this shit didn’t bother me but in retrospect holy fuck 2011 was such a damaging year. to think if like three events didn’t happen i wouldn’t be the fucked up mess you see before you today.

god fuck this turned out super long but i’m not apologising because this was a therapeutic exercise for me and also constitutes as one of the biggest pochapal lore dumps of all time. come get your food or whatever.

#Anonymous #long post #read all of this if you have vested interest in knowing intimate details about my life or whatever

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sadaboutniall · 4 years

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something about you;

introduction | masterlist | tag | wattpad

Seventeen. April, 2015.

‘Hey, has everyone got a minute to talk?’

Harry pokes his head around the corner into the dressing room and Niall, who had been lying back on the couch scrolling aimlessly through Twitter, nods, kicking his feet down off the couch to make room for Harry. On the other side of the room, Louis picks up the football he’d been kicking at the wall, and Liam puts his phone down, too. It’s still a little weird, being a foursome—Niall always finds himself feeling like someone is missing.

‘Great show tonight,’ Harry starts, taking the spot Niall’d cleared for him. They’re in Dubai, the final show of this leg. Ahead of them the boys have two months free before kicking things off again in Cardiff. Niall’s already thinking about sleep.

‘Was sick, yeah,’ says Louis, skeptical already. ‘Have you got something you actually want to say, or?’

‘Yeah, yeah,’ Harry sits up straight, runs a hand through his hair. It’s getting way too long and Niall keeps finding random strands of it all over the place, but it suits him, at least. ‘I just feel like—well, I feel like things are going really fucking brilliantly for us right now.’

‘Okay…’ Louis doesn’t look convinced. Niall bites back a laugh.

‘I mean, we’re on top of the fucking world’ Harry runs his hand through his hair again. ‘And I just think… wouldn’t it be a better idea to quit while we’re ahead?’

The sun is rising in Dubai and Niall is drunk. After Harry’s suggestion—which seemed more like a decision he’d already made for all four of them, really—he and Louis went out, just the two of them, to celebrate, to mourn. They did shots high above the city, in some exclusive sky bar that looked identical to every other exclusive sky bar Niall’s done shots in over the past few years. They screamed over loud, thumping music and Niall made out with a stranger in the lounge in the back for a little while, letting her kiss down his neck while the room spun around him. They held up their drinks and cheersed to what they lost, to the impossible, beautiful, improbability of the last five years. They stumbled into a cab as the sun began to peek over the horizon, Louis reeking of smoke and alcohol, Niall feeling like the entire world was about to fall out from under him.

And now he’s here, lying on his back in the middle of a massive bed in an indistinguishably expensive hotel room in an indistinguishably expensive city that just happens, this time, to be Dubai, staring up at the ceiling. He can’t help but think about the fact that his entire life is over.

He doesn’t know what comes after this, if anything. He doesn’t know what’s left for him, if anything. Harry’s got a solo career in the pipeline, Niall can tell that much, and Louis is the best songwriter he knows, and Liam has a better voice than Niall could ever dream of having. There won’t be space for all four of them, plus Zayn. There won’t be anything left for Niall.

Slowly it dawns on Niall that this could be it for him—that he’s already lived his best years, that it’s all downhill from here. He peaked as a teenager and wasted it all, completely unaware. He’s going to have to live the rest of his life thinking about what he lost.

Niall bolts upright in a sudden burst of nausea, sure he’s going to throw up all the alcohol in his system. He makes it to the bathroom in record time but relief doesn’t come—instead he hunches over the bowl on his knees, forehead pressed to the cool porcelain to keep himself from overheating, for what feels like hours. He dry heaves a few times, his body convulsing painfully and, eventually, tears prickling at the corners of his eyes from the physical effort of it all. His heart hammers like a thunderstorm and every move feels like running a marathon, every breath like a pathetic triumph.

Eventually his knees protest painfully and he forces himself to stand up, one hand on the sink for support, the other holding his throbbing head. Body prickling with heat, oversensitivity, pain, Niall makes his way back to the massive bed and strips down. Lying on his back in the middle of it once again, he realizes belatedly that he’s just had a panic attack.

He wonders if the rest of his life is going to be like this.

It takes him a few moments of wallowing in self-pity to realize what he’s feeling. It hasn’t happened to him in a few months, and he wasn’t expecting it now, of all times. Now, when his entire life is falling apart. Now, when nothing is working and he needs to come up with a Plan B that he’s never had. Now, when he feels like the world is ending.

All he wants to do is call Isla.

In the logical part of his brain—which feels like it’s quickly dying—Niall knows he shouldn’t. He knows this isn’t fair. He knows Isla deserves better.

On the emotional side, he doesn’t give a shit.

He gropes around the bed for his phone, finds it buried under the folds of the duvet, and dials. He doesn’t let himself think about what he’s doing.

‘Niall?’ Isla sounds a million miles away. Belatedly, Niall realizes that she is. ‘Are you okay? What’s going on?’

‘Happy birthday,’ he says. Talking makes his head spin.

‘My birthday is in January. It’s April.’ Isla sounds annoyed, and Niall hears a door open, then close, on her side of the world.

‘Yeah, well, I didn’t call you then so I figured I’d tell you now.’

‘Are you drunk?’ The sound of a faucet turning on.

‘A bit,’ Niall admits, closing his eyes. He wishes he had it in him to get up and close the blinds, too. ‘A lot.’

‘I can tell,’ a click, Isla turning on an electric kettle. ‘Thank you for the birthday wishes, but we probably shouldn’t be doing this.’

‘Why not?’ Niall turns his head, presses his cheek into the pillow to block out some of the rising sun.

‘Well, for starters, it’s four in the morning in London,’ says Isla, and Niall feels a pang of guilt, on top of the anxiety. ‘And my boyfriend is sleeping, so.’

‘Right,’ Niall slurs, squeezing his eyes shut tighter. ‘Sorry to wake him.’

‘It’s not that,’ Isla’s pacing around her kitchen, Niall can tell from the sounds of the floorboards underneath her. She sighs. ‘Sorry I said it like that. That was shitty of me.’

‘S’alright. You’re not wrong.’

‘Where are you? You sound a mess, are you somewhere safe?’

‘Yeah, Dubai. I’m in my hotel room.’

‘Is it not, like, seven in the morning in Dubai?’ Niall can hear Isla pouring the kettle. He wonders if she’s making one cup or two. ‘Why are you drunk at seven in the morning?’

‘Not gone to sleep yet,’ Niall says around a yawn, his heart rate finally starting to settle down. ‘Went out last night.’

Isla hums, and Niall can imagine her, the way she curls in on herself when she’s got a fresh cup of tea, holds it against her chest to breathe in the warmth. He thinks of her on the couch, in a flat he’s only seen tiny pictures of on Instagram, phone sandwiched between her ear and her shoulder, wearing that Derby jumper he gave her a century ago. She says, ‘it was a good night, then?’

‘No,’ Niall admits, without even thinking about it. ‘We broke up.’

‘Oh,’ Isla coughs a little, then: ‘I didn’t know you were seeing someone. I’m sorry to hear that.’

‘No, no,’ Niall shakes his head into the pillow, even though she can’t see him. ‘Not seeing anyone. The band.’

‘The—what? The band broke up?’

‘Yeah,’ he doesn’t have it in him, he thinks, to explain the stupid hiatus idea right now. He’s so fucking tired. ‘But don’t say anything. We’re not announcing it yet, like.’

‘I won’t,’ Isla promises, but Niall already knows she would never. He lets her carry on: ‘Maybe it’s a good thing, though. You deserve some time to rest. You could work on some golf stuff, or write your own music, even?’

‘Dunno that anyone wants to hear my own music.’ It feels okay to say it to Isla, to let it out of his racing mind and into the space between then. He knows she won’t throw it back at him. ‘Dunno where I go from here.’

‘I’m interested,’ says Isla. Niall hears her slurp at her tea on the other end of the phone.

‘You’re interested in everything I do.’

‘Not true. I really don’t give a shit about golf. Like, at all.’

Niall laughs, and it’s a shooting pain behind his eyes and in his head, but he feels better for it. His mouth is dry, and his stomach is starting to grumble. He thinks he might be feeling a bit more human. ‘Maybe if you gave it a shot.’

‘Don’t want to, if I’m honest. Maybe you should give going to sleep a shot.’

‘S’why I called ya,’ Niall yawns again. ‘Talk to me about law or something. Bore me to sleep, Boyne.’

But Isla doesn’t answer right away. Instead, Niall hears the phone jostling, muffled speaking, a deep, tired, masculine voice. He hears his own name, a quiet sigh, retreating footsteps. Bile rises in his throat again.

‘Sorry,’ Isla’s voice is full volume again. ‘Listen, Niall, I should go. It’s really late. Or early, whatever, and you’re drunk. And this is… we can’t keep doing things like this.’

‘What do you mean, doing things like this?’ There’s a flame of aggression in his stomach—not aimed toward Isla, but toward Jack, who he’s sure is the reason she’s hanging up so quickly. ‘We haven’t spoken in ages.’

‘I know, I know, but. This… this thing, Niall. Always coming back to each other. We’ve got to move on.’

‘I’m not—’

‘I’m sorry, Niall,’ Isla sounds small. He thinks of her, back in school, stressed about exams and uni. ‘I shouldn’t have picked up. Take a sleeping pill and make sure you drink a load of water. You’ll feel better in the morning.’

‘Isla—’

‘Whatever comes after this, it’ll be the right thing for you. You’re brilliant, Niall, you really are,’ he can hear Isla standing up, moving the phone away from her ear. ‘Sleep well.’

She hangs up.

Fourteen hours later, Niall wakes up. He has a headache, a dry mouth, a sore chest, and one, singular text.

Isla (9:49am): Let me know when you wake up so I know you’re okay. You’ll be grand. Xx

He flips his phone over, screen pressed into the mattress. He needs to take a shower. He needs to eat. He needs to get laid.

He needs to fall out of love with Isla.

####

taglist: @stylishmuser @thicksniall @stayclose-holdsteady @niallhoranruinsme @ajayque @flickerswinehouse @1dfangirls35 @crocodileniall @halfpinthoran @awomanindeniall @booksncoffee @edgeofmyniall @kare38

join the taglist here

#one direction #1dff #one direction fan fiction #niall horan #niall horan fic #niall horan fan fiction #niall horan imagine #niall #something about you #woooooo ok #we're moving I promise!!#thank you as always to rand for helping me fix the end of this!!

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houseofarmanto · 4 years

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hellooo love 💕 favorite season? some favorite places you’ve been to or would like to visit? early mornings or late nights? a song to listen to on a long bus ride? one book you love? something you’re proud of achieving this year? first thing that comes to mind when you hear the word ‘wish’? if you could relive something again for the first time what would it be?

.alice you sweetheart!! thanks for ensuring that this ask game does not flop 😭💓

favorite season? i love spring, seasons changing are just so beautiful. everything comes to life again. every sun ray on your skin feels extra warm after the cold winter. there is this special smell in the air. it’s an overall hopeful time.

some favorite places you’ve been to or would like to visit? my favorite places are definitely korea and japan. food & culture are the obvious reasons why they are great places to visit. especially for me as an asian woman, who grew up in a country where very few people look like myself, it is always an endearing but also heartbreaking experience to be somewhere where you look like most people and also feel safe. places that i would like to visit, once it is possible again, are hong kong and taiwan.

early mornings or late nights? late nights. if it were up to me, i would prefer working in the still of the night because my for some unknown reason my creativity and alertness peak around 1am.

a song to listen to on a long bus ride? first song that came to mind is thees uhlmann - zum laichen und sterben ziehen die fische den fluss hinauf it’s an upbeat song about a feeling of instability and longing, and the search for one’s home

one book you love? on earth we're briefly gorgeous by ocean voung. his writing is effortless and beautiful. and the story really resonates with me.

something you’re proud of achieving this year? finally graduating (although that was in nov’19, but the actual ceremony was in january this year, austria is kinda weird like that lol) and finding a job in my field

first thing that comes to mind when you hear the word ‘wish’? “i wish that i could love myself”, immediately got reflection stuck in my head and also have to think about the concert where rm changed the lyrics to “yes, i do love myself” 🥺

if you could relive something again for the first time what would it be? to be honest i really debated if i should answer it with something deep and meaningful like falling in love but actually my truest desire would be reliving seeing bts the first time. the excitement, joy and pure happiness i felt will be forever treasured. anonymously (or not) ask me any question you’d like to know about me

#jiminswn #so moots love #ask game

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nomattertheoceans · 4 years

Note

The 100?

Thank you Nonnie!!! :)

Top 5 favourite characters:

Echo / Emori / Raven / Murphy / Octavia

Other characters you like:

A lot, actually! Off the top of my head, Lexa, Clarke (although not in the way most people like her, I enjoy her as an anti-hero lmao), Bellamy, Monty, Jasper, Lincoln, Indra!

Least favourite characters:

Aside from the obvious villains obviously, I’m gonna say Kane and Abby. I never really cared for their stories, I’ve hated Abby since season 1 and Kane since s5 there’s just something about them being absolutely awful leaders and blaming kids for their failures that I can’t get behind.

Otps:

Basically lmao.

No but seriously, I think their love story is just great on so many levels, they’re the only love story I really care about in the show.

Other couples I really like are: Bellamy and Echo, Octavia and Lincoln, Octavia and Niylah, Octavia and Diyoza, Murphy and Emori and Raven, Echo and Raven, Jasper and Maya, Monty and Harper

Notps:

..... Bellarke lmao.

I enjoy the dynamic between Bellamy and Clarke, but I never saw it as romantic, and that’s how I enjoyed it. I love their ennemies to reluctant allies dynamic, I love the fact that their relationship is dysfunctional I love the parallels between Clarke and Octavia. But I don’t enjoy it at all as a romantic dynamic.

Favourite friendships:

Monty and Jasper, Octavia and Jasper, Raven and Murphy

Favourite family:

This is almost only found family because this show has a ton of found family dnamics that I love!! The Blake siblings, Spacekru, Octavia Diyoza and Hope, Raven and Finn.

Favourite episodes:

Murphy’s Law, Blood Must have Blood part 1 and part 2, Thirteen, The Chosen, Pramfayia, Red Queen, The Garden

Favourite season/book/movie:

Season 2. It has my favorite version of Lexa, it has Bellamy and Echo meeting, it has the most interesting antagonists (in my opinion haha). Season 4 is a close second though!

Favourite quotes:

“You believe that to defeat an ennemy who will stop at nothing, you must stop at nothing. How is that any different than Blood must have Blood?” - Luna in s3, because I think this quote shows very well the central conflict of the show, one that was established by Finn in s1: We have to try not to repeat history, and yet everytime, they do repeat it. I disagree with Luna in that instance because the threat that was ALI wasn’t like any other, but I agree with her sentiment.

“In peace, may you leave this shore. In love, may you find the next. Safe passage on your travels. Until our final journey to the Ground. May we meet again.” LISTEN. If there’s is one thing of the world building I absolutely adore, it’s the Traveler’s Blessing. It’s a beautiful prayer, and it gives me all the right emotions when I think about it. I was disappointed with what the show was making of it in seasons 2 and 3, with characters saying it all around, but then there are two instances that really get to me: Octavia and Bellamy saying it over the dead radio at the end of s4, and Monty / Bellamy and Clarke saying it at the end of season 5.

Best musical moment:

I loved the way the music carried the scene right after Lexa’s death, how it melts from Lexa’s death and Titus saying his ritual words, to Becca reaching earth, back to Lexa and the Flame coming out of her.

Moment that made you fangirl/boy the hardest:

Oh boy there are a LOT Off the top of my head: when Monty refuses to leave Jasper alone when he gives his blood to Maya, when Murphy says “Touch me again and I’ll end you... in a non-criminal way”, when Becho was confirmed in s5, When Clarke managed to align the satellite dish in Pramfyia, when Octavia confronted Skaikru in The Chosen,.... I can’t think of others right now but there are a lot lmao You can check out my favorite scenes series if you want, I’m working on it slowly!

When it really disappointed you:

A lot of times, honestly... I’m gonna say, all of season 6. I hated it. It had so much potential, with characters having to deal with the aftermath of season 5, Monty and Harper dying, Jordan existing, Wonkru.... Instead we got a whole mess that didn’t do much for any character and I was really disappointed.

Saddest moment:

Lincoln’s death. I knew it was coming because I knew the actor was leaving the show, but I was so NOT READY for it omg it’s the scene I still cry everytime I watch it because it’s so sad and heartwrenching....

Most well done character death:

Okay so I think The 100 is really bad at having well done character deaths, so I’m gonna say my less well-done one lmaoooo

Lexa’s. Her death was so stupid. I wasn’t in the fandom at the time so I wasn’t aware of the awful queerbaiting that was going on, so without talking about BTS and marketing ploys, I do believe that her death was heavily predicted by the show. However, it was a stupid death and Lexa was too awesome a character to die by a stray bullet. She deserved a proper send-off, she deserved to die in an epic battle, or fighting for what she believed in,..... not a bullet.

Favourite guest star:

I know Shawn Mendes (Mendez? I don’t know lmao i don’t know him) was a guest star but I don’t know any other guest star so I guess that’s my answer lmao

Favourite cast member:

I don’t follow the cast, so I don’t have a favorite xD

Character you wish was still alive:

Jasper and Finn both deserve to still be alive, because the show treated their mental struggles like shit and I’m very bitter about that!

One thing you hope really happens:

Honestly, I don’t know? We have four episodes left of the entire show and I have no idea where it’s headed lmao I guess I hope both Emori and Murphy survive to see the end and have a long and happy life <3

Most shocking twist:

Okay I actually have three so I’ll you my top three:

1- The revelation of the Mountain Men. I was absolutely NOT expecting this to happen and I was gasping and going “nooooooooo way!!!” at my computer because it was so out of nowhere!! I loved it lmao

2- Murphy discovers that ALI destroyed the world: the ending of s2. That scene is so chilling, Murphy watching the video of Chris crying and killing himself, cut with scenes of Jaha getting to the mansion and the wholse scene with ALI herself... that whole scene was really cool and unexpected!

3- Clarke and Jaha steal the bunker during the conclave. I was so SHOOK by this moment, it was such a bold move and I loved it!

When did you start watching/reading?:

Early January, 2015. I was back at my appartment waiting for the semester to start, my roommates weren’t back from the holidays yet, and I was bored. So I started the show, and I binged all of season 1 and half of season 2 in 24 hours xD I caught up at Spacewalker, and then had to wait two weeks for the next episode to air and it was agony!!!!

Best animal/creature:

HELIOS THE BEST HORSE THERE IS

Favourite location:

The Second Dawn Bunker. Yeah I know it’s strange coming from me because I absolutely hate so many things about the bunker xD But it was such a cool location!! With the rotunda/arena, the farm, the huge corridors,.....

Trope you wish they would stop using:

“It’s the end of the world, whatever shall we do???” I’m just tired you guys. Nuclear apocalypses and other bombings should not be that common lmao

One thing this show/book/film does better than others:

I love the fact that it has so many different and well developped female characters.It shouldn’t be rare, but it still is, and this show really stands out to me for that reason. I’m not saying it’s the peak of feminism or anything because lmao IT’S NOT. But the women of the show have agency, freedom, they’re all distinct from one another and not just tropes and cliches. I really like it.

Funniest moments:

Nothing comes to mind right now? I feel like an idiot lmao I have so many moments that make me laugh and I can’t think of a single one right now x)

Couple you would like to see:

I would love to have canon Murphy x Emori x Raven!!

Actor/Actress you want to join the cast:

Nobody haha sorry

Favourite outfit:

Blodreina’s cape thingy!

Favourite item:

Raven’s necklace!!! I’m actually hoping to make myself one someday, it’s my favorite thing ^^

Do you own anything related to this show/book/film?:

Nothing!

What house/team/group/friendship group/family/race etc would you be in?:

I wish I could be spacekru haha they’re the best found family of the whole show and we deserved a flashback episode for them <3

Most boring plotline:

the entirety of season 6 xDDDDD

No but seriously, I’m gona say Illian’s plot. Honestly I never got into it at all, I didn’t care enough about him, or his family.

Most laughably bad moment:

I mean, the pilot is pretty cringe-worthy xD

Best flashback/flashfoward if any:

the flashbacks of the Dark Year.

Most layered character:

Octavia

Most one dimensional character:

Jordan lmao I was so disappointed with his story in s6.....

Scariest moment:

OMG in season 2 when Bellamy, Octavia and the guards go into the old parking garage and CAROL OF THE BELLS START PLAYING THAT WAS SO FUCKING CREEPY

Grossest moment:

Ewwww the whole worm thing happening in s5, AND the weird trees growing inside people in s6 xD

Best looking male:

S5 Murphy, hands down. Also s7 Murphy cause he spends half his time shirtless lmao

Best looking female:

Emori! She’s so pretty.

Who you’re crushing on (if any):

I mean everybody is gorgeous but I don’t have a particular fixation haha

Favourite cast moment:

I don’t watch interviews or BTS stuff so I don’t know much, but Richard Harmon wearing hie sister’s costume and wig was really funny ^^

Favourite transportation:

Becca’s rocket

Most beautiful scene (scenery/shot wise):

It’s very obvious symbolism, but I love the last shot of Blood must have blood part 1, with Clarke standing alone in front of the door of Mount Weather.

Also, Octavia forcing the clans into submission in Red Queen, the mini conclave in fron of the doors of the vafeteria. The shots in that scene were really good!

Unanswered question/continuity issue/plot error that bugs you:

Lmaooooooo do you have ten hours? Because that’s how long I can ramblr about the inconsistencies and plotholtes of this show x) Off the top of my head:

- Why does everybody on the Ark speak Enlighs?

- If Becca knew Nightblood could let you live on Earth then why didn’t she distribute it among the space stations?

- Why did Cadogan build the bunker in the middle of the city when he had a prefectly good FOREST??

- If Lexa is the first Commander to unite the clans then what was the role of the Commander before her?

- Why didn’t the Ark send one adult with the 100 (Pyke) to protect and help them?

- How come the Eligius IV prisoners don’t die when they come back to Earth in s5 since they have no nightblood and didn’t adapt through evolution?

- How is it that Spacekru survived with algea alone but Wonkru had to have this huge variety of plants?? WHAT’S THE MAGIC ALGEA MONTY???

- Why did Mount Weather crash the Exodus ship?

- If the ressources on the Ark are so scarce then why would they float people with clothes on them?

- How come Raven could visit Finn in prison but Bellamy couldn’t visit Octavia?? If Octavia was in solitary, why?

...... Okay i’m gonna stop for now lmao but I could write an entire memoir on the inconsistencies of this show lmao

Best promo:

That one:

At what point did you fall in love with this show/book:

I’m thinking Murphy’s Law? The first few episodes were a little too teenage-drama for me but this episode shifted my opinion enough to get me to keep watching ^^

#the 100 #Anonymous #Asks

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pompamaroon · 4 years

Text

2019: A Year of Ups and Downs

In this post, I will go over some reasoning as to why 2019 was a slow year in terms of providing content or updating my tumblr profiles, and how I was feeling. Most will be seeing this coming from either SHSL Scans and/or my Manlyronpa profile. This is not a necessary read, but it will also go into why my interest in the Danganronpa series was at an all time low and despite a burning passion, I overall just gave up on the fandom and community for awhile.

My year started off quite strong, with my occupation changing from something draining to something that allowed me to build a career and have new opportunities. This was definitely the high point of my year, and I was even able to save up enough to take a trip to see someone I had grown close to across the country, something I’d only dreamed of up to this point. However, during the trip, I found myself in awe of the location and in awe of the presence of the person I went to visit. They are truly one-of-a-kind and always know how to make me smile just with their company alone. In comparison though, I felt I just could not stand beside them. Personally, I felt I was a 180 in about every way to this person and I still feel this way. It was a bitter sweet feeling, and by the time I left, I got the feeling that I’d truly given it my best, and I would have to push aside the feelings I had for this person. I attempted to set aside these feelings by devoting myself to my career which was honestly a great escape. Not only did I have a dream job, my co-workers were great to work with and bounce banter off. Additionally my managers and supervisor all had great senses of humor and I truly felt welcome to my position, resulting in a comrade dynamic that is very rare in the work force. Thanks to this boost in motivation at work, I actually managed to be able to consistently pay and commission for things. This is where I first encountered some issues with the DR fanbase. Admittedly, I had commissioned some adult works and the material in these works made it obvious it was me who asked for them, or inspired others to get them. Around late may/early June, I ended up reaching out to some SFW work artists because I wanted to commission something a bit more wholesome involving favorites, however due to my notoriety of my earlier commissions, 2 artists turned me down as they were either not interested or did not want to be associated with NSFW artists and another artist ghosted me. It was admittedly a bit of a weird situation to deal with, but overall I felt discouraged. Additionally, the NSFW artists I had commissioned before also were not interested in drawing anything further, and so I ultimately had nowhere to go with my ideas. While I understood being turned down is completely in the artists right, I felt that my ideas were just bad, which lead to me feeling like what I enjoyed about the DR series or wanted to see from the DR series was wrong altogether. I sat down and seriously thought about it and realized that despite everything I had done to contribute to the community, that ultimately, there were no real connections made with anyone. The people I had worked with in terms of manga had either stolen my raws, or spoke negatively about other contributors(something I was also guilty of) or even in a surprising case with a certain person, just ended up leaving with out a word! In the middle of nearing completion of a large project as well! Out of everyone I’ve ever met thanks to DR, there are only 2 people I’ve consistently continued to talk with on a somewhat daily-basis. The rest ultimately just cast me aside in various ways, leaving me feeling alienated further and like I just was not going to fit into the community no matter what I tried or what I did. I did get a lot of messages from people of course, but most were reaching out for where they could find more DR manga or what they could get from me. Eventually, I got so frustrated with it, I decided to just not do anything else in the DR fandom. I no longer felt a need to be exceedingly contributing to it or seeing it grow further, and so, after literally pulling out all the stops, the final V3 anthology release was the last thing DR related I dared to even open for a long time. I really wish that the completion of that anthology series could’ve been something more optimistic, but it just ended on a sour note for me feeling very resentful towards the fandom and community. So I shifted to doing manga I personally enjoyed, and just actually reading manga which ended up being fun! It was awesome indulging in stuff that made me happy and while it was not as popular as the DR stuff I released, I didn’t care. I wanted to treat myself. Once completed(and even during the process) though, I did have an annoying unsatisfactory feeling that I had so much DR manga unfinished. So with a new fire in me, I tackled the manga again, completing the Genocider Mode manga as I was close to completing it but also had promised someone like, 5 years+ ago that I’d complete it. After that, there was a lot of silence, but not because I had lost interested. Instead it was around the end of August and I was in peak form. I wasn’t just killing it at work, I was going all out with the DR1 Anthologies. I had started working on them in early 2018, however, there was just a large demand for V3 stuff, so I was mostly working on that. I was on a hot streak until early November, when one of my close higher ups was let go. This completely fractured our team and we were all getting divided up as our company began to slowly change. This was a huge shock for me as the high points of my days were going to work, and those were slowly being phased out. My friends at the time also were busy with work and this left me alone for a looong time. This sent me into a depression that I could just not dig myself out of. Of course, I still functioned and went to work, but with no feeling of social connection with anyone inside or outside of work, I felt no reason to continue my work on the anthology. I had completely given up and there were only 3 stories left to work too. This went on until January of 2020, when the new year started and I had received a promotion at my work due to my continued perseverance and growth. Since then, we’ve received lots of good news at work even with the epidemic going on, and concerning the Danganronpa series, I found my fire being lit anew. Of course, I’m anxious and worried, especially after DR3 and DRV3 failed to impress me, however with both the creators and devs wanting to give off the feeling of a “Class Reunion” for DR’s anniversary, I’m feeling excited that regardless of what we get, it will be something familiar and hopeful and like DR1 inspired me to truly take steps forward, I’m hoping the major game they announce will help me reconnect with those feelings of wanting to just move forward and not let my previous experiences to go to waste. I’m more than ready to give it my all to make this anniversary great as possible too by releasing as much manga as possible, even if it is just by myself. I truly do enjoy the series and am thankful for the few good things it was able to bring into my life by getting me out of the dark place I was in before I played it and this will hopefully be the year I can truly convey that.

#Yaz's stuff

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ilikeoldchangke · 4 years

Text

My drunk tuition teacher

This is a work of fiction

Doing what i really wanted to do to my tuition teacher. Good grades should be rewarded isn’t it ? Drunk tuition teachers are what dreams are made of.

…………………………………………………

I barely had a strand of pubic hair on my dick when I first saw Lydia when I was in secondary school. I was a late bloomer and coming to terms with what is happening to my body. I remembered it was just after my 16th birthday in January when Lydia was brought in to tutor me for secondary 4.

It’s the ‘o’ levels and there’s nothing more worrying than a child doing badly for his exams in Singapore, for parents that is.

I was hitting the peak of my puberty years when I knew Lydia.

That was when I started getting all these weird reactions in my body whenever I see her.

Lydia is 3 years older than me and the effect of her well developed body is like putting sugar outside the entrance of an ant’s nest.

I could get a hard erection whenever Lydia walks into my house.

We have our lessons in the living room. There’s a large study table just by the piano we would always sit.

Initially I called Lydia ‘teacher’ , but after a while, she suggested I call her by her name instead.

3 years isn’t that much an age gap.

Lydia smells so good that I wondered if all girls smell as nice as her.

I came from an all boys school, I hardly have any female friends. So you can imagine the excitement i have whenever it’s time for my tuition with Lydia.

It’s like spending an hour or 2 with a close girl friend or sort. Except that she is being paid.

The first few months, my parents were always around at home. My grades improved greatly after Lydia came into the picture and it wasn’t long before she gained their trust to look after me like I’m her little brother.

My parents would go run their errands while the class is going on, leaving me alone in the house with Lydia.

I’m a growing boy.

The things that go through my mind, is the same thing that went through yours when you were my age.

When I looked at how firm Lydia’s breast were, I wanted to touch them. I want to squeeze them.

When I saw how smooth and thin her bra straps were, I wanted to snap them against her fair skin to hear that sickening ‘ piak’ sound.

Everytime Lydia crossed her legs , I wished I could smell them, or put my dick in between her thighs so when she put her legs together, it would squeeze my small dick together.

Sick thoughts like this constantly filled my head.

There was once Lydia came with a sweater because it was raining outside. She was a little drench. While she was drying herself up in the bathroom, I picked up her sweater and started smelling it.

My cock got so hard that It took a while for the erection to die down.

3 months before my ‘o’ levels, I found myself drinking from the same cup Lydia used during the tuition. I would smell and lick the part she put her mouth to.

I would also sit on the same chair she did, trying to imagine myself feeling the warmth from her body.

I did really well for my ‘o’ levels thanks to Lydia and my parents were over the moon. Motivation to see Lydia played a big part in my grades.

I was eager to go to a Junior college and have Lydia continue as my tuition teacher.

Then something happened.

About half a year into my year one in JC, Lydia turned up for one of our Saturday lesson drunk.

It was a 8am lesson.

I was already up and ready by 7.30am

That was when I saw Lydia staggering towards the gate.

She could hardly walk straight.

James : Lydia…. Are you ok ??

Lydia : morning James… morning….. morning…. Hahah…

When I opened the door for Lydia, I could smell the stench of alcohol from her body and her breathe.

She must have partied through the night and came straight to my place.

James : Are you ok ?? Lydia… ?

Lydia : I’m ok… I’m ok…. I’m early right…. It’s not 8am yet….

James : No… you’re early…. You better sit down….

Lydia staggered into the house with her shoe on and I quickly went to the kitchen to get her a glass of water.

When I came back, I saw Lydia slumped on the sofa in a weird position.

James : Lydia…. Lydia… are you ok ?? hey….

I tapped her several times and she’s totally out cold.

I could hear her snore a little too.

I was about to call my parents when something inside me snapped.

My heart started beating faster.

My throat felt dry.

Looking at Lydia’s body, my own started moving.

I know it’s wrong but I can’t help it. I cant control myself.

I put my hands gently around Lydia’s bottom. She did not move.

I held my breath and I touched her breast, something I really wanted to do for so long.

She did not react either.

Lydia suddenly stirred and I quickly backed away.

I thought she was going to wake up but no, she readjusted her body, and fell back down the sofa.

I looked at the clock.

It’s 7.45am.

My parents will usually come back around 10.30am.

That gives me lightly more than 2 hours if I include some buffer.

I was shaking by then as I kept feasting my eyes on Lydia’s body.

Looking at her legs, her bottom and her exposed midriff, I highly doubt I can last more than 5 minutes.

7000 words

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bereft-of-frogs · 4 years

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@veliseraptor tagged me in a meme! I’ve gone for my daily state-approved walk and am ready to overshare. ;-)

1. Name: Taylor

2. Nickname: I don’t really have one, I don’t really like any of the ways my name can be shortened.

3. Zodiac sign: Fishy (pisces)

4. Height: Funny story, so for like years I thought I was 5′4″, and then one night I got into kind of drunken argument at a bar with my friends who were like ‘you are Not 5′4″’ and then the next morning I was having coffee with my mom and relaying the story and being like ‘can you believe they didn’t believe me when I said I was 5′4″‘ and she just stops...slowly looks at me, and is like ‘yeah, you’re not 5′4″...’ and then called my brother to get the tape measure. So yeah, I’m like 5′5 1/2″, almost 5′6″.

5. Languages: English, French, I took Latin in high school, I studied Hebrew and Arabic for two years in college (I got almost conversational in Hebrew, Arabic was a lot harder in terms of actually speaking but I loved loved loved learning the script.)

6. Nationality: USA (though after some considerable digging, apparently with a temporary work visa, I am to be treated with all the rights to social services and economic relief as though I was a Canadian. So. That’s good. Cuz I’m kinda stuck here for a while XD )

7. Favourite season: Fall! Fall is when my power is at a peak! I am at my spookiest! Everyone else appreciates how spooky I am! It is great!

8. Favourite flower: I really like sunflowers.

9. Favourite scent: I like the ocean (where is it *sobs*), and that way the morning air smells. Like, you know what I mean? Even in the city. When I went to take the trash out this morning, I just stood on the stoop for a minute and breathed in the air. I can’t really explain it...but mornings. I like the smell of mornings.

10. Favourite colour: All shades of purple.

11. Favourite animals: I like cats. And I like bats. But in a really strange way, my favorite animal will always be cows. I don’t know why. Cows just became my favorite animal really early and stuck with me.

12. Favourite fictional character: Hm, well, I mean...anyone I write a whole mess of fanfiction about......that’s a safe bet. Also, since I’m rereading Lord of the Rings right now and just got to this part I have a love of feelings about Faramir. Also a few months back, I don’t remember why I was doing this, but I was rereading the ‘Friends of the ABC’ chapter of Les Misérables and had a lot of feelings about Combeferre.

13. Coffee, tea or hot chocolate: Coffee. Definitely coffee, which I am actually physically addicted to but also it’s a super big part of my routine. Coffee is my favorite part of the day. I have two cups in the morning while reading a book and it is excellent.

I actually really dislike most tea, except for lemon-ginger when I’m sick. I do really like hot chocolate and I’ve also found it is even better when you add a little whiskey to it.

14. Average hours of sleep: I’m usually pretty regularly an 8-hour type of person, though usually in the spring I go through this weird period where I sleep a lot. Like every spring, I’ll wake up around my usual time 7:30-8ish, and then pass back out until like noon. So. I’m anticipating that starting to happen.

15. Dog or cat: I think I related to cats on a deeper level but I do love dogs and I dream of the day I get to have a cat or a dog, or both. Both is best.

16. Number of blankets you sleep with: 3? I don’t use a top sheet, but I have a duvet, and then a comforter on top of that, and then an extra fleece blanket in case it’s particularly cold.

17. Dream tip: Was this supposed to be a tip from my dreams or a tip about dreaming?

Considering I have very bizarre dreams, I’ll give you a tip about dreaming. So in December/January, I was basically having horrible stress dreams every single night and successfully got rid of them by keeping a really strict bedtime routine, like I was a toddler again. I start off by turning off most lights and watching one episode of a TV show without scrolling on my phone. (As a result, I’ve been watching a lot of subtitled stuff because that forces me to pay attention and not scroll.) And then I prep coffee for the morning, take my vitamin, get in my PJs and brush my teeth, floss (yes I floss every night), wash my face etc...And then I write in my journal, use a lavender scented hand lotion, and voilà! I usually fall asleep pretty quickly and have really weird dreams but...they’re like fun weird dreams rather than stress dreams.

If you want a tip from my dreams, the other night I dreamed I was walking in a massive forest with these huge trees, so tall you couldn’t see the tops, and one of them was very, very slowly falling...

So make of that what you will.

18. Blog established: I started my mainblog in August of 2011, but this one I started in like...July/August 2018.

19. Followers: There are 222 of you right now which is a fun number! Thanks for following me everyone! <3

20. Random fact: Hm, my go-to random personal fact is that I had chicken pox twice. It was not enjoyable.

As usual, consider this an open tag! ;-)

#meme!#thanks for tagging!

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mythicallore · 5 years

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Dark Watchers

Meandering along the coast of California from Monterey County all the way up into central San Luis Obispo County is the Santa Lucia Mountain Range, a rugged expanse of peaks and wilderness that is imposing enough to have posed a hurdle to early Spanish explorers making their way to the California coast. It is a place of undeniable natural beauty and history, and it has also long been said to be the haunt of inscrutable shadow beings that seem to stand and observe our world from afar.

What have come to be known as the “Dark Watchers” are typically said to be very tall humanoid entities ranging in height from 7 feet tall all the way up to around 15 feet tall, dressed all in black and wearing flowing cloaks and wide brimmed hats, with many sightings also mentioning some sort of staves or sticks in the beings’ hands. Facial features are not typically seen, and they are almost always silent, enigmatic figures usually seen at a distance up on ridges silhouetted against the darkening twilight sky, always at around dusk or dawn, quietly looking over and surveying their domain with unknowable purpose and often vanishing in the blink of an eye, especially if one is to try and draw closer.

Such bizarre entities have been reported for centuries, with the accounts supposedly traced back to at least the Native Chumash tribe of the central coast of California and the Channel Islands, who apparently had a rich tradition of lore on these enigmatic beings and called them “The Old Ones.” Early Spanish explorers and Mexican ranchers also knew of them, referring to them as Los Vigilantes Oscuros, and they were often seen by early explorers and soldiers in the region, who described the unsettling experience of being observed by them from cliffs high above. These beings have been sighted ever since, going on to be mentioned in countless literary references and sightings reports. One very well-known literary mention of the mysterious beings was written of in John Steinbeck’s 1938 book The Long Valley, in which the creatures were written of in a short story called Flight, particularly in one passage that reads:

Pepe looked up to the top of the next dry withered ridge. He saw a dark form against the sky, a man’s figure standing on top of a rock, and he glanced away quickly not to appear curious. When a moment later he looked up again, the figure was gone. Pepé looked suspiciously back every minute or so, and his eyes sought the tops of the ridges ahead. Once, on a white barren spur, he saw a black figure for a moment; but he looked quickly away, for it was one of the dark watchers. No one knew who the watchers were, nor where they lived, but it was better to ignore them and never to show interest in them. They did not bother one who stayed on the trail and minded his own business.

This is undeniably based on the pervasive lore of these entities, and other writers at around the same time made mention of the Dark Watchers, including notably poet Robinson Jeffers, in his poem Such Counsels You Gave to Me & Other Poems, in which he calls them “forms that look human… but certainly are not human,” and says of them:

He thought it might be one of the watchers, who are often seen in this length of coast-range, forms that look human to human eyes, but certainly are not human. They come from behind ridges to watch. But when he approached it he recognized the shabby clothes and pale hair and even the averted forehead and concave line from the eye to the jaw, so that he was not surprised when the figure turning toward him in the quiet twilight showed his own face. Then it melted and merged into the shadows beyond it.

These literary accounts draw from the same local traditions, which have gone back centuries and continue on into this day. In the mid 1960s there was an alleged sighting of the Dark Watchers made by a high school teacher, who was out hiking in the range at the Monterrey peninsula. As he walked along he claimed that he had seen a tall dark figure looming up upon a ridge, which seemed to be in the process of merely standing and contemplating the scenery. The hiker called out to the mysterious figure and at that instance the entity simply dissolved from sight as if it had never been there at all. There have been numerous supposed sightings of these strange entities since, right up into very recent years. One strange occurrence was told of by a witness from Moreno Valley, California, who in 2011 said:

Many many years ago I was with a friend driving through a dirt field here in Moreno Valley near Allessandro (old east part) near what I believe were old abandoned barns, that I always had heard were haunted when my friends car broke down. (could have been coincidence, it was a beat up volkswagen bug) It was dusk at best and there was no way we were going to make it out of the field before it was pitch black and instead of chancing getting retardedly lost and/or hurt in the dark we decided to sleep in the car and set out in the morning to go get help to tow the car. (it was wayyyyy before the days of everyone having cell phones and quick help) As we were killing time, in the pitch black now, we were hanging out inside and outside of the car, killing time, sharing smokes, and we started to distinctly see what looked like black shadows, evenly distributed completely encircling us, they did not move, they stayed motionless but were of significant size and based on the distance, I would say at least the size of a small car like the bug we ourselves were in. Whatever these were seemed hunched over, perhaps kneeling. Time passed, they never moved and though we walked around the car and got in and out of the car to see if what we were seeing was some sort of optical illusion, yet we couldn’t explain or discredit what we were seeing. To this day, it racks my brain.

In 2013 there was a report made by a Elizabeth Benitez of San Mateo, California, who claimed to have seen the specters in broad daylight near the San Luis Obispo reservoir. She would say of this encounter:

I remember one day my friend and I were coming back from Los Angeles. We passed the San Luis Obispo reservoir, and as we drove on the road I saw something at a distance down at the end of the mountain. It was a really big human figure, but it wasn’t. It had a black cape kind of like the grim reaper and it was leaning over holding on to a staff at a “puddle of water” or so that is what it seemed at a distance. It was in daytime too, so I could identify it wasn’t a person. Even in mid light he was very black and reminded me of a raven. I told my friend that was driving to look over at the mountains, and surprisingly she was able to see a glimpse of it. I asked her what she saw without giving her my details, and she said exactly what I saw. She only looked at it for about 5 seconds, but she was able to see it. She almost lost control of the car too when she looked away at it, and I begged her to go back and see it, but she was very tired of driving already. These Dark Watchers are real!

Also in 2013 was an account from a witness known only as “Brian,” from Hollister, California, who claimed to have seen the entities as they were driving home. He would say of the incident:

We where coming home to the San Juan Bautista/hollister side when we saw a very large dark figure standing at the edge of the mountains which is extremely weird since I’ve never seen anyone cross over the barbed wire fence and I travel that road daily and at all hours. We drove by it slowly behind the figure noticing it staring off into the distant valleys and mountains (fremonts peak). It appeared to have a large cape with straight shoulders that where very broad. It seemed to have a hunch on it’s back. At first from a distance I thought it was a condor but when I got closer it stood almost over 10 ft tall. It did not notice us driving behind it but when we found a spot on the cliffy road to turn around and get a better look it was gone.

In 2015 there was a report from a long distance runner calling himself Joey, in Sylmar California. The witness said that he had been out training for a race in the mountains when he saw something peculiar, saying of his experience:

Time of day was 2:00 pm I was running and up in an area where no human could climb without gear I saw a black figure in plain day light. I never seen anything like it up in the mountain. Was darker than dark could not explain it. A year past and today again January 24th I saw it again and in the same spot.

There have been many other reports as well. As recently as 2018 there was a report from a witness from Ojai , California, who was out hiking in the mountains when he came across something very bizarre indeed. He would say:

I was hiking up a remote trail up the 33 in Ojai, I was about an hour up the mountain, no people, no cars in sight. as I was hiking, I had this eerie feeling I was being watched. I looked up at the top of the mountain. It was a black figure. I waved, jokingly, not really thinking the object was a person. It waved back. Thinking I was maybe tripping, or that it was a tree waving in the wind, I took a puff of my cigarette, only to see the figure blow out a plume of smoke as well. I started seeing it flowing, and I say flowing, almost floating vertically. I ran like hell back to my car, spraining my knee in the process.

There are numerous other accounts of seeing these inexplicable shadow beings out in the wilderness silently surveying the land, to the point that, rather interestingly, John Steinbeck’s own son Thomas Steinbeck wrote an entire book on the subject after having his own encounter. He would go on to research the lore of the Dark Watchers and pen the book In Search of the Dark Watchers along with co-author Benjamin Brode, which goes into quite a lot of depth into the phenomenon and its cultural origins. Some have pointed to this being a trick of light or illusion, but that somehow seems to be an inadequate explanation for the entirety of this phenomenon.

It seems that this is a phenomenon for which there are no clear answers, and those enigmatic tall beings dressed in dark upon the cliffs and ridges of these mountains at twilight remain a baffling mystery. Are these just illusions or hallucinations? If so, why should they be confined to this one mountain range? There is also the idea that this may be due to the presence of infrasound signals in the area, which can be caused by natural processes such as the wind along the rocks and can have strange effects on the human psyche, but again why should the Dark Watchers legend take root here of all places if that is the case, and why would the reports be so consistent in the appearance and behavior of the entities? Could this be something else? Are these some sort of supernatural or even inter-dimensional entities here on some unknown mission? It is impossible to tell, and the Dark Watchers of California remain a compelling mystery that really captures the imagination.

#dark watchers #california #creepy #supernatural #paranormal

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aleksiann · 4 years

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I’ve always liked to draw and paint but I didn’t start regularly drawing until around 2010, heres a decade of progress (I didn’t necessarily pick my “best” pieces from any year though, just something I found reflective of that year). Scary, I can remember 2010 like it was yesterday. Going through a decade of art was weird!

2010-Nibbler. I learned to draw by drawing cartoon characters with a pencil. I was 12 and my first “sketchbooks” were lined school notebooks. By 2011 I was still drawing cartoons but on slightly better paper and began colouring them in. Futurama was my favourite show at the time and is still one of my favourites, so I thought this was a good reflection of it. I also drew a lot of horror movie posters in pencil in 2010!

2011- the Twisted Twins. My art was still basically just cartoons and horror posters, but I also started my first attempts at portraiture which I was INCREDIBLY nervous to do but it’s definitely helped me out tremendously. This is an early portrait featuring the Soska twins!

2012-Ginger Wolf. Experimented with pens a lot this year! Was gifted my first set of fineliners for Christmas in 2011, so 2012 was when I played with them a lot. This is one of the first drawings I felt genuinely proud of and wanted to show off, I still do like quite a bit. 14 year old me spent HOURS on it! Ginger snaps was my favourite movie for a few years, and stil is one of them and I’ve met some of my dearest friends over our mutual love for it!

2013-Courtney and Kurt. When I drew it I wasn’t a big fan of it but at the time it became my most popular drawing on tumblr! I was still into pens, and colour. I started using coloured pencils regularly, though this piece is just ink. I had always drawn musicians occasionally, and hole and nirvana were/are some of my favourite bands!

2014-Corky 2. This was my first full coloured pencil piece, with a fully rendered background (I had some some whales with backgrounds in 2013, but the backgrounds were mostly just blue or gradients!). I spent an ABSURD amount of time on this, probably 30-40 hours which for a 16 year old is a lot of dedication, I rarely spend more than 20 on any given piece now, at age 21. I consider this the peak of my whale “phase” (I still draw and paint whales but for a while I exclusively drew and painted whales!), Corky is my absolute favourite orca, and this piece was the most time I had ever spent drawing one.

2015-Sleater-Kinney. The beginning of my obsession with “style” and drawing more musicians and fan art once again. I wanted my pieces to look recognizable as mine which made me try out some different things, but mostly my “style” consisted of dramatic and sketchy inking and unconventional colour. I had a lot of fun with it for a couple of years but then I got over it. Style is cool and all, but trapping yourself into a style leaves little room for growth. I’m less hung up on style now, I like to play.

2016-Mabel and Me. It was hard to pick a piece from this year when it was a weird year for me. It was a transitional year, I moved out, went to university to study animal bioscience before transferring to art in 2017, and I started exploring new mediums, specifically watercolour. I thought about having a watercolour piece here, but in 2016 I also officially “adopted” my cat Mabel (she was a street cat I got to know in late 2015, and I finally got her vetted and licensed in January 2016), so I wanted to have a piece of her on here!

2017-cricket. A painting of Carrie Brownsteins dog. In 2017 I got my first set of professional grade watercolours and started painting watercolour pet portraits (still a very regular thing!) and became really comfortable painting dogs and cats. This was one of my favourites and was on my banner for shows for a while!

2018-Aimee Mann. Okay I probably should have put a dinosaur painting here because I painted a LOT of dinosaurs, but I think this shows a progression of how I became less concerned with consistent style as opposed to 2015. It’s a faux inkwash, half done in India ink and half watercolour. In 2018, after a full year of art school I became really interested in play and trying to make art that was interesting, even if it didn’t look like mine.

2019-Therese. I had a super hard time deciding what to put here!!! 2019 has been a weird year (I’ll do a year in review post next!) of lots of experimenting and lots of art block. My drawing professor this past semester really pushed me to do “weird” work and try new things and acted like a mentor and it felt good to challenge myself, though difficult. Rather than show any class work, I decided to go with the painting I most recently finished, a quick gouache study it Therese Belivet. 2019 was the year I started using gouache and I am utterly obsessed with it!

The 2010’s were weird, but they were my coming of age. I spent a lot of the decade really miserable and in isolation, however that did give me a lot of time to grow my fascination with art as a teenager. I’m hoping the 20s are better mentally, and full of artistic grow, and I can learn to balance all of the aspects in my life on a healthy and productive way..... but given a lot of people have rough 20s that’s probably wishful thinking!

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dailyaudiobible · 4 years

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01/07/2020 DAB Transcript

Genesis 16:1-18:15, Matthew 6:1-24, Psalms 7:1-17, Proverbs 2:1-5

Today is the 7th day of January, welcome to the daily Bible I’m Brian and it is a joy, every day it is a joy to come around this Global Campfire that…that we all share, where the fire is burning and no matter what time of day or night it is we can kinda come…come out of the cold, come out of the heat even and just come to this place, this space that overtime just kinda becomes an oasis. It’s like this one space, this once period of time a day that we kinda step out of all of the chaos that’s swirling around and just simply allow God's word to wash over us and then we go back out into it. It'll still be there, but we may go back out into it with some perspective and some transformation in our lives, And, so it’s a beautiful thing to be here with you today for the next step forward. And we have been reading from the New International Version this week. And we have, in the book of Genesis, been reading about this guy named Abram who has entered into a covenant with God and God has given him a promise for lots…like an innumerable amount of offspring, but he doesn't have any kids at all. And he has followed this God into a land that is not his homeland, a land that God has said will become his ancestral homeland, but that hasn't happened either and God has just told him yesterday that it’s gonna be like for centuries of mistreatment before that stuff starts to happen. And all of a sudden, we see, “oh… the stories in the Bible are full of ups…ups and downs just like my life is. There's no straight line to anywhere. It goes through all of the issues of life” and where we arrive is how we respond to those things. And, so, we continue with that journey. Today we’ll read Genesis chapter 16 verse 1 through 18 verse 15.

Commentary:

Alright. There are a few things we should touch base on in our reading today. I’m trying to think of the fastest way to go about this. So, let’s go into Genesis. And we read within the last couple of days of Lot and Abram separating. Like, they’re close relatives, but their…their households have grown too big to sustain them in one place. So, they go in separate directions and subsequently Lot is captured in sort of a nine-king battle and Abram goes and reclaims Lot and retakes all of the things that have been stolen and those get divvied up and Abram takes nothing. He won't let anybody claim that they made him rich, it was only God. And then we have up person, like right after that battle a person kind of comes in and his name is Melchizedek. Okay. So, pause for a second. Some of the things that we’re doing in our time going to the Bible this year is to try to look below the surface, not to find hidden Bible codes or secret messages and stuff like that, but because we need to be below the surface at the level of our hearts to allow the Bible to begin to speak to us deeply. And, so, every time one of these little, strange kind of references show up, and it's happened several times in the book of Genesis so far, where we get a peek into the spiritual realm, most of time we just kinda move past, go like, “that's weird. That's something. That's something spiritual but it's weird. I don't understand it.” And we just kinda move on trying to find the things that would apply to our lives today, which is okay. But since we’re realizing that as we follow Jesus and as we look at Jesus in the Gospels we’re looking at a whole person who is their Spirit and their soul and their body integrated and they’re working through the world and realizing that we are spiritual beings and there is a spiritual realm. I guess we should look at that when it peaks up. So, Melchizedek shows up. This strange figure who is the first named priest of the most-high God. I’m gonna go into all kinds of things about Melchizedek right now because he will show back up for us later when we…when we wind our way into the book of Hebrews, but to connect it to the story that we’re in in Genesis, Melchizedek blesses Abram. And this incident that we witnessed at the Tower of Babel a couple of days ago where the…the earth's languages were confused and people went off into their language groups, that actually has significance because we’re moving one story to the next, to the next, to the next and it can seem like, “well, maybe that was a thousand years, or maybe…who knows how long that was” but there does seem to be a cohesive story being told underneath it all. And we are most definitely watching apparent spiritual beings communicating and being seen on the earth by humans. We see that in today's reading alone. So, we see that a flood happened on the earth because everyone on the earth had only evil in their hearts and the Bible talks about them essentially kind of a devolving into animals, which I guess is a really decent way of describing what happens to us when we are separated from God. And, so the flood goes away, but the evil in the hearts of people is still there. And then we move right into God calling Abram who has today become Abraham and has today entered into covenant with God and the outward representation of that covenant is circumcision. This idea of circumcision is gonna carry us because it's from a Hebrew perspective through the rest of the Bible, but now God’s saying, “okay. There is a mark, a very intimate mark, one that will be observed in the most private and intimate times of life, and for that matter, one that will constantly be a reminder of the covenant and who you belong to, and who you are submitted to.” And what God is doing with all of the language of Abram whose name is turned to Abraham is to tell him, “a new people will be raised up and they will be my people. There are lots of people that are in absolute rebellion and disobedience. These people I’m raising up through you, Abraham, my covenant partner to be my people.” And that's gonna become more and more important as we go on and that is actually gonna cause problems that need to be worked out when we get into the letters of the New Testament's early church era. Okay, so we know Hagar, you know, Sarai gave Hagar to Abram. And, of course, Abram agreed. And, so, a child was born. His name was Ishmael. And we read of the tension that happened between Sarai and Hagar and that's pretty understandable, but Hagar was mistreated to the point that she ran away and she had an encounter with a spiritual being upon the earth that she could see, the angel of the Lord. And often among biblical scholars, the angel of the Lord means the Lord. This is like a physical visible representation, but God. So anyway, after they have this conversation, she says something really, really profound. It's…it's fairly famous, but it's pretty profound, “you are, the God who sees me. I have now seen the one who sees me.” This is actually quite beautiful, because we will remember back in Genesis chapter 3, that as soon and Adam and he realized the separateness from God that rebellion had made them aware of this and even caused this, that they realized they could be seen, and they hid. And that has really been a fundamental reality of a fallen mankind existing until today. We still struggle. We don’t want to be exposed. We don’t even want to be exposed before God. The thing is, people, like when you’re in a relationship with somebody, they only know of you what you're willing to reveal to them. They can only know of you, what you will let them see. So, if we understand that we understand how much we are hiding and how pretty much nobody really sees us, no one really knows us. And here is Hagar in ultimate distress, a really difficult situation and what we’ll find in the Bible and what we’ll find in our lives is that this is where God dwells a lot of the time, when we…when we have unraveled ourselves to the point that we, in our own strength cannot move forward. So, she's in distress but she is also saying that she is seen. And if we could all just understand that the more we are willing to reveal…we could say, “well, God knows everything about me. I don’t…like…He sees it all” but that's different than opening your heart and revealing it all. We can be seen. We can be seen by one another. We can be seen by God. It's all really hinging on how vulnerable we’re willing to be.

And man, I feel like I…I…I should…I could stop there, but there's more and can't really skip this because Jesus gave us the Lord's prayer today. Maybe we even recited it as we were reading it. And, so, the Lord's prayer is certainly very, very famous. But Jesus kinda comments on portions of the Lord's prayer as soon as He ends the prayer, right? So, like, “forgive us our debts as we have also forgiven our debtors.” This isn't just debt, like you owe somebody some money. Like this…this is a transgression against you or a transgression that like you are indebted to somebody because you've done them wrong and it needs to be made right. So, we get through the Lord's prayer and then immediately Jesus says, “if you forgive other people when they sin against you, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive others their sins, your Father will not forgive your sins.” Okay that is certainly a posture of heart. But if we’re looking at what Jesus says and we’re looking below the surface then we begin to realize that the underlying truth is that when you set someone free you are being set free. And when this is the way you live then…then you live in freedom.

Then we get into the Psalms today and we read, “whoever is pregnant with evil”, right? And I mean, let’s just like stop there. “Pregnant with the evil.” How do you get pregnant with evil? So, the language is out of the Bible, pregnant. Pregnant is that you're incubating something within you that has been put…put their very intimately. “Whoever is pregnant with evil conceives trouble and gives birth to disillusionment.” We can say a ton of stuff about it, but there is one of those sentences that we can ponder and invite God into as we meditate upon it.

Prayer:

Father there’s…like there’s plenty of other things that we could…we could maybe talk about just from today's reading alone, but it feels like this is…this is where we’ll land today. And, so we thank You for all the many facets in today alone that…that gives us pause and gives us a chance to reflect, gives us the opportunity to invite Your Holy Spirit, gives us an opportunity to…to just observe ourselves and the past that our lives are on, understanding now that it doesn't all have to be pure confusion, it doesn't all have to be a mystery. There is a way. There is a way that leads to life. And as we interact with Your word every day it is revealing that path. And, so, come Holy Spirit and lead us into all truth we pray. In the name of Jesus, we ask. Amen.

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dailyaudiobible.com is the website its home base, its where you find out what’s going on around here. And there's always something or another going on around here.

And I've been spending the last…well…since we began this year just maybe pointing out a few things here and there that are good to know about. And, so, today I’ll tell you about the transcriptions. So, like, if, you know, you’re listening and you’re driving or whatever, and something sticks out, something you want to remember, whatever. Every day, everything that…that we’re saying here gets transcribed by a team of very dedicated volunteers that…ahhh…well…it wouldn't exist without their labor of love and it is seen, and it is valued by many, myself included. And, so, you can access those by going to the community section at dailyaudiobible.com and then clicking the Social Media tab which brings up all the links to all the different social media channels that we interact on. And one of those links is DAB transcripts and that will take you where you want to go. So, that's a great resource to know about.

If you want to partner with the Daily Audio Bible in the mission that we share that is to bring the spoken word of God to anybody who will listen anywhere on this planet any time of day or night, and to build community around that rhythm so that no one has to feel alone in this journey, if that is life-giving to you then thank you for your partnership. There's a link on the homepage at dailyaudiobible.com. If you’re using the Daily Audio Bible app, you can press the Give button in the upper right-hand corner or, if you prefer, the mailing address is PO Box 1996 Spring Hill Tennessee 37174.

And, as always, if you have a prayer request a comment 877-942-4253 is the number to dial or you can just press the Hotline button. That is the little round red button at the top of the app and just start sharing from there.

And that's it for today. I’m Brian I love you and I'll be waiting for you here tomorrow.

Community Prayer and Praise:

Hi this is Wayne from the Chicago area. I’ve not called in quite a while. I need prayer. Please, just pray for me. Everything’s falling apart. Thank you for praying for me. Thank you so much.

Hi. Hello Brian and fellow Daily Audio Bible listeners my name is Brian Milikan and I’m in Anniston Alabama and I’ve been listening to the Daily Audio Bible for most of 2019 and I will continue to do so in 2020. I am very thankful for what this program offers for listeners as far as the word and fellowship and prayer. It’s just…it’s incredible that were able to come together like this. But my call today is a praise report. First time I’ve ever called by the way, but it’s a praise report. I wanted to share what God spoke to me or how He spoke to me through today’s reading. Today’s December 29th and today’s reading focused on…well…it focused on a few books, but Proverbs 31 was one of the Scriptures. And after the reading Brian focused also on what Proverbs 31 was teaching us. But for the past month or so my wife and I and our little six-year-old daughter have been in the process of acquiring legal custody of my nephew whose name is Justus. He spells it JUSTUS but throughout this entire process we’ve been seeking God’s wisdom and God’s guidance from the first day that it became apparent that his home life in Indiana had gotten to a point where somebody needed to step in and…and rescue him to an extent and God put that on our hearts to do so. And he has spoken to us, God has spoken to us in numerous ways. And today as I was listening to Daily Audio Bible, of all the Scriptures, of all the teachings Brian could’ve focused on after reading today he focused on Proverbs 31 and the idea of justice and that is not just political…

Hey Daily Audio Bible my name is Isadore I’m from New York and this is my first __ year of ever using the Daily Audio Bible. And I didn’t really think I was actually going to call. One of my childhood best friends, one of my childhood friends passed away about two days ago. So, December 28th. He was shot and killed on the block that we grew up on. So, if you guys could just pray for his family, pray that we could sort out the funeral that we have and that we can hopefully catch the individual that shot him, that would be greatly appreciated. Also, pray for me. Trying to just figure out how to sort how I’m feeling, I guess. Pray for…that God would give me wisdom, understanding. I’m still kind of getting into this Christian lifestyle, trying to be a better person and all that. Just been a year be a married in June of this year and I just kinda need help. It’s kinda hard understanding how to grow together and things of that nature. So, pray for my marriage __ and lastly the New Year’s about to start and I’d like to ask for prayer because I’m currently training for the 2020 Olympics and, you know, going to school full-time and everything like that and just I could really use the support.

Hi this is Ben…Hi this is Bella and we live in Pennsylvania and wanted to wish everybody on the audio Bible…blah…the audio Bible a happy New Year’s and everybody on the Daily Audio Bible family a happy new year and a nice beginning of the new year and a fresh start. Goodbye.

Hi this is Bruce Pittman calling in for the first time from Northern Nevada and I discovered the Daily Audio Bible this past…toward the end of this summer and I really love it. I really love the idea of a community of people being able to join together and discover God’s word together. And, so, I just want to thank you Brian and your family for bringing such great value to the kingdom of God. And I will be…today is the last day of the year, December 31st…and I will be joining this community to embark on the journey of going through the entire Bible in 2020 and I made it a goal to not miss any days whatsoever. And just God bless this whole community. Thank you for…for being there. Let’s do this.

Hi, my name’s Cricket from Colorado. I called in the other day and left a message for Anonymous and told her I would be praying but I failed to introduce myself to the community and say hi. I was a first time caller then and I’m new to you guys since August but I spent this whole year, remaining of it, trying to catch up and finish the entire Bible with you and I plan to do it forever until I die, to listen to the Daily Audio Bible. I’m grateful because of this community and not because it’s a place where I can read the Bible every day, which I’ve never done until now, but because I have all of you that I can learn and grow from and you’ve all taught me so much in just the prayers alone. There’s so much value in this group and in this family. I thank you Brian, I thank you God, I thank you everyone who participates, and I encourage everyone who might be hearing this for the first time or deciding if they want to do this. Don’t just do this because you’ll hear the Bible in a year, do this because this is a family. I’ve finally found a church home. I love my church, but it doesn’t fill every desire that I have, but listening and connecting with everyone every day at 2 o’clock in the morning while I milk my cows is just amazing to me. It’s helped me so much. I thank you and I love you and I will be praying for you all in the new year.

Hi guys this is Michaela from Gloucester. It is Tuesday, the 31st of December 2019. I was thinking earlier today about the change of the decade and things to highlight of the decades that have gone before and then I realized that this last decade has been Daily Audio Bible. So, I found it in 2010 and, although I haven’t quite made it through the year yet, it has been a real blessing to me. So, I wanted to say a massive thank you to all those who were listening before me and left reviews which enabled me to find. A huge thank you to Brian and family and Mike and SarahJane and all of those people on the tech side who make this magic happen every day. And, so yeah. And, yeah, okay. Father God, thank You so much for the Daily Audio Bible. Thank You so much for the blessing that it has brought me, and I pray Lord that it will find its way to those who need it. Father God thank You for this journey we’ve been on in 2019 and I pray Lord that You would seal what we have learned in our hearts. And Lord we look ahead to 2020 and we look forward to what You’re going to do, and we’re expecting for what You gonna do. Please be blessing us greatly Lord. And Father God we do lift up the people of Australia and I pray Lord that You’d be giving people wisdom on how best to tackle these fires and how best to protect lives and property. Father God, please bring an end to these fires. Please be at work in the situation. Please be blessing Australia in Jesus’ name. Amen.

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