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thornedrose44 · 2 years

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Broken Hearts Make Broken Worlds

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She stumbled upon the oasis after a month of walking.

The cracked earth giving way to softer soil, the brown monotone giving way to flickers of green; the only warning of the blinding vibrancy to come. The blades of grass turned from individuals into a lush fur that made Lena whimper, her callused and hardened soles lovingly stroked with each step. Colours came fast and quick, popping pinks, intimidating purples, royal blues and burnished golds patterned the landscape.

Lena knew after spending her entire life in the Shadowlands - where the only brightness came from the flash of white teeth set between snarling lips and the drips of crimson that followed from whoever had faced her brother’s twisted smile - that she would never get used to the vividness of this new world she had stepped into.

She came upon the lake after four days; pale, grubby fingers with chipped nails having tenderly touched each new plant and piece of life that wouldn’t recoil from her dark semblance. She’d gratefully licked the moisture from leaves and sucked the nectar from the fruit that had fallen. She tried not to take anything more than she needed; she knew the cost that would inevitably follow and she’d learnt from a young age to keep her debts low else face having to bargain with the little she had to her name.

It was hard though, the entire oasis was a symphony of sirens, offering her safe shelter under wide leafed trees, and unbroken earth to sleep on.

The lake was the most tempting thing of all. The water clear and cool, but not glacial. A place to truly quench her thirst and try to wash away the lifetime of stains that marked her. She slipped off the ragged cloak she’d been wearing eagerly, dark breeches and loose shirt following after until she was bare under the sun that previously was unforgiving but was now warm and invigorating. She slid into the water, feeling the marrow-deep ache lessen and the burdens that weighed her down float harmlessly alongside her.

The dirt in her hair and skin coalesced, leeching to freedom but marring the clarity of the water. She laid back, allowing buoyancy to raise her worn body to the surface, saturating in the sun. She stayed there, watching her once enemy move across the sky, until her skin shaded pink and the dangers of sleeping came close to being realised. She lowered her feet to the underbed, hair slicked back out of the way as she turned to the shore.

There was a figure standing by her discarded clothing, someone bright and shiny to match the world she’d fallen into.

Lena shoved down the fear that rose in her chest, clawing up her throat and trying to seize control of her tongue.

This was not a cracked and broken world.

This was not the Shadowlands where each crevasse you created by destroying the lives of others was an emblem of victory and distinction.

This was not her once-home where she slept between scars of the earth and was expected to add to her family’s trophies.

The fear retreated back and her screams went unvoiced. Her body moved on instinct, arms cutting through the undulating water, head dropping down between each stroke. Upon reaching the shore, she found herself alone.

Her clothes were untouched.

Instead, there were replacements. Brown trousers, loose and fitting, light and quick to dry. A shirt crisp white - an impossible achievement in the Shadowlands, scarlet seeping into and overwhelming any flash of purity. There was even a cloak, green and embroidered by a delicate hand.

She considered the offering, hesitant to use the term gift.

Gifts were a myth; a dream the Shadowland disabused you of quickly enough.

A gift requires no payment and no such thing existed in Lena’s once home.

The new clothes were high-quality, and her old ones would not last much longer.

She’d already indulged in the oasis and would be charged, adding the clothes seemed paltry in comparison to how it had saved her life and fed her spirit. She pulled them on, letting out a helpless sigh of appreciation as she wrapped the cloak around her shoulders.

Once dressed she used the rags that were her old clothes as kindling to make a fire by the lake-shore, aware that her visitor would likely return once she was settled.

She didn’t have to wait long.

A fish - still flopping and gasping for breath - in a well constructed basket was placed by her side.

“Hungry?” Asked the oasis keeper, voice melodious and cheerful with the barest hint of melancholy.

There is nothing more beautiful than something damaged, Lex’s voice whispered inside her head.

“Always.” Lena replied far too honestly - this place had bared itself to Lena, it only felt honourable to bare herself in return. Not that Lena knew much of honour, having to carve out her sense of morality by reaching into the unknown, taking roads no one in the Shadowlands would ever consider treading on.

“Well, that won’t do.” The oasis keeper hummed, stepping into the light cast by the fire, providing Lena her first true glimpse of the woman.

If the oasis could take human form, there is no doubt it would be this woman’s handsome appearance it would claim.

She was tall, with eyes like the brightest summer day and hair like the gleaming rocks her family would demand poor souls retrieve from the caverns of night. She stood at ease, safe in her surroundings and unafraid of what could be lurking in the darkness - a confidence that could only come from someone who had never seen monsters or had vanquished more than her fair share of them. She smiled quickly, there was an earnestness to her defined features that her brother would have paid an arm and a leg for - there is nothing more dangerous than a trustworthy face.

Lena pulled the cloak tighter around herself, wariness keeping her on edge - the woman was too beautiful to be real and too handsome to be kind.

The oasis keeper kept her distance as she gutted the fish with practised ease, pulling a sharp blade from beneath her blue cloak. She didn’t watch Lena, or even shoot her furtive glances, she turned her back without fear of reprisal whilst Lena’s hands clenched into fists at her sides awaiting a sudden strike.

The fish was cooked to perfection and Lena consumed it without care for formality, finally dropping her gaze away from the other woman to grant her unfettered attention to the fulfilling meal.

“Here.”

Lena glanced over, the oasis keeper was watching her with a curious expression, holding out the other half of the fish.

“Eat it.” The oasis keeper gently insisted when Lena hesitated.

Lena wasn’t strong enough to refuse, grabbing the offered flesh with both hands, consuming each edible flake. Her stomach felt distended and heavy afterwards and her eyes drooped without prompt.

“Thank you.” Lena mumbled quietly as the oasis keeper poked at the embers of the fire, stoking life back into it and encouraging it to catch on the newly added logs.

“You’re welcome.” The oasis keeper said simply.

Lena wanted to curl up, pull her new cloak around herself and drift off into what will inevitably be the best slumber of her life; but whilst her guard was down, it was not entirely absent. She eyed the oasis keeper, wanting them to either lay out the terms of her indenture or leave her in peace until the morrow.

She did neither. The oasis keeper merely continued to tend to the fire.

xxx

She woke the next morning to another refreshingly bright day, having unintentionally fallen asleep the previous night; the ashes of her fire were still glowing with residual heat indicating that it had only recently died. There was a parcel of food, fresh fruit and nuts to break her fast placed by her head.

There was no sign of the oasis keeper, so Lena spent the morning getting to know the surrounding area. She ventured around the lake, but it was so wide she could not see the other side nor how far it extended. If the water hadn’t been fresh and free from salt, she would think she had discovered the ocean that her father once claimed to have raised a tsunami from by killing a woman who was so dearly loved by an entire clan that a canyon inadvertently cleaved the sea bed to contain the grief.

With survival no longer her only motivation, Lena could explore and study until her heart’s content. She made note of the trees, the conditions that they seemed to thrive in, which ones grew closer to the lake shore and which preferred more sheltered inland locations. She returned to her once-fire late in the afternoon, mind buzzing with new knowledge to find flames already rising and the oasis keeper standing up to the waist in water nearby, cloak abandoned, and shirt sodden - clinging to defined musculature as a curved, rigid arm held a spear aloft.

Lena felt a rush of heat that the fire could claim little responsibility for. Her cheeks pinkened with the realisation and she hurried to pile up a stack of kindling whilst the oasis keeper caught them another meal.

The oasis keeper returned, two large fish in hand, and a proud smile lighting up her face.

Lena took over cooking this time, keen to chip off a small part of her debt even if it barely impacted the total.

“Do you have a name?” The oasis keeper inquired, as Lena half watched the cooking fish and half watched the stranger.

“Names are dangerous where I come from.” Lena answered, pressing her lips into a flat-line.

A crease, far prettier than those that tore up the ground, appeared between eyebrows. “Why?”

“Names can be used to identify attachments. They show familiarity. Affection.”

Lena remembered a man with flaming hair, a traveller who sang pretty songs and told tall tales, he’d made a joke at her brother’s expense. One of many over a long evening, and the only one directed at Lex was so minor it would have barely prickled at anyone else’s pride. But it was a slight, and even a pinprick of a needle required extreme retribution by the King of Shadows. He’d tortured the traveller, his screams echoing into the litany of crevices. He held tight to his name for longer than most but gave it up like everyone else eventually. It was all Lex needed; seekers traced the name back to a village, back to a woman with two sons with flaming hair. The shadowlands grew in size that day and Lex added another piece of broken earth to his fearsome reputation.

“What if I gave mine in exchange?” The oasis keeper asked seriously.

“Why would you do that?” Lena paused, gaze narrowing as she tried to parse the hidden reasoning. “You could demand mine and I would still not have paid off half of the debt I have incurred.”

“What debt?” The oasis keeper murmured, the crease deepening to a crevasse which would have made Lena’s family consider her worthy enough to take her back.

“What debt?” Lena repeated, jaw clenching and attention fully removed from the food.

The oasis keeper nodded.

“Your land has provided me with nourishment and shelter when I was on the verge of extinction.” Lena explained, chin raised as she laid out the items she had bought without care for the price. “You have clothed me and allowed me to bathe. This oasis has expanded the horizons of my mind, where it once was pressed against tight walls. I owe you a life debt.”

“This land is as much yours as it is mine.” The oasis keeper said with a dismissive wave of the hand. “I do not own it, its gifts are available to any to claim.”

Lena breathed harshly through her nose. “That’s not how it works.”

“Maybe it is in the Shadowlands, but not here.”

Lena flinched; the oasis keeper raised an eyebrow at her.

“Did you think I do not know what exists beyond this place?” The oasis keeper asked. “That I have been eternally sheltered here?”

Lena pressed her lips tight together, keeping her expression blank.

“I know the horrors out there.” The oasis keeper whispered. “My grief has split the Earth asunder and left behind bottomless pits.”

Lena inhaled sharply as blue eyes shifted to reflective chasms.

“If anyone owes this place a debt it is I,” The oasis keeper confessed, “and yet… I find this place continues to give without a single request for something in return. You owe me nothing, I can assure you.”

“Not even for the clothes?”

The oasis keeper’s mouth ticked up at the side in amusement, “They were too small for me anyway.”

Lena bristled at that which merely made the oasis keeper release a chuckle - a sound that Lena could live off if allowed to.

“Clearly you have developed kinship with the plants and learnt to gain height with the aid of the sun.” Lena remarked.

“If you are to mock me, do me the kindness of using my name as you do so.” The oasis keeper requested, still smiling broadly. “My name is Kara.”

There is danger in a name, but that is only because you wish to grasp it despite the barbs that encompass it, and Lena wanted to hold on with both hands - one syllable in either fist.

“Kara.” Lena repeated, tasting it in her mouth, how her tongue formed it like it had been saying it for decades. “Lena.” She offered once the sweet taste of Kara’s name had started to fade.

“Lena.” Kara whispered, and Lena couldn’t help but hope she was savouring it too. “You are burning our dinner, Lena.”

Lena jolted, head snapping round to discover the truth of the declaration.

They ate their fish accompanied by a bitter, ashy aftertaste. Kara made no comment on the less than satisfactory cooking but Lena was acutely aware of her puckered lips which revealed her distaste.

“If I offered you a roof and a bed would you insist on unnecessarily paying me back?” Kara asked once dinner had been consumed.

“No, especially considering you could have offered it to me the previous night.” Lena shot back, earning her a bark of laughter as Kara stretched and got to her feet.

“You’re not the only one wary of strangers.” Kara explained simply.

“And we are no longer strangers now?” Lena questioned, accepting Kara’s hand - their rough palms brushing together with pleasant friction - as she was tugged to her feet.

“We have exchanged names.”

“And that makes me trustworthy?” Lena mused, raising an eyebrow as she found herself standing within Kara’s personal space, breaths almost mingling.

“Well, I can’t imagine you hurting me any worse than your cooking.” Kara smirked.

Lena frowned but held her tongue… for now anyway.

Kara’s home was a short walk from the lake, nestled on a hill. It was clean and well-built. There were two mattresses filled with straw and an array of blankets to stave the chill that would inevitably come with winter. A small chimney was nestled into the corner of the one-room abode and there were trinkets tucked here, there and everywhere, allowing the colours of the oasis to seep in the under dour construction materials.

“There’s a village nearly a day's walk away from here, I trade with them for the little I need.” Kara explained when Lena eyed the fabrics and tools.

“I’m surprised more people don’t live near the lake, taking advantage of the oasis’ bounty.” Lena remarked.

“It’s relatively new.” Kara replied, moving to straighten the blankets on the mattresses.

“The village?”

“The oasis.”

Lena’s eyebrows shot up in surprise. “It… underwent rapid expansion?”

Kara hummed, “Rapid, indeed. I was stumbling through the desert and collapsed, when next I opened my eyes I found my feet dipped in the shallows of the lake, and a bed of green beneath my head.”

“That’s impossible.”

Kara turned to face her, “You live in a world where the Earth shatters itself in sympathy when a heart is broken. Is it so absurd to think that it can blossom to show its compassion?”

“Yes.” Lena said simply.

“Why?”

“Because…” Lena licked her lips, thinking about a traveller who begged for death if it meant saving his sons, about a mother who sent her children away before they could be used as weapons against her and about a brother that sneered at his sister who was yet to make a single chip in the ground. “Why would sympathy extend to everyone but compassion to only a few?”

Kara deflated at the question, shuffling towards the mattress that was clearly her own and sitting down, “I don’t know.”

Lena sighed, claiming the unoccupied bed, and slipping under the blankets - her entire body losing years worth of tension as she settled in.

“Kara?” Lena murmured, as Kara readied herself for bed.

“Hmm?”

“I’m glad it showed compassion to you.” Lena declared, causing Kara to go still.

“Goodnight, Lena.” Kara said eventually.

“Goodnight, Kara.”

Continue on AO3

#supercorp #supercorp fic #supercorp prompt

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fizzigigsimmer · 1 year

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Steve is a struggling superhero trying to gain entry into The Defense League, where the top tier superhero’s work together to save the galaxy. But his powers are unruly. He’s kinda like the hulk only instead of going smash, when he loses control of himself he spits out solar energy. He can cause a lot of damage if he’s not careful, and his origin as a hero is pretty messy. Rich boy doing penance: it’s been done. He’s not even president of the club (that’s Tony). Steve’s gadgets aren’t nearly as cool as the tin man’s but Dustin and the rest of the nerd squad certainly keep him in the most unique gear. The indestructible bubble gum actually does adhere itself to any surface. He had to buy a new laundry machine, but he certainly can’t fault them for imagination.

Steve may be a third string hero, but he must be doing something right because he’s already got an arch nemesis. ‘The Hurricane’ blows in about once a month to terrify Saturday afternoon shoppers and trash the downtown in the name of anti-capitalism or whatever, and Steve seems to be the only one who can stop him. The Brain? Turns out her cloaking ability doesn’t hold up to torrential rain. Freeze Frame? Won’t get near the guy after Hurricane picked him up and blew him right into the giant fish tank at Bob’s Seafood. Prism (Robin to those in the know) was done with him from the moment Hurricane started playing rock music from the city alert system whenever he started a rampage.

“He just wants attention. He’s your problem Steve because you give it to him.”

He didn’t put any thought into it at first. Then Hurricane starts showing up every couple weeks instead of once a month. Then it progresses to once a week, and now twice in the same week. It’s troubling… also annoying as fuck because Hurricane always shows up at the worst times, and he just talks so much. He talks more shit than even Billy Hargrove, the super critical and overly suspicious personal assistant (read babysitter) his father stuck on him to make sure Steve isn’t running the Hawkins branch of the company into the ground. The guy’s got his nose so far up Steve’s business that Steve’s 90% sure he is a corporate spy, he just hasn’t found the proof yet.

But he can’t focus on the problem of Hargrove with an overgrown super baby throwing tantrums to Metallica every five seconds. When Hurricane attacks for the third time in the same week, Steve has had enough. He calls it in and leaves before the others even confirm they’re on their way. He knows better than to rush in without backup but he’s so sick of this bullshit. He’s gonna put a stop to this once and for all. He takes the nerd mobile (as Robin likes to call it since Dustin and the other kids in R&D are always coming up with excuses for more test drives) and arrives on the scene in a cloud of smoke and screeching tires.

Jesus he’s going to have to have a talk with the kids about why his car needs to spit flame out the back. The smoke is so black and thick! Though it does look cool (he’s got to admit) when he emerges from the dark cloud, his cape fluttering behind him in the wind.

The sky is an ugly purple overhead, thunder booms and lightning cracks, and the wind whips around them like a twister, tossing droplets of water in every direction. In the center of it all, the eye of the storm, is the man who started it all.

“Hurricane!” Steve shouts to be heard over the howling wind and the super villain's manic laughter.

He turns. Glacial eyes spark with life when they recognize Steve. And it is Steve he recognizes, not just the costume. Cause the one time they thought to send in a fake to do this, Hurricane literally fed the poor guy to the fishes. Blew him so far away they had to fish him out of Lake Michigan.

“Am I dreaming or is that you, Pretty Boy?” Steve’s so done with him he doesn’t even bother reminding him that his name is Photon Blast.

“Yeah yeah it’s me. Don’t cream your pants.”

Hurricane laughs like a lunatic. Because he is a lunatic. And the sky crackles with lightning.

Right about now, usually Steve’s backup would be sneaking into place in order to spring a trap on Hurricane while he’s distracted; only Steve didn’t wait for them so there is no backup.

“Brave of you to challenge me alone.”

“Man, what are you talking about?” Steve huffs and Hurricane blinks at him in obvious surprise. He presses on, “Have I ever come at you alone? We banter, we fight, I let you pin me, and just when you think you’ve won, my team appears and you get captured. It’s the same shit every time.”

“Your prison cells can’t hold me!” Hurricane growls, eyes narrowing in Steve with rage like he thinks he’s being insulted.

“Yeah no shit. This is the third time we’re doing this.” Steve rolls his eyes, fists his hands on his hips. Taps his foot. “What gives man? You need a hug or something? A cuddle buddy?”

He’s expecting Hurricane to explode. Is ready for it. Aching for it if he’s honest, because it irks him that he never really beats Hurricane no matter how many rounds he ‘wins’. When the guy keeps breaking out of custody like it’s nothing and coming back, it feels like Steve’s trapped in a game with rules he doesn’t know. So he’s ready for a fight but what happens is worse.

“Are you offering?” Hurricane asks.

Steve stares at him, his mouth dropping open. Did he hear that right?

“What did you just say?”

The whipping rain parts for the leather clad villain and he saunters towards Steve. The fang of some poor creature dangles from his ear and his teeth glint in a sharp smile as he stops in front of Steve.

“I asked if you’re offering.”

“No fucking way dude!” Steve snaps without, thinking and immediately regrets it as the sky booms with thunder.

“Too bad. I give great hugs.” is what he hears before a gust of wind slams into him, so strong it smacks him right into the side of a parked car.

Steve groans. Partly in pain. Mostly in misery. This guy is fucking insane and for some reason, he’s obsessed with Steve and like only Steve.

This is his true penance, he thinks as he struggles back onto his feet before a small tree comes hurtling at his head like a toy carried on the wind.

Oh well, all the greats have their villainous groupies. Stark has too many to name. Wayne has a clown and Steve has a walking storm.

“You finally ready to put up a real fight Pretty Boy?” Steve’s personal pest in bondage gear calls out to him as the hero is reaching for his utility belt. “Or are you still playing around with toys?”

Steve pauses, chest heaving with anger, fighting for breath. He reminds himself that he can’t use his powers because they’re too unstable. People could get hurt and he’d never forgive himself if that happened again. But he’s so tempted.

Because Steve’s not nearly as good as he tries to be. Hurricane is laughing again, those eyes cutting into Steve… and all he wants in the world is the chance to show him what real power is and shut him up for good.

#harringrove #billy hargrove #steve harrington #this is for the lols #whenever people call Billy a villian this is all I see #he would be exactly this bad at being a super villian #he gives no shits about anything but Steve’s attention #superhero!au

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katblu42 · 9 months

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Day 14 Journey from Jasper to Banff First stop Athabasca Falls

And a quick roadside stop at a place I think Bruce (the bus driver) called Tickle Falls.

Then it was off to the Columbia Icefield Centre, with the view of 3 glaciers . . .

Hilda and Athabasca glaciers (left)

and Athebasca and Dome glaciers (right)

Dome Glacier is one of four glaciers fed by snow/ice/water from Snow Dome peak. Water from Snow Dome's summit can end up in the Pacific Ocean, the Arctic Ocean, or the Atlantic Ocean!

Then, all aboard an Ice Explorer

to go walk on Athabasca Glacier (and drink the glacial water!).

(Proof I was actually there)

Next stop was the Skywalk over the Sunwapta Valley

with views through the glass floor.

Then, lunch at the Altitude restaurant in the Columbia Icefield Centre before heading back on the road.

We got stuck in traffic at The Big Bend for around 35mins. This is the place where the two teams building the Icefields Parkway (one from Jasper in BC, the other from Banff in Alberta) were supposed to meet. Apparently some of the calculations were slightly out, so they "fixed" it with a giant curve in the road to bring the two ends together.

(You'll have to look closely to see the queued traffic in both directions.)

Our final official stop of the day was Peyto Lake (or a lookout above it.)

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gsunny6 · 2 years

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New list based off the new headcanons! Magic affinities and sources time, expect some babbling, to be added to as I come up with something that works and listed in no particular order.

Aqua: water and ice magic, sourced from magical bodies of water, with a particularly strong link to the many glacial and spring-fed lakes in the LoD. Was cut off when she fell to the RoD, and the realm consistently manipulated her until she re-established a link with its ocean.

Terra: earth and gravity (and dark) magic, sourced from the coniferous trees and mountains themselves. Aqua locking the LoD as Castle Oblivion prevented it from fully falling to darkness, helping maintain his link so that lingering will and his overshadowed heart could last over 10 years under siege.

Ventus: wind and light magic, his wind magic was and always will be sourced from convection the four winds, but even he’s not sure where the light magic is sourced from its Kingdom Hearts magic but shhhh. Thankfully wind magic is extremely adaptive and is users are extremely capable of reestablishing a link, and the only thing than can cut a link to Kingdom Hearts is Kingdom Hearts itself.

Lea: fire magic, originally drawn from radiant gardens young host star, although this connection was weakened when it fell, he managed to reestablish and similar link with twilight towns cooler and dimmer sun, and was ultimately able to stay relatively sane compared to the other apprentices do to being in the field often enough to do so.

Isa: no one (except Lea) is actually entirely sure what his magic affinity actually is, just that he’s linked to the moon and is very good at converting it to physical strength. However being cut off from the RGs moon and establishing a new link with the Xemnas extremely unstable fabricated Kingdom Hearts and eventually getting the Recusant’s etched onto his face likely significantly weakened his own emotional and mental stability. reestablishing a link with an actual moon with a stable and consistent cycle will be important for his recovery from going through the recompletion process twice.

Lauriam and strelitzia were both significantly connected to the plants that grew in Daybreak Town, as well as each other (as siblings tend to be) and they’re magic reflects this. They are both extremely valued for their skills at healing magic, but they’re plant-based offensive magic is not to be underestimated, especially in a team. Lauriam being is master of wrapping you in woody, hard to break vines and brambles, while Strelitzia sicks nettles and ivy and other poisonous plants on you. Loosing his sister, having his connection to daybreak town severed via time travel, and being somehow nobodied before he could reestablish link with a new world (because all worlds arose from Daybreak) likely drove him mad

Elrena as we know uses thunder magic, but thunder magic is actually produced by combining water and wind magic, one of many base affinity sets referred to as storm magic. Elrena was originally drawn from the winds and sea of daybreak town, and like Lauriam, was significantly damaged from having that link broken and losing their heart.

Magic scholars and non magic bearing physicists will likely tell you that electricity, gravity, and magnet are all fundamentally the same thing.

#kh #minor kh spoilers #kingdom hearts #khux #kh headcanons #long post #and it’s only going to get longer #kh magic theory headcanons #keyblade headcanons

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fleurcareil · 9 months

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BC: East Kootenay

When I left Nelson, there was no longer ash falling on the car but still a lot of smoke and the sudden 10C drop in temperature from the day before held out, so suddenly I was wearing a sweater & scarf again!

Ferries always make me think of holiday (when we were little, we would take the ferry across the Mediterranean from Tunisia to the Netherlands & France, maybe that's why?), so even with poor view I enjoyed the 35-minute (free!) crossing of Kootenay Lake. Upon landing, I visited the Pilot Bay lighthouse which was in use from 1905 to 1993 to guide ships on the long lake on days like this with poor visibility... I was able to climb tiny stairs to the top but the view remained the same; none! 😂 Somewhat further south, I walked a bit on Lockheart Beach and could only imagine the mountains surrounding it.

Still further south on the lake I visited the Glass House, completely made out of embalming bottles that an undertaker had collected through his job (the strangest hobbies one can have!?!😁) and which is still lived in during the winter by his descendants.

Off the lake now, the town of Creston has two grain elevators that I had wanted to take a photo of (given that we're west of the Rockies instead of on the prairies) but they were in such a bad state that I didn't even bother stopping.

I had planned to do some wine tasting in the famous Okanagan wine valley, so instead I did one in the up & coming Creston wine valley at the Baillie-Grohman winery... out of the four that I sampled, the pinot gris was my favourite to go with the baked brie. 😊

I stayed overnight at a nearby private campground, which interestingly had simple garbage bins right next to my site instead of bear/raccoon/other wildlife-proof ones... having been conditioned to always keep food securely packed away, it was a bit unsettling but luckily the night passed uneventful. 👍

Next day, driving northeast up to Radium Hot Springs where there were another two large fires, the smoke was getting worse so I didn't feel like doing anything and cancelled all other attractions I had earmarked as potentially interesting; any viewpoints ofcourse, paddling on a pretty lake, a trout hatchery and a hike to the source of the Columbia River... With the town of Nelson having been unexpectedly the farthest west on my trip in BC, I had hoped that things would improve going back so it was disheartening that nothing changed. I had not wanted to travel to East Kootenay in the first place, and I did not like it now! 😣😅

Instead, I drove straight to my campround at Radium, set up shop and then had a soak in the nearby hot springs which improved my mood. After a tasty jambalaya dinner, I spent the evening playing solitaire and won three times in a row! 😄

In the morning, it rained but there was no smoke, and you cannot imagine how happy I was... I had not thought that I would be so glad to see proper clouds again!😂

At the hot springs the previous day, I had already spotted the first few bighorn sheep (most without big horns though) and now I saw quite a few more on my way out along the canyon. Bighorn sheep don't lose their horns annually such as deer so they grow longer each year, and you can determine their age from the horn rings just like trees... roadkill is unfortunately a major issue, but this was not going to be by me (the duck was enough!!) so I slowed down properly. 👍

In Kootenay National Park, I checked out Olive Lake which is spring-fed and has pretty colours but the rain made it a brief stop.

The road follows the Kootenay river, which with its light-blue glacial water was a bit monotone with the grey-white sky, but still pretty and with an impressive flow, not to swim in!

I started a hike crossing the river towards a lake but turned around at the bridge, as I didn't feel at ease. August is prime berry time for bears and as I didn't see anyone else on the trail, it felt a bad choice to continue... I'm not too concerned about black bears as they tend to flee when they see humans (unless they feel threatened), but grizzly bears are aggressive and will attack, against which my hiking poles & whistle are not really up to 😯. Lesson learnt; if I ever come back to BC and the Rockies, I would want to be in a larger group so that I can hike more!

I did do a small hike in a fire restoration area as the parking lot was full and there were more people on the trail. The scenery was a bit haunting with a lot of dead trees but at the same time it had a positive feel to it as new plants were taking over. The area has had four fires in the last 20 years, some natural and some burned on purpose to create meadows, which does not only reduces the risk of devastating, out-of-control fires but also provides important habitat for wildlife who depend on the grasses & shrubs for their survival.

Although there was a tiny bit of blue sky during the hike, once I got to the Marble Canyon campground, it rained and rained and rained, so I sat comfortably in the car reading a magazine until there was a dry spell, set up the tent in record time and continued reading there when the rain restarted. 😁

In the morning it still rained on & off but it felt really good to breathe fresh mountain air, so I was not fed up yet. 😅 Out of the 3 Rockies canyons (Johnston in Banff & Maligne in Jasper are the other two), I found my hike at Marble Canyon to be the prettiest, as the river has carved deep into the rocks, leaving a narrow chasm with the water way down below. Impossible to photograph its full length, the waterfall plunging down into the canyon is unbelievable! 😍 As a bonus, the sun even came out!

The other highlight of Kootenay park is the Paint Pots, ochre-red pools that were used by the Indigenous for e.g. body painting. I had a vague recollection that we were disappointed when we were here in 2010 and that got reconfirmed once I got to the 2-3 small pools... nothing special here but the hike to them was pretty enough not to make it a waste.

As the weather was flipflopping between rain & sunshine and I didn't want to get rained on another hike, I decided to spend the afternoon in Banff as there were still several things I was interested to explore & it would be fun to go for dinner in town... Banff was just 30 minutes away on the other side of the Continental Divide, which determines whether a rain droplet flows west to the Pacific Ocean or east to the Atlantic Ocean. Kinda cool to think how different those paths would be if you were to be a rain droplet! 😉

Am running out of my photo limit so next post will be about Banff (2nd visit) and Jasper!

Wildlife: 21 bighorn sheep (only 2 with actual big horns 😜) at Radium

SUPs: none

Hikes: 4 at Kootenay Park

Distance driven from last map: 1,631km

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glitchlight · 1 year

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DIRT

so, what makes a dry gravel prairie so special? I tried to look it up, but it flew over my head.

does it have a weird soil or a cool ecosystem or some sort of gravel based lifeform?

I will admit I'd not quite heard of these before; most of my work professionally has been in the Indiana/Ohio/Kentucky region, and as an environmental consultant i don't get to read as much surficial geology maps as I'd like. With that said, having done some review, the Illinois DNR helped.

So basically the reason gravel prairies exist is due to the depositional environments created by the glacial retreat from the last glacial maximum (in what is referred to as the Wisconsin Glaciation), which was an approximately 10,000 year period approximately from 21 to 11 thousand years ago. Colloquially, people who never set foot in a geology course might not understand the scale of what a glaciation period looks like; we are talking about ice as tall as mountains covering the majority of continents. In Manhattan, approximately a mile of ice sat over the island.

So naturally glaciers are essentially bulldozers that obliterate topography and surface geology, and absorb it into the ice sheet as they advance. Then, when they retreat, sediments are sorted by water and wind based on how large they are.

Mineral sediments are generally divided by particle size into five categories: clays, silts, sands, gravels, and boulders. Clays are super fine and easily wash away with the meltwater. Silts are small enough that they can get picked up by dust storms and modest floods. Sands and gravels and boulders aren't though.

So what ends up happening with them is that they are often poorly sorted by the glacial meltwater, which include both glacial floods from ice dammed lakes melting in violent events, and thousands of streams that fed into local rivers. Essentially every river in the midwest has enormous beds of glacial sand and gravel from thousands of years of meltwater carrying deposits until the glaciers receded farther north than their watershed.

(here's a portion of the surficial geologic quadrangle for the Cincinnati area; the area in yellow, which encompasses much of the downtown metro area, is a 100-150' thick layer of glacial outwash.)

The other main way glaciers drop sediment high in proportions of sands, gravels, and boulders in mounds called kames, or other types of glacial fluvial features, such as eskers, which are relict features of water sorting that happened within or on top of the glaciers; after all, glaciers were three-dimensional structures melting in complex patterns. The kames and eskers seen on the land surface now, they're essentially upside down rivers and ponds that fell out! Very weird stuff!

Anyways, ecology loves a weird niche, and soils high in sands and gravels are going to have different properties from the surrounding soils, namely tending to be dryer and less fertile. Accordingly, the species that would develop in these areas would be different from the surrounding areas, and adapt to those different conditions. One can imagine pre-development species traveling along the small eskers or river gravel beds, but the limited spatial extent of the gravel deposits means that these endemic species (meaning they live nowhere else) are more prone than other populations to habitat fragmentation and loss, which is why preservation of the remaining gravel prairies are important and!!

Check out this preservation battle that is actively ongoing in Illinois regarding dry gravel praries just so a fuckin airport can expand a stupid road.

#dirtposting

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swissforextrading · 2 months

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Glacier shrinkage is causing a “green transition”

01.03.24 - Glacier-fed streams are undergoing a process of profound change, according to EPFL scientists in a paper appearing in Nature Geoscience. This conclusion is based on the expeditions to the world’s major mountain ranges by members of the Vanishing Glaciers project. Microbial life will flourish in mountain streams because of ongoing glacier shrinkage. This is what a team of scientists from EPFL and Charles University, Prague, report in a paper published in Nature Geoscience. Their observations are based on samples collected from 154 glacier-fed streams worldwide as part of the EPFL-led Vanishing Glaciers project, which is funded by the NOMIS Foundation. Video from the longread article about the "Vanishing Glaciers" project published in April 2021. Glacier-fed streams are murky, raging torrents in the summer. Large quantities of glacial meltwater churn up rocks and sediment, allowing very little light to reach the streambed, while freezing temperatures and snow in other seasons provide little opportunity for a rich microbiome to develop. But, as glaciers shrink under the effects of global warming, the volume of water originating from glaciers is declining. That means the streams are becoming warmer, calmer, and clearer, giving algae and other microorganisms an opportunity to become abundant and to contribute more to local carbon and nutrient cycles. “We’re witnessing a process of profound change at the level of the microbiome in these ecosystems – nothing short of a ‘green transition’ because of the increased primary production,” says Tom Battin, a full professor at EPFL’s River Ecosystems Laboratory (RIVER). Example of algae flourishing in a glacier-fed stream. © EPFL / Martina Schön / RIVER Changing composition In their paper, the scientists looked at the nutrients, such as nitrogen and phosphorus, in the stream water as well as the enzymes that microorganisms living in the streambed sediment produce in order to use these nutrients. Then, they looked at changes in both of these over a very large gradient of streams fed by glaciers that differ in size. “Glacier-fed-stream ecosystems generally have limited quantities of carbon and nutrients, particularly phosphorous,” explains Tyler Kohler, a former postdoc at RIVER and the paper’s lead author. “As glaciers shrink and the demand for phosphorus by algae and other microorganisms grows, phosphorus may become more limiting in high-mountain streams.” Hence phosphorus, a critical building block for life, will become even more rare in downstream ecosystems, including larger rivers and lakes, with yet unknown impacts for their food webs. Members of RIVER lab in the Mounts Rwenzori, Uganda, in 2022. Tyler Kohler is the fifth person from the left. © EPFL / Matteo Tolosano Advanced stage in Uganda These findings are supported by a paper published in Royal Society Open Science in August 2023 by scientists from the Vanishing Glaciers project. In this study, the authors analyzed the microbiome of a small glacier-fed stream in the Rwenzori Mountains, in Uganda, where the “green transition” was already at an advanced stage. Here, the nutrient and enzyme composition was also much different, and algae were abundant. “What’s happening with the Rwenzori glacier gives us a glimpse of what Swiss glacier-fed streams will look like 30 or 50 years from now,” says Battin. One outcome of this change is that as glacier-fed streams host more microbial life, they will play a bigger role in biogeochemical cycles such as CO2 fluxes. The RIVER team plans to build on this research. They are conducting a census of the microbial biodiversity in glacier-fed streams and, using various lines of genomic information, are exploring how diverse microorganisms are able to dwell in one of Earth’s most extreme freshwater ecosystems. * This research is part of the Alpine and Polar Environmental Research Centre (ALPOLE) in EPFl Valais Wallis Sandrine Perroud http://actu.epfl.ch/news/glacier-shrinkage-is-causing-a-green-transition (Source of the original content)

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