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jaesqueso · 3 years

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The Bachelorette: NCT edition - Ep. 6

The season of love is finally here! An interactive series where you’ll get to choose who goes home each week and ultimately who Y/N chooses in the end!

pairing: nct(ot23) x fem!reader

summary: The competition gets tighter and someone decides to take things their own way for a greater good

episode guide

word count: 6,184

warnings: mentions of alcohol (all responsible!)

☽ ・・・・・ ☾

Last week on the Bachelorette:

Y/N confronts the bachelors with a warning she received but they all seemed oblivious, could it be a lie after all or is someone hiding something?

Despite the doubts, they keep working on their relationships with the bachelorette in hopes to prove they’re the right man for her..

7 guys are still on the love race but after tonight only 5 will keep running.

Who will she choose? Who will she reject? And will someone reject her?

Find out on the Bachelorette!

“Hello guys!” The boys gather around as Chris enters the guest house. “So, there were a lot of emotions when we last saw each other and I hope you really think about the reasons that brought you to this competition and if they match Y/N’s expectations.”

Tension builds up in the air as they recall the last ceremony.

“This week we will get back to having two one-on-one dates and one group date.”

The guys breathe in relief as this will decrease the chances of being eliminated ahead of the end of the week.

“As you know, if you don’t receive a rose by the end of the individual dates you will be sent home and the group date brings another chance to win a rose in advance. As always, good luck to you all and see you in a few days!”

A siren is heard when Chris leaves the room announcing the message for the first date.

How is it that some of you still didn’t get a chance to go on a one-on-one with me? Something sounds fishy…

Taeyong and Johnny exchange a look, they’re the only two in this situation, apart from Renjun that actually went on a two-on-one date. Who could it be?

I think it’s time we sea how good of a match we are, don’t you agree, Taeyong?

The boy’s eyes sparkle finally getting his chance to show you how much he wants to be here. Johnny looks a bit disappointed but nevertheless joins the others as they congratulate the lucky one.

“Oh man, I think my heart will explode.” Taeyong cries out in excitement.

“Hey, not before the date!” Yuta pats his back laughing.

“Otherwise I might take your place.” Johnny wiggles his eyebrows.

“Hell no, nobody will take this away from me, I waited for too long!”

Everybody laughs as Taeyong happily skips around the room.

The first one to get an individual date this week looks like a kid on his birthday when he gets out of the guest house to enter the car that’s waiting for him. A big smile refuses to leave his face the whole ride and it only grows when he sees you standing in front of an oceanarium.

“Hey pretty boy.” You happily great him.

“Hi Y/N.” He approaches you shyly at the pet name.

“Oh look, we’re matching!” You point at your same color shirts and sneakers.

“Looking like a real couple already!” Confidence builds up inside Taeyong.

“I know!” You giggle. “Well, in case you didn’t get it from my message, we’ll be looking at some sea creatures today. Are you as excited as I am?”

“Maybe even more.” He winks.

“That’s great! Shall we go in?”

He nods extending his arm for you to take, which you happily do as you two enter the building.

You two are amazed with the beautiful setting with low blue lights that makes you feel like you’re really underwater. As you walk through the rooms you observe all the different fish and they’re beautiful colors. Taeyong amazes you with his knowledge about the sea life telling you all sorts of random facts about the different species.

You get into a room where you see a huge shark swimming away from the glass. You take a step forward trying to get a closer look but the animal suddenly decides to take a turn next to where you’re standing and you squeal turning around hiding your face on Taeyong’s chest.

“Hey, it’s ok.” He lightly chuckles rubbing your back to calm you down feeling your body slightly shake.

“It startled me…” You murmur into his chest taking a deep breath in his embrace.

“It’s not coming anywhere near you, I’ll protect you.”

You look up and admire his beautiful features that are only enhanced in the dim lights. His gaze lowers to your face smiling and you feel like you are safe with him, as stupid as that may sound considering you were not in actual danger.

Moving on, you two stop at a corridor where the tank goes over your heads giving you the illusion the fish are swimming around you. There’s a bench in the middle so you decide to sit down for a bit. You take a seat opposite to him, your backs together and lean your head on his shoulder admiring the animals casually swimming above you. Taeyong follows your lead resting his head besides yours. Anyone passing by the two of you would mistake you for a real couple. Submersed in this mystical environment, your date starts asking you deep things wanting to know your hopes and dreams, your biggest fears, what keeps you up at night. You gladly reply enjoying how you’re getting to know each other at a deeper level than you ever expected.

After a while, you both get up to see the rest of the rooms, arms interlocked again. You’re really enjoying his company and you feel bad you haven’t decided to take in on a date sooner. As less and less guys remain in the competition sometimes it’s easier to work on the connections you already established with some of them and sadly end up neglecting the others. But you’re glad to have taken this chance today.

Back in the guest house, things get heated once again.

“Is no one seriously going to admit anything?” Jaehyun asks the group as the topic from last week is still in the air.

“I thought we had dropped this already.” Renjun rolls his eyes.

“I bet it’s you.” Yuta addresses him. “Just admit it!”

“Look dude I’ve got nothing to admit, stay in your lane.” Renjun spits back.

“All I’m saying is,” Jaehyun steps in again, “if I go home and find out a cheater gets to stay I will be pissed.”

“Same.” Yuta agrees.

Jaemin and Jeno simply nod at the statements actively listening to the conversation while Johnny silently stands on his corner lost on his thoughts.

The awaited siren is then heard and they all gather around the TV in the living room.

I may seem like a practical woman but sometimes if feels good to be treated like a princess. Now who’ll be my prince?

Curious looks replace the tense faces around the room.

Unfortunately one of you won’t be in the race for the throne but don’t worry, that means you already passed the competition and we’ll have our time in two days.

They lean forward, excited to know who will be going on the date tomorrow and who’ll be the second lucky man this week.

Yuta | Jaehyun | Renjun | Jeno | Jaemin

See you tomorrow!

“You go Johnny!” Jaehyun cheers.

“Thanks man.” Johnny says as Renjun quietly leaves the room.

“Guess everybody will have had an one-on-one date by the end of this week right?” Jeno quickly does the math.

“Well, Renjun had a two-on-one…” Jaemin states.

“But he was able to survive that date so it’s kinda like it right?” Jeno looks around the other boys who kind of nod unsure on what Renjun is feeling right now.

After a lovely time at the oceanarium, you and Taeyong decide to go grab some food at a restaurant with river view.

“I gotta say, Taeyong, you’re really impressing me today.” You mention as your drink arrive.

“Did you hold your expectations about me that low?” He playfully pouts.

“No!” You quickly reassure him. “I just didn’t foresee the deep conversations we had today.”

“I’m sorry if it got a bit intense.” He scratches the back of his head.

“Not at all, it feels good to talk like that once in a while.” You smile.

“Let’s toast then.” He raises his glass and you follow. “To deep talks under the sea and may I always protect you from vicious sharks coming your way.”

He winks and you bot chuckle, clinking your glasses. The dinner conversation is lighter, discussing hobbies and other interests.

When you first met him he looked so intimidating but as time goes by and you get to know him better you can now see he’s a sweet and kind guy, very caring and also funny without even realising. He really could be the man for you but could this be too late? Could you heart already be taken by someone else in this competition? You shake those thoughts out of your head to focus on this moment.

“How about we go for a walk?” You propose as you wrap up the meal.

“Sounds lovely.” He agrees and you two get up and leave the restaurant.

It’s a good summer night with a light breeze good enough to tame the temperature. You walk around the streets admiring the city lights and enjoying each others company.

“I’m really grateful you choose me for this date today.” Taeyong stops in the city square and takes your hand caressing the back with his thumb. “I’m having a great time, I hope you are too.”

“I really am.” You smile. “I feel like I have to apologise for not doing this sooner.”

“Please, better late than never!” He chuckles.

“Ok, can you close your eyes?” You excitedly ask.

“Wait, why?” He’s confused with your question.

“Please?” You put on the best puppy eyes you can.

“How can I say no to you?” He melts at your expression and shuts his eyelids. “Ok, now what?”

Besides the background noise of cars passing and people walking, there’s only silence. Taeyong really wants to open his eyes and see what you’re up to but he resists the thought.

“You can open them now.” He finally hears your voice.

The first thing he sees is a pink box in your hands with the word ‘Macaron’ on the top in gold. He looks at you in surprise.

“You mentioned you like the strawberry ones and there’s a stand right there.” You point behind you and he’s amazed by your gesture. “C’mon, open it up!”

He chuckles and opens the box. Delicious pink macarons ready for him to eat but… Wait. The middle one is not a macaron. That’s… He widens his eyes and looks back at you to see you smiling proudly as you were able to really surprise him.

“So? Do you accept it?”

“I-” Taeyong clears his throat. “Of course I do.”

You finally take the rose from the box and pin it to his shirt.

“Oh my god, this is amazing, thank you Y/N.” He pulls you for a tight hug with his free hand as the other still holds the box.

“I’m glad you liked it.” You giggle.

On the ride back you happily share the macarons, talking and laughing. Taeyong doesn’t even try to hide his excitement with a rose on his chest and you are very happy you gave it to him and hold him in for another week.

The next day the boys get on their ride to meet you leaving Johnny and Taeyong in the guest house. On the way they try to decipher your message and get very excited once their dropped off at the beach. They walk around the shore until they spot you in a less busy area.

“Over here guys!” You wave your hand in the air.

They walk towards you and you can tell their curious about the five marked areas in the sand behind you.

“Oh these?” You ask. “I thought we could have a little competition today, what do you think?”

Cheers are heard and you can clearly see the excitement in their faces.

“Like I said in my message, sometimes I like to feel like a princess and what kind of royalty doesn’t have a castle? That’s right, today each of you will build me a sand castle!”

The guys look surprised but not less enthusiastic.

“Then I will judge your creations and choose a winner. I will be looking at your creativity and the size and beauty of your castles so do your best to impress me!”

“What does the winner get?” Renjun asks.

“Do you see that platform over there?”

You point to the sea where a wooden trail leads to a romantic setting with an outdoor couch, a structure with white fabrics draped over it and a small table holding two glasses and a champagne bottle inside an ice bucket.

“My prince will have the opportunity to watch the sunset with me right there.”

The boys looked impressed and motivated to start building their castle.

“Alright, you can each pick a spot. There are a few beach utensils you can use but you can always walk around for any more props.”

Taking their space, they await for you to give them the go ahead.

“While you do that I will be over here ‘supervising’.” You wink taking off your dress and laying down on a sun lounger wearing only a bikini.

The guys carefully watch you, jaws dropping. How are they supposed to work when you’re laying there half naked distracting them?

“Oh, you can start now.” You smirk and they forcefully break their gaze to focus on the task in hands.

From time to time you look at them to see the process. They first work on the structure of the castles, making towers and even several floors. Once that is done they walk around the beach collecting sea shells, seaweed and even… water? You’re definitely intrigued on the final results but try not to spy on them too much not to give yourself spoilers.

After some time Renjun walks over to you sitting down in the sand beside you.

“Hey beautiful.” You look at him in surprise.

“You finished already?” You ask him as you still see the others busy with their creations.

“I work fast.” He casually replies. “And while the sloths over there finish up I thought I’d keep you some company.”

“Well, alright then.”

You two talk for a while without even noticing you’re being watched.

“What is he doing over there?” Jeno questions.

“I don’t know, do you think he finished already?” Jaemin says.

They all glance over at his station and raise their eyebrows?

“He thinks he’s gonna win with that? Good luck!” Yuta laughs.

“What a greedy idiot.” Jaehyun chuckles shaking his head as they all return to their projects.

Half an hour later everybody is ready to be judged and they all stand proudly next to their stations. The first one up is Yuta. There are several towers with different heights, a big gate in the front and the whole thing is decorated with seaweed strategically placed as stripes on the walls.

“Nice one, Yuta, I love the paint job!” He smiles widely at your compliment.

Next one up is Jaehyun. Design wise it’s more simple than the previous one but not less beautiful, there are even flags at the top of some towers and sea shells decorate the outer wall that surrounds the castle.

“Great job, Jaehyun, this looks amazing!” Another bright smile.

Moving on to Jeno you are amazed at how he separated the castle into two sections with a bridge connecting them. Broken sea shells embellish the windows all over the structure making it all look so magical.

“Wow! So beautiful, Jeno!” His eyes squint into his beautiful eye smile.

After him there’s Jaemin’s creation. Now this is a proper princess castle! Structure wise it’s not very complicated but he managed to make a river around the property with actual water there and a bridge that give access to the gates to enter the castle. In terms of decoration it looks like he used everything he could find but you’d be lying if you said it doesn’t look good.

“How did you manage to do all this, Jaemin?” Your jaw almost drops.

“What can I say? I was inspired.” He winks and you gently push his shoulder.

Finally you arrive to next station that belongs to Renjun and… There’s barely anything there. Two towers and a main section in the middle with maybe two stories if you squint. Little to none decoration. It looks rushed and unfinished but you kind of guessed that would happen with how fast he was sitting by your side.

“It’s… Something! But is it really finished?” You question him.

“You know what? I looked around and everybody was doing something amazing and I thought I could never beat them so I decide to just do something quick and enjoy some time alone with you.”

“Well, that’s kind of disappointing, I like someone who fights for what he wants and you might have lost a good chance here.”

Before he can even reply your already announcing the winner.

“And the best castle of today is…” the guys make a drum roll with their hands on their legs. “Jaemin!”

While the others groan in defeat Jaemin jumps in the air unfortunately making his bridge collapse. He gasps and turns to you.

“I still win, right?” He worriedly asks and you pretend to think about it.

“Of course, we’ll get it fixed. Now c’mon my prince, let’s enjoy some champagne. Bye guys!”

You extend your arm and he happily takes it as you wave the others goodbye and walk towards the platform.

Back in the guest house Johnny and Taeyong sit outside enjoying the sun.

“How was that first one-on-one date?” Johnny asks.

“Oh it was incredible, she’s the sweetest girl I swear.” Taeyong is still high on your date.

“Aren’t you scared of arriving too late into her heart?” Johnny questions.

“Too late? What do you mean?” Taeyong is a bit confused.

“I mean, she went on dates with all the others long ago and she clearly has built some connections with them. Don’t you think maybe because you’re only getting closer to her now you won’t be able to surpass the other guys?”

“I didn’t think about things that way…” Taeyong looks up at the sky. “But honestly you shouldn’t either. It’s thoughts like those that get you sent home. And look at me, I still got a rose!”

“Yeah, maybe you’re right…” Johnny looks up at the sky too.

“Look, just enjoy whatever is planned for tomorrow and forget those thoughts ok?” Taeyong tries to comfort him.

“I guess you’re right…”

Soon noises are heard from the front door making the two get inside and join the ones returning from the group date.

“Alright, who’s missing?” Taeyong analyses the crowd. “Oh man, Jaemin?”

“Yup.” Yuta nods.

“What did you guys do though?” Johnny asks but the siren announces a new message for him.

“I’ll tell you later, let’s check this out.” Jaehyun holds Johnny’s shoulders guiding him to the front of the TV.

Hey Johnny! I hope you’re enjoying the calmness around the house today because tomorrow we’re getting wet!

The boys widen their eyes. There you again making them anxious with your suggestive messages.

Don’t worry too much about the clothing and I promise it will be flippin amazing.

“You guys getting naked?” Taeyong almost shouts.

“Don’t be silly, of course not.” Jeno shakes his head.

“Or are we?” Johnny wiggles his eyebrows earning himself all the pillows in the living room thrown at his face.

Jaemin kindly fills up the two glasses and you get comfortable in the couch. He pulls you closer to his body wrapping his arm around your shoulders as the sun slowly goes down.

“I missed this.” He says.

“Missed what exactly?” You smirk.

“Just being alone with you, not worried if anyone is going to pop up and interrupt us.”

You snuggle closer to him trying to hide your embarrassed face. Jaemin really has a way of leaving you flustered out of nowhere like this. You stay in silence for a bit but then you decide to clarify something that’s been in your head for quite some time.

“Can I ask you something?”

“Of course, you can ask me anything.” He pets your hair.

“Do you remember when we were talking in that cocktail party after I sent Shotaro home?”

“Yes, I remember.” He recalls every single moment he spent with you.

“On that day, why didn’t you kiss me?”

His hand on your hair stops and you hear him gulp.

“You were fragile, Y/N. You were crying in my arms and pouring your heart out. My job in that moment was to hear you and comfort you. I didn’t want you to feel like I was taking advantage of you.”

You take a deep breath and smile. He really is a caring person.

“But I would be lying if I said I didn’t want to do it.” He continues and you look up at him. “It just wasn’t the right time.”

“Thank you Jaemin.” You lift your hand and caress his cheek. “I can’t wait for the right time to arrive.”

“Me neither.”

You stare at each other for a few seconds before you both start to lean in closing the distance and making your lips come together at last. Jaemin takes his time kissing you, savouring every second as it was the last time he’d be tasting you like this. You melt into his mouth feeling your heart beat faster even if time seems to have come to a stop for this very moment.

When you finally part, he grabs a blanket and lays it over the two of you as you cuddle watching the beautiful sunset that is almost reaching its end. With smiles plastered on your faces you lay in the most comfortable silence listening to the waves and the sound of your hearts that beat in sync, body and soul together as one.

Before you two head back you take the rose that was laying on the table since the beginning and he seemed to miss.

“Do you accept this rose, Jaemin?”

“Every single time you ask me.” You giggle and pin the rose to his shirt.

He thanks you by pulling you into another romantic kiss as the now dark sky and moonlight shine upon you. This was really the right time, definitely a moment you’ll never forget, but so are all moments with Jaemin.

The following day, Johnny leaves the guest house with a smile on his face ready to spend some alone time with you. He enters the car and is taken out of town to a marine aquatic park where you are waiting for him in a floral skirt and a plain top.

“Hi Johnny.” You happily greet him.

“Hey!” He excitedly walks to you.

“Question: do you like dolphins?”

“Oh dolphins are the cutest! Right after you of course.” He winks and you giggle.

“Well, should we combine those cute things?”

“Really? I might die from the cuteness overload.” He takes a hand to his heart making a painful face.

“Lucky for you I have first aid training!” You both laugh and enter the building.

You go to the locker rooms to get change into some wetsuits and meet again in front of a big pool where two dolphins swim around. You take your time subtly admiring how the tight clothing wraps around Johnny’s fit body, he definitely has a great built. What you don’t know is that he is doing the exact same thing, his eyes following your every curve.

An instructs arrives, interrupting your gazes, and introduces himself. He explains what you can and can’t do to make the best of this experience.

You two enter the water and the dolphins swim to you. You get scare at first and get closer to Johnny that takes advantage of the situation to wrap his arm around your shoulders. Giggling you start playing with the animals.

The instructor helps you making the dolphins do tricks in the water, jump around and even giving you kisses. This is really a one of a kind experience and you’re glad you’re sharing it with Johnny. He’s all smiles and looks really happy.

After a while the animals do a final set of tricks saying goodbye and you two clap.

“Thank you so much, this was amazing!” Johnny tells the instructor.

“Yes it was really incredible, thank you!” You add as Johnny helps you out of the pool.

You two walk back to the locker rooms, changing into your regular clothes so you can go get some dinner.

You go to a restaurant in the hills with a great view of the city. As the drink arrive you make a toast to a great day you two spent together.

“Had you ever played with dolphins before?” You ask Johnny as the food arrives.

“Never, but it was so cool!” The excitement is still on his voice as he recalls the experience.

“I know right? I’ve been wanting to do this forever but with work and volunteering it’s like I never have the time to do fun things like this.” You say with some sadness on your voice.

“At least you’re making the most out of this experience.” He smiles. “Not only you try to find love but also have the opportunity to make up for lost time on your daily life.”

“You’re absolutely right. You know, I always tend to put other people first and that sometimes makes me feel like I’m losing myself a little bit. This experience made me enjoy having fun for me again and I’m really thankful all of you are by my side in this journey.”

“You only live once, Y/N. You gotta make every second count.”

The conversation runs smoothly throughout the rest of the evening and you really enjoy Johnny’s company, he would be a great man to keep by your side for a long time.

The meal ends and before you leave you decide you want to keep him around another week so you reach on your purse to grab the rose you were saving for tonight.

“Wait.” Johnny holds out his hand as you were about to rise the rose in his direction and you freeze. “You shouldn’t do that.”

“W-What do you mean?” You stutter confused with his statement.

“Look, I…” He sighs. “I really like you, I think I’ve shown you that. But… I see you with the others and I know that some of them already hold a piece of your heart. As for us, I think we have a beautiful friendship embezzled with some old fashion flirting.”

You let out a sad chuckle as it seems like he’s saying goodbye.

“I don’t know if we’ll ever grow into that special connection you are looking for.” He continues. “But I strongly believe you already found it in someone else, you just haven’t realised it yet.”

You furrow your brows, how can he be so certain when everything is a mess in your head and your heart.

“If you give me a rose tonight that will only make things harder for you at the ceremony and I want to leave knowing I made things easier for you.” He covers the rose still in your hand with his. “Save this and give it to the person you’d regret sending home tomorrow.”

“Johnny, I-” You start saying but he interrupts you.

“It’s ok. There’s no hard feelings, for real.” He genuinely smiles. “I feel like I’d fall in love with you soon and maybe it’s better if I don’t.”

“Are you sure you want to leave?” You ask with tears in your eyes.

“I’d rather do this now before I get hurt.” A tear falls down your cheek and he softly wipes it off. “Please don’t cry. I’ll thank me for this one day.”

“I can’t make you stay if you want to go. But I appreciate your honesty.” You manage to say feeling more emotions than you want to in this moment.

You two exit the restaurant and his ride already awaits him. Johnny gives you a tight hug and before he leaves he gives you a final message.

“Oh, about that ‘someone has a girlfriend back home’ situation, don’t worry about it ok?”

Before you have a chance to reply he enters the vehicle and leaves. As the car disappears down the street his last words linger in your head. Why did he tell you not to worry about it? Is it him the one with the girlfriend? Could it be that you already sent that person home? Or was it all a lie after all? You don’t really know but you trust that if he said this he wouldn’t be lying.

You join the bachelors is the cocktail party in hopes to talk to all of them, specially the ones who didn’t get a change to due to the group date.

The first one to call for a minute of your attention is Jeno. After last week’s time with him on the boat got cut short and no cocktail party, he takes this opportunity to catch up with you.

“We should just get back on that boat for a do over.” He smiles.

“That actually sounds pretty nice but I’d rather we do something different next time.” You smile back.

“Next time? I already got you thinking about that? I like where this is going.” He winks and you giggle.

You really love these alone moments with Jeno when he lets himself loose and his not afraid or shy to show you every inch of his personality.

You talk and playfully flirt for a little while before you decide to go outside where you find Jaehyun. He looks more than happy to see you making sure he stands close as you two talk. This man is always a flirt and you cannot stop melting at those adorable dimples.

You think about the end of your last date when you came back to give him a little peck and he seems to recall it too by the way he occasionally glances at your lips gently licking his own.

When you two step back inside you notice Yuta make is way towards you. But in the corner of your eye you see Renjun speeding your way looking at the other boy to make sure he gets to you first. And he does. But this time you stop him. You though these petty actions would be over when you sent Hendery home but perhaps you should’ve made a different choice.

“I was hoping I’d talk to you.” Renjun says.

“I’m sorry Renjun, I’m just going to talk to Yuta first, I’ll be right back ok?”

Before he could reply you linked arms with the other guy and pulled him over to a less crowed area.

As you’re now alone with Yuta you instantly forget about Renjun. It’s been a while since you actually sat down and talked to him so you take the opportunity to check on him and how he’s been feeling in this competition. He always seems like a confident guy, very sure of himself, but as you get closer to him you can start to see his true emotions in his eyes. As the competition gets tighter he too is scared of the possibility to be sent home, even if he feels a very good connection with you already.

After talking for a while and making sure he’s ok you keep your promise and approach Renjun. He doesn’t talk about what happened so neither do you, even though you’re still a little bothered. The conversation seems to be like all the others you had before. As he started to get boring or are you just fed up?

You mingle with the other boys too and before Chris calls you to the decision room, Jaemin pulls you to the side.

“I just wanted to ask how are you?” He asks with worry in his eyes. “I don’t know exactly what happened yesterday but he never came back so I assume he went home and I know how that affects you.”

You explain what went down but you don’t feel as bad anymore, you had time to think and you really appreciated what Johnny did for you. Besides your heart always gets warmer when Jaemin checks up on you. He knows you so well already and really cares about you, and honestly you feel the exact same way. Could Johnny be right? Has your heart made its choice but forgot to tell your brain?

“So, what’s going on inside your head tonight.?” Chris asks you int he decisions room.

“Total confusion as always.” You chuckle.

“You have 4 men downstairs waiting to know if you are interested in keeping them around a little longer. Do you have an idea of who you’re going to send home?”

“As much as it pains me I think I do. I really like all of them at this point so I gotta take in consideration every action, everything they said and everything they did since day one and weight in the pros and cons of each thing.”

“Johnny’s decision was hard for the both of you but before he left he told you not to worry about the big doubt that has been dominating the competition since Doyoung left. How do you feel regarding what he said?”

“If he told me not to worry I shouldn’t. Johnny had no reason to say that if it wasn’t the truth. And like he said, he wanted to leave knowing he would help me and I think that’s what he tried to do. I trust him.”

“It’s good to see you maintaining some friendships even when they leave. Well, I’ll leave you for a bit for you to finalise your decision and when you’re ready let me know.”

“Thank you, Chris.”

As he leaves the room you look at the pictures of the remaining guys. You take a deep breath, nodding as you made up your mind, the more you think about it the more you’ll second guess your decision and you don’t want that right now.

You walk downstairs with Chris joining the bachelors.

“Alright guys, Johnny decided not to accept the date rose yesterday and Taeyong and Jaemin already have theirs. Tonight there’s still 3 roses to be handed out meaning one of you will be going home.” Chris then turns to you. “Whenever you’re ready.”

As he leave the room you address the boys first.

“As you know this is getting harder and harder for me. Letting go of Johnny was hard but we talked and he left on good terms. I’m here to find the person to spend my life with and so I can’t keep you all here.”

You take the first rose.

“Jeno.”

He’s happy to be the first one called.

“Do you accept this rose?”

“Absolutely.” You smile as you pin it to his jacket. “Thank you.”

He walks back and you grab another one.

“Yuta.”

Proud to hear his name he steps forward in your direction.

“Do you accept this rose?”

“Of course I do.” You pin the rose. “Thank you.”

You take a deep breath as you hold the last rose.

“Jaehyun.”

You finally say and the bachelor sighs in relief.

“Do you accept this rose?”

“Yes!” He excitedly says as you pin it. “Thank you so much, Y/N.”

Chris re-enters the room.

“That means Renjun, it’s your time to go home. You can say your goodbyes.”

The eliminated man shakes his head in disbelief. The others come around but he just nods with an annoyed face. He’s about to leave the room without even looking at you but then steps back.

“Is this for real?” He abruptly asks and you don’t even know what to say. “I thought we were building something special.”

“Renjun, I’m sorry, but someone had to go.” You try to say but he simply scoffs and leaves.

The other bachelors, having watched the whole situation and seeing the devastated look on your face, are quick to come around and give you a group hug cheering you up. You smile but deep inside your heart tightens as you know that from the remaining five the goodbyes will only be worse.

In the next episode:

With only five bachelors left the rules switch up a little bit.

“This could be good or bad.”

“I think you’re making a big deal out of nothing.”

And someone will have to leave the competition.

“I didn’t think it would be this hard to go.”

“Should I just give up?”

“I’m so sorry…”

Stay tuned for next weeks episode premiering 25/07.

☽ ・・・・・ ☾

Episode 7

a/n: johnnyyyyyyyyyy T_T I apologise over how late I’m posting this but this week has been so hard… I promise to do better in the future! do give me some feedback please! ❤

quick thank you to everyone who keeps supporting this series, we’re half way through guys!

taglist: @skrtbabe @yutahoes @yokshi-unbeliebubble @nakamotonudes @n0hyuck @negincho @love-and-other-possibilities @readers-posts @sylviacxt @tyongf-sunflower99 @princessjunnie

If you’d like to be included in the taglist for the series do let me know ❤︎

#cznnet #nctcreations #kpopscape #the bachelorette nct edition #nct imagine #johnny imagine #taeyong imagine #yuta imagine #jaehyun imagine #renjun imagine #jeno imagine #jaemin imagine

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my-writings-and-musings · 3 years

Note

Hello! Just wanted to say that I really enjoy all your writing, it's the only thing that gives my tired body some serotonin. Can you do some berth-sharing headcannons with Ravage and human reader, please? Free to refuse if you're uncomfortable with it

(sorry for bad grammar, English is not my native language)

Aw, that's so incredibly nice of you to say! You just made my day! That's absolutely something I can do, and your English is perfect, don't worry at all. I hope you like what I have for our beloved kitty boy!

Ravage

·Being over six to eight feet tall at the shoulder, this big boy is absolutely massive compared to you, so his first bit of happiness upon your joining of the crew came from not being the smallest one on the ship anymore. Thanks to a bit of warning you also knew he wasn't a pet, so your polite respect quickly got you in his okay book, and eventually he decided to keep an optic on you when he's not guarding Megatron.

·Initially he'd hang out in the vents by your room and just... sleep in proximity to you. He wouldn't watch while you sleep or anything creepy, but he always wanted to be nearby just in case. Had he ever been caught he'd have brushed it off as ensuring the safety of the squishiest crewmember, because someone has to, right?

·Eventually he approaches you about being roommates, and you swear his darkly colored cheeks betray the faintest hint of a blush despite how incredibly casually he asks the question. Knowing how hard it must have been for him to even consider making this request, you don't point his bashfullness out, and gladly accept as you enjoy his company. You're certain the brightening of his optics and the delighted wave of his tail in response must have been an illusion.

·He's actually not a bad bot to share space with, but him being so unobtrusive occasionally results in him scaring the absolute daylights out of you, especially if you get up at night for a drink or something and there's just unexpectedly a giant cat in your path. He's actually embarrassed when, after one occasion, you ask why he always gets up when you do and he flounders for an answer. He mumbles something about his sensitive hearing waking him up.

·When you unexpectedly fall sick with an unpleasant but not dangerous illness, he's pushed to new levels of concern, especially when you're encouraged not to leave the room and to rest for the duration of your symptoms. He's worried beyond belief by this sudden increase in your vulnerability, even when he's told you'll absolutely survive. You were always fragile, but now you're tired and disoriented, and staying in the same place at all hours means a potential attacker will have no trouble finding you. Drastic measures must be taken.

·He half asks and half insists on sharing a berth, emphasizing the considerable amount of space that a bot sized one has for two beings of your size, as well as how he refuses to allow you to remain unguarded in such a brazen tactical error. You're almost certain your fever is giving you hallucinations before he sighs and places a tender paw over your hand, speaking plainly that he... appreciates your presence on the ship and just wants to be cautious. You agree while still partially convinced this isn't real.

·Thanks to good medicine and lots of rest, plus ample gifts and care from worried bots (who must pass an intimidating screening from Ravage before entering), you start on the path to recovery quickly. A clearer head allows you to see his promise of space on the berth fade each night, with his curled up form inching closer until his back is just an arms length from your body by the time your fever breaks. You never bring up returning to your old sleeping arrangements, and neither does he.

·Once you convince him the sickness has run its course and you're indeed all better, he seems to change in his own subtle way, as if the threat of losing you shocked something new into him even if it was hardly a possibility. There's a softness in his optics and a loosening of his always tense shoulders when the two of you are together.

·When you're up a little late on your phone one night, not in any hurry to go to bed, he quietly gets your attention with a little cough that sounds oh so much like a tiny meow. With his head laid between his paws and his ears tilted outwards in anxiety, he's undoubtedly blushing as he asks if you'd mind resting in... much closer proximity to him than usual. Just for tonight, even. Of course he'll understand if you say no, he just likes knowing you're alright. Your casual yes throws him for a total loop.

·For the first time ever you hear him purr. He doesn't just do it when you agree, but also in his deep sleep after he curls his body around the little mattress you sleep on, and the new closeness allows you to observe how his tail and ears and claws twitch in his sleep. You keep the cuteness of this discovery to yourself.

·His comfort around you grows beyond this newfound intimacy during bedtime, and eventually he gets downright friendly with you in public: swapping snarky quips, playfully pushing you with his shoulder, and even gently bumping his head against you on occasion throughout the day. On one especially upbeat evening he picks you up like a kitten in his surprisingly careful mouth and leaps onto the berth to get you there more effectively.

·A friendly pat on his shoulder in thanks immediately makes you panic; he hates being treated like an animal, what if he took that as unwanted petting? But before you can apologize he rubs his helm against you in a warm gesture of reasurance, explaining that he actually loves a good pat or scratch and that it's just the entitlement from most he can't stand. Friendly little touches are more than okay. For you in fact, so long as you ask permission, straight up petting is also okay.

·It turns out to be more than okay when he rests his helm just beside your mattress and requests some ear rubs, if you don't mind... The power of his purr is felt all the way up your arm as you happily do so, watching as his tail happily flicks all the while and he smiles softly while resting. The underside of his chin is another favorite spot.

·From that point on he essentially snuggles you in a manner similiar to a gigantic house cat, and every morning you find he starts to prefer waking up with you, stretching out completely before the day and encouraging you to do the same. If he thinks you're being lazy or if you have somewhere you need to be, he'll helpfully wake you up in his own way, bumping you with his nose or straight up lifting you out of bed like a misbehaving kitten.

·At one point he'll confess that he's missed sleeping with company something awful. Before everything changed, he and his friends would often huddle through the night for warmth and safety, and losing that connection hurt more than he'd ever admit to anyone but you. Having this back, curling around you each night and feeling you safe and alive beside him, has brought an unknowable kind of peace to his spark.

#transformers #more than meets the eye #mtmte #maccadam #lost light #idw #tf #transformers headcanon #requests #anon #my writing #my asks #ravage #self insert #human reader #ravage x reader

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ladyartemesia · 4 years

Note

How does one go about making friends?

That’s an interesting question, anon... I suppose it depends on whether you’re talking about on-line or in-person. I can share my experiences with both and hopefully that will provide insight...

(Though I am not really an expert, by any means, I suppose that having friends does make me at least marginally qualified to give advice about it.)

(Also - please assume that any in-person interaction I mention is carried out with ALL appropriate and applicable safety measures in place with regards to the pandemic.)

In-Person

I suppose this sort of friendship could come from school, or church, or on a team, or in a club, or at a party, or any thing where people habitually gather... I usually wait until I hear someone speak on something I know about and then chime in with thoughts and discussion. People like to be listened to. If you want to make friends, try and listen intently (I mean don’t be fake lol but if you are intent on forming a connection then effort is required obviously) and maybe ask questions that will keep them talking (if they seem interested in the topic).

There are often moments that can be shared, like a professor being too hard or some thing silly happening that can be used as conversation starters. Shared micro-experiences like this (and subsequent discussions of them) are excellent building blocks for friendship.

Honestly... being honest about trying to make connections is really good as well. You may feel uncomfortable with that and worry what people think but ... if someone were to say to you, “I would just like to make more friends,” would you look down on them? And if that person does look down on you for this type of honesty... is that really the type of person you want to be friends with anyways? We are social creatures, we should never be ashamed of our desire for connection.

It is important to recognize boundaries in a growing friendship. Adults have many demands on their time and therefore cannot always be available for each other. Respecting this is vital. Empathy in general is vital. This goes for in-person and on-line.

Inviting these individuals to shared experiences is important as well. Come over to play games, let’s go have dinner, let’s just take a walk... etc. It may feel in the beginning like you are initiating all of this, but that is OK seriously, you are the one trying to make the friend after all. My current best friend of 15 years who I would legit charge into a burning building for... she called me every day for weeks. She always asked me to hang out. I was kind of an aspiring hermit at that tender young age, but she was persistent and one day I realized I couldn’t imagine not having her there. Retrospectively I was not pulling my weight in the beginning of our friendship, but she wanted to be my friend so she put in the work. She was my maid of honor. When she struggled with unprecedented challenges after her first child, I took off days of work to be by her side. We have travelled to England and the Bahamas and a ton of states together. Her friendship is one of the most important relationships in my life. I have pulled her back from the edge and she has done the same for me and you don’t get that if someone isn’t willing to put in the work in the beginning. Not everyone is best friend material - it’s true. But some people are.

There is also, I have found, a pervasive habit among humans to seek out a “desirable” friend group. This means completely different things to every person. For some people, they want stereotypical popular friends, for others they want influential friends, for others they want friends who have idealized lifestyles, for others they want friends who have achieved things... Don’t look for anything like this. Look for commonalities instead. We both love BTS. We both love anime. We both love traveling. We both love... whatever. The desirable traits you may be hoping to collect in a friend group are illusions, constructs, and perceptions... They are nothing in the face of one beautiful connection.

On-Line

My closest friends online became my friends when no one read our work (except for Donna, but she is Donna and is therefore the exception to most rules) - as I was saying - we joined a few network and collab chats here and there and shared each other’s stories... We started to talk about our experiences... We bonded over BTS. We talked about fic writers and fics we loved. Eventually we formed our own little server on Discord.

I would definitely recommend joining network chats or joining general discord chats. There are a bunch of them floating around. Kinktae and Gukyi run one of the best ones out there called the BTSSmutHub and it’s fabulous. I have made many friends there. Everyone in there is always willing to talk. They even host game nights and I have so much fun... Truly a lovely group.

Honestly... with Donna ( @taetaewonderland ) - she messaged me and began to talk to me about my work and what she was working on and it grew from there. She was a much bigger blog, but she liked my edits and I liked her.

Ana ( @xjoonchildx ) and Lindy ( @ppersonna ) and I became friends because we were baby blogs with like 7 notes on each of our stories, but we loved each other’s work and we talked to each other about it. No one really reached out to me or wanted to be my friend back then - I had like 6 followers and I’m pretty sure 4 of them were bots... but the three of us would comment on each other’s stuff and share funny memes in our chat boxes and theorize about the drama big blogs that never spoke to us seemed to always post about. We talked about BTS and the content and how our lives were being affected by the pandemic. Donna became friends with Lindy and we merged our little group together.

Those three are special to me. Truly my friends. We have been through things now. Things I never expected, but they remain a constant. We talk every day. The other three are such social butterflies, they have other group chats that they have friends in as well, but I have always been someone who is a little more reserved in general. I love playing in the Smut Hub server now and then and I am close with a few other blogs who I have small chats or small group chats with and I value them so so much. Because... making friends really ISN’T easy. I mentioned those three ladies because they were my very first friends here and they are incredibly close to me still. (Again - to the other blogs I’m close to - I VALUE YOU SO MUCH I AM JUST TALKING ABOUT THESE THREE CAUSE THEY WERE FIRST AND I FEEL LESS SELF-CONSCIOUS ABOUT NAME DROPPING THEM 🙈🙈)

I would really just try and interact with blogs who like the things you like. Ana, Donna, Lindy and I bonded because we loved the same kind of stories... We sent in asks to each other and shared things on each other’s feed or tagged each other in games. We shared authors we liked and BTS moments we couldn’t get enough of...

Way more people know who Donna, and Lindy, and Ana are now... (though people did know Donna already lolz) They are so talented and it was only a matter of time before more people than myself realized that. I’m so proud of what they have achieved, and watching their blogs grow has been so rewarding to me. I’m so glad they put effort into being my friend. I couldn’t give them influence or share their work with a huge audience, but they never cared about that... I wish everyone in the world could find friends like mine. They are one in a billion.

Find someone who will hype you up. If you’re a creator, find someone who will be honest with you about your work, for better or for worse. If you’re just a blog looking to read and make connections then making lists and recs and reviews of great BTS content like gifs, fics, and whatever BTS puts out for us is a great way to start conversations. Don’t be afraid to interact. It is the universal signal that you want connection of some sort. Not everyone will interact back, but that is fine... I only needed one Ana - one Lindy - one Donna... they were more than enough. If someone is willing to interact with you, then they probably want connection too. I’m so glad that those three didn’t look at me and think “she isn’t really a very impressive blog” and just brush me off.

#on friendship #my angels #anon anon

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mysteriousdreaming · 5 years

Link

Symmetra had always had mixed feelings about flying. Something about being tens of thousands of feet off the ground in a large metal bird both intrigued and terrified her. Usually however when she flew for work with Viskar, the perks of first class helped soothe her anxieties. The private lounges, priority boarding, free drinks and spacious seats always helped to calm her nerves long enough for her to reach her destination.

Unfortunately Overwatch’s budget did not allow for such luxuries.

Winston had booked them last minute economy seats on a budget airline and the seats themselves were so cramped she almost felt as though she was sitting on the lap of the Junker next to her. Not that he was much more comfortable, his long legs were almost pressed up under his chin and he was fidgeting constantly throughout the flight. For once though she couldn't blame him. Thank god the flight to France had been a fairly short one and not a long haul journey. She was also thankful the Junker had been forced to clean up before the trip, the claustrophobic environment was bad enough without adding the Australians usual...musk.

But despite the uncomfortable conditions they had got to the airport safely, slogged through security and baggage claim, and Symmetra was now sat in a taxi patiently waiting for Jamison to finish helping the driver load up their belongings. A minute or two later he joined her, telling the omic the address of their hotel before slouching back in his seat.

“Don’t trust being driven by a bot one bit.” He grumbled, earning himself a glare from the architect. He was looking very different to his normal self, almost unrecognizable (which she supposed was sort of the point of the whole mission). As well as the rarity of being clean and the welcome addition of some cologne, he was wearing a loose fitting shirt and a pair of black jeans along with a pair of sunglasses. After much protest before they left his usual scrap prosthetics had also been temporarily replaced with basic prosthetics Mercy had found in storage.

Her own appearance didn’t experience as much of a dramatic change. Casual clothes and a pair of shades was more than enough to make her look ‘normal’. Unlike Junkrat she was even able to keep her own prosthetic, thankfully giving them the ability to defend themselves with hard light if needed.

She had to admit the ‘illusion’ worked, they looked just like a normal couple on romantic weekend to the city of love.

The drive to the hotel was quick if not slightly awkward. Despite the drivers and her own best efforts any attempts at pleasant conversation were quickly shot down or ignored by the somewhat moody Junker. She was relieved when taxi finally pulled over at their destination and looked over to Jamison who seemed just as eager as her to escape.

“Love, can you grab our stuff? I’ll go check us in.”

Love. Obviously it was just a professional charade, one they had been partaking in for a few hours now, but she couldn't help but feel a little red all the same at how naturally he said it. She’d never thought of him as an actor, but Junkrat was putting on an almost too convincing performance for her liking. Still, she needed to keep herself together. Two days, one night, and they would never have to act like this again. She just hoped no one from Vishkar saw her in the meantime.

She grabbed the two bags, giving the driver a rather generous tip and a heartfelt apology. The omnic however didn't seem too bothered by Junkrats attitude and gave her a warm, but sad, smile "Your boyfriend isn't the first passenger to be hostile to me, and he won't be the last." He shrugged "I'm honestly more thankful he didn't throw anything at me or try and do a runner."

"Does that happen a lot here?" She questioned, quickly correcting her abruptness "Sorry, I hope you don't mind me asking."

"All the time I'm afraid mademoiselle. It's been getting worse recently too. World's a scary place right now, ominc or otherwise."

Well, she couldn't disagree with that. Even if Talon weren't stirring things up for their own gain, tensions were still high. South Korea, Russia, the Outback, people were still hurting from the omnic crisis all these years later and without groups like the old Overwatch to help…

She didn't want to think how close order was to breaking…

With one final thanks to the taxi driver she grabbed the bags and made her way into the lobby.

The hotel they were staying in was far more luxurious than the plane they took to get there. It turned out that Winston had an old contact in Paris who had a close connection to the owner of one of the most classy five star hotels in the city. They had managed to pull some strings and got the pair a premium room free of charge, which Symmetra was immensely grateful for. The last thing she wanted was to also be sharing a small hostel room with the lanky arsonist.

The lobby itself was large and tastefully modern. There were several seating areas made up of plush sofas and coffee tables, long green hanging plants fell like waterfalls from the first floor balconies and a large chandelier was attached to the ceiling, filling the room with a warm orange glow. The lobby was also filled with quite a crowd of guests, talking, checking into rooms or just generally relaxing.

Waiting for her in one of the seating areas was a very pissed off Rat, sitting on a sofa and bouncing his leg viciously. What was wrong with him now? Regardless she sat down next to him, putting the bags at their feet.

As she sat down Junkrat nonchalantly put his arm around her shoulders, pulling her into a close embrace and whispering in her ear "Metra, Ah swear to god, when we get back to Gibraltar I'm gonna turn that monkey into a fucking rug."

Ignoring his use of that annoying nickname she pulled away from him a little in surprise, both at his words and at the physical contact, although she assumed the latter was due to the busy nature of the lobby "What? Why?"

He simply grumbled in reply, bouncing his leg a few more times before standing up and grabbing the bags "Ya’ll know in a minute. Come on, I've got the key and the room number."

His reply infuriated her. Why did he have to be such an over dramatic child? And why was she just expected to follow him? If it was something important to the mission that could compromise it she should be told, not strung along. If it wasn't for the crowds and their cover she'd put her foot down and call him out right there and then. But she had to bite her tongue...for now at least.

Instead she reluctantly followed him out of the lobby and up the flights of stairs to their room where Junkrat unlocked the door and made an exaggerated gesture for her to go inside. At first she couldn't see the issue. The room was large and spacious, exactly what Winston's contact had promised and more than enough for a weekend stay. There was a large TV mounted on the wall in front of a glass coffee table and a sofa with a fridge she assumed was fully stoked. At the far side of the room there was an open door leading to a big en-suite bathroom. Then she saw the bed.

The one bed.

Jamison must have noticed her expression from where he was leaning against the door frame as he let out a loud laugh. “Looks like we’re going to be getting quite cosy Metra” he smirked, although there was still a hint of anger in his voice.

She took a deep breath, bristling at the use of that nickname once again. It wasn’t that bad, was it? It was a ridiculously large bed after all, at least super king size or bigger, and it was only for one night. That would be fine right? As long as they stuck to their own sides…

Their own sides of the same bed. Her and the almost attractive Junker. In one bed

To her horror even the thought was making her face feel flushed. Pretending to be partners with a college for the sake of a mission was one thing, but sharing a bed with them? It was unprofessional. Yes that was it. That was why she was flustered, embarrassment and nothing more. “Is there not another room we can-”

“Nope!” he interrupted her before she could finish with another manic laugh. “This is one of the most popular hotels in Paris, we were lucky to get a room last minute at all.” However he seemed to (thankfully) mistake her expression for one of discomfort, and his own face softened a little “...Metra if you feel uncomfortable I can just sleep on the floor. I wouldn't mind.”

She quickly pulled herself together, taking another deep breath and smoothing out her dress before flashing Junkrat a smile “No, that wouldn't be fair on you. Besides, I'm sure we’ll manage, its big enough it’s practically two beds anyway, so no need to make a fuss.”

The lanky arsonist didn't seem too convinced himself but nodded along anyway, running a hand through his hair absentmindedly. “Yeah...guess it is only one night…”

“Exactly. And we're professionals and teammates. No need to act like teenagers. We should be getting ready to head back out” She motioned for him to place the bags on the bed and began looking through her things for her toiletries. She could worry about the nights arrangements later, for now they had a job to do.

Junkrat was starting to see why this was the only mission ol’ Angel face would let the ape send him on. At first the little scouting mission he’d been tasked with alongside Symmetra wasn't half bad, they’d landed in Paris in the early morning and, after a minor hiccup with their hotel room, had left to begin scouting out the spots Winston had listed for them.

He’d be lying if he said he wasn’t enjoying being undercover. After all, for two days he wasn’t Jamison Fawkes, Junker, missing half his limbs and currently on the verge of dying. He was Victor Norman, a normal guy with a girlfriend, probably a normal job and a normal family he could visit on the weekends.

The name ‘Victor’ had been Metras idea. The night before she had come to find him tinkering away in the workshop and had stood in the doorway, her arms folded over the front of a light blue nightie. “Shouldn't you be heading to bed soon? We’re scheduled to leave at 4am”

He’d shrugged, waving her away with a hand “Ah’ll sleep in a minute. Just gotta tweak this first. '' His attention was focused on a modification to his Riptire. The things were far too big to make and tinker with while in his room and had fallen annoyingly behind when it came to upgrades and improvements compared to the rest of his gear.

“Have you packed? Got the temporary prosthetics from Angela? Thought of an alias?”

He absentmindedly nodded along until she got to the last thing “An alias?”

Symmetra rested her palm on her forehead and sighed, giving him a disappointed look that made him squirm a little “Yes. A name to go by for the mission.” she paused “We’re meant to be undercover, surely you realised you couldn’t go by Junkrat? Or even Jamison-”

“Yeah yeah I knew that.” He winced, not wanting her to say his full name out loud. “Just ma brain didn’t fill in the bit between not using that name and me needing a new one…” The Junker finished faffing with the tire for now and span his chair around to face her. “You got one thought out?”

“Of course” She smiled “Saffron Sharma. I quite liked the ring of it. The forename is that of an old acquaintance at the academy, and ‘Sharma’ means joyfulness”

He liked it too, it was elegant and formal. Although he much preferred ‘Satya Vaswani’. The way it flowed, the way it rolled off the tongue. A cracking name for a beautiful lass.

Once again the strange fuzzy feeling in his belly returned and it took everything inch of his will not to turn bright red when he realized he’d been sat staring at her for several seconds. “It’s not bad.” He finally forced out with an awkward cough. “I’m fresh out of ideas for me self though.” For fucks sake, pull yourself together Rat. If you can’t deal with this you won't survive the next few days…

Life was a lot easier before he fixed that fucking clock…

Symmetra moved to sit in her own chair for a moment thinking, crossing one leg over the other and staring at the floor. The architect stayed like this for a few moments before smiling and looking back at him “How about Victor?”

The suggestion took him back a little at first. It wasn't something he would have chosen himself, but it wasn't bad, he actually quite liked it. “Why Victor?”

“Its a Latin name. Quite a popular in Christian countries.” She paused, going a little red with embarrassment “Well, that and it’s the name of a mad scientist in a literary classic, one of my favorites… Actually a retelling of the original has become quite popular in recent years.”

The Junker leaned back in his chair, resting his arm on the work top and wiggling an eyebrow at her teasingly “Fancy me a bit of a mad scientist then Metra?”

“Its Symmetra please. And I guess I do, well more mad inventor, but it's close.” She smiled “Is it suitable? If not I can try and think of another.”

It was more than suitable, and the fake passports and other documents had been printed ready for them in the morning.

He was brought back to the present by a light shake from the architect sat next to him. “Junkrat you need to focus, stop daydreaming” She whispered annoyed, her voice low enough that no one would hear her using his ‘real’ name. “I know you're finding this boring but please just pay attention”

The junker slouched in his chair grumbling to himself, picking up the boba tea he’d brought and taking a long, angry drink. He looked around him at the tourists sat outside the same little cafe. As with the last two locations, no one looked suspicious or was doing anything anywhere close to talon-y looking things. Hell the worst ‘crime’ they'd even seen was when some stupid Parisian 14 year old's had wolf whistled at Metra.

A chilling glare had soon sent them scarpering

Again, at first he hadn’t minded the slow pace scouty shit. Sitting in the sun in somewhere as appealing as Paris wasn't the worst way to spend a weekend after all. But the longer the day went on the more and more bored he got. Halfway through the second location he began fidgeting, and by the time they got to their third and final destination Symmetra seemed to be growing tired of his antics.

He had better things to be doing for fucks sake! He wasn't a scout, he was a fighter! An Inventor! He should be tinkering in the workshop on his riptires, working on new designs and schematics or even just blowing shit up. He was even starting to doubt if there had been any talon sightings, or if it was just all one big plan by his trio of baby sitters to get him out of the house. It was all a waste of time, and he didn’t know how much of that he was working with anymore…

Jesus mate. Where the fuck had that thought come from?

Then again...It wasn’t exactly wrong was it? Hadn't Mercy had said so herself just over a month ago? If this poison she was pumping him full of didn't work he had about year, 12 months, 52 weeks, 365-

The Junker shook his head, trying to rid himself of the morbid thoughts. No. He was fine. Angela Ziegler was a top crack doctor, one of the best in the world. If anyone could fix what the Outback had done to him it was her, and in a years time he’d look back on this and laugh that he was ever even worried.

Once again Symmetra brought him out of his daydreaming, although this time it was with a soft touch on his arm and a concerned expression, her dark eyes studying his face carefully. “Are you ok?”

He froze up for a moment at how softly she asked the question before quickly throwing on a smile and bolting upright “Course I'm alright! Just off in me own little world ah guess!” He laughed quickly. “Just thinking up some new bomb ideas is all.”

She seemed satisfied enough with his response, picking up her own tea cup and drinking from it while taking a break from scanning the area to look at her watch. “We’re almost done here, don't worry.”

As she moved sparkle from her wrist caught his attention and, without really thinking, he gently grabbed her arm to get a closer look. She had a bracelet he never noticed before and sitting in the middle was a tiny Rat charm. “Hey, when did you get this? It’s pretty.”

To his surprise she didn't try to pull away from him, although she did still tense up a little at his sudden touch “I made it myself, quite a while ago now actually. Apart from the charm of course, that was brought during a day out with Lena.” she took another sip from the cup and eyed him almost suspiciously “With your love of shiny things I'm surprised it took you so long to notice.”

“Guess I’ve just been spending more time in me room not the workshop..” And when he had been there he was never really in the right mind to notice, with him either being sick from his treatment or far too engrossed in his work.

Not wanting his mind to drift back to...that.. He tried to change the subject “Ah didn’t know you were a fan of Rats.”

She gently pulled her arm away from his grasp “I'm not. It’s actually a mouse. Something about it called to me, so I bought it.” The architect put the now empty tea cup back on the saucer with a smile “I tend not to make impulse purchases, but for this little guy I had to make an exception.”

The lanky arsonist gave her a cheeky grin “Well, I’m gonna say its a rat anyway. Like a little me as a good luck charm.”

“I don’t feel your much of a bringer of luck. Maybe a bringer of chaos”

Junkrat put his hand to his chest in mock offence, drawing in an exaggerated gasp “How dare ya! I feel I’ve been a pretty good luck token so far. Stopped you from getting blown to giblets didn't I?...even if it was my grenade…”

He got an eye roll for that, but he could see the shadows of another smile pulling at her cheeks all the same. “Come on, we best get going” She stood up, neatly tucking her chair under the table before turning and begin to walk away. “The restaurant at the hotel is meant to be quite marvelous and it would be a shame for us not to get a table. The earlier we get there the quieter it will be.”

Us? The words made him freeze for a moment, and he had to perform an awkward running hobble to catch up to her “Hang on, you wanna grab dinner together?”

She stopped walking to allow him to catch up and looked back at him confused. “Why is there something wrong with that?”

The Junker shook his head, going to pick at his prosthetic arm out of habit but not finding any paint to pull on. “Nah, Just thought you were more the ‘eat alone’ type that’s all”

“While I do prefer my own company on most occasions, dinner with a coworker can always be pleasant as well. Particularly one who may not have experienced much fine dinning” She blushed slightly out of what he assumed was embarrassment “Well, at least I assume you have not…”

He laughed rubbing the back of his neck “Nah, not many 5 star eateries in Junkertown. Most of the fancy suit places on our crime spree wouldn't let me and hog in either, always said something about a dress code.”

Symmetra stifled her own giggle with a hand and Junkrat quickly felt the fuzzy feeling once again. That laugh, it was just music to his ears and he wanted to stand here cracking jokes just to hear it again and again. And here she was, actually wanting to spend time with him as well, even if it was only as professional friends.

“Well then I guess it’s time to change that isn’t it?”

#junkmetra #symmrat #symmetra #Junkrat #Overwatch #ow #overwatch fanfic #ow fanfic #hurt #angst #fluff #comfort #tw cancer #tw death

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aizawa-yamada-shinsou · 5 years

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Alright, so our least favorite person in my AU, Jackieboyman!

Jk, Jk we still love him even if I’ve made him kinda a dick in my AU.

So Biggest thing about his backstory is he’s from the MCU. Don’t worry NO Endgame spoilers are in this, I swear! In fact, due to the inclusion of JBM, I can only say that his backstory is based on the MCU but pretty canon divergent.

I’m going to put it under the cut since this is going to get LONG.

So to start with JBM was a first gen immigrant to the good old US of A, coming across the pond from Ireland with his parents when he was seven, gaining citizenship right before his 10th birthday. They live in an apartment in the Bronx. (mostly because I want the three-way rivalry between Our Brooklyn boys, Queen’s Spider and now Bronx JBM.)

He was staying with a family friend when he gained his powers at age 13 in 2006, no one is sure what happened as he was the only survivor of the event that totaled the apartment building the friends lived in. JBM remembers a deep rumbling and arcs of electricity but nothing else before he woke up in the rumble surrounded by his best friend and his parent’s body. JBM parents don’t make him His abilities are just like they are now for the most part; X-ray vision, keen hearing, and superior agility, only instead of hacking/coding skills, he has straight up Technology Manipulation. He makes his own suit and decides he wants to have an epic superhero adventure, because what 13 year old wouldn’t want to be a hero if given the chance? Plus, he wanted to know why he was given these powers while his friend and so many others died that day.

He ends up taking care of the Bronx, kinda like how Spidey takes care of Queens and Daredevil takes care of Hell’s Kitchen. He trained himself to be good at parkour and hand to hand fighting so that he could help out his neighborhood. He took the name Jackieboyman from his friend who perished the day he got his powers, his name was Jack and his dad always called him ‘good ol’ Jackieboy!’. JBM names are actually not even close to Jack, or Sean but he prefers Jackie now that he’s ego and doesn’t really need to give away his original name.

When the battle of New York happened in 2009, he ended up fighting as it was way too close to home for comfort. The other Avengers weren’t really happy to see a teenager in what really accounted as PJs out in the fray but he helped them out greatly when he went to the tower with Nat using his Technology Manipulation to help shut down the protections on the portal control and help to turn it off after Tony took the Nuke up.

He went with the Avengers to confront Loki, calling him an icy creep. Thor misunderstands and asks how JBM knew about his brothers Frost giant heritage, but Jackie equally confused said he was talking about the god’s icy blue glare. THIS gets Thor’s attention as he knows that Loki, in fact, has green eyes. This makes the others think back realizing that they all had met the very blue eyes of the god at some point during his stay on the Helicarrier, the same blue Clint’s eyes had been not too long ago.

It doesn’t take a genius to realize the man they all thought was pulling the strings was a mind-controlled pawn, and since the spell wasn’t breaking after Hulk smashed him into the ground many times over Thor needed to take him back to Asgard quickly for help breaking free.

After they leave JBM is ‘inducted’ into the Avengers by Fury, who really just wanted to know how they didn’t notice this little dude running around the Bronx. No one tell him about Daredevil. Tony ends up getting JBM a better suit so the idiot doesn’t end up dead, but he has very limited contact with the Avengers from then on out.

Loki, on the other hand, comes down to Midgard, using his secret pathways as he may not be in trouble for the invasion but he’s still imprisoned for destroying Jotunheim, to thank JBM for helping his idiot brother realize that he was not in his right mind during his time as an invader. Loki and JBM end up being fairly good friends with Loki slipping out of his prison on a fairly regular basis to annoy JBM.

He does get sent to help for bigger missions as he gets older, like helping take out the Helicarriers when he was 18 in 2014, and Slovakia mission when he was 19 in 2015. Thor tells the group that Loki is dead but JBM knows this is a load of Bullshit because the god stole his Twix bar the day before, but keeps it quiet because he knows Loki has a plan and if he ruins it he has to deal with a pouting trickster and that’s never fun.

He ends up helping Tony and Bruce create Ultron with his powers, which as we know ends up lovely. He is there when they rescue what will end up being Vision, and running a battery of diagnostics to see how the body is doing when Thor shows up and Frankensteins Vision alive. JBM is not going to even pretend that he didn’t fangirled over Vision and wanted to figure out how the bot ticked really badly.

In Civil War he sides with Tony, not believing that Bucky could be innocent after all the evidence starts building up. Emotions do not outway facts in his mind. He ends up meeting Peter during the team up and feels an instant brotherly connection with this tiny child. Yes, he realized Spidey is a year older then he was when he joined the hero biz but he refuses to believe that he was ever this adorable and small.

After the ‘civil war’ JBM ends up stopping over in Queens more than entirely necessary to check in on his ‘baby bro’. He ends up helping Peter realize that he can be an awesome Spiderman without Tony’s constant approval, even though Peter does not stop trying, but it gives Peter more confidence over the course of the movie. They form a very competitive brotherly relationship, always trying to one-up each other.

Loki ends up following JBM to Queens and meets Peter and ends up deciding that Peter is way too precious for this world and deserves to be protected. Thus forming the Trio of pranksters that no one puts together is them because Spidey is too innocent, Loki is ‘dead’ and JBM, the only one they suspect could be one of the pranksters, always has an alibi ala Loki illusion.

Shuri ends up joining their group after Tony introduces Peter and JBM to her. She loves how intelligent JBM and Peter are about technology and science in general, and is in awe at Jackie’s powers. She demands to run tests on his abilities to see how it works with Wakanda tech and that’s how Loki finds them seven hours later. She loves helping out with pranks remotely as long as she gets recordings of the results.

Shortly before Infinity War picks up JBM is killed, he wasn’t even on duty, just heading to his job in Stark Industry's IT department (No Tony was not aware that JBM worked for him, JBM thought it was hilarious not to tell him since Tony never could figure out who he was. Stark may be good at Hacking but JBM was better and wiped any clues towards his secret ID too well to be discovered), when the bus he was on crashed killing five passengers including JBM.

Peter and Shuri were the only ones that knew as they, along with Loki but he was in the Dark as he was facing Ragnarok, were the only three he trusted with his ID, but Peter ended up breaking down causing Tony to find out and He informed the public, announcing that he was financing a service to honor and say goodbye to the fallen hero, even if he wasn’t going to release the name of JBM, or the cause of death and he made sure that the press knew that the body would not be present as he wanted the family to be able to mourn their loved one without being hounded. Jackie was 25 when he died.

There’s just one thing I’m on the fence about. I’m debating on if JBM would have been a transman when he was first alive in the MCU, since it’s such a popular fan theory, only to be remade in Sean’s image when he became an ego thus making him a cis dude now, what do y’ all think?

#JBM #My backstory for my AU #So long

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burlybanner · 5 years

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Syzygy - 7

Syzygy - An AU of Infundo (post-Infundo Chronicles).

Chapter 7: You Can’t Handle the Truth

Summary: It takes a village to raise an alter. Link to Chapter 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 Note: Alcohol trigger warning.

** "You...wait. You're what? Where?"

Tony smirked behind his sunglasses and Bruce knew something was wrong. Tony's body language was off, really, really off. "Korea," Tony barked. "Emergency SI meeting I couldn't miss. I had to jet out at three am just to make it on time for this fuckin' shithole of a gathering." Tony sighed, ran a hand through his hair.

He's lying. Bruce knew it as soon as Tony finger-combed his hair. He shyly glanced at Steve and noticed the other man's lips had thinned.

So Steve saw it too.

"Well, stay safe then," Steve muttered. "You're gonna be back soon, yeah?"

"Six...seven days. Tops."

"Gonna hold you to that, Tony."

"Yeah," Bruce sighed. He felt his lip quiver as he tried imitating a brave smile. "Miss you."

"Heh. I'll be back before you can say Jack Daniels, Pooh. Can't keep me away. Ciao, lovelies."

And he cut the connection before either Bruce or Steve said anything else.

Steve folded his arms and inhaled while staring at the blank video screen. His cheek jumped as he clenched and unclenched his jaw. "You buy any of that?"

Bruce ran his tongue over his bottom lip and took in Steve's soldier stance. He was livid. Bruce didn't blame him, because he felt the same. "Not a word."

"Mmhm. You buy the whole, 'Hulk broke the GoPro so the feed didn't load' crap either?"

Bruce scratched his neck. "Nope."

Steve snorted angrily and stared at his toes. "Jarvis," he growled. "What protocol's up for last night's north kitchen feed, from say...eleven PM to two AM?"

"Protocol 1-1 A, 2B, B2, B3. Zero. Zero. D. Zero."

"Fuck."

Bruce closely echoed Steve sentiment even if he didn't say it. "Absolute lockdown," Bruce murmured. Hell, he wasn't the computer science genius Tony was. They couldn't view what happened even if they wanted to.

"Hulk...Hulk must've said or done something," Bruce whispered. "That's the only reason--"

"Don't, Bruce. God, please. Don't." Steve drew him close and hugged him, even though he wanted to break down too. "It's not your fault. It's...whatever screw's loose in Tony's head right now. He ran but we're gonna have to let him, until he's ready to come back."

"I...I don't think I can handle not knowing." Bruce shuddered once in Steve's arms then pulled away. "If it's my fault I need to own it. I--I have to. Especially if H-Hulk...if I hu-hurt--"

"Shhh..."

Steve comforted Bruce again and kept his hold on him. God, he was gonna kill Tony for this passive aggressive bullshit.

"I need to find out what happened," Bruce snuffled. He rubbed his nose and quickly wiped under his glasses. "Tony doesn't do this. He wouldn't do this to us. To me."

"I know, Bruce, but--"

"No." Bruce firmly stood his ground. "It's not normal. The clues are around here. We'll...just unearth every rock no matter how ugly it is."

Steve smiled sadly, but gave Bruce a little half-shrug. "Okay. We can try. But where should we search first?"

Bruce paused a moment. "Jarvis," he said. "What are the protocols for the data Tony worked on, prior to late last night?"

"No protocols exist, sir."

A bitter smile broke across his lips. "Good."

Jarvis had private abilities few knew about, ones he'd cobbled together on his own without Tony's prompting. When he discovered Jarvis’ hidden talents, Tony was awestruck but absolutely thrilled: his AI had learned to interrupt the subtleties of negative human behavior to avert mental breakdowns. How cool was that?

"Sir," Jarvis softly prompted. "I know you've muted me, but I feel insistent."

"N'now, J." Tony's slurred speech wasn't unknown to the AI, and Jarvis easily interpreted the garbled words. Video was only partially effective since Tony’s wristwatch angles hampered his abilities, but Jarvis could easily make out a desk and his creator’s slouched posture over a bottle of Glenlivet Reserve, 25y. A twin of the same had also been opened, but not nearly as depleted.

"G'wan...G'wan home."

If the AI could sigh, he would. He did not believe the amount of alcohol consumed was particularly safe. Over the years his creator’s tolerance levels had changed, and it took far less alcohol to endanger the updated safety protocols.

"If you persist, I will need to contact the authorities per emergency health protocol 1, aka, 'Pepper's Law.' " Unbidden, Jarvis monitored Tony's respiratory and heart patterns and immediately ran quick calculations. Alcohol was a known sedative at higher levels, and his creator had not imbibed this heavily in many years. In conclusion, imbibing so much now after a period of comparatively light drinking could cause dangerous consequences.

"You've had thirty ounces of whisky in less than two hours, sir. I'm obliged to, per the vernacular, 'cut you off.' "

"Hmf." Tony sloppily sloshed another shot in his glass but Jarvis wasn't entirely sure if he could recognize the tumbler at this point.

"Sir."

Tony huffed tiredly and stared at the shot glass. But something must have activated within him, as he seemed to ponder the drink and observe it. Then he flung the glass into the trash, along with his second bottle.

"Fuck. Fuckin' sucks, J."

"What does, sir?" Sometimes, Jarvis learned, the best option of all was to keep people talking. He would continue to monitor sir's health levels, and if they dipped below dangerous levels, he would immediately call an ambulance and the hotel concierge. "Oblige me, please."

Tony ran a hand through his hair and the camera angle jarred from the desk and careened back-first onto the bed. Jarvis could review the ceiling, noting the sleek, rotunda designs of a four-star hotel room. "World. Shit. World spins. Spins."

"Alcohol at extreme levels create the illusion of a 'spinning planet,'" Jarvis agreed. "However, it's simply a density difference between the cupula and the fluid in your ear canal--"

Tony chuckled darkly. "Y'sound like 'im."

"Who, sir?"

"Brucie Bear. Juuust like 'im. Fuck. It's...it sucks. He. He's not the same."

"How so, sir? Could you elaborate?" Jarvis made a few other calculations. His creator would, most probably fall into an unconscious state in three minutes or fewer, depending on their conversation. He would continue to monitor his health, however. His BAC would continue to climb but should remain below emergency protocol levels.

Barely.

The voice in the room hitched, and Jarvis' camera jiggled and the feed included a blurry smudge. "I dunno...gotta say, wasn't expectin' it. Me an' Cap, we gotta...gotta change us. Regro. Renog..."

"Renegotiate?" Jarvis offered helpfully.

"Yeah. That. Poor Bruce..."

Tony trailed, and Jarvis wasn't sure if he'd succumbed to sleep. His heart rate and breathing slowed enough to warrant it.

"Jarv," Tony finally mumbled. "He doesn't...does he know?"

"If you're referring to Professor Banner's knowledge of an additional altar, I do not believe so, sir. Not according to what I could determine."

Tony grunted. "We gotta tell 'im. Dunno how. He's gotta know. S'ok to tell 'im, J. I give you permish."

"Understood, sir."

But Jarvis wasn't sure if Tony heard him, as the audio echoed with tortured snoring.

Bruce knew he had maybe a day to piece the clues together. As soon as Tony returned to his right mind he'd be locking down everything left and right to hide the events leading to last night.

"Jarvis," Bruce said. His fingers flew across Tony's keyboard while ideas poured into his head, ideas born from desperation. He glanced at the output before checking his companion notes. "Run 13:52 through 15:40, double speed."

"Same parameters, sir?"

"Yeah."

Bruce tented his fingers and leaned in close, viewing the feed from yesterday's main living room. He was eating cookies, with Steve and Tony fondly looking on. He was a little messier with the crumbs than usual - but...wait. There.

"Jarvis. Pause."

The feed stopped. Tony's expression had changed from lustful abandon to...something less quantifiable. Tony was scrutinizing him, and Bruce drank in Tony’s frozen posture. His boyfriend’s eyes were unnaturally cautious as he checked Bruce out, and it was the same expression Bruce remembered catching at lunch, although the frown fleeted as quickly as Bruce caught it.

Bruce grit his teeth and muttered softly. "Tony, what are you hiding in that big, beautiful brain?"

"Hey."

Bruce startled at Steve's hand on his shoulder. "Sorry. You finished your snack, so now you get four sandwiches with sodas, chips, and a half dozen monster cookies."

Bruce snorted and tore into the food as soon as Steve handed him the bags. He started in on the chicken pesto hoagie and dumped on a few chips, for a crispier crunch. "I could've had the bots get something for me from the kitchen." He tsked when a few globs from his lunch plopped on his shirt.

They provide napkins for a reason, Banner, he sighed, pulling one from a bag and tucking it under his chin.

"Nah. I know you too well. You'll disappear into your project and forget to eat. Can't waste what we've done so far, gotta at least maintain you."

"Mmph." Bruce nodded. He pointed to one soda, noticing it was opened and waiting. "You put in the gainer fuel?"

"Yep. So you'll probably get hungry in a while. But I'm ready." He held up another bag of food.

Bruce chuckled and took giant gulps from his soda bottle.

Steve put down his own bag and ambled over to Bruce's screen. His hooded expression scanned the frozen video feed and Bruce sighed.

"Do you see it?"

"I think so." Steve’s fingers ran across Tony's paused visage. "He's hiding something. Weighing out the pros and cons, mulling over consequences." He frowned at Bruce. "You and he can get like that in the lab, sometimes, and it's impossible to talk to you two when you're like that."

"Sorry." Bruce smiled and threw the empty soda bottle into the recycling bin. "We do go into 'science mode' a lot, leaving you out."

"I'm used to it." Steve seemed to ponder something and anxiously tapped the screen. "But I...may have part of the puzzle. Tony didn't want me to say anything, but due to current events I think I should."

Bruce sat back in his chair with a frown. It popped and squealed under his large frame; Tony mentioned adjusting it soon, but it probably needed changing in the next few weeks the rate he was gaining.

"Enlighten me," he murmured coldly.

Steve swallowed the lump in his throat and pulled a chair to him. He sat and grabbed for Bruce's hand, but Bruce subtly moved it. "Okay, then. It'll probably make you mad to be honest."

"Better angry than clueless." Bruce tapped his fingers against his desk. "Spill it, Steve."

"We had a talk yesterday. During your after breakfast nap."

Bruce turned to face Steve fully, his expression unreadable but undeniably chilly. "What about?"

"I, ah. I told Tony that I thought--" he rifled a hand through his hair and puffed out a gust of air while Bruce kept his glare on him. "It's the Hulk. I told Tony that I thought Hulk... was finding a way into your subconscious to manipulate you."

"What?"

"Yeah. It's a theory, though. I'm not sure if--"

Bruce whipped around to the screen, ignoring Steve while his fingers tore across the keyboard. It couldn't be possible, but hold on. What if--

He brought his gainer formula on the screen and anxiously scanned it, but he couldn't find anything wrong. "There's no way...he couldn't have. He's not that smart..."

"Who, Hulk?"

Bruce put a hand to his lips. Dismay pushed at his temples and created the headache from hell, but this was--no. Hulk didn't. Couldn't. But how?

"Talk to me, Muffin. Please."

He waved off Steve but still felt a hand on his shoulder, trying to be supportive, but it felt wrong somehow. Not right.

"Doctor Banner."

Was that Jarvis?

"Jarvis, unless it's Tony put it on the back burner for me." He brought up the screen with his notes and frantically poured over the minutiae of each section. He told them he hadn't finished the testing phase but Hulk used it anyway - but Hulk couldn't have possibly understood.

Or could he?

He began to shiver. "T--this doesn't feel...right. This--"

"Bruce, sweetheart. Please talk to me. You're getting worked up."

"Doctor Banner. You have a message."

His head felt floaty. He began disassociating and losing his sense of self but he had shit to do they had to find Tony...

"Doctor Banner, please. It's an emergency."

"An...a what?"

"Captain Rogers, I recommend fetching a bottled water from the lab mini refrigerator near Master Stark's console."

"On it, Jarvis."

Steve sounded worried. Why was Steve worried?

"Doctor Banner. Can you hear me?"

"Hh...Yes, Jarvis," he said softly. "I...I'm here."

"Please remain calm."

He jumped when something cold pressed into his trembling hands. "You were turning half green, Bruce," Steve said softly but Bruce barely acknowledged him. It felt hard to breathe. To think. "Drink it. Please."

"You have an emergency message," Jarvis repeated.

"From...who?"

"I was instructed to play a message for you once you reviewed your notes. Please review the video feed piping into your monitor. Should you like, you can ask to view it alone or with Captain Rogers."

"I'd...like to stay," Steve murmured. Bruce could almost feel gentle thumbs digging into his jumpy, tense back muscles. "If that's okay with you."

Bruce gulped down the icy water and let the shock of it clear his mental cobwebs. The hazy feeling mostly evaporated, but he didn't feel 100% normal. "If it's serious, Jarvis, I think Steven and I should see it together." Especially since he couldn't quell the weird feelings of dread suffocating his rational mind. "Thanks, Steve."

Steve slowly massaged Bruce's arms and kissed his temple, further calming him. "Of course."

Bruce suddenly felt pressure on his back and over his shoulders as Steve draped his body over him, covering him like a warm, heavy cloak. The effect grounded him. Made him feel comforted and safe. His synapses began firing like turned switches, nerve to cell, one by one. Steve knew what Bruce needed without saying anything and that's why Bruce loved him so much - he understood the power of timely touch and silence when Bruce so desperately craved it.

"Thank you," Bruce whispered, and he leaned into Steve's strengthening hug.

Fortunately Jarvis knew well enough to wait until he'd calmed down. "I was instructed to preface this recording," he began. "It will be alarming, but it is not a prank. I've also been instructed to freely answer any additional questions, although I am more interested in what the video has to say."

Bruce frowned. "Wait, you didn't view it?"

He imagined the AI would be frustrated, if it had the capacity. "No, Doctor Banner. I was instructed not to until..."

"By who?"

The video began playing.

"By me," the person said.

A person who looked exactly like Bruce.

#polyamory #chubby bruce fic #infundoau #chubby bruce banner #steve rogers #tony stark #bruce banner #american pi #science bros #hulk #stark spangled banner #bhm #chubby kink #syzygy #starkspangledbanner syzygy #professor hulk

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aion-rsa · 3 years

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MST3K Turkey Day: The Long History of Mystery Science Theater 3000 and Thanksgiving

https://ift.tt/3l4KHUl

Sometimes a long-running TV show finds itself linked to a certain holiday. Community had Christmas. The Simpsons has Halloween. Brooklyn 99 had Halloween, then changed it to Cinco de Mayo for scheduling reasons. Saturday Night Live has…Election Day, I guess? I probably should have thought this through a bit more.

While Mystery Science Theater 3000 has done a handful of Christmas-themed episodes (one major one per host, at least), the series has a much deeper relationship with Thanksgiving. Turkey Day is essentially its legacy. It started on Thanksgiving and it always comes back to that one Thursday in late November, whether the show is on the air or not.

Back in 1988, Joel Hodgson created a new show idea inspired by a random image from the liner notes of an Elton John album, wherein a couple of silhouettes sit in front of a movie screen. He and some robot puppets would watch bad movies and crack jokes. While the 15-minute proof of concept footage of him watching The Green Slime never made it to air, the world would be introduced to Mystery Science Theater 3000 on November 24 as he and Crow (here voiced by J. Elvis Weinstein) sat through Invaders from the Deep.

Well, only a very small piece of the world would be introduced. The show aired on KTMA-TV in Minnesota. Regardless, the first time MST3K hit the airwaves, it was Thanksgiving night.

The episode – and really the entire KTMA-TV season – wasn’t great. The idea was there, but they hadn’t come close to hitting its potential. It still found an audience and about a year later, it was airing on the Comedy Channel. That first season, which had Joel Hodgson as Joel Robinson, Weinstein as Tom Servo, and Trace Beaulieu as Crow T. Robot, was also pretty rough. It wasn’t until the second and third seasons (where Kevin Murphy had taken over the Servo role) that MST3K really started to find its footing.

On November 28, 1991, to celebrate MST3K’s third anniversary, Comedy Central put together the very first Turkey Day marathon. Starting at midnight and ending at 6 AM on the following day (!), they would air fifteen episodes in a row, accompanied by various Thanksgiving-based bumpers and sketches.

Keep in mind, this was long before the days of The Daily Show and South Park, so Comedy Central’s pool of popular shows wasn’t the deepest. This was back when you’d turn on the channel in the middle of the day and see episodes of Soap or some ’80s movie about a mime joining a ninja academy. No really, that was a thing. They played it all the time.

In 1992, they kicked up Turkey Day a notch. While still a 15-episode marathon, it started on Wednesday, November 25 at 6 PM with the debut showing of The Beatniks. By the time they reached the home stretch at 10 PM on Thanksgiving night, they played the episode premiere for Fire Maidens of Outer Space. At midnight, to finish things off, a half-hour special called This is MST3K was aired.

They kept many of the bumpers from the first Turkey Day, added some more, and each episode was introduced with a segment where Dr. Forrester would force-feed TV’s Frank some kind of turkey dish themed to the featured movie.

1993 went even bigger by adding one more episode to the marathon, making the whole thing 32 hours long. This time, the framing bumpers took the form of clips from a party that an MST3K fan won via contest. Initially, Comedy Central wanted the guys from the show to put together some segments with a tiny budget, but it was probably for the better that they didn’t. By the time Turkey Day ’93 aired, Mike Nelson had taken over for Joel as the show’s host and that major transition was still less than a month old.

This time the marathon went from 6pm on November 24 to 2am on November 26. At 10pm on Thanksgiving night, they premiered the episode featuring Beginning of the End.

The next year’s special episode premieres were Kitten with a Whip (starting the marathon) and Zombie Nightmare (ending it). Using Zombie Nightmare worked out perfectly because that movie’s antagonist was played by none other than Adam West and who better to host the Turkey Day segments? Though in retrospect, Adam West was pretty much everywhere in the mid-90s, so it wasn’t the biggest deal ever.

Still, it was nice and even featured appearances from other MST3K targets like Robert Vaughn, Beverly Garland, and Mamie Van Doren. The main focus was Adam West cooking turkeys themed to each episode and delighting us with his smooth, tryptophan-laced voice.

The 1995 edition (officially called “MST3K Anthology” despite still airing on Thanksgiving) existed to debut the seventh season of the show, known for its meager six episodes. As Comedy Central was losing interest in the series, the marathon was shortened to fifteen hours. It also featured a rare inclusion of a Season 1 episode, The Crawling Hand.

What made MST3K Anthology so memorable was not that it was the last hurrah for Comedy Central’s annual marathons or the shortened string of episodes. It was for the premiere of Episode 701, Night of the Blood Beast and the interesting way that episode was handled. Throughout the marathon, episodes would be introduced via Dr. Forrester being forced to host an impromptu Thanksgiving party with guests including preexisting characters Jack Perkins (Mike Nelson), Mr. B Natural (Bridget Nelson), Pitch (Paul Chaplin), Kitten with a Whip (Kevin Murphy), and Michael Feinstein (also Mike Nelson). This led to the airing of Night of the Blood Beast, where not only were the host segments based on celebrating Thanksgiving, but it was shown that Forrester’s Thanksgiving party was still going on.

In later airings of that episode, the host segments were completely different and had zero connection to Thanksgiving. Everything inside the theater remained the same. They just took a holiday-themed episode and made it run-of-the-mill for the sake of easier reruns. The host segments from the MST3K Anthology version of Night of the Blood Beast are available as extras on various DVD releases.

MST3K would spend three seasons on the Sci-Fi Channel, but would only get one Thanksgiving marathon, taking place in 1997. Even then, it was a bit half-assed. The marathon aired from 7:30am on November 27 to 4am on November 28, but with a six-hour break in the middle to play a couple of Star Wars movies. It also lacked any special flavor to it, foregoing any special bumpers or segments. No episode premieres. Just a handful of Sci-Fi era episodes and a lengthy Star Wars break.

Then it was sixteen years of silence. MST3K was cancelled after its tenth season in 1999. Those involved in the show mostly split into two teams. Some followed Joel as he started his new venture Cinematic Titanic. Others followed Mike, whose failed series The Film Crew was followed by the much more successful RiffTrax. That left MST3K rights owner Jim Mallon, who tried to move forward with an animated web series starring the robots and…the less said about it the better.

Joel was seeing enough money coming to him from DVD sales to realize that despite being cancelled a long time ago, there were still people wanting MST3K. With a 25-year anniversary DVD set coming out, Joel decided to promote it with the return of Turkey Day. Turkey Day ’13 featured Joel introducing the six most popular episodes of the show, which he’d also give hints about ahead of time. Streamed online, the special ended with him at the dinner table with Servo and Crow, causing speculation amongst the fans.

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There was more speculation a year later when Turkey Day ’14 had the two bots regularly appear during the host segments, voiced once again by J. Elvis Weinstein and Trace Beaulieu. There would also be segments of Joel, Trace, and Frank Conniff sitting back and reminiscing about the history of this MST3K/Thanksgiving connection.

While riding the wave of the previous year’s success, this installment of Turkey Day was also promoting a DVD set Mystery Science Theater 3000: The Turkey Day Collection. The set mainly featured four random episodes (Jungle Goddess, Painted Hills, Screaming Skull, and Squirm), but with Servo and Crow hosting intro segments to give it the illusion of a Turkey Day marathon.

By early November of 2015, shit had hit the fan. Joel had bought the rights to MST3K from Mallon and started up a Kickstarter to raise money for new episodes. Wouldn’t you know it, Turkey Day ’15 happened right during said Kickstarter. The theme of the marathon was mostly Joel hanging out with different Kickstarter employees, but it also had newly-announced Season 11 host Jonah Ray Skype his way into the broadcast to introduce one of the episodes.

The following year was pretty chill, all things considered. The new season hadn’t started yet, but it was very much on the way. Just not far along enough to show us any clips or give us any juicy news. Joel and Jonah casually hosted the six most popular episodes as polled by the fans. Nothing too crazy.

The chillness continued in 2017. This time, things were hosted by Joel, Jonah, and Felicia Day. Things seemed pedestrian with another six episodes being streamed online, but there were two important things about this marathon.

First off, everyone realized that Joel’s arms are beefier than expected, netting him the nickname Swole Hodgson.

Second, after it seemed like they were off the air, it bounced back with a special announcement that – yes, Virginia – MST3K was coming back for a twelfth season on Netflix! It’s a Turkey Day miracle! Happy Thanksgiving, you ol’ savings and loan!

Turkey Day ’18 was a bit complicated. Rather than air on Thanksgiving, the marathon streamed on the Sunday prior, once again hosted by Joel and Jonah. What made it special was that Netflix had allowed them to include the Season 11 instant classic Cry Wilderness. As for why they didn’t air the Turkey Day marathon on actual Turkey Day?

Well, Thanksgiving was when MST3K’s twelfth season debuted all at once on Netflix. Also known as MST3K: The Gauntlet, the six-episode season was based around the idea of binging the whole thing in one day. Kind of like what MST3K fans have been using Thanksgiving for for many years. While it wasn’t on the exact date as the first KTMA-TV episode in 1988, both that debut and this debut happened on the same holiday and that’s good enough as a way to celebrate the show’s 30-year anniversary.

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Unfortunately, much like the Comedy Central days, having a season of only six episodes was a bad omen. Merely a day before Thanksgiving 2019, it was announced that Netflix had canceled the show. The jerks. Any hope that Turkey Day ’19 was going to include some kind of announcement about a thirteenth season was immediately crushed and murdered like it was one of the Brute Man’s victims.

That said, the marathon that year did feature segments filmed behind-the-scenes at the third MST3K live tour. In a pre-COVID time, this was how Joel and the rest intended to keep MST3K in the minds of the public until the Netflix contract runs out and they can search out new outlets.

Up next is Turkey Day ’20. Right now, details are a little scarce, but they are figuring out the six movies via fan votes. A tournament of 24 episodes has been set up on MST3K.org, though I’m not quite sure how a tournament leads to six winners instead of just the one.

The post MST3K Turkey Day: The Long History of Mystery Science Theater 3000 and Thanksgiving appeared first on Den of Geek.

from Den of Geek https://ift.tt/2JbZxLE

#aion-rsa #Den of Geek

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sacredaltean · 7 years

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VLD Theory: Altea and the Alteans

Alright, so,, we all know that there are a few plot holes and a lot of unanswered questions when it comes to the Alteans and the Galra. Like:

If Alteans are such a peaceful species, what requires them to have training droids who are not only set for Altean child combatants, but whose child setting is enough to take down 5 garrison-experienced humans in less than a minute flat?

Why build Voltron, the most powerful weapon in the universe, in the first place, especially if during the time of its construction, the Galra and the Alteans were at peace?

How did the war even start? It’s not like the Galra and the Alteans had a distant kind of peace--they worked together to defend the universe. Where did that go?

How deep does the connection with the Galra even run? We know that they were close enough to create Voltron together, and that its creation wasn’t a secret kept between just Zarkon and Alfor. Allura even refers to a time when she traveled through Galran transportation hubs. Just how far back do they go?

Well I think I picked up on something within the new info given to us in season 2, and my thought process while answering all these questions relies strongly on this speculation. So sit back folks because this is gonna be a Lot.

They key to all of this is that I believe that in season 2, during Shiro’s escapades in the Black Lion, the destroyed planet we see is none other than Altea itself.

There’s a lot to cover, so im going to be breaking this down into a few parts, starting with the most pressing matter:

1.) How do we know this planet is Altea?

Not exactly a parallel resemblance, it seems. Fear not, friends, beyond the surface, there’s much to support this claim.

The first screencap of the planet is from the moment before the comet strikes the planet’s surface, and we’re treated to a montage of the immediate aftermath:

There are a few noteworthy things about the caps that follow:

Zarkon and Alfor approaching the lion together

The setting in which Alfor is constructing the lion

I’ll come back to Zarkon and Alfor later down the line, but for now, I want to focus on the setting. Doesn’t it seem a little..familiar?

Yes, that’s right. Alfor built the Black Lion inside of the Castle of Lions. Which means that the Castle of Lions must have been dormant on that planet during the time in which the comet crashed into it.

Now, there’s a roadblock: how do we know that Alfor didn’t just take the comet to another site to construct the Lion there? The Castle is a ship. Just because the Lion was built in the Castle doesn’t mean the Castle had to have physically be on the planet the comet crashed onto, right?

Wrong.

When the Black Lion first takes Shiro to see the remnants of the planet, Shiro asks this:

Now, while the Black Lion doesn’t give any affirmative or negative to this question, we can infer that yes, this is indeed the Black Lion’s home planet. Because think about it: why would Black show Shiro the memories of a planet her atoms had crashed on, but she wasn’t built on herself? Shiro came to Black to bond with her, not with Zarkon or the memories of him. It wouldn’t make sense for Black to show him the remnants of a planet she had very little physical connection to.

So, now we know that the Castle of Lions was dormant on this planet while constructing the Black Lion. However, there’s still one basic problem: the planet from s1 episode 9 and s2 episode 7 look nothing alike.

Well, it depends on the angle.

In episode 7, we’re seeing the planet from the angle at which the comet entered. However, it wouldn’t make sense for it to appear that way in episode 9, because the projection of Altea was placed over the circular shape of a dying star. Of course an angle from the side wouldn’t instill the illusion Alfor’s corrupted AI wanted to get across.

That just leaves the transportation/decorative elements of the projection. Well, let’s do a little time crunching here. Seeing as how the Black Lion was built in the Castle of Lions, and Coran has helpfully told us that he was around when his grandfather was constructing the Castle, we can assume that Voltron itself must only be few hundred years old, perhaps 3 hundred at the least (not counting the 10,000 years of cryosleep). Judging by Alfor’s clothes in the s2 flashbacks and his clothes in Allura’s trip through their memories, Allura may have been born shortly after Votlron’s complete construction.

Tying this all back to the planet, once Voltron exists, it’s the most powerful weapon in the universe. It can put an easy end to the troubles and fears many people inhabiting the planet (especially considering its small size) may have faced, allowing them to begin an industrial revolution, eventually leading up to the sci-fi metropolis we see for a brief moment in episode 9.

It wouldn’t even be a stretch to say some of those rings and devices around the planet are the Galra transportation hubs mentioned by Allura in episode 10. After all, we know that during this time they shared a close bond.

It’s also a bit harder to see, but in the projection, there appears to be a distinct separation between the city/populated areas and what appears to be a more rural, fielded area, which could very well be the same fields we see when Allura talks to her father throughout Season 1.

And the last little kicker: what is in the debris field around the planet post-destruction?

That’s right. A ring of rubble.

Yes, my friends. The deceased planet that we see in in Black’s memories is indeed Altea.

2.) Okay, so this is Altea. What does that mean?

Proving that this planet is Altea only touches on the tip of the iceberg. With this new idea in mind, we can now begin to answer the questions posed earlier in this post, and many more. But first, there’s a little more to discuss.

Earlier, I brought up the fact that Zarkon and Alfor approached the comet together. Now, that in itself wouldn’t be much of an important fact, if not for the other snippets we see in the Black Lion’s memories, and the order we see them in:

Having been shown the scene of Zarkon and Alfor standing before the Black Lion right after the still of the planet, we’re meant to assume that the scene takes place on the planet itself. Which means that, at some point, there was a Galran civilization on this planet.

Now that we know that this planet is Altea, this makes the scene all the more interesting. Because we now can conclude that Alteans and Galra didn’t just have peaceful relationship, they grew up and evolved together. They lived together.

3.) How does this apply to the unanswered questions regarding Alteans and Galra?

Again, there’s a lot to cover here, so I’m going to break this down question by question.

If the Alteans were diplomats and peacemakers before the time of Voltron, I like to believe that the Galra served a form of military on Altea. Obviously, before Voltron, the universe was full of things that threatened peace and safety, and it would make sense for planets who actively engaged with others to have a means of protecting themselves and others. And because of the close connection between the two, it may not have been unlikely for Alteans to train for military positions or for Galra to travel as diplomats.

So, the concept of powerful Altean training bots, especially within the Castle of Lions (which could have been a place for both diplomats and militants alike to train and learn), doesn’t seem that far fetched anymore.

Why build Voltron, the most powerful weapon in the universe, in the first place, especially if during the time of its construction, the Galra and the Alteans were at peace?

There could actually be a lot of reasons for this, and I’ll probably touch on all of them in a separate post eventually. However, I currently believe that Voltron was never originally intended to be Voltron.

Though both Zarkon and Alfor are shown approaching the comet, we only ever actually see Alteans engaging in the building of the lion. This, coupled with the fact that Zarkon is facing Alfor while still in the center of this cap, leads me to believe that the Black Lion was originally intended as a gift to Zarkon from Alfor. Zarkon’s back is to the crowd while Alfor is facing forward, meaning that we’re meant to assume that Alfor is the only one presenting the Black Lion to the crowd, and that Zarkon didn’t actually have a hand in its construction.

Going back to the concept of the Galra being essentially the military force of Altea, Zarkon was most likely the one in command of it all. It would make sense for Alfor to give him the Black Lion as a gift for keeping their world safe.

Unfortunately, because we don’t know whether or not the origins of the other Lions is similar to the Black Lion’s, we really can’t be certain as to how the concept of Voltron itself came to be. But because the early scenes of the Black Lion in battle show only her, it’s safe to assume at least for now that Voltron was not the initial plan when the Black Lion was created.

How did the war even start? It’s not like the Galra and the Alteans had a distant kind of peace--they worked together to defend the universe. Where did that go?

I have another theory post involving Zarkon, and in that post, I suspected that Voltron fell apart in part due to obsession with power at Zarkon’s hands. Especially if we consider the potential fact that the Black Lion was originally a gift just for Zarkon before the other Lions came into existence.

Well, considering how the whole point of this post is to prove that that the Galra and the Alteans originate from the same planet, I would say that they go back a hell of a long time. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

In conclusion:

The decimated planet we see in season 2 is Altea, and both the Galra and Alteans were once inhabitants of it.

Stray observations

So after nearly 2k of analysis and the inability to ever conclude anything properly, we end up here. These are a few tidbits of information i stumbled across while writing this theory, but didn’t quite know how to fit into the major points. Fell free to yell with me about any of them. They’ll probably tie into other theories/meta I plan to write eventually, but for now, just some food for thought:

Altea being the home planet of the Galra would also explain why they don’t seem to reside on a main planetary base and keep their central fleet in deep space.

The crystals used to power both the Castle in episode 4/5 of S1 are seen in the flashbacks to power the platform in which Alfor and Zarkon are standing.

I’m currently assuming that these are Balmeran crystals extracted by either extremely powerful Galra or perhaps a secret association of magic-bearing Alteans who have learned to use their powers in dark ways

The ships that the Black Lion is battling in the flashbacks look very reminiscent to the design of Rolor & Nyma’s ship, and the ones seen in the Season 3 teaser

Voltron is younger than 10,600 years old

There was a war between the Alteans and the Galra before the planet was destroyed and the lions were hid away

This means that in order for Voltron to still have been formed in that time, there must have been a third Black Paladin

I touch on this a little more in my post about Zarkon not being the original Black Paladin, if that interests anyone

Thank you all for reading this far; pls feel free to scream with me about this or any other meta/analysis/theories you may have!

#vld theories #this is 100 words under being my second longest piece of writing for the vld fandom wow #2.1k #theories #galra #alteans #zarkon #alfor #meta #my meta #analysis page

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zpomnicore · 7 years

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About this blog, life and other overrated bullshit (German dadrunter)

Thank you for wasting your time by following shitty musicblogs like this and grabbing dirty badmade music you don´t want to listen anymore tommorrow and never again. I do the same. Sometimes. Now here comes the surprising “i am getting older and have 20 new children and police says i should stop my drugabuse a bit because it makes me buying sexy nuclear weapons in the street instead of looking for a job, wanking and bring the trash out to the spam folder” line. Done. Another: I am talking like an average Americanised middleclass idiot yet, now. Shit. Lets stop this. But how? Uhm... don´t know. Some other ideas and preferences:

1. I posted too much average or overrated bullshit here the last time. This time shall be over now. Quantity is also overrated. You know the big names of the game, yet, now. If not, skroll the blogarchieve and just listen to the 1300 audios I´ve posted, then you will know. Or ask an expert.

2. I want to make (ad) stickers for this blog in June. If you´re interested, just write a mail to horrorrrgrrrl at web dot de (guess there is not so much interest so I can send you a package with some stickers for free if you give your postal adress, but I don´t promise for free, but that the first 10 people will get a free package, that would be yet 22% of my followers [incl. bots and other strange beeings with sexual explicit material blogs following this blog]). In worst case I will tell you “sorry, give cash or stay stickerless.”

3. Speedcore becomes fashion. Its obvious. Look at all these suckers now uploading shitty fuckshit with commercial mellowlines and sexy photos and japanese sweet trendmanga shit and how much clicks some sets have on Youtube and that DJs do speedcoresets at Red Bull sponsored DJ-Competitions and so on. All these “MTV speedcore fashionshow” jokes are lapsed.

You needn´t be a culture philosopher to see that it was very probable this will happen. Anyhow, relax, sit down and enjoy watching how (underground) history repeats, watch hysterical, young people selling their souls for nothing, watch fucked up old people selling their souls and names for a little peace of the shitty pink cake, watch how another subculture will go down, it hadn´t that much to offer and “speedcore against racism” didn´t include “against sexism”, “against dumbism” and/or “against staying a drugged narrow-minded asshole all life long”. This was always obvious. +You are not the hardest, sickest and most respected undergroundperson in the world anymore, if you wear a “speedcore-something” T-Shirt now. And if you wear it on your marriage, you will stay a fucked up fool. Yet because marrying is for fucking pussies and you can´t conceal this. Marriage is in general conservative bullshit and an important column of a fucked up repressive system that eats your soul as the sellout of subcultures, cultural appropriatation, ignoring sexism and other forms of hierachy in one´s (sub-)culture and Red Bull DJ-Contests are. And so on. (Much to say, nothing to add).

Ways to deal with that:

- Get your piece of cake! Make a facebookaccount that contains “speedcore” or shitty folders on Soundcloud, connect it with stuff or events you want to sell or design longboards with shitty skullframed speedcorelogos (don´t forget to add a weapon!) and add 20000 users whos name contains also “speedcore” and/or ”hakkuh”, “noisekick”, “komprex” or “terror”. If you want more clicks on SC, make some “Early speedcore” sets containing the obvious tracks of DOA, Amiga shock force and so on.

- Go Extratone and tell everyone (really everyone) that you are still harder than em all and that you listened to speedcore long time ago. But now its to slow for you. Maybe some will pay attention and suck your genital for this extra hardness. Extratone is part of the game, but some hillbillies & noobs will always think its not. Buy extratone stocks instead of speedcore stocks. Wear an Extratone shirt at your boyfriends marriage. Thats cute.

- Ignore the trend. Well these people at the bar of your party sure aren´t hippsters or just stupid little teenies who try to look hard, its totally cool underground people who know what the shit is like, they will share love with you, they will support you and add fancy filters before uploading the photos of your drugged dancemoves on instagramm they´ll share with thousands of nice looking bots and people, The scene was always full of assholes and fuckheads, so where is the difference? Lets talk about this in some years, again.

- Quit with music! Do sports, get religious or study creative customer based speedcore management on your local university after having saved enough money and done all the other shit, enhancement drugs are healthier than partydrugs some people say.

- Fight the trend! Come to the next party with a baseballbat and destroy all cars and people with Noisekick, Komprex, P.O.S. (Where would you draw the line?) or “Terror Worldwide” T-Shirts or logos, sell ratpoison-interlarded speed and pills (the “true people” are used that, they wont die, only the posers will die!), start pogo each 5 minutes or each Cannibal Corpse-Sample (same), hack accounts of all people using masks, tits and other bullshit in their profiles to “gain” anything, the only thing they gain is death!!!! Make some “dos and don´ts videos, texts and vlogs about prohibited and non prohibited artists, samples, tracknames, logo contents and colours you may wear on a party or on your avatar and look for some sheeps who will obey to all you will preach them. Your sect is the only way to keep the true spirit alive!

-Cry! If this doesn´t help, kill yourself! All our lives, values and identities were based on the power of true speedcore (speedcore will never die, life begins with speedcore and so on...), so how can you deal with the fact that all you believed in and lived for is now rotting away to an average piece of shit? Speedcore was so clean once (you could eat from the dancefloor), it was so beautiful once, so strong and cool and making life worthful, but now they will soon sell shirts with a gameboy that has the word “speedcore”written instead of “Tetris” on the frame on H&M, Zalando and Pimkies, also for kids in 152 and 164, Satan will not help you because he´s the new manager of H&M men´s world, so all you believed in is ridiculous now. You could believe in yourself, but you are just a slave to the rhythm and rhythm is a dancer and your master is now a servant, thank god there´s enough other authorities and illusions left to believe in. Not? Hm...

If you need a better solution call the police or ambulance. My good humour has also gone during the last time.

4. Nothing.

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Scheiße, ich hab garkein Bock jetzt das alles nochmal auf deutsch zu übersetzen. Aber trotzdem. Blogarbeit ist pflicht und ein deutsche Tugend. Ich mag deutsche Tugenden nicht. Das alles motiviert mich nicht. Aber ich will auch nicht jetzt hochskrollen und den Betreff ändern, mein Laptop ist so virenverseucht, daß er beim hochskrollen möglicherweise abscheißt. Also los:

Danke, daß ihr eure Zeit damit verschwendet, beschissenen Musikblogs wie diesem und schlecht gemachter Musik zu folgen. Ich mache das auch. Manchmal. Auf deutsch klingt das alles noch kackiger als auf englisch.

Jetzt kommt eine überraschende “Ich bin älter geworden, habe 20 Kinder mehr und die Bullen sagen, daß ich meinen Drogenmissbrauch redizieren soll, weil ich drauf immer in sexy-Atomwaffen-Straßenhandel verwickelt werde, statt nach einem Job zu gucken, zu onanieren und den Müll raus in den Spamordner zu bringen” Zeile. So, fertig. Noch eine: Ich red inzwischen wie irgendein amerikanisierter Durchschnittsvollidiot (auch als Affin kann man Frack tragen). Scheiße, Leute. Das muss aufhören. Aber wie? KP. Ein paar Ideen und (...äh, wie bersetz ich “Preferences”? Das war eh schon falsch, das Wort, aber das andere Wort hatte ich vergessen):

1. In letzter Zeit hab ich viel zu viel durchschnittlichen Bullshit und Zeug, das zuviel Beachtung bekommt, gepostet. Die Zeit ist ab jetzt vorbei (ab diesem Post). Masse wird überschätzt. Ihr kennt jetzt die großen Namen im Game. Wenn nicht, hört einfach nochmal die 1300 Posts durch, dann wisst ihr sie. Oder fragt einen Experten.

2. Ich mach Sticker für diesen Blog. bei Interesse einfach mal an horrorrrgrrrl ätt web de schreiben. Rest mit Übersetzerin (das wird voll geil jetzt):

Wenn Sie interessiert sind, einfach eine Mail an Web horrorrrgrrrl Schreiben dot de (denke, es ist nicht so viel Interesse, so kann ich Ihnen ein Paket mit einigen Aufklebern senden kostenlos wenn sie ihre Anschrift geben, aber ich habe nicht kostenlos, aber die ersten 10 Leute werden nach dieser Blog] erhalten Sie gratis ein Paket, das wäre noch 22% meiner Jünger werden [inkl. Bots und andere seltsame Mensch mit sexuellen explizites Material Blogs). Im schlimmsten Fall Ich werde Ihnen sagen, "es tut uns leid, Bargeld oder Aufenthalt stickerless geben."

3. Speedcore wird Mode. Seine Hand. An alle diese Sauger jetzt hochladen shitty Fuckshit mit kommerziellen Mellowlines und sexy Fotos und japanische Süße trendmanga Scheiße aussehen und wie viel Klicks einige Sätze haben auf Youtube und die DJs tun speedcoresets bei Red Bull dj-Wettbewerben gefördert und so weiter. Alle diese "MTV speedcore Fashionshow "Witze sind nichtig.

Sie brauchen nicht eine Kultur Philosoph sein, um zu sehen, dass es sehr wahrscheinlich war dies geschehen wird. Jedenfalls, entspannen Sie sich und genießen Sie, wie (U-Bahn) Geschichte wiederholt, beobachten Sie hysterisch, junge Menschen, die ihre Seelen für nichts achten, Abgefuckte alte Menschen ihre Seelen und Namen verkaufen für ein wenig Frieden der shitty rosa Kuchen, beobachten, wie eine andere Subkultur nach unten gehen wird, hatte es nicht so viel zu bieten und "speedcore gegen Rassismus" nicht "gegen Sexismus", "Gegen dumbism" und/oder "gegen eine Droge beigemischt Engstirnigen alles Leben Arschloch long". Dies war immer auf der Hand. Sie sind nicht der härteste, Krankste und angesehensten undergroundperson in der Welt mehr, wenn Sie eine "speedcore Verschleiß-etwas" T-Shirt. Und wenn du es tragen auf ihre Ehe, werden Sie eine abgefuckte Narr bleiben. Doch weil das Heiraten ist für fucking pussy und Sie können dies nicht verbergen. Die Ehe ist in der Regel konservativ Bullshit und eine wichtige Säule einer Abgefuckte repressiven System, dass Ihre Seele frisst wie den Ausverkauf von Subkulturen, kulturelle appropriatation, ignorieren, Sexismus und anderen Formen der Hierachie in der (Sub-) Kultur und Red Bull DJ-Wettbewerbe sind. Und so weiter. (viel zu sagen, nichts hinzuzufügen).

Weisen Sie das beschäftigen:

- Holen Sie sich Ihr Stück vom Kuchen! Machen Sie einen facebookaccount, enthält "speedcore" im Namen oder shitty Ordner auf Soundcloud, mit Material oder Veranstaltungen Sie wollen verkaufen oder longboards Design mit shitty verbinden skullframed speedcorelogos (vergessen Sie nicht, eine Waffe hinzuzufügen!) und 20000 Benutzer whos Name hinzufügen enthält auch "speedcore" und/oder "hakkuh", "noisekick", "komprex" oder "Terror". Wenn Sie mehr Klicks auf Sc möchten, stellen einige "Frühe speedcore" Datensätze, die offensichtliche Spuren von DOA, Amiga Schock tritt und so weiter.

- Gehen Sie Extratone und erklärt jeder (wirklich jeder), dass Sie noch härter sind als Em All und, dass Sie zugehört längst Speedcore. Aber jetzt sein für Sie zu verlangsamen. Vielleicht werden einige Aufmerksamkeit und Ihre genitalen für diese zusätzliche Härte saugen. Extratone ist Teil des Spiels, aber einige Hinterwäldler & noobs wird immer der Meinung sein nicht. Extratone Aktien kaufen, anstatt speedcore Bestände. Eine extratone Shirt an Ihre Freunde, ehe tragen. Das ist niedlich.

- Den Trend zu ignorieren. Auch diese Menschen an der Bar Ihrer Feier sicher nicht Hippsters sind oder einfach nur dumme kleine Teenies, die versuchen, schwer zu suchen, seine total cool u-Menschen, die wissen, was die Scheiße ist wie, Sie werden mit ihnen Liebe teilhaben, werden Sie sie unterstützen und Fancy Filter hinzufügen, bevor Sie mit dem Hochladen der Fotos von euren betäubten dancemoves auf instagramm sie mit Tausenden von gut aussehende Bots und Menschen teilen, die Szene war immer voller Arschlöcher und fuckheads, also wo ist der Unterschied? Lassen Sie uns darüber sprechen diese in einigen Jahren wieder.

- Beenden Sie mit Musik! Sport tun, erhalten Sie religiöse oder kreative Kunden speedcore Management auf Ihrem lokalen Universität studium nachdem Sie genug Geld und alle anderen scheiße gemacht gespeichert, Verbesserung Drogen sind gesünder als partydrugs einige Leute sagen.

- Zerstören Sie Der Trend! Kommen Sie auf die nächste Party mit einem baseballbat und alle Autos und Menschen mit Noisekick, komprex, P.O.S.-ZERSTÖREN (Wo würdest Du die Linie zeichnen?) oder "Terror Weltweit" T-Shirts oder Logos, Ratpoison verkaufen - blödsinnige Geschwindigkeit und Pillen (die "wahren Menschen" verwendet werden, dass Sie nicht sterben, nur die Poser wird sterben!), start Pogo jede 5 Minuten oder jede Cannibal Corpse-Sample (Gleichen), hack Konten aller Personen, die Masken, Titten und anderen Bullshit in ihren Profilen zu profitieren." "Alles, das Einzige, was Sie gewinnen, ist der Tod!!!!!!! Einige "Dos und Don'ts, Videos, Texte und Vlogs über verboten und nicht verboten Künstler, Muster, tracknames, logo Inhalt und Farben können Sie auf einer Party oder auf deinen Avatar tragen und für einige Schafe, die alle werden sie predigen sie gehorchen aussehen wird. Ihre Sekte ist der einzige Weg, der wahre Geist lebendig zu halten!

-Heule! Wenn das nicht hilft, sich selbst töten! Unser aller Leben, Werte und Identitäten wurden auf der Grundlage der Macht der wahren speedcore (speedcore wird nie sterben, Leben beginnt mit speedcore und so weiter…), so wie können Sie mit der Tatsache, dass alle, die Sie geglaubt und lebte jetzt weg ist Fäulnis auf durchschnittlich Stück Scheiße? Speedcore so einmal sauber war (man konnte von der Tanzfläche essen), es war so schön, so stark und cool und kostbare, aber jetzt werden sie bald T-Shirts mit einem Gameboy, hat sich das Wort "speedcore" geschrieben statt "Tetris" auf dem Rahmen auf h&m, Zalando und pimkies Verkaufen, auch für Kinder in 152 und 164, Satan wird Ihnen nicht helfen, weil er der neue Manager von H&M für Männer Welt, also ist alles, was Sie glaubten an jetzt lächerlich ist. Man könnte glauben Sie an sich selbst, aber sie sind nur ein Sklave der Rhythmus und der Rhythmus ist ein Tänzer und dein Meister ist jetzt ein Knecht, Gott sei Dank, es gibt genügend andere Behörden und Illusionen Links zu glauben. Nicht? Hm…Wenn Du eine bessere Lösung benötigen, die Polizei oder Krankenwagen rufen. Mein guter Humor hat auch in der letzten Zeit gegangen

.4. Nichts.

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stevensavage · 6 years

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Speculation: Living Without Facebook And Twitter?

(This column is posted at www.StevenSavage.com and Steve's Tumblr)

Facebook was used to harvest data by a highly unethical and bizarre campaign firm, Cambridge Analytica, to sway the US elections resulting in a worldwide scandal, with more coming out all the time. Twitter has terrible controls and policing and still seems infested with bots and haters. It's not looking good for social media out there.

I saw someone post recently (I think, ironically, on Twitter) that the internet becgan being less beneficial with Twitter and Facebook became prominent. That got me thinking as my instinct, as a technophile, is to not believe that any technology is bad. My instinct was there, but it wasn't defending itself very well.

So I'm going to try a thought experiment - what would happen if I suddenly gave up Facebook and/or Twitter? What if they vanished?Let's learn from this experiment.

FACEBOOK

OK, so Facebook gives us a massively integrated service. Messaging, posting, building groups, events, and more. it integrated with OTHER services as well. It's a one-stop shop of things - which of course was part of the problem for data mining, because it's a great place to get tons of data and influence people.

My intended use for it is:

Keep in touch with friends and family.

Post about my books and projects and provide a way to be reached.

Schedule events without using email or Meetup.com.

Find people I forgot about.

In addition I use it for:

Reading and posting random funny stuff.

Occasional ranting.

Right here I see that one of the big advantages of Facebook is twofold - integrated services and everyone else using it. However it's the latter that means a lot more to me - Facebook is successful as people are using it. If no one else was using it I wouldn't care, it'd just be an interesting thing.

So if Facebook vanished then I'd:

Keep up with friends and family in other ways. I'd probably use mailing lists and chat programs more.

I'd read more friend's blogs/tumblrs to keep up with them.

I'd schedule things via email, meetup.com, or google.

I'd get random stuff through tumblr.

I'd promote my projects differently and probably focus more on blogs and newsletters.

Hmmm. Sounds like that "integration" and "everyone uses it" thing is a big part of Facebook. Those are things that can be done elsewhere (integration) or change (mass exodus from Facebook).

Let's try Twitter.

TWITTER

Yes, I know Twitter is a swamp of BS, bots, hate. it's also a great focused Microblogging service and good for news feeds. I am going to passionately note that the current Twitter could have been something better - a microblogging and news alert system. But I get ahead of myself, though it reveals I probably like Twitter more than Facebook.

So what do I use Twitter for?

Screaming into the void.

Following friends doing the above or doing something useful.

Getting newsfeeds and updates and re-posting them.

Sort-of chatting.

Microblogging.

Promoting my work and networking.

Finding and enjoying funny stuff or weird stuff.

I can't say there's anything that surprises me. That also tells me I'm kinda more open about my Twitter usage.

So looking at this it tells me my Twitter usage is broader and more passionate. I get updates that are important, post stuff, and communicate. I'm not scheduling events or anything, just communicating, listening, or yelling. Again it makes me appreciate the odd purity of Twitter.

But what if Twitter vanished and there was no replacement? What would I do?

Get my news via newsfeeds.

I'd probably discuss news more in my blogs.

I'd probably join some news discussion groups and sites and use them.

I'd focus a lot more on my newsletters for promoting my work.

I'd do different marketing for my work.

I'd definitely look more to tumblr for weird and silly stuff.

This tells me that, again, I actually like Twitter more than Facebook, which I may have to process for awhile. Also almost everything it does can be done elsewhere, though not as fast. Twitter is a sort of blog/message board/RSS fusion.

WAIT WHAT IF BOTH VANISHED?

OK if Twitter and Facebook both vanished what would I do? I think it's obvious - everything would be back to blogging, newsletters, meetups, chats, and RSS feeds.

Which tells me, that, yes Twitter and Facebook really changed how we used the internet. If they vanished my life would basically go back to what I did before the service came to be. I'd just have more awareness of the goals, benefits, and disadvantage of integration.

WHAT DID I LEARN?

So thought experiment done. Now what have I learned out of all of this? Here's what these two social media services give us:

AMPLIFICATION: One reason we love these services is Amplification. They can reach people and reach a TON of people. That's an obvious answer but it's very important to understand the power (or illusion of power) Facebook and Twitter give us.

That also means that any potential replacements or new incarnations need to keep this in mind - or we ask if we need it.

INTEGRATION: Is useful, it's nice to have, and I think we get used to it. It certainly helps when you use something as primary social tool - but it also brings its own problems of data usage, spamming, or time-wasting.

As social media evolves and changing, we'll need to rethink Integration. What do we need, how do we do it safely, and how often do we care.

AUDIENCE: Twitter and Facebook wouldn't matter if they hadn't built their huge user bases. They're the result of self-fulfilling prophecy. It may be hard to get people off the platforms, but clearly audience matters.

This also means they're vulnerable as part of their weight is just weight - we want that audience.

CONNECTION: We want to connect with people. These services give that - or the illusion of that at the very least. We value that.

We might question if we're actually connecting in a useful or appropriate or healthy way. I'm wondering, as I examine this, if there may be some problems here. It's not always deep connection.

COMMUNICATION: We want to know what's up. Obviously. In many ways Social Media isn't remarkable as there's just so many ways to do this, Social Media just adds all the above.

I question if we're communicating that well via social media considering the various joke posts, bot posts, etc. Maybe we're not really communicating.

In the end, Facebook and Twitter don't do anything unusual, they integrate things, streamline them, and bring a big audience and access. Ther'es nothing wrong with this of course, it's just as I step back I see how they built on known services and our desires.

I think they've proven to be both problems and benefits. I view them as neutrals-to-sort-of-good - but deeply flawed and manipulated. Sometimes I think they both cause and solve problems, which seems a bit of a wash.

If they vanished, though, or I stopped using them I could live without them. Anyone could, we'd just have to rethink how we interact (which maybe we ought to do anyway). It'd just be back to the earlier internet - but we did learn valuable lessons in what we need and want.

MOVING FORWARD

After this little exercise it's given me a few things to think about with social media, our dependence, our issues, our mistakes. There's probably a lot more to come out of this.

I have a few changes I'm making:

I'm going to be more thoughtful on my social media and what I use it for.

I want to cultivate more intimate discussions through my various media.

I don't want to depend on any one kind of media.

It's pretty clear I use Social Media to waste a lot of time and need to rethink that.

As for the future of Twitter and Facebook? Well in a way they'r enothing specual or unique, and they can't (and won't) stay the same forever o rbe forever. Things are changing, how they change - and how others change - is going to be something to watch.

But I can choose what I do.

- Steve

www.StevenSavage.com

www.InformoTron.com

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bizmediaweb · 6 years

Text

Unmasking Fake Twitter Followers, Social Media Fraud & Fake Profiles

Social media in general, and Twitter in particular, is taking a huge hit after revelations that celebrities, politicians, athletes and influencers in all walks of life have boosted their social media following by buying fake Twitter followers.

In a series of articles in late January, the New York Times revealed the results of a lengthy investigation into fake Twitter accounts and how those accounts are sold to legitimate Twitter users to increase their number of followers and therefore their influence to advertisers and sponsors.

The fake accounts are “Counterfeit coins in the booming economy of online influence, reaching into virtually any industry where a mass audience – or the illusion of it – can be monetized,” The Times reports.

Unmasking Social Media Fraud - The Investigation

Scrutinizing more than one thousand features to identify robot or “bot” accounts on Twitter, researchers at the University of Southern California (USC) wrote that “our estimates suggest that between 9% and 15% of active Twitter accounts are bots.”

The fake (Twitter) accounts are counterfeit coins in the booming economy of online influence.

– The New York Times

With an estimated 330 million monthly and active users, that means between 30 and 50 million of these accounts are bots and the number could be even higher. The USC report goes on to say that complex bots could have shown up as humans in their model, “making even the 15% figure a conservative estimate.”

While USC’s researchers highlighted the benefits of some bots as “Perform[ing] useful functions, such as dissemination of news and publications,” it also pointed to the downside, saying, “There is a growing record of malicious applications of social bots. Some emulate human behavior to manufacture fake grassroots political support… [and] promote terrorist propaganda and recruitment.”

The New "Influence Economy"

So why do people bend and break the rules of social media sites and enlist fake followers?

The answer is status, which often times means money.

For some entertainers, athletes and entrepreneurs the number of people who follow, like or “friend” them means status in the virtual world and that often translates into real-world currency.

The number of followers may help determine who hires high profile people and how much they are paid for bookings or endorsements. It can even affect how potential customers evaluate their businesses or products.

Even for less famous but so-called “influencers,” followers can affect how much advertisers are willing to spend for their endorsements; that is the more people influencers reach, the more money they make.

An influencer with 100,000 followers might earn an average of $2,000 for a promotional tweet, while one with a million followers might earn $20,000, according to Captiv8, a company that connects influencers to brands.

For some entertainers, athletes and entrepreneurs the number of people who follow, like or “friend” them means status in the virtual world and that often translates into real-world currency.

(Source): New York Times

The Times investigation focused on Devumi, an up-to-now obscure American company which sells Twitter followers and retweets to celebrities, businesses and anyone who wants to appear more popular or exert influence online. According to the Times, Devumi stockpiled at least 3.5 million automated accounts, repeatedly sold each one many times over, and provided customers with more than 200 million Twitter followers.

The Rich and Famous with Fake Twitter Followers

Among those found to have fake Twitter followers from Devumi were actor John Leguizamo, computer billionaire Michael Dell, American football commentator and former player Ray Lewis and Kathy Ireland, the onetime swimsuit model who today runs a multi-million-dollar licensing empire. Akbar Gbajabiamila, the host of the show “American Ninja Warrior” and even a Twitter board member, Martha Lane Fox, had some Devumi accounts as well.

A Twitter spokeswoman says the company did not typically suspend users suspected of buying bots, partially because it is difficult for them to know who is responsible for any given purchase.

“We continue to fight hard to tackle any malicious automation on our platform as well as false or spam accounts,” spokeswoman Kristin Binns said, adding that it’s difficult to know whether the fake accounts cited by the Times violated the company’s policies against impersonation.

Ireland boasts more than one million Twitter followers and often uses the platform to promote companies – such as Wisconsin-based American Family Insurance – with whom she has endorsement deals.

As of January 2017, Ireland had only roughly 160,000 Twitter followers, but after an employee made several purchases from Devumi, her numbers jumped to more than a million. A spokeswoman said that the employee acted without Ireland’s authorization and had been suspended after the purchases were questioned.

We continue to fight hard to tackle any malicious automation on our platform as well as false or spam accounts.

– Twitter Spokeswoman

Just for fun, I ran a Twitter audit on President Donald Trump and it appears that only 51% of his followers are real, making almost half of them fake Twitter followers.

If you are ever curious how many followers are real on a particular profile, you can use the free tool Twitter Audit, just type in the Twitter handle in question and the results will populate so you can see exactly how many of their followers are real and fake.

I’ve personally seen many people in the social media industry with a very high percentage of fake Twitter followers, which means only one thing… they’ve bought them.

The Not So Rich and Famous

At the other end of the spectrum from the rich and famous are those obscure and unknown users who are victimized by this type of identity theft. Such was the case of a college student and aspiring filmmaker who set up his Twitter account while a high school sophomore. But before he even graduated, his Twitter details were copied onto a bot account.

The fake account remained dormant until last year when it suddenly began retweeting Devumi customers continuously. Among other things, the fake account promoted various pornographic accounts and a gambling website.

Puzzled as to why they’d take his identity, the 20-year-old college student didn’t realize that his unknown social identity has value in the influence economy – where his “profile” might be sold for 15 cents per customer. Multiply that by thousands of similar profiles and millions of customers and the profits add up.

And what about job-seekers, worried that a potential employer will come across a fake profile with their photo and links to questionable websites? Such was the case of a 40-year-old female engineer who said she was grateful potential employees didn’t come across a fake account that used her photo during the vetting of her social media accounts as part of the hiring process.

Fake Profiles and Malware

As if that form of identity theft isn’t bad enough, fake social media accounts can also be used by hackers to install Trojan malware onto the networks of target organizations, according to a recent article in CNET magazine.

Cybersecurity researchers at SecureWorks say a phishing campaign in 2017 targeted individuals in organizations predominantly in the Middle East and North Africa, along with some targets in the US. The emails’ general subjects included job offers and requests to reset passwords.

These lures contained shorted URLs, which – when opened – installed an open-source remote access Trojan which can infiltrate Windows, Linux, OSX and Android to give the hacker full access to the victim’s computer system.

The “Mia Ash” profile used to spread a virus had more than 500 LinkedIn Connections and even more on Facebook.

(Source): Secureworks

But when the scheme failed to obtain the expected results, the hackers tried again, this time utilizing a fake social media profile that had been interacting with some of the targets.

Named “Mia Ash,” the profile purported to be a young woman working as a photographer in London, however, the persona was completely fake and used the Instagram photos of a young Eastern European woman.

The fake profile had over 500 connections on LinkedIn and an even larger number on Facebook. The LinkedIn account had stolen a job description from a legitimate photographer in the U.S. and initially appeared to have connected with others in photography in order to look authentic.

The attack began with LinkedIn messages before moving to Facebook then eventually email. One particular exchange included a Microsoft Excel attachment and urged recipients to open it at work for it to “function properly.”

This survey contained macros which, once enabled, downloaded the PupyRAT Trojan onto the targeted system, giving the attackers access to the business network.

What Can Be Done to Combat Social Media Fraud?

The revelation of fake social media accounts has led some to call for tighter restrictions and more accountability from social media companies to ensure that real people are actually utilizing the services and reposting the comments of others.

Entrepreneur and tech investor Mark Cuban says it’s time for Twitter to require that accounts be associated with a real person and for Facebook to tighten its requirements.

“I do think Twitter would benefit from requiring every account(s) being tied back to an individual. If someone wants to run a bot account, great, but identify a person behind it.”

– Mark Cuban

“I don’t think your user handle or profile has to reflect your actual name or picture,” Cuban tweeted. “I do think Twitter would benefit from requiring every account(s) being tied back to an individual. If someone wants to run a bot account, great, but identify a person behind it.”

Cuban told the Times in a follow-up email that automated accounts, or bots, and impersonation on Twitter had made him “less enthusiastic about using the platform.”

In the legal realm, investigations have begun in the United States on both the federal and state levels. Two U.S. Senators have asked the nation’s Federal Trade Commission to begin an investigation into the “deceptive and unfair marketing practices” of Devumi and similar companies.

Meanwhile, Florida’s Attorney General, Pam Bondi has also begun an investigation into Devumi, joining New York Attorney General Eric T. Schneiderman who announced that he would begin reviewing whether the company had violated state laws against impersonation and commercial deception.

“Impersonation and deception are illegal under New York law,” Schneiderman wrote on Twitter. “We’re opening an investigation into Devumi and its apparent sale of bots using stolen identities.”

What's the Impact for Social Media & Digital Marketers?

Buying fake profiles to boost your influence ultimately hurts your credibility and will cost you business if you are perceived as less than trustworthy.

Once trust is broken, it’s almost impossible to earn back. And remember, the biggest payoff for ethical marketing, or as I like to call it, trust-based marketing, is people do business with those they know, like and trust.

– Melonie Dodaro

I’ve personally seen many people in the social media industry with a very high percentage of fake Twitter followers, which means only one thing… they’ve bought them. Remember you can do a quick search using Twitter Audit to double check anyone you are curious about.

Integrity is what you do when no one is watching, so ask yourself, “Am I a person of integrity that my business colleagues can trust and safely refer others too? Or am I looking for a short-cut to success and a way to manipulate the market to my advantage?” Eventually, the web of deceit unravels and businesses and relationships are ruined. Ask yourself today, “Is it worth the risk?”

Social media fraud is a problem and one of the ways that you can help combat that problem is to report post, profiles or anything else that seems suspicious to the social media platform you are seeing it on.

Please share any stories you have related to social media fraud, fake Twitter followers and fake profiles with us in the comments, your story could help many others.

The post Unmasking Fake Twitter Followers, Social Media Fraud & Fake Profiles appeared first on Top Dog Social Media.

Unmasking Fake Twitter Followers, Social Media Fraud & Fake Profiles published first on https://themarketingheaven.tumblr.com/

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unifiedsocialblog · 6 years

Text

Unmasking Fake Twitter Followers, Social Media Fraud & Fake Profiles

Unmasking Social Media Fraud - The Investigation

The fake (Twitter) accounts are counterfeit coins in the booming economy of online influence.

– The New York Times

The New "Influence Economy"

So why do people bend and break the rules of social media sites and enlist fake followers?

The answer is status, which often times means money.

For some entertainers, athletes and entrepreneurs the number of people who follow, like or “friend” them means status in the virtual world and that often translates into real-world currency.

(Source): New York Times

The Rich and Famous with Fake Twitter Followers

A Twitter spokeswoman says the company did not typically suspend users suspected of buying bots, partially because it is difficult for them to know who is responsible for any given purchase.

Ireland boasts more than one million Twitter followers and often uses the platform to promote companies – such as Wisconsin-based American Family Insurance – with whom she has endorsement deals.

We continue to fight hard to tackle any malicious automation on our platform as well as false or spam accounts.

– Twitter Spokeswoman

Just for fun, I ran a Twitter audit on President Donald Trump and it appears that only 51% of his followers are real, making almost half of them fake Twitter followers.

I’ve personally seen many people in the social media industry with a very high percentage of fake Twitter followers, which means only one thing… they’ve bought them.

The Not So Rich and Famous

Fake Profiles and Malware

The “Mia Ash” profile used to spread a virus had more than 500 LinkedIn Connections and even more on Facebook.

(Source): Secureworks

But when the scheme failed to obtain the expected results, the hackers tried again, this time utilizing a fake social media profile that had been interacting with some of the targets.

This survey contained macros which, once enabled, downloaded the PupyRAT Trojan onto the targeted system, giving the attackers access to the business network.

What Can Be Done to Combat Social Media Fraud?

Entrepreneur and tech investor Mark Cuban says it’s time for Twitter to require that accounts be associated with a real person and for Facebook to tighten its requirements.

“I do think Twitter would benefit from requiring every account(s) being tied back to an individual. If someone wants to run a bot account, great, but identify a person behind it.”

– Mark Cuban

Cuban told the Times in a follow-up email that automated accounts, or bots, and impersonation on Twitter had made him “less enthusiastic about using the platform.”

What's the Impact for Social Media & Digital Marketers?

Buying fake profiles to boost your influence ultimately hurts your credibility and will cost you business if you are perceived as less than trustworthy.

– Melonie Dodaro

Please share any stories you have related to social media fraud, fake Twitter followers and fake profiles with us in the comments, your story could help many others.

The post Unmasking Fake Twitter Followers, Social Media Fraud & Fake Profiles appeared first on Top Dog Social Media.

Unmasking Fake Twitter Followers, Social Media Fraud & Fake Profiles published first on https://getfblike.tumblr.com/

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iyarpage · 6 years

Text

5 Ways to Design for Customers and Search Engines

Business owners and web designers are pulled in many different directions when determining what features and content they should add to their website. Variables like site colors, button designs, animations, copy and messaging, user flow, search engine optimization, fonts, photos and video, page performance and more all play a role in how an overall design and user experience come together.

Of the variables mentioned—and there are certainly some that were left out—SEO is probably the most heavily weighted as most businesses want to be at the top of search results for their industry.

…by designing your site for Google, and not for your customers, you are actually hurting your rankings, not helping them.

However, designing for search engines can mean sacrificing too much of the user experience for the sake of appeasing the robots that crawl your site and determine ranking on SERPs (Search Engine Results Pages). This, in turn, will cause visitors to spend less time on your site, or to leave the site before performing an action such as submitting a lead form.

Ironically enough, search engines like Google then factor in metrics like session duration, bounce rate, and average pages per session to determine whether your website is worth ranking. In other words, by designing your site for Google, and not for your customers, you are actually hurting your rankings, not helping them.

You should, instead, design your website with your customer in mind.

1. Start with User Experience

Start by asking yourself a couple of questions regarding the user experience (UX). For example, why do I want customers to visit my site? Am I trying to sell them something directly on my website, or am I trying to entice them to contact my business or sign up for a newsletter? Do I want them to visit various webpages on my site in a certain order (i.e. the home page, about page, services page and contact page) or am I simply wanting readers to visit blog articles?

How you answer these questions will determine how you create your user flow. You want to start with the first page in the user’s journey (i.e. the Home page), then connect pages within the user experience that ultimately lead a visitor to the final goal (i.e. submitting a contact form or making a purchase).

Once you have determined how visitors flow throughout your site, you’ll want to make sure that the copy, or site text, contains subject matter that is concise and informative, with keywords your visitors are searching for prior to landing on your site.

Do not keyword stuff, as readers will find this sort of copy very annoying and search engines will penalize you for such a style of writing.

You’ll also want to make sure that your copy uses proper grammar, and is easily readable (i.e. doesn’t use super long sentences or big words).

Finally, you want titles that describe the main points of the text so that visitors can skim through the copy to find what they are looking for.

2. Always Properly Manage Images on Your Site

Within the various paragraphs of text, you’ll want to link users to the next page or product that is a continuation of the copy. And, you’ll want the link—which is the next step in the user flow—to be as obvious as possible, such as a nice big button right under the last paragraph of text.

For example, if you write a paragraph talking about how great your organic men’s t-shirts are, link that paragraph to your Men’s Organic T’s products so that customers are taken to the next stage in the purchase funnel. In this scenario, it may be helpful to have the button read “Click Here to Buy Organic Tees” or to just have a picture of the product and a button within the picture (sort of like the format for a Google Display ad).

It also helps to include images alongside your paragraphs that represent the subject matter within the corresponding text, even if the images aren’t linked (though they should be). Just be sure to compress and/or resize your images beforehand in a photo editing software like Photoshop or GIMP to maintain faster page loading speeds. Larger images slow down your site as they are larger in file size.

Plus, be sure to add a title to your image so that the Google crawl bots know what is in the image. Google’s bots can’t see images but Google loves recommending images to people in search results, so Titles and Meta-tags with relative keywords are the way they can “see” what’s in your image.

Finally, be sure to look up how to save your images in “Progressive” format, as this helps speed up the loading process of larger images on your site. Proper management of images on your site appeases both website visitors and search engines alike.

3. Make Sure Your Website Focuses on a Niche

Make sure that everything important on your site is accessible within 3 clicks.

The key thing to remember at all stages of your web design is that people are looking for something specific when landing on your site, and are wanting to obtain that specific thing as fast as they can without having to be on your site too long or having to visit too many sites.

Your site should be centered around a specific thing or niche so that customers or visitors will know they have landed on the right site immediately. In other words, you are attracting a very specific type of site visitor with a higher chance of performing an action when they land on your site.

Once they have recognized that your site has what they want, you must make it easier for visitors to obtain the item they came for. This means not making your visitors navigate to 5 different pages to finally land where they were wanting to land or find what they were after. In other words don’t bury the lead! This keeps visitors from getting frustrated and giving up, thus exiting your site and increasing your bounce rates or exit percentages.

4. Keep Your Site Secure

People usually rate security as one of the most important factors when visiting someone’s site and deciding on a service. If your site is extremely slow, looks outdated, and doesn’t have any indication that it is secure, it will turn away visitors faster than the pages can load.

However, if your site uses an SSL Certificate to secure the transfer of information between customers and the site, you’ll immediately make visitors feel more secure and thus increase your chances of a conversion.

Some websites go so far as to add a logo of the type of security certificates or software they use to add more security to something like, for example, a checkout page on an eCommerce site. Surprisingly, this has been proven to comfort customers during the checkout process.

It should be noted that you should only add the logo of the security programs you are implementing, as adding a logo of a program you don’t use to create the illusion of security is highly illegal.

5. Offer What Visitors Want

In the end, it comes down to whether or not your site has something to offer its visitors. This is why so many marketing companies talk about the importance of good and consistent content. Think of content in a variety of ways – it can be blogs, videos, new products, or new images.

These things should be continuously added or enhanced throughout your site. Your website and web design should consistently be getting better each day.

Additionally, good content should be matched with a high-performance, easy-to-navigate site that delivers what they need fast and in an aesthetically pleasing way. Add to that the comfort of security, and you’ve got yourself a site that will not only perform well for visitors, but also for search engines.

LAST CHANCE: Massive Discounts on Stock Photos – 67% off!

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webbygraphic001 · 6 years

Text

5 Ways to Design for Customers and Search Engines

Of the variables mentioned—and there are certainly some that were left out—SEO is probably the most heavily weighted as most businesses want to be at the top of search results for their industry.

…by designing your site for Google, and not for your customers, you are actually hurting your rankings, not helping them.

You should, instead, design your website with your customer in mind.

1. Start with User Experience

Do not keyword stuff, as readers will find this sort of copy very annoying and search engines will penalize you for such a style of writing.

You’ll also want to make sure that your copy uses proper grammar, and is easily readable (i.e. doesn’t use super long sentences or big words).

Finally, you want titles that describe the main points of the text so that visitors can skim through the copy to find what they are looking for.

2. Always Properly Manage Images on Your Site

3. Make Sure Your Website Focuses on a Niche

Make sure that everything important on your site is accessible within 3 clicks.

4. Keep Your Site Secure

It should be noted that you should only add the logo of the security programs you are implementing, as adding a logo of a program you don’t use to create the illusion of security is highly illegal.

5. Offer What Visitors Want

These things should be continuously added or enhanced throughout your site. Your website and web design should consistently be getting better each day.

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unixcommerce · 6 years

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5 Ways to Design for Customers and Search Engines

Of the variables mentioned—and there are certainly some that were left out—SEO is probably the most heavily weighted as most businesses want to be at the top of search results for their industry.

…by designing your site for Google, and not for your customers, you are actually hurting your rankings, not helping them.

You should, instead, design your website with your customer in mind.

1. Start with User Experience

Do not keyword stuff, as readers will find this sort of copy very annoying and search engines will penalize you for such a style of writing.

You’ll also want to make sure that your copy uses proper grammar, and is easily readable (i.e. doesn’t use super long sentences or big words).

Finally, you want titles that describe the main points of the text so that visitors can skim through the copy to find what they are looking for.

2. Always Properly Manage Images on Your Site

3. Make Sure Your Website Focuses on a Niche

Make sure that everything important on your site is accessible within 3 clicks.

4. Keep Your Site Secure

It should be noted that you should only add the logo of the security programs you are implementing, as adding a logo of a program you don’t use to create the illusion of security is highly illegal.

5. Offer What Visitors Want

These things should be continuously added or enhanced throughout your site. Your website and web design should consistently be getting better each day.

LAST CHANCE: Massive Discounts on Stock Photos – 67% off!

Source p img {display:inline-block; margin-right:10px;} .alignleft {float:left;} p.showcase {clear:both;} body#browserfriendly p, body#podcast p, div#emailbody p{margin:0;}

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