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mostlysignssomeportents · 1 month

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Prison-tech company bribed jails to ban in-person visits

I'm on tour with my new, nationally bestselling novel The Bezzle! Catch me in BOSTON with Randall "XKCD" Munroe (Apr 11), then PROVIDENCE (Apr 12), and beyond!

Beware of geeks bearing gifts. When prison-tech companies started offering "free" tablets to America's vast army of prisoners, it set off alarm-bells for prison reform advocates – but not for the law-enforcement agencies that manage the great American carceral enterprise.

The pitch from these prison-tech companies was that they could cut the costs of locking people up while making jails and prisons safer. Hell, they'd even make life better for prisoners. And they'd do it for free!

These prison tablets would give every prisoner their own phone and their own video-conferencing terminal. They'd supply email, of course, and all the world's books, music, movies and games. Prisoners could maintain connections with the outside world, from family to continuing education. Sounds too good to be true, huh?

Here's the catch: all of these services are blisteringly expensive. Prisoners are accustomed to being gouged on phone calls – for years, prisons have done deals with private telcos that charge a fortune for prisoners' calls and split the take with prison administrators – but even by those standards, the calls you make on a tablet are still a ripoff.

Sure, there are some prisoners for whom money is no object – wealthy people who screwed up so bad they can't get bail and are stewing in a county lockup, along with the odd rich murderer or scammer serving a long bid. But most prisoners are poor. They start poor – the cops are more likely to arrest poor people than rich people, even for the same crime, and the poorer you are, the more likely you are to get convicted or be suckered into a plea bargain with a long sentence. State legislatures are easy to whip up into a froth about minimum sentences for shoplifters who steal $7 deodorant sticks, but they are wildly indifferent to the store owner's rampant wage-theft. Wage theft is by far the most costly form of property crime in America and it is almost entirely ignored:

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/jun/15/wage-theft-us-workers-employees

So America's prisons are heaving with its poorest citizens, and they're certainly not getting any richer while they're inside. While many prisoners hold jobs – prisoners produce $2b/year in goods and $9b/year in services – the average prison wage is $0.52/hour:

https://www.dollarsandsense.org/archives/2024/0324bowman.html

(In six states, prisoners get nothing; North Carolina law bans paying prisoners more than $1/day, the 13th Amendment to the US Constitution explicitly permits slavery – forced labor without pay – for prisoners.)

Likewise, prisoners' families are poor. They start poor – being poor is a strong correlate of being an American prisoner – and then one of their breadwinners is put behind bars, taking their income with them. The family savings go to paying a lawyer.

Prison-tech is a bet that these poor people, locked up and paid $1/day or less; or their families, deprived of an earner and in debt to a lawyer; will somehow come up with cash to pay $13 for a 20-minute phone call, $3 for an MP3, or double the Kindle price for an ebook.

How do you convince a prisoner earning $0.52/hour to spend $13 on a phone-call?

Well, for Securus and Viapath (AKA Global Tellink) – a pair of private equity backed prison monopolists who have swallowed nearly all their competitors – the answer was simple: they bribed prison officials to get rid of the prison phones.

Not just the phones, either: a pair of Michigan suits brought by the Civil Rights Corps accuse sheriffs and the state Department of Corrections of ending in-person visits in exchange for kickbacks from the money that prisoners' families would pay once the only way to reach their loved ones was over the "free" tablets:

https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2024/03/jails-banned-family-visits-to-make-more-money-on-video-calls-lawsuits-claim/

These two cases are just the tip of the iceberg; Civil Rights Corps says there are hundreds of jails and prisons where Securus and Viapath have struck similar corrupt bargains:

https://civilrightscorps.org/case/port-huron-michigan-right2hug/

And it's not just visits and calls. Prison-tech companies have convinced jails and prisons to eliminate mail and parcels. Letters to prisoners are scanned and delivered their tablets, at a price. Prisoners – and their loved ones – have to buy virtual "postage stamps" and pay one stamp per "page" of email. Scanned letters (say, hand-drawn birthday cards from your kids) cost several stamps:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/02/14/minnesota-nice/#shitty-technology-adoption-curve

Prisons and jails have also been convinced to eliminate their libraries and continuing education programs, and to get rid of TVs and recreational equipment. That way, prisoners will pay vastly inflated prices for streaming videos and DRM-locked music.

The icing on the cake? If the prison changes providers, all that data is wiped out – a prisoner serving decades of time will lose their music library, their kids' letters, the books they love. They can get some of that back – by working for $1/day – but the personal stuff? It's just gone.

Readers of my novels know all this. A prison-tech scam just like the one described in the Civil Rights Corps suits is at the center of my latest novel The Bezzle:

https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250865878/thebezzle

Prison-tech has haunted me for years. At first, it was just the normal horror anyone with a shred of empathy would feel for prisoners and their families, captive customers for sadistic "businesses" that have figured out how to get the poorest, most desperate people in the country to make them billions. In the novel, I call prison-tech "a machine":

a million-armed robot whose every limb was tipped with a needle that sank itself into a different place on prisoners and their families and drew out a few more cc’s of blood.

But over time, that furious empathy gave way to dread. Prisoners are at the bottom of the shitty technology adoption curve. They endure the technological torments that haven't yet been sanded down on their bodies, normalized enough to impose them on people with a little more privilege and agency. I'm a long way up the curve from prisoners, but while the shitty technology curve may grind slow, it grinds fine:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/02/24/gwb-rumsfeld-monsters/#bossware

The future isn't here, it's just not evenly distributed. Prisoners are the ultimate early adopters of the technology that the richest, most powerful, most sadistic people in the country's corporate board-rooms would like to force us all to use.

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/04/02/captive-customers/#guillotine-watch

Image: Cryteria (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:HAL9000.svg

CC BY 3.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/deed.en

Flying Logos https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Over_$1,000,000_dollars_in_USD_$100_bill_stacks.png

CC BY-SA 4.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/deed.en

KGBO https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Suncorp_Bank_ATM.jpg

CC BY-SA 3.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/deed.en

#pluralistic #prison #prison-tech #marty hench #the bezzle #securus #captive audiences #St Clair County #human rights #prisoners rights #viapath #gtl #global tellink #Genesee County #michigan #guillotine watch #carceral state #corruption

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villainessbian · 1 year

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Concept: most aliens can get anxious, can get scared, can get fight-or-flight. What most aliens do not get, however, is stress. Stress is a weird thing even by human standards. It can build up over time or be something tied to a very limited situation. It can be caused by a lot of things, and it comes in a lot of different ways. But it's a core human reaction, when a situation is wrong, it causes stress until it is righted. And it even affects different people differently!

Cue Human Cassandra, on a ship with her friend and co-worker Human Pauline. The ship is crewed with a mix of species. It's a cargo ship - load up in a space port, unload in another, get news and supplies during their stops, and live as an ever-shifting family as some of the two dozen crew members, give or take, get replaced. Some leave come payday, and new ones come looking for the thrill of low-level adventure, experiencing warp drives across the safer roads of the known universe.

But getting the supplies you need, or want, in stops is never so easy. Humans are new to the galactic community, and their needs misunderstood. Most broad-edibility food is bland for them, but that's okay. A big enough bag of their condiments can last them years. But ADHD meds... now that's less easy to get, the further from Earth you are. And a contract too big for their captain to pass on came up, much farther than the two humans expected.

Cassandra's mood deteriorated, her work priorities out of order, her sleep schedule in disarray. Little by little, she grew restless, shifting moods and gears unpredictably. A few weeks in and she was a mess, barely able to keep up with the minimum her job doing maintenance and running safety diagnostics for the route charting team required of her. While Pauline could help with the mechanical aspects of keeping the ship running, picking up the "slack", the safety had to be double-checked by the charting and pilot teams. When the curves of asteroid probability reached beyond a certain level, several hundred simulations had to be run, time-consuming processes had to be used, to avoid any collision at speeds beyond speed c. Some truly exotic things happened to ships that experienced those, but none of them contained the words "surviving crew." A safe route avoided any probability of collision over .1% and when going faster than light, any choice of course required thinking in 3 dimensions plus relative time to navigate dangerous probability fields in one piece, finding time-specific corridors and accounting for a dozen variables at once.

After she had a breakdown over a path she would normally have been able to find in under a minute, Pauline spoke to a concerned pilot team member:

"You have to understand her, this is a stressful situation and she's doing her best..."

"What do you mean by 'stressful'?" Gabalt asked. The furry little creature stood on two arched legs, and barely reached up to Pauline's shoulder, opening three wide eyes with curiosity and concern in equal parts.

"Things are... getting difficult for her, and keep getting more difficult because she does not have medication to help her brain be efficient. It makes her tired, and inefficient, and as it goes on, she's less and less able to cope with the situation. The longer this goes on, the worse it gets, and that is stress. Getting more tired because it takes more energy to deal with the situation, and less efficient because she's more tired, and things get harder because she's less efficient, on and on until something can solve the problem and the stress goes away."

"That sounds... hard. Do all humans have to deal with this?"

"Well, everyone has sources of stress, but she's got a disability. Without her meds, she gets stressed all the time. Not a lot all at once, but it always adds up."

"Oh no! So she'll be stuck like that until we get closer to Earth?"

"Most likely, yes."

But the most momentous thing to happen this day was not her breakdown. Not an hour later, alarms blared up. The simulation holograms all displayed blinking red masses - the less-travelled "safe route" was not as well protected! An asteroid range had been detected cutting through the border field, and it was in their way!

Pauline froze up, not knowing what to do. Gabalt was too surprised to act fast. All the courses from the ship's library of regular manoeuvres suggested a crash chance of over 60%, and mere seconds to act before entering the field!

Before anyone could react, Cassandra came in running from her corner to the front of the bridge, slamming the warp drive shutdown button. Most holograms stuttered and collapsed, the exit from FTL essentially dividing one or several of their dimensions by zero.

Looking quickly at the few remaining ones and gazing at the screens showing the current outside situation like a large window would have - plus a few critical extra points of data - she adjusted the angles manually while everyone still shuddered from the gravitational and temporal whiplash of suddenly coming back into normal time. Unblinkingly, she spotted the asteroids on the route while the ship was still going, if not at relativistic speeds, still fast enough for a single pebble they met to vaporise the Whipple shields, the outer hull, the inner hull, the crew members, and the hull again coming out if they but grazed it. Confirming the angles visually, she played with the reaction wheels, the thrusters, the gravity drives, to divert the ship's course just enough to miss a collision while not risking any grave injury on board. There was no time to react - if anything showed up straight ahead on the "unaugmented" outside view screens, it was too late to not get splatted. After half the crew had had the time to get thrown to the side or on the ground due to the rough handling, she'd managed to avoid any crash.

Gabalt was reeling. While it was surely not impossible, these was the kind of moves experienced veterans would never wish to attempt, and the margins for error were ridiculously low! She'd saved the ship and everyone on it, whereas she'd been unable to do a simple safety run so soon before?

Pauline was white as a sheet, but this was nothing compared to Cassandra, shaking violently and breathing unevenly.

"Pauline? What is she doing?"

"That's... probably the adrenaline."

"What's it for?"

"It's from stress. When it comes it overcharges the body. It's like the traditional, 'fight or flight' instinct from survival in prey-predator paradigms, it lets you move fast but paralyses thought... it feels pretty bad after a lot of it is released though. Now she's crashing down, must be harrowing."

"How did she do that? And you said her thoughts were paralysed for precision manoeuvres?"

Cassandra's voice came, nearly a mutter: "I just... had to. do it."

Gabalt needed to understand what happened.

"What do you mean you had to? Someone had to do it, but why you?"

"It- it was very stressful, I saw you freeze, and so."

"But... but HOW did you do all that? That was extremely complicated, few pilots -whose main craft is directly piloting- would want to even try doing that when given a choice!?"

"I had to. do it, so I did. I couldn't. couldn't make a mistake."

"This makes absolutely no sense."

Pauline interrupted. "She just works like that. Lots of stress and when people freeze up, humans with her condition... sometimes, surprisingly, function better in the moment than others can."

"Ah. So it's a human thing. of course, it's a human thing. NOTHING MAKES ANY SENSE WITH YOUR ACCURSED SPECIES" the diminutive pilot pouted.

And so one more story of the humans doing the impossible spread around. Humans of a subtype, more easily harmed, sometimes unstable and needing help for the simplest things... accomplishing odd, unthinkable, borderline heroic feats under duress none could be expected to withstand - but only then. Cursed, blessed? No story-teller seemed too certain. But the "magical" species never stopped surprising all others. And a new proverb developed: "it's not over until the human says it is".

#humans are space fae #humans are weird #humans are space orcs #humans are space australians #humans are deathworlders #earth is space australia #stress response #ADHD #attention deficit hyperactivity disorder

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alicedrawslesmis · 3 months

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(sorry this is from a week ago but) Wait, what's going on right now that's complicated with Amazonian farmers' land rights?

Not farmers, indigenous people

See, recently they put a new law through congress that severely reduces indigenous land to the borders established during the late dictatorship, or immediately post-dictatorship, in 1988. An absolute joke of a border that was dreamed up by some military assholes. People in america may recognize this type of society from the times of westward expansion and think this is a thing of the past because for you guys it is. But here it is a reality. Murder is rampant. The reach of the law is incredibly limited. Government is just too weak and landowners basically run things. THAT'S WHY it's so important to donate directly to the native peoples instead of random NGOs because native people are fucking there and the more power they hold in the land the safer the land will be from agroindustrial expansion.

Well the law was vetoed by the the president and the Supremo Tribunal Federal, aka supreme federal court, labeled it as unconstitutional. Which it is, because our 1988 constitution describes native american land rights in some of its first articles. We thought this would be it for the law

But then the senate (that already overrepresents landowners in rural states) just went along and approved it anyway. I had no idea they could approve something unconstitutional. The progressives and particularly the socialists are fighting this in court. But it happens that for now the legal border is the severely reduced version.

Doesn't mean they'll just give up, because as it happens we don't have any stand your ground laws so even if you own a piece of land, you cannot legally speaking just shoot everyone there. Or attack or threaten them in any way. They'll just have long legal battles individually for the rights to occupy land based on use. Also the Xingu national park, the largest preserved land of the Amazon described as 'larger than Belgium', is being encroached by huge farms that are poisoning their water supply. The border is Visible. I'll try to find video of it but essentially you have a forest and a desert separated by a strict line.

Just last week in the south of Bahia (not the Amazon, let me explain more about the Amazon situation in a bit) Hãhãhãe leadership Nega Muniz Pataxó was shot and killed by an armed militia group that invaded and occupied the Caramuru territory.

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A post shared by SOMOS PATAXÓ HÃHÃHÃE (@somoshahahai)

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The situation in the Amazon, specifically the yanomami territory in Roraima our northernmost state, aka deep forest, is more dire than average given difficulty of access, sheer size, and government abandonment. It's a place that depends on government aid for medicine. It's land that is being systematically invaded by gold miners, pandemic, toxins from nearby farmlands, wood extraction etc. (wood extration is rampant everywhere tho). Early 2023 saw a massive federal government operation by now president Lula to empty the mines and try to look for where funding comes from. Yanomami land is still being invaded to this day, the struggle is ongoing.

The yanomamis need support right now more than any other. Last year saw a massive heat wave that (well, one, caused a girl named Ana Clara Machado to die during the Taylor Swift concert. This is unrelated but I feel like not enough foreign media covered this, Taylor even lied about it as well.) dried up a lot of rivers, killed a LOT of fresh water animals including an unprecedented amount of pink dolphins. Access that was already hard became damn near impossible without boats. I cannot overstate how many pink dolphins were found dead.

Another technique that landowners use to clear space for farms is to just set things on fire and then occupy the empty land, which they legally can do to land that was naturally burned in a forest fire. It happened that Pantanal, another national park of swampland, was massively devastated by fires last year too

this article is from 2020, the year that the worst fire happened, but in 2023 there was another one. It's been happening yearly now due to a) deliberate action and b) climate change aggravation.

And this is not nearly all. Just off the top of my head. If you speak portuguese I recommend following the APIB or the COIAB on instagram to keep up with the news. The FUNAI is the government branch of indigenous organization, but it's not generally that well liked. Still.

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trans-axolotl · 5 months

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US Harm Reduction Resources

continually updating, not a complete list. feel free to add on any resources you find helpful.

Free Safer Supplies:

Each organization will have different supplies, but generally, harm reduction orgs provide things like syringes, safer snorting + smoking kits, Narcan, condoms, lube, and wound care supplies. Each org has different policies for how to get supplies--some do deliveries, some have drop in centers, some only do one to one needle exchange, some are more flexible.

Next Distro: mail based syringe provider for certain states. Also mails free Narcan.

NASEN: national map of syringe providers

a lot of harm reduction collectives aren't going to have their information listed on big national websites--it's always worth searching "harm reduction in my area" and seeing what's around you. Even if you don't live in a big city, there might be a harm reduction organization in your state that can help you find someone closer to you. there's a lot of rad people doing underground work who want to be there to help you who aren't as easy to find online. If there's street medic collectives, mutual aid groups or groups like Food not Bombs in your area, you can ask people in them who might know where to find harm reduction services in your area!

Drug Users Unions:

Drug users unions are activist groups made for people who use drugs, by people who use drugs! Drug users unions do advocacy work to end criminalization, as well as providing vital community support. Many drug users unions are also inclusive of sex workers and work to decriminalize sex work as well. You can search for "drug users union" in your state.

Urban Survivors Union: National, has resources for creating drug users union

Chosen Few: Drug users union for Black drug users in DC

San Francisco Drug users union

Sex Work Advocacy Groups:

Organizations that do decrim advocacy and provide support for sex workers.

Sex Worker Outreach Project USA- National, has chapters in many states.

Black Sex Worker Collective

Sex Workers Project

How to Use Safely:

Guides, videos, toolkits for safer use!

Harm Reduction Coalition Resource Library

Getting Off Right: A Safety Manual for Injection Drug Users

Safer Crack Smoking

Safer Snorting

Safer Hormone Injection

Levels of Risk: Veins

Wound Care video w/ ASL

How to Use Fentanyl Test Strips

DanceSafe-testing kits, including reagent testing kits!

Erowid-shares experiences people have with different drugs, dosages, what things to expect

Bluelight- another forum for discussing experiences with drugs.

Drug Interactions Checker

Sex Work Resources:

Tricks of the Trade by L. Synn Stern: tips for street based sex work

A Quick and Dirty Sex Worker Safety Toolkit

Girls Do What they Have to Do To Survive by YWEP

Dis/Organizing: How We Build Collectives Beyond Institutions by Rachel Kuo & Lorelei Lee

Tryst Blog

Hotlines:

Never Use Alone: 877-696-1996. Overdose Prevention Hotline--Volunteers stay on the phone with you while you use and call emergency services if you overdose.

HIPS Hotline-1 (800) 676-4477. Emotional support for drug users and sex workers. Does not work with cops.

feel free to add on more resources. love + lube <3

#personal #harm reduction #sw #sex work is work #safer use

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batfleshh · 6 months

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Early Morning

GhostSoap X M!Reader

Warnings: fluff because I can’t handle whatever the fuck that campaign was., cuddling and kissing, small make out sesh, poly gs+r, off duty boys, not many warnings tbh

Waking up on the weekends always felt refreshing, especially when you were surrounded by warmth. You push your face against a chest in front of you, not really bothering to check who’s it was. You could hear quiet whispers and mumbles, and a hand pushing its fingers through your hair. A small noise of content is exhaled through your nose, the body behind you that was supplying the equal side of the warmth shuffles around a bit, pushing up against you more than it was before.

As you finally listen in to what’s happening around you, you realize the chest your pressed against is Johnnys. A warmth blossoms in your chest, a smile curling up on your face. Your eyes are still closed, not wanting to be fully awake to the world yet. You reach a hand back slowly and feel around for Simon behind you, his hand quickly finding yours. He grabs ahold of it and squeezes, letting you know he knows you’re awake as he continues to talk to Soap. It seemed pretty early, the room not looking that light. It wasn’t unusual for them to be awake early, usually used to immediately getting up in the mornings and being off to work.

You hear Ghost say something involving you, and the next thing you know you feel Soap lifting your head up gently, his lips kissing your face as you open your eyes to him. “Well good mornin’ love. Hope we didn’t wake you.”, he says, the touch of his soft lips leave a fluttering feeling in your chest. You shake your head at his words, your hand still holding Simons rougher one. You feel the older male behind you move his face down to the nape of your neck, his lips pressing against it softly.

“Mornin’, dear.”, you hear Simon mumble against your skin, a hum of acknowledgment leaving your throat. Laying between the both of them made you feel safer, the feeling of it bringing you a comfort that you didn’t know you needed. You feel Ghost move himself back up to continue his talk with Johnny, his hand still holding on to yours. Your eyes travel up to stare at Johnny as he talks, his accent captivating you every time it slips out when he talks. Your look doesn’t go unnoticed as he glances down at you a few times, a smile appearing ever so slightly every time he did as you looked up in awe.

Soap leans down to press a soft kiss to your lips, a soft chuckle rumbling from his chest as you chase after his lips as he attempts to pull away. He looks over at Ghost and glances down at you, pushing his lips against yours again and deepening it, letting his tongue slip in. You feel Simon let go of your hand, moving it up your body to grab at your chin gently. Ghost moves down to bite at your neck softly, marking it while he holds your face in place for Soap.

When they both pull away, you’re all breathing heftily. They both loved showing you how much they loved you, every piece lining up perfectly when you three had moments like that. As excited as you were from the attention, drowsiness was still nagging at you. You mumble as you move back down to push your face into Johnnys chest. You sigh calmly as you feel Ghost push against your back, a deep breath leaving him as he rests against you. Soap follows in behind you both and rests his head against the pillow, moving his face closer to you and closing his eyes. You all loved your moments together, and it would only take death for you three to be apart.

~ ★

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vigilante-3073 · 3 months

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Tree-hugger

Daryl Dixon x Female Reader

PART 1

Summary: Daryl meets his match when traveling through the woods with Beth.

TW: Flirting, guns, fluff.

Daryl and Beth made their way through the woods in the direction of a small town. The group had been running low on supplies and sent Daryl up the road to see what he could find. Daryl was sure that it would be a waste of a few hours, the shops had likely been cleared out a long time ago. The only thing that kept him moving was the possibility of an auto shop.

His bike was getting old and would likely need replacement parts sooner rather than later.

"Daryl, look," Beth chirped suddenly.

Daryl looked up from the uneven terrain, following her gaze to a motorcycle parked at the base of a tree.

Maybe it was his lucky day after all.

"Looks like it still runs. You could probably get some good parts," Beth said.

Daryl nodded with a grunt, his eyes scanning the area warily as he made his way over.

Daryl reached out towards the bike, freezing in place when he heard a gun cock.

"Hands off the bike, sugar," Someone said.

Daryl stepped back and looked around, crossbow aimed at the trees around them. Beth pulled out her gun, staying close to Daryl's side.

"Up here, big guy," The voice called again.

Daryl and Beth looked up, squinting in the bright afternoon sunlight.

"Holy shit," Daryl muttered when he spotted her.

The woman was up in a tree with a rifle pointed down at them.

"Sorry, thought it was up for grabs," Daryl said, eyes dropping to the bike before returning to the person in the tree.

"Well, it's not," She stated.

"It's a nice bike," Daryl said.

"I take good care of my things," She replied.

Daryl nodded, "Let's get out of here," He muttered before taking a step away from the motorcycle.

"We were just wonderin' if-" "Don't," Daryl said sternly.

"If she wanted to kill us we'd be dead already," Beth pointed out, tucking her gun away.

"She's right," The woman stated.

"Do you know if there's anywhere closeby where we can find parts for a bike like that?" Beth questioned, tilting her head towards the bike.

The woman lowered her gun, "There's an auto parts store about three miles East of here. Found it when I blew one of my shocks a while back," She said.

"Thanks," Beth smiled before lookig over at Daryl, "Now we can go," She said.

"Be careful, there was a herd of almost forty dead headed that way a few days ago. It would be a damn shame to see something happen to a handsome man like you over something as trivial as a bike part," The woman said, eyes running over him appreciatively.

"No way," Beth grinned.

"Shut up," Daryl muttered, his cheeks flushing at the compliment.

"I'm Beth and he's Daryl," Beth said.

"Let's go. Now," Daryl grumbled, walking in the direction of the town.

"I'm Y/N. It was nice meeting you, Daryl," Y/N called.

"It was nice meetin' you too, Y/N," Beth said, turning around and running after Daryl.

...

Daryl managed to cross paths with Y/N a few more times over the next few weeks. She moved around the area frequently and spent an alarming amount of time up in the trees. Y/N told him that it was safer than being on the ground and he was inclined to agree with her.

Rick and Daryl had decided to go out on a run to the nearest town in one of the cars. They were looking to stock up on cans and non-perishables for the upcoming months.

Rick parked in front of the shop before the pair slowly made their way up to the door. The small bell above the door jingled as they pushed it open. The men hesitated for a second, silently listening for movement before stepping into the store.

They moved across the room, scanning the area with weapons. Rick and Daryl shared a look before silently parting ways and searching the rest of the store.

Rick caught Daryl's gaze over the shelves before tilting his head towards the back room. Daryl nodded, continuing his search of the aisles.

Daryl froze when he heard a noise, a soft rustling sound from down one of the aisles. He stepped around the corner quickly, crossbow raised and ready to shoot.

"Long time no see, stranger," Y/N stated casually, staring down at the dented can in her hand.

"Jesus, Y/N. I coulda killed your ass," Daryl huffed, lowering his crossbow as he made his way over to her.

"Cute and funny," She mused with a smile. Y/N grabbed two more cans from the metal shelf and tucked them into her backpack.

"You can call your friend back in here, honey. I already swept the place," Y/N stated, zipping up her backpack.

She lifted the backpack strap up onto her shoulder before grabbing her gun from the floor beside her.

Y/N stood up, slipping her arm into the other strap of her bag.

"You leavin'?" Daryl asked.

"Yeah, but I left plenty of supplies for you," Y/N assured, Daryl nodded.

"See you around, Daryl," Y/N said, making her way over to the door.

"You know, it's startin' to get colder out," Daryl called after her.

"That tends to happen in the winter," She stated, pushing open the door.

"You should come back with us... There's food, warm water and some actual beds if you're lookin' for somethin' more comfortable than a tree branch," Daryl said.

He wasn't quite sure why he found himself pushing for her to come to the prison with them. Daryl barely knew the woman, but he did worry about how she would survive out in the woods during the winter.

"I appreciate the offer, but I don't do groups," Y/N stated.

"You could set up camp in the area then... Good huntin' and we have supplies if you run out," Daryl suggested, fidgeting with his crossbow nervously.

"I just might take you up on that... As long as you come visit me," Y/N said, hand slipping from the door handle as she made her way back over to him.

"I can do that," Daryl nodded.

"Good... Because I'm starting to like you, Daryl," Y/N smiled.

#daryl dixon imagine #the walking dead #walking dead imagine #daryl dixon #twd daryl #daryl dixon x reader #daryl dixon x y/n #daryl fanfiction #daryl x reader #daryl dixon x female reader #daryl dixon x you

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felixcloud6288 · 9 months

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It's Hurricane Season so I'd like to share some advice as a life-long Floridian who's experienced a few things. This is going to be directed primarily to people living in areas at risk of blackouts which could last several days.

Preparations

Aside from food, water, and gas, some things you'll want to make sure you have are flashlights and batteries. Make sure to refill any medications you might need.

Get raincoats in case you need to go outside cause the wind will destroy any umbrellas.. If you can't get one, take a garbage bag and tear a face hole into it and use that.

Also, get bug repellent, especially mosquito repellent. Mosquitos breed around still water and there will be a lot of still water.

You might want to buy some gardening gloves as well to make the post-storm cleanup safer.

SUPER IMPORTANT FOR SANITY AND SANITATION: get caught up on laundry and dishes. No power means no running water. Don't make things worse by not having clean dishes or clean clothes to use. While you're cleaning, change your bed sheets as well. Once you have power, change your sheets again.

Also, download any games, ebooks, shows, etc you can onto any battery-charged electronic devices you have. It will help your sanity when all you can do is wait.

Finally, while you should ideally board up your windows to protect them from debris, make sure at the minimum that all your windows are closed. Wind pressures are going to suck air out of any openings in your home.

Food and Water

First and most important: DO NOT BE A HOARDER!!

Even if your home has no power, that doesn't mean your local grocery store has no power. You can expect some reduced supply due to damaged supply lines and a spike in demand, but you shouldn't be worrying about empty shelves. At worst, have the amount of supplies you might need for 10 days. If you normally go to the grocery store every 2 weeks or longer, just stock up the amount you normally would.

Buy more items that are less likely to spoil and don't need refrigeration. When you have no power, prioritize eating anything which requires refrigeration (milk, cheese, meats) or has a short shelf life (bread).

Demand will be higher in preparation, and supply will be diminished for a bit, but supply issues only become unbearable when people start hoarding.

As for water, you'll need a surplus since you need water for so much. I cannot stress this particular part enough:

You need water to flush your toilet.

If there's somewhere with running water you can go when you need to poop, use that whenever possible, but you need water available at home to refill your toilet's cistern if you don't have that option (either time, distance, etc).

Make sure you have a supply of drinking water. Don't go buying every water bottle you can find (See the bit about hoarding), but you should buy more than you might normally use. Instead, gather water through things like your sink or from a hose into any sealable containers you might have . If you have a bathtub, fill it up just before the hurricane. If you have a pool, that's another source of water. If no debris got in the pool, you can use it for bathing. If you have empty buckets, you can get some additional water during the hurricane by filling them with large rocks or bricks and leaving them out in the open to collect the rain water.

Different water sources will be used for different purposes:

bottled, canned, or other store-bought water: Drinking, cooking, and refrigeration (explained later)

Water in unsealed containers: refill the toilet cistern

Water in a sealed containers: bathing and cleaning (Can also be used for the toilet)

As mentioned with food, supplies at your grocer will be reduced but not necessarily empty. You should be able to buy enough additional drinking water and be able to also use it for cleaning, giving you more water for the toilet. The tip about gathering rain water will only work once. There will likely be no rain for at least a week afterward.

In case you need to evacuate

Keep tabs on whatever emergency alerts are available. Check what your local radio channel is or what sites to check online. Make sure you know how to get to your local shelter, including alternate paths in case a road is inaccessible.

Load your vehicle with anything you might need to bring with you before the storm so you don't have to spend time looking for them and double checking when every minute could count. Pack some pillows, blankets, and extra clothes just in case. Also include anything you cannot risk losing for school or work like laptops.

Refrigeration

Without power, your fridge is now just a giant cooler and a ticking bomb to being a biohazard. Fill it up as much as possible. Cold air escapes easily when you open it and heat disperses fastest throw the air. Remember how I said you should buy extra water? A fridge filled with cold water will stay cooler longer. Any liquid will do. Fill your fridge with water bottles, soda cans, beer, fruit juice, whatever. As long as it doesn't spoil at room temperature. Milk can technically help too, but since it spoils you shouldn't keep much of it and should use it quickly.

Additional things like fruits and veggies will also help. What matters is you want to reduce the amount of empty space and fill it with anything which can keep the temperature down. Put a frozen block of iron in for all I care. Just don't have a super empty fridge.

If you have a generator

Good for you. You're not completely without power now. But you need to set priorities on what to use it for. Generators can only supply so much power at a time so you can't just hook everything to it and expect things to work out.

Top priority is the fridge. Twice a day, morning and evening, plug the fridge to the generator and let it run for two hours to cool things down. Don't hook up the fridge when you don't expect to open it (like when everyone is asleep).

Second priority should be charging cell phones, laptops, and anything else like that. Depending on your circumstances, you can charge them at work, from your car, etc so only hook them up when batteries are low.

Third, comfort. I understand this will be stressful, but hooking up your tv and gaming computer isn't the best idea. If you've done what I suggested earlier, you'll at least have something to watch or do without needing to hook it to your generator. Like with the above electronics, you might be able to find other ways to charge them, but only attach them to your generator when you don't need to worry about necessities.

Finally for the love of god, DO NOT HOOK AN AC TO THE GENERATOR!!. Air conditioners draw a lot of power, especially once the room is hot. But your generator can only do so much. The AC will kill your power supply really quickly. Use a fan or the AC in your vehicle if you need to cool down.

Also worth noting, if you have an electric vehicle, that could potentially be used as well. I don't know specifics, but look into that if you own one.

Final notes

This is not comprehensive and I may be wrong about some things.

Please refer to actual expert sources for comprehensive help.

This is just suggestions from someone who has to deal with this every year and has figured out how to deal with the aftermath. Your living conditions may be different so please check how to handle any concerns unique to you.

Stay safe and do not give up hope.

#original post #hurricane #hurricane prep #weather

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chronicallycouchbound · 8 months

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An important thing about me is that I fully support people who use substances, people in recovery, people who use in moderation, people who’ve never used, and none of those things contradict each other.

I’m very much pro-harm reduction and always will be. I support meeting people wherever they’re at, I support people having access to knowledge they need in order to make informed decisions around their use. I support people having access to safe means to use.

And more than anything, I filly support people in active use, including (especially) problematic use. I want my community to be safe. I don’t believe that offering support to people in active use is inherently enabling. I know that the only thing Narcan/Naloxone enables is breathing.

I’ve lost too many loved ones to sit on the sidelines and hope they’ll do what’s needed to keep themselves safe. The bare minimum I can do is emotionally support my community. I need harm reduction, we all do.

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f4nd0m-fun · 9 days

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DPxDC - Mafia Ties

Good parents Fenton and redeemed Vlad escaping to another universe with Danny, Jordan, Ellie, Jazz, Tucker, and Sam because of GIW chaos getting so bad they literally need to go to another world to get help, only for the portal to close, and they can't open it from this side. Jordan is Jazz's age maybe a year older and Ellie accidentally got deaged to her actual age give or take which is probably about a year and a half old. Yes it's the Family Breakfast ship.

@hallowsden

Cue Vlad doing his whole possession stuff to not only get them new identities but carefully accumulate a small amount of wealth, not enough to be suspicious in his opinion but still.

The Fenton parents start looking to see if/where this world has ectoplasm because the kids, and maybe Vlad, need it. Hel, maybe the parents accidentally need it too after all those years of exposure.

I know everyone chooses Gotham for this stuff, but also that's about the most I know about DC and it has a Lazarus pit underground so we're using it.

Vlad doesn't get back into the proper businessman profile, too many eyes for him to feel safe after the GIW disaster, but he does end up a Mafia boss, or at least tries. Also, Hood becomes a new 'son' obsession for him, yeah he has Danny and Jordan and Ellie but this kid is also ghosty and probably hungry or something, right?

Hood doesn't get what's up with this weird older man who always has a baby with him, let alone why he'd even bring a baby along to mafia stuff.

Vlad thinks it's safer to have Ellie in mafia meetings than be left with the Fentons during their research obsession periods because they will literally not pay attention to anything else unless it's an emergency, it's not their fault, they're learning to manage it though.

Speaking of Fentons, they work on clean energy manufacturing topside, but underground they deal with weapons. Mostly they supply them to Vlad's crew, since that's basically their testing grounds, but they also don't make anything that's actually lethal. Vlad isn't a fan of guns though but he isn't about to bring out his plasma blasts if there isn't a good reason. (He pretends anyone who sees him cackling like a maniac hit their head, he did say he hates using guns after all).

Jordan and Jazz are probably about 17/18 now. Jazz is going to college, while Jordan slips his way into the kid's mafia (yes he knows he's a kid now too, shut up, he used to be 24). This is half to annoy Vlad and half because he's curious. Jazz, of course, with a little help from both Vlad and Tucker in getting her grades moved between universes, is in college soon, and manages a full scholarship (not that Vlad wouldn't have paid if he still had his old money, in fact he might even be a little jealous that he wasn't the one to pay for her schooling).

Jordan looks a little more like Vlad than he does Jack, due to the way the ghost half fusion effects everything, but he also looks more like Jack than Maddie because Jack is what Danny would have grown into anyway.

Ellie of course just looks like a nearly carbon copy of Danny of course, just baby and female.

Danny, Sam, and Tucker are all going to Gotham Prep, if Vlad can't pay for Jazz's schooling then he's paying at just some for theirs (they might have partial scholarships but not full ride). Danny still sneaks out at night because he can't stand sitting still after an hour time being a vigilante and ends up running into the Bat. He promptly apologizes for invading his haunt and flees.

If any ships, I'm thinking Jazz/Jason and Jordan/Dick, but I'm a sucker for everlasting Trio and Tim also has a trio of his own.

Back to Ellie and Vlad. He of course is trying to keep any 'Meta' rumors on the downlow, but she's just a baby. The harness she's in is ghost proof mostly so she can't just phase out of it, but you try changing a baby's diaper and they just turn intangible, or put then down to nap when they start floating. Hel, imagine setting her down for two seconds, she accidentally makes a shield, and now she's crying because she wants to be held. Sure, Vlad and Danny both, Jordan and Ellie too, can go through shields in human form, but that doesn't mean it doesn't sting or something. Eventually it gets figured out though.

I wonder how long it takes Jason to figure out that this Jordan fellow is related to Vlad. 😂

I also wonder what it would take for Vlad to actually use his ghost form outright, what kind of threat he'd expose himself to for the sake of his family. Just, shoving the kids at Jack - "Darling your aim is iced tea, let Maddie and myself handle this" - and doing what he has to.

And, yes, even as a Mafia boss he refuses to actually swear. Also, he probably still goes by Plasmius, the way his other form looks does NOT help the vampire rumors. Let alone the- well, I read a post on here a while ago where Ellie Danny and Jordan were deaged and needed his ectoplasm to survive. Imagine being a Plasmius goon in a meeting while he's trying to rock his baby to sleep and she's just sucking on his hand. You don't think much of it until you see he's bleeding and, even though it's technically red, your pretty sure it's glowing green and you're not sure if you want to ask (you won't but still). Plus, he's not even reacting to what must be a fair bit of pain, right?

Honestly, there's probably a betting pool about the whole weird family.

And of course I'm bringing in my Alfred Clockwork storyline. Flashpoint Thomas is Frighty, dead Thomas is Pariah, and Gotham is Martha. The moment Vlad finds out that Jason's grandparents are some of the most powerful ghosts in the realms (or at least this side of them in Gotham's case) he's like "okay I won't interfere, but maybe he'd like a friend? He doesn't seem to know a lot of ghosts.' (he tries to figure out which kid would be a better fit and that's when he finds out Jordan's been working for Hood this whole time. "You didn't tell me?" "You didn't know?!") 😂

Basically, give me a Mafia family who's major story plot isn't even the bats outright, it's just trying to survive after fleeing a world that may as well be destroyed at this point. Sure, they interact with the bats, cross paths, maybe even a couple relationships, but, overall, the Fenton-Masters are just outsiders in Gotham, learning to adjust to this new life.

#Fenton-Masters Mafia Crossover #Fenton-Masters Mafia AU #Fenton-Masters Mafia Family #dpxdc #dpxdc crossover #dpxdc au #dimensional travel #new life

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specialagentlokitty · 4 months

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Daryl x reader - out my sight

A/N: this is my first time writing for TWD and for Daryl so have fun ahah

You were looking for food, and you found a bit, so you made your way back to the highway you were walking along.

Maybe it wasn’t the best idea, but it was the safest one, rather than trees, you had open space you could see walkers for miles on, and it was safer, with more supplies available when you needed it, and you had your trusted pointy stick.

You did have a machete as well, but you preferred being able to keep those freaks at a distance, you didn’t want them to get too close.

You moved slowly and quietly, keeping an eye out for any hiding spaces or places that seemed a little too dangerous to for you to go too close to.

Every day, three times a day you would stop, climbing into the nearest available tree.

That’s what you did now, you found a good tree to climb and you climbed up it, resting your back on the bark, looking around.

Reaching into the jacket, you pulled out a photo, and unfolded it, smiling you folded it in half the other way, running your thumb along the forever memory of the man.

“You better be alive you dumb bastard…” you whispered.

You wondered if he had made it, if he was nearby or if he was safe, if he wasn’t even still in the state.

You didn’t know if he was looking for you, part of you hoped he was, but the other part hoped that he had just forgotten about you, and that he was focusing on his own safety.

The thought of your boyfriend from days gone by was the only thing that kept you going, the memories that you had of the pair of you before the world suddenly went to shit.

They kept you alive.

Kept you fighting.

Putting the photo away into the pocket of the jacket you were wearing, you sat there for a shot while, taking a break.

It was safe in the trees, away from the walkers and you had learnt that pretty quickly.

Clasping your hands together, you brought them to to your mouth and blew air into your hallowed palms, letting out a deep whistle, and you extended your fingers to make it higher pitched.

You stopped and listened.

At this point you weren’t expecting a reply, but three times a day you did this in the hopes that you would get one, but you never did.

You saw a few walkers perk up at the sound, but they carried on about their own business, the sound mimicking natural sounds in a way.

Taking a breath, you stayed there for maybe an hour before you carried on walking, checking car for anything that may be of use, but you didn’t want to stray too far from your camp.

You checked a few cars briefly, and made a mental note of what they had in them and if it was of use before trudging back towards your camp, and you sat between the circle of cars, cooking something to eat.

You had to eat during the day when it safer, and during the evenings you slept, in the night you stayed awake, keeping watch over the road, noting how many walkers there were if you saw any.

Early morning came, and you took a quick nap before making your way down to the cars from the day before.

Grabbing anything you could out of them, you jogged your way back towards your camp.

Climbing up your tree, you grabbed one of the bags you had in there and split the medicines and foods between them.

That’s when you heard it, the sound of vehicles moving and you climbed to a slightly lower branch, sitting down.

They came to a stop a little way up the road and began to search the cars you had already searched.

“Dumbasses… what the fuck are they doing…” you whispered.

You quietly jumped down, walking over to a car you hid behind it, gripping your machete this time.

You didn’t know who they were or what they wanted, so you had to be cautious.

You crept around them, weaving in and out of the cars, and you watched them, not wanting to get any closer.

They seemed like a large group, you couldn’t see them all, a couple of kids, some women, a man with them, but you still kept your distance, they could still be dangerous.

You backed away as they got closer, and ran back into the cover of the trees and up your tree to watch.

You could see more, and more people.

You wondered if he was there, and there was only one way for you to find out, at least up there through the branches and leaves they wouldn’t be able to find you.

You went to raised your hands, but stopped when you saw the horde, and you kept yourself hidden.

You watched as everybody scrambled to find a place to hide.

They weren’t going to last with the walkers and you knew that, and as much as you didn’t want to trust them, you couldn’t let anybody else die.

So you raised your hands and whistled again, leaving it as a long, deep whistle this time.

It drew the attention of the walkers and they kept moving.

Taking a deep breath, you whistled again, keeping them coming towards you, and when they were close enough you stopped.

They weren’t as stupid as they looked, but you knew they were going to keep going up the highway, so you waited.

Everything seemed so tense, so quiet.

“What the fuck was that?” Shane whispered.

Daryl stood up, helping get T-Dog to safety and he looked out on to the road.

“There ain’t no way…”

“What?” Rick asked.

Daryl let out a low and quiet whistle, pushing back Rick and Dale who tried to stop him.

“Just shut the fuck up and listen!” Daryl hissed.

You heard the low whistle, and you whistled again, seeing if it would happen once more.

If it was who you thought it was then he would know the pattern, but if it wasn’t then you knew to stay hiding.

A response came in a slightly shorter, lower whistle.

Climbing down from the tree you walked on to the road, standing on one of the cars to stare at the group.

They all saw you, and raised their guns but nobody moved.

Daryl raised his crossbow, and he whistled again, only a short one this time, maybe a second long.

You jumped down from the car, walking a little closer to get a better view, hand covering your eyes.

“Holy fuckin’ shit…”

Daryl set his crossbow aside and he raised his hands to the others.

“Don’t shoot, she’s human.”

“How the hell can you be so sure?!” Lori hissed.

“You ever heard one of them fuckers whistle? No, so she’s fucking human I swear to god you hurt her I’ll put an arrow straight through your fucking eyes bitch.”

He shoved past T-Dog and Rick, making his way carefully through the cars, just like you were doing.

You stopped, pointing the stick and he stopped as well.

“Are you bit?”

“No dumbass I ain’t bit, you think I’d still be here if I were?”

You shrugged a little.

“Maybe, you smell dead enough.”

“You asshole you can’t smell me from that far away, and you know they can’t talk neither, get over here.” He scoffed.

You lowered the stick and walked over a closer, getting a better look at him and you smiled softly, a few tears brimming your eyes.

“I can’t believe you’re still alive…” you whispered.

“Nah come on, seriously don’t start crying.”

He walked over, taking your weapon he set it aside and wrapped his arm around your shoulders, pulling you into him.

You balled your hands into the back of his shirt, closing your eyes as you tried to fight the tears.

“Come on darl… you know I don’t deal with the crying… I don’t like the crying…”

You sniffled a little, pulling away and draped his arms on your shoulders, clasping his hands together behind your head.

You sniffled a little, locking eyes with him.

“You smell like ass Daryl…”

“Well I’m sorry, I’ll just whip a shower out my ass and clean.”

You laughed a little and he smirked a little bit.

“You don’t smell all too good either you know, I’m pretty sure you could rival the dead with that damn smell.”

“Shut up.” You said.

You sighed, resting your head on his chest again and he placed his hand on the back of your head, kissing your head.

He rested his chin there, eyes scanning over the surrounding areas.

He pulled away and then smacked you upside the head and you smacked his arm.

“Ow! Daryl what the fuck?!”

“The fuck were you thinking running off huh? You fucking stupid or something?”

You rolled your eyes.

“Well I’m sorry, I didn’t exactly plan on a world ending apocalypse you dumbass, I just wanted some space.”

“You ran off you moron! Didn’t even leave a note!”

“I’m sorry! God! Don’t get so pissy about it, you told me to leave.”

“Jesus Christ (Y/N), we had an argument, course I told you to leave, I didn’t think you actually would.”

You shrugged a little, putting your hands in your pockets as you grinned sheepishly up at your boyfriend.

He rose a brow, crossing his arms as he looked down at you unamused.

“I love you?”

“Damn straight you better, now where’s your crap? You’re coming with me.”

He grabbed your weapon and you led him back towards your tree so you could grab everything you were stashing.

Daryl kept his eyes glued to you, making sure you didn’t vanish again, because he wasn’t all that sure you were actually there, and that it wasn’t his mind playing tricks on him.

While he was staring at you he clicked on to the familiar jacket you were wearing.

“Dammit (Y/N), you’re the reason my jacket went missin’? Seriously?”

“Oh pipe down.” You laughed.

Daryl shook his head, but he did smirk a little bit.

It was definitely you, because only you could piss him off that much and he still have a soft spot for you, just like he always had.

He was going to make sure you went everywhere with him this time, even if he had to handcuff you both together he wasn’t about to let you out of his sight again

#the walking dead #the walking dead x reader #the walking dead x you #the walking dead imagine #twd #twd x reader #twd x you #twd x y/n #twd imagine #daryl dixon #Daryl Dixon x reader #Daryl Dixon x you #Daryl Dixon imagine #daryl dixon x y/n

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unfinishedslurs · 1 year

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bedsharing (future stobin lavender marriage) (steddie)

“Why do you have tampons in your bathroom?” Eddie asks, toweling off his hair. “Wouldn’t your mom just keep them in hers?”

“They’re Robin’s.”

He can feel Eddie’s eyes on the back of his neck, and turns around from where he’s hastily folding his clothes. He has another towel wrapped around his hips, and Steve’s gaze drifts there before snapping back up to his face.

“What?” He asks.

“I thought you guys weren’t together.”

Steve sighs. “Just because I have tampons for when she stays over—“

“It’s just—why wouldn’t they be in the guest bathroom?”

“She stays in my room,” he says, and then realizes how that sounds. “Okay, yeah, but we’re not dating. That’s never gonna happen.”

“So you’re just hooking up?”

Steve instinctively makes a face, and Eddie’s eyebrows jut up. “No. I’m not her type, and even if I was, at this point that ball has left the court. I don’t like her like that, she definitely doesn’t like me like that, and next time Henderson tries to convince someone we’re soulmates I’m going to wring his little neck.”

“I thought you said you were soulmates.”

“Yeah, but not like that.”

“Just enough that she sleeps in your bed and has tampons in your bathroom, apparently.” Eddie bends over to wrap his hair in the towel, and Steve spends a long moment staring at the curve of his bare spine.

“Hey, man,” he says belatedly. “We got caught off guard one time. I’m not doing that again.”

Two loads of laundry, and Robin had cried in anger and embarrassment. Steve of ‘83 would have found it disgusting. Steve of now was a little grossed out, but also had been bled on in ways much worse than a period, so he just took her out to milkshakes and stocked up on enough supplies to last for a lifetime. After that, all bets were off when it came to the few boundaries they had left.

Eddie grimaces in acknowledgment, grabbing the pair of sweatpants on the bed. Steve turns around before the towel drops, because years of locker room experience can’t possibly prepare him for seeing Eddie Munson’s naked ass.

“So no dreams of a white wedding and gaggles of grandchildren running around?”

“I mean, we’ll probably get married at some point,” Steve says absently, fiddling with his bedspread to keep from turning around. He can have self control. He’s capable of not ogling his friends. “It’ll be safer that way.” Shit, why did he say that? He might as well hang a neon sign that says QUEER over his head. “Easier,” he corrects himself, knowing damn well it’s useless.

There’s a thud and a groan, and Steve whirls around to see Eddie on the ground, halfway into his pants.

“Are you okay?”

“So you’re not together, and you’re not hooking up, but you’ll get married?” Eddie demands from the floor, wiggling into his sweats. “And…what? Have a loveless, sexless marriage? Because it’s easy?”

“Just because the love isn’t romantic doesn’t mean our marriage would be loveless,” he protests, mind whirling with excuses he can’t use. Why did he open his big mouth? Why couldn’t he have just said anything else?

“That’s what you’re focusing on?”

“I don’t know what to tell you, man,” he shrugs, trying to get his heartbeat under control. “We’re already going to spend the rest of our lives together. Might as well get some legal benefits out of it.”

“Sure, sure,” Eddie laughs, disbelieving. “Getting married for legal benefits and safety. Harrington, if I didn’t know better, I’d say this sounds like—“

“Sounds like what?” Steve cuts through what Eddie was about to say. He doesn’t know what it is, but there’s a bone-deep certainty that Eddie will end up on the truth if he keeps talking. “Are you coming to bed or not, man?”

Eddie falls silent in the middle of standing up, dark eyes pinning Steve to the spot. He knows, Steve thinks, and tries not to picture what Robin would say if he got another concussion. He hasn’t confirmed anything, and Eddie seems like a good guy, maybe even their kind of guy, but if he’s wrong then he’d better grab Robin fast and get the hell out of dodge. Dustin might forgive him eventually, if he knew the reason why.

The silence is getting unbearable.

“Yeah, alright,” Eddie finally shrugs. “Don’t get your panties in a bunch. I want the left side.”

“You asshole,” Steve hisses, pretending the relief in his chest isn’t damn near killing him. “You know that’s the side I sleep on.”

#menstration #period mention #bedsharing au #stranger things fanfic #sorry robin hasn't been in any yet i promise she's coming soon #i love lavender marriage stobin they are my everything #steddie #steve harrington #eddie munson

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misscammiedawn · 3 months

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Hypnosis and Dissociative Disorders

I've been meaning to write this since Charmed.

I shall not point fingers or name names but during Charmed 2024 there was a 101 class that taught that it was unsafe to play with those who dissociate as part of a mental illness. The graphic, which I'll paste below, used the word "Can't".

I wanted to speak to that.

Hypnosis has several different definitions. One could go to a hypnosis event and ask every presenter "define hypnosis in a single sentence" and get a different answer every class, likely a few may even contradict.

One such definition I could use is "Hypnosis is an altered state where a hypnotee is lead to a suggestible state where the hypnotee is dissociated from their conscious thinking." though one could say it is "an altered state that leads to breakdown in critical thinking and a heightened state of suggestibility" or you could start talking about the unconscious or subconscious mind.

Fact is, there's a lot of theory work at play and the language we use to shape the concepts isn't as important as understanding the concepts.

Dissociation is a natural part of hypnosis. It's also a natural part of existing. In much pre-talk patter we as hypnotists tend to ask an introduction level hypnotee to think about their experiences with time dilation, with highway hypnosis, with spacing out, with walking into a room and forgetting why you came in there.

Things so normal that as part of rapport, a hypnotist tends to assume the hypnotee can latch on to one of the concepts.

Dissociation is a spectrum. Literally. Within psychology the DES-II tool grades dissociation experiences on a scale, hence the acronym.

Graphic source

When people, including myself at times, describe dissociative disorders they tend to be referring to disorders that focus on dissociation as their main symptom. Depersonalization, Derealization and of course Dissociative Identity Disorder. Over the course of my life I have been diagnosed with all three.

But the scale includes Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, both complex and standard. Complex simply refers to a level of trauma that has been ongoing long enough that it is not a single memory or incident that triggers the symptoms.

According to the American Psychiatric Association one in eleven people will be diagnosed with PTSD at some point in their life with 3.5m diagnosed per year in the USA.

Which is to say that dissociating as part of an illness includes 8% of the population. Does that mean 8% of all potential hypnotees are too dangerous to play with?

...the answer is not a clear cut, "no". There is some elevated danger. But rather than teaching people not to play with those who live with these experiences, perhaps we can teach why there should be heightened caution and then allow people to navigate together.

We should always strive to educate and provide tools. When you tell a person they can't do something then they'll just do it without understanding why they aren't supposed to or, worse, predators will find those who were excluded from safer spaces. Harm is not reduced, an educator just gets to walk away from the harm with a simple "I said they shouldn't".

And plus, I said 8% of the general population...

Within hypnosis circles I assure you it is far higher when one factors in that multiple studies have supplied evidence that hypnotic susceptibility increases along with dissociative capacity.

Suffice to say, from utilizing hypnotic susceptibility tests (HGSHS) and dissociative tests (SDD and DES) the more a person dissociates, the more susceptible to hypnosis they are.

The human mind uses dissociation as a way of coping with physical and emotional pain, among other necessary inner needs, and so a person suffering from a mental illness that features dissociation becomes a naturally gifted hypnotee. It's a matter of practicing a skill constantly without realizing that they are refining something useful. Wax-On/Wax-Off.

This leads to a number of safety concerns. We've typed on serious concerns such as altering sense of identity and derealization attacks from lack of grounding. This is a topic near and dear to our heart as we acknowledge that we needed to gain an education in how to safely consent to hypnosis play and failing to do so in the past caused harm to ourselves and to those we played with.

So here's a list of potential dangers in playing with those who are further along the dissociative spectrum, how to mitigate those dangers and create a space where everyone can play safely.

I'll focus on hypnotees with dissociative experiences for the most part as the relationship between dissociation and hypnosis is primarily a concern while the hypnotee is in trance. That having been said I acknowledge that Dom Space connects just as much to the spectrum and an entire new post can be made on the topic of performing hypnosis when you have a dissociative disorder.

Heaven knows it is a topic I study feverishly to maintain safety for myself and those who entrust their mind to my care.

So... with that said, let's talk about the dangers.

Abreactions

This is likely the most common concept that comes up when thinking of the relationship between PTSD and hypnosis. An abreaction is the moment a hypnosis session or scene goes off the rails because the hypnotee is actively reacting to a trauma trigger while they are in a suggestible state. Their Fight/Flight/Freeze/Fawn impulse may be triggered and cause a physical or emotional reaction which was not part of the negotiated/planned scene.

This could be a cut and dry example of "and think about all the times you've been hypnotized right there on that sofa" causing a hypnotee to follow the suggestion and regress in memory to a time before a bad break-up when their former partner hypnotized them on the sofa they are currently on.

It could be an abstract example like "imagining yourself in a field of flowers and breathing in, noting how lovely the scent is, like the most beautiful perfume." causing sense memory to trigger the scent of a perfume that was in the air during a traumatic moment of their life that instantly flips the switch in their mind to go into F/F/F/F mode.

Likely any given hypnotist will experience this at some point in their life. The first example is one that any person could experience. Hypnosis naturally draws upon associations and when you create an association in the present to a negative emotion in the past you will summon it into the present.

With the second example, that association is already there and it was activated during the scene. The source of the abreaction. I avoid using the word "Trigger" both because of shitty internet discourse in the 2010s and because the term is used for other things in hypnosis, but that is what it is. A sense, a memory, an association which causes the source of trauma to intrude upon the present. The danger that the hypnotee experiences in these moments is very real.

Typically when I discuss these topics I put a disclaimer and emphasize how present the traumatic experience is. My hope is that anyone who is interested in hypnosis knows full well how true and powerful inner experiences are. If you doubt that then I sincerely do not know why you are in this community to begin with.

How to prevent an abreaction is important but should never be learned at the expense of learning how to handle an abreaction. Prevention is about disclosing during negotiation, asking the hypnotee to volunteer anything which may activate a negative reaction or simply what topics to avoid. Phobias are common enough examples of things that a hypnotist should know before working.

But disclosing every part of a trance or scene during the early phases of a hypnotic relationship is essential too. This way the hypnotee does not get surprised by anything propping up during play and they can measure their expected reactions before going into a suggestible state.

But if, despite caution, something does happen? What then?

Noting that every abreaction manifests specific to the person, their situation, their emotional state and how the scene caused it to happen. The first thing the hypnotist needs to do is not overreact. Over-correcting is an easy mistake to make in the moment but it will lead to an overall negative outcome.

Assess the situation and try to recognize what is happening. I had mentioned that the reflex is "Fight/Flight/Freeze/Fawn" this can be obvious like thrashing or ejecting out of trance instantly. It could be something harder to notice like locking up and becoming unresponsive or emotionally regressing to a terrified state.

If the hypnotee is still in trance then do your best to offer comfort and grounding. Remind them what is happening, remind them that they are safe, perform some grounding exercises such as box breathing (breathe in, hold, exhale for a number of seconds).

Touch is a case by case situation here. I know if I were having an emotional flashback to an assault then being touched would launch me further into abreaction territory. If you believe holding a hand would be beneficial then at the very least communicate it "I'm here, I'm going to take your hand, everything's safe, I'm here."

Over distance you should communicate this via modality. "I'm here, just listen to my voice, focus on the sounds in the room, I'm not going anywhere" for an audio example, "Just feel the blanket beneath you, you can brush your fingers against it if you need" for touch based.

The idea is to use emotional comfort, sensory grounding and patience to bring the hypnotee gently out of the moment.

Then apply aftercare and discuss what happened, what could be improved, what the hypnotee needs and acknowledge that the stress of these moments impacts the hypnotist too. Leave room for the hypnotist to recover as much as the hypnotee.

Decide together if this will end the session or not. Do not cut off on principal. If someone is conditioned to believe that displaying their negative reactions will lead to play stopping then they will hide those reactions. Accept that they happen. Learn how to grow together and incorporate care, comfort and safety into every scene.

Spontaneous Hypnotic Amnesia

One danger for those who suffer dissociative disorders is that their brains are very good at editing information. The further down the spectrum one is, the more adept their mind is at naturally pushing away things that they do not wish to think about nor have the capacity to integrate.

One categorization of dissociation is a failure for the brain to integrate information and experience. It is the cause of time dilation, it is why critical thinking is bypassed and it is why those further on the dissociative spectrum are able to compartmentalize their experiences so effortlessly that they can maintain dissociated personalities.

Where most people who practice hypnosis typically have to study how to achieve post-hypnotic amnesia, those who begin working with hypnosis with patholigized dissociative experiences may need to learn how not to experience it. I include this as I have spoken to multiple people who have lived this reality and it is something we ourselves experienced in the past.

Should a newer hypnotee show signs that they are not remembering what is happening during trance, it is a good practice to train them on how to retain information. Hypnotee Agency is a skill that one develops and allowing them the knowledge that they can chose to retain the information during a trance is as important as reinforcing how easy and normal it is to forget when that is a negotiated part of the scene.

All it takes to be safe here is to just remind them that if they wish to and find it enjoyable to do so, they may retain the information from this trance.

Nothing more complicated than that.

Derealization/Unreality

Derealization is a common experience within dissociation that is actually lower on the dissociative spectrum than PTSD. It is when you do not feel attached to your present experiences in real time.

A common version of this is "Deja Vu" which is a sensation where you are having difficulty integrating your present experience because it "feels" like you've already experienced it.

It can manifest in many other ways, however the commonality is that the person experiencing this knows that it's abnormal. When a person is disconnected from their surroundings like this they may experience a barrier between themselves and the world, they may have a distorted sense of time and they may become physically unresponsive and withdrawn.

Source: Mayo Clinic

The best way to handle this is to make sure that grounding always includes a thorough count-up that lets a person feel both in their body (this will help with depersonalization too) and aware of their surroundings. Ensuring both debriefing and aftercare focus on keeping reality in the room is important when someone's sense of what is real can drift.

For that reason it's a good idea to try and reinforce those ideas of what is real and save them in a little box that can be stored away if there are ever any reality altering suggestions in play, that way retrieving and unpacking that box can just be a natural part of the post-scene.

I linked it earlier, but my post on the topic can be found here.

Depersonalization/Altered States of Identity

Ah, our favorite soapbox.

Much like derealization, depersonalization is a symptom that is lower on the scale than PTSD and is actively invoked during inductions such as the Bandler which turns a handshake into the hypnotee starring at their hand and having the sensation of the hand distanced from their mind. Literally dissociating the hand from your body and using that sensation to build a trance.

It's a good induction. All forms of dissociation are not bad things. That is something I want to make sure an audience fully understands. This post is here to destigmatize, particularly when a 101 class was teaching stigma.

Depersonalization is a disconnection from one's sense of self. These are the moments when one feels like they are not the ones living through a moment, they are experiencing themselves from an outside perspective.

Once again, things that are utilized heavily in induction patter.

Source: Mayo Clinic

The derealization advice works well in this case, particularly the idea of creating a "back-up" to restore carefully at the end of a scene.

The big difference though is that depersonalization as a natural thing that those with dissociative disorders do can lead to some bleed when doing suggestions which alter a person's sense of self. I highly recommend an optional suggestion or affirmation that can help a hypnotee ground themselves. That may be too close to therapy for many though.

The hard part about being safe with depersonalization symptoms is that they are typically things that we actively engage with during hypnosis. I guarantee at least one person read "Feeling like a robot or that you're not in control of what you say or how you move." and thought of that as an absolute win.

This is where a bit of negotiation and hypnotee agency comes into play. Reality needs to be kept in the room during all hypnosis. Diving into ego-death or erasing reality may be tempting, especially for those who aren't particularly fond of reality or themselves, but it is too dangerous to surrender those things.

My definitive post on the topic has more information.

Though while I'm talking about altered personalities, I want to make something clear which I did not type about much in my Personality Play post...

Plurality

This is a topic on its own which could take on an entire post to itself. I may yet write it. If anyone has read our Madison and Belladonna stories they would know that they are written entirely based upon the life lessons Daja and I have been learning while I began therapy and was diagnosed with Dissociative Identity Disorder. Many of my lessons for how to safely play with plural systems are mixed in with the fiction.

When I say Plural I mean to refer to those who have multiple dissociated personalities, along with circumstances such as dissociative barriers.

There are as many displays of plurality as there are people who experience it. Every system is different. No two people are not on fire (awww).

So with that said, any play on either side of the watch is going to be lead with self-advocating. A hypnotic relationship involving a system (or more than one, even) will need a level of disclosure. Not just that a system exists but how that system manifests. What patterns are known regarding switches, what best works when an unexpected switch occurs, what levels of dissociative barriers exist between alters/parts, what terminology is preferred...

Wait, that's a lot to throw at once.

Our version of plurality is based upon Dissociative Identity Disorder. Which is to say that my system, originating via complex PTSD during childhood, used to have firm dissociative barriers between one another. This meant that, prior to diagnosis, you could have an emotionally charged conversation with me, Dawn, and then the next day Cammie will wake up and depending on the level of dissociation (typically but not always linked to stress or proximity to trauma triggers) will either not remember what happened during that conversation or will not carry the emotions that I had experienced. "Not remembering" can simply be "won't think about"

As I said, it's quite subjective. But the conceit is that with those on the DID spectrum will have a complete disconnect between parts/alters.

For those with less dissociation, but still experience plurality, they may not have amnesia or barriers between parts, allowing themselves to communicate with one another actively.

Within psychological communities there is eternal debate on all of these experiences and one of the more poignant debates is that the difference between DID and OSDD seems to just be a level of severity and that treatment and therapy tactics tend to move DID patients into the OSDD box and so they shouldn't be labeled as separate disorders.

These rules on amnesia, inner communication and emotional consistency between parts typically apply outside of disorders. I do not wish to engage in syscourse. But as above when I mentioned abreactions, those who practice with hypnosis know how capable a mind is to create hypnotically induced personalities. There are experiences outside of the DSM-V and that really shouldn't be a controversial statement.

A switch is when one part/alter trades out for another. The reasons are hyper specific to every system and cannot really be predicted without knowing their circumstances intimately. For instance the scent of lavender will draw me out without fail.

These can happen without warning and during hypnosis. Being cautious about body language, tone of voice and sudden changes in mood are the best you can do without guidance from the one with lived experience.

I'd also cautiously warn to end a scene and check in if there is an unexpected switch and there's no negotiated playbook on what to do in case of a switch.

The first Madison and Belladonna story tells the story of that very circumstance because that happened in my real life.

For safety it is best to try and communicate with the entire system over how to approach any aspect of hypnosis play. Exploring is a collaborative action and it can be a rewarding experience to find what works and what doesn't work. But it does take time.

For some basic "until I know better" rules, I'd say NEVER FORCE A SWITCH is a fairly basic rule, though. Also do not assume consent for a specific part/alter counts as consent for the whole system.

There is so much to say on this topic and I will likely revisit it at another point, but much of the safety tied up with DID and identity based dissociative disorders boils down to the fact that you are negotiating consent for a group and that you cannot always guarantee that the hypnotee at the start of a scene will always be present during the entire scene.

To that, I say treat switches like an abreaction, display acceptance and curiosity and don't get too hung up on the circumstances.

At the end of the day plural folx are just people too, just not person.

So... why did I write all this, anyway?

A lovely friend of mine recently joked that Charmed 2024 was the "Year of Plurality" and in a way they were right. I've been attending the event since 2020 and where my first had been a humble little class of 8 or so people on a Sunday afternoon ran by Vulpes Automata (Vulpes teaches the same class at Plural Positivity, albeit without the hypnosis content, a recording is hosted here) this year's event included many systems declaring themselves as such on their badge, both an in-person and online unconference that stretched beyond the time limits put in place and were feverishly well attended.

It has done my heart so good to see the safety and community growing and becoming more accepting.

It reminds me of the community's slow growth to accepting and embracing the transgender community in the mid-2010s.

Which is why I wish to be firm about trying to stop bad ideas from taking root in how we teach on these topics.

Some may remember that in the 2000s, respectable resources teaching hypnokink used to state firmly to "confirm biological sex" with any potential play partner. Said material has been revised. Times change and communities grow.

So when I see this teaching graphic saying that those who dissociate as part of a mental illness "Can't" be hypnotized, due to safety concerns? I get worried.

It was being used in a 101 class at the very same Charmed event that I am praising for having such good acceptance of plural experiences?

I lived this once as a closeted transgender woman. I don't want to live it again with our DID.

And I remember that "never play with anyone who has a mental illness" used to be taught in the same resources that once said to disclose one's "biological sex". People have taught this in classes and been approached by someone who had a mental illness and told how ignorant it was to teach that they could not be played with.

We, as a community, can do better.

I'd rather a 3 hour 101 become a 4 hour 101 and teach this material than to dismiss those who are the most vulnerable and susceptible and have them seek their trances from those who do not have reservations about safety and ethics.

Thank you for reading. I know this was a big soap box.

#dawn posting #hypnokink #hypnosis #hypnokink writings #charmed 2024 #did #bpd #community resources #community safety

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