#the people of my class were sufficiently impressed
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roaches and gender dysphoria bunny gjinka
#my art#roach#tw roach#the people of my class were sufficiently impressed#they said i could make money off of it lmao
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What the shit. Fighting a god in hand to hand combat as a gold dragon using immovable rods goes so fucking hard and it’s the backstory for a character that’s just in the main backstory???????? AMY???
You know how a lot of people, when making DND characters, make the mistake of having their level 1 PC have an elaborate backstory where they're super badass and already recognized as a hero?
When I made Ash I did the opposite. Her backstory is elaborate, yes, but in very mundane ways that inform her personality and how she perceives the world around her, and build up the logic of how she makes decisions.
I made everyone AROUND my PC a super powerful character who had done incredible things, and I gave Ash anxiety about it.
She feels, constantly, that she is inadequate by comparison. Her entire frame of reference is shaped by a bunch of women in her life that are outstandingly powerful, and she's just a quiet girl who makes leather goods and sells them for a living. She thinks of herself as the NPC in other people's more impressive lives.
Her mother, Lailah, is a nearly seven foot tall divine warrior created in Elysium to destroy Pit Fiends. She's an angel of lightning built like an MMA fighter, and she wields a weapon like piece of a lightning bolt (not stylized, I mean a real, glowing crackling arc of electricity that she holds like a staff and can be used like anything from a polearm to a spear to a whip, and when thrown it acts like a Lightning Bolt spell). She is built, both narratively and in game stats, to be an unkillable holy destroyer, capable of fighting MULTIPLE PIT FIENDS simultaneously, and winning. She's a CR 10+ magical creature (she's a homebrewed mix of Deva and Erinyes stat blocks with some unique flavor) with eighteen class levels, 16 in Zealot Barbarian and 2 in Fighter. She has a strength of 27 and a constitution of 25. She's designed to deal HUGE amounts of damage, tank unfathomable amounts in turn, NOT DROP WHEN SHE HITS ZERO HITPOINTS, and keep swinging until every devil in her way is a pile of dust, then use bonus action Second Wind to bring herself back above 0 so she doesn't incur the auto-death caveat on Zealot Barbarian's Rage Beyond Death ability. One of her attuned items is also the very simple uncommon item "Periapt of Wound Closure" which automatically stabilizes you at the start of your turn, thereby resetting the death saving throws she would theoretically have to make each time she gets hit below 0. Also, as an angel, she's innately immune to auto-death effects like Power Word Kill, which closes almost all loopholes that get around her build. She is UNSPEAKABLY badass. I ran a simulated round of combat with her once, and she could potentially one-shot a CR 15 Skittering Horror (228 HP) in a single turn. Her theoretical maximum damage output is like, 456 damage in a turn (granted this assumes all crits and rolling max damage).
So that's Ash's mom.
Aria is interesting. She was always strongly attuned to the forces of nature, and her magic grew quickly. Where Ash grew up with someone she knew would always be there to protect her from anything, Aria did NOT have that safety net, and spent her formative years learning to be more self-sufficient in terms of relying on her own power. So eventually she got sucked into an adventuring party consisting of herself (a tiefling Witch subclass with very strong druid flavor), a tiefling zealot barbarian, and a couple of elf twins who were an Arcana cleric and a Celestial Warlock. Sometime after they had made a name for themselves, they were tasked with stopping a suspected fledgling vampire who had been kidnapping girls and killing a bunch of people. When they arrived, they met Cass, who was very much NOT a new vampire. She was almost 150 years old and had been protecting women from abusers and overzealous debt collectors, and things had gotten a little messy with one or two of them, leading to a lot more attention than she normally got. They start off fighting Cass (Aria polymorphs herself into a dire wolf and lunges directly for the throat, which Cass found amusing and impressive) but realize in the banter that Cass wasn't the real problem, and she ends up being a sort of a lesson for the group in terms of whose word they trust and who they take jobs from (YES THE BACKSTORY'S BACKSTORY HAS NARRATIVE ARCS AND MORAL LESSONS THAT LEAD TO LONG TERM CHARACTER GROWTH OKAY I CAN'T HELP MYSELF). Cass, having a particular rapport with Aria, ends up joining their party as a dhampir Soulknife Rogue/Shadow Monk.
Yes, that's all backstory that I made up for an imaginary campaign that exists entirely as a set piece for Aria as one of Ash's story NPCs. This doesn't even touch on the fact that I liked Cass so much as a character that I gave HER an entire backstory of her own. I DON'T HAVE A PROBLEM.
Anyway the team only makes a bigger name for themselves for handling things that other groups can't. Eventually, they just happen to be in the Tenth District when the War of the Spark happens (major established event in the MTG canon), and I basically added some extra "scenes" to it that didn't violate existing canon so I could have that be the climax of their imaginary campaign. One of Aria's partners was a new planeswalker at the time and her spark got harvested by the Dreadhorde, specifically by the god eternal Bontu.
Gods in Magic The Gathering aren't honestly that special? They don't seem to have THAT much power, all things considered. Ravnica's gods are mostly powerful magical animals, and in the most recent Magic Story one of their gods (Anzrag the Quake Mole) was captured in an "evidence capsule" (basically Magic's version of a Pokeball). The most powerful god in MTG is probably the Ur Dragon honestly, unless you count the Eldrazi, but that's a whole other conversation since neither of those actually have the "God" creature type.
Anyway, Bontu was one of the gods of Amonket (basically a plane based on ancient Egypt), which had been conquered by an Elder Dragon planeswalker named Nichol Bolas. HE was the one who actually killed all but one of Amonket's gods, and then another planeswalker named Liliana Vess (extremely powerful necromancer) raised them as zombies for his army, because Bolas had a ton of complicated leverage over her (magical contract that he could invoke to kill her if she betrayed him). So Bontu was a god zombie.
Here's a reference:
Well, Aria was a level 18 Witch at this point since this was the climax of their campaign, so she had access to the Shapechange spell, a 9th level transmutation that lets you become any creature with a challenge rating equal or lower than your character level. And the best candidate for that was an Adult Gold Dragon (CR 17). So Aria goes full berserk and stands up on her dragon hind legs and picks a fight with a dead god that she's determined to make deader, and has a Godzilla vs King Ghidorah standoff with her.
So how do you fight a god that can suck your soul out and instantly kill you with a single touch? You don't let it touch you.
What Aria did was basically inspired by this gif of a Wildebeest trying to charge at a lion:
Or this:
And to be clear, yes, I'm saying Aria was the lion in that situation. She basically did a big dragon threat display to get Bontu's attention, and used the Gold Dragon's weakening breath to give Bontu disadvantage on Strength checks and saves. Bontu charged at her, and at the last second Aria dropped to the ground and then shot back up, clamped her teeth around the god's throat, and used her weight to throw Bontu around and knock her off balance, and her superior strength to grab her by the wrists and wrestled her to the ground so she couldn't get a grip on Aria. She had every part of the god that could have killed her pinned, and used the claws of her wings to pull Bontu's armor apart and tear at everything she could reach while thrashing her around. It was Fen, the Arcana cleric, who thought to use Immovable rods to pin Bontu down so that even if Aria lost her grip, Bontu wouldn't be able to immediately one-shot any of them. So Athena (barbarian) and Cass (rogue/monk) as the two martial classes were the ones who got close enough to handle that while Fen and her sister (Gwen) used whatever holy magic they could to help from a distance.
Now CASS had a problem, because she's a DEX based martial class, not a strength based one. She needed a boost to be able to get this job done. So she drank some of Bontu's blood from one of the wounds Aria had left on her arm to give herself a burst of strength. Except. She had to get real close to do that. And Bontu managed to get a loose grip on her, and tried to suck out her soul.
The magic that makes Cass what she is is very old and very powerful. It binds her soul to her body in a much stronger way than any living creature, fusing the two together to prevent her from dying (i.e. by having her soul separated from her body; Cass can recover from almost any conceivable physical injury as long as there's life energy, in the form of blood, for the magic that keeps her alive to feed on and maintain the seal between her body and her soul). BECAUSE SHE WAS FEEDING ON THE BLOOD OF A GOD AT THE TIME, the magic holding her together basically fought against the magic that was trying to rip her soul out, and it had enough fuel to hold on until Aria's thrashing forced Bontu to let go. So Cass survived the Elderspell thanks to a very weird and unrepeatable set of circumstances (which allows something narratively impressive and legendary to happen without being gamebreakingly overpowered and violating the established rules of the world).
Because of how her magic draws energy from other things, though, there was a side effect: she also accidentally took in one of the planeswalker sparks that Bontu had harvested. So when Cass had healed enough for her soul to no longer be dislocated, her spark activated and she became a Planeswalker. (I imagine a soul is connected to a body mostly through the nervous system, because that's how a brain holds consciousness in it, so a "dislocated" soul is like something glued to every nerve ending in your body being pulled on with an enormous amount of force, trying to sever that connection; imagine trying to pull yourself off the ground when every nerve ending in your body is superglued to the floor by something akin to the Strong Nuclear Force. It SUCKED.)
The team ended up being forced to retreat because of Cass' injuries, so Aria didn't actually manage to kill Bontu personally (or die trying, which in her grief-rage she was fully open to). Right about this time, my bottle scene ends and Magic canon comes back into play: Liliana betrays Bolas and turns the Dreadhorde against him, and Bontu ends up being the one who bites him and rips out HIS spark. Due to the enormous rush of energy of consuming all of Bolas' stolen Planeswalker sparks (tl;dr he was trying to become a god), and with the added bit of lore that it was Aria's team that heavily injured Bontu just prior to this, Bontu exploded in the process.
This resulted in Ravnica playing a game of telephone in the chaotic aftermath of the War. Aria fought a god. She's still alive and that god is dead. Rumors spread and now Aria is misremembered as the one who killed Bontu. Half the plane thinks of her as the "god killer." All she wanted was to avenge her lover or die trying.
Neither outcome happened, and now she's credited with the very thing she sees as her greatest failure. And that trauma has haunted her ever since.
#so my backstory has a backstory with its own backstory#this is a normal and healthy way to approach storytelling I think.#so anyway Ash is surrounded by badass women and doesn't recognize her own potential#because her entire frame of reference is the most outrageous statistical outliers#Ash#Aria#Lailah#Cass#eldritch OCs#Uneiverse#I have one character whose backstory goes back over 6000 years have I ever mentioned that#y'all don't even KNOW the shit that lives in my brain#also I invented god from scratch so TECHNICALLY I made backstory for the universe itself and it goes back billions of years#when I say that I don't mean I made up A GOD from scratch. I mean I reinvented the CONCEPT of what 'god' even means.#and built a universe around that concept#I also have some cool thoughts about the nature of time and fate that I haven't talked about yet#the inside of my brain is a very interesting place. try not to get lost. the exits are not clearly marked.#what if I gave my characters *T R A U M A*#anyway I'm glad you thought this sounded cool enough to ask about. I hope you feel the same about the rest of the story someday.
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September 16th, 1789: 234 years ago, Jean-Paul Marat published the first issue of L'Ami Du Peuple
L'Ami du Peuple, or, as it was called at the time it was founded, L'Ami Du Peuple ou Le Publiciste Parisien, was an active revolutionary newspaper and also one of the most absolutely fascinating and interesting pieces of the entire French Revolution, created and edited by Marat from September 1789.
The year 1789 was a relatively turbulent period for both Marat's career and the history of the Revolution. This can be seen simply by the number of projects that Marat began in a short space of time. In February, just two months after publishing his Offrande à la Patrie (1788), he published the Supplément à l'Offrande (1789). In March, he began to attend the sessions of the electoral assembly of his district, Carmes-Déchaussés, with great assiduity and was soon elected to the electoral committee. In August, he began publishing Le Moniteur Patriote and also published the Projet de déclaration des droits de l'homme et du citoyen suivi d'un Plan de constitution juste, sage et libre. Finally, in September, he published No. 1 of Le Publiciste Parisien, and consequently No. 5 of the then L'Ami Du Peuple ou Le Publiciste Parisien, which marked the birth of the famous Friend of the People, a character Marat would identify with until the last day of his life. It can be said that this newspaper came about when Marat found himself in a situation where he would have to produce and publish newspapers and pamphlets independently and without the approval of his colleagues. He proposed to the committee that it should have a press, which was apparently not accepted by the district.
More than just one of the many periodicals that existed during the course of the revolution, L'Ami du Peuple is a precious historical source of information and there is no doubt that it was important for the unfolding of revolutionary events. Not even Delisle de Sales, in his Essai sur le journalisme depuis 1735 jusqu'à l'an 1800 (1811), a work that expressed the author's deep aversion to the revolutionary process and especially to Marat, denies that L'Ami Du Peuple left a mark on the philosophical memory of the history of French journalism.
Albert Mathiez, in a summary of Gottschalk's Marat in the 1927 AHRF (pp. 599-602), makes an interesting comment on Marat's analysis in the context of revolutionary journalism:
"In my opinion, what makes Marat original among the journalists and statesmen of the Revolution has not been sufficiently appreciated by M. Gottschalk. (...) He was never naïve about the revolution that was taking place. From the first moment, he proclaimed that the proletarians - an expression he had already used in its current sense - would gain nothing. (...) No other revolutionary had the same degree of feeling that the proletariat was a class distinct from the bourgeoisie. (...) What always distinguished Marat, presented as an enlightened man, was the correctness of his vision, the total absence of candor, the profound and even pessimistic realism. Marat was not only one of the most determined and precocious republicans. He also did not conceive of the Republic except in the form of direct rule."
In addition to the abundant and impressive number of issues that were written (L'Ami du Peuple had almost 700 issues in total, not counting the pamphlets and later works), it is even more astonishing when we stop to consider that a large part of all the work produced by Marat during the five years of revolution was almost entirely uninterrupted, but mainly clandestine. He managed not to be prevented even by laws (such as the decree of March 9, 1793, which obliged members of the Convention who were newspaper editors to choose between legislation and journalism) from continuing to produce and publish his writings.
Today's date is important and significant for history - the history of journalism and the revolution, but especially and undoubtedly the history of Marat. L'Ami du Peuple was, above all, a character. He is a truly dedicated patriot, brave and fearless, who cares about his fellow citizens and the people. He is an important character for Marat because the two, at a certain point, become one. L'Ami du Peuple, who initially appears as the construction of a publicity strategy, quickly becomes a kind of romantic hero of the revolution, with whom Marat identifies and whom he also uses to continue ceaselessly defending what was right for him, what fit in with his very well-founded and observed political and social principles. The previous Marat, the Marat Man of the Enlightenment, physicist, doctor and experimenter, had a passion that managed to outshine all his other interests: politics, and of that there is no doubt. Marat found himself moved by this political passion a few times before the Revolution - Chains Of Slavery (1774), for example, which was written incessantly over just three months, with mainly political aims, is living proof of Marat's burning passion in this area - but none of the times he expressed his interest was as strong and as significant for him as the creation of L'Ami du Peuple, which signified Marat's definitive entry into the revolution. L'Ami du Peuple was important to Marat because it was through it that he was able to express and make his politics heard; because L'Ami du Peuple made Marat so passionately committed to a revolution that it gave him, definitively, a homeland: the France.
#l'ami du peuple day!!! 🦦#this is very personal to me sorry for the longmaratposting#marat#l'ami du peuple#jean paul marat#french revolution#my posts
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CTJL 2021: FINALE, PART I
SYDNEY, AUSTRALIA
2021! I have become aware that it is now 2023, yes, thank you. I promise I am sufficiently ashamed of myself. But not a lot happens in my game these days, which means big things need to be celebrated bigger than usual... which, if you’re me, means you end up confusing your ambitions with your capabilities and end up squashed and discouraged beneath the weight of all the visions you couldn’t achieve, with several painful WIPs relegated to your blackest, backest project folders to show for it.
Fun!
Story-related stuff below the cut, if you’re into that.
Despite missing the opening show in Rio de Janeiro, the little Lowmax team managed to end the 2021 season with two riders on the podium!
(Nobody was as shocked as I was)
Archie & Speakeasy were awarded champion of the 1.30m class and second place overall, while Agatha & Poquelin won the 1.50m class and were hot on their heels in third place overall. Considering they were pipped by Elizabeth Howell, the face of the tour and arguably, the current face of show jumping itself, being the first losers wasn’t too tough!
Archie (who was almost as tall as Liz while she stood atop the towering first place position, much to the amusement of the press) was ever the professional- and frankly, ever himself- graciously shaking Liz’ hand and offering sincere congratulations, as well as the promise of a celebratory drink at the gala later on. Anyone who can manage to perform so well so consistently is deserving of as much in his book, but the fact Elizabeth (because you know he’s calling her ‘Elizabeth’ and not ‘Liz’) is managing it while still so young is rather impressive.
As for Agatha...
There would be those who’d say she was jealous. But there are those who say a lot of things about Agatha.
(”She looks like a hair yanker.”)
(”Speaking to her is like a near-death experience.”)
(”She’d eat him alive.”)
(”I’d never want to meet her.”)
(”Officially terrifying.”)
(”Her favourite food is probably crisp charcoal.”)
(...)
In truth, yes: being beaten by someone younger than her wasn’t exactly thrilling, and being beaten by Archie again was adding insult to injury (even if it had privately been expected) But Agatha’s comparatively subdued demeanour had little to do with envy, and everything to do with her self-expectations.
Self-expectations, and a hollow sort of feeling where there should have been excitement.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Big thanks to @calveroterranorasj for collaborating with me, and for allowing me to participate in the CTJL in the first place! I genuinely had a blast travelling the globe with the team and rubbing shoulders with the different characters out in the world.
Fun bit of trivia for you: all those things ‘said’ about Agatha are all real things said at some point by my so-called friends. I’d be offended if I didn’t find them so amusing. The charcoal one in particular- courtesy of @kullabergs, who has a unique talent for insulting Agatha- has a permanent place in my head. Makes me smile every time. Ridiculous. I can’t even be mad about it.
Finally, I’m just going to say before anyone else asks: contrary to popular belief (the popular belief being that held by 3 out of the 4 people who’ve seen these photographs) Archie is not, in fact, proposing marriage to the 2021 CTJL Champion, Elizabeth Howell.
IT’S A GENTEEL HANDSHAKE, GUYS.
Honestly. 🙄
#The Sims 3#TS3#Simblr#Equus-Sims#CTJL#Competition#Show Jumping#Lowmax Stud#Agatha Foskett#Archie Vandover#Elizabeth Howell#One of my favourite things about these pictures is the fact Archie is almost as tall as Liz and she's standing on a GIANT podium#Also it might interest you to know that I did more editing on a bridle for half a horse's head than I think I did in the entire CTJL#Folly
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Get To Know Your Tav
Tagged by the lovely @starknstarwars -- thank you! <3 Throwing a tag out to whoever has also been infected with the BG3 brainrot and wants to gush about their babies. ;)
Leeeeet's talk about Deviali Nulys, aka Devi!
What is your tav’s favorite weapon?
Devi's first weapon is her words. She's a smooth talker, and rolls decently high (most of the time) on her persuasion checks! She can usually talk her way out of trouble. Second-favourite weapons are her knives. Her brother Jehn taught her how to fight with daggers when she was eight or so, and she learned to keep a backup pair of knives in her boots/in her inventory for if she ever lost her main weapons.
style of combat?
DIRTY. Devi has no aversions to biting (unless it's a goblin... eww.), kicking, elbowing, ambushing her foes, or throwing sand/mud/warg shit/whatever at her enemies. If it gives her an edge, she'll take it! Considering she's a Smol for a half-Elf, it's easy to push her around or physically overwhelm her -- best to take down her bigger enemies quickly and decisively. She's picked up using a bow over the course of her adventure, so she can shoot with pretty good aim (and loooooves her lightning arrows), but she would rather use her knives.
most prized possession?
Remember those backup daggers Devi keeps in her boots? Those were a gift on her tenth birthday from Jehn -- and after he ran away from home, they were all she had left of him. She would rather cut her ears off than give those up! Her lockpicks have gotten her into (and out of) more than a few tight spots too. She learned how to play the violin as a teenager, but her asshole of a father destroyed her violin that Jehn had stolen for her; she picks up a new violin in Act I, and it's a prized possession now.
deepest desire?
She wants answers for what happened to her mother, who disappeared when she was about five. She has her suspicions, but nothing she can confirm. (She also wants her father and some of his friends to die slowly and painfully.)
And after the events of the game, she wants to personally murder Shar, and to punch Mystra in the face, godhood status be damned.
guilty pleasure?
Trashy bodice-ripping romance stories. She and Shadowheart compare notes regularly. ;) Even if she struggles to read easily, thanks to her childhood lack of education, she puts in the effort for those!
best-kept secret?
Pre-game: She's a SA survivor, and she's got some trauma from that. But she keeps that secret under wraps -- she won't talk about it unless she absolutely has to. (Honestly, this girl needed therapy even before the game.)
Post-game: Look, she has no idea who drew a large mustache on every statue of Mystra in the Lower City, but she wishes she could kiss that person on the mouth, honest, Mister Interrogating Cleric! (It was totally her, with Astarion's help. Gale pretends he doesn't know anything about it. Mystra is not amused.)
greatest strength?
Her loyalty. She trusts very few people, but those whom she trusts and loves, she is very much the ride-or-die friend. (See also: why she wants to kill Shar and punch Mystra.)
fatal flaw?
Her temper and her insecurities. She is a wee bit fiery and will throw hands when provoked. And she's so afraid of being abandoned again that she tries to give off the impression that she's self-sufficient and doesn't need anyone's help -- she won't accept help until she either trusts someone (which, again, doesn't come easily for her) or she's desperate.
favourite smell?
Pre-game: flowers in the public parks in the Lower City, the scent of tea steeping.
Post-game: Gale, the books in his library, and the flowers he frequently brings home for her since he knows she loves them.
favourite spell or cantrip?
She doesn't have access to any spells of her own (unless I up the difficulty level of my game enough to multi-class her as a bard)! But she highly appreciates a good usage of Vicious Mockery.
pet peeve?
Cracking knuckles. She haaaaaaates that sound.
bad habit?
She does not put things away correctly. She has a bad habit of leaving whatever she's reading/playing with/working on out in the open and forgetting about it until it's in the way. It drives Gale bonkers.
She also swears like a pirate... and can drink like one, too.
hidden talent?
She's an excellent violin player, and can sing surprisingly well! The rest of the Tadfools figured out she can sing quite by accident after a drink-off at the tiefling party in their camp during Act I. She doesn't sing often, since she's very self-conscious about her voice, but her friends try to get her to sing something for them regularly.
She also claims she hasn't yet met the lock that she can't pick. ;)
leisure activity?
Playing new tunes on her violin. She can't read music very well, but she can remember a tune like nobody's business -- if she hears a song once or twice, she'll probably remember it.
favourite drink?
She used to just get the cheap wine at the taverns that she frequented, but Gale's gotten her used to the finer tastes in life, so she's grown to appreciate the good wine in his cellar. She also likes tea in the mornings!
comfort food?
Her favourite food is pumpkin soup, from one itty-bitty tavern in the Lower City. Gale has learned to replicate it perfectly, much to her delight.
favourite person(s)?
Gale, for obvious reasons.
Her older half-brother, Jehn (and by extension, his partner, Ferrus).
Shadowheart, Wyll, Astarion, and Karlach become her best non-romantic friends over the course of their adventure.
Do Scratch and the owlbear cub (who she and Halsin name Garmus) count?
favoured display of affection (platonic and/or romantic)?
She's very touchy with the people she loves. With her platonic friends or her brother, she'll lean on them, or nudge them, or sometimes kiss their cheeks if she's feeling very touchy. With Gale, she'll almost always be in contact with him in some way, whether that's leaning against him, or playing with his hair, or kissing him -- his lips, his cheek, his neck, whatever.
fondest childhood memory?
She barely remembers her Elf mother, but she can remember one day when she was curled up on her mother's lap, Jehn sitting on the floor beside them, and listening to her mother sing a song in her native tongue. She doesn't clearly remember the lyrics anymore, but she can just remember the tune, and she remembers how comfortable and safe she felt in her mama's arms with her big brother right there.
free-response! Is there anything else about your Tav you’d like to share?
I think Devi is trying to learn magic post-game in Waterdeep! She won't enrol in the Academy, but she does try to get Gale to teach her some basic spells.
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yayyyyy @sonic-fizz tagged me to answer these 15 questions this is so old web core slayyyyyyyyyyyyyy love it thx <3
1. are you named after anyone
eh i was named after a grandparent in a slapdash way. like they just chopped off half the name and called it a day...
2. when was the last time you cried?
literally probably like 24-48 hours ago in the car thinking about how doomed i am (this is not true.). or maybe it was reading a sad article...i don't know. I tear up a lot but full on sobbing bawling was in mid-Dec and a more sustained sniffle crying was when i was hungover and miserable about my tortured loneliness and doom for the future on new year's day lol
3. do you have kids?
omg...no...the microplastics in my womb and doom in my genome and also i'm broke and single and american
4. what sports do you play/have played?
i swim but it's like in the way that other ppl take walks around the neighborhood a few times a week. sports were so fucking abysmal for me growing up that i feel i am unlikely to ever return
5. do you use sarcasm?
occasionally...i've grown out of it for the most part though. there are better ways to be funny in a lot of situations...i am silly goofy mostly, or use observational humor and wacky metaphors etc
6. what is the first thing you notice about people?
i'd love to be like 'a warm smile :-)' but if i'm being totally honest i'm scanning their clothing/hairstyle/grooming etc to scan for anyone likely to judge me based on my failure to conform to gender and modern consumerism...which isn't fair to others, i know......but sometimes you just see someone in like salon highlights barrel curls full makeup suburban drip and you're like hmmm eeeeeek scary! I think this is a vestigial defense mechanism from my relentless failure to dress right and be liked growing up. need 2 keep an eye out for the freaks and geeks and allies you know (but i'm so lucky to be in circles where everyone is dressing androgynously, having full on body hair everywhere, no makeup is the norm rather than the exception, funky used clothes and practical work/outdoors gear is the norm, etc. ok i'm getting off track...). i also notice people's height relative to my own bc i'm a bit insecure about towering over some people even though i'm not that tall.... :-( this stuff says way more about me than about anyone else... :-( i will say though that i'm pretty good about ignoring these first readings and giving people a chance once i get to know them. this is just the knee jerk first impression stuff
7. what’s your eye colour?
pale blue/grey. sorry :-/
8. scary movies or happy endings?
i like SAD ENDINGS of LOVERS' DEATHS and UNREQUITED PASSIONS and FAILED DREAMS and SCARRED MEMORIES....
9. any talents?
nothing like above and beyond. but there's a number of things i'm pretty sufficient at without trying too hard which is nice i guess. gardening, cooking from scratch w/o recipes, stringing together a sentence or a laugh...
10. where were you born?
my beautiful steel city...kisses 2 her majesty.......
11. what are your hobbies?
swimming gardening fermenting cooking writing reading going to indie films with friends of discerning tastes attending potlucks oh and LAYING FACE DOWN IN MY BED.....
12. do you have any pets?
i wish :-( renter problems......
13. how tall are you?
5’11" or so i have not been to the doctor in so many years LOL....
14. favourite subject in school?
hated school but hated the humanities the least...i loved my filmmaking class in college the most probably
15. dream job?
MOVIE DIRECTOR...FAMOUS AUTEUR NOVELIST...HOMEMAKER...
I tag @fieryphrazes, @iwrotemrtambourineman, @chriselliottfanblog, and @chekovsphaser from my notes recently...and literally anyone who wants to and is bored you can say i tagged you. in fact i would love to read it i think tag games are so fun and i love to read them ok yay byeeee
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OCs as planets
I’ve seen this uquiz go around and obviously had to do it for my OCs. Because I won’t miss a chance to talk about astronomy, I also added the first thing that each planet made me think about.
Putting it under a cut and not tagging anyone, because I doubt astronomy ramblings are what anyone is following me for and I don't want people to feel obligated to read this, but if you want do the quiz, please feel free to tag me <3
Yael
venus
passionate. romantic. loving to be loved. courtship. adoration and taste. you are your own personal aesthetic. you are hand written love letters in copper ink. you are "let me show you just how much i can love you." you are royalty and class. love has no bounds with you. your heart is wrapped in chocolate tin foil. you attract what you manifest so keep believing in love. it is you and you, it.
I swear this didn’t come to mind just because I started watching the Bridgerton prequel series last weekend, haha, but the Venus transit, the phenomenon of Venus passing between the Earth and the Sun, has been key in determining the distance between Earth and the Sun. Before the 18th century, Kepler’s laws had given an idea of the relative scales within the solar system, but actual distances were very hard to measure. However, astronomers realised they would be able to derive the Earth-Sun distance (the “astronomical unit”, au) if they had measurements of the duration of the transit from different places across the globe. I won’t go into the maths, but the idea is that Venus crosses a different part of the Sun if seen from different locations. With some trigonometry (simplified example here, since it has images that explain this better than words can), distances can be calculated.
In order to get these measurements, entire expeditions were coordinated in the 17th and 18th century! They eventually ended up with a value that was only about 3% off from the value we know it to be today, which is pretty impressive.
Gabi
saturn
patient. stable. reliable. preserving and diligent. your capacity to hold focus on something you choose to is unmatched by all other planets. you were made for hard work that you love and that you know is rewarding. you are the shoulder that everyone wants to cry on, so remember you can lean on yourself when it seems there is no one else. there is nothing wrong with being self sufficient. you are justice and evenly balanced scales.
While I love this answer for Gabi, nothing really came to mind at first, other than the obvious rings. But then I started thinking about planetary migration, which is very cool. There’s this theory called the Grand tack hypothesis that says Jupiter formed a lot closer to the Sun than where it is now. It then started moving even closer to the Sun, until it got caught into a gravitational resonance with Saturn, and both migrated farther out, eventually ending up in their current positions.
Laura
uranus
innovative. unpredictable. resourceful. imaginative. creativity in science and disruption. oh, uranus. you were dealt the cards that don't have much to offer, but luckily you can always make them work. you are acrylic paint that has been plastered over the same canvas so many times that it is starting to have those little grooves of texture. you are ever-changing and suddenly it stops. and starts again. keep moving. nothing is wrong with not wanting to sit still.
This is a fun one! While the rotational axes of the other planets in our solar system are more or less perpendicular to their orbital plane, for Uranus, it’s tilted some 90 degrees. Basically, Uranus is lying on its side and is “rolling” along its orbit around the Sun. This means it are its poles that are pointed at the Sun—one at a time, of course — and not just its equator. Several theories exist to explain this odd orientation of the rotational axis, for example collisions with other objects.
Melike
neptune
mercy. kindness. sweet. forgiving and compassionate. you are second chances and sometimes third. you are "its ok because everyone makes mistakes." you are "i forgive you as long as you are learning." you are not held down by the demands of your ego. you believe and right and fair. open mindedness and friendship. you are mystical and magical, observant and the smell of warm bread in the morning.
Neptune is interesting, because it wasn’t discovered as a planet by observations like the other major planets, but through a comparison between models and real-life measurements of the orbit of Uranus. A discrepancy between the two was found, which was postulated to be cause by the gravitational influence of another planet: Neptune. Indeed, some years later, Neptune was “discovered”. I say “discovered”, because the planet had already been observed several centuries before by Galileo Galilei, but he thought it was a star. The thing I like about this is how it shows how theories and observations can complement each other!
#oc: yael greene#oc: gabi sousa#oc: laura kingston#oc: melike akyün#not entirely sure how much i like this answer for melike#the part about learning through experiences is very true though#yael's made me laugh#what else was i expecting?#in case anyone is wondering why my part about venus is that long#it's because i wrote an essay on the history of the astronomical unit back in uni#astronomy
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Les Mis 1.2.2
Following up from Pilf’s post, because clothing is the topic I have stuff to say about. [Also the rest of the action feels very natural follow ups from the previous 15 chapters: the people and house we met in 1.1.1-14 are about to encounter the guy having an awful day in 1.2.1, and this is Hugo’s set up for that.]
Caveat: my main research area is the mid-19th century (right around the time Hugo was finishing Les Mis, not the years it is set), and my working language is English. The US in 1860 is not France in 1815-1832, but I think some elements here do transfer over, or at least offer insight into how Hugo’s readers might have interpreted the text.
Main observations re: Baptistine Myriel’s clothing:
9 years is a very long time for a dress in active use. Washing and non-washing dresses will have different trajectories, but in contemporary non-fiction, making a silk dress last 7 years is a feat of clever planning and care. Five years is noteworthy. One to two years is more typical, and 3 months isn’t necessarily a frivolous waste (wearing a silk dress only once would be). Much like with the soup thing, the Myriel household is taking ‘practicing good economy’ to an extreme, almost absurd degree.
Also, the fact that Mlle Baptistine is still wearing her silk dress “in the style of 1806″ in 1815 is notably weird. Fiction and non-fiction sources of the 1850s/60s show economically-minded women remodeling their silks every season in order to keep up to date. Magazine articles give instructions for turning last year’s flounced skirts into gored ones, or adding puffed overskirts to update narrow gored skirts. Advice books recommend getting an extra yard or two of fabric so that you can update the sleeves of your dress when it’s taken apart for washing. Trousseaus should have some of the dresses left “unmade” (as lengths of fabrics) in case fashions change over the year. A missionary woman writing from not-yet-Seattle in the mid-1850s opines that the dresses she made for her wedding less than a year earlier are too “rusty” to be worn at home (in New York) but are sufficient for living in the woods.
So my impression of Baptistine is that she’s meant to be The Superlatively Economical gentlewoman, and also Not At All Vain About Clothes. She’s not spending her time or money on fashion, but the fact that she is still bothering to wear a silk gown for dinner is signalling that she’s still performing (her class’s) respectability. From this, and her letter about re-doing her room, I expect that her whole wardrobe and all the house’s domestic interiors are scrupulously clean and mended, but also old and likely inharmonious. The two women will do the work to live respectably, but will not spend any unnecessary money on their own comfort or aesthetics.
Hugo taking the trouble to describe Baptistine’s dress (”short waist, a narrow, sheath-like skirt, puffed sleeves, with flaps and buttons”) just reminds me of how much crinoline-era Victorians do not like the Neoclassical look. All of these specific elements are basically the opposite of early 1860s fashion--waists are worn just at/above the natural waist, skirts are about as wide as they can get, more fitted coat sleeves are replacing the wide-open sleeves of the late 1850s. It’s a bit different from how most modern folks seem to view the 1810s style (Austen! Romance! Bridgerton?): I’ll need to dig through my notes, but there’s at least one 1850/60s cartoon and one article I recall which amount to ‘yikes, the fashions of 50 years ago were awful’, and another article from the late 1860s which holds that the crinoline is a great improvement on the raised-waistline silhouette. I think we all prefer to ignore the weirdness of the c.1865-9 Second Empire style, but there were absolutely pairing high waistlines with fitted sleeves and trained skirts over elliptical or half-hoops (transitioning from the rounder cages of the late 1850s and early 1860s into the bustles of the early 1870s).
#Les Miserables#1.2.2#les mis letters#overthinking it#I have a long-running research project on just how long people expected clothing to last in the period 1855-1865#it's pretty fragmentary still#but the 1870s-1890s sources will give you exact timetables of what you should buy and when to maintain a ladylike wardrobe on a budget#most run a 3-year cycle in which you buy the highest quality fabric you can#remake your old best garments to be your next year's second-best#and rotate items seasonally#even so you're looking at a quality winter coat is used three years as the longest-lived garment#bonnets get retrimmed for each season and put away when the weather turns#dresses do one or two seasons before you put them away then get refreshed when they're agian in season and discarded or remade after that
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Not me starting to unironically care about like the concept of Fleshed Out Cardin
Like in my mind he's kind of like a Jaune foil
The Winchesters are another pretty successful Hunter family, Cardin is a middle child of a big family and has five siblings.
I do imagine they're lowkey kind of washed up in terms of actual Hunter accolades, with more recent generations being like, decent but sort of just coasting off of past ancestor rep, and Cardin's family is upper-middle-class more because there's still some old money left.
But they actually believed in Cardin and supported him, with their flaws being that they were both too indulgent and unable to be sufficiently attentive, resulting in an arrogant, entitled guy who has an excessive need for attention and control.
Honestly I don't even imagine his parents as being overtly terrible or malicious in any obvious way, at worst they're like subconsciously racist centrists who can't spend time with their kids a ton, so the guilt causes them to overcompensate, and they also tended to show favoritism towards Cardin that wasn't really on purpose either.
Cardin then just picked up most of his more overt racism from just exposure to bad crowds and bad media, and what limited corrections and interventions occured were always too little, too late.
It was just that he was the most promising as the next potential Big Name Hunter of the family, giving him a further inflated ego and actually starting to diminish his work ethic when he realized he could just brute force and manipulate his way through anything challenging.
In the semi-headcanon/semi-AU I'm envisioning here, I imagine Beacon then put up enough of a genuine challenge that all of this caught up to him, he started to struggle, and doubled down on his biggest flaws as a way of trying to reassert a feeling of power and competence.
I then imagine that of he remained relevant you could do something with like
Him being humbled and somewhat humiliated after the Jaune stuff, then seeing Velvet fight and begrudgingly being impressed, then he goes for the standard "I guess you're pretty good... For a Faunus..." type thing and just. Genuinely doesn't understand why Velvet takes this so awkwardly and uncomfortably.
And nobody is really in a position to willingly and eloquently explain it without just making him get irritated and defensive because it's too hard to admit he's in the wrong, so this just kind of awkwardly lingers with him feeling kind of "unfairly targeted" for a while (oh the irony)
And then the Vytal Festival happens and he and his team just barely win against some other team lead by someone with a family of moderate Hunter-world importance, who trash talked him about how washed up the Winchesters are for a bit, then begrudgingly admits "I guess you're pretty good... For a Winchester,"
And when Cardin feels how this backhanded shit actually just makes him dislike them even more, once he's done being pissed, that's when he has the "Oohhhh..." moment and truly realizes why his "compliment" towards Velvet was so shitty.
Yes, still kind of a self-centered path to finally Getting It, but feels a hell of a lot more natural than someone patiently going out of their way to explain this stuff to him like it's a Saturday morning cartoon, because he sure as hell isn't going to seek out and listen to a professor.
Cue a string of Thee World's Most Awkward Attempts to arrange both the time and courage to apologize to Velvet (let's just ignore the fall of beacon here since it doesn't tonally jive with what I'm going for)
Which like
I don't actually envision this AU as Holybun, but I *do* think it would be hilarious if this starts to make people THINK Cardin now has a weird and possibly fetishistic thing for Velvet.
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OCs as Planets
Thanks @wayhavenots for the tag! I took this quiz for my detectives. I crossed out anything I didn't feel really fit.
Tagging (no pressure!): @megatraven ; @sealriously-sealrious ; if anyone else wants to do it please go ahead!!
Lauren Jenkins -Saturn - patient. stable. reliable. preserving and diligent. your capacity to hold focus on something you choose to is unmatched by all other planets. you were made for hard work that you love and that you know is rewarding. you are the shoulder that everyone wants to cry on, so remember you can lean on yourself when it seems there is no one else. there is nothing wrong with being self sufficient. you are justice and evenly balanced scales.
This was a solid effort to describe Lauren Jenkins in positive terms. Lauren is pretty stubborn when she wants to be. The things she finds rewarding are not usually things society looks upon favorably, but she will work hard for them.
Her self-sufficiency and avoidance of relationships is based on the fact that there weren't people (*cough* Rebecca *cough*) around when she needed them. Don't hire her as your mediator, please don't cry on her shoulder, but if an asshole needs punched she will equalize the playing field.
Pax Izaz - Earth - nurturing, generous and caring. introverted, tolerant, honest and trustworthy. you are "my phone is always on, call me any time." you are "i feel like i'm everyone's therapist." you are impressive with your stability and peacefulness. you are wallpapers of cows and fields of ever-growing seeds. you are the best friend. mother nature. ice cold water and the smell of rain.
Most of this works just...not in the traditional way one thinks of these descriptions. She's nurturing in a clinical sort of way. Can keep very finicky plants alive nurturing, not warm and loves children nurturing. Her phone is always on and she will answer, but its usually because she's hoping for (mis)adventures.
She's not particularly attached to most objects, and the things she is aren't usually coveted by others. That makes it easy to be superficially generous, but she's not virtuously generous. Similarly, she's not super attached to social power nor does she need much social interaction. So yeah, she seems very honest and trustworthy... because she doesn't care about maintaining any of the dishonesty that is so frequently encouraged by social rules and hierarchy.
Neveah Desanto - Neptune - mercy. kindness. sweet. forgiving and compassionate. you are second chances and sometimes third. you are "its ok because everyone makes mistakes." you are "i forgive you as long as you are learning." you are not held down by the demands of your ego. you believe in right and fair. open mindedness and friendship. you are mystical and magical, observant and the smell of warm bread in the morning.
I have no notes. She is problematically forgiving and idealistic and it's her greatest strength and greatest weakness.
Ainsley Rice - Jupiter - optimistic. hopeful. generous and compassionate. you are the guardian angel. you are 4:44 am and a sense of being watched over. you enrich the lives of others just by existing and caring for them. you give as many blessings as you receive and there is always more to go around. careful not to become too over-confident in these abilities. what makes you jupiter is your belief that ego has no part in caring and love. you are softness and the smell of almond coffee.
Yeah, this fits very well.
Louise Langford - Venus - passionate. romantic. loving to be loved. courtship. adoration and taste. you are your own personal aesthetic. you are hand written love letters in copper ink. you are "let me show you just how much i can love you." you are royalty and class. love has no bounds with you. your heart is wrapped in chocolate tin foil. you attract what you manifest so keep believing in love. it is you and you, it.
I wasn't sure about this at first, but I think it's actually pretty solid. Louise is very much into grand gestures, romanticism, and appearances. This is part of why Nat's affection hit her so hard.
Bernadette Kane - Mercury - clever. intelligent and witty. wisdom, sharpness, anxiety and indecisiveness. you are the comedian. the "make someone laugh if they are crying" kind of lover. you dont want to think too much about anything because that stops you from just having fun, but your brain doesn't ever shut off. you are curious and never ending. forecast and shadows. the smell of clean sheets.
No notes.
#tag game#louise langford#neveah desanto#ainsley rice#bernadette kane#pax izaz#the wayhaven chronicles#these are all the ones who have at least some sort of content for them and aren't done by random number generator
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Two Styles of Ethical Argument
Or: the ethics post which I wish I'd read some time before or during the various ethics-related philosophy classes I took at school, but which I instead had to figure out for myself over the course of the past year.
There are two major styles of argument people tend to make, when arguing that people should follow or not follow particular ethical systems.
The first style—let's call it argument from instability—goes: there exist certain ethical systems which are unstable. Which, perhaps non-obviously, imply that one should adopt a different system. So, if one currently follows one of these systems, then one should, to fulfill one's own values better, abandon one's current system and/or adopt this other system.
A made-up example of an (unconvincing-to-me) argument from instability would be: "Preference utilitarianism implies that one should become a hedonic utilitarian, because everyone prefers that they be maximally happy and has no other preferences. Remembering that people prefer nothing but being maximally happy has mental overhead, though; thus, a person will fulfill people's preferences better if they lose the indirection-layer and just maximize their happiness directly."
The second style—let's call it argument from introspection—goes: there exist certain people who are wrong about which ethical system best represents their values. Who, perhaps non-obviously, value some outcome* A over some other outcome B even though the ethical system they believe themselves to be following ranks B as better than A. If one is currently one of these people, then one should, to understand one's own values better, abandon one's current system and/or adopt this other system.
A made-up example of an (unconvincing-to-me) argument from introspection would be: "Hedonic utilitarianism involves wanting the world to be full of happiness and not caring about other things except in terms of their effects on happiness. But consider the case of this Buddhist monk, who prefers to not be happy because happiness is a source of attachment to the world. Do you really think it's morally correct to force him to experience happiness against his will? If not, consider the possibility that you might actually be a preference utilitarian who just happens to be under the mistaken impression that most people have no preferences other than wanting to be maximally happy."
Both of these styles of argument will be potentially convincing to some people. But the styles are not the same, and sometimes a given person will be susceptible only to one or only to the other. (Arguments from instability are ineffective against people whose ethics don't imply they should change their ethics; arguments from introspection are ineffective against people whose ethical systems represent their values fully accurately.)
It can be easy, if one is sufficiently resistant to one of these styles of argument, to assume that only the style to which one is not resistant is valid ethical argumentation, while the style one is resistant to is some other confused thing. (During my ethics classes, I often found myself reading papers which were in retrospect making arguments from introspection but which, at the time, just made me go "why is this person making arguments about aesthetics and then publishing them as ethics papers?", because the "look, doesn't this implication of hedonic total utilitarianism just seem really unappealing, despite its effectiveness utility-maximization-wise? Wouldn't you rather just not?" genre of argument was very much not one to which I was susceptible.) But this assumption is incorrect. Both styles of argument can be made validly (and soundly); that their audiences are sometimes non-overlapping doesn't change that fact.
* Taking 'outcome' broadly, to include deontological actions, virtue-ethical states-of-personal-character, consequentialist states-of-the-overall-world, et cetera.
#Archive#Ethics#Philosophy#Categorization#Introspection#Self-Improvement#this post brought to you by a series of introspective realizations over the course of this year#which pointed me in the general direction of “my ethics were both underspecified and not-accurate-to-my-values even where fully specified”#and by my resulting meta-realization that the papers i'd previously dismissed were in fact trying to make arguments in similar directions#rather than just being weirdly mislabeled papers about aesthetics#(to be clear i still don't find any of those particular papers convincing in retrospect)#(nor am i even necessarily convinced that arguments from introspection are worth publishing most of the time)#(at least absent a specific reason to think people are actually falling into whatever introspection-failures the arguments are premised on)#(but i no longer think they're *invalid* as ethical arguments)
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“Hey, babe, why are you all buttoned up?” said a young-looking guy on her right. “Let us see your tits!” He and his friend laughed.
“Very well,” she calmly responded, and started undoing the buttons of her shirt. It wasn’t airline policy to strip when asked, but it was something she personally enjoyed.
“Oh wow, she did it!” said one of the guys, as her boobs spilled out.
“Oh wow, what a rack!” said the other.
“Don’t stare at them!” she said, with a look of fake annoyance. “Touch them…” she added with a sly smile.
The guy closer to her grabbed her and pulled her on his and his buddy’s laps.
They started groping her everywhere. Her tits, her big ass, her pussy. Their hands were all over her, and hers were all over them, but more often than not on their crotches, which were already bulging.
She was absolutely loving this, as always, and she was becoming more and more excited. Wetter too, especially when she felt a finger slipping inside her. She figured that passing out drinks would have to wait, she was getting finger banged at the very least.
“This is a wild one,” said one of the guys. “I thought this kind of attendant was reserved only for first class or something.”
“I actually requested to be here,” Julie purred. “I always have a lot more fun this way.”
“A genuine slut,” said the other guy. “What good luck!”
She really was a cock-hungry, wanton, insatiable slut. That’s what the guidance counselor back in college used to call her, especially when she was on her back on his desk, getting plowed by his cock. After hundreds and hundreds of fuckings by faculty and students, she had to agree, and the counselor told her that she should be in a profession that dealt with people. Lots and lots of people.
Two fingers were pumping in her pussy. She didn’t know who they belonged to, and she didn’t much care. What she cared about was the fact that she was about to come.
“Faster… yeah… like that… faster… oh God… give it to me… I’m cominggggg!” She exploded with pleasure and kept trembling for a good half minute.
“Cocks out, now!” she said. She wasn’t asking, she was ordering them. Not that they would hesitate either way and a few seconds later both poles were completely exposed.
“Oh yummy, those are the best dicks I have seen in weeks!” she lied. There was nothing wrong with them, and in any case, they looked sufficiently big to pleasure her, but you have to understand that Julie saw scores of cocks daily. It was very hard for her to be genuinely impressed.
Nevertheless, she grabbed one and lunged on the other, sealing her lips around it.
“Man, she’s like a vacuum!” said its owner.
“And she’s giving me the best handjob of my life!” said the other one. That, she thought to herself without a bit of modesty, was probably true. She was really good with her hands.
She was sucking one and jerking the other alternatively. Pretty soon, they were both hard enough, ready to do what she wanted them to do.
“Time to fuck me, boys,” she said.
“Okay, now we’re talking,” said one of the guys. “Who goes first?”
“First?” she giggled. “No one goes first, honey, you’re both going together.” She got up and bent over, spreading her butt cheeks for them. “I have two holes down there, see?”
After a bit of reshuffling, she was riding the one with the thicker cock, while the other was prodding her butthole.
“Don’t be afraid, you just have to jam it in there hard, and it will make way.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yeah. It’s not my first rodeo, you know. Just do as I say.”
And he did, which delighted Julie to no end. Feeling her anal cavity spreading itself under the girth of his cock, being so completely and utterly filled with man meat, she couldn’t help but let out a long ‘yes’ while he worked himself as deep as he could until he was all inside.
“Best flight ever!” said the one in her pussy.
“Best stewardess ever!” chimed in the other.
“Flight attendant!” she corrected him.
“I’m sorry. Well, best asshole ever, at any rate.”
“That I’ll take. Now, you better fuck me good, both of you. I want to be walking funny for the rest of the flight, you hear?”
“Yes, ma’am!”
And they did. Fast, slow, then fast again, they were grinding their erect cocks inside her, hitting her in all the right places. She was feeling her second orgasm approaching, and the plane had hardly taken off!
Her body was positioned in such a way that she was able to see the corridor between the seats. And it was from that corridor that another guy approached her.
“Excuse me,” he said. “May you help me?”
“Yes, sir,” she said with mild annoyance in her voice. “But you need to go back to your seat. I’ll be right with you.”
“Not even a blowjob? Just a little one.”
Julie sighed. “Okay,” she said. It was against regulations, letting him stand on the corridor like that, but she couldn’t resist the temptation of being fucked by three dicks at the same time.
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There is a lot to talk about re: tonight's chant class.
First of all, my scope was entirely too ambitious. I will be lucky to teach one tone sufficiently in the time that I have. I would rather do that than do info-spatter and leave the folks who come with a general, but impractical knowledge. It will be tedious work, but I think it's worth it.
My first impression — besides a pure panic spike that only four people besides me were present, and half of them virtually — was how failed American people are by their education in general, and how failed Christian Americans are by their education regarding their spiritual tradition in particular.
The knowledge of history is of pitiful, because the church doesn't teach history on Sunday; the church embodies myth and ritual. Their catechism (which I don't care about) is somewhat in place, but it's all just memorized information and no comprehension, and definitely no synthesis. The singing, however, was surprisingly graceful. The four of us made a decent ensemble, and they had enough intuition to take immediately to phrasing, even if it was sometimes parroting. At the very least, they parroted well. (Parrots are birds after all, and singers are notoriously avian, at least in this way of mimetic reproduction.)
It was hard work, but it was good work.
Next, I cannot help but note that my prayer calls me to more silence and my work calls me to more voice. But I cannot yet give myself into so silence's embrace, because I have not said what is in me to say. Once I have said what I mean, I am always happy to retreat into silence, sometimes for a long time. This call into silence is an invitation first to Voice the Big Thing and then rest.
Anyway, I receive the metaphor, but I don't know the best way to interpret it. I don't mind helping with chanting, but even things I enjoy doing musically — like rattling myself completely loose in the most expansive "Wälse" I can manage — I ought not make my profession for the sake of my mental and eventually even physical health. But I am called to something to do with voice, which, I understand, is entirely figeral, but I always lean one direction or the other, and I often end up not liking my own interpretation.
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Life lesson from my past, because I reblogged a post about people looking down on you for being your genuine self.
When I was young, I was probably "the weird kid." I was loud and obnoxious, trying to be funny and make everyone like me.
When I joined a karate class, I toned it down to be a good student and role model. But when I tried to be friendly with my peers, not many kids liked me, because of that "class-clown-itis" coming out lol. I always tried to be funny and loud, because I wanted to be noticed and liked. It didn't work. Until it worked on ONE girl, who became my best friend.
Fast forward, age 18, she, my one and ONLY true friend throughout my childhood, stopped attending karate and moved out of my neighborhood. So we stopped hanging out like we used to. I was lonely.
Back to trying to impress people. Instead of class clown, I graduated to "smarty pants." Carried myself as if I was a big shot, and had the answers to everything. I was teaching karate now, and so I had much more confidence. The confidence act worked, and I started dating a new guy at karate.
Kept up the act until I felt I was safe to start being genuine with him, and once I let my walls down, he didn't like the real me. He broke up with me after 3 months.
I can't be upset with him. Because he came in thinking I was confident and self sufficient. I wasn't. I was afraid. I was a people pleaser. I felt uncomfortable with some things he had no problems with. The personality that attracted him, my "agreeable and easygoing" personality, was a lie.
After he broke up with me, I decided "that's enough: I'm done caring if people think I'm "cool or fun." I'm done trying to trick people into liking me. I'm gonna be myself from the get-go. If I'm tired, I will act tired. If I'm bored, I will look bored. If I have an opinion, I will not lie and say I agree with yours instead. If I have convictions, I will act on them without permission from anyone."
"I will be loud when I am excited, even if people think that's annoying. I will be quiet when I am upset, even if people think that's rude. I will feel what I feel without fear, and people who like me will like me for my true self: I won't be able to question it, because I would never be acting as anyone BUT my true self."
Once I made that decision, I just so happened to reconnect with an old online friend. We decided to video chat for the very first time. For a split second, I was a bundle of nerves. "How do I act on a video call? What if there is a lull in conversation? What if he starts talking about something I know nothing about? I'll have to lie and say I understand, to seem relatable. What if he thinks I'm weird?"
Oh wait. He is supposed to be my friend. So no matter how I carry myself, he will enjoy my company. And if he does not, then we are not compatible friends. And so, I was not afraid. And it was the easiest video call ever. Because I was being held to 0 expectations.
Being my true self allowed this friend to grow into my BEST friend. And once we were best friends, he really saw me for who I really am. And would you believe it, it was enough to make him fall in love with me.
December 2023 will mark 8 years of dating, and March was 12 years of friendship. Not to mention the other genuine online friends I've made since age 18: Girls I love with all my heart, and who love me and accept me, even when I'm weird or loud or quiet or boisterous AND in a far away state lol.
I just wanted to rant about my little life story because TRUE confidence is something I feel so strongly about. Once you let go of your prideful attitude that demands acceptance from everyone you cross paths with, you are free to make genuine connections. You no longer have fear, because what HAVE I to fear? Rejection? That's a blessing. Please, reject me now, to save me the trouble once I also discover we are not compatible.
I wish true confidence to everyone! Be humble: know that you are not perfect for everyone. So don't carry yourself in a way that is trying to be perfect for everyone.
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Ok ok I know I said I wouldn’t elaborate unless explicitly asked to but idc I lied 😋 !!!
Birthday Surprise
Zeke Jaeger x Reader, afab reader, she/her pronouns
There’s not much plot but I had to get this out of my dumb silly little system, so here you go <3 I hope you guys enjoy!
Contents:
WC: 3,518
Smut, Food Play, Zeke being a fool (whom I love dearly), oral (m + mention of f), Unprotected Vaginal, Creampie, B00ty Eating, Zeke is kinda rough, Name Calling, Choking, Some Spanking, Everything in this fic is 100% consentual no dub/noncon, Slight Fluff (?), MDNI
If I missed anything please let me know!
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You’ve been a workaholic for as long as you could possibly remember. Attending after school and taking any extra classes available despite being at the top of all of your school’s honor-roll every single year up until you graduated high school; you never missed a single day and to this day hold the records of the highest regents exams scores that your high school so proudly shows off.
That full room and board scholarship that was given to you was taken graciously, and you worked your ass off getting through college, very proudly being one of your college’s highest prospects; earning a prized internship at the country’s fastest growing, highly influential business corporation, Warriors Inc. First impressions always matter, your enchanting appearance accompanied by your exuberant personality and diligent work ethic landing you an official position at the end of your internship. Your position in your career was solidified, you were on a clear highway towards success and life only seemed to be getting better. Because it was.
Your job was a godsend to you in many ways, much of them you were anticipating, but it granted you a gift that you would’ve never in your life have seen coming.
Zeke Jaeger.
He was your internship supervisor, and at the beginning of your abrupt work relationship, he was a bit of a, what’s the word, asshole. It’s not that you disliked him, quite the contrary, actually. You found him to be intriguing, a bit of a mystery that you wanted to dive a little deeper into.
Socializing wasn’t much of a difficulty to you, so you were delighted to approach him. The only problem was that he was very distant and spoke enthusiastically in sarcasm. You were relentless, determined to make your time with your fellow employee a joyful one, and eventually, like everything else you set your mind to in your life, you succeeded. What you weren’t expecting was for him to take it to the next level.
Nevertheless here you were, 2 years into your relationship with him and happier than you could’ve imagined yourself to be.
Zeke was, unconventional, to say the least. He had the driest sense of humor you thought you’ve ever seen, and he had a mass of odd interests and habits that he displayed with no ounces of shame. He was confident in himself and proud, even. While most people would’ve found him arrogant or aggravating to some degree (which you understand and agree with to an extent), you found him to be self-sufficient, self-aware, and in tune with himself. Nothing was more attractive to you than those qualities that he possessed.
You soon found yourself in a comfortable routine of occasionally seeing him at work and eventually meeting him at home once you two decided to take your relationship to that next level, and it was what you looked forward to most on your tiring days.
Today in particular was a hard one. You woke up achy and exhausted, rushed to work where you were bombarded and overloaded with work and were suffocated by your coworkers and family and friends (through your phone, of course). The day felt excruciatingly long, even more so considering your doting boyfriend was at home due to his day off. You wanted nothing more than to just come home and relax in his arms in a bath, ordering your favorite for take out and then finally drifting to sleep in that blessed California king bed that Zeke insisted on buying once you two moved into your brand new condo.
The hallways were deafeningly silent as you twisted the keys to the front door of your spacious condo. This in and of itself wasn’t unusual, but the opaque darkness and hollow echoes of your home most definitely was.
“Hello?”
Silence.
“Zeke, are you home?”
Silence, still.
You never received any indication that he wouldn’t be home for any reason, that wasn’t very like him. The frown on your face adorned itself on its own, and your melancholy for his absence was strong.
With a heavy sigh, you made strides to your shared bedroom nonetheless, ready to sink into your home even if he wasn’t there. You missed him, but it wouldn’t help you in any way to discomfort your body anymore than it already was. You had a shower to get through before you could hit the hay.
The oddities of the day were quickly counting up, with there being an obvious glint of light shining beneath your bedroom door. It was a waste of the utility to leave the lights on if no one was home, so now you were suspicious and slightly angry.
“This stupid bitch” you quietly muttered under your breath, sucking your teeth and internally preparing the lecture you were gonna give him in your head. He has the nerve to not be home on the day you wanted to see him the most AND he’s wasting the light bill?
Your hand finally reaches the knob, turning it quickly, and absolutely nothing could prepare you for the sight you were just about to see.
“Happy Birthday, doll”
There he lied in all his glory, fully naked with a mass of candles encircling your enormous bed and rose petals adorning the entirety of the room.
This normally would’ve been a romance cliche, but Zeke couldn’t let it be normal, no, that wasn’t his style at all.
Your eyes roamed around every wall, cans of Reddi-Wip littered across your nightstand. What the fuck is he doing?
“I’m just getting your cake ready love, I know how much you love whipped cream”.
It’s as if you spoke out loud, his answer leaving his lips like a chirp.
“Zeke what is all of this, why are you covered in whipped cream?”.
And he was, his glasses were carefully placed on the nightstand away from the mess of cans and cream.
Zeke was by all accounts, a very attractive man. He was sprawled out on the bed, nipples soaking up the whipped cream that he generously applied on the top. The cream was spread all the way down from his chest, along through his happy trail, all the way until it reached the head of his thick, long cock. His tip, bright and pink, was left clean.
He was laying on his side, and you could evidently see some cream reaching the underside of his ass cheeks.
“What, don’t act like you’re not interested, you clearly don’t remember all of the shit you stutter out when you’re drunk off your ass. Are you gonna just stand there and stare at me the whole night?”
Now you realize that this is probably somehow your fault, some silly idiocy that escaped like word vomit on a drunken night where your mouth spoke whatever thought flew by.
His eyes leered over you, dick in hand as he started to slowly pump, cream spreading with every stroke and dick quickly getting harder and harder. It made you realize that whatever the cause of this was didn’t matter. It was happening, and it was happening now. The rest was instantaneous, your hands quick to remove the layers that were sheltering your body from the outside.
You rushed your way over to where he lay on the center of the bed, feverishly getting on the bed, both of you now naked and his dick fully erect upon the sight.
“My god sweets, I’ve been waiting for this all d-”, you were suckling on his nipples before he could finish. Mouth shifting between the left and the right as if you were entranced. You were hungry, you wanted dinner, and if he was going to be your dinner tonight, you were going to eat.
The cream was long gone before you could truly even taste it, enamored with how good it felt to be suckling on him rather than the other way around.
Zeke was holding back any and every groan or moan that threatened to escape his throat. You could tell that he was enjoying this, peeking your eyes above to see his eyes closed and knowing that he was longing for more.
His large hand came up to entangle around the threads of your h/c locks, his grip yanking your head back, lips coming off of his right nub with a subtle pop.
“Such a hungry bitch today aren’t ya?” He could feel you writhe and greedily mutter out steady chants of “mhm”, measly attempting to nod your head in agreement.
“You are, yeah? Then it’s time to move on to your main course, don’t y’think?”
Without further discussion you were shoving your face back down onto him, licking and slurping up all of the whipped cream that trailed its way down his stomach. You stopped at the hilt of his throbbing eager cock, letting out a thirsty laugh before peppering tiny kisses on his thinner thigh. You were ready, taking no further moment before putting half of his impressive length past your lips.
You were keeling over the tiny mewl that he released at the feeling, your tongue glued on his shaft, licking up his balls right before you licked a long stripe at the underside of his member.
God Zeke loved you so much, your mouth so expertly sucked him in, happy to suffocate yourself just to deepthroat his entirety, bobbing your head up and down and taking steady breaths through your nose.
Your ministrations were perfect, subtle moans escaping every so often until it was becoming too much to bear, his hand holding your head all the way down while he shot loads down your throat.
The pubic hair on his pelvic area lightly tickled your nose as you took it all in. Your pussy throbbed violently against your core, slick arousal pooling near your touch-starved hole. You knew that you were getting close to losing it, you needed his dick inside of you, but not yet, you needed to taste more.
“Not done”
It almost came out as a whisper, and you were gleefully repeating yourself.
“‘M not done, wanna taste more”, hands aggressively gripping Zeke’s thighs, borderline leaving tiny marks as you hastily flipped him over. The mess of whipped cream was revealed on the bed, most of what previously adorned his cheeks now soaking in the sheets you were definitely going to change at the end of this session. His ass wasn’t fully cleaned yet, lathered in the remnants.
You could tell that he was actually quite nervous. Zeke liked to try to be a funny guy, and it wouldn’t come off as a surprise if he doused the cream all over his ass just to make some stupid joke about you eating his “cake” for dessert, a dumb birthday joke, but he didn’t think you’d take it literal.
It was meant as a joke, but you were ready to see if he actually did want his ass ate, even if it was a silent fantasy. Taboo or not, you couldn’t care less. You loved him, and if by any chance this was something he wanted, you were more than ready to do it for him.
You looked up to him, fully in position.
His face was turned towards yours, the brightest you’ve ever seen it before, and honestly? Right now, you’re proud of yourself for that.
“You really don’t have to, I would never make you do something like this”.
“Trust me, I know.”
No more words were needed. The air was cleared and you were prepared.
You got to work on his cheeks first, licking them completely clean of all of the cream, going as far as to even suckle little kisses and litter little marks sparsely all over the surface. Zeke was at a loss for words, at a loss for everything. It wasn’t much but even what you was giving him felt like so much. The stimulation to his ass was something he’s always secretly thought of, but never did he think that his girlfriend would happily introduce him to that entire new world.
A momentary pause to catch your breath was needed, and you took the time to examine his ass, an area of his body that you never previously took so much interest in.
He was fully shaven, giving your eyes all of the access it needed to his private. Maybe he was preparing himself for this afterall. As you spread his cheeks to the side, you could see his puckered asshole twitch in anticipation, finger involuntarily reaching to touch. You could hear Zeke shudder at the touch, and you weren’t a cruel being to finger his virgin ass with no sort of lube on it.
You couldn’t bear to tease him any longer, diving face first into his ass, slurping every available inch up and licking vicariously.
His ass was quick to get slippery, your tongue happily lapping beneath his crack. He tastes so good, his ass was so much better than you could’ve ever imagined. You wondered how you kept this treat away from yourself for so long, finding an entire new home in between his beautifully sculpted ass.
“Ah, FUCK, just like that baby”, he cooed over to you, the praise only adding fuel to the fire that was pitted deep in your abdomen.
Your tongue circled around his hole, making sure to lick kitten stripes up and down as you knead on his ass cheeks as if you were starved, his ass serving as your first meal in years. You couldn’t have asked for a better one.
As you slurped and popped on his ass, your left hand found purchase in his left cheek, gripping and occasionally spanking as you went to town on him. Watching it turn a lovely hue of pink was like a slice of heaven on earth. Your right hand sneakily snaked its way around his hip, squeezing on his balls that you personally thought weren’t tended to enough.
You gave a strong grip, pulling every now and then, earning you those succulent moans out of his salivating mouth.
You kept a strong pace up, fondling his balls while you licked all up on his ass and gooch, leaving no space unattended. Zeke was doing his best to keep his composure in place, already having came once and being sensitive enough to maybe even cum like this.
But once that hand came up to grab his leaking cock he couldn’t take it anymore,
“Oh god get the fuck up”
You didn’t listen, you were having so much fun afterall and he just tasted so good.
“I said to get. Up.”
Zeke didn’t wait any longer, detaching himself from you before he couldn’t help himself anymore. His hand left the headboard of the bed and easily wrapped around your throat instead, pushing you down the bed and spreading your legs wide open so that he could easily begin to fuck you.
“You’re such a nasty fucking bitch aren’t you? Eating my ass like it’s your last meal.”
Your face burned at his comment, fully taking in everything you’ve actually done tonight. The embarrassment didn’t matter, you were so fucking horny you couldn’t take it. You know that you’re not fully prepped, his intimidating length that always gave you that bone-chilling burn threatening to break you. But tonight, that’s exactly what you wanted. It’s what you needed.
His hand suddenly gripped your throat tighter, the air pleasantly being blocked from your lungs.
“You’re gonna ignore me now? You’re all fucked out without my dick even so much as touching you? Answer me slut”
“Y-yes daddy, yes! I’m your nasty bitch, your dirty slut, yours!”
Your desperate hole clenched around nothing as you intensely hoped for him to finally stick his dick in you.
He took a hand and slid a single stripe along your burning heat, revelling at the slobbery mess that existed by you just sucking his dick and eating his ass.
“So fucking wet, such a good little bitch”, as he spanked your puffy clit, electricity shooting through your entire body from just the slightest bit of attention to the deprived bud.
“Need you to fuck me, I want you to fuck me Zeke please”, you cried out, unable to hold out anymore.
“You need me to fuck you, yeah? I’ll fuck you then”.
Your mouth gaped with a silent scream as his cock burrowed through your walls, the tip easily slipping in with the mixture of your collected juices and his pre. He made sure to slip it in slow, dragging the stroke out until he finally filled you to the brim, a relieved sigh befalling both of your lips as he bottomed out.
Zeke’s eyes met yours for a moment, ensuring that you were comfortable and ready. He made sure not to hold back any longer as his hips withdrew his pulsating cock until just the tip remained, slamming his hips to yours with a swiftness. Your mouth fell agape once more, but this time with a genuine scream, one that you’ve been dying to let out.
The pace that he set was relentless, quick and hard, your needy cunt feeling every detail and vein of his cock along your aching walls. Squelching sounds were soon filling the room as his cock filled you, your pussy only getting wetter and wetter with every stroke that he gave, cockhead kissing your cervix ever so passionately everytime his hilt would meet your heat.
“God this pussy’s so good, can’t get enough of this tight little pussy I swear”,
Zeke’s head fell back as his hands hungrily settled into your sides, the pudge from your lower midsection and hips acting as a placeholder for them. Your moans were unrelenting, reverberrating throughout the room and bouncing off of the walls. Coupled with the sounds of his length hitting every spot in your spongey walls, it was a symphony to Zeke’s ears. If these walls weren’t worth the money your salaries paid for you were sure that your neighbors would be hearing every single sound.
He knew that he could make you feel even better, grabbing your legs and folding them over your head so that he could drill into you even deeper, as impossible as that seemed to feel before. With the shift of his hips you could feel his cock dragging along that sweet spot that always killed you, his tender pubic hairs brushing along your bundle of nerves so slightly that it was delectable.
His cock was abusing your pussy so deliciously that you couldn’t comprehend it, the waves of pleasure possessing your body. Zeke grabbed your face with a hand, interlocking your lips together as he thrusted into you. The kiss was delirious, tongues twisting together and his mouth housing your moans, muffling the sounds as your hands traveled up and down his body with your nails scratching fresh wounds onto his back with every long stroke that scratched that spot inside you.
You were getting too close to your climax to let anything get in its way now, grabbing his own throat with one hand while your nails sunk into his back.
“Right there! ‘M gonna cum, nghhh”
Zeke knew exactly what to do, keeping the exact pace he had going steady and letting his hand quickly travel to your clit, rubbing tentative shapes that your body heeded to with ease. This action alone would’ve sent you over the edge with how sensitive you felt, but doubled with the collision of his massive member, you felt like you were going to pass out.
A few more strokes with your clit being so tenderly cared for, the dams broke and you finally came, drenching his dick in your juices, walls clamming down onto him as you spasmed beneath him.
Your pussy felt impossibly tight on his cock, driving him towards the edge where he carelessly spilled his seed deep inside of you.
He held you tightly as you both came down from your highs, dick throbbing slightly as it settled down inside of your full pussy. You eagerly brought his face up and aligned it with your own, showering him with kisses until your lips settled onto his.
“Thank you for the perfect end to my birthday”, you stated in content, rubbing your thumb along his cheekbone.
“Did you really think that was it? Some dick isn’t enough for your special day, I have your gift wrapped up for you and an entire day planned tomorrow.”
He smiled against you as you perked up at his words, beyond grateful for him and excited for whatever it is that he had awaiting you.
Zeke suddenly leaned up, removing his body from yours and lowering his body to where he met your melting center. He watched as the cum slowly oozed out, scooping it up with his fingers,
“I never did say I was done, did I? It’s your birthday, you should be the one cumming more than once here”.
“Wait, wha-”
His face dove into your pussy without further ado, and you knew that you were in for a long night <3
Sorry if it’s not good or anything, I’m not that great at writing smut but I figured why not try anyways, y’know? Also I copy and pasted this from docs on my laptop so if there’s any mistakes blame Google 🙄 Love you all so much and I hope that your day is so very lovely!!!!
#attack on titan#attack on titan zeke#zeke jaeger#zeke yeager#zeke x reader#zeke x y/n#aot#whipped cream#birthday#freak lil bitch stuff#dirty things
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Like Pieces of a Puzzle
Chapter 5
Summary: What if Harry wasn't the only extra student called upon to participate in the Triwizard Tournament? Far from the most popular candidate, Draco not only has to take on the trials but also deal with his unexpected feelings for Hermione. Will he be able to face the challenges as well as follow his heart?
Chapter length will vary. I'll be referencing both the books and movie versions. Some things from what I've previously written will be mentioned, all of which you can find here.
And for those who asked to be tagged:
@dayane245love
Hermione found herself in great displeasure of Moody’s class, regardless of Harry and Ron’s expressed interest. Using the Unforgivable Curses for a lesson was unethical and she stated as much as they walked down the spiral staircase. To kill a spider right in front of Harry the way he did (even she couldn’t bring herself to glance down at her desk after the jet of green light silenced it) she saw the aftereffect however silently it fractured beyond his eyes.
He brushed it aside for appearance’s sake. The temptation to voice a question of his wellbeing prodded her, though she didn’t ask him. She knew Harry and he’d only supply a simple answer then somehow bring up another matter entirely.
As for Hermione’s time in the library, she kept herself busy, enthralled in research. Show up for food, eat quickly and leave. All week the schedule remained the same, shy a few days, given it being Thursday and all. Ginny kept her company for two afternoons, Harry once and Ron never bothered, but she hardly minded. She tended to talk more with others around, distracting her from making sufficient progress.
Hermione clutched her book closer to her chest as they descended. She skimmed a couple of chapters of The Dark Forces: A Guide to Self-Protection for nothing apparently. Moody told them to put it away, clearly aiming to go off his own agenda when it came to his teachings.
Her fingers grasped the hardcover tightly due to Draco’s voice echoing at least a semi-circle above them. His complaints proved, in any case, that others weren’t overly fond of the method exhibited today either. His precise words eluded her thanks to Ron’s ongoing positivity about the experience.
Harry’s hand tapped against her arm, nearly grabbing her sleeve to stop her from walking further, gesturing towards their friend. Neville looked ashen-faced, his eyes glued to the stained-glass window. She knew the Cruciatus Curse bothered him, hence his reaction. She wondered why it casted a prolonged impression.
Before Hermione voiced her concern, Draco spoke, having reached the crowded landing. “What’s everyone standing around for? Some people actually want to get down the ruddy staircase.”
“Then feel free to walk around everyone,” Harry remarked, waving him onward. He attempted to block Neville from view, seeing as he knew Malfoy never missed an opportunity to reticule him.
Which did him little good, Draco was already wise to his intentions.
By now he ought to know better than to go around willfully antagonizing people with stupid jabs, yet he couldn’t help himself. “What? Were the Unforgivable Curses too much for you to handle, Longbottom? Hit a little too close to home, did it?”
“Ignore him,” Ron advised prior to facing the other. “I bet you seen them already anyway. It wouldn’t surprise anyone, especially after the World Cup.”
“Real original. What’s next? Potter’s going to accuse my parents of being Death Eaters again?” A smile similar to the one he held that night took over his features. “If you’re interested in talking about something even more noteworthy, how about what happened to Neville’s parents. Judging by the looks on your faces, he hasn’t told anyone.”
Hermione never said a word to him since Monday and she had a funny feeling (though she drew no real logic from any assumed reasoning) that he was avoiding her.
In any case, she refused to allow him to disclose a personal matter. He opened his mouth to speak, only for Hermione to interrupt. “Honestly, don’t you have anything better to do?”
He refused to look at her, which chased away the nervous electricity bouncing inside. Instead, irritation hit. Which came across ironically because she spent the past couple of days priding herself on keeping her cool whenever he happened to be around.
Well, she never assumed it’d last forever.
Hermione pushed her way into the small space between her friends and Draco, too close physically, nonetheless the boldness born from exasperation slingshot the deeply rooted crush she harbored from her mind. “Why must you always make everything worse? It’s not your right to say whatever you please. Clearly, Neville doesn’t want to talk about it. Can’t you just leave him alone?”
He still said nothing, not a single word. And he knew his silence angered her.
Draco shut down his emotions to the best of his abilities. Sure, he managed a convincing glare and struck the precise tone to emphasize the right amount of malice. The very fact of having to do it whenever Hermione involved herself threw him off kilter.
“My sentiments exactly, Miss Granger.” Moody’s growling voice boomed in the background, causing a sudden halt in confrontation. “You, come along. I’ve got something to show you.” Neville dejectedly went up the steps, almost frightened of the man. “And, Mr. Malfoy, come along as well.”
Draco suppressed a protest filled groan, narrowing his gaze at Harry and Ron for their smug looks, getting the impression he was in trouble.
He entered the Defense Against the Dark Arts classroom, told to wait as Neville and Moody talked in his office. After twenty minutes, Draco’s impatience took a sharp climb. Not only did it seem like he’d miss dinner, he still had a pile of homework to do for Divination.
He lingered near the table Hermione sat at, letting his fingers trace the surface, briefly giving himself the permission to think of her. The way she approached him. Once he would’ve complained about the lack of respect, which held true despite being unable to get the words out.
Her fury held no bounds. It caused her eyes to glow vibrantly, so very bright, identical to a flame bursting alight. Maybe shining beautifully ––
Pretty in any regard he regrettably admitted, but beautiful?
Draco spent way too long getting her out of his head to simply go on thinking about her in an attractive sense. Those of the Malfoy family don’t fall for people such as Hermione Granger. He could imagine the uproar in upmost clarity.
How he wished he gave a scathing remark. Anything to shove her further away. But he knew from experience she’d continue to push back. What an annoying trait.
The door finally opened and Moody’s wooden leg clanged against each step. Draco moved, nearly flinching – for a second the noise turned into the banging of a cane. The apprehension of awaiting a form of punishment of scolding at school rivaled when he endured at home.
Neville hurried past, holding onto a large book, not keen on lingering, though he appeared less sulky.
Draco rolled his eyes. Sure, scurry past like a frightened rabbit. Did Neville think he’d do something in retaliation? In front of a professor, as if he’d consider it.
“I bet you’re wondering why I wanted you here,” Moody announced, coming to the front of the classroom. “I think that little display of yours is deserving of detention, don’t you?”
His typical coldness in tack, Draco fell into complaint. “You’ve got to be joking. It’s not the least bit deserving of anything of the sort.”
Moody took a long sip from his flask, head shaking before he addressed Draco again. “You have no respect for others. Still, you think yourself worthy of it. Just like your father. The apple certainly doesn’t fall far from the tree. Knew who you were the second I laid eyes on you.”
His bright blond hair tended to be a telling sight.
The mention of Lucius brought about a spark of anger. “Congratulations, you can see. Am I supposed to be impressed?”
Moody’s abrupt turn caused Draco to stiffen, more intimidated by the man than he’d admit. The moniker Mad-Eye fit well, his abrasive personality matched the stories he knew of the wizard.
“Your father is a poor excuse of a man, walking around freely after all he’s done.” An unexpected tone of hatred clung to the professor’s voice.
“I didn’t realize you wanted to chat about my family. Is that what this whole thing’s really about? You being another person who hates us for no reason.” What an excuse he was for a pure-blood. Akin to Ron and the entire Weasley household.
“No reason, you say? I’ve got plenty.” Much more than Barty could declare while in disguise. “Loyal to You-Know-Who only when it benefitted him. Bellatrix Lestrange, as I’m sure you’re aware, is imprisoned in Azkaban. Unwavering Death Eater, she is.”
Draco tilted his head, picking up on something, however, not quite able to pinpoint the cause. “Odd really. It almost seems like you’re praising my aunt, all the while chastising my father.”
Moody took a long pause (for in reality any of those who abandoned Voldemort or renounced their allegiance were a disgrace to the Dark Lord’s name). “It’s your very aunt and uncle who used the Cruciatus Curse to torture Frank and Alice Longbottom until they went insane.”
“I’m not saying they deserved it, though I do have to wonder what all the fuss is about,” Draco mentioned, knowing the story of the attack well. Educated enough to know Barty Crouch Jr. and Rabastan Lestrange joined in too. “But it has nothing to do with me.”
“Yet you mock him for it.” He brought out his wand, starting to advance forward. “How you’d like being cursed yourself? Bet you wouldn’t be so smart-mouthed then, would you? That cowardly father of yours, he’d do anything to save his own skin. How about it? Going to turn tail the second you’re threatened?”
The sudden surge of anger caught him off guard. Draco shuffled his feet backward; every sentence brought the other closer. He hit a table, the legs stretching against the floor. The wand lingered too close to his throat. He turned his neck away as much as possible.
His whole body tensed, expecting indescribable pain to strike. Moody merely kept still, unbeknownst to his student, trying immensely hard not to say the words. After a moment he recollected himself, slowly drawing away.
Draco remained frozen in place, his gaze following the professor.
“Lines I suppose,” Moody said after putting a little distance between them. Perhaps he couldn’t curse the boy, but he brought along something fitting to take its place. “You’ll be using this new quill, just came out this year. Invented by Dolores Umbridge herself. Made in a way it doesn’t require ink.”
He took it while kidnapping the real Alastor Moody at his home. Barty didn’t question why it was there, assuming he acquired the dark object to examine it further without prying eyes. The Ministry surely possessed more.
Barty decided, however, Harry’s name wouldn’t be the only one he’d place in the Goblet of Fire. Voldemort never said anything against addressing a personal vendetta, he might be pleased. Lucius turned on them, not once bothering to search for their master. The punishment seemed fitting given he chose family over the Dark Lord.
Draco slowly returned to a normal stance, losing the ability to fight back. He knew Moody disliked him, but now the impression came across more antagonistic. Maybe he should consider being mindful of the professor’s presence.
As for the punishment, he could manage writing the same thing over and over despite thinking his actions barely warranted a detention.
Moody tossed a stack of paper on the table, some pieces fluttering to the floor as he muttered to himself. “Let’s see. What to have you write.” He disappeared up the stairs, returning with an extremely sharp, black feathered quill. “How about this. I must learn to respect my fellow students. I think that about sums it up.”
Draco begrudgingly pulled out a chair and sat down. “How many times?”
“Until I say you’re finished,” he snapped, handing over the quill. “Get started.”
Although not really wanting to, Draco picked up the utensil and wrote the words across the top of the first page.
He felt a sting of discomfort on his left hand. The sentence emerged on the parchment in red while simultaneously etching into his skin. He curled his shaking fingers into his palm, pressing his lips together to not vocalize the pain.
Draco immediately understood the intention of the newly made device. The Ministry used it for torture, no doubt. Blood in place of ink. He stared down, caught at an impasse – risk abandoning the task (because who’d willingly sit there silently subjecting themselves to such a cruel penalty) or fulfill it until completion. He put into perspective Moody’s aggressive behavior, fighting the urge to give him the satisfaction of asking questions or complaining.
He repeated the process and the searing sensation returned, cutting deeper into his flesh. But he forced himself onward, tolerating it to the best of his abilities.
Every sweep of the quill dug in deeper, making every incision more excruciating than the last.
He persisted until he got through the first page, shoving it to the side. He glanced up expectantly, hoping to be allowed to stop, seeing as he could barely keep his injured hand steady, only to be instructed to keep going.
Moody spent the duration pacing and quietly speaking to himself. Draco had difficulty catching the mumbling verses. Not like he found it easy to focus on much of anything while the pain started to cloud his head.
It took about halfway into the third page for Moody to interrupt his progress.
“Have you learned your lesson yet, Mr. Malfoy?” the professor asked, glancing at the work done. “Or do you require more time?”
“No, I think I got it quite well,” Draco responded rather curtly. “Can I go?”
Moody approached and tapped his finger on the parchment. “You should take that as a warning. If I catch you messing with Neville Longbottom again, you’ll be at it twice as long.”
Draco didn’t delay his leave after being dismissed, desiring nothing more than to get away from Moody. He descended the long spiral staircase in a hurry.
He inspected his hand further once on level ground. It almost appeared to be in the process of healing, holding a clear indication of a forming scar. The letters remained a light red in hue, slightly blood-stained and puffy along the outside of the sentence. It still burned, throbbing so relentlessly he almost considered going to see Madam Pomfrey.
He couldn’t get himself to do it.
She’d ask what happened and tell Dumbledore. As much as he’d love to get Moody kicked out, Draco got the feeling the headmaster wouldn’t be overly inclined to fire his friend.
Too distracted to even hear his own footsteps along the corridor, he banged into someone while turning around the corner. A box hit the ground, sending S.P.E.W. badges across the floor.
Of course, out of everyone in the entire school he walked right into Hermione.
#dramione#hermione granger#draco malfoy#harry potter#the goblet of fire#next chapter will be very dramione centric#until then i hope this one is enjoyable#nice comments are always appreciated#sorry for any spelling or grammar mistakes
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