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tundrainafrica · 3 years

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Title: Lovebug (2/10)

Summary:

“It might be a bug.”

“A bug?”

“Sometimes the developers of this application make mistakes. This is our first time meeting I’m sure so…Isn’t it a bit weird that we just met for the first time and it rings like this? And for two strangers to coincidentally ring each other’s alarms?“

Levi is the developer of the Love Alarm App and Hange is married to Zeke.

Link to cross-postings: AO3

Other Chapters: 1 3 4 5

Notes: I was torn between publishing the next chapter of lovebug or outlier tonight so I opted to just go for lovebug. I'll post the next chapter of outlier mid next week. As always, feedback is very much appreciated.

“We’re gonna delay the release of our next fix…” Levi repeated, just a little slower that time. He didn’t trust himself then to speak in anything faster or with a tone any louder.

It was too early in the morning for a meeting, just a little past eight in the morning. He was called into Erwin’s office right after arriving into company grounds and Erwin, a natural early bird, was talking louder than what could have been considered bearable for Levi.

At eight in the morning though, not a lot of things were bearable, especially if they involved a huge change of plans and a glaring reminder that he had a long work day ahead of him.

More importantly, Erwin’s voice was grating in a way that most bosses’ voices were grating when laced with a little more urgency than necessary. “Yes Levi, we’re delaying our fixes indefinitely, not just for Love Alarm but all of our other apps as well.”

Levi raised his eyebrows. “Really? You know we’ve been announcing this big fix for months.”

“I’ve contacted the marketing team. We are pushing the fixes back a week. You think that will be enough for you to finish everything you need?”

Levi shook his head. “There’s no need to push back the release. I can work on this bug now and I can have the other developers and the support team work on getting the regression testing done and getting the release out.”

Erwin shook his head. “I do not want to give Mr. Jaeger the impression that we aren’t prioritizing his complaints. Levi, you have to understand. He’s an important client.”

“I understand that. And I will be on top of things. I’m testing this issue myself.” Most days, Levi left the testing option to the support team. Given the nature of the bug though and the severe urgency of getting it fixed, it had been an easy decision for Levi to take it upon himself.

Erwin hummed in approval. “Yes and I’m happy to hear that you're going to be investigating this bug. I would rather that we didn’t release anything while investigating this.”

“May I ask why? This bug doesn’t involve any of our other functionalities. I can test this myself.”

Erwin hummed. “Zeke Jaeger is an unpredictable man. I don’t think he would appreciate us improving our product while such a glaring bug still exists. He is a very vocal and he might give us some bad press.”

“Oh?” Levi heard the derision in his own tone then, a smooth yet venomous sound. Zeke Jaeger had been outwardly friendly yet for some reason Levi couldn’t explain just yet. He wasn’t at all drawn by the charisma that accompanied it. In fact, the blonde had just been annoying and the conversation only cemented Levi’s first impression of Zeke Jaeger as bad, maybe even terrible.

What the hell does Hange see in him? He added to himself then. How that had entered his own contemplations then, he didn’t know. He quickly brushed it away and mustered the most seemingly uninvested face he could make then.

Erwin had that special talent of seeming uninvested either. As he settled on the sofa in front of Levi, he mixed the coffee just a little too loudly. He had an aura about him that very much meant business. “Have you done some prior investigation?”

“I did,” Levi said. As he soon found out, that aura was contagious.

“Anything new?”

“I’m entertaining the idea that what if…. The application is working fine?”

“Can you explain why his partner had two hearts while he had none?”

Levi cleared his throat. “Assuming the application is working perfectly, we can draw two conclusions. One, someone in love with Hange Zoe had their application on and Two, Hange Zoe isn’t in love with Zeke Jaeger.” That last conclusion couldn’t have easily been true, but still such words left such a sweet aftertaste in Levi’s mouth that he had to make some considerable effort not to smile.

Erwin raised his eyebrows inquisitively. “Any leads on whose application could have been on?”

It had taken some strength, some self confidence and some self discipline on Levi’s side to pull his phone out then. “My love alarm was on yesterday, I forgot to turn it off after the demo…” He navigated to the ‘history’ tab and opened his history to the exact time to late afternoon yesterday.

One person nearby is in love with you. Levi read silently to himself. In that split second, he was contemplating display issues and front end bugs that maybe just maybe accidentally chalked Hange’s heart as ‘love.’ It was highly unlikely though so even before that idea had ripened into something worth an explanation and a support ticket, Levi brushed it aside.

“So your application was on the whole time.” Erwin murmured, looking intently at the phone in front of him.

Levi nodded. “But it’s a good step in the right direction. That means there’s a bug to investigate after all. I just have to isolate it to either Hange Zoe’s application build or mine,” he explained.

“That seems promising and do you need any help organizing a meeting with her.”

“She’s coming today for a little testing.”

“Just like my best engineer to think a few steps ahead.” Erwin asked, a smile curling up his lips. “And you think you can get it done within a week?”

“If all goes well… Even less than a week.”

***

It had turned out that that small meeting had worked well to organize Levi’s thoughts. He had a quick action plan from there and with an action plan, a new burst of motivation, or at least enough of it to carry him from Erwin’s room to his own small office space in a little less than five minutes.

A week to investigate. Levi thought to himself as he leaned back on his office chair. He looked back up at the ceiling for a good few seconds before writing his deadline down on the white board next to him.

He didn’t need that whiteboard, their workflow trackers and excel sheets worked well to always keep Levi in the right state of mind. Yet there was something organic about white boards, something natural about being able to write the numbers with his own hand, freely changing his fonts with just the slight of the hand, impulsively changing formats at just a quick motion.

So he kept it there next to him, a large annoying waste of space to most people. But Levi had taken great pains to make it look organized in his room, measuring each frame to the millimeter. It was a large clean slate right next to his desk in his very small office. And more importantly, it was something that was very much his to play around with like he wanted to.

Under the deadline, he put the new release date of their fix.

We’re delaying the release of the next fix by a week.

Such wise words from someone who didn’t know how the investigation process actually worked. But with an employee and boss relationship, emphasis on Levi being the employee, he had to make it work. That’s how it had always been in the office. Erwin wasn’t a developer. He was a manager. And Levi was being paid by him.

Levi though never liked the idea of delaying fix releases. Once the date was announced, he liked to make sure all of the quality assurance testing and the regression testing was done two weeks ahead. And with that habit becoming custom for the Love Alarm project, he was sure they would have managed to make the release next week. Staring at the workflow interface, he noted the bar was more than half full already, most bugs were tagged as fix. All test builds were submitted and passed and they could have easily moved on to the final regression testing before release.

And regression testing never actually failed. The Love Alarm app after all was a very functionally simple application.

With the weight of a wasted timely release and the powerlessness of corporate politics bare on his back, Levi let out a long sigh.

He opened up his slack channel and typed out a few words.

We’re delaying the next fix release.

But it wouldn’t just be the Love Alarm which would be affected, all the other applications would be affected as well. His notifications exploded within five seconds, all feedback from each time. Levi started to wonder, maybe he should have put everything in one message.

So he edited his old message.

We’re pushing it back a week.

Under that, he put a new date and time as a reminder to all other employees. There were many why’s, many protests and his application continued to shake with notifications.

He checked the time on his phone. Hange had agreed to meet at nine and she should be texting soon. With little to no brains pace to create a summary of his meeting with Erwin in less than ten minutes, Levi typed out two words.

Erwin’s orders. Without waiting for anymore protests, he closed his laptop, packed up his things and ready to move to the small conference room he had reserved for him and Hange.

It was a few floors below. A small room among others but Levi was familiar enough with the layout of their offices to know it was very much soundproof.

Any unwelcome alarms, unwelcome notifications and unwelcome conversations would stay in that room. Even before Levi had dropped off his things in the conference room, Hange had already texted.

Her car was by the gate already.

Meet in the lobby. Levi texted back as he quickened his pace, quickly turning back towards the elevator, laptop bag still in hand.

He could have been too slow. Or Hange could have just been too fast but by the time he had arrived in the lobby, she was already on one of the seats next to the reception, playing around with her phone.

She was wearing a light sweater, her brown hair was pulled up messily into a half ponytail. Levi though had to note that it still looked very much like it fell into place. For a second, he had given her a good onceover, admiring everything at once.

Only a split second later, he was cruelly reminded that he had made her wait, long enough for her to have to sit down in one of the lobby sofas. “How long were you waiting?” It wouldn’t have been the first greeting Levi would have liked to give then. His heart was racing though and soon he realized, maybe he had taken up the unnecessary challenge of jogging down those five flights of stairs while keeping his laptop safely in tow.

Hange looked up from her phone seeming surprised. “Are you busy? Was this a bad time to visit?” Hange asked. “We could reschedule... “

More and more, the first greeting then was seeming less and less ideal. “No, no. This is great. I don’t know what just came over me. Thank you for taking the time to test this bug with me.”

Hange shook her head. “No, no, I asked my partner to invest in this application for a reason. I see great potential and I’d be happy to tweak some of those bugs with you.” Her lips widened into a smile. “So what’s the game plan?”

Levi gestured towards the elevators. “We do some simple testing. I just need to isolate the cause of this bug.”

“Oh? How does application testing work?”

“We use the application,” Levi answered matter-of-factly. Was there any other way to test it? It didn’t seem like something he should be asking the very important partner of a very important person though so Levi kept that last question to himself, instead keeping his face then as something both subtle and questioning.

“That’s cool,” Hange said. “So how’s your job?”

“It’s fine,” Levi answered. “The investigation will keep me busy.” He stared at the numbers on the elevator, getting lower and lower and Levi could have sworn it couldn’t go any slower. He could have found some consolation if anybody else had joined them in the elevator then, to at least abate that awkward need to carry some conversation between them.

Any other employees though had chosen for themselves to wait in front of other elevators. Levi was almost considering doing the same thing.

After all, Hange was talkative. She was asking questions. When they entered the elevator together, the very slow elevator, there would be more than enough time to send two to three questions back and forth. And Levi was quick to realize, he was an incredibly boring person.

“So do you have any hobbies?”

“Programming.” What about you? Levi had readied himself to ask in that long split second of silence that followed.

Hange though was quick to respond even before he could take control of the conversation. “Well aside from your actual job.”

“I like to clean,” Levi answered. He started to wonder how dorky that hobby sounded like. He needed to rephrase. “I meant--- organize things…” He added a second later. “Like Marie Kondo.”

“Oh yes, I’ve heard about her,” Hange said. She had at least allowed for a split second silence then, long enough for Levi to take the reins of the conversation.

Hange though was a high profile person, her partner was one of the richest men in the country and Levi’s mind was racing with hypotheticals. Was it okay to ask her about her hobbies? Her interests? Or was that supposed to be an exclusively professional meeting?

Soon, with all the questions nagging at him at once, he unearthed a question at the back of his mind that he had been meaning to ask since he had met Hange down at the lobby.

So how’s your husband?

Where’s your husband? Do you hang out with him often? Do you usually do stuff alone? A question that couldn’t so easily be answered by a single google search on an incognito window, only that night, he had tried searching keywords just to be sure.

Hange Zoe Zeke Jaeger Relationship

And soon after searching that just once. He had made sure to clear his browser history just in case he didn’t do it in some incognito window. After all, night mode and incognito mode had almost the same interface.

He soon found out though after jumbling around keywords over a search engine that Google wasn’t omnipotent as it turned out. The only one who could have satisfied his curiosity at that moment was the brunette next to him then.

He couldn’t bring himself to ask it just then though. So he went for another question, a very vanilla one but it seemed like a safe bet. “What about you?”

“What about me? What do you mean about me?”

Levi was starting to doubt the flow of the conversation of a while ago. Did he remember it correctly?

The elevator dinged like it was announcing some coming of a messiah. That had been more than enough to break the awkwardness of that exchange and Levi quickly slammed the open elevator door, just a little more loudly than usual. He gestured for Hange to go ahead.

“Hobbies,” Levi said as he met her outside the elevator.

“I like research,” Hange answered.

“Is that your full time job?” Levi asked. He didn’t need to ask. He had read more than enough articles of Zeke Jaeger’s partner to have seen ‘neuropsychologist’ used as an epithet enough to be convinced that that was her full time job. The last thing he wanted to do though was actually accidentally imply in a conversation that he had googled a few keywords for answers before clearing his browser history.

Hange nodded. “Yes it is.”

“Well… Hobbies aside from your actual job?” Levi asked. He kept his own word usage and his own phrasing similar to what Hange had used with him. If Hange asked it that way, that should have been a socially acceptable way to ask.

“I like plants,” Hange said firmly. She wasn’t looking at him. Although Levi had wanted to see the face she was making then, he started to realize that craning his neck to get a good view of her face might just look a little too weird.

So he settled for her side profile. From his view he could see eyes were everywhere at once from the hallways to the doorways just a little further away from the area that opened up as soon as they exited the elevator. “Where are we going?”

“Over here,” Levi said, he was quick to pull her towards the other side though, before she found out that he had taken a good few steps already in the wrong direction. “The conference room is over here…”

“We have a meeting?” Hange asked, her voice suddenly very tense.

“No, it’s nothing like that. I just thought it would be better that I reserved a room, so we could do some testing where we wouldn’t bother anyone.”

She let out a sigh of relief. “That’s good. I thought I was supposed to be preparing something.”

In those few minutes, he had made her wait, made her navigate some awkward conversation and made her panic. Then and there as he led her to the room, he was guessing what kind of dashing review she’d be giving Zeke about their first meet up.

More importantly, was he giving a great second impression? It was nine in the morning, too early for him to be confident that he was a fully functioning human being. Or so, that was what he repeated to himself then. He could make up for it after lunch.

Hange settled on one of the chairs nearest to the door. “Do we sit together?” She asked. The meeting room was designed for a maximum of ten people and for a good few seconds, he wondered if he should have gotten something much smaller.

Even before he had figured it out for himself, he was looking between sitting right next to her or towards the other side of the room. They weren’t married. Could he sit beside someone who was married?

But if he sat too far, he might not be able to hear her. He went for a very safe in between. He dropped his laptop bag on the seat next to her with some flourish, as if to say, he was married to his job and he was happy with that arrangement before sitting on the seat right next to his bag.

There was a bag between them, they were a safe distance away and Levi pulled his laptop out and booted it up. “I’m suspecting that the issue with your application might be the build. Can you redownload it for me?” He asked. The laptop had been a reminder at least that they were there for business. And business meant that they had a topic of conversation and he had practiced that script enough times to know, he probably didn’t sound like an idiot.

“Are we testing now?” Hange pulled her phone from her bag.

“Yes we are. Just download the app from the app store. I need to confirm that this isn't just your build in particular being faulty,” Levi brought out his own phone, deleted the application from the folder before redownloading it into his phone.

The ‘downloading’ message next to the love alarm application served some form of inspiration for conversation topics at least. “So, how does your husband like the app?” Levi asked. That line was straight from the basic customer service manual and he was very much sure that was acceptable territory for a professional conversation topic.

“Ahh Zeke? He loves the application. He told me himself, he sees potential in it too.”

Did he tell you over dinner? Over car rides? Somehow, Levi was picturing them over a happy dinner in their European style dining room in their very expensive penthouse apartment down town. He knew how it looked. He had seen it in one of the lifestyle articles he had googled just the night before. “That’s good,” Levi said, he felt that comment catch at his throat. He cleared his throat. “The bug... How does he feel about it?”

Hange’s face fell at that. Subtly at least, but with Levi had been staring at her for the past few seconds, it was very much noticeable as a split second movement. “Yeah, about that…”

“Did he say anything about it?”

“We did research on the application last night… And we were theorizing… so the heart could have been from him… and from someone else right? Someone else had their application open then. And he was saying it was you.” Hange’s eyes were wide with disbelief. “But I remember you said, it could be a bug right? And I’m sure you turned off your phone before we tested it…”

“And we’re testing again,” Levi said as he opened the newly downloaded application on his phone. “Log into your account.” He ordered, looking pointedly at Hange’s phone.

The biometrics were already in his account, all he needed was to log his fingerprints again. Levi took a glance at Hange’s phone laid out on the table.

She had gone through the log in process quickly. He turned the love alarm on and rested his chin on his hands and waited. Hange only needed a few seconds. Soon she had turned it on.

And within a second, her phone buzzed then his phone buzzed. It did wonders to shake the whole table then, enough for Levi to have to grit his teeth as the table shook sending a bolt of shivers up to his chin.

He could have sworn he felt blood rush to his face then. He quickly turned off the alarm. “It might be a problem with our phones. I”ll bring down some test devices and we can try this again. He avoided Hange’s gaze only brushing his hands on her shoulders long enough to make his point known. “Just wait here.”

Hange mumbled something with a seemingly obedient tone. Levi didn’t bother to guess. He quickly made his way out of the room, up the stairs--- he was in no mood to run into anyone in the elevator.

It had taken him roughly ten minutes to go back up to the office and come back down with a bag full of gadgets. He dropped the bag on the meeting table, maybe a little too loud and a little too roughly. “These are the most common gadgets used for testing the love alarm. They’ve all been factory reset so just set any one of them up and we try the application again.”

Hange seemed frozen with surprise, at the least she had managed a nod.

Setting up the device was a simple process and Hange didn’t ask too much about it. She had at least kept quiet through the whole ordeal and although it was second nature for Levi to set up a device, he made sure to keep his head down, his eyes intent, feigning deep concentration.

Or maybe he needed to concentrate. His hands were shaking just a little bit, his heart was racing.

He was sure he only needed to try it one different device, one commonly used model for both of their phones to rule out any problems with build or model. It was a decisive move.

And the climax of such a process came once again when Hange had motioned to click the love alarm again before looking up at him. Before they even met eyes, Levi clicked the on button on his end.

It was at the moment when the alarms rang in unison again did Hange avert her gaze. Levi bit his lip as he stared back at his phone.

One person nearby is in love with you.

He glanced up, at Hange’s phone. Although he couldn’t make out the words on it, the characteristic heart near the center was enough. She was getting the same heart.

He grabbed the phone from her. “It might be related to the model,” Levi said, Years of experience working with applications and phones were telling him, it wasn’t related. One working phone was more than enough proof. Looking at the watch at the end of the meeting room, he saw it was far from lunch time, he had at least ten devices in the bag. “Let’s try it on other phones… Just to be sure.”

***

“Levi, what if…”

“What if…” Levi nodding his head at Hange slowly, a subtle gesture for her to continue speaking.

For lunch, they had settled for one of the diner just along the wide shopping streets only a few minutes walk from the building.

An eventful few minutes walk. Levi had turned on his love alarm, put an earbud to one ear and listened to the alarm ring on repeat as he followed Hange through the streets. There were a few other notifications that popped up and left as he listened. But the ringing coming from that one heart which he had already surmised long ago, was from Hange’s heart had settled into even the cadence of his steps. It became an ubiquitous part of the short walk to the shopping street.

When they had settled in the diner though, Hange was quick to drop her phone in front of him and show him the history of her application. On her phone, there was one heart that remained steadfast through the whole ten minute walk as well.

At that moment, Hange pointed at it, then glanced quickly at Levi’s own phone. “What if… You are attracted to me. And I’m attracted to you? Because this love alarm, it doesn’t just check love right? It checks attractiveness. So if a passer by thinks you’re attractive, your alarm rings,” Hange said.

Levi leaned back on the diner behind him, picking at his fries with a fork. He couldn’t bring himself to eat one, just the results of their testing that morning had him losing his appetite. Consequently, he had ordered the burger meal at the front of the menu, something he was in no mood to eat.

“So maybe…” Hange said.

“Hange, we just met. During all the tests. I have never made anyone’s love alarm ring. Besides, I don’t think I’d be the type of guy to get attracted to someone at first glance. I don’t believe in love at first sight.” And someone who’s married at that. If Levi had something in his mouth then as that thought ran through his mind, he was sure he would have choked. He was more grateful than ever that he hadn’t started eating.

“But, we saw it already… The application was giving the same reading and when we were walking too… It never stopped ringing…” Hange explained. Still she looked like she was still finding the right words.

Levi understood her clearly though. “Hange, are you in love with me?”

Hange turned a bright red. “What? No, I'm married. Also, we just met and I don’t believe in love at first sight either”

“So do you believe there’s a bug?”

Hange nodded. “Maybe? Or maybe the data you put into the application was flawed. Maybe there are things that need to be improved.”

“That is a good point. So what do you suggest then Hange?”

“I’ll help you research. I pitched this application to Zeke because I wanted to try rolling something out similar to hospitals, psychiatric units. And if he invests maybe we could improve the application, work to make it more accurate?”

“That’s the plan. But he said so himself, he’s not going to invest in the application until the bug is fixed.”

“But what if it is working as expected… What if it’s just a matter of fixing the data?” Hange looked out the window, seeming deep in thought. Levi wondered if that last question had been for him or for herself.

“I can do further testing on this. Just to make sure,” Levi said. “The problem is… How are you gonna convince Zeke to invest in this?”

Hange sighed. “I guess it's going to be a question of timing. I'll catch him when he's in a good mood and--”

“Hange, are you willing to admit to your husband that you might just be attracted to some stranger?”

That shouldn't have been such a difficult thing. He had heard before of married couples who window shopped so Levi amended that question in his mind.

Are you willing to admit to your seemingly unhinged husband that you might just be attracted to some stranger?

***

Sometimes, the only way to find the bug is to break the application.

Levi and Hange got caught in the lunch time rush. But Hange wasn’t a typical worker, Levi wasn’t a typical eight to five employee either.

So Levi saw opportunity for a little test. “Open your love alarm,” he whispered. He put one earbud to his ear, motioning for Hange to do the same. He turned on the application once again, letting the shill ring grace his ears one again.

It was annoying at first, but over time, he had started to see it as an old friend. He was far from the denial stage already and he was already threading the lines of acceptance.

He was a developer. He had fucked up the coding and a bug had appeared. And that issue, it was a bug for sure, a bug he needed to investigate.

And any opportunity for data and evidence, was an opportunity he couldn’t waste.

“We walk through the lunch crowd,” Levi said. “Usually when I walk through, I get two to three rings. Sometimes more. There have been issues before that getting too many at once, sometimes the application would conceal all the hearts and the only way to get it to work again is to reset the application.”

“So what do we do?” Hange asked.

“Turn on your application and we walk through the crowds,” Levi repeated matter-of-factly.

The crowds around him though were disconcerting and he could understand how Hange would have needed some guidance then.

What did she know about testing? When Levi asked himself that question, he started to pick out another question too. What did he know about testing?

He was an engineer and he had been working with applications for years. He had experienced a lot about testing. But he had never experienced testing with a customer married to one of the biggest opportunities of a company and being accused of being in love with her by his own brain child.

He was treading unfamiliar grounds.

The ringing of the alarm was always unsettling at first. By the fifth ring, it always found a rhythm. Or maybe it was his own brain that found rhythm in it.

And he walked to that rhythm, he pushed past the crowds to that rhythm and every two to three rings, he would take a glance to see Hange beside him, her face had settled to some rhythm too. Sometimes, she would look back at him, other times she would look behind her, as if she suspected someone had set her alarm off.

But he had become part of her rhythm too. From his peripherals, he could see she snuck glances at him. Very quick glances that Levi had been perceptible, invested enough to notice.

They could have been walking for five minutes, or maybe even ten. Soon, Levi realized, the love alarm had embedded itself into the background noise, an annoying ring amid faint voices, conversations, public announcements.

It had only seemed loud once again when the street had opened up to an open space at the center.

In front of them was an empty park, and it usually was empty when the lunch crowds had made their way back to their offices. Levi had worked there long enough to know.

The chaos of the alarm had subsided into one noise. He turned to Hange to see that she was looking up at the sky then, one hand over her forehead, shading the view from the bright afternoon sun.

The light from the sun had done wonders to make her cheeks look a bright pink and for a second or so, Levi just stared, long enough for Hange to have noticed. Or maybe it was her plan to look to him eventually.

“Did it stop?” Levi asked as soon as he became aware of those hazel eyes on him. He averted his gaze and looked around the empty park. Nobody should be ringing his alarm. Nobody should be ringing her alarm. But them.

It should have been a win-win situation. If that had worked to break the application, Levi could have clocked that as the bug and investigated that instead. If it worked as expected, if the two applications continued to ring, then maybe it was working.

His alarm was still ringing. He did a thorough 360 of the park. No one was near enough to even meet the ten meter radius. Just to be sure though he turned to Hange. “Anyone around our ten meter radius?”

The park was empty save for one old man on a bench a good distance away, definitely more than ten meters. He hoped it had sounded like a redundant question.

Hange shook her head. “Nobody. But the application is still ringing.”

“Did it stop at all? During the walk?”

Once again, Hange shook her head.

Levi took a deep breath and dropped his shoulders back. “Erwin gave me a week to figure this out. I’ll do some of my own personal investigation after this.”

“Hey, I’ll do what I can too. I really want you to get those funds.” Hange took her hands in his and Levi had half the mind to pull away. If her hands weren’t so soft and maybe a little too warm even for a cool spring day.

Levi had been almost disappointed when Hange dropped his hand and turned back to her phone. Just ‘almost’ though. They just met, he couldn’t be too invested in hands.

So he thought back once again to backend work to the numbers that made up the love alarm. And he thought of Hange’s little suggestion. “You said something about flawed data right?”

***

“My plan is I’m gonna see if I can convince Zeke to take up that love alarm,” Hange said.

“No need to hurry. I have a week to get it working,” Levi muttered. He wasn’t looking at Hange then. His laptop was propped on his lap and he was looking through open support tickets.

They had a support team and being a developer, answering customer queries wasn’t his job. At that rate though, he was looking for anything to keep him busy. Zeke would be coming to pick up Hange and the last thing he wanted to be was free enough to stare at them.

“I have some books on love, I could send them over,” Hange suggested

Levi looked up from his laptop. The support ticket on ‘how to download the app’ was not very interesting after all and he found reason once again to stare at Hange’s bright hazel eyes. “Why would I need books about love?”

“You seem… inexperienced with love?” Hange started. She seemed unsure with that answer.

“Inexperienced with love?” Levi narrowed his eyes at her.

“Allergic to love,” Hange repeated. “so I thought it might help if you read on them.”

“Why would you care if I read them?”

“If we’re gonna work together to improve the accuracy of your alarm, I think you should learn. I’ll do my part too. I’ll learn a bit of coding.”

Levi shrugged. “Send them over then. I’ll look through them if I have time. First things first, I need to get a little more testing done.”

“They might be useful for testing. Or maybe they’ll be able to help you pick out which sensations in particular point to love.”

“I loaded the data. I would know,” Levi said.

Hange raised one eyebrow at him in playful suspicion. It had done some magic in helping Levi recall that all he remembered were the numbers and some hints about sweating, palpitations and some quickening paces. But machines had a tendency of learning more about the users over time.

“Maybe I’ll read one or two before bed," he added a second later.

“Great. Then I’ll do my homework too. I’ll see what I can get from Zeke. Hopefully I can convince him to invest, even with the bug.”

“You have my number---” Just update me. Before Levi could let those words out, he had fallen back into that support ticket about that one person not knowing how to download the application.

It was still a boring and stupid support ticket. But when Zeke had padded into the lobby like he owned the place with a butler in tow, Levi decided that the idiot of a ticket was still a better view than Zeke at that moment.

“Thank you for picking me up,” Hange said in an almost melodic tone, a tone that made Levi’s ears bleed.

“My meeting ended early and I don’t think we had a good dinner since last week. What did you have for lunch?”

“Burgers and fries.”

“Burgers and fries? Hange, I gave you more than enough money for a good meal." Zeke sounded mortified.

Levi froze. He had suggested the diner for its strategic location. He found himself running his right hand slowly over his wallet in his front pocket. He was sure he had the money for anything more expensive.

“It was good.”

“Well, I’ll make sure we get something better tonight. There’s a new restaurant, just outside town, they sell the pink fatty tuna and Kobe beef imported straight from Japan, same day shipping apparently so it’s definitely the freshest we can get here. What do you think?”

“That sounds great,” Hange said.

She had said it in such a tone, a tone she had never used with Levi before. Like she was tasting the food as she spoke of it. Of course she wouldn’t use it on you. You just met her. Levi thought to himself. As he willed himself to get back to his senses, he realized the ticket was still untouched. Although he had been staring at it since a while ago, he hadn’t made any progress at all.

He looked up at Hange then at Zeke. “Apologies for only taking her to a diner. Next time, I’ll make sure to take her somewhere a little…” Rich, expensive, snazzy, exclusive, snobby? Too many adjectives were running through his head then but Levi settled for something seemingly more professional, or as professional as he could go. “More your tastes.”

“That would be very much appreciated,” Zeke said. He took one of Levi’s hands in his, too suddenly and too forcefully that Levi had to smack his laptop to keep it balanced on his lap. “Thank you again for taking very good care of my Hange here.” He had slipped a hundred dollar bill in between Levi’s hands and maybe he had expected Levi to smile and say ‘thank you.’

And most days, Levi was polite enough to have mustered one but his ears were still ringing, not from hearing the love alarm non stop that day but from those last words Zeke had said.

My Hange.

Hange waved, motioning with her hands to ‘text soon,’ then she turned her back on him.

Levi couldn't’ even get a good view of Hange as she walked away. Soon enough, Zeke had wrapped one arm around her shoulders. From Levi's angle, he couldn’t tell whether Hange had pushed closer to him or Zeke was the one who pulled her closer.

For a second longer, he pondered it. Of course Zeke would pull her closer, that’s his Hange. Of course Hange would move closer to him, she’s his.

Levi looked back at the support ticket, he had opened again.

How to download application. Please help.

He closed his eyes and leaned back on the sofa. He closed all his open tabs before laying his eyes again on the empty draft.

Within seconds, he had closed that tab as well. There were larger issues then than a customer not being able to download an application.

***

Hange had sent books about love in a drive folder and she had emailed it to him. When Levi opened it, he was quick to figure out, they were all self help books

Scott Peck? He could have sworn he had heard that name somewhere and when he opened it, he found the book was hundreds of pages long. He didn’t have the attention span for that.

Maybe I’ll read one or two before bed. He had promised Hange that evening. But he didn’t actually have to read it right?

So instead, Levi googled the summary.

Genuine love is volitional rather than emotional. The person who truly loves does so because of a decision to love. This person has made a commitment to be loving whether or not the loving feeling is present. ...Conversely, it is not only possible but necessary for a loving person to avoid acting on feelings of love.

Levi was quick to close it after that. If that concept of love was real, that would defeat the whole purpose of the love alarm. The last thing he had wanted to do so late at night was invalidate his own brain child.

“Book one for the night. Done,” Levi whispered to himself as he opened the next book on file.

Before you love others, you must learn to love yourself.

“Cliche,” Levi said. But soon after reading it, he turned back to the application on his phone. He turned it on to see an empty blue screen void of hearts. There wouldn’t be hearts, he was alone in his apartment.

He thought back to Hange’s mention of flawed data. He thought back to the alarm that wouldn’t stop ringing. They had been testing it that whole day, there was nothing wrong with the application and the developer in Levi knew there weren't any glaring bugs.

But the testing would continue. He hadn’t completely tested all the scenarios after all. The alarm ringed with Hange but would it have alarmed with anybody else? His five years worth of experience testing the application told him 'no.'

Or maybe he just hadn’t been actively looking for the right people.

Even at night, the gears in his mind managed to turn and soon, he had a plan albeit a vague one. But the first few steps were clear at least. Levi navigated to his play store and typed a few words on the screen. A few minutes later, he was downloading an application with a familiar flame icon on the screen.

He took a deep breath. "This is part of the testing process," he muttered to himself. He was gonna be spending the whole night swiping.

#levihan #levihan fanfiction

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sanstropfremir · 3 years

Text

ok alright alright alright kingdom episode two

kinda disappointed that they only showed half the stages, but that's just an editing thing to draw out the content so you can air for longer, i'm not super surprised about that. i would have liked to evaluate them all at the same time, but at least this gives me time to go more in depth for all of them since they're full stages this time and I wrote 3000 words for last episode when they only had 100 secs. so this format will probably keep me sane for longer, i think.

solid stages all round for them, none had especially glaring flaws on the whole. i'm not gonna do a full ranking for this episode since we haven't seen them all, but i will say that btob’s was my favourite from this set and both ikon’s and tbz’s stages were about equal; they both had things i liked and disliked in equal measure so i'm tentatively giving them the same ranking. full opinions and analysis on each stage below the cut, plus another section of general notes because hey what the fuck did you do to that stage mnet???

and for anyone that’s wondering yes i do have the qualifications. also seriously grab a drink or something because this is LONG.

some general notes

and here i thought this section wouldn't be as big as it was last time because mnet was going to get their shit together about the stage design, but noooooooooooo they had to go and make it worse! thanks mnet i hate it! remember how i said you shot yourself in the foot last time? well ya fuckin kneecapped yourself AND all your idols with this one ya dumb fuckin idiots. alright folks welcome back to stage design 101, my recurring segment where i explain the different types of stage layouts and their effectiveness for kpop idol survival shows, i guess.

ok so last week i covered the basics on theatre in the round and traverse staging, which i’ll link here if there’s anyone new or just wants a refresher. i mentioned that its likely that mnet will switch to an in the round style staging because it offers a lot more freedom for camera movement and also for directional blocking. well, i was wrong. so i'm gonna give you a quick rundown of prosceniums. a proscenium, proscenium arch, or just prosc, is an architectural feature that sits around the front ‘opening’ of the stage that delineates the stage from the audience. if you've ever been in or seen any pictures of old european style theatres it can be quite ornately decorated with scrolling, but it's almost always there in most western theatres. it basically provides your ‘wings,’ which are where you exit off into to get offstage, they provide cover from the audience sitelines. pretty much any theatre where the audience is directly opposing the stage across the 180 degree line is a proscenium stage, even if it doesn't physically have the arch. hell, movie theatres are prosc stages. now, there's a secondary architectural feature/device called a false proscenium, where you set a second, smaller archway inside the first prosc, usually done for a specific effect. think of it like a literal framing device; it's often used to visually signify that ‘this is a play, we are telling a story, please be aware that this is a play thank you.’ but sometimes, it can be a semi-permanent structure that’s set in place to narrow the prosc opening. we had this at my university, there was a false prosc set just inside the actual prosc because the stage had a hilariously big prosc opening for a university that never had casts larger than 24 people. so they set false prosc in to make the stage slightly narrower and to widen the wings, because it doesn't matter what size theatre you're in, you always need more wingspace. makes sense? ok, now here’s a very quick drawing of what i'm pretty sure the kingdom stage looks like:

before you get lost: stage directions are oriented to a person standing on the stage, hence SL and SR being reversed. a quick tip for remembering which way is upstage and which is downstage: if you go too far downstage you fall down (most stages are raised between 2-4’ from the floor, so if you step off the end you will actually fall.) the arrows on here signify the entrances i observed during the performances, which is not necessary in this explanation but i just thought it was interesting to note. still not entirely sure what the surrounding architecture is but it appears that the stage is a raised platform inside a room, and not actually built as part of the building. the ‘house’ is just a technical term for where the audience is, and in this case it's where it looks like most of the film crew and the producers/staff are. there’s pretty clearly a platform upstage centre, and i think there may be some others but i don't care about those right now. what i want to talk about is this dumbass false prosc they set IN THE MIDDLE OF THE STAGE. now i suspect that they did this to solve some problems that they could have had that i don't know about, since i don't know who the stage designer was and what the actual limitations of the space are. but basically they've built two stages and stacked them on top of each other to create one very deep stage, and then separated it off with a false prosc in order to control the size of the space a little better, and possibly to add some visual interest. this stage is functional for its purpose, absolutely, and i think, if mnet actually gave a shit about point of view and camerawork, it could produce some really interesting performances. however, because this stage is so deep, it kind of has the same properties as the traverse stage from before, but just with some big led screens in the middle for reasons. you extra have to pay attention to the directionality because you have all the staff and cameras concentrated in one specific cardinal point, so you have to get creative if you want to crossover between the two sides frequently. again, this is not necessarily bad; restrictions often produce some of the most creative decisions. but! we have not seen a lot of consideration for camera and sightlines and audience pov, hence why i think this setup is dumb: it’s not facilitating the best performances it could.

ok now to the actual performances

btob

this is my favourite of the group because it's very clean lined and utilizes a few simple devices to pretty good effect. i realize these reviews are making me sound like i only like simple performances but i promise this is not at all true i'm just very critical and very picky. let’s start with the costumes, because why not.

costumes

i like these very much, i love modernized traditional clothing in all forms, and these are very well tailored and well coordinated. they do the bulk of the work establishing the theme for the performance, along with the costumes on the backup dancers. personally i would have liked them to be a bit more colourful, à la the teal detailing that was on minhyuk’s final look. i'm getting a bit tired of the whole trend of having groups only wear all dark or all white, or maybe sometimes red if they're feeling spicy. obviously uniform colour is the easiest way to tie a group together visually, but on a show like this i think the groups would actually benefit more from looking distinct from each other internally rather than establishing the group as whole.

i liked that minhyuk had a costume change but i didn't really care for how it was how it was broken down. this is a very personal quibble because i literally have spent years prepping quickchanges but the method it broke down wasn’t the most visually compatible with the garment and felt kinda clunky. please ignore this anecdote it's just me being picky.

set

i loved the forest! a very excellent way to divide the stage area and obscure the weird stage lines/architecture that mnet has made. plus the snow, flowers, and fog? makes a really sharp and immediately indicative atmosphere, a very good use of visual shorthand to establish place.

i didnt love the screens, they reminded me a bit too much of rolling whiteboards from grade school, but they are thematically relevant. also, i feel like we didnt actually get to see about half the choreo for them? fuckin mnet and idiocy again. fun use of rear projection with the dancers’ shadows, and also good use of them to direct traffic, if you will.

personally i think that the sheet gimmick from tbz’s performance would have been a better fit here instead of the screens, especially since the fabric motif was already established at the very beginning of the performance. plus you can do some really fun shadow work with a stretch fabric screen.

personally i think there could have been a little bit more integration between the forest area and the screen area, or they could have done the whole thing in the forest space, but that would require a bit more consideration of camera and choreo maneuverability

sound

really liked this arrangement, obviously the song is iconic but they added a more traditional instrument sound. has good structure for the loose narrative that they had and they were well to label this as ‘theatre’ version because this did follow very closely to a traditional musical theatre sound and style

lighting

no complaints. the overall theme for this episode is apparently blue and red? again with them i like their dedication to a limited colour palette and i especially like the blossoms at the climax

staging

there was pretty clear camera choreo and a minimum of nausea inducing moves. i think some of the effectiveness of the staging got chopped by the editing but that’s not really btob’s fault.

i was just saying i wanted them to give minhyuk some time to shine, i was not expecting to get it so soon! this is a very smart choreo that proves you can be interesting without doing a lot of tricking. minhyuk obviously did a lot of practice and work with that sword, his movements are very fluid and he knows how to handle it. and it looks like its either a blunted proper blade or a correctly weighted replica. a lot of the times when sword choreo looks fake it's because the person either hasn't had enough practice or the weapon is not weighted/weighted incorrectly. only complaints are that you would never hold your fingers/palm that close and un-anchored over the edge of the blade, which is just a safety thing. also you would never scrape your blade on the ground like that, nor toss the thing like dead fish but that's a respect thing with a live blade and this is clearly done for dramatic effect so i’ll forgive it. please ignore this anecdote also it’s just my third dan getting uppity.

ikon

costume/set

smart thematically to go with the sort of miscellaneous 30s-40s (western) aesthetic because it's the fastest way to make it look like you built a theme with mnet’s weird pseudo art deco nonsense they've inexplicably got going on in the set dec. however, they should have stuck the theme all the way through, it would have been more visually cohesive and more interesting. we expect more hiphop/electronic sounding songs to come with these kinds of 4th gen costumes, it would have been anachronistic in a fun way to have them do that second half in 40s style suits. here’s a performance from sdc3 that uses that kind of anachronistic play (this was a combo stage with two ballroom dancers and it has a 20s aesthetic but close enough.) also here’s another routine from sdc3 that does a similar effect on a much more abstract scale, and also it’s a fucking incredible performance and it got slept on by the captains. also yes i know these are incredibly experienced career dancers but they way they construct narrative within their routines and their stage presence is SO GOOD.

do not speak to me about the backup dancers costumes, holy shit i hate them. i hate them so much. how do you manage to hit too shapeless AND too fitted in the same fell swoop? i'm so mad at these. i'm neutral on bodycon dresses on the best of days but these were absolutely the wrong choice for this stage. generally kpop has abysmal costuming for female backup dancers on the whole but this is just like.....especially lazy. the point of the costume are to help give an indication of where and when you set your performance. they started off with a vaguely 40s theme and then jumped abruptly modern. why? also skirts like that are the literal worst choice for dancing in, hello?? the men’s looks are just sloppy, when you have a garment that big you want it to serve a purpose within the choreo, whereas with this it's just hiding the dancers’ movements.

as for ikon themselves, see everything ive said about black on black on black styling in the previous two reviews.

the actual set is minimal and that's tragic. i mentioned mnet’s weird art deco theme and it was smart of them to try and play off that with a lack of stuff. definitely a mismatch of stuff pulled from yg’s prop storage, but they made it work as well as they could. no other meaningful comments i’m just kinda sad about it.

sound

the arrangement is fine, no complaints from me. they keyed up the old hollywood style musical theatre sound in the beginning which i really liked. i didn't mind the song/tone switch, i think they pulled it off.

staging

same as btob they learned more towards a theatrical style, which is smart for this particular format of show. i think this was the smartest staging of these three, and also i think the only ones to not get the crew in shot.

despite seemingly leaning into a more old hollywood style the narrative was a bit too loose for my taste. i'm not sure what i would have done to make it clearer at this moment since they had so little to work with, but i did get by on my previous knowledge of the songs. that shouldn’t be the only indication of narrative though! all elements need to support it!!

also like btob they had a pretty intentional point of direction and there weren't a crazy amount of spins. they also used the camera cuts the most effectively that i've seen so far. the first half is actually all in one take!!! incredible!!! thank you!!!! this is how you do it!!

the lighter flick gimmick was well pulled off and a good example of how to use a couple of simple tricks to good effect.

ikon as a whole has really great stage chemistry with each other, and they're extremely cohesive performers. this is a really strong physical performance from them, the dance was very solid and clean. good use of levels without verging into acrobatics. this might be the best group choreo i've seen so far, but we’re not very far so that's not a very high bar to clear.

it's a shame they had the budget of 1 banana.

tbz

i liked this stage better than their intro stage, but i still think they have a long way to go and they're still over ambitious. personally i find stages based on specific pop culture properties to be kind of twee and ineffectual, because it requires a specific knowledge of that pop culture property to work. sometimes the specificity can help with a narrative but you're at risk of alienating a larger portion of your audience out of sheer non-knowledge than anything else.

costumes

again, interesting garments physically, but not much clarity of relation to the theme other than the colour. also the backup dancers???? another case of backup dancers being from an entirely different stage, what is up with those coats/dresses? looked more like they belonged in either sweeney todd or a vampire movie.

hands in front of the camera again, but these were used much more effectively. i'm not the biggest fan of mixing metals and i’m partial to silver on the whole so i didn't love the jewelry, but at least it was vague and stereotypical enough to denote ‘fire magic’ even if it does rely on a derivative middle eastern shorthand.

set

the stage set itself is fine, although definitely feels a bit haphazard to me. doric columns and frozen rocks and whatever that cover for the pyrotechnics was at the front, combined with the candles and the chaise lounge? like ikon, it felt a bit like they were pulling out of the props/set storage. not that all these things do not work together, it's just that you need a thread to tie them together, and this didn't have that for me.

sound

it's a crime they have a song called ‘no air’ and its not a jordin sparks cover. just saying.

i didnt really like this arrangement, again like their intro stage it didn't have a strong structure that suited the narrative, because they were pretty clearly trying a narrative on this one. also were most of the adlibs playback? they were singing live but there were so few shots of anyone specific singing.

lighting

probably the weakest of the three. the projection design was a bit too tacky for me, and although i appreciated the small amount of variety in colour, it felt way too concert-lighting for me.

staging

the editing on this stage is wack and did no one any good. the hands leading/pov was a really smart device and they should have stuck out the one takes like ikon did, it would have made the whole stage feel a bit more cohesive. a lot better directional camerawork from them this time around, well done. again with the hands in front of the camera gimmick which i actually preferred this time, since they were a part of the narrative. the stretch/silhouette fabric i think they pulled off quite well, even if it didn't really fit thematically with the piece. i actually worked on a show a very long time ago that used this exact same effect with dancers and also rear shadow projection, and it requires a lot of rehearsal and trust to pull off well, so props to them. i think it was the wrong choice because there isn't an established motif for the fabric, so it kind of appears out of nowhere for one specific visual moment and then disappears, and i think that time could have been better served for something else narratively relevant.

again, these 4th gen groups are overly focussed on gimmicks as a way to make up for the lack of experience. personally i think this will be detrimental in the long run, and a reliance on gimmicks means that you don't trust your performers. tbz have the manpower to be doing some pretty cool collective dance work and i dont think its being trained or utilized correctly. they are suffering from a lack of cohesive stage presence right now and that can be fixed with training and time.

this might be because the group sizes are so different between these three but this choreo is very directionless. mnet is also providing to be absolute garbage at editing and i feel like i can't see the choreo at all.

this is a thing i've noticed with kpop camerawork in general, there’s very little regard for actually viewing the choreo as a singular work. and for some reason the camera always needs to be moving???? people do actually want to see what’s happening on the stage. the choreographer can only see from one spot, so from that spot is how they are intending it to look. you wouldn't need to upload full cams of every music stage if you just filmed the choreo properly in the first place. if you watch the two sdc3 clips i linked you can see a clear difference in maintaining the integrity of the choreo, even though both shows use several cameras and a lot of cuts. obviously for kpop you want the money shots of idols’ faces but i definitely think there’s a healthier middle ground than what we have now.

ill wait for full subs but i want to know where in the fuck in sk you can rent a tank thas clearly been custom made for underwater photography, because that’s extremely cool even if it was absolutely unnecessary to the actual stage itself. i can think of several ways off the top of my head that would have achieved that same freezing effect without any of that wasted time and effort.

mnet decided to drop full cams while i was writing this and despite watching those my opinions are the same.

in conclusion, some more general thoughts:

i think ikon and btob got it right by leaning more into the theatrical than the cinematic, if that makes sense. i might be talking up my own ass here but these are theatre performances, and they should be treated as such. trying to do things that you can do on film isn't going to do you any favours in the long run, and it makes it harder to make a cohesive performance. i’m harping a lot about narrative but it is so important to performance. although it is not technically necessary, when doing big theatrical performance stages like this it does help with clarity of intent and general success. humans have brains structured around storytelling, it is literally the way our history has been passed down for tens of thousands of years. the atlantic published an article recently on narrative and memory, and it's a really excellent read for maybe after you've taken a break from this behemoth, oh dear god.

tldr: the stages were good but disappointing in their own ways. mnet continues to sabotage via weird stage design decisions and bad editing. see you next week! (or in my ask box if you have questions)

#kingdom review #kpop analysis #kingdom #oh dear lord this is almost 4k #to anybody that actually reads this thank you and im sorry #text

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lonelypond · 3 years

Text

Love Is For Losers

NicoMaki, Love Live, 1.7K, 1/2

Summary: Yazawa Nico and Nishikino Maki are both key players on the Otonokizaka University Tennis Team. But now Nico has decided to "improve" Maki's social media and tennis game.

Love Is For Losers

Not the most flattering picture of herself, racquet ready, waiting for the return of a serve, but Maki Nishikino really liked her look of concentration. So she hit “Post.”. And the hearts and reactions and fire emojis piled on. Wait, what was that comment, from @NicoNi? “With squinty eyes like that, how can you see the ball?”

WTF?!?!?!? Junior and top tennis singles player Nico Yazawa was notorious for living on social media. Since practice started in September, she’d been leading weekly social media best practice training sessions for the Otonokizaka University team that freshman Maki had proudly never attended. And now she was trolling Maki? Was that a social media best practice?

Maki never replied to a comment, but to let the smug Nico Ni have the last word would grate across every nerve Maki had.

To quickly type, “Who’s in the top 10 national standings again? Can you see that?” seemed almost an illicit thrill. To get an instant reply of eye emojis, plus a sweatdrop made Maki laugh out loud. Quickly scoping out the coffeeshop to check if she’d drawn any attention to herself, Maki clicked through to NicoNi’s home page, Nico’s last post was a bikini shot with an obscene amount of hearts and various emoji combinations in an endless comment scroll. Maki snorted, too obvious an attention grab. Maki would ignore it and stick to tennis, which she knew very well. Ah, there was a pic of Nico rushing the net, one of her favorite ways to use her sprint speed. Maki had an in.

“Spend less time looking at my pics and more time on your approach shots.”

Another instant reply. Another sweat drop. “Nico knows. But you’re so pretty. See you at media training ; )”

Did Nico think she was going to get Maki into one of her stupid sessions like that? Maki dropped her phone on the table, sipping her espresso with a frown.

###

Maki’s phone pinged explosively. A series of messages from her self proclaimed bestie and doubles partner, Hoshizora Rin.

R: hahaha Maki Ma you really need to be here

R: Nico’s going through your TWIG account as her “what not to do on social media” slideshow

R: it’s so funny, Maki

R: (*≧艸≦)(*≧艸≦)(*≧艸≦)

R: you missed out Check out Nico’s LIVE.

Maki stared at her phone. Nico’s Live, that happened when you went to someone’s TWIG profile and clicked on their pic, right? Maki did, grimacing as she clicked on Nico’s face. Nico was in front of a whiteboard, drawing pictures of tennis rackets, disgustingly cute tennis rackets. She leaned forward, checking her phone, then grinned like someone who’d just served a winning ace.

“And @Nishikinoshot has just joined the fans watching Nico on TWIG Live…”

Maki heard Rin yell “Hi Maki!!!” in the background as Nico continued, “One of the best ways to learn how to properly conduct and promote yourself on social media is to find an influencer you respect and build a relationship with them. @Nishikinoshot has chosen @NicoNi, the smartest move she…

“I have not.” Maki shouted at her phone and then felt silly when she realized there was no way for Nico to see or hear her, or was there? TWIG kept floating an “ask to join the Live” teaser, so Maki thumbed it. Nico paused, obviously her notifications were on, another one of those winning serve grins and suddenly Maki was sharing Nico’s screen.

“Jumping into the Live. Good initiative, Nishikino..”

“Maki.”

“So why’d you pick your TWIG handle?”

What kind of a question was that?

“Nishikino shot...you know...because of tennis...the Nishikino shot always scores.” Also worked with photography, a hobby Maki wanted more time for.

“Nishikino announces her prowess off and on the court.” Nico giggled, Maki glared.

“What are you saying? That’s not right.”

“Ah, so you admit it is confusing. Make a note of that, class, it’s always best to have a tag that doesn’t confuse people.” Staring right at Maki, ruby eyes twinkling, Nico made an elaborately surprised, amused face, raising a hand to cover her mouth. “We were reading it as Nishikino’s hot, ‘cause you are.”

Maki flushed. And fumbled with her phone to end the live, not even registering what other garbage Nico was saying. And then her phone pinged again.

R: Are you all right, Maki? Nico was just having a little fun.

M: I don’t want to talk about Nico.

R: Okay.

M: That was your fault.

R: Hey, I thought you’d want to know.

M; Yeah...but tomorrow, after practice, you’re on clean up.

R: Maaaaaki (⁎˃ᆺ˂)’

###

Grunting, Maki swung through at full velocity, then grimaced as yet another practice serve skipped out of bounds. She leaned over to pick up another couple of balls. Both buckets were empty. Tempted to throw her racket, instead she shook her head, tucked her racquet under her arm, grabbed a bucket and went to the other side of the court to pick up the balls.

“Hey, let me help you,” chirped an unfamiliar voice. Maki turned. Nico Yazawa had grabbed the other buckets and was hustling for the net. Nico was always hustling, all lean muscle and speed. Her sable hair, usually put up in twin tails, was loose, still wet from the shower. She’d changed from her usual practice uniform to casual pink and black striped biker shorts and an oversized pink t-shirt shirt that slid off her shoulder and read “Killer Cute.” “Coach ended practice an hour ago.”

Maki shrugged, starting with the balls as far away as possible from the spot Nico had chosen.

“You’re always out here.”

“I take tennis seriously.”

Nico hesitated, hands on her hips, watching Maki curiously over mirror sunglasses perched halfway down her nose, “Nico sees that. But you can get trapped in patterns if no one points them out.”

“I’m fine. I win.”

“Don’t you want to win better?”

“Win better? That’s not a thing.” Maki tapped her racquet against her leg, fidgety.

“Accuracy matters.” Nico picked up a tennis ball, tossed it into Maki’s bucket, and winked, “Crush your opponents with finesse, not raw power. Fewer wasted serves.”

Maki’s hasty rush of anger changed to curiosity. Nico led the team in aces, with amazing power for someone so short. “Coach hasn’t said anything.”

“Like you said, you get the job done. And Coach has other problems...like keeping Honoka from exhausting herself in the first few volleys.”

They both chuckled at how eager Honoka Kosaka was to chase down every ball, until she hit empty. As a joke, after their last practice, Rin had her girlfriend, Hanayo Koizumi, the team manager, post a photoshopped pic of a golden retriever playing next to Honoka’s double’s partner, Umi Sonoda. Honoka had laughed longer than anyone.

Nico was right, Maki realized. Coach had been spending a lot of time on the players with more basic problems. And their assistant spend most of the time on opponent research, editing video footage.

“Nico uses a platform stance, but Maki could get away with a pin-point stance. Watch my feet.” Nico grabbed a ball, tossing it up, swinging at it with a pretend racquet. Instead of her feet remaining the same distance apart, her back foot shifted closer to the front one and then she pushed off up into the serve. “You’ve already got natural explosive power, you don’t need a nitro boost.”

Maki considered, moving her feet through the change Nico suggested. It felt comfortable, offering more control. She nodded, then jumped back when Nico clapped her on the upper arm.

“You’re a quick learner. Hang on. Nico will hop over there and you can try it out. It’s more fun with an opponent.”

“I’ll win. You’ll be crushed.” Maki winked.

Nico laughed and it echoed. “Nico didn’t teach you everything Nico knows.”

###

“So you’re a local too.” Nico was scooping salad into Maki’s bowl. They’d decided to stop for dinner.

“Yeah. My family owns a medical center so I couldn’t just go off anywhere.”

Nico paused, eyebrow raised. “Why not?”

“I’ve been working there since…” Maki tried to remember her first job at the hospital, how old was she? She remembered sitting at her father’s desk, coloring in specially made anatomy chart pages in elementary school. Did that count as a job? “Forever.”

“Ah. Nico had to stick close for family too. Three sibs.” Nico flashed a smile and three fingers. “They’re the best, but they rely on Nico.”

“Your parents work a lot?” Maki understood that.

“Yeah, my mom does. My dad died when I was little.”

Maki paled, what did you say to that. “I’m sorry” came out as a mumble.

A sigh, weary, as Nico pushed Maki’s filled bowl in her direction, “Me too. But we survived. He taught me tennis. And…” Nico put on a sparkling smile, bounced her hands up to her temple, rock hands gesture, and her voice became brighter. “Nico Nico Ni.” Then she relaxed back to normal, “He said it could cheer up the whole world..”

Maki remembered something. “Nico Nico is the ideophone for smile.”

Nico leaned forward, “So the Nishikino isn’t just for show.”

Maki shook her head, “We have a hospital in Tokyo too. I’ve spent a lot of summers there.”

“Wow, a doc and a jet setter. So why tennis?”

“I liked it better than golf. My parents said piano didn’t count as a networking activity.”

“Piano? Classic stuff.” Nico created a melody on an air keyboard.

“Some. And jazz. I get to take a couple of music classes, at least this year.”

Nico wondered if Maki realized how robotic she sounded, and how laced through with sadness her mood was as she talked about her family.

“Hey, Nishikino…”

“Maki.”

“Maki. Play for Nico sometime. Nico loves singing. My dad always said I should go on American Idol.”

“Sorry.” Maki twisted a curl of hair, “I don’t play those kind of songs.”

Maki obviously just needed to know more about Nico, which was Nico’s favorite topic. “Nico is multifaceted. We can do Ella and Count Basie, if you want. With the time you save not practicing your serve.”

Nico winked, her multifaceted ruby eyes cheerful pulls as she hummed. Maki found herself intrigued. “I’ll think about it.”

“Nico will be your personal tennis coach to make sure you improve.”

“Not necessary.” Maki leaned back to signal the waiter. Time to start the main course.

A/N: Another AU Yeah August entry, college rivals was requested and the Olympics put me in a sports mood. Planning another chapter.

Still taking requests.

#NicoMaki #Love Is For Losers #Nishikino Maki #Yazawa Nico #au yeah august #AUYEAHAUGUST21 #tennis #rivals #college

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mythgirlimagines · 4 years

Text

ANON-CORRECT QUOTES

———————————–

(Context: Iris is consulting Myth about her relationship with Wolf.)

Myth: (drawing a staircase with 15 steps on a whiteboard) Look, Iris! Let me explain some junk about dating.

Myth: (points to the first step) Right now, you’re at Tier 1, which is hugging.

Myth: (points to the second step) But pretty soon, you’ll make it to Tier 2, which is smooching!

Myth: (points to the fifth step) Then down the road, you’ll make it to Tier 5! Where you’ll first discover all of her muscled glory on your trip to the beach~!

Myth: (points to the eighth step) And after a while, you’ll make it Tier 8, where she’ll begrudgingly let you stroke her ahoge for the very first time! Very special!

Iris: (points to the highest step) What about Tier 15?

Myth: (angrily) YOU STAY AWAY FROM THAT!

Iris: (confused)

Myth: (scolding) DO NOT DO TIER 15!

Iris: (confused) Myth. I have no idea what you’re talking about.

Myth: (calming down) Don’t worry about it, Iris! Just let things move naturally to Tier 2!

Source: Adventure Time

Video Source: (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bysdQaAkvKY)

—————————————

Janon: (exasperated) Ugh, Curious. Remember that time I told you you were too friendly with everyone?

Curious: (making tea) No.

Burglar: (drinking tea) Two sugars, please.

Source: Unknown

—————————————

(at one of Sparkle’s fancy banquets)

Dream: (pulls out a hot dog and eats it)

Sparkle: DREAM! ONE MUST NOT EAT A HOT DOG IN FORMAL WEAR!

Dream: (stops eating, confused) This hot dog isn’t in formal wear.

Source: Drake and Josh

Video Source: (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8M-ggQy0LiE)

—————————————

Myth: Y'know, Fusion II. Underneath those sunglasses and swagger, you’re just a big ol’ nerd!

Fusion II: (indignant) W-WHA?! I-I-I’m plenty tough! I-In fact, just the other day, I started my own gang!

Wyre: (incredulous) Really?! How did it go?!

Fusion II: (turns away, blushing and muttering) It turned into a book club.

Source: Unknown

—————————————

(at the beach)

Eldritch: (embarrassed) F-FINE, I ADMIT IT! I s-s-still can’t swim! I n-never took those lessons at the community pool!

Scar: O’ Demon of Fear! You’ve forged a contract with us!

Eldritch: (panicking) They wanted to put me in the b-beginner’s class with the little kids! I can’t be swimming around with a bunch of f-f-five-year-olds! They can be so c-c-cruel when they sense w-weakness!

Nerd: That’s why on the first day, you have to beat up the biggest one in the yard!

Fusion: (worried) Nerd, that’s prison.

Nerd: (pounding his fists, with a grin on his face) Only if you let it be!

Source: Sonic Boom

Video Source: (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r0MJf-d_JJY)

——————————————

Fusion II: (as a spelling bee judge) Purple Anon, your word is “fergalicious”.

Purple: (as a spelling bee contestant, confused) Uh, may I acquire some elucidation to the connotation of said term?

Zero: (as a spelling bee judge, Fancy takes over) I T M A K E S T H E M B O Y S G O L O C O ~ ! ★

Source: Twitter

——————————————-

Egg: You can tell a story is written by an only child when they write siblings calling each other “bro” or “sis”. It’s so unrealistic! Isn’t that right, Wet Sock?

Wet Sock: (angrily) Get out of my room before I grind you into birdseed and feed you to your own birds, you living disappointment!

Egg: (unfazed) See?

Source: Tumblr

——————————————–

So, how’d I do? Did I get your character right? Hope you like these quotes! And trust me, there are more batches that I’m cooking up for the next couple of weeks! Tune in next time, where I will have a freshly baked batch of “Papa Fusion’s Anon-Correct Quotes”! In the meantime, peace out and enjoy this week’s edition!

-Fusion Anon

——————————————–

Can confirm, siblings do not call each other “bro” and “sis,” my sisters and I don’t even address each other half the time, we just start talking lol

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destieldrabblesdaily · 5 years

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hello there (ﾉ◕ヮ◕)ﾉ*:･ﾟ✧ I'm pretty new to destiel and just found your blog because I wanted to look into some fanfics and someone recommended & turns that you have like a billion one shots for destiel! love your writing style but, I'm not sure where to start in your drabbles tag because it's soooo much (ﾟдﾟ) can u maybe point me to some popular ones or some that you preferred writing or something like that to get me started? thank you anyway (ʘ‿ʘ)ノ✿

Hey friend!

Ahh, I totally get you. :p A billion is a bit ambitious, but with like 400 stories in one tag and no way to sort, it might get tricky. *sweats nervously for not having a better tagging system*

But anyway, you rock for finding my blog and liking my style, so here is a little something to help you out! For starters, a lot of my stories are also on AO3, which is still a realm of chaos, but is a hell of a lot easier to navigate than my tumblr tag.

Anyway, here is a little map to get you started, sorted by my most popular Destiel fics (according to AO3), and ones I personally just loved writing!

—

Canon!Verse fics, most popular:

1) CursedTeam Free Will is hunting a witch, but before she dies she turns Cas into a kitten. They can’t find a cure, and after two weeks everyone is losing hope. One night when Cas is sleeping on Dean’s chest, the curse fades and he turns into himself again. As Dean’s luck would have it, Sam walks into the living room seeing Dean sprawled out on the couch with a very naked Castiel on top of him.

2) JealousyWhen Dean, Sam and Castiel are having a drink at a bar after a hunt, Dean finds Cas flirting with a guy, and suddenly realizes something about his own feelings for the angel…

3) Dream A Little DreamCastiel goes after a Djinn but gets captured, and of course his dream world is all about Dean and him being happy together, so he’s very disappointed when Dean and Sam save him and he wakes up…

4) With A Little Help From My FriendDean is really nervous about finally telling Castiel how he feels, so he practices over Skype with Charlie. Naturally, Cas chooses that exact moment to drop by, and ends up hearing the whole thing…

5) WhiteboardFor a while now, there has been a whiteboard in Dean’s room. When failing to say the words out loud, there’s always the option to write them down. So that’s exactly what Castiel suggests, and Dean humors him, the two of them finding new ways to understand and forgive each other by working through some issues from both the present and the past.

—

Soulmate AU’s, most popular:

1) What Can’t Be SeenSoulmate AU where you first see color after eye contact: Cas is a famous best selling author and he’s promoting his book, so he’s talking to a crowd of people and suddenly his world is in color, and a lot of his fans pretend to be his soulmate. A Cinderella type situation ensues.

2) The PendantAU where instead of a tattoo/name everyone’s born with a pendant/charm necklace that matches their soulmate’s. Dean walks into their bathroom thinking it’s empty, but there’s Cas taking off his shirt to take a shower and Dean sees his necklace (that matches Dean’s, obviously) and freaks out (because Dean is totally 100% NOT gay at all). Bonus if Cas already knows.

3) Daffodils & Forget-Me-NotsSoulmate AU where when you write something on your skin with pen/marker/whatever the hell you want, it will show up on your soulmate’s skin as well.

—

High School AU’s, most popular:

1) No HomoFor the prompt: ‘I wasn’t gay, but then I kissed you in front of some homophobes to piss them off, and turns out I might be kinda gay for you after all’. In which a kiss makes Dean realize that he has feelings for his best friend.

2) This Game We PlayDean and Castiel have been best friends since they were little, and sleepovers are a common event. They’ve always loved playing the game where they draw out letters on each others backs and try to guess what the other is writing. Even though sixteen seems to be a bit too old to still play the game, Castiel uses it as a chance to silently confess something that he’s been wanting to share with Dean for a long time.

3) Camping and CuddlesDean and Castiel have been best friends since forever, and they decide to go on a camping trip to celebrate graduating high school. When it starts raining and Cas’ tent turns out to have a huge hole in it, the boys are forced to share Dean’s tent, and things heat up.

4) The CallCastiel accidentally butt dials his best friend Dean, and Dean overhears a conversation that wasn’t meant for his ears. Or: the one in which Dean finds out that his best friend has feelings for him.

5) Practice Makes Perfect‘It’s not gay if it’s practice, but shit that was actually really nice wanna practice some more?’ Or, the one in which Dean offers to help his best friend Cas improve his kissing skills, until it’s no longer just ‘practice’.

(If you are particularly into High School AU’s, I also made a complete list of al my HS AU’s that you can find here –> Click!

—

College/Roommate AU’s, most popular:

1) What It MeansDean’s roommate and best friend Castiel always says ‘I love you’ to him every night before they go to sleep. Seeing as Dean has some serious feelings for his friend, he can’t take the confusion any longer and one night asks Cas what it means when he says ‘I love you’.

2) If At First You Don’t SucceedFor the prompt: “Wait, did you just flirt with me?“ “Have been for the past year, but thanks for noticing.

”Dean has a huge crush on his friend Castiel, with whom he also shares an apartment. When he decides that he finally wants to woo Cas, everything that could possibly go wrong, does indeed go wrong.

3) UnbrokenDean’s best friend and roommate Castiel is asexual, and it’s causing Cas a lot of trouble when it comes to dating. Cas feels broken, but Dean deeply disagrees; he’d be with Cas in a heartbeat, if only Cas would see him as more than a friend…

4) Safe And SoundFor the prompt: ‘College!AU where Dean and Cas are roommates and one of them is afraid of thunder, so naturally they have to huddle/cuddle together until the storm is over.’

5) Hot & ColdDean and his best friend Castiel get stuck in the middle of nowhere when the Impala’s engine gives up on them. A snowstorm is raging, and it seems that the only way to keep warm is a method that sounds a lot like ‘naked cuddling’. Not that Dean is complaining.

—

Blind/Deaf AU’s, most popular:

1) Through Your EyesDean’s best friend Castiel is blind, which is why Cas loves it whenever Dean describes the things as he sees them. When Castiel gets curious and wants more details about Dean’s looks, Dean is reluctant to go into detail about them. Castiel’s solution is simple, and demands nothing more than a gentle touch.

2) At First SightDean has been blind since he was four years old, but at 18 years old he regains his sight through special surgery. This also means that he will finally be able to actually see his boyfriend Castiel for the first time. Castiel is excited, but at the same time utterly terrified that Dean won’t approve of his looks…

3) MisunderstandingsWhen the handsome new student Castiel Novak arrives at Lawrence High, Dean has every intention of making him feel welcome. However, Castiel seems to ignore Dean whenever Dean tries to talk to him…

4) DeliciousImagine your OTP, based on this text post: ‘Okay, so I’m a waitress at this restaurant that’s open really late and it’s nearly 1am and this family comes in and I’m so tired that I handed their BLIND SON a menu and he’s like “ah… thank you… I’ll just… read this” in a serious voice and I fucking snorted.'With blind!Dean and waiter!Cas.

—

Personal favorites to write:

1) Her Favorite Love StoryThe story of Dean and Castiel as seen through Mary Winchester’s eyes; AKA how she witnesses her oldest son fall in love with his best friend.

2) The MatchmakerBased on this prompt: “My cat keeps breaking into your apartment next to mine, so I tied a note to its collar to apologize, and you write back. We keep exchanging cat notes, and you turn out to be pretty cute.”

3) WingsWhen ten year old Dean Winchester and his family move to a new town, he becomes best friends with the boy next door, who happens to be an actual angel. Dean is fascinated with Castiel’s wings from the start, however when they get older, Cas suddenly starts hiding them and no longer wants Dean to groom them for him.

4) BlackboardsFor the prompt: 'Dean and Cas are both high school teachers, and they leave each other cute notes on each others’ black boards.’

5) To Date a DickCas is out on a date with a complete and utter asshole in a really nice restaurant, and Dean is their waiter who feels the need to intervene.

6) Angel Grace (2 Parts)Dean Winchester loves going to conventions to meet the cast of his favorite TV show 'Angel Grace’. Aside from being good at his job, lead actor Castiel Novak is charming, handsome, and has a heart of gold. Like many fans, Dean has a serious crush on the guy. However after meeting Castiel several times, it’s starting to look like Dean’s crush isn’t as one sided as Dean had always assumed it was.

—

Holiday Specials:

❄ Destiel Drabbles: December/Christmas Edition Fluffy Christmas-themed Destiel stories to warm the cockles of your heart during the cold December days!

❄ All I Want For ChristmasDuring a big family get together, a drunk Castiel starts singing ‘All I Want For Christmas Is You’ to his best friend Dean while the whole family watches.

🕷Destiel Drabbles: Halloween EditionSome fluffy Halloween themed Destiel drabbles. Happy Halloween!

🕷Kiss Or TreatCastiel has been dutifully handing out Halloween candy all night, entertaining the many kids ringing the Novak house’s doorbell, but he’s in for a big surprise when the bell rings once more and it’s his crush Dean Winchester suddenly standing there on his front porch…

🕷Of Holding Hands and Haunted HousesFor the prompt: 'You’re scared of haunted houses and Halloween attractions, and I don’t even know you but your friends left you behind (what dicks) so I’m gonna hold your hand and get you through this, alright?’

♥Valentine’s DayFor the prompt: 'Cas anonymously sending Dean one of those school Valentine’s Day flowers with a little personalized note, thinking that someone as popular as Dean won’t notice his message anyway because he gets so many. Little does he know that Dean sent one to him as well…’

—

If you feel like reading a multi-chapter Destiel fic, I wrote one of those as well:

Fortune CookiesDean and his best friend Jo own a bakery together. When a salesman named Crowley visits Dean to make a deal, Dean has no idea of the consequences, and his world turns upside down when an actual angel literally crashes into his life. For the first time in his thirty-year-existence, Dean is overwhelmed by real companionship, wings, and most of all… love.

—

Or for easily reading and clicking through short fluffy (mostly canon!verse) Destiel stories, go here:

~ 100 Days of Destiel Drabbles ~

Or here:

~ 30 Days of Destiel Drabbles ~

—

Hope this was helpful, and happy reading! :D (I really need to become a better tagger, ahum. :p)

#Anonymous #replies for ts #destiel #deancas #fic rec #sort of #long post for ts

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watchingninjago-archive · 5 years

Text

Season 2, Episode 3 - Double Trouble

my mouse fuCKING D IED

[21:21] let’s go on then!

[21:13] back in that asshole’s dojo and Lloyd’s learning to control his powers! This time it’s electricity and it’s being focused into a lightbulb. It’s not going too well though

[20:59] It’s gonna be that he blows the bulb up huh

[20:55] Called it!

[20:47] And…. he’s done this a lot, which means that his progress is just going to be a bit of a steep climb, huh

[20:40] Lloyd. Lloyd, Cole gave you the broom to clean up not to whack the punching bags with, Lloyd,

[20:09] I hear that some weird love triangle stuff I predict I’ll very much hate is gonna happen but the whole Jay and Nya thing right now is still very much in my good books.

[19:52] And Lloyd’s got a letter? Okay.

[19:39] I… I’ve seen the description Netflix gave for this episode. No, they haven’t turned good :pensive:

On a sidenote, there was this post about Wu’s weird 3D mouth and I literally just realised that… that’s gonna bug me until his model is updated to exclude it huh

[19:35ish] “I love ceremonies! That means there’s going to be cake!” As someone whose enjoyment of weddings is based on the food I get which makes up mostly for the … ahem, preparation, Cole continues to be a Big Mood and if what I hear about him NOT EVEN GETTING A SEASON FOR 11+ SEASONS is true, then what the hell writers get on that

[19:07] Cut to Garmadon and his minions. They’re trying to figure out how they can use a weapon of creation to destroy.

[18:44] okay but what came first: The sound effects being used in Ninjago or Minecraft

[18:35] WHY DID YOU EVEN SUGGEST RECREATING THE DEVOURER WE WOULDN’T EVEN BE HERE IF IT DIDN’T EXIST IN THE FIRST PLACE DUDE

[18:18] I get you’re innately evil but you’re using up your crew, dude

[17:57] I love this show so much because where else can “one time a main character almost left a kid (a brat but still a KID) for dead and almost died himself because he was so desperate to prove himself that he was losing his grip” and “the main villain kicks a snakeman minion off the boat because the minion suggested making a giant ham sandwich with a weapon of mass creation” co-exist?

[17:51] I have had…. EXPERIENCES… with doubling up on the same character related to Lego. If these are evil I think I’m going to try and find the holy water. I mean, I don’t think I actually will, a: I was joking and b: what I Am Referring To is in a different universe entirely but like… you get my drift, right

[17:43] ? Are these their old uniforms?

[17:42] No, def. the new ones. Guess Wu bought doubles.

[17:28] I don’t think that’s going to work out well.

[17:16] Oh. The duplicates are just… not right

[17:01] ??? What the fuck

[16:47] Woo! Let’s go dragon-riding boys! (cut the real ninjas in case that wasn’t clear)

[16:29] Why’d you even trust a young kid to drive the dragon anyways?

[16:14] Aw! I know that the kids at Darkly are probably faking but it’s nice while it lasts.

[15:33] ??? why is the principal moving like THAT

[15:11] YUP they were faking it! how did the kids even take over the school

[15:03] ouch. that’s gotta hurt

[14:53] And they’ve woken up surrounded by teachers. Okaay.

[14:47] Welp, that’s where the adults are! Locked up in a classroom somewhere.

[14:31] Cole’s priorty being the cake is such a fucking Mood

[14:29] And now Lloyd’s being held hostage somewhere else in the school?

[14:11] What the fuck are wrong with these kids?

[14:01] And now the duplicate ninjas are out and about. Jesus christ, their reputation is gonna suck if this isn’t made clear they’re fakes to the city by the end of this.

[13:57] djdjd the old lady model is the same as the old lady teacher model at the school if I’m not wrong

[13:51] jdfjdfj

[13:45] (in unison making it all the more unnerving) “aha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha -”

[13:40] me: what an on the nose bank name. bank of ninjago-

me: wait we have a bank of melbourne. i guess i can’t judge

[13:29] Cut to Wu, cleaning up the glass (still?). Welp, the duplicates are gonna break in, huh.

[13:25] yEah

[13:21] alright when is Wu gonna catch on. I’d be freaked out already

[13:15] is Wu being genuine with acting like nothing’s up? If he’s been handed the Idiot Ball that’s gonna be annoying

[12:56] No, no, he’s caught on.

[12:24] UH OH

[12:15] Welp.

[12:08] Cut back to the school and Zane has a battering ram mode. Why the hell not?

[11:48] This isn’t going well.

[11:46] duplicate jay: m-m-m m-m-m-MM

[11:40] this is gonna be… so awkward

[11:39] iTs A wHoLe NeW mE bAbY

[11:37] nIce woRk!

[11:29] djdjdj Nya’s too into bad boys ™ to notice somethings REALLY up

[11:26] “Darkly’s School? Is that where we were?” If that’s not a dead give away I’m losing it

[11:25] oh ho ho, that’s not consensual kissing! what the fuck man

[11:20] i mean she’s into it??? but seriously what the FUCK + he stole the damn keys >:(

[11:03] that’s also illegal! don’t run the lights

[10:48] Back at the boarding school, the ninja are still stuck in the classroom turned prison.

[10:19] Zane, thank you for drawing connections and keeping the plot moving thank youu

[9:52] djjdjd just put stuff back!!!

[9:38] wait who’s tickling him ???

[9:32] WELP

[9:20] okay but Lloyd’s probably lying out of his ass. and good for him here. can’t do much tied to a chair

[9:14] ah shit that Brad kid’s caught on too

[8:57] goddammit the duplicates are here

[8:43] alright, let’s see how this goes down

[8:34] probably not well

[8:08] (sounding like it’s from the depths of audio editing hell) “nNNNIJAAAA gOOO-”

[7:50] this is how it feels to play dodgeball

[7:45] uhhh want to chill a bit, duplicate Kai?

[7:20] break! that! lightbulb!

[7:12] (slams himself down onto broken glass to cut the rope) uhhh doesn’t that… HURT

[6:41] DJDJDJD D GUESS WHAT IT’S YOU BUT NOT LADS

[6:06] but like, when the duplicates were making those god awful one liners, it was like the equivalent of like… those companies trying to be One Of The Kids but like more evil

[5:44] …. Lloyd please stand up enough to help your ambiguously defined guardian figures

[5:33] poor Lloyd he keeps getting tied to chairs

[5:10] how is the chalkboard making that much dust??? why don’t you have whiteboards??? is chalkboards one of your implements of evil???

[4:45] Taunting people into being good? Fucking powermove.

[4:14] Like i’m saying! Fucking powermove.

[3:39] “Aw, my dad is gonna be so mad!” “Yeah, join the club.” djdfdjdj

[3:28] I guess they don’t do design classes in this boardin- wait is it based on American culture because I’m from a very Aussie pov?? do you have middle school wherever it’s written??? ????

[3:21] Wait, are they dressing up as the ninja to confuse the duplicates? That’s kind of a smart move here.

[3:15] yeah!

[2:50] “Hey, it really is Ninja Day!” djdjd

[2:17] THAT IS NOT IN THE CLONE CODE. DON’T KISS THE ORIGINAL’S GIRLFRIEND I GET HIS REACTION

[2:11] fucking oof, duplicate jay

[1:43] And it’s all fine now! The duplicates are gone!

[1:20] djjddj Cole stole the entire cake

[0:39] Oh hell yeah! He got a grip on electricity! Nice one, Lloyd

#ninjago #jaime watches ninjago season 2 #double trouble

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mawichandoodles · 6 years

Text

Beloved Rival (RusAme/AmeRus fanfiction)

My super late gift for @purplepatchwork in the RusAme Secret Santa2017 exchange.

This is my first fanfic EVER. And it’s longer than expected, almost 5k words. I’m a bit nervous, but know I wrote this with all the love. Merry Christmas and Happy New Year, Patch!

I mixed prompts number 2 and 3 :

“2. Al and Ivan as two rivalling teachers whom all the students secretly ship, whether they find out about this and/or their reaction to it is optional, just go wild.“

“3. Ivan confessing feelings to Alfred while being drunk, can be human or canonverse, Alfred’s reaction is entirely up to you.”

Note: I don't know much about the school system in other countries, so I'm going with what I was used to see during my high school years. I hope it doesn't end up clashing too much with other people's idea of high school.

Note2: English is not my native language, so regardless of research and editing, there may be some errors I’m unable to detect.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

It's Friday afternoon, near the end of the Algebra class, but more importantly, it's the end of the semester. The group is only a few ticks of the clock away from winter break. The only sounds in the classroom come from numb-handed students scribbling on their notebooks, and the mellow humming of the one sitting at the old desk in the front corner.

They are writing a final essay about the content reviewed throughout the semester, what they learned, why it's important, why they liked it, and things like that. Alternatively, they could write a whole manifesto of hate to the teacher, to algebra, or the world in general, if they sowanted. The only things the teacher asked for was eight pages of text, and finished within the hundred minutes of class they had on Fridays, as designated by the group's schedule.

Raivis, sitting in the middle of the front row, looks up at the clock over the whiteboard, a drop of sweat runs down his forehead. He relaxes the grip on his pencil, cue the feel of pins and needles as he stretches his fingers.

"Five minutes," he mutters.

The teacher, seating on his desk in silence, stops humming, along with his calculation of the student's final grades.

"Five minutes!?" A voice echoes from across the room.

A collective gasp and muffled muttering fill the teacher's ears.

Raivis' sight is blocked by a towering figure standing in front of his desk. The figure leans closer, revealing the smiling face of the teacher, Ivan Braginsky.

"Are you done, Mr. Raivis?"

Chills run down the spine of the small student.

"I ju-just... two more left."

Mr. Braginsky kept smiling. He gently places a hand on Raivis' head, and looks him in the eyes.

"The clock doesn't care you're staring at it. Mind your own work, before time runs out, yes?"

Raivis bites his lower lip from the inside, and remains silent. He resumes writing his paper without looking up at the teacher again. Pleased, Mr. Braginsky pats his head and goes on to walk around the classroom, nonchalantly. He happily strokes his red and pink scarf as he walks, the part wrapped around his neck. Not one of Raivis' classmates dare turn their heads towards the teacher.

"Remember this is an optional task you can do, if you want (or need) extra points. Because I don't want failing students. This is my Christmas gift for you. That's why I will take no less than 10 pages of text, as a sign of your appreciation, yes?".

The glasses of the guy sitting left to Raivis fall off his face and on his notebook.

"You said nine!" Says, Toris, who sat in the right corner of the middle row.

"Oh, is that how you say 'eleven' in your native language?" Mr. Braginsky chuckles.

Everyone groans at Toris.

Mr. Braginsky takes the empty seat in the middle of the room, right among his students. He begins talking outloud, tapping his fingers on the desk. No one was sure if he was doing it to distract them away from the last precious minutes they had left or not. He could be testing their ability to focus, to work under pressure, he could just want to ruin their lives (as every teenager thinks about any teacher, ever). They were all too familiar with Mr. Braginsky's subtle "tests" of character. Although they share the sentiment expessed by Mr. Braginsky, they do their best to tune out his voice.

"Uff, it's getting suffocated here." He pulls on his scarf with two fingers. "Who though repurposing a storage room as a classroom was a good idea? Greedy people, trying to save money instead of making more buildings. No wonder you guys call it the 'the Rat Trap', huh?"

A rat trap indeed. Located, next to the chemistry lab, the two rooms were built together in a one-story building, separate but next to the main building for classrooms which blocked whatever sunlight could have gotten through. Thus the room tends to be low, yet suffocating at times. There was barely enough space for fifteen people, and had four 30cm x 30 cm stuck-closed windows on upper walls.

"And the other teachers said 'You should be fine, you have the smallest group'. I'm sure in the next semester, the room distribution will be a total bloodbath. Mr. Jones will fight for the same room I choose, I bet. Regardless I'll make sure we get a better place for us this spring... Yeah, I will be your teacher next year too, hehe." He continues rambling.

The echoes of the ringing bell penetrate the walls of the Rat Trap. As soon as they hear it, most people put their pencils down and start packing their belongings. Some people sight in relief, others from exhaustion. Others shake their hands in the air to relieve the numbness and someone in the back corner starts crying. Meanwhile, Mr. Braginsky gets up and returns to his desk, without sitting down.

"Time's up, turn in your papers. Leave them on my desk here. I'll have them graded by Monday, and I'll send the final grades to you all via e-mail in the evening of the same day."

No matter what face the kids are making at him, with a fatherly smile Mr. Braginsky wishes merry Christmas to each one of them as they leave. One by one, the youths place their essays on the desk, not before stapling the pages together with the teacher's stapler, as they usually did. He put it there for the students after all.

"Brother," mutters Natalya, as she stands in front of Mr. Braginsky, adjusting her white ribbon. "Thank you for your hard work."

She hands a thick bundle of pages to Mr. Braginsky. With a gesture, she insists on him receiving it with his hands, instead of leaving in on the desk. He raises an eyebrow.

"Natalya? You don't need extra points at all. You could have gone home already."

"I wrote you a letter. I don't want you to read anyone else's paper first, it must be that one, okay?"

"Merry Christmas?" Says Mr. Braginsky, patting her sister on the shoulder as she turns to leave.

And so as the teacher begins to pack his belongings too, he notices a girl with pink flowers adorning her head, sitting at the bottom left corner. It is Mei, the youngest sister of Mr. Wang, who also teaches algebra. Hoever she chose not to have a relative as her teacher.

Mr. Braginsky gives her a puzzled look and approaches her. Mei seems to be focused on her notebook, moving her pencil with meticulous dedication. A whole two minutes have passed. By the time Mei raises her head, Mr. Braginsky is sitting next to her, leaning on the desk as he stares at her work with clenched teeth, hidden by a lips-shut smile.

"Don't your eyes get tired of drawing in a place with such bad lighting?"

Mei jumps on her seat and slams her hands on the notebook.

"Mr. B.!" Mei she raises the corners of her mouth in a dubiously successful attempt to sound calm. "You're still here?"

"I am the one locking the classroom door today."

"I didn't mean to make you wait, Mr. B., I'll go home right away."

"Did you take on the final task?" He says, fingers fidgetting, focusing on Mei's small black spot near her chin, probably a pencil graphite stain.

"My grade is fine, as you told me, so I didn't write anything".

"Is it too cold outside or something? Why didn't you leave early, like your friend Lien? Maybe you like my class that much?"

Mei looks down, without moving her hands off the notebook. Several seconds of silence ensue.

"Alright, let me see it."

Mei's eyes widen. Her hands press even more on the notebook.

"But it's nothing," she stutters,

"Yes, so let me see it."

"But..."

Mei sighs, her face turns red and quietly slides her graphite-stained palms away from her work, revealing the semi-realistic unfinished image of two men, suspiciously similar to Mr. Braginsky and Mr. Jones, engaging in what looked like "adult activities". Mr. Braginsky slowly extends his arm to grab the notebook, looking Mei in the eye as if to ask for permission to take it. Mei remains silent. Mr. Braginsky then proceeds to inspect the drawing, now on his hands.

"I have to questions, Miss Wang."

An imaginary knot forms in her stomach. She closes her eyes and folds her arms around her abdomen, anticipating the scariest scolding of her life as if she was preparing to take a fist to the gut. And so she nods in silence.

"Number one: Is that Mr. Jones, tying me up with the candy cane-pattern scarf I got from my grandma?" He inquires, pointing at the goofy scarf he's wearing.

Mei nods again.

"Number two: Did you draw my nose smaller on purpose?"

Mei is unable to hold back her nervousness any longer.

"Mr. B. please the don't tell my brother about this, please don't show it to him! I'm really sorry, I'll accept my punishment but please don't-"

"Shhh Shhh... Can I keep it?" He interrupted.

"Eh?" Mei stopped cold. "Do you... actually like it?" She stuttered.

"Well, no, but I can't let you keep it, much less actually finish it."

"I'm really sorry."

Mr. Braginsky chuckled behind his hand.

"Making a fuzz about this would be a waste of time, right? Just go home and don't draw these things at school. That's my Christmas gift for you, what do you say?"

Mei placed her hand on her chest.

"So, my Christmas gift for you would be letting you keep it?"

Mr. Braginsky chokes on his own breath.

"The gift is not drawing these things at school anymore. Now go, shoo shoo." Mr. Braginsky gestures, still smiling.

"Thank you, thank you so much! Merry Christmas, Mr. B.!" Mei exclaimed. She masterfully ripped the drawing from the notebook without damaging it, handed it back to Mr. Braginsky and hurried to pack everything. She then runs away from the Rat Trap more happy than scared.

Mr. Braginsky is still in the desk next to where Mei was, staring at the confiscated drawing, with narrowed eyes and furrowed brows. The rythmic tapping of his fingers echo across the room. Soon the image blurs as his minds simply wanders off.

"But why with Mr. Jones?" He thinks out loud.

It wasn't that Mr. Jones was a man, just like himself. It was that wether in public or in private, they were seldom "nice" to one another, if ever at all. How did so many kids get the idea that they could "love" each other? He didn't understand. Did Mr. Jones say something he was not aware of? Did they do it as a form of mockery? Could it be they noticed something?

"Because I'm the best teacher ever?"

Startled and holding his breath, Mr. Braginsky folds the sheet of paper with the drawing and places it on his lap to cover it under the desk. He looks up to where the voice came, only to see Mr. Alfred F. Jones, the physics teacher. standing just past the entrance of the room, staring back at him. Mr. Braginsky exhales and shakes his arm in a dismissive "go away" kind of motion.

"Ivan, how's it going? Found anything interesting? Said Mr. Jones, with an intentional, emphasized mispronounctiation of the "I" in "Ivan" as "eye".

"Alf," Ivan greeted him, referencing the extraterrestial protagonist of the eponymous 80's sitcom. "What do you want?"

Alfred goes to Ivan's desk and casually grabs the other's suitcase.

"Do you have, like, a stapler?"

Ivan puts Mei's drawing in the pocket of his coat and returns to his desk. He yanks the suitcase away from Alfred's hands.

"Not for you. Besides, I think I ran out of staples after my kids used it just now." Ivan replied with a dry tone. "And I don't want you to lose it or break it with your clumsy gorilla hands anyway."

Alfred smirks.

"So you're admitting I'm stronger, after all?"

"Clumsy." Ivan replies, walking to the door. Alfred follows him.

"Come on, I forgot mine at home. I need to staple my student's papers!" He begs. "And some other documents too," he mutters.

Ivan stops walking and turns to Alfred.

"Show me the papers and I'll staple them myself."

"Ivan, do you really think I'm gonna break it?"

No response.

"Man, the mug incident was an accident, I'm not asshole enough to break other people's stuff on purpose."

Ivan stepps out of the Rat Trap and closes the door behind him, with Alfred still inside.

"Oh you did break something of mine and it was not just a mug," Ivan replies, making noises with the keychain as to make Alfred think he's going to really lock the door and leave.

Alfred takes a deep breath and exhales. He rubs his temples then folds his arms.

"Then will you come with me to the teacher's lounge? I left them there. I have to present some of those papers real soon. I don't have time to drive home or look for one in a store, you know. I'll treat you to lunch if you want."

Ivan opened the door slowly, only enough to poke his head inside, like a shy little kid.

"I'll help, but I'll choose the meal. I don't want cheap trash-burgers get it?."

"F-- yes!" Alfred cheers and slams the door open. He runs outside, pulling a startled Ivan from the arm.

"Hey I have to lock the door!" Ivan complains. And so Alfred freezes on the spot, almost stumbling on his feet.

"Ah yeah, I forgot. Lock the door, then. It's just that I'm really short on time."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The lingering scent of cheap coffee floats in the air within the teachers lounge. The old coffee machine emmits a buzzing sound that everyone doubts is normal but no ones cares enough to actually check. Ivan and Alfred are sitting in the worn out but strangely comfortable couch next to the teachers' lockers.

Ivan had taken off his scarf, it was neatly folded and put on the couch, next to his lap. Under the beige coat he wears a wine-red turtleneck sweater, so his neck remains covered, as usual. Alfred had rolled up his sleeves and loosened his tie for the sake of comfort.

They two of them were alone in the room as most other teachers usually tried to go home early at this time of the year. There was a small coffee table in front of the couch, where they placed a tall tower of paper sheets Alfred had been passing mini bunches of paper to Ivan, who carefully stapled them together and placed them in the opposite corner of the table. Within minutes they had picked a good rythm of work.

"So, how did your kids do this semester?" Alfred grabs the next bunch of paper sheets and hands it to Ivan after asking.

"Overall a few low grades but no failed students."

"Well my students didn't get anything lower than 80."

"In last week's meeting you complained that 'kids nowadays don't care about science,' I recall? You called them burger-flipping babies then."

"I was mad at the time," Alfred laughs. "And I meant just the neglectful ones... But okay, my kids got nothing lower than 70. There, I said it."

Alfred grabs a thick bunch of documents and sorts them out appropiately. As he inspects them he holds the documents in such a way that the contents can't be seen by Ivan. He gives the next batch to his helper and leaves the rest aside. A single sheet falls off from them and glides unceremoniously until it lands on Ivans feet. Alfred freezes. Ivan picks it up without thinking much of it until he flips the sheet and sees the other side of the page.

A drawing made with blue ink, maybe from a regular pen. The sheet has some tomato sauce stains, it seems. It features cutesy characters holding hands. A blushing, big-nosed character kisses a spectacled character on the cheek. The artstyle looks like what the quiet and mysterious school librarian would call "moe", as Ivan learned during their rare small talk. As "stylized" as the appearance of the characters is, he grimaces when he gets to figure out the character's identities and feels the earlier situation with Mei kind of repeat itself. All within the same hour.

Ivan glances at Alfred with a serious face, without saying anything, holding the cutesy drawing for Alfred to see. Alfred loosens his grip on the next batch of documents so much they fall to the floor. He immediately picks them up and rushes to take the drawing away from the other's hands.

"I confiscated that thing from a student who was not paying attention," he says after clearing his throat.

Ivan looks down on the mess of sheets on Alfred feet and notices at least three other similar drawings lying among the "normal" documents. After shaking his head from side to side, Ivan stands up and stretches his body.

"I'll get myself some coffee," he says, but when he tries to step away, his foot stumbles on the table's leg and the tower of unstapled sheets is collapses and is now everywhere. Alfred snarls and just throws the paper on his hands onto the table, blending in with the rest of the mess.

"Goddamn it, what a great help you turned out to be! Talk about clumsy!"

"It's your fault for being so disorganized!... And having weird things among important documents!"

"Weird things, you say? Well it's NOT my fault you're so delicate you get offended so easily. I bet you doodled things like this yourself when we were in high school."

"I bet you now wish I did!" Ivan raises his voice. He takes his suitcase and is about to rush out of the lounge, when Alfred talks back once more.

"Ivan."

And so he stops, but doesn't turn back to face him.

"Your stapler," Alfred says, holding the tool with a stretched arm, trying to get it to reach Ivan. Even though Ivan is not seeing, so he wouldn't know.

"It's yours now. Merry Fucking Christmas." Ivan grunts and storms out of the room.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"The asshole forgot his dumb scarf," Alfred muttered to himself. "No way in hell I'm gonna go give it back to him."

More than an hour has passed since Ivan left the teacher's lounge. Alfred is sitting alone in the couch. Four neatly organized piles of documents were placed on the small table in front of him. The stapler sits on his lap as though and he pets it as though it was a living cat. Not too ago he had finished sorting out the last batch of documents, All of them now stapled together. He leans back and beholds the result of his efforts.

The first pile of paper corresponds to his final reports on the class and its members. The second and largest one corresponds to the planned content to review in the next semester. The third one is made of student's graded homework that he couldn't return to them on time. The last one is a collection of assorted documents and other non-school-related curiousities that had found their way into Alfred's current paperwork.

Alfred reached to the fourth pile. He grabbed it hole and placed it on his lap, not before putting his new stapler aside. The pile contained old tests, some postcards, wrinkly notes about past lessons, some letters from his students from years ago, some pictures, and, who would have though, more drawings like the one that sparked the short-lived argument an hour ago.

The cutesy drawing is the sixth drawing featuring him and his coworker that he confiscated during that semester alone. The first time he caught a student drawing or writing such material he was shocked, almost traumatized, he could have said at the time. However, somewhere along the way he began to find it amusing. Now he would only confiscate material and punish the student if it was being used as a distraction during class. Otherwise he'd even joke about it and keep the students guessing. It's not like other coworkers didn't make similar jokes about them from time to time.

Of course Alfred would have never let Ivan know about that guilty pleasure of his. Not after the things he had said in the past, and has come to regret now. But more on that comes later. Now as he beholds his secret collection he wonders, why is he even keeping those dumb doodles around? In his mind, most of them look like specimens of failed human experimentation, begging for the sweet release of death. And yet...

Alfred moves the fourth pile back to the table and rests his hand on the side. His hand lands on the still folded, abandoned candy cane scarf. He slaps it away and it comes undone on the floor. Alfred sighs lets his body collapse on his side onto the couch, like a ragdoll.

His stretched arm hangs from the couch. Before he knows it, he's grabbing the scarf again. He brings it back to himself and strokes the fabric. He starts to knead it back and forth with his fingers, similar to how cats do when they find a comfortable spot for a nap. The scarf is soft and way more fluffy than its appearance would indicate.

And so Alfred digs into his pocket and takes out his cell phone to start texting.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

A brief vibration comes from Ivan's pocket on his coat. He's at a grocery store, standing in front of a stack full of small potato sacks. He's looking for ingredients for tonight's dinner. The store is very crowded. He hopes the vibration of the phone is not something important enough for him to need to call back.

Ivan takes the phone out, it's just a notification from the app store, a pending update for one of those annoying preinstalled applications that he never uses.

"I thought I turned those off." Once he places his phone back on his pocked, he puts a potato sack in the shopping cart, next to the cabbage, the carrots, and the onions. He turns his head around, making sure there's nothing else around that he might want to take. He clutches his turtle neck, forgetting once again that he left his scarf back at the school. He had an habit of stroking it to keep his hands busy when he was nervous, anxious, or bored. Concluding the assessment of his surroundings, he moves on to the meat and fish section. It didn't take too long for him to find what he needed, but he now he has to wait in a very long queue just so he can pay for the groceries and go home.

So Ivan stands there, advancing mini steps each several minutes. All the while the speakers around the store are emit obnoxious Christmas carol remixes as dictated by modern tradition. In a way he thinks it's kind of nice. To be reminded that there are other things in life to be mad about, other than whatever spurs out of a dumb, old high school c...

"Hey, sir. Your turn for the cashier," Ivan hears someone behind him on the queue say.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Alfred locked his car and made his way through the parking lot of the mall. Both hands are hidden on the pocket of his jacket to protect them from the cold. He is whistling the Ruldolph the red-nosed reindeer song. He was interrupted when someone called him from several meters behind him.

He turned back. It was almost 5pm and the sun had begun to set a while ago. The sunset glare hurts Alfreds eyes and obscures the figure of the person standing in front of it, calling Alfred. He can't quite make out the words the other person is shouting. As he approaches the figure gets clear enough for him to figure out it's just Ivan. He's next to his car, carrying a grocery bag on each hand. Now that Ivan too, has a clearer sight of Alfred, his neutral expression changes to that of disgust.

"What the hell are you wearing?" Ivan exclaimed.

"Excuse me?" Alfred was confused.

"Don't 'excuse me'. Why the fuck are you wearing my scarf?"

"Oh, that. Welp." Alfred shrugged. "It's warm."

The two of them stood in there for the longest ten seconds ever.

"Are you gonna give it back to me or...?"

Alfred clicked his tongue.

"Of course I will." He ripped the scarf off of himself and threw it at Ivan. "Take your gay-ass scarf."

Ivan catches the garment, making sure none of it is dragged on the ground. One of the bags almost falls off, but he holds them well. He doesn't put the scarf back on. Just keeps it under his arm.

"That says more about you than about me." He replies.

Alfred lowers his head, awkwardly scratches the back of his neck.

"Whatever. So uh, lunch is like, cancelled, I guess? Is dinner ok?"

"I'll cook dinner at home." Ivan says. he taps his foot as he waits for Alfred to leave. Now that he got back his personal property he can carry on with his evening.

"What are you gonna make?" Alfred is still there.

"Shchi."

Alfred squints, lips curled a little bit.

"It's cabbage soup, you uncultured swine."

"Eeew. You know, my pal's restaurant serves the best lasagna ever. He's from Italy, you know."

"Thanks, I know. I'll take my sisters there sometime soon."

Ivan opens his car. He shoves the grocery bags in the front passenger seat and gets inside.

"Okay then why the hell did you shout at me from across the damn parking lot if you are gonna be like this?" Alfred yells from the side of the car, knocking on the front glass.

Ivan lowers his window.

"I just wanted my scarf. Saw a red-pink dot in the distance. I more-less knew it was you. Wondered if you carried it with you, but didn't think you'd be actually wearing it. I may be messed up, but you're a total creep. Just go away."

Ivan turns the keys. The engine sounds like it's going to start but then dies off. Both men's eyes widen and turn their heads to the front of the car. Ivan tries to start the engine again to no avail. Alfred folds his arms, expectant, until Ivan gives up on the tenth failed attempt. Defeated, Ivan leans on the steering wheel, his head presses the honk button. Some bystanders a few cars away begin to direct their attention towards them, but Ivan doesn't care. Alfred leans on the car, laughing histerically.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ "This is the kind of day that makes me regret being born." Ivan says as he chops fresh cabbage. The knife gets closer the fingers of his other hand and pokes the side of the thumb. Unsurprised, he leaves the knife and opens the nearest drawer to look for a band-aid.

"Look at it in a different way," says Alfred, who's turned back from him. "You got your scarf back, we managed to take your car for repair so you can have it back within the weekend. You don't need to drive to work for now anyway."

Alfred sniffs and grunts, trying to hold back the tears. "I even gave you a ride back to here, which is an hour away from where we were." He puts aside the onions he's chopping and rushes to get a napkin.

"I even volunteered to chop the onions you ungrateful piece of shit." He wipes his nose so the swearing gets muffled at the end.

"No one asked you to stay for dinner either." Ivan puts on a band-aid and resumes his tasks. "Besides, kids who complain about chores don't get dessert, you know," he jokes. He acknowledges Alfred has a point, though. His mood begins to lighten up.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

After a while they managed to cook a decent cabbage soup. Alfred didn’t waste the opportunity to mock Ivan for eating "grandpa food", despite getting a second helping himself. Alfred was supposed to leave not long after dinner, but a couple of cookies and cups of sbiten later, the two of them are at Ivan's rooftop, simply chatting, gazing the sky at midnight. The roof was slightly angled, with blue flat roof tiles. And a thin layer of snow covered the surface, but none of that bothered them. It was also a one-story house, so they were not quite worried about falling off.

Alfred lies on his back. His arms are folded behind his head as a pillow. Sitting next to him is Ivan, hugging his knees with one arm, and hugging a two thirds-empty bottle of vodka with the other. Ivan tries to lie down on his back too, but is encumbered by another empty bottle behind him. He pushes it away with his free hand. When trying to lie down again. His head lands on the bottle, but he's a bit too drunk to care, he just stays like that. That's going to be his pillow. It is to be noted that while there are two open bottles, Alfred has abstained from taking a sip, knowing that he'll eventually have to drive home.

"You know, I kinda regret not studying Astronomy at all in university," Ivan said, biting the tip of the bottle. In the end he had gone for Computer Science.

"Me too," Alfred replied. "But a degree on Engineering for me wasn't bad at all. Not like I'm doing much with it, though."

Ivan reaches to Alfred and pulls his sleeve slightly to get his attention.

"Your telescope still works?"

"Pfft, that thing's been broken for years," Alfred replies. "I never got rid of it, though. I've been saying I'm 'fixing' it for years, but it's just gathering dust in my basement."

"Why cling onto old stuff, though." Ivan takes a sip of Vodka.

"It's not old stuff until it becomes irrelevant, right?" Alfred turns his body on its side to face Ivan. His head rests on one hand. "We still love space and stuff. Hell, we are gazing at it right now!"

"Yeah, even the other club members called us weird." Ivan gulps down the remaining contents of the bottle. "If you want, I could help you clean your basement after I leave the town."

"Oh that'd be... Wait what?" with furrowed brows, Alfred's eyes widen.

"What?" Ivan doesn't understand the reaction.

"What did you say?"

"I'd help you throw the trash." Ivan shruggs.

"What do you mean you're gonna move out of town?" Alfred drags his own body closer to Ivan.

"I'm thinking of it." Ivan plays with his hair, dodges his gaze. He clasps both hands together, doesn’t elaborate further.

"And your job?"

"Teaching has always been part-time stuff. I'm more established as a programmer now. I'm just waiting for a reply from any of the places I applied into."

"What the- Why didn't you tell me about it?"

Ivan turns his back on Alfred. He hugs the empty bottle of vodka like a teddy bear.

"That matters because...?"

"Then just... why?"

"I really want to get rid of the old stuff myself." Ivan replies with a hand his chest. "You know what I mean?"

Alfred stops making questions. He lies on his back again and sights. His breath is visible in the warm vapor escaping his mouth. His glasses become foggy so he takes them out. And so he finally notices that there's no moon to be seen anywhere in the firmament. But the stars were still there, still, beautful, The location of Ivan's home near the countryside made the precious stars even more visible on the darker environment. Even if visible, a full moon would not outshine them that night. He can almost hear them twinkle, if such a thing existed outside of cartoon sound effects. He turns to Ivan. He is seeing them too. They are reflected on his irises.

Alfred hadn't paid as much attention to space and the stars as he'd have liked after he started university. Even less so after his telescope broke down. It was the telescope Ivan gave him for his birthday, when they were on their high school's Astronomy club. Meeting Ivan again as a teacher in the same school gave both of them a chance to get back to those interests, after having to push them aside in favor of their new duties and obligations.

Though that came only recently. Right now they can to tolerate each other, yet at the time of their first encounter as teachers, after separation during university, Ivan wanted nothing to do with him. It was like their time as two territorial chimps posing as teenage nerds was the only relationship they ever had. As if they had never managed to become best friends before they had to part ways. And it was all his fault, he thought; for as early as that reencounter Alfred realized that just like the stars, Ivan too had become inaccessible after he smashed the telescope with his baseball bat.

"Dude, maybe you should go to bed, you know," Alfred sat up. "I should go home too, I guess."

"I'm not done with this vodka." Ivan declared, lifiting the bottle with force.

Alfred slaps the bottle out of Ivan's hands and it falls off the rooftop. The shrill sound of glass shattering offscreen leaves the state of the ground by the house's entrance to be imagined. Ivan glares at Alfred, a few veins seem to be popping out.

"It was empty anyway. Come on big boy, you drunk."

A grmbly Ivan lifts his arm towards Alfred. Alfred takes his hand and helps him sit up. Ivan stands up on his own, but as soon as he starts showing signs of dizziness Alfred holds him. He makes sure Ivan gets back inside in one piece. All the while Alfred is not even trying to hide that Ivan is a bit too heavy for him. But Alfred would rather place the blame on Ivan being "fat" instead of lack of strength or exhaustion due to the time.

At some point even before they left the rooftop Ivan's body decides without telling anyone that it will stop cooperating altogether. So Alfred has to carry him all the way back to his bedroom as well. Ivan's head and arms are perched onto Alfred's shoulder and the tip of his feet are being dragged on the floor.

"What the hell Ivan? You're effin' fat."

"I'm big boned," Ivan whispers.

"Big-boned my ass!"

Panting and grouching, Alfred grouches and throws Ivan on his bed. His legs are left hanging from the edge of the bed after he falls like the potato sack he bought earlier. He giggles from the slight bouncing on the mattress

"Really? I don't want to see and find out for myself," Ivan talks back and crawls his way into the center of the bed to fit his whole body in.

"Shut up. You're the fat one here."

"Don't worry, Alf. Softer bodies are cute too." Ivan makes squeezing motions with both hands.

"You say the weirdest things when you're wasted." Chuckling, Alfred slaps Ivan's hands then hides them on his pockets.

"Who's wasted?"

"You are wasted."

Ivan shakes his head left to right. Standing next to the bed, Alfred leans close to Ivan.

"Come on, big boy, take off your shoes and go to sleep already." He says, patting the other's large chest. "Let's hope you don't wake up all hung over. I'll lock the doors well and turn off the lights, so don't worry, okay? Good night.

Alfred walks out of the room and closes the door. But Ivan keeps talking, seemingly not realizing Alfred is not there anymore.

"Say, Alfred. We didn't use to be like this. Do you still want us to remain as rivals? Even now?"

The door of the room is thrown open. Alfred knows the best would have been to ignore the other's rambling and leave, but he is overcome by a an impulse even stronger than him. His excuse is that he is just making sure Ivan's really saying what he heard or that he's not asking for help for whatever reason. He just stops and keeps listening, though. He is yet to step back inside.

"When I said I regret not studying Astronomy, I meant it."

Ivan is now lying on his belly. His face rests against a pillow, so his words are muffled, but Alfred is able to make out most of what he's saying with little trouble.

"We've been so childish. And it's my fault we are like this."

Alfred is uncertain about the point Ivan is trying to get to. Maybe is just pointless drunken rambling, but he wants to listen still.

He adjusts his glasses and leans on the doorframe. Ivan turns his body again to face the window next to the bed and curls his body in a ball. Even his wide back begins to look small in Alfred eyes.

"I'm sorry for moving back to Russia instead of going for the University we wanted. I left you alone, and told you confusing, unwanted things too."

Alfred's heart becomes heavy inside his chest, his lips shut tight, curled downwards. He steps inside and returns to Ivan's side. He sits on his bed. Ivan face is still turned away from him.

"Since we met again I've been doing as you told me before I left. But it hurts, you know, going back to this after we got to become friends."

Alfred gets further in the bed and pulls Ivan's shoulder to face him. Ivan looks at him with squinty, glassy eyes. It is uncertain if alcohol is to blame for that.

"Don't touch me," Ivan whines. He languidly throws a pillow to alfred's face. "I'm sorry Alfred but what do you even want anymore? You rejected me then, but won't stop teasing me now."

"Hey Ivan I want to..."

"I don't want to like you anymore. You're too much."

Alfred's heart becomes even heavier. So much his body alone will be crushed under its weight. He allows himself to fall on top of Ivan to wrap his arms around him. His glasses fall off his face and on his hand, but he tosses them away. Ivan lifts both knees together. He wants to curl up again, but is unable to.

"I'm the one who's sorry," said Alfred.

He puts both hands on Alfred's sides, but is hesitant to return the gesture. Alfred buries his face in the gap between Ivan's neck and shoulder. Alfred's cold cheeks against the warmth of his body sends chills down Ivan's spine. The skin underneath his clothes get goosebumps. He closes his eyes.

"I shouldn't have reacted like that when you told me." Alfred muttered to the other's ear.

He clings tightly to Ivan's body. His resistance is waning, but Alfred hugs tighter and tigther as he continues.

"I was a stupid kid just like you. I was confused, and sad... and I got angry."

A knot swells inside Alfred's throat, he jitters, his arms and legs tremble, but he wouldn't stop.

"It was easier to hit you and call you disgusting and a traitor, instead of saying "goodbye" and accepting that maybe... I felt the same for you too."

Alfred's lungs run out of air after saying that. He makes a pause to breathe. Ivan doesn't respond. He opens his watery eyes to see Alfred, but everything is blurry in his eyes and hazy in his head. He can't tell if he's dreaming or not, so he too, wraps his arms tight around the other. He runs his hands back and forth on his back. He wants to confirm he's holding the real deal and not an alcohol-induced hallucination.

"Ivan, I didn't want you to leave... I don't want you to leave again now. I like you too."

And like that, the thoughts weighting down on Alfred's heart escape through the air he exhales. Ivan turns his face in and goes for a kiss. He misses and smooches the corner of the other's lips. Smiling, Alfred cups Ivan's face on one hand and joins their lips properly. And it was all great until Alfred noticed the smell and taste of Vodka and remembered that Ivan was drunk as f...

"Wait wait wait. Stop."

Alfred gets up. Suddenly he doesn't feel as heavy anymore. He picks his glasses from the floor and fixes his jacket.

"No good. Let's... try again when you're sober," He says after clearing his throat. However, Ivan was already passed out.

After realizing Ivan's done for the night, Alfred begins walking in circles around the room at a pace so fast he's almost hopping like a rabit. He feels so energized he might as well do it. He cover his mouth to muffle what would otherwise be uncontrollable squealing.

After the euphoria wears off the events that transpired moments ago sink in completely. In a single day did they just sort out years of buried feelings and childish grudges? Oh boy, no. But they sure had one hell of a start.

Now A stream of questions flooded Alfred's mind. With what had happened, does that mean they are lovers now? Will Ivan even remember what happened? If he doesn't remember, will he tell him and explain what happened? Would Ivan believe him and/or confirm his confession?

He doesn't know if he should feel happy or scared. More importantly, he's thinking whether or not he should stay over tonight. It's not like he doesn't want to go home. However, leaving a drunk person alone is always dangerous, even when they are asleep.

As carefully as he can, Alfred takes off Ivan's shoes and leaves them next to the bed. He turns Ivan's body on its side and puts him on a position to lessen the choking risk in case he gets nauseous; although so far Ivan doesn't show signs of sickness. His breath is calm and follows a normal pace too.

A bit hesitant, Alfred decides to check Ivan's pockets, only so he doesn't crush or damage anything under his weight or when rolling on bed. He takes out Ivan's phone and wallet out of his pants and leaves them on the night table. Ivan didn't seem to have anything on his jacket, but then Alfred pulls out a now wrinkly folded paper sheet. He opens it and the more he examines it the more flustered he becomes. Of all the weird erotic art of them two their students had made, that one was by far the most detailed and realistic-looking as of yet.

He could only wonder where did that thing come from. Leaving the drawing together with the other objects, Alfred goes to pull the thickest blanket he can find out of the closet and covers Ivan with it. He rushes out of the room to lock the house properly, makes a trip to the kitchen, and then returns to Ivan with a tall glass of water, just in case.

Alfred leans close to Ivan and kisses his forehead, an affectionate, loud smooch. He sits on the bed again, close to Ivan's legs. The wisest thing to do for now is to stay there and take care of his beloved rival. At least until he wakes up. Whatever comes next for them they will figure. After a day like that, It's not like he will be able to fall sleep anyway. ��

The End.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Final note:

Writing this was one hell of a ride. This is my first fanfic ever, and I'm not a very good writer when it comes to prose. But I gave it my best shot, and wrote this with lots of love. I'm sorry if the overall tone or mood is too bittersweet or if the humour is kinda sour. I also hope Ivan and Alfred’s backstory wasn’t too hard or confusing to piece totgether. I'd still say the ending is a happy one, even if there's an air of uncertainty for the future haha.

Thank you for reading and for your god-tier patience, Patch. I love your blog.

#rusame secret santa 2017 #laaaate #purplepatchwork #rusame #amerus #hetalia #aph russia #aph america #hetalia fanfic

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philomathstudies · 7 years

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Introduction: Hi! I’m Annie, I recently graduated as valedictorian of a class of almost 700, and I’m about to be a freshman at Johns Hopkins (go blue jays!!). High school was some of the best and worst moments of my life, and looking back, there are so many things that I wish I’d done and things that made me successful, so I wanted to share them! Of course, disclaimer, these tips may not apply to everyone!

(These tips generally apply to all classes, but if you have a specific subject you want tips on, I’ve taken these AP courses: european history, world history, us gov’t, macroeconomics, lang, lit, calc ab, chemistry, physics 1, physics c, environmental science, art: drawing, biology, human geography, chinese, and art history. Feel free to message me!)

College applications are a crapshoot- I can’t begin to tell you the number of incredible, brilliant people with extraordinary, international level achievements that got denied at top schools in favor of those lacking those accomplishments. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t mean those who got in don’t have qualities that earned them a spot, it just speaks to the unpredictable nature of the college application process. When deans of admission at top schools openly say they could reject all admitted students and build the same exemplary class from the waitlist, or that they have enough qualified applicants to fill 3 or 4 classes with, there’s a certain amount of luck involved. Therefore I urge all rising seniors to go into this process realizing that the odds are not in your favor. I went into the process with too much blind hope, too confident in my ability to be that lucky 1 in 10 (or less) that would gain admission, and I was sorely disappointed. So that leads me to my next tip…

Don’t do things just for your college application- Those slim acceptance rates are the exact reason I urge you not to join things solely for how good they look on a college application. It seems counterintuitive; wouldn’t they give you a better chance of acceptance? However, my point is not to dissuade you from extracurriculars, but rather to commit to ones that genuinely make you happy. As I wrote above, the process is so competitive that even international achievements may mean rejection, so don’t waste your high school experience by dedicating so much time and effort to something that you feel obligated to do.

Try everything your freshman and sophomore year- My biggest regret is not joining clubs where my passions lie simply because I was too lazy or scared of things like public speaking my freshman year. It’s much more intimidating to join as upperclassmen, and you may not be able to participate at all the levels/in all the ways people who have dedicated 3-4 years can. Even if you don’t think its for you (like debate for me because of my fear of public speaking), I urge you to expand your horizons and push yourself out of your comfort zone. Many clubs give you great opportunities to build leadership, public speaking, etc. skills and to find your passions.

Know both sides of the flashcard- I learned this tip from my organic chemistry class, and I’d never though about how useful it is. For example, if you’re memorizing polyatomic ions, it’s extremely important that you know both the formula and the name, as either version may show up on the exam. Not doing this also makes the weaknesses in your memorization evident- whenever I study vocab, I tend to glance at the side with the term and only memorize the definition. This meant that when I was given only the definitions, I couldn’t remember the word they defined, because I was so used to being given the vocab word and responding with the definition.

The first lecture of the unit is one of the most important for STEM classes- I know the beginning of the unit can often seem like the perfect time to tune out, as it goes over information you’ve previously learned or the easiest material of the topic, but it often forms the foundation for everything else in the unit. For example, the first lecture on a stoichiometry unit will probably teach you dimensional analysis, a skill integral to calculating molecular or empirical formulas, moles or grams of a substance, etc.

Buy/sell books secondhand- Everyone knows how expensive college textbooks are, but between SAT and AP prep books, and books for English, high school books can cost quite a bit of money too. Unless they redesigned the exam recently, you absolutely don’t need the newest edition of the review book, so buy from upperclassmen and then sell it to underclassmen the following year.

Learn to self study- Unless you’re really lucky, you’re guaranteed to have a teacher who doesn’t teach, teaches badly, or whose teaching style just doesn’t work for you. Personally, I find that self learning, especially if I’m struggling because resources such as textbooks and online explanations, and videos seem to contradict, really helps me understand the topic throughly. In AP bio, my teacher had us create claymation videos on the processes of cellular respiration and photosynthesis independently. It was incredibly frustrating and confusing because all the resources described the cycles in varying degrees of details, but I felt like I genuinely understood the topic, instead of having been spoon-fed the information and memorizing it. Obviously, this method isn’t very efficient for frequent use, but the key is to try to understand the material independently instead of going to the teacher the moment you hit a snag.

Keep your backpack/binders/notebooks reasonably organized- When teachers ask for homework to be passed up and you have to dig through mountains of papers in your backpack, not only is that super stressful, but a lot of teachers won’t let you turn it in after they have already collected all the papers. I was definitely guilty of being lazy and just stuffing papers, once I got them, into my backpack instead of taking a few seconds to slide them into a binder, and as a result I got 0s on lots of homework because either I couldn’t find it at the time or because everything was so messy I didn’t remember there was homework. Try to have some sort of organization system going on or at least a homework folder, because those 0s add up and can be the difference between an 89 and 90.

You’re gonna get senioritis, badly, and that’s ok- I’ve always been the type of person who did every homework assignment and was very focused on grades, so the idea that I would completely let myself ago seemed absurd to me. Don’t underestimate what senior year does to you. I can honestly count on one hand the econ worksheets that I actually turned in during senior year, and I made my first B in a grading period during the spring. I was very stressed about how awful my grades were, but unable to muster the energy to do anything about it. And you know what, it’s ok. It’s senior year, you can give yourself a break. Yes, your senior grades are still important for college applications, so don’t go from straight A’s to straight C’s, but for the most part, all the hard work is behind you. Do keep in mind that these habits may haunt you when you’re a college freshman. I haven’t started classes yet, but based on how little I studied for the math placement exam for my college, senioitis doesn’t magically end when you graduate, so don’t let it get completely out of control during the year.

Learn how to do math without a calculator- If you take either of the AP Calculuses or the SAT, you need to master this skill because there are sections of the exams that are strictly non-calculator. Beyond that, when you get to calculus, you’ll be introduced to complicated concepts, where not being able to multiply by hand will drag you down.

Keep old notes- Not only for finals, but some topics are very interdisciplinary, like biochemistry, so it’s very important that you have a working knowledge of both biology and chemistry. As you take advanced classes, such as for me, taking physics c after physics 1, it will be assumed that you have completely mastered the basics, and they will be skipped or referenced very quickly. It is very useful to look at notes on the basics, which provide the foundation for the advanced material you learn.

Invest in a whiteboard- Whenever I was learning about processes or cycles, from the Krebs cycle to organic chemistry mechanisms, it was really useful to practice drawing the steps over and over again. Then when it came to the test, I could do a brain dump and draw out the information as a reference.

Understand formulas instead of blindly memorizing- This basically has physics and calculus written all over it. In physics, you should be given formula charts during exams, and in any case, something like F=ma isn’t terribly hard to memorize. The problem comes when there are a multitude of formulas that are derived from one of the fundamental equations. Of course, deriving from scratch each time is incredibly tedious, but I want to dissuade you from simply memorizing it or storing it on your calculator, because that means you probably don’t understand the physics behind it. What makes physics so difficult and different from any other subject you’ve taken is that every problem will have a slightly different scenario that tests your understanding of the physics behind it.

Use all the time given to you during tests- I know I hate looking back through my test because I just get so bored halfway through, but missing points because of silly mistakes is honestly the most frustrating thing ever when you had plenty of time to check. Depending on if I have time, I like to cover my original work and resolve the question. If checking answers is not your thing, try slowing now when you first see each question, and checking your work briefly each step.

Form study groups- Talking about something, especially teaching it to someone, always helped me remember something so much better than reading it on paper. It’s also so important to have second interpretations of the information you’re studying to ensure that you don’t make a huge misconception.

AP students: released/practice exams are your best friend- Obviously, they’re the best resources for studying for the AP exam, but they’re also a great tool for a hint at what your teacher’s tests may look like. AP teachers have access to tons of College Board material and will often use questions directly from old exams.

If you start getting confused during a lecture- Many times this is because I didn’t pay attention during the very beginning, so I’m missing that important foundation I talked about in the previous tip. Of course, I typically wouldn’t recommend doing things other than listening to what is currently being taught, but in this case, I would just get more confused and it’s a waste of time. So I discretely go back to my previous notes and focus on understanding them.

The most stressful part of schoolwork is just thinking about your assignments- There’s always specific period of time that threatens to kill me- a week where I had two competitions simultaneously, in cities 3 hours apart. When you’re taking 7 AP classes at the same time, just reading over your to-do list will make you want to cry. Even on a normal day, as I go to classes throughout the day and my list of homework gets longer and longer, it makes me so stressed to where I’m planning out how to finish everything and I’m no longer listening in class. It overwhelmed me so much that I just wanted to take a nap and avoid school. But every single time, stressing about the work I have is 1000x worse than sitting down and actually going through each task. I find that what had seemed impossible before was very doable, and many times I even finished early enough to relax before bed. Keep a positive mindset, don’t underestimate your abilities, and have the discipline to start working immediately on the hardest days, and you’ll be fine. Of course, this doesn’t mean that the workload that is able to be handled by one person can work for another, and things like mental illnesses are things I have no experience in, so this is definitely just something that worked for me and is not applicable to everyone.

Best of luck with high school! If you have any questions, feel free to send me an ask!

My AP World masterpost

Asks I’ve answered about school

#studyblr #studyspo #studyquill #heysareena #tbhstudying #elkstudies #academiix #eruditekid #etudiance #studybuzz #p #acadmia

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mariafaustina · 3 years

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Whiteboard Video As Part of Your Marketing Strategy

Although a visual informercial kind of explaining video that might describe any product or company is, in most cases, the most effective one, that does not mean that every whiteboard video is going to be the same. It really depends upon your exact purpose, your message, and the merchandise or service that you wish to convey. One good thing about using this sort of video for your corporate purposes is that it is often interactive, meaning that you can ask questions or provide answers through the use of visual aids. It is also a great tool for providing company information and even training sessions, especially for those who prefer to present information visually rather than verbally. However, all of these are excellent reasons to make sure that you have chosen the right video for your needs, because if not you could find yourself with something that not only doesn't work well, but will also probably drive your employees away as well!

One of the most important things that you need to keep in mind whenever you're looking for a whiteboard video provider is that you'll want a provider that has a wide variety of options, both in terms of animation styles and in terms of the actual video content itself. There's nothing more annoying than trying to understand a complex whiteboard video when you are distracted by something else, so make sure that whichever firm you go with has a wide variety of options up their sleeve. A good place to begin your search for such a provider would be by going online, specifically to sites that cater specifically to the business of creating and airing visual explainers. You can also go to the websites for particular industries, which typically have lists of companies that offer these services. You can then browse through these lists to determine the most competent whiteboard animation company that you're comfortable with working with.

Of course, having a quality whiteboard animation whiteboard video script will also go a long way towards ensuring that your presentation is as effective as possible. In the end, you'll want your audience to be engaged, not bored. If the whiteboard video is boring, they will simply sit there, unmoving, and not do much at all. The process of making an engaging presentation is easier when you have an engaging script to work with.

Good whiteboard video scripts can tell a great story, so make sure that you find one that tells a compelling story. Your script should follow the basic structure of a story, beginning with a high conflict, climaxing with a resolution, and a conclusion that ties everything together neatly. Of course, you should always take the time to thoroughly read through your storyboard animation script before you go to film. This will ensure that you don't miss any important aspects of the script, as well as allowing you to make any necessary changes before you begin shooting.

Whiteboard animation can also be created using storyboards using sketches, instead of storyboards. Sketching whiteboard videos is a very easy process, as you just need to have a drawing hand and the ability to express yourself on paper. To draw a sketch of your subject, simply turn your computer monitor (or an old notebook that can be switched on with a mouse) into a paper drawing program like sketch pad or Paint Shop Pro, then use the drawing hand to draw and color your subject's head, torso, arms, legs and torso. If you want to make a 3D impression of your subject, you can use a special software program for creating reflections. You can also add special effects by playing with the contrast, lightness and darkness of your sketches, or by cropping or editing existing photographs. There are also many software programs available to help create 3D graphics.

You can use whiteboard animations for a wide variety of things, such as showing visitors where to park on the first floor of a building, or showing employees how to use a machine. These videos can be a great teaching tool for businesses to promote themselves to employees, or they can be used for fun. Some people are passionate about using visuals, while others aren't as talented as you might hope. In either case, it's good to know that there are people who are willing to make these videos for you online at affordable prices.

One of the advantages of whiteboard animation video is that the process is easy to follow and doesn't have a particularly steep learning curve. You don't need to have a high school diploma in screenwriting to learn how to write scripts that use animation in your productions. In fact, you'll probably find that most of the steps are self-explanatory, especially if you're familiar with basic storyboard and voiceover formats. If not, you'll find that there are many easy-to-understand video tutorials on the internet that will walk you through the entire process.

Perhaps the hardest part about creating whiteboard animations for your marketing strategy is that you need to be able to produce a polished final product. Fortunately, most graphics programs today come with the tools necessary to create excellent animation videos. Once you've gotten your characters in place, it should be relatively easy to put together a professional looking video, complete with music, text, and an engaging plot. As you can see, whiteboard animations can be an extremely valuable tool for your marketing strategy, as long as you know how to use them. It may even be possible to incorporate some aspects of traditional storyboards into your marketing strategy as well.

#video marketing

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creamstudiobranded · 3 years

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5 Best Explainer Videos (& How to Make Your Own)

We will cover everything there is to know about explanatory videos today, from types of explanatory videos, to video examples, to tips for making a stellar explanatory video that will jumpstart conversion rates. Ready to see why explanatory videos for any start-up company are a must-have?

Let's just start!

What is an explainer video?

Explainer videos are brief online marketing videos used to explain the product or service of your company. Explainer videos are usually placed on a landing page, the home page of your website, or a prominent product page. Some sites boast conversion rates rising by as much as 144 percent after including an explanatory video on their website. These types of videos have become extremely popular. There is no argument that online videos are wonderful assets for a company. The question is, how can you get your own video explainer?

Today we're going to look at:

The best web-based explainer videos and why they work

Why videos for explanation are good for business

The various kinds of explanatory videos you can make

How to create explanatory videos for your website

Types of videos of explainers

Live Action Explainer Videos: A non-animated promotional video that explains the product or service of your business. The Dollar Shave Club and the PooPourri videos are examples of this (see below). For businesses selling a physical product or people-oriented service, such as a restaurant or consulting group, live action clarifier videos are usually best. In your explanatory video, having flesh and blood individuals can create an emotional connection for viewers, as we are naturally drawn to other human faces. Live action, however, implies that you are stuck in the real world's limits-no magical unicorns whose enchanted horns can back up your data.

Animated Explainer Videos: The most popular form of explainer video, animation is often the preferred format for software-like software to explain services or intangible tech products. Some services include few, if any, physical objects, making it an unrealistic choice for live action. Animated explanatory videos allow for greater imagination, and when you want to make future adjustments, they are easier to edit or update.

Whiteboard Explainer Videos: A whiteboard video is an explanatory video in which the animation on a whiteboard is hand drawn and deleted. Due to its ease of operation and low cost, this video format has become popular, making it one of the cheapest forms of explanatory video to generate.

5 great explainer video examples

There are plenty of top video examples to choose from, with these types of promotional videos becoming increasingly popular. We have to show you a couple of favorites.

1. Dollar Shave Club

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You know that Dollar Shave Club is going for something edgy with their video headline, "DollarShaveClub.com - Our Blades Are F***ing Great." With this wacky video, which we also featured in our blog post about funny ads, they follow through and go all-in. What makes the video of this explanation work so well? Dollar Shave Club is really well aware of their audience, down to a tee. Their market is 20-30-something year-old men who are open to the idea of buying a steady online supply of razors. The language and humor of the video suit their ideal audience perfectly.

A great example of a well-structured explanation video is the Dollar Shave Club. They start with a brief overview of the service (get great razors for $1/month delivered to your door), introduce the problem (most blades are too expensive, have unnecessary features that jack up prices, and it's easy to forget to buy new razors), and reiterate the solution their service offers (cheap blades delivered monthly to your door).

2. PooPourri

youtube

For many of the same reasons, PooPourri is successful, Dollar Shave Club is, and it's no surprise that their styles are quite similar. You will notice that the explanatory video of PooPourri is mainly live action, but switches to some animation to show the complexities of how PooPourri works (no one wants to see a live action load dropped into a toilet). Also, at the end of the video, check out that big green button that begs to be clicked, ending with a strong call to action.

It should be noted that it would be quite difficult to match this tone of humor for your own explanatory video-most companies will be better off with more subtle humor. PooPourri is an outrageous product, so they can also be outrageous in their humor.

3. Mint

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Mint is a perfect example of why animation rather than live action is much better off for some companies. Mint uses animation to illustrate how it draws financial information from different parts of the life of a user and curates everything into one configuration. The animated clarifier video from Mint also uses screenshots of the actual product, familiarizing viewers with the design and arrangement of the product.

4. Airbnb

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Airbnb uses a cool combination of live action and animation to show the unique (and reasonably priced) experiences obtained by using Air Bnb. This explainer video does a great job of showing the perks of the Airbnb system while also explaining them verbally.

5. Spotify

youtube

To explain their digital music service, Spotify relies exclusively on fun animation and a rocking soundtrack. With fast-paced cutting, the video matches the lively music and the color scheme of the video fits perfectly with the Spotify design, so we already feel familiar with it. Not much needs to be said; Spotify is not too complicated, relying instead on a tune and a few lines of text to show that the music is all about them.

Do you have any preferred video explanatory examples that you recommend? What do you enjoy about them? Let us know in the comment section below!

How to make an explainer video

We will take you through the steps of making your own video explainer! It's not an easy task, requiring a lot of concentration and effort, but we can guarantee the work is worth it.

Step 1: Write the video script

In making a good explanatory video, the script is the most important component. Your explanatory video might have the coolest graphics and most of the world's Morgan Freeman-esque voiceover, and it wouldn't mean getting behind without a solid script.

The script is where the majority of your concentration will have to be spent. It's best if you write your own explanatory video script (even if you choose to hire a production company). You know the concerns and pain points of your target customer better than anyone else, and the video is where those concerns must be addressed. What makes your potential customers freak out? What is making them confused about your product or offer? If you haven't done some research to answer these questions yet, now is the time to consider surveying and figuring out your audience.

It is recommended that your video script explainer follow this general outline:

1. Product's overview.

2. Introduction of the issue.

3. Respond to the problem with your solution (via product or service)

4. Call to action (by clicking here, for example, sign up for our free trial!)

5. Broadcast your signals of trust (such as well-known clients, awards, write-ups, etc.)

Explainer video script best practices:

Keep it short. It is ideal for 90 seconds or less.

Your key message should be in the first 30 seconds and your value proposition. Don't keep people wondering.

Using words such as "You" and "Your”.

Use simple language not with technical terms they won't understand. Don't alienate viewers.

Keep the tone you want for your video explanation in mind. The majority of videos choose a casual, conversational tone.

Try a touch of humor. Videos tend to be more pleasant with some subtle laughs.

Step 2: Recording the voiceovers

You will need a voiceover once you have a script. A few options are:

Voices.com: There is a broad network of professional voice actors to choose from on this site.

Craigslist: Ah yes, reliable, old. On insane Craigslist, including voiceovers, you can find just about anything.

Fiverr: Yup, for only $5 on Fiverr, you can get a decent voiceover for your explanatory video! You're probably going to have to pay a bit more than that ($5 is usually the starting price, some by the second, some by the word. Chances are you're not going to be in the lowest price bracket). Even so, you aren't likely to find a cheaper voiceover anywhere.

Step 3: Explainer video production

When it comes to the actual development and production of your explanatory video, there are a number of different paths you can take. The possibilities include.

Bring Out the Pros: Some very talented professional video production companies are out there that can assist you to make a killer promotional video. If you go this path, you will have some high video explanatory costs-be prepared to shell out anywhere from $5,000 to $20,000 for a service like this. The benefit is that you will have video experts assisting you every step of the way, and it's guaranteed that your video will look great. A few more video companies to consider are Demo Duck, Wyzowl, LessFilms, Flikli, Explainly, and Studio Pigeon.

Pow Toon: Pow Toon is the way to go if you make animated explanatory videos, have no animation experience, but want to do it yourself on a budget. This animated explainer video software can be used by anyone with some fundamental computer skills. It's not likely to be a masterpiece, but it's easy to create and free to create (to start at least). They even have a series of tutorials to guide you through constructing your creation.

DIY Explainer Video with iPhone: Right, on your iPhone you can film your own explanatory video! This amazing post by Wistia is going to show you how. DIY filming is a great way for cheap explanatory videos to be created. For the editing, good choices are iMovie or Camtasia. This animation toolkit by Salsify can provide you with a ton of great animation tools and resources if you want to take on a DIY animated explainer videos.

Hire a Freelancer: Professional freelancers will have a much cheaper expense than a big production firm for high-quality video production assistance. You should be able to locate one on Craigslist or other freelance platforms quickly enough.

Crowd Sourcing: The video crowd-sourcing business. Video Brewery is one alternative you could offer a try. Send a general project summary and generate a bunch of proposals from a network of trustworthy freelancers from Video Brewery. Select one that you need, and you're on the road! Video Brewery reports that these explanatory video costs typically vary between $3,000 to $5,000.

Step 4: Music & sound effects Chances are you need some nice sound effects and music for your animated explainer video or even your live action explainer video. Any areas for tracks to rate are:

MusOpen: Providing free services for music including albums, sheet music, etc.

Free Sound: A directory of registered music excerpts and videos for Artistic Commons.

YouTube: The game king himself includes some free background music for video productions to be included.

Audio Jungle: Royalty-free audio files of sound effects, loops and more.

Audacity: This free application is not a source for audio files, it lets you build your own audio files instead.

In respect to what is or is not permissible under the license arrangement of the sound recording, note to read the fine print carefully on these pages. Others are a one-time and royalty-free cheap buy, some require attribution, etc.

Step 5: Measure the performance of your explainer video

Measure the commitment of the video and be willing to tweak the hell out the video. Through YouTube Insight, you may be able to see some strong results, but Google Analytics will carry you much further into the rabbit hole as long as you're a game to set up nifty custom event monitoring.

Imagine watching matches, breaks, how many viewers reach the mark of 30 seconds vs the mark of 60 seconds, etc. Wistia also has several good analytic monitoring solutions, and Wistia and Google Analytics can also be conveniently synchronized.

0 notes

michaelandy101-blog · 4 years

Text

5 SEO Tactics to Maximize Internal Links — Whiteboard Friday

New Post has been published on https://tiptopreview.com/5-seo-tactics-to-maximize-internal-links-whiteboard-friday/

5 SEO Tactics to Maximize Internal Links — Whiteboard Friday

Are you using internal links to their full potential? Probably not. Luckily, Cyrus is here with five tips to help you boost your internal linking strategy — and your site performance — in this brand new Whiteboard Friday.

Resources for further reading:

• Should SEOs Care About Internal Links? • Internal Linking Best Practices

Click on the whiteboard image above to open a high resolution version in a new tab!

Video Transcription

Howdy, Moz fans! Welcome to another edition of Whiteboard Friday. I’m Cyrus Shepard, and today we are talking about internal links. Specifically, five SEO tactics to maximize your internal links.

I love internal links. There are a lot of guides out there, internal link best practices — they explain everything. This is not that video. This is not that guide. Instead, I want to show you ways to maximize your internal links for maximum SEO gain, because I see a lot of people who don’t leverage their full power, and they think internal links simply aren’t as powerful.

But first, a story…

So I have some specific tactics for you to try and employ, and we’ll get into those in a second. But first, to demonstrate internal links, I want to start with a story, a story which shows some of their potential power. It’s a story of a single link here at Moz that we employed several months ago.

We have a page on Domain Authority. If you Google “Domain Authority,” it’s typically the very first result. Back in January, we added a single link to the page. We had just launched a new tool, SEO Domain Metrics, and we wanted to add a link from our existing page to our new page. So we did. The link said “Check your Domain Authority for free,” and we added it. Within weeks we saw some interesting metrics, not on the page that we linked to, but on the page that we linked from.

We also included an image on the page to draw attention to the link. Bounce rate instantly went down 33%. Why? People were clicking the link. They wanted to check their Domain Authority. Pages per session went up 33%. So when people were visiting this page, they were visiting more pages pretty much because of this link and the accompanying image.

Session duration was up 10%. So people were spending 10% more time on Moz after they visited this page. Within a few weeks, traffic to the page that we added the link to was up 42%, and it has sustained that traffic increase ever since January when we added that link. Of course, the page that we linked to we added links from all over the site.

Traffic on this page has risen exponentially, and it’s now one of the top pages on Moz, probably not all because of this link, but the cumulative efforts of many of those links. So why did that link work so well and why do we think that the link helped improve those page metrics? So here’s the thing that most people don’t get about internal links.

1. Engagement

Number one, strive for engagement. When you add internal links to your page, it gives people the opportunity to visit other relevant pages on your site, thereby improving your engagement metrics. That’s when you know that your internal links are working when you improve engagement. If you’re just adding SEO links for SEO value and there’s no engagement change, are you really adding value?

No. So you want to go after engagement. There are some technical Google reasons for this. Google has several patents that we’ve discussed over the years — reasonable surfer. There’s a patent called User Sensitive PageRank. Through these patents, Google describes how they want to count links that people actually click.

If people aren’t clicking on your links, should they really count? So Google has several processes in place to sort of measure what people are clicking or what they might click and actually pass more weight through those links. So you get help with the engagement, but you also pass more link signals through those links that people are actually clicking.

Now think about where you might be putting your internal links now. Are you putting them at the bottom of the page, like in a related post? Is anybody clicking those widget links? Maybe not, probably not. Look at the top of this post, the top of this page. I’m going to add some links about internal linking at the very top of the post. Do you think people are going to click those links?

You bet they are. There’s a good chance you’re going to click one of those links after you watch this video. Or maybe you clicked on it before you watch those videos. So we would expect those links to pass more value than adding those links further down on the page or in a widget or something like that. You can tell your internal links are working and have value when you see your engagement metrics start to move.

So that should be the number one measure or standard of if your internal links are valuable and are working for you. Pursue engagement, number one rule.

2. Extreme topical relevance

Number two tip, extreme topical relevance. Now people say, yes, you should link to topically relevant pages. I like link to extremely topically relevant pages.

So whenever I publish a new page, I look for the other pages on my site that are very topically related, and I make sure to interlink them appropriately so I can get the right rankings boost to the right pages that I want. There are other Google technical reasons for this too. We talked about reasonable surfer and user sensitive PageRank. Well, Google also has something they patented called Topical PageRank, and that means that links that are more topically relevant pass more value.

Links that are less topically relevant pass less value. You can also look at your engagement metrics to see if these links are topically relevant because people generally don’t want to click less topically relevant links. So a couple of tips for finding your most topically relevant pages on your site. For example, for Domain Authority, I might look at all the other keywords that that page ranks for in positions 2 and 10, which means they rank highly but they’re not quite number 1 and I want to boost the rankings.

I want to find other pages on my site that also rank for those keywords. So I would use a query like this, and I’ll put the code in the transcription below. I would search on my site, site to moz.com, search for my keyword “Domain Authority,” and I would exclude the page that I’m actually looking for, so:

site:moz.com domain authority -inurl:/domainauthority

Google will give me a list of other pages on my site that rank for Domain Authority, excluding this, and I know those might be good link targets to link to my page to help it rank for those terms. We have some other resources on that as well if you search around and I’ll link to:

Harnessing the Flow of Link Equity to Maximize SEO Ranking Opportunity

3. Add context

Third tip, don’t just add links, add context to your links.

One thing that a lot of people do, that I hate seeing, is when they add a link to a page, they’ll just find a piece of relevant text and they’ll add a link to it and that’s it, without adding any relevant context or anything else like that. In my experience, it’s much better if you add context around a link. Google’s freshness patents talk about the amount of change in a document.

When they just see a link, they might ignore just a simple link added. But if you add text, if you add image, if you add context around a link to help draw people’s attention to it, to help give some relevant signals to Google, that link, in my experience, is much more likely to pass value than simply adding a link and linking some existing text.

So always add context to your links.

4. Make every link unique

Number four, can you believe we’re at four out of five? Number four, make every link unique. Now a lot of people in SEO they talk about link ratio. Should you use exact match anchor text or partial match anchor text? What should your ratios be? I think that’s far too complicated.

I think much easier is just simply make every new link you add unique. Make it natural. Use natural words. I tend to avoid exact match anchor text completely. That way I get to avoid something that’s very easy to do, which is over-optimization. If you’re a new site with not a lot of authority, Google has processes in place to detect over-optimization when they think that you’re trying to manipulate your rankings.

So make every link unique. Use natural words. Don’t worry about ratios and things like that. If you follow my advice, I would generally avoid exact match anchor text on internal links. Other people may give you different advice though.

5. Trim low value links

Finally, tactic number five, you may consider trimming your low value links, and this is another technical reason.

This is a type of old PageRank sculpting. The idea is every page has a certain amount of PageRank. If you include lots and lots of links on your page, the value that Google is able to pass through each link is diminished. It’s diluted. So you sometimes may want to eliminate the low value links. So what do I mean by a low value link?

Links that are not engaging and not relevant. People are not clicking them. If they’re not engaging and they’re not relevant, there is simply no point to include them on the page if they’re not being actually helpful.

Conclusion

All right. So those are my five tips for getting the most power of your internal linking. If you have any other tips that you’d like to share with the community, we’d love to hear about them in the comments below.

Hope you enjoyed this video. Best of luck with your SEO.

Video transcription by Speechpad.com

Source link

#General

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ductrungnguyen87 · 4 years

Text

5 SEO Tactics to Maximize Internal Links — Whiteboard Friday

Posted by Cyrus-Shepard

Resources for further reading:

• Should SEOs Care About Internal Links? • Internal Linking Best Practices

Click on the whiteboard image above to open a high resolution version in a new tab!

Video Transcription

Howdy, Moz fans! Welcome to another edition of Whiteboard Friday. I'm Cyrus Shepard, and today we are talking about internal links. Specifically, five SEO tactics to maximize your internal links.

I love internal links. There are a lot of guides out there, internal link best practices — they explain everything. This is not that video. This is not that guide. Instead, I want to show you ways to maximize your internal links for maximum SEO gain, because I see a lot of people who don't leverage their full power, and they think internal links simply aren't as powerful.

But first, a story...

So I have some specific tactics for you to try and employ, and we'll get into those in a second. But first, to demonstrate internal links, I want to start with a story, a story which shows some of their potential power. It's a story of a single link here at Moz that we employed several months ago.

We have a page on Domain Authority. If you Google "Domain Authority," it's typically the very first result. Back in January, we added a single link to the page. We had just launched a new tool, SEO Domain Metrics, and we wanted to add a link from our existing page to our new page. So we did. The link said "Check your Domain Authority for free," and we added it. Within weeks we saw some interesting metrics, not on the page that we linked to, but on the page that we linked from.

Traffic on this page has risen exponentially, and it's now one of the top pages on Moz, probably not all because of this link, but the cumulative efforts of many of those links. So why did that link work so well and why do we think that the link helped improve those page metrics? So here's the thing that most people don't get about internal links.

1. Engagement

Number one, strive for engagement. When you add internal links to your page, it gives people the opportunity to visit other relevant pages on your site, thereby improving your engagement metrics. That's when you know that your internal links are working when you improve engagement. If you're just adding SEO links for SEO value and there's no engagement change, are you really adding value?

No. So you want to go after engagement. There are some technical Google reasons for this. Google has several patents that we've discussed over the years — reasonable surfer. There's a patent called User Sensitive PageRank. Through these patents, Google describes how they want to count links that people actually click.

If people aren't clicking on your links, should they really count? So Google has several processes in place to sort of measure what people are clicking or what they might click and actually pass more weight through those links. So you get help with the engagement, but you also pass more link signals through those links that people are actually clicking.

Now think about where you might be putting your internal links now. Are you putting them at the bottom of the page, like in a related post? Is anybody clicking those widget links? Maybe not, probably not. Look at the top of this post, the top of this page. I'm going to add some links about internal linking at the very top of the post. Do you think people are going to click those links?

You bet they are. There's a good chance you're going to click one of those links after you watch this video. Or maybe you clicked on it before you watch those videos. So we would expect those links to pass more value than adding those links further down on the page or in a widget or something like that. You can tell your internal links are working and have value when you see your engagement metrics start to move.

So that should be the number one measure or standard of if your internal links are valuable and are working for you. Pursue engagement, number one rule.

2. Extreme topical relevance

Number two tip, extreme topical relevance. Now people say, yes, you should link to topically relevant pages. I like link to extremely topically relevant pages.

Links that are less topically relevant pass less value. You can also look at your engagement metrics to see if these links are topically relevant because people generally don't want to click less topically relevant links. So a couple of tips for finding your most topically relevant pages on your site. For example, for Domain Authority, I might look at all the other keywords that that page ranks for in positions 2 and 10, which means they rank highly but they're not quite number 1 and I want to boost the rankings.

I want to find other pages on my site that also rank for those keywords. So I would use a query like this, and I'll put the code in the transcription below. I would search on my site, site to moz.com, search for my keyword "Domain Authority," and I would exclude the page that I'm actually looking for, so:

site:moz.com domain authority -inurl:/domainauthority

Harnessing the Flow of Link Equity to Maximize SEO Ranking Opportunity

3. Add context

Third tip, don't just add links, add context to your links.

One thing that a lot of people do, that I hate seeing, is when they add a link to a page, they'll just find a piece of relevant text and they'll add a link to it and that's it, without adding any relevant context or anything else like that. In my experience, it's much better if you add context around a link. Google's freshness patents talk about the amount of change in a document.

When they just see a link, they might ignore just a simple link added. But if you add text, if you add image, if you add context around a link to help draw people's attention to it, to help give some relevant signals to Google, that link, in my experience, is much more likely to pass value than simply adding a link and linking some existing text.

So always add context to your links.

4. Make every link unique

Number four, can you believe we're at four out of five? Number four, make every link unique. Now a lot of people in SEO they talk about link ratio. Should you use exact match anchor text or partial match anchor text? What should your ratios be? I think that's far too complicated.

I think much easier is just simply make every new link you add unique. Make it natural. Use natural words. I tend to avoid exact match anchor text completely. That way I get to avoid something that's very easy to do, which is over-optimization. If you're a new site with not a lot of authority, Google has processes in place to detect over-optimization when they think that you're trying to manipulate your rankings.

So make every link unique. Use natural words. Don't worry about ratios and things like that. If you follow my advice, I would generally avoid exact match anchor text on internal links. Other people may give you different advice though.

5. Trim low value links

Finally, tactic number five, you may consider trimming your low value links, and this is another technical reason.

This is a type of old PageRank sculpting. The idea is every page has a certain amount of PageRank. If you include lots and lots of links on your page, the value that Google is able to pass through each link is diminished. It's diluted. So you sometimes may want to eliminate the low value links. So what do I mean by a low value link?

Links that are not engaging and not relevant. People are not clicking them. If they're not engaging and they're not relevant, there is simply no point to include them on the page if they're not being actually helpful.

Conclusion

All right. So those are my five tips for getting the most power of your internal linking. If you have any other tips that you'd like to share with the community, we'd love to hear about them in the comments below.

Hope you enjoyed this video. Best of luck with your SEO.

Video transcription by Speechpad.com

Sign up for The Moz Top 10, a semimonthly mailer updating you on the top ten hottest pieces of SEO news, tips, and rad links uncovered by the Moz team. Think of it as your exclusive digest of stuff you don't have time to hunt down but want to read!

0 notes

lakelandseo · 4 years

Text

5 SEO Tactics to Maximize Internal Links — Whiteboard Friday

Posted by Cyrus-Shepard

Resources for further reading:

• Should SEOs Care About Internal Links? • Internal Linking Best Practices

Click on the whiteboard image above to open a high resolution version in a new tab!

Video Transcription

Howdy, Moz fans! Welcome to another edition of Whiteboard Friday. I'm Cyrus Shepard, and today we are talking about internal links. Specifically, five SEO tactics to maximize your internal links.

I love internal links. There are a lot of guides out there, internal link best practices — they explain everything. This is not that video. This is not that guide. Instead, I want to show you ways to maximize your internal links for maximum SEO gain, because I see a lot of people who don't leverage their full power, and they think internal links simply aren't as powerful.

But first, a story...

1. Engagement

Number one, strive for engagement. When you add internal links to your page, it gives people the opportunity to visit other relevant pages on your site, thereby improving your engagement metrics. That's when you know that your internal links are working when you improve engagement. If you're just adding SEO links for SEO value and there's no engagement change, are you really adding value?

Now think about where you might be putting your internal links now. Are you putting them at the bottom of the page, like in a related post? Is anybody clicking those widget links? Maybe not, probably not. Look at the top of this post, the top of this page. I'm going to add some links about internal linking at the very top of the post. Do you think people are going to click those links?

So that should be the number one measure or standard of if your internal links are valuable and are working for you. Pursue engagement, number one rule.

2. Extreme topical relevance

Number two tip, extreme topical relevance. Now people say, yes, you should link to topically relevant pages. I like link to extremely topically relevant pages.

site:moz.com domain authority -inurl:/domainauthority

Harnessing the Flow of Link Equity to Maximize SEO Ranking Opportunity

3. Add context

Third tip, don't just add links, add context to your links.

So always add context to your links.

4. Make every link unique

I think much easier is just simply make every new link you add unique. Make it natural. Use natural words. I tend to avoid exact match anchor text completely. That way I get to avoid something that's very easy to do, which is over-optimization. If you're a new site with not a lot of authority, Google has processes in place to detect over-optimization when they think that you're trying to manipulate your rankings.

5. Trim low value links

Finally, tactic number five, you may consider trimming your low value links, and this is another technical reason.

This is a type of old PageRank sculpting. The idea is every page has a certain amount of PageRank. If you include lots and lots of links on your page, the value that Google is able to pass through each link is diminished. It's diluted. So you sometimes may want to eliminate the low value links. So what do I mean by a low value link?

Conclusion

Hope you enjoyed this video. Best of luck with your SEO.

Video transcription by Speechpad.com

0 notes

epackingvietnam · 4 years

Text

5 SEO Tactics to Maximize Internal Links — Whiteboard Friday

Posted by Cyrus-Shepard

Resources for further reading:

• Should SEOs Care About Internal Links? • Internal Linking Best Practices

Click on the whiteboard image above to open a high resolution version in a new tab!

Video Transcription

Howdy, Moz fans! Welcome to another edition of Whiteboard Friday. I'm Cyrus Shepard, and today we are talking about internal links. Specifically, five SEO tactics to maximize your internal links.

I love internal links. There are a lot of guides out there, internal link best practices — they explain everything. This is not that video. This is not that guide. Instead, I want to show you ways to maximize your internal links for maximum SEO gain, because I see a lot of people who don't leverage their full power, and they think internal links simply aren't as powerful.

But first, a story...

1. Engagement

Number one, strive for engagement. When you add internal links to your page, it gives people the opportunity to visit other relevant pages on your site, thereby improving your engagement metrics. That's when you know that your internal links are working when you improve engagement. If you're just adding SEO links for SEO value and there's no engagement change, are you really adding value?

Now think about where you might be putting your internal links now. Are you putting them at the bottom of the page, like in a related post? Is anybody clicking those widget links? Maybe not, probably not. Look at the top of this post, the top of this page. I'm going to add some links about internal linking at the very top of the post. Do you think people are going to click those links?

So that should be the number one measure or standard of if your internal links are valuable and are working for you. Pursue engagement, number one rule.

2. Extreme topical relevance

Number two tip, extreme topical relevance. Now people say, yes, you should link to topically relevant pages. I like link to extremely topically relevant pages.

site:moz.com domain authority -inurl:/domainauthority

Harnessing the Flow of Link Equity to Maximize SEO Ranking Opportunity

3. Add context

Third tip, don't just add links, add context to your links.

So always add context to your links.

4. Make every link unique

I think much easier is just simply make every new link you add unique. Make it natural. Use natural words. I tend to avoid exact match anchor text completely. That way I get to avoid something that's very easy to do, which is over-optimization. If you're a new site with not a lot of authority, Google has processes in place to detect over-optimization when they think that you're trying to manipulate your rankings.

5. Trim low value links

Finally, tactic number five, you may consider trimming your low value links, and this is another technical reason.

This is a type of old PageRank sculpting. The idea is every page has a certain amount of PageRank. If you include lots and lots of links on your page, the value that Google is able to pass through each link is diminished. It's diluted. So you sometimes may want to eliminate the low value links. So what do I mean by a low value link?

Conclusion

Hope you enjoyed this video. Best of luck with your SEO.

Video transcription by Speechpad.com

#túi_giấy_epacking_việt_nam #túi_giấy_epacking #in_túi_giấy_giá_rẻ #in_túi_giấy #epackingvietnam #tuigiayepacking

0 notes