#a lead seed accelerator

[kajmasterclass]

#How To Manage Annoying People | Ilene Marcus Managing Annoying People with Ilene Marcus Ilene Marcus is the author of Managing Annoying P #helping Leaders and Founders use innovation to attract and keep great talent. With over 32 years in executive positions managing high-stake #from turning around a 10 #000-person social welfare agency to traveling the country for Techstars #a lead seed accelerator #facilitating groups of entrepreneurs to start and scale businesses. Ilene has faced her own emotions surviving a rare cancer at 39; a fina #and public humiliation #being fired when her boss was sent to prison for embezzlement. She knows first-hand that managing emotions matters. Her stories and advice #cringe #feel noble and ultimately change. managingpeople leadership kajmasterclass #Youtube

[reasonsforhope]

In 2022, something happened in Britain for the first time in 6,000 years. Deep in the Kent countryside, a wild European bison calf was born as part of the Wilder Blean rewilding project. The last time wild European bison roamed Britain’s landscapes was after the last Ice Age, some 10,000 years ago, so it’s no wonder the calf’s arrival caused a stir. European bison were once a common sight across most of Europe. As the largest herbivore to roam the continent, European bison could be found from France all the way to the tip of the Black Sea in the Ukraine. The fossil record tells us that European bison have been roving the continent since the end of the Paleolithic Ice Age, with the earliest fossils dating back to 9,000 BC.

Now, bison are bouncing back. They have experienced a 166-fold increase in their population in the last 50 years. And these rates of return are not solely the reserve of the mighty bison. Other wild European mammals are also making a roaring comeback, and the speed of their resurgence suggests that wider, rapid natural regeneration is possible with multiple ecological, and therefore human benefits.

From 1960 to 2016, Eurasian beaver (Castor fiber) populations have ballooned 167-fold, from just a few thousand at the start of the 20th century to over 1.2 million wild beavers today. Grey seal populations have also grown by 6,273 percent and the population of Alpine ibex has risen by 417 percent. Eurasian badger populations have doubled, while Eurasian otter populations have tripled.

While these impressive rates of recovery are not reflected across all of Europe’s 250 wild mammal species, they do provide some evidence-based hope that wild mammals can once again flourish across Europe’s diverse and varied landscapes with the right support and policies in place.

The big picture

... Over the last 50 years the fate of some wild mammals across Europe has shifted. Some populations have experienced a rapid and dramatic increase over the last half century, reversing millenia of decline and offering fresh hope that nature can recover – if it’s given the chance.

Brown bear numbers have risen by an average of 44 percent between 1960 and 2016, while the Iberian lynx has seen its population grow by 252 percent. Humpback whales have seen their numbers rise by 37 percent between 1986 to 2016, while the pine marten – a natural predator to the invasive grey squirrel – has seen its population grow by 21 percent from 1986 to 2016. Some reptile species, such as the loggerhead turtle, have seen its numbers grow by 68 percent over the last 40 years.

The most impressive bounce backs, however, are among the beaver and bison – two species that play vital roles within ecosystems. Both beaver and bison populations have seen 167-fold increases over the last 50 years. These mammals help support a rich mosaic of habitats and biodiversity. Wild bison, for instance, trample and wallow in the soil and sand to create niche habitats for plants, insects and lizards, while also playing an important role in the dispersal of seeds.

Context and background

The impressive recovery rates over the past 50 years have been possible due to a shifting cultural and economic context. Alongside this, there is a growing scientific consensus of the importance of small and large mammals for sustaining biodiversity and helping ecosystems flourish. The sheer diversity of mammals, both in terms of their morphology and their roles within ecosystems, is testimony to the functions they perform. From the tiny bumblebee bat, which weighs just two grams, to behemoth blue whales, weighing in at 150,000 kilograms, mammals really do come in all shapes and sizes.

Wild mammals play a variety of leading roles within an ecosystem, from dispersing seeds, pollinating plants and regulating insect populations, to reducing disease transmission and creating niche habitats for other species. The European bison reintroduced to Kent in the UK have already started clearing paths through undergrowth, ripping the bark off trees, and wallowing around in the mud to make space for seeds and other habitats – natural processes that humans would struggle to replicate. Bison and other large herbivores are often labelled ‘ecosystem engineers’ for this very reason – they shape and manage the land they reside on.

Some species of mammals – such as the magical beaver – are considered keystone species due to their ability to shape the ecosystems around them, creating entirely new habitats through building dams where fish, birds and all manner of species can thrive. Other mammals, like bats, act as indicators of healthy and functioning ecosystems. Between 1974 and 2016, Geoffroy’s bat populations have increased 53-fold across Europe.

Wild mammals also have a role to play in reducing the damage and destruction wrought by climate breakdown. In the temperate climate of Europe, large mammals have been proven to reduce the risk of forest and wildfires by creating gaps in vegetation through grazing and trampling. In the summer of 2022, wildfires ravaged Europe, burning the second-largest area on record. As global temperatures continue to rise, wildfires will increase in their frequency and severity. Bolstering the population of large mammals could provide a useful tool in the fight against fires alongside deep and immediate cuts to emissions...

What’s more, the grazing of wild mammals can also help retain the carbon stability of soil over long periods of time. Soil contains vast amounts of carbon – more than all plants and the atmosphere combined – which makes ensuring its stability important for both climate efforts and environmental conservation. Mammals like the alpine ibex, which have seen their numbers grow by 417 percent from 1975 to 2016, are highly effective at stabilising soil carbon within grazing ecosystems.

-via Rapid Transition Alliance, March 29, 2023

#beaver #bison #mammal #ecosystem #ecology #endangered species #europe #united kingdom #kent #wildfires #rewilding #ecosystem restoration #good news #hope #hope posting

[the-fiction-witch]

Little Bird P2

Media House Of The Dragon

Character Daemon Targaryen

Couple Daemon X Reader

Rating Smut

Part One

Y/n nodded and gently moved her hand to daemons’ tight leather trousers and began to unlace and untie slowly until they opened up and she slipped her hand down into his leather trousers her fingers stroked across his V muscles leading her hand even lower, The prince's voice grew more heavy as he spoke and his voice was thick with his desire.

"That... That's good... Keep going my little bird, please.... Don't... Don't stop my dear…”

She giggled as she softly stroked the Targaryen blonde hair that even graced him. Petting it softly and slowly half to tease him and half to fully explore him, 

"My little bird…such an innocent little thing, go on.” he growled, 

Y/n smiled and moved her hand further down pulling his cock from his trousers blushing as she revealed him and him her fingertips stroking the half-hard shaft watching as blood rushed to engorge him which caused his body to involuntarily continued to squirm in pleasure. She smiled and laid her chin on his peck to watch him and his shaft carefully to make sure she was doing it right, His eyes were heavy and tired from the excitement. His voice grew heavy to speak again and he sounded breathless from it all. 

"That... That feels good... So good…” He groaned, "My little bird... It feels too good... Please... Keep... Going."

"am I doing alright my prince?" She cooed nervous to continue 

The prince's chest heaved and his breathing remained heavy. "Mhm... You're... You're perfect... Don't stop... Please."

Y/n nodded taking a grip of him in her hand and slowly moving her wrist to pay off his many desires, Daemon was almost losing himself in the pleasure and would have almost not been able to form words as he watched his little bird, his future wife, please him for the first time, seeing her so nervous to touch him turned him on, to think he was taking something so innocent and corrupting her to give him his pleasure.

"I'm... Oh... My.... little bird..." Daemon's body began to shiver and he groaned louder as the pleasure took over. He started breathing heavily as he neared the moment that was fast approaching for him, his orgasm hit like flying his dragon into a stone wall, Daemon yelled her name in pleasure and he seemed to have collapsed in on himself on the pillow as the intense pleasure washed over him. His voice was heavy and he sounded almost tired as he spoke. "Oh god... Oh my... God. Oh my little bird... that- that was perfect..." he groaned as his seed split out across his stomach but her hand didn’t stop or even slow keeping him in this overstimulated state but he could barely choke out the need for her to stop, "My little bird, I..." Daemon could feel the pleasure building for a second time and his body began to respond in kind. The prince's breath remained heavy and he seemed to moan involuntarily as she continued. "Please... Dear little bird... Please... I" He found his words hard to get out, but he managed nonetheless. The prince's words were spoken through heavy breaths, and his breathing increased as the bird continued to tease him.

"Faster?" she asked with an innocent smile, 

He could barely even think already past the point of no return, so he nodded, "Yes... Yes... Faster... Oh..."

She nodded and continued now even faster as he asked his body completely was in another level of enjoyment something no whore. No lady. No castle girl before has ever made him feel. Still on cloud nine from his first orgasm and now on the edge of a second with no sign of her even slowing, his body began to shiver and shake as his excitement grew and grew. Y/n’s hand kept moving at it's pace and did not slow down, which was only accelerating Daemon's excitement. The prince's voice was almost non-existent now and instead he only groaned and moaned from her touch.

Daemon's body began to shake and twitch hard as his second climax was near and the bird's hand had not slowed. Daemon's breathing was heavy, and he could no longer speak. The prince was on his way to being completely overstimulated, his body was reaching it's limit. Daemon's breathing was heavy and his body was twitching and shaking. The bird was truly a master at what she was doing, because she was about to drive him over the edge. The prince sounded extremely out of breath and he spoke "I- It's... It's too much my little bird... It's so... so.. Good.."

"too much? Should I stop? I don't want to hurt you?" She began to panic

Daemon immediately shook his head and replied in a thick and rough voice that sounded even more desperate than before. "No- No... Don't stop... I need this... please... Don't stop... little bird... I... need it..."

She nodded and kissed his cheek as she continued keeping at her pace until he exploded his mind flooding with overstimulated ecstasy reaching his second orgasm in one session without even a second of break reaching highs only dragon riding could compare to in height! His back arched and he let out a loud moan of pure ecstasy and he let out a heavy sigh as he finally started to fall back to earth. Daemon's body was twitching and twitching in the aftermath, and he was completely soaked with sweat a second smaller load of his seed spurting out onto his stomach, The prince's voice was heavy with exhaustion and he could barely speak at this point.

Y/n smiled seeming to enjoy the sight of him like his but still her hand didn't stop, Daemon seemed to have regained some form of consciousness now, but he still found himself unable to speak for a short while, and all he did was moan and groan at the pleasure that was still being supplied to him. he was overwhelmed. Overstimulated. Knowing she wouldn't stop unless he stopped her so he had no choice but to make her stop

Daemon opened his eyes with the sudden realization that he needed her to stop. He looked up at her and looked like he had almost passed out. Daemon's body would not stop twitching and his breathing was still heavy. The prince's voice was weak and tired and he barely managed to speak. "Please... my dear little bird... My body cannot take much more of this... You have given me far more than I could have ever asked for..."

"but I want to make you happy" she smiled Innocently,

Daemon smiled weakly back, and spoke with a heavy voice as he tried to say words. "You have made me extremely happy... You make me so happy that I don't even think my body can take more. My little bird does not have to please me anymore, I am content."

"content? But not satisfied?" She asked keeping her hand going

He smirked at her innocence and her determination an eyebrow raised at her for a second before he knew his answer and shook his head slowly  "No... Not satisfied..."

"humm then I'll keep going until my beloved prince is satisfied"

"Oh... My beloved little bird... You are going to be the death of me..."

she giggled Innocently speeding up her hand even more now with a slightly new technique that was almost enough to drive him over the edge already.

 He was exhausted. Overstimulated. Overwhelmed. But she was determined to satisfy him no matter how much or how long it took her

Daemon's breath remained heavy as he looked back up at her and the pace she was moving her hand at. He wanted to tell her to stop, but he could barely muster up the strength to speak. The excitement was too much for him, his body began to shake involuntarily and only let out a heavy moan. 

"I like this. This is fun. I like playing with you Daemon" she giggled almost childishly

"Oh my little bird, I... Oh..." she sped her hand up again and that was it.

 He was a mess. His body reacted in a way he has never known before as he reached his third orgasm of the night without a single moment of rest the whole of his body felt pleasure like he had never known. The tiniest load spurted out onto his stomach as he reached a level of pleasure he had Never in his life felt pleasure been so intense. And it finally satisfied him!

Daemon lay there for a few seconds in a state of pure ecstasy and pleasure. His legs were twitching and his eyes were closed for the moment. The prince was exhausted and felt like he could not move, yet he was so utterly satisfied and pleased. His body was soaked with sweat and his chest heaved with heavy breathing. Daemon's voice was thick as he finally spoke again.

"My little bird... Oh my little bird... I think I've had enough. I am utterly satisfied."

"enough? Your sure?" She asked as her hand slowed

"Yes... This time... I cannot take any more little bird... You have pleasured me to Utter satisfaction..."

"yay!" She gave him a kiss and slowed to a stop giggling at the sight before her "ohh so messy" she complained looking at the state of her hand and his stomach, 

Daemon looked up at her with a tired, content smile, and he began to chuckle a little.

"It is a mess..." his voice was breathless and he was exhausted from the excitement she had supplied to him, but it was the good kind of exhaustion. 

"I've never done that before. never even seen one before" she said as she slowly took her hand away and began playing with his spilt seed between her fingers,

Daemon was actually surprised by this. He thought the way she was able to pleasure him in such a way meant that his future bride was very experienced with this sort of thing, but he had been mistaken. Daemon smiled softly and looked at the bird curiously.

"You've never touched a man in this way before?"

"no never."

He smirked, looking at her seductively, he knew of course she was a maiden but even never seeing or touching her surprised him, especially after how good she had just made him feel, "Then you did very well, little bird... You did VERY well..."

"I did?"

Daemon nodded as he spoke with a soft smile. "You did. This was incredible. Thank you... Thank you for doing this for me... I have never felt such pleasure before..."

"really! Never?"

Daemon nodded with an amused look. "No. Never. You have given me something I did not think possible... This was beyond anything I could have imagined. You satisfied me, Thank you, dear little bird."

"your welcome, I liked it. It was fun. Can I do it again?"

Daemon smiled softly and nodded his head. "Yes.. Yes, you can absolutely do it again... You can do it as many times as you'd like..."

"again... Now?"

Daemon was completely taken aback by her request and he had to make her repeat it again just to believe that she meant what she said. "Again now? Really...?"

"mhm, if you'd not to tried?" She smiled up at his overstimulated, overwhelmed, face seemingly unaware that men usually have one and then like a hour break not three non stop! And understandably he loved her enthusiasm his spirit was willing but his body was screaming for rest

#daemon targeryan #daemon x reader #daemon targaryen #daemon #daemon targeryen #daemon targeryen x reader #hotd daemon #house targaryen #house of the dragon #houseofthedragon #hotd #mattsmith #matt smith

[promisinininining]

logos operator file #3 translation for those who want to know what went down in the chair sliding tournament

Frankly, the elite team of Rhodes Island's Operators are an unapologetically weird bunch. I'm not saying that there aren't other weirdos on Rhodes Island besides them, or that their abilities are lacking in any way. As I explained, Doctor, the Elite Operators are not necessarily unparalleled powerhouses, but they are the vanguard of Rhodes Island: a group of people who have sworn to dedicate everything to their ideals, and who have managed to fulfil that oath despite the most challenging situations.

Crossing the line between life and death to embrace a more equal vision. 

As for the "weirdo" comment... Doctor, you've worked with most of them, so of course you understand. Let me add a few details: Blaze has her own critical notifications in the medical department, because she goes into shock two to three times every time she participates in high-intensity combat; Stormeye is prone to getting carried away when fighting a strong opponent and requires someone like Sharp, who lives by "never do more than one has to", to tear him away from the line of fire; Misery's dazzling dagger-juggling skills actually have nothing to do with his Originium Arts, but inspired by a bet he made with Outcast; Mechanist's motor oil foam latte art coffee does exist, and Mantra has a penchant for quietly keeping tabs on the ship's gossip...

As for Logos? Ha, I think there are plenty of people in Rhodes Island who remember that one chair sliding race. Unfortunately, Doctor, you weren't there, but as you guessed, the tournament was instigated and organised by him. They first conducted group and round-robin matches in the workshop, then moved the finals to the training ground. The night before the finals, Logos and Mechanist made some unauthorised modifications to the operator training venue. When the contestants came to the track the next day, they found that they were actually going to face a brutal obstacle course with sharp turns and steep slopes. 

Blaze was the first to be eliminated. She relied on heat to accelerate at the start, which burned the plastic on the wheels; Mechanist, who had confidently proclaimed victory before the match, was swept off the track by a trap he had placed himself on the very first U-turn; Misery was lost in thought while going at a constant pace, and ultimately failed to get out of the way in time, causing Outcast, who was leading by one lap, to rear end him... As the seeded racers were eliminated one by one, Ace came in to take on Logos and Scout in the final showdown. Just as they were rushing towards the finish line neck-to-neck, Amiya walked in, Kal'tsit following behind her. Ace immediately exited the track, but Logos and Scout apparently didn't notice the hush that fell over the crowd that had, just moments before, been cheering loudly. All in all, Logos was crowned the winner, Scout in second, and there was no third place. Under Kal'tsit's supervision, and for the first time as Rhodes Island's leader, Amiya delivered a "stern" talk to the person responsible—Logos.

You see, the Elite Operators are just a bunch of weirdos. 

Joining the ranks of these weirdos is actually much easier than most people think. Becoming an Elite Operator doesn't require going through any assessment process. You only need to be officially recognised by Amiya, and a meeting of Elite Operators. If all goes well, you will receive a gift—a strange little key which is the only thing that can open the door in the workshop. It is only after you pass through that door when you truly become an Elite Operator of Rhodes Island. 

In case you didn't know, Doctor, each key is created by Logos himself, and it can't be stolen. As such, the keys are also seen as a token by Elite Operators. Should the bearer never come back, Logos will be the first to know, and trigger them to self-destruct, leaving no residue. 

Logos, and each of the weirdos I mentioned, knew very well the price of their "ideals".

——■■■

#mis-translates #unofficial #arknights

[roguehongsami]

Velvet Crowbar | Pt. 1

—★ pairing/s: guitarist!wooyoung x fem!metalhead

—★ genre/s: smut, fluff, au

—★ synopsis: 1983. wooyoung is the lead guitarist of the local metal band, velvet crowbar. he's every parents' walking nightmare & against your better judgement, you still gave him a chance.

—★ content: age gap (18!reader x 23!wooyoung, consensual), unprotected sex (condomize), praise, late dad (mentioned), classism, abortion (insinuated).

—★ word count: 4k

—★ navigation: part 1 | part 2 | part 3 | part 4

—★ masterlist here

↻ ◁ II ▷ ↺ lana del rey // velvet crowbar

Wooyoung had seen Y/N at many house parties. With her friends, enjoying herself. Getting drunk and either mindlessly dancing on tables or aggressively headbanging to whoever. She sported a black Venom t-shirt, black leather jacket, black leggings with horizontal slits on the sides, and black Doc Martens. For weeks, he had observed her from a distance, waiting for the perfect moment to approach her.

As she weaved her way through the crowd, nearing the hallway, she turned around and caught Wooyoung's gaze. A simple wink was all he needed. She went into an empty bedroom and sat down on the bed. Wooyoung was trailing right behind her. He locked the door and stood with his back against it.

"Finally got you alone." he coaxed, a smirk dancing on his face.

"About time, you've been eyeing me for weeks." she said, jokingly.

He reached into his jean pocket and presented a blunt and a lighter. "Want?" he offered, eyebrows arching. She accepted.

He lit the blunt and after a few pulls, he gave it to Y/N. With small talk to fill the air, Wooyoung took his seat next to her on the bed. Once the blunt was finished and the butt was discarded, Y/N hoisted herself onto his lap, straddling him.

"Fuck now talk later, yeah?" she spelled. Wooyoung obliged without protest.

The makeout was heated and passionate. Her core was grinding against his growing bulge. He removed all of her top garments and laid them on the floor. His lips teased her nipples relentlessly as she moaned for more. He laid her down on the bed as he undressed himself. She slipped out of her lower garments and laid there, waiting for him. He positioned himself between her thighs and traced wet kisses from her stomach to her lips. She was already gushing at the thought of him filling her up.

His tip danced right her entrance. As he slid into her, his tongue roamed her mouth to muffle her moan. He balanced himself over her with his forearms. He slowly pulled out and slammed back in with more force. She snaked her legs around his waist and grabbed onto his shoulders. The pace slowly accelerating.

"Fuck, you're even hotter when you're under me." Wooyoung moaned almost breathless.

"You're even hotter when you're inside me." Y/N retorted.

A smug look materialised on Wooyoung's face. "Look at us, we're bonding..."

It wasn't long until they both erupted into euphoria. As Wooyoung was painting the last of his seed on her walls, with slow and steady thrusts, Y/N's high was gradually subsiding. He splattered beside her, taking in a breath or two. She knew better than to hang around Wooyoung. He was nothing but trouble, and the whole of Kialecombe knew it. She scrambled off the bed and got dressed.

"Where are you going?" he sat upright on the bed.

"Gonna look for my friends." she deadpanned.

"Well, when can I see you again?" the room fell silent as she failed to respond.

She tied her shoelaces and straightened her back. With her back turned to the bed, as she unlocked the door and was about to open it, Wooyoung was behind her. He slammed the door shut , his chest pressed against her back, still in his nude. Too scared to turn around, she remained facing the door.

"I get it. I'm the waste-of-spacer Woo that your moms warned you about." he chuckled. "'All he does is party and drink and do drugs. No future, no college education. A bum of note'." he parrotted what Kialecombe parents had said about him.

"Wooyoung, just let me go." she mumbled. She turned around to face him.

"I'm no trust fund kid like you but I still deserve respect." his voice dropping an octave lower, with a blank expression on his face. He held her chin up. "A little honestly won't kill me, sweetheart. Sex is meaningless to me, okay?"

He backed away from the door and walked back to bed, he got dressed. As she was about to close the door and leave, she said, "Detention ends at three."

In the past month and a half, Y/N and Wooyoung had hooked up more times than one can count. Everyday at 14:00, 15:00 if she sat detention, he'd pick her up from school and walk her back home. But he wouldn't leave without making out with her on her doorstep first. On weekends, they'd either go to house parties together, stay in at Wooyoung's one-bedroom apartment while they cuddled, and I use this term very loosely, on the couch and watched TV or go to the junkyard to break abandoned property.

It wasn't long until both philanderers had found themselves secretly yearning for more than. Wooyoung was upfront about his developing feelings for Y/N. It frightened her a bit considering she had never been in a relationship before. She was a risk taker at heart. So they both took the plunge to commitment and it slowly but surely came together. They knew they had something beautiful in their hands and they didn't want to squander it. Effort was exerted from both parties. There came peace with this coming-together. A peace they never knew of.

It didn't take long for news of their union to reach Y/N's mother's ears. Her mother’s friends had seen her gallivant around town with him. And hell hath no fury like Mrs. Scott disobeyed.

"Okay, my big three." Y/N turned away from the shelf with the vinyl records pressed to her chest. She handed them over to Wooyoung, who was seated on her bed.

"Okay, okay. Black Metal is an instant classic. Good girl."

A smile broke out on Y/N's face. She squealed and clapped as she jumped up and down in her spot.

"Black Sabbath, the birth of metal. Solid."

His eyebrow arched at the third vinyl in the stack. "Ace of Spades?" he cocked his head up to meet her eyes.

"I love Mötorhead." she shrugged.

"They're punk."

"They're metal, jerk!"

He broke into a laugh as he put the vinyls on the bedside table. "Why are you getting so worked up?"

She crossed her arms over her chest and huffed. "You called me a poser!"

Not seizing the laughing, he grabbed her by her bullet belt and inched her forward, then staddled her on his lap. He pressed a kiss on her forehead and coddled her, muffling chuckles.

"I'm sorry, baby. My girl is not a poser." he pecked her on the cheek. "Just shits and giggles, yeah?"

"Hurt my feelings, Woo." she whispered. "It's annoying to get called a poser when you're a girl."

"I know. I didn't mean to, okay?" he peppered kisses all over her face. "Best headbanger in Kialecombe, that's for sure."

"Yeah, you best remember that, pretty boy."

He grabbed her by the back of her neck. "Oh trust, I will." he then slammed his lips into hers. The kiss was wet and sloppy. As he had her pressed against the bed and hovering over her, he started undoing his belt buckle. Not breaking the kiss. She was undoing her belt as well. All actions were halted when they heard the downstairs door open.

"My mom's here." she whispered against his lips.

"Raincheck."

As Mrs. Scott hooked her coat against the wall, she slipped out of her heels and into her house slippers. Y/N and Wooyoung came down the stairs, with Wooyoung leading the way. He stood in front of Mrs. Scott and extended out his hand.

"Afternoon, Mrs. Scott. I'm Wooyoung, pleasure to meet you."

She stared him down and scoffed arrogantly. His hand retreated back into his jacket pocket. He slid past her and to the door, about to close it, he turned to face Y/N, who still stood at the stairs glaring at her mother.

"See you tomorrow, okay baby?"

She waved at him and gave a beaming smile, which he returned with a wink. "Bye Woo."

Wooyoung took his leave and closed the door. Silence blanketed Y/N and Mrs. Scott for a few moments. Y/N brushed past her mother and went into the kitchen to make a bowl of cereal.

"Really, Y/N?" her mother pinched the bridge of her nose. "You chose that... malcontent punk over Bradford Halliwell, from a founding family?" she exasperated as she sighed dissatisfied.

She ignored her mother as she took the warm bowl of milk out of the microwave, pouring cereal into the bowl. She spooned some, sitting on the couch and watching TV. Mrs. Scott wasn't even disappointed, to say the least, it was disgust. She had always held Wooyoung in low regards. Always dreamt of her daughter being with a good man who would put her above everything. In her eyes, Wooyoung was a disease. He was making her the worst possible version of herself. In truth, Y/N had already changed before dating Wooyoung. Mrs. Scott knew that, but she was just grasping for reasons to hate the boy.

"And what is this obsession with being goth, sweetie?" she pulled a wine bottle out of the fridge and poured some into a glass. "You look like the child of a greater evil."

"You are the greater evil." Y/N mumbled under her breath.

"What happened to that pretty yellow dress I bought for you in Italy?" she took a sip of her wine. "And what is this..." she picked up the cassette on the counter. "Iron Maiden nonsense you listen to? The Beatles are so much better."

Y/N slowly turned her head, lips pressed in a hard line. "You're being mean again."

"I'm simply saying." she sucked her teeth and sipped her wine. "What were you and that ignant fool doing in your room?"

"His name is Wooyoung. And nothing happened, I was just showing him my records."

She poured herself another glass then discarding of the empty bottle. "You used to be such a sweet girl. Dressed nice all the time, associated with all the right people at the best establishments." she rolled her eyes. "And now you're wearing- what is that?" she grimaced as she pointed at her belt. "A... belt made of bullets? What happened? When was the last time you went to the country club?" her voice getting higher with every insult.

"Dad died and you locked yourself in your room, downing bottles of do Noval." she stood from the couch and walked to the kitchen. "You left me to fend for myself when my whole world came crashing down around me."

"That's not fair. I lost my husband too." her voice calm.

"No mom, what's not fair is you having all these ridiculous expectations of me, yet failing to meet my most important one; being my mom!" she exclaimed. "Dad died! The grief was too much, I needed you."

"I'm just trying to look out for you, Y/N." Mrs. Scott shook her head disapprovingly. "That Jung boy is bad news and some. I can tell."

Y/N marched up the stairs. "Yet you can't tell when to be a mom."

Tensions at home were only worsening. Y/N and her mother could not hold a conversation for longer than two minutes before it broke into an argument. It seemed the longer Wooyoung was in the picture, the more they'd get into a spat. To make matters worse, Wooyoung was being the perfect boyfriend. Walked her home every afternoon, got her home safely after a party, helped with her math homework. He even encouraged Y/N to take art classes as an extracurricular activity.

Mrs. Scott had no leg to stand on. Despite her preconceived notions of the boy, he was quite the opposite. Y/N was slowly becoming reacquainted with her old self, and Wooyoung was holding her hand every step of the way. But it wasn't enough to change her mind. The simple fact that he wasn't from an upper class family rubbed her the wrong way and some. She wanted her daughter to be with someone who guaranteed financial freedom, and Wooyoung's offers were laughable at best.

"I am not breaking up with him!" Y/N yelled at her mother.

"You lower your voice when you speak to me, young lady." Mrs. Scott pointed her finger in Y/N's face.

She slapped her hand away. "You've been a pain in my ass since I started dating Woo!"

"He is not good for you!" she snapped. "Just a prospective freeloader with a drug problem and delusions of being a rockstar."

"You're so cruel and miserable, always talking shit about undeserving people! You sucked the life out of dad, maybe he died to get away from you!"

A loud snap echoed in the living room, the sound bouncing off the vinyl floor and acoustic wall panels. Silence befell them. Mrs. Scott's chest was heaving up and down as she tried to assuage her fury. Shock painted across Y/N's face, her breathing hitched almost catching in her throat. Her ear was ringing irritably. She cupped the side of her face that had made contact with her mother’s palm. Heat arose in the region with a stinging sensation.

[ . . . ]

The clock was a bit too bright for a half asleep Wooyoung. 01:23. He groaned as he sat up on the bed, rubbing sleep out of his eyes. A yawn broke out as he walked to the living room door. He was only in his boxer briefs and didn't care enough to cover up. When he opened the door, all the sleep he had left dissipated. Standing at his door, a tear-covered Y/N stifling sobs and sniffling, with a duffle bag on her shoulder and backpack in her hand. Her head hung low.

"Hi Woo." she sobbed.

Wooyoung pulled her into a hug and locked the door. He pressed a kiss on the top of her head. Cupping her face with his hands, wiping her tears with his thumbs. He rubbed her back as she sobbed louder into his chest. She dropped her bags and wrapped her arms tightly around his waist. He knew he wasn't going to get any answers out of her in that state.

They cuddled in bed as Wooyoung soothed her to sleep. By 02:15, she had already passed out from all her crying. He maneuvered out of bed, careful not to wake her. He undressed her, only leaving on her underwear, and slipped her into one of his sweatshirts. He got back in bed and brought her into a hug as he tried to find his own sleep.

[ . . . ]

"Thanks." she mumbled under her breath as she sipped her tea.

"How are you feeling?" he stared at her intently, studying the mark on her cheek.

She slumped into the couch, her hand covering her cheek. He bowed his head and started playing with his fingers instead.

"Like shit." she deadpanned. "Please don't make me go to school today?"

"I won't. But you'll eventually have to. I don't want you falling behind."

A few seconds of silence fell, which prompted Y/N to tell Wooyoung the truth.

"We got into a fight. I said something awful and she slapped me." she whispered, shamefully. "Probably deserved it honestly."

He took the mug out of her grasp and held her hands in his. His eyes never leaving hers. "I don't care what you said. She had no right to lay a hand on you. How long has this been happening?"

"She's never hit me before but there's been a lot of tension at home since we started dating."

"She hates me so she takes it out on you..." Wooyoung scoffed as he rolled his eyes. "Listen, you can stay here as long as you want, okay?"

A meek smile stretched across her face. "Thanks Woo. I can get a part-time job to-"

"No." he said sternly. "Absolutely not. Your only job is to go to school and do your homework."

He stood up off the couch, taking Y/N with him. He embraced her, pressing her head into his chest and leaving a kiss on the top of her head. She slumped in his hold and let out a breath she wasn't aware she was holding.

"I love you, okay?"

"I love you, Woo."

Two months had past and Y/N was still staying with Wooyoung. She had no intention of returning home, although a small part of her made her feel as if she was crowding him. On the other hand, Wooyoung had no problem with her taking up residence in his apartment. If anything, he enjoyed her company. She helped around with chores, helped him with composing new songs for Velvet Crowbar.

While he prepared dinner for them, she sat at the counter doing her Geography homework. Soft music on low volume played to fill the silence. He slid a glass of cranberry juice in front of her. She took a sip and went back to her homework.

"How's it coming along?" he leaned over the counter in front of her.

"'In no less than eight lines, explain how energy provision and labour will become major challenges that Old Western will experience in the processing of copper in the next three years?'" she met his eyes with an eyebrow arched. "Like, really now? This question is gonna be in the final exam."

"So it's not coming along."

There was a loud and heavy knock on the door, startling them both. They blinked at one another before a second, equally disturbing knock followed. Wooyoung rushed to open the door and before he could react, the door was pushed into his face. Y/N scrambled off the barstool and made distance between herself and Mrs. Scott. Her mother was wearing a black tracksuit, white runners and her hair was disheveled. Her eyes were puffy and she reeked of rum.

"You've made your point, Y/N. Come back home." Mrs. Scott stood in the living room in akimbo.

Wooyoung stood between them. "Excuse me, lady. You can't just barge in here and start calling all the shots."

Mrs. Scott stared him down like she did months ago, except with a scowl plastered on her face this time around. "You're keeping Y/N here against her will. I know my daughter, she'd never choose this..." she waved her hands, gesturing at his apartment. "over the comfort I can give her."

"If she cared about living comfortable, she would've left long ago. I'm not forcing her to stay." Wooyoung said arrogantly. "She's scared of you."

His tone rubbed Mrs. Scott the wrong way and she did not appreciate it. She stretched her hand out to reach for Y/N's arm, attempting to drag her. Y/N tried to wrestle her arm out of her grasp, but it was tight as a drum.

"You're coming home now!" she yelled as anger was bubbling within her.

"Mom, no!" Y/N cried.

Wooyoung held Mrs. Scott's wrist and gave her a deadly glare. "Let. Her. Go. Or I'm calling the cops."

She released her daughter's arm and Wooyoung let go of her wrist. He stood in front of Y/N, pushing her behind him. Y/N held onto his arm as she peaked over him. Mrs. Scott released an exasperated breath. She palmed her forehead, her eyes closed.

She pointed a finger at her daughter. "So help me Y/N, if you don't come-"

"You don't get it, do you?" Y/N spoke up. "You completely abandoned me when I needed you the most. You've made my life hell because you hate Woo. Every chance you get, you insult the way I dress, the music I listen to. You haven't even apologised for slapping me. You've been so mean to me since dad died, I wonder if you pretended to love me because he'd never let you treat me this way. Just leave, please."

Mrs. Scott stood silent, watching her daughter. She started tearing silently. Her breathing hitched. "I'm sorry that I haven't been the best m-mom since your father died." she choked. "I just don't want to lose my daughter too, and you being with Wooyoung feels like you're growing up too fast. I'm scared I'll be alone when you start your own life." she walked to the door and right before she left, she said, "Come back home when you're ready."

She closed the door behind her and Wooyoung locked the door. Y/N made her way to the bedroom to lay down, leaving Wooyoung standing idly in the living room. He continued dinner preparation. A part of him felt as though he might be coming between Y/N and Mrs. Scott, leaving him stuck between a rock and a hard place; protect her but risk driving them further apart or encourage her to go back home but potentially lose their relationship?

"You're so fucking good, baby. So good for me." Wooyoung panted as he was thrusting into her.

Her hands roamed all over his chest and abdomen, legs snaked around his waist as he pounded into her until all she could see were stars. He had one hand on the headboard and another holding the back of Y/N's knee, pressing it into his waist. He smacked her thigh and the clap resonated all over the bedroom. His hand moved from her leg to her neck, applying pressure to the sides.

"Who's girl are you?"

"I'm your girl." she moaned as both her hands squeezed his wrist.

Hand still on her neck, he pushed her head further into the pillow. "I said who's. Girl. Are. You?" he grunted as he slammed into her after each word.

"I'm Jung Wooyoung's girl!" she cried with tears freefalling down her temples. It was ecstasy and more.

"That's right, baby. You make sure every loser in town knows that. You're my girl." He lowered his head to meet her lips. His tongue roamed inside her mouth. As he pulled away, he dropped a sliver of spit in her mouth, she reached for it with her tongue.

"Such a good girl for me." he moaned into her ear. "My pretty little fuck toy is all fucked out, isn't she?" she moaned loudly in response, crying even more.

She was clenching around him. Her body was radiating immensely. A knot in her stomach began forming. Wooyoung was railing her faster, chasing his own high. Not so long after, a bile was rising in the back of her throat. She was struggling to breathe, and not because of Wooyoung's hand on her neck.

Her hands were tapping his arm incessantly. Her legs fell from his waist. "Woo, stop..." she whispered almost breathlessly. She tried kicking him off of her but his hand was still firm on her neck.

Confusion materialised on his face, slowing down his movements. "W-what?"

"Move, Woo!" she pushed him onto the bed and ran to the bathroom.

She spilled all her contents into the bowl, gagging endlessly. She flushed the toilet and sat up on the cover. Wooyoung came in in his underwear and kneeled before her, his hands rubbing her thighs.

"I knew something was off with that chicken. It smelled weird." she mumbled as she rested her head on the cold counter.

He cupped her face. "You wanna stay home from school?"

Her hand held his, giving him a small smile. "I can't. I have my Geography test today."

"I'll get you something to keep the sickness away."

[ . . . ]

There was a bit of distance between them in the bed, backs facing each other. He was far gone into slumber as she laid sleepless and awake. Her throat felt constricted and her breathing was laboured. Careful not to sniff so loud. Head throbbing, brain pounding painfully against her skull. Smeared with tears all over. Her heart was beyond broken.

"Why didn't you tell me sooner?" he ran his fingers through his hair.

"I thought it was stress from the tests and leaving home. Stress does that to you, Woo. I didn't think much of it." she waved the wand around.

"How could you let this happen?" he shouted off the top of his voice.

Her eyes widened and her mouth fell open. "Me? Last I checked, this was a two-person effort, Woo!"

He paced around the living room for a few moments. Occasionally raking his fingers through his hair and grabbing his head with both hands. Muttering curses under his breath. He turned to face her, a dead look in his eyes.

"You know we can't keep it, right?"

The room was sterile and serene, lights a blinding white. Sounds of metal clattering and weighted footsteps filling the room. Her heart was thumping loud in her ears. She laid on the bed, fingers twiddling about. Her anxiety was skyrocketing.

The nurse stroked her hair, she wore a comforting smile. "Relax. You're in good hands, sweetie." her voice was soft.

"We're going to sedate you during the procedure, so don't worry about feeling any pain." the doctor spoke as he slid his gloves on.

The nurse slid the mask over her nose. The anesthesia was slowly kicking in as she slowly drifted into unconsciousness. Her eyelids drooped.

"It will all be over soon..."

[ . . . ]

As she closed the door behind her, Mrs. Scott stood in the living room wide-eyed. Her hand over her chest, tears falling, as she took small steps to her daughter. A sense of relief had washed over her. It had been 3 months since Y/N had set foot in the house. All she wanted was for her daughter to come home and to mend their relationship, but at what cost?

"Hi mom." she mumbled. "I'm just gonna go sleep, if you don't mind."

Mrs. Scott nodded her head reassuringly. "That's okay, sweetie. Go get some rest."

.

.

.

PART 2, READ HERE.

#ateez #jung wooyoung #wooyoung smut #wooyoung fluff #roguehongsami

[dutifullynuttywitch]

Reflections on the eve of battle

Blades of Light and Shadow 2

Pairing: Mal Volari X f!mc (Autumn Nightbloom)

Rating: Teen

Word count: 744

Summary: This takes place on the eve of the Ash Empire’s invasion in Blades of Light and Shadow 2. I kept thinking of Mal’s internal conflict throughout Blades 2 and how it would come to a head before the big battle… wanted to try and do it justice

She loved him. Mal Volari still couldn’t wrap his head around it.

“You love me.”

“Yes I do, you scoundrel. Make sure to tell everyone.”

She looked up at him with a light smirk, a twinkle in her eyes, fingers lightly tracing down his face and chest. He pulled her tighter into their intimate embrace, unbelievably happy that this woman, his kit, really loved him back.

“Oh, I plan to.”

He flashed her a bright smile, preening. Some of the old swagger returning.

And he planned on doing just that.

A giddy smile lit up his face at the memory, all too quickly replaced by the now near-constant mask of worry.

Right after figuring out how to make sure she’ll survive the upcoming battle.

His chest constricted, heart rate accelerating as the familiar panic and dread took over. The guilt at having failed her already, again and again.

At not having been fast enough to keep Valax from dragging her into that portal. At not having been sufficiently resourceful or cunning to figure out how to get her back. Or able to keep their party from slowly falling apart after their repeated failures at freeing her from the shadow realm.

He had worked himself to exhaustion all those months, grasping at any leads albeit thin, going to increasing lengths – and risks – to find artefacts or spells that could bring her back.

He had poured his earnings from defeating the Shadow Court towards opening an orphanage. A dream he had shared with her just before her disappearance, on that wonderful evening where she had finally broken down the last of his defenses and gotten him to start to hope for something better, for the possibility of happiness and a life together.

He had wanted to honor her memory, and make sure these kids had a happier alternative to the harsh, violent life he had led, growing up in the Thief’s Guild.

But really, he had needed to keep busy. He didn’t want to stop, couldn’t stop and consider the possibility that she was really gone.

That nothing he could do would bring her back.

Because those thoughts brought him to a dark and dangerous place. One he had only visited in the deepest pits of hopelessness in his reaper days, horrified at his capacity for violence and death but desperate to pay out his and his sister’s debts and free them from that terrible life.

So he kept going, like an automat, refusing to stop and feel the loss of his love, of his home, because he knew he couldn’t live in a world without her.

And then suddenly she was back. His one dream come true. Smiling, beautiful as ever, bantering and alive.

Gods how he had wanted to lose himself in her embrace and forget the world around them.

But he couldn’t relax and let himself feel the joy of her return. Couldn’t let his guard down.

She was still being hunted down by Valax and the Ash Empress. He had already failed her too many times. Wouldn’t do it again.

His dark train of thoughts returned to the present, and the impending invasion from the Ash Empire.

He looked across the sprawling camp, eyes trained on his beautiful kit, striding confidently from one group of fighters to the other, boosting morale and talking strategy.

Gods he was proud of her. His beautiful warrior. His finest treasure, the only one he would ever need.

He told her he’d have her back out on the battlefield, and he meant it. He would do whatever it took to keep her safe, help her protect the Light Realm. He would lay down his life for a chance at keeping her alive.

Amidst all the darkness and doubt swirling around in his head, that warm feeling, the seeds of hope she had planted with her patience, understanding and love, kept pulling at him.

He would die for her, but he hoped that somehow… somehow they’d make it out of this fight alive, and would have a second chance at love and a life together.

A slow, hesitant smile etched Mal’s features. He gazed on at the woman he loved.

“For you, kit, I’ll do anything.”

#blades of light and shadow #mal volari #bolas #playchoices #blades of light and shadow 2 #bolas 2 #mal volari x mc #mal x mc #choices #blades fanfic #choices stories you play #choices fanfiction #pb choices

[enkeladyte]

Hellboy & his world

this is for people who dont know anything about hellboy..!

Hellboy is a series created by Mike Mignola, which began in 1994 with the four-issue story arc Seed of Destruction. The story begins in 1944 and establishes his origin story as a hellbound human-demon hybrid, summoned to Earth by Nazis during World War 2 to be used as a weapon against the Allies. This, of course, didn't work out as planned, as the operation was intercepted by a contingent of paranormal experts, soldiers, and the Torch of Liberty, an analogue for Captain America.

Upon finding the infant, a young Professor Trevor Bruttonholm adopts it and names him Hellboy. We also get a sneak peek of Rasputin (yeah, that Rasputin), who is the Nazi's own paranormal expert, and the one who performed the ritual that summoned Hellboy.

Skipping forward a year, the Professor establishes an international organization to combat and research paranormal threats to the world. This group is the Bureau for Paranormal Research and Defense (BPRD), and nearly every one of our protagonists will be a member of it at one point or another. Hellboy himself is granted honorary human status by the UN, and joins the BPRD in 1952 (having grown at an accelerated rate to the size of a young adult). These early years of his are collected in an ongoing series called 'Hellboy and the BPRD', and they all take place before the rest of the Seed of Destruction story.

Going forward again, we get to 1992, and the Professor goes missing during an expedition in the Arctic. He resurfaces two years later, but is tragically killed in front of Hellboy by a mutant frog creature. This begins a chain of events which leads to a confrontation with a seemingly immortal Rasputin, who reveals to Hellboy that he is destined to end the world.

During this story, we are introduced to two members of the BPRD who aid Hellboy in his fight against Rasputin, and who are close friends of his.

Liz Sherman, a pyrokinetic human with a tragic past,

-- and Abe Sapien, a friendly fishman of unknown origins.

Now, all of this probably sounds familiar. If you've seen Guillermo Del Toro's first Hellboy movie, you'll have seen something close to this exact story, yet there are several key differences. In the movie, Rasputin is the ultimate Big Bad of the story, and there is only a hint of something greater behind the scenes-- but in the comic, it is explicitly stated that he is serving an extra-dimensional being known as the Ogrdu Jahad, the Seven Beasts, also known as the Serpent, the Dragon, and so on. He even summons one of the Serpent's offspring- known as an Ogdru Hem.

The Ogdru Jahad are intrinsic to understanding the story of Hellboy. Their origin goes back to the creation of the world itself, and most of the enemies of the BPRD are either wanting to summon it to end the world, or harness its power for their own benefit. The Hem themselves are a complicated topic. While most of the time they are physical monsters you can fight, they are capable of influencing the world in more subtle ways.

There's also some key characters lacking in every one of the Hellboy films. One that I find quite insulting to leave out is Kate Corrigan.

She plays a supporting role to the rest of the cast, and has several important moments with Hellboy and the others. She also has a few stories in which she plays a much more active role, such as the Wolves of St. August.

There's also a few characters that get their own spinoff titles that delve more into the past of the series, like Lobster Johnson, Sir Edward Grey, or Sledgehammer 44.

Going back to the threats out protagonists face, there are others that come from some unexpected places. Hecate, who plays both the role of antagonist and supporting character of Hellboy, comes from the more mythological side of the world. There are mad scientists, monsters from other realms unrelated to the Ogdru Jahad, secretive cults, vampires, fae creatures, ghosts, zombies, and more.

If I were to name one in particular that poses as big of a threat as the Ogdru Jahad, it would be the denizens of Hell and their forces. Demons, imps, humans who have made pacts with them, and the Dukes that rule over them all. Hellboy is half demon, after all.

Oh yeah. There's also the aliens. They kinda look like Abe, but they're unrelated to any of the goings on of Earth, and are simply monitoring the situation.

Last but not least, there's the Right Hand of Doom. This hulking mass of stone that been attached to Hellboy from birth is not only one of his most useful assets- for pummeling his enemies- but also a curse he carries everywhere with him. It is an iconic part of the character and the mythos surrounding him, and it plays a massive role in his unwilling fate to end the world. The nature of it and how he came to have it are explored in detail throughout the many series Mignola has written.

...and with that, this is the end of a very long post about a very long series. Hopefully it'll be the longest post on this blog. Thank you to anyone who actually read all this, and I hope you stay to learn more about the world of Hellboy!

#hellboy #mike mignola #bprd #comics #hope this isnt too boring. im glad tumblr allows so many images on posts nowadays #itd be unreadable without pics to break up the walls of text #idk if this reads well its been a long time since ive done informative writing

[gritsandbrits]

My fancure Cure Apple!

Or my self indulgent wish for more lead Cures who aren't pink! Her eyes are supposed to be brown but the picrews i used didn't have that option. Orange/red is the next best choice since it's closer and complements the green. As Cure Apple her power involves temporary acceleration, firing magical seed pellets, and a Earth/Wood elemental attack called Caramel Pirouette.

So Cure Apple, aka Cara Melany in civilian, is a intelligent girl who wise beyond her years. A little bit too wise, since she seeks knowledge and tends to stick her nose in places she ain't got no business. After her father gets transferred they move to a new town. Cara is enrolled at a prestigous academy, but due to her loner quiet nature she ends up alone. But there are hidden secrets at her new school. With the helps if unlikely friends and a mysterious power, Cara must protect her new home from a supernatural revenge decades in the making.

#fancure #precure #pretty cure #precure oc #black magical girl #picrew

[direwombat]

like clockwork, another wip wednesday rolls around

tagged by @euryalex @gaeadene, @inafieldofdaisies, @socially-awkward-skeleton, @adelaidedrubman, @ivymarquis, and @g0dspeeed (tysm lovelies~ i will rb your wips momentarily <3)

Tagging: @strangefable , @jillvalentinesday , @voidika , @aceghosts , @purplehairsecretlair , @henbased, @poetikat, @vampireninjabunnies-blog , @cassietrn , @confidentandgood , @wrathfulrook , @josephslittledeputy , @madparadoxum , @clonesupport, @trench-rot, @miyabilicious, @simplegenius042, @strafethesesinners, @deputyash, @schoute, @harmonyowl, and anyone else with a wip they want to share (also to be officially added to/removed from the taglist please like/reply to this post!)

i'm feeling generous so here are two wips: one for the werewolf au and one for katc because i've been doing my best to work on both at the same time :) everything is subject to change since these are still early drafts but they're mostly coherent

here's something from the horror and the wild, where syb is skedaddling from the veterans center :)c

Her scowl returns and she flips him off before tossing the map on top of her dashboard and rolling up her window. She throws her truck back into gear, and clumsily swings a three point turn to set her back down the road she drove in on. Jacob, at the very least, has the courtesy to step out of her way before she has the opportunity to spitefully run his foot over. 

She grits her teeth, her hands alternating between clenching and releasing the steering wheel while she creeps back down the road. Her left knee bounces while she keeps her foot lightly pressed against the accelerator, resisting the urge to speed away. 

Maybe kick up some dirt in his face for good measure. 

But when she glances up into her rear-view mirror, her heart stutters in her chest and her limbs lock in place. Framed by the sinister gates and standing directly beneath the arching letters, Jacob Seed watches her retreat with his arms crossed over his broad chest. She’s too far away to make out any facial expression, but she’s almost positive he’s smirking. 

She takes her eyes off him in favor of following the slight curve of the dirt road, but as she does — as the angle of her rear lights changes, she swears she catches something flashing in her rear-view mirror. It’s so fast, so sudden, but if she didn’t know any better, she would have said Jacob’s eyes were reflecting like an animal’s.

But when her eyes dart back up to catch his shrinking reflection, there’s nothing strange to be seen. 

Just a man, watching her take her leave from his property. 

The road continues to curve, and it isn’t long  before he eventually disappears behind the trees. 

She breathes out a sigh of relief, and continues along until she reaches an intersection with one of the main, paved roads. Pulling over, she takes a moment to press her forehead to the top of the steering wheel, allowing the tension to melt away. 

Christ, that was fuckin’ creepy.

Lifting her head and raking her fingers through her hair, she puffs out her cheeks and heaves another sigh. “Alright, c’mon, get yourself together,” she mutters to herself. She punches her overhead light back on and drags the map — right side up — back onto her lap. The thick, plastic-y paper crinkles loudly as she searches for the old Veterans center. Once she finds it, she taps her finger against it to hold its place and looks for Forest Road 135. 

Jesus, she really missed the mark, and she grimaces when she notices the clock on her dash reads just past 9:30 pm. 

Fuck, Eli must be worried. 

Part of her considers driving back to his place; they can check in on Chad in the morning. But she told him she would, and she’s a woman of her word. 

Gingerly, she traces her finger along the roads leading from the Veterans Center. It crawls down the map — take a left onto the main road, hook right, then left, and then Chad’s place should be on a small dirt road somewhere on her right. She goes over the path a few times, committing it to memory before turning off her interior light and folding up the map. 

Just as she makes that first turn onto the main road, the clear, distinct sound of a wolf’s howl rings out into the night, followed by an echoing chorus. It isn’t an uncommon sound up here in the mountains — there have been many nights with Eli where she’s woken up in the middle of the night and stayed up listening to them sing. 

Normally, she finds the sound to be beautiful. But tonight, she just finds it haunting. 

Her eyes dart to the treeline, keeping an eye out for any animals that may come bounding across her path just as much as she pays attention to the road itself. Dark shapes move in the shadows, entirely hidden from her despite the brightness of her high-beams. The hair prickles at the back of her neck and her breathing suddenly goes ragged. 

Her gut, animal instinct is screaming at her to move faster. She’s being followed. Stalked.

Hunted.

and here's some some of syb getting rescued by jerome from katc :)

Somewhere in the Holland Valley. 10:34 pm.

While not entirely accurate, to say that Sybille feels like she’s been hit by a bus is by no means an understatement. 

She lies on the ground -- the ceiling? -- of the van. Blood oozes from the same gash near her hairline that she had stitched up in Dutch’s bunker earlier that morning. The lights illuminating the van flicker unsteadily. Dark shadows strobe violently, causing her eyes to throb in their sockets while the ringing in her ears drowns out all sound. 

A wheeze of a groan forces itself from her lungs, and she lifts her head only to have her surroundings swim around her. Every muscle throbs with the dispersed aches of full body blunt force trauma. The taste of blood sits on her tongue and as she coughs to clear her throat of the thick substance blocking it, a splash of red spatters messily onto the ground beneath her. 

“Oh, God,” she moans to herself. She forces herself up onto her elbows, her arms trembling as they struggle to carry her weight, and crawls towards the back doors, over the broken glass left behind by shattered windows . There’s no thought to the pain exploding around her left shoulder or how off-kilter she feels every time she heaves herself forward. Her shoulder is definitely dislocated but she can’t worry about that right now. Whatever injuries she’s sustained, she can take stock of them later. 

She needs to get out of here. 

She needs to find Joey. 

She needs to find Augustine. 

With a clumsy heave, she throws herself against the van’s back doors, trying to force them open. They move, pushing outwards, but she meets some kind of resistance. There must be something blocking the way, or the metal frame must have buckled when the truck rolled over. She tries again, grunting in pain as it flashes white-hot through her injured shoulder, but to no avail. 

The door is stuck. 

Another curse slips through her teeth, but her attention is quickly focused on the pained groans and rustling sounding behind her. Her mouth opens to call to one of the other passengers to help her, but when she looks over her shoulder, her eyes go wide. The two civilians she was with lay in broken, bloody heaps, their limbs hanging at limp, awkward angles. 

Dead. Killed during the crash. 

The Peggie, however, much like her, somehow managed to miraculously survive. He groans as he weakly lifts his head. Blood pours down his face, further matting his already unkempt hair and beard. A wet cough rattles from his lungs, and when he sucks in a breath, it comes out heavy and rasping. He’s obviously struggling to breathe. 

Punctured lung, she thinks with a grimace. She’d know the sound anywhere. After spending what felt like hours baking in the Afghanistan sun waiting for someone to find her and pinned down by the weight of the villager she’d failed to save, the sound of her own labored breathing has been burned into her memory. 

She’s suddenly thankful that her wounds mostly seem to be superficial. 

As far as she can tell, anyways. 

His eyes go wide when he sees her trying to break free, and he reaches towards her. A hand, slick with blood, grips her by the ankle. There’s more force to his tug than she’d anticipated. Her shirt rides up her stomach, and she lets out a scream as the soft flesh of her belly is mercilessly raked across the bits of broken glass. 

Frantically, she twists around, desperately attempting to kick at his face. He manages to evade her strikes and, much to her dismay, reaches for his gun, which had been flung about the van during the crash. 

And then his brains are suddenly blown out of the back of his skull. Skull fragments and bits of gray matter go splattering against the other two dead bodies and the cultist falls limp. 

Her head whips around, and she breathes a sigh of relief when she finds the van doors wide open and Pastor Jerome standing over her, smoke still rising from the barrel of his pistol. If she believed in such things, she might have considered him her guardian angel. He smiles warmly at her as he stows his gun into the hollow of his Bible. Crouching down, he pulls out a small knife and reaches toward her bound hands. 

“Stay with me,” he says. It’s muffled, overpowered by the ringing in her ears, but she can hear him. The plastic snaps, freeing her hands, and he helps her up. She grunts as she rises. Her sore muscles scream at her, telling her to lay back down, to rest, but she pushes past it. He places his hands on her good shoulder, steadying her on her feet. “Didn’t go through all this trouble just to lose you now.” 

“I’m gettin' goddamn sick of bein’ tossed around like Raggedy Ann doll," she tells him.

#wip wednesday #chap 1 of the werewolf au (titled act i: infection) is so tropey writing a creature feature fic is so much fun #also lmao @ syb in the second snippet #syb: *coughs up blood* #also syb: im sure that's fine

[dailyadventureprompts]

Deity: Lysthazo, Mistress of the Unforgiving Sea

“Pray to your Gods of Shore and Tide, child of the land. These waters are not for you and they will not hold you when your little boat sinks beneath the waves.“

-Eelgrin the merrowguide

To hear the sailors tell it  Lysthazo, goddess of merfolk and those places of the ocean unsullied by the land, defies what most would come to expect of a deity by scorning those who invoke her in prayer. She is a goddess of take, not give, and the best one can hope for is to offer silent deference and hope that the seas are calm tomorrow. Still, that does not mean Lysthazo does not have a following among whalers and those others who spend too long far from friendly ports,  who settle into a love-hate relationship with the “Bitch of the Brine” as she delivers them luck with one hand and endless tribulation with the other.

Adventure Hooks:

Rumors in the harbor tell of a ship that beached itself some days up the coast, it’s crew so desperate to make land that they didn’t even try to aim for port. While exploring the hulk or questioning one of the crew, the party discovers hints that these sailors went ashore to a jungle island looking for treasure. They instead found the shrine of some terrible sea goddess which they desicrated in their search for plunder, earning the goddess’s wrath in the form of some great leviathan that’s been hunting them ever since. As it turns out, this leviathan is still on its way, and will likely raise the nearby settlement in its search for the cursed crew.

A spree of on-land drownings among the city’s importers and rare animal dealers leads the party to a mermaid cleric. Far from the sea thanks to a cleverly constructed driftwood wheelchair she has come seeking her niece who was abducted from their home and sold up river to decorate some heartless noble’s menagerie. The heroes are faced with a difficult decision: abetting a murderer in her rightious quest or siding with a kidnapper for a bounty.

Sorting through a great treasure haul, the party end up discovering a rune-carved conch shell that echos audibly with crashing waves. In attmepting to tinker with it and discover its purpose the party unleashes an unending tide of briny water that floods them out of wherever they happen to be staying and carries with it a mischievous elemental in the form of an octopus that steals the conch and scuttles off somewhere to hide. Now faced with the prospect of unchecked flooding from a source they can’t plug, the party must search the town for the shell while it’s many armed owner causes problems on purpose.

Those born beneath the waters have a very different relationship with the goddess, calling her the “artist in currents” and conceiving of her as the one who gives order to the oceans many cycles as she seeds life in those sheltered places where it can thrive. Coral shoals are her gardens, schools of fish the dabbings of her paintbrush, echoing whalesong the tune she hums while she works. Even then the merfolk, tritons, and Kou-toa who revere her do not think of her as a strictly benevolent goddess, as Lysthazo’s artistic bent is understood as one that prioritizes new work over old and though she attended to their peoples closely during the dawn age it is known she has set her interest on bigger things at present.

Lysthazo’s most infamous aspect is as the “Mother of Kaiju”, an inapt title as she does not birth the beasts herself, but instead spurs their creation in a series of deepsea trenches scattered throughout the multiverse. In these pressured depths she stokes engines of rapid mutation and accelerated darwanism, wrenching promising examples from their place in the foodchain to hurl out into the ocean at large and observe how they perform. There is vaugery in whether these monsterous emergences are truely the acts of the goddess herself or merely her most sunken and devoted followers spilling out into the wider seas.

Titles: She who is vast and vasterstill, Mother of Kaiju, The devil of the depths, “bitch of the brine” “dancer in currents”

Signs: collected water appearing unaturlaly deep such as in wells, streams, or drinking glasses. The spontaneous growth of coral or tidepool ecologies, aquatic animals developing bioluminescence or other strange

Symbols: A wide vessel overflowing with water, entangled or chimeric sea creatures,

Followers: Those who live far from land, merfolk, trion, kou-toa, and may other creatures of the deep. Biomancers of an aquatic bent, Kaiju groupies.

#we are cancelling the apocalypse #deity #divinity: water #divinity: sea #divinity: monsters #Merfolk #low level #mid level #high level #kaiju #seaside #elemental #elemental: water #mystery #rescue mission #pirates

[jadelotusflower]

Stargate rewatch: 1x21 Within the Serpent's Grasp

We’re back in tarp city, quite a circle back to the pilot.

Daniel sans glasses once again, urging the team to go through the gate to the address he got in the AU. Jack still doesn’t believe him and Sam is concerned about a court martial, but Teal’c is immediately on board.

“In the other reality by the time I left Sara was dead, Carter your whole family was dead, hell I was dead, everyone was dead.” Interesting that Daniel specifically mentions Sara here, I wonder if the Jack/Sara relationship was something they were considering revisiting at some point.

The first use (I think) of the black BDUs by the team.

Is Daniel wearing contacts? At least in the earlier scene he had his glasses hooked on his shirt. I realise I’m harping on this but there doesn’t seem to be any continuity to Daniel’s vision.

Story by James Crocker (his only Stargate credit), teleplay by Jonathan Glassner, directed by David Warry-Smith.

Our first use of the Zat’nik’tel - unpopular opinion maybe but I love the Zats, they become somewhat of a crutch as an all purpose stun gun rather than the “extreme pain” they’re introduced as inflicting, but that’s how it goes.

Jack, Daniel, and Sam being floored by the ship accelerating but not Teal’c is a nice touch.

It’s Ferretti! Confirmation that he took over from Kawalsky leading SG-2. I always liked Ferretti, it’s a shame he wasn’t more of a supporting/recurring character in the show. In fact I don’t think we see him again after this episode? He’s off to get into prosthetics on Andromeda.

Some continuity issues with what Teal’c knows about the Ha’tak vessels in this episode compared to later on - his knowledge/experience really is dictated by the episode requirements.

The Jaffa turn on the big ol’ silver ball of communication and Apophis dials in to introduce his son Klorel. It’s a bit of a retcon from the pilot but I discuss my headcanon explanation in that episode writeup.

Daniel shifting into rage mode at seeing Apophis.

Also lol at everyone in their beanies but Jack. RDA really said nope, caps only for O’Neill, no exceptions.

The discussion the team has about whether to try and capture Klorel/rescue Skarra is actually a nice mirror of the one they have in The Nox - Jack and Daniel, being emotionally invested, are keen to do it despite the risk and are quick with justifications (Jack - it would be a strategic advantage, Daniel - they could try and reach Skaara), Teal’c supports them with his own tactical logic, while Sam appropriately questions the plan and makes sure there’s a contingency.

It’s part of why they make such a good team - each of them bring a different skillset and pov to each situation, and they have the respect for each other to talk it through.

Sam and Daniel plant the C4, and apparently Daniel’s glasses were clipped to his shirt after all, because he takes them out and puts them in a vest pocket for some reason.

For Daniel's snark about "uploading a virus to the mothership" the previous episode, it's kind of lol that their solution ends up being just blowing up the mothership - uploading a virus in the form of explosives.

Jack and Teal’c actually nab Klorel pretty easily in the end - it’s holding onto him that’s the problem.

“He is my father. He seeded the queen mother. He chose the host in which I will live out eternity. Apophis gave me life.” I suppose we’re meant to assume Amaunet is the queen in question but I really wish they’d done more with the familial relationships - both of the Goa’uld and human sides.

Alexis Cruz gives a great performance as Klorel, really pushing Jack’s buttons.

After Jack shoots him with the Zat, Skaara calls for both Sha’re and Daniel 🥺

Skaara is able to maintain a degree of influence over Klorel even when he regains control - afteraffects of the zat, Skaara’s strength, or because Klorel is a young Goa’uld not yet experienced in controlling a host? Perhaps all three.

Klorel gets Daniel in the hold of the ribbon device (but of course!), and Jack has to make the agonising decision to shoot Skaara to save Daniel’s life.

I mean, if I had a nickel every time a member of SG-1 has to shoot one of Daniel’s family to stop the Goa’uld that possesses them from killing him with the ribbon device…

Maybe it’s not that weird it happened twice, since Jonathan Glassner also wrote Forever in a Day.

“O’Neill, you must take action!” Why doesn’t Teal’c take action? Someone run over there and tackle Klorel instead of standing around watching Daniel’s brain get fried!

But of course it has to be Jack - Jack who brushed by Daniel in the pilot to greet Skaara, but has grown closer to Daniel since he joined SG-1; they started out only united by a common goal (find Sha’re and Skaara) but have started to develop a real bond. It’s the emotional climax not only of the episode, but the whole season in forcing Jack to chose between the lives of his surrogate son and his comrade and friend.

Added to this is the trauma of Jack being forced to stop Skaara with a gun - Charlie died in part due to Jack’s negligence around his gun, but Jack actively had to shoot Skaara here and that’s heartbreaking.

A nice mirror to the end of the last episode, with our team staring down at the Stargate framed by the control room of the SGC, and now they're staring down at Earth framed by the Pel'Tak.

#stargate sg-1 #stargate rewatch #1x21 within the serpent's grasp #jlf posts

[spacetimewithstuartgary]

Which came first: Black holes or galaxies?

Findings 'completely shake up' what we know about galaxy formation

Black holes not only existed at the dawn of time, they birthed new stars and supercharged galaxy formation, a new analysis of James Webb Space Telescope data suggests.

The insights upend theories of how black holes shape the cosmos, challenging classical understanding that they formed after the first stars and galaxies emerged. Instead, black holes might have dramatically accelerated the birth of new stars during the first 50 million years of the universe, a fleeting period within its 13.8 billion—year history.

"We know these monster black holes exist at the center of galaxies near our Milky Way, but the big surprise now is that they were present at the beginning of the universe as well and were almost like building blocks or seeds for early galaxies," said lead author Joseph Silk, a professor of physics and astronomy at Johns Hopkins University and at Institut of Astrophysics, Paris, Sorbonne University. "They really boosted everything, like gigantic amplifiers of star formation, which is a whole turnaround of what we thought possible before—so much so that this could completely shake up our understanding of how galaxies form."

The work is newly published in the Astrophysical Journal Letters.

Distant galaxies from the very early universe, observed through the Webb telescope, appear much brighter than scientists predicted and reveal unusually high numbers of young stars and supermassive black holes, Silk said.

Conventional wisdom holds that black holes formed after the collapse of supermassive stars and that galaxies formed after the first stars lit up the dark early universe. But the analysis by Silk's team suggests that black holes and galaxies coexisted and influenced each other's fate during the first 100 million years. If the entire history of the universe were a 12-month calendar, those years would be like the first days of January, Silk said.

"We're arguing that black hole outflows crushed gas clouds, turning them into stars and greatly accelerating the rate of star formation," Silk said. "Otherwise, it's very hard to understand where these bright galaxies came from because they're typically smaller in the early universe. Why on earth should they be making stars so rapidly?"

Black holes are regions in space where gravity is so strong that nothing can escape their pull, not even light. Because of this force, they generate powerful magnetic fields that make violent storms, ejecting turbulent plasma and ultimately acting like enormous particle accelerators, Silk said. This process, he said, is likely why Webb's detectors have spotted more of these black holes and bright galaxies than scientists anticipated.

"We can't quite see these violent winds or jets far, far away, but we know they must be present because we see many black holes early on in the universe," Silk explained. "These enormous winds coming from the black holes crush nearby gas clouds and turn them into stars. That's the missing link that explains why these first galaxies are so much brighter than we expected."

Silk's team predicts the young universe had two phases. During the first phase, high-speed outflows from black holes accelerated star formation, and then, in a second phase, the outflows slowed down. A few hundred million years after the big bang, gas clouds collapsed because of supermassive black hole magnetic storms, and new stars were born at a rate far exceeding that observed billions of years later in normal galaxies, Silk said. The creation of stars slowed down because these powerful outflows transitioned into a state of energy conservation, he said, reducing the gas available to form stars in galaxies.

"We thought that in the beginning, galaxies formed when a giant gas cloud collapsed," Silk explained. "The big surprise is that there was a seed in the middle of that cloud—a big black hole—and that helped rapidly turn the inner part of that cloud into stars at a rate much greater than we ever expected. And so the first galaxies are incredibly bright."

The team expects future Webb telescope observations, with more precise counts of stars and supermassive black holes in the early universe, will help confirm their calculations. Silk expects these observations will also help scientists piece together more clues about the evolution of the universe.

"The big question is, what were our beginnings? The sun is one star in 100 billion in the Milky Way galaxy, and there's a massive black hole sitting in the middle, too. What's the connection between the two?" he said. "Within a year we'll have so much better data, and a lot of our questions will begin to get answers."

Authors include Colin Norman and Rosemary F. G. Wyse of Johns Hopkins; Mitchell C. Begelman of University of Colorado and National Institute of Standards and Technology; and Adi Nusser of the Israel Institute of Technology.

The team is supported by the Israel Science Foundation and the Asher Space Research Institute, as well as Eric and Wendy Schmidt by recommendation of the Schmidt Futures program.

IMAGE....An illustration of a magnetic field generated by a supermassive black hole in the early universe, showing turbulent plasma outflows that help turn nearby gas clouds into stars. New findings suggest this process might be responsible for accelerated star formation in the first 50 million years of the universe.  Credit Roberto Molar Candanosa/Johns Hopkins University

#science #space #astronomy #physics #news #nasa #esa #astrophysics

[tomorrowusa]

The Great Salt Lake is drying up and the Republican government of Utah is doing little to save it. They constantly cave to the usual groups: agricultural interests, mining, homeowners who like spacious lawns in an arid region, and big industry.

The largest saltwater lake in the western hemisphere has been steadily shrinking, as more and more water has been diverted away from the lake to irrigate farmland, feed industry and water lawns. A megadrought across the US south-west, accelerated by global heating, has hastened the lake’s demise. Unless dire action is taken, the lake could decline beyond recognition within five years, a report published early this year warned, exposing a dusty lakebed laced with arsenic, mercury, lead and other toxic substances.The resulting toxic dustbowl would be “one of the worst environmental disasters in modern US history”, the ecologist Ben Abbott of Brigham Young University told the Guardian earlier this year. Despite such warnings, officials have failed to take serious action, local groups said in their lawsuit, which was filed on Wednesday. “We are trying to avert disaster. We are trying to force the hand of state government to take serious action,” said Brian Moench of the Utah Physicians for a Healthy Environment, one of the groups suing state agencies. “Plaintiffs pray that this Court declare that the State of Utah has breached its trust duty to ensure water flows into the Great Salt Lake sufficient to maintain the Lake,” reads the lawsuit, which was brought by coalition that includes Earthjustice, the Utah Rivers Council, the Center for Biological Diversity and the Sierra Club, among others.

Political pressure has not been very effective in a state dominated by Republicans. The state's response is lukewarm at best. That's in addition to bizarre proposals.

The state’s Republican governor, Spencer Cox, has suspended new claims to water in the Great Salt Lake basin and appointed a commissioner to oversee response to the lake crisis. Last year, Utah’s legislature passed several conservation measures, including a $40m trust to support lake preservation projects. But Abbott and his colleagues, who authored a sobering report on the lake in January, found that those measures increased flows to the lake by just 100,000 acre feet in 2022. About 2.5m acre-feet a year of water will need to flow into the lake to bring it to a healthy level, the researchers estimated. That water will likely have to come at the expense of agriculture, which takes in about three-quarters of the water diverted away from the lake to grow mostly alfalfa and hay. Cities and mineral extraction operations each take up another 9% of diverted water. But wresting water away from agriculture is politically complicated. Officials have explored propositions to pay farmers to fallow land and use less water, though such proposals have yet to gain much tractions. Lawmakers have also offered up a series of out-of-the-box solutions – including cloud seeding, which uses chemicals to prompt more precipitation – or building a giant pipeline from the Pacific Ocean.

Seriously, a pipeline from the Pacific Ocean? This is a classic idiotic GOP way to deal with an environmental catastrophe which doesn't get to the root of the problem.

Already, the lake has lost 73% of its water and 60% of its surface area, and is becoming saltier, threatening native flies and brine shrimp. A diminished lake may be unable to support the more than 10 million migratory birds that stop over in the region. A white pelican colony recently abandoned a nesting site on the lake, potentially due to declining water levels. “In addition to the millions of people who live here, so many plants and animals depend on the lake,” said Deeda Seed, Utah campaigner at the Center for Biological Diversity. “The health of northern Utah’s entire population depends on the Great Salt Lake’s survival and I hope this lawsuit can help save it.”

^^^ emphasis added

Yep, take their asses to court to save the body of water which gave the state's largest city its name.

#utah #great salt lake #water levels #diversion of water #the environment #migratory birds #white pelicans #brine shrimp #republicans #utah state government #spencer cox #deeda seed #brian moench #ben abbott #earthjustice #utah rivers council #the sierra club #center for biological diversity #utah physicians for a healthy environment

[mariacallous]

If you ever had pastries at breakfast, drank soy milk, used soaps at home, or built yourself a nice flat-pack piece of furniture, you may have contributed to deforestation and climate change.

Every item has a price—but the cost isn’t felt only in our pockets. Hidden in that price is a complex chain of production, encompassing economic, social, and environmental relations that sustain livelihoods and, unfortunately, contribute to habitat destruction, deforestation, and the warming of our planet.

Approximately 4 billion hectares of forest around the world act as a carbon sink which, over the past two decades, has annually absorbed a net 7.6 billion metric tons of CO2. That’s the equivalent of 1.5 times the annual emissions of the US.

Conversely, a cleared forest becomes a carbon source. Many factors lead to forest clearing, but the root cause is economic. Farmers cut down the forest to expand their farms, support cattle grazing, harvest timber, mine minerals, and build infrastructure such as roads. Until that economic pressure goes away, the clearing may continue.

In 2024, however, we are going to see a big boost to global efforts to fight deforestation. New EU legislation will make it illegal to sell or export a range of commodities if they have been produced on deforested land. Sellers will need to identify exactly where their product originates, down to the geolocation of the plot. Penalties are harsh, including bans and fines of up to 4 percent of the offender's annual EU-wide turnover. As such, industry pushback has been strong, claiming that the costs are too high or the requirements are too onerous. Like many global frameworks, this initiative is being led by the EU, with other countries sure to follow, as the so-called Brussels Effect pressures ever more jurisdictions to adopt its methods.

The impact of these measures will only be as strong as the enforcement and, in 2024, we will see new ways of doing that digitally. At Farmerline (which I cofounded), for instance, we have been working on supply chain traceability for over a decade. We incentivize rule-following by making it beneficial.

When we digitize farmers and allow them and other stakeholders to track their products from soil to shelf, they also gain access to a suite of other products: the latest, most sustainable farming practices in their own language, access to flexible financing to fund climate-smart products such as drought-resistant seeds, solar irrigation systems and organic fertilizers, and the ability to earn more through international commodity markets.

Digitization helps build resilience and lasting wealth for the smallholders and helps save the environment. Another example is the World Economic Forum’s OneMap—an open-source privacy-preserving digital tool which helps governments use geospatial and farmer data to improve planning and decision making in agriculture and land. In India, the Data Empowerment Protection Architecture also provides a secure consent-based data-sharing framework to accelerate global financial inclusion.

In 2024 we will also see more food companies and food certification bodies leverage digital payment tools, like mobile money, to ensure farmers’ pay is not only direct and transparent, but also better if they comply with deforestation regulations.

The fight against deforestation will also be made easier by developments in hardware technology. New, lightweight drones from startups such as AirSeed can plant seeds, while further up, mini-satellites, such as those from Planet Labs, are taking millions of images per week, allowing governments and NGOs to track areas being deforested in near-real time. In Rwanda, researchers are using AI and the aerial footage captured by Planet Labs to calculate, monitor, and estimate the carbon stock of the entire country.

With these advances in software and hard-tech, in 2024, the global fight against deforestation will finally start to grow new shoots.

[hazey-moonlight]

Name: Fiora Rosenote

Gender: Mare

Age: Adult

Bio: Fiora Rosenote is an Earth pony who calls Ponyville home, renowned for her hot fuchsia coat and vibrant orange hair. From a young age, she has been a symbol of positivity and cheer in the Ponyville community, known for her radiant presence.

More about her undercut~

Cutie Mark: Fiora's cutie mark is a dandelion with its seeds caught in a gentle breeze, transforming into music notes as they scatter. This unique design perfectly represents her harmonious resonance abilities and her deep connection to nature and music. It showcases her nurturing and growth-inducing talents as well as her passion for creating harmonious melodies that resonate with the world around her.

Special Talent: Vibrational Resonance and Topiary Sculptor Fiora's extraordinary abilities combine her innate understanding of vibrations with her Earth pony heritage, creating a dynamic set of talents. She is sensitive to the vibrations in the earth, able to create harmonious frequencies, and possesses the unique ability to shape and sculpt living plants into intricate topiaries. Her talents also include accelerating plant growth, promoting healing, and offering emotional harmony to those around her.

Special Talent: Vibrational Resonance and Topiary Sculptor Fiora's extraordinary abilities combine her innate understanding of vibrations with her Earth pony heritage, creating a dynamic set of talents:

Sensitivity to Vibrations: Fiora has a heightened sensitivity to the vibrations and energies in the earth, allowing her to perceive and understand the natural rhythms and frequencies of the world around her.

Harmonious Frequencies: Her Earth pony heritage enhances her ability to create harmonious frequencies. She can generate these harmonious vibrations through her voice, hoofstomps, or specialized musical instruments, amplifying their potency.

Topiary Sculptor: Fiora's unique twist on her talents lies in her ability to use her vibrational resonance to shape and sculpt living plants into intricate topiaries. She can guide the growth of plants with precision, turning them into living works of art that reflect her artistic expression and deep bond with the plant world.

Accelerated Plant Growth: Fiora's harmonious frequencies stimulate the rapid growth of plants, making her an invaluable asset to local farmers and gardeners who seek her assistance in achieving bountiful harvests and flourishing gardens.

Healing and Structural Repair: Her vibrations can promote healing in injured or sick ponies, as well as mending damaged structures. By matching the resonant frequencies with the body or materials, she accelerates the healing process and reinforces the stability of structures.

Emotional Harmony: Fiora's harmonious abilities also extend to creating emotional calm and uplifting the spirits of those around her, providing comfort and harmony in times of distress.

Personality: Fiora is a beacon of positivity and cheer, known for her exuberance, optimism, and genuine love for beauty and vibrancy. Her outgoing nature and radiant personality make her a beloved figure in Ponyville. She can be overenthusiastic at times, leading to impulsive decision-making, but she always approaches life with trust and an open heart.

Friendship with Applejack: Fiora's connection with the earth and her passion for farming and agriculture naturally drew her to Applejack, a hardworking and down-to-earth pony. Their friendship blossomed through their shared love for the land and a mutual appreciation for the beauty that can be found in both nature and hard work. Together, they embark on various farming and gardening projects, ensuring that Ponyville remains a vibrant and fruitful place for all.

Additional Personality Traits: Fiora is known for her generosity and her willingness to lend a helping hoof to those in need. She's an excellent problem solver, using her harmonious frequencies and topiary skills to tackle challenges creatively. Her love for music and the beauty of the natural world often inspires her to organize garden parties and outdoor musical events for the community.

Fiora Radiancebloom Rosenote's harmonious nature, vibrational resonance talents, and topiary artistry make her a cherished and invaluable member of the Ponyville community. She brings beauty and positivity to the world around her while embracing her earth pony roots as a caretaker of the land and a creator of living art.

base lambrotbases

#hazeys art #mlp #my little pony #mlp oc #Fiora Rosenote

[growth91]

Demystifying Startup Investment in India: A Beginner's Guide

The Indian startup scene is a kaleidoscope of innovation, brimming with young ventures brimming with potential. As an investor, navigating this exciting yet complex landscape requires careful consideration. But where do you begin your journey to invest in startups India?

Growth91, a leading seed-stage investment platform, understands your questions. This guide unpacks the world of Indian startup investment, equipping you with the knowledge to make informed decisions.

Understanding the Startup Lifecycle:

Startups evolve through distinct stages, each with unique investment opportunities. Here's a simplified breakdown:

Seed Stage: This is where the magic starts. Passionate founders nurture a promising idea, often with a prototype and a clear vision. Seed-stage investors, like Growth91, play a crucial role by providing the initial funding needed to validate the concept and build a Minimum Viable Product (MVP).

Early Stage: With a validated concept and a growing customer base, the focus shifts towards scaling the business. Early-stage investors, like venture capitalists (VCs) and angel investors, provide capital to fuel growth initiatives like marketing and product development.

Growth Stage: The startup has achieved product-market fit and is scaling rapidly. Growth-stage investors, including VCs and private equity firms, provide larger funding rounds to accelerate expansion and market dominance.

Maturity Stage: The startup is a well-established, profitable business. Investment options at this stage include private equity or even an Initial Public Offering (IPO), allowing investors to potentially exit with significant returns.

Why Invest in Indian Startups?

India boasts a thriving entrepreneurial ecosystem, fueled by a young and tech-savvy population. This translates to a constant stream of innovative ideas tackling real-world problems. By investing in early-stage startups, you have the potential to:

Be an Early Mover: Gain exposure to high-growth ventures before they become mainstream.

Shape the Future: Support disruptive innovations that can transform industries and society.

Unlock High Returns: Seed-stage investments, while high-risk, offer the potential for exponential returns if the startup succeeds.

Growth91: Your Gateway to Promising Indian Startups

Growth91 simplifies your journey to invest in startups India. We offer a curated platform connecting you with high-potential seed-stage ventures across various sectors. Our rigorous due diligence process ensures you invest in promising ideas with strong founding teams.

Ready to join the Indian startup revolution? Explore investment opportunities on Growth91 and empower the next generation of Indian innovation.Demystifying Startup Investment in India: A Beginner's Guide

#startup #investment