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southernbluebellereader · 1 year

Note

Coffee shop AU? Nah, gas station AU.

Reader who works the night shift and Ghost who comes in at unholy hours to buy a specific brand of snacks only found there.

This is a request but only if you feel like it!

Emergency Snack Run

A/N: GIRL. I love this. We love us some night owls up here. I think gas station is better lol this took a little longer than expected because life and I had like 50 different ways of how I wanted to end this but I'm happy where it went.

Lt. Simon "Ghost" Riley x F! Gas Station Clerk Reader

Warnings: bothersome customer/attack; unwanted attention

Master List (Tag List at the bottom)

Honestly, you liked working the night shift. It was quiet. And despite what most people think, most of the weird people come during the day. But occasionally someone would come in during your shift that creeped you out enough to keep one hand on the emergency call button and the other on the metal bat that was kept under the cash register.

Anyways. You usually worked the night shifts during the week. Almost no one came in, and you could stock up the shelves or read your magazines in peace. You're technically not supposed to sleep on the job, but if you positioned yourself correctly while sitting behind the cash register, you could hide your face from the camera and from the window well enough so that no one could see that you were sleeping. And the door would hit a bell every time it opened and closed, waking you up from a solid fifteen minute nap.

You liked Wednesdays. Usually it was the quietest, but it also tended to be the most boring. The only reason you liked it was because-

Ding.

You didn't even have to look up from your magazine to see who it was, but you did anyways. You looked at the time, then smiled up at the darkly clad man. 3:04 AM.

It was almost like clockwork, every Wednesday at around three in the morning. You expected it. Even when he was gone for weeks, sometimes months. And he was finally back.

"Simon! You're back."

You chuckled at his grunt and brief eye contact as he walked through the chip aisle.

"What happened to my crisps?"

Every time he came, you'd put his favorite crips in the same spot and make sure they were well-stocked. You always kept a few bags on the side just in case the shelves were empty.

"You're out." The large man was suddenly by your counter, placing a few drinks on your counter. The corner of his mouth was slightly curved. Only God knows when you'd ever see his full smile.

"Who says I'm out?" You smile and pull out three bags of his favorite crisps from under the cash register and placed them on the counter, beginning to ring him up. "You know the truck comes in on Thursdays, Simon."

"Yeah yeah, thank you, Y/N." Simon chuckled and paid for his snacks.

"Just Y/N? Geezer comes every day at six in the morning always trying to serenade me."

Simon took his change from you and placed it in the empty jar next to the register. You weren't supposed to keep a tip jar, Simon just hated keeping change. So you just kept it there. You smiled at him as you put his food in a plastic bag. He couldn't help but sigh and smile, "You're God-sent, Y/N. That better?"

"Much better. Good seeing you Simon."

"Yeah yeah, see you next week. Call me when that Geezer comes in here, that metal bat isn't going to do anything."

"Yeah yeah, see you next week, Simon." You shooed him away and he gave you a wink as he left the store.

---

"Geezer, I'm calling Simon!"

Geezer was the crazy person who would come in almost every morning at six in the morning, half-crazy, half-harassing everyone both in and out of the gas station.

"OooOOooH who's Simon? That your boyfriend? I thought I was your boyfriend, Miss Y/N!" Geezer leaned over the counter, getting closer to you. You were the only one working until at least seven in the morning.

It was Monday, you knew it was out of the ordinary for Simon to come to the gas station. He'd given you his phone number months ago on the back of his receipt under a note reading:

When you finish your magazine

/Simon

You hadn't called him - nothing ever happened that you couldn't handle, and every time Geezer came, someone else would be in the store to help you.

You cursed under your breath and quickly dialed his number, before you could put your phone up to your ear, Geezer was nearly on the counter, nearly cornering you. You didn't get a chance to grab the bat.

You couldn't even comprehend what the crazed man was saying, but thanking whoever was in Heaven when you barely heard Simon's voice on the phone.

"Y/N? You alright?"

"S-Simon! Can you-

"Simon? Is that Simon?"

Simon's heart began to race, he couldn't tell if it was racing in his throat, his ears, or in the bottom of his stomach. "Y/N, keep the phone on. I'm almost there."

He was due to deal with rookie training but he'd rather have Price chew him out. The gas station was only a few minutes away from the base. Simon made it there in less than that.

You didn't even see or hear Simon come in. Geezer had you trapped in the corner by the cigarettes. He saw your phone and threw it to the side. You didn't even process how much the man smelled or how dirty he was, you just wanted him off of you. You could barely keep him off of you and he was practically on top of you.

Your cool and sassy persona had been stripped, you felt helpless - you were helpless. You begged the old man to get off of you.

"Please let me go! Please, the register is open!"

"You think I want money, pretty girl? Why do you think I come here every morning?"

Before you could move a muscle. Geezer was yanked away from you by a large hand. You yelped in fear and covered your face. Simon ran behind the counter and had pulled the old man off of you, not saying a word. Geezer did all the yelling as he was being dragged to the back of the store, loud grunts and moans of pain and pleads for mercy could be heard in between punches.

You stayed on the floor, sobbing under your hands, scared to move a muscle, scared to move your hands away from your face.

"Y/N?"

The voice was a little rough around the edges, yet soft and gentle. But you were still afraid to look. Simon crouched in front of you, giving you a moment to realize that it was safe. He felt guilty. He never understood why you chose to work night shifts, despite his protests that it was unsafe, and your reassurances that it was ok.

He liked seeing you every Wednesday at three in the morning. You were a constant in his life. A reassurance that something - or someone - would always be there. He should have done something sooner, but he'd let his guard down with you - he'd let it down too much and if you hadn't called him, who knows what would've happened.

After a moment, unsure of what to do, he reluctantly leaned forwards and gently placed his hands on your back against your shoulder blades, speaking out loud every action he did so that nothing would come as a surprise.

"Y/N. Everything is ok now. I'm going to put my hands on your back and move you out of here."

His voice was even softer now. You'd stopped crying and sniffled, rubbing your face as you nodded, allowing him to put his large hands on your back and move you towards him. Simon placed you between his legs, your body and head resting on his body as he held you close, and whispered, "I got you," over and over again.

Your body was still trembling, but it soon subsided the longer you were in in embrace. People started coming in the store but were shooed away by Simon's glares until a police officer eventually arrived to process the scene.

Simon kept you in his arms, remaining on the floor for as long as possible until the officers needed to take your statement and the EMTs needed to give you a look over.

Even then, he didn't leave your side. He didn't want to. He never wanted you to be alone.

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

Tag List

@ateliefloresdaprimavera @galagcica @sweetybuzz25 @wisedinosaurpolice @itsasecrets-things @ronbon @lieutenantlashfaz @piper570 @shuttlelauncher81 @thanksbutno98 @gabriellathegreat @kult6 @loadedberetta @sarahs-secrets2

#cod #call of duty #call of duty mw #call of duty mwii #call of duty mw2 #simon x reader #simon riley x reader #simon ghost riley #simon ghost riley x reader #ghost x reader #fan fic #fan fiction #simon #riley #lieutenant simon riley #riley x reader #cod request #call of duty request #request

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goldnhourwrites · 4 months

Text

Not enough people talked about these so I'm gonna do it myself because oh my god (commentary and headcanons below, it's just long)

Sett has a little travel-sized sewing kit in his bag... it's so tidy... sett stitching things back together when his bandmates rip them...

Sett just casually carries around like 20+ pounds of dumbbells. Mans is literally always working out. The grind never stops.

"yo Ezreal can you grab my bag for me?" "Yeah sure--what the FUCK do you have in here? This thing weighs a hundred pounds."

His little exercise headband... and is that a hair tie behind it? Sett with his hair tied back??

Sett's energy bar collection. Sett's the type of person to pack an entire backpack full of snacks for a road trip.

Ezreal has a plushie OF HIMSELF on his bag.

this guy practically collects aesthetic glasses. 3 pairs in the bag plus the circle ones he had in PARANOIA.

Sharpie (for signing autographs???) His signature on the polaroids of himself???

The photo under the lip balm looks like it might be Ezreal and Aphelios. Ezreal's the type of person to make sure he has photos with all of his friends. Ezreal hanging up his favorite polaroids in his room.

can we talk about the all-white fit in the very bottom photo omg

Aphelios has back-up headphones for his headphones.

WHO SENT THE SNACKS. WAS IT ALUNE. WAS IT SOMEONE ELSE.

The writing on the note looks like Korean but unfortunately I don't know any Korean :(

his sticky noted book... is it a journal? is it full of lyrics? who put the little smiley face sticker on the front!! does he write in it!!

I love the idea of Aphelios just pulling out a little keyboard whenever he wants to write down a tune. How well can he play the piano? Only enough to write music, or does he have songs memorized? Does he ever play for anyone?

K'SANTE'S DRAWING TABLET

he's not just in charge of putting together their fashion, he designs it himself. i'm going to scream

I am in love with those glasses. I need art of k'sante in those glasses ASAP. i will do it myself if i have to.

What is his book!! What does the W stand for!!

The way the button on his gloves matches the one on his jacket in his LoL splash art. This tiny detail is driving me insane.

Also, the cologne? The top is the same as his necklace? Does he have a specific personal cologne? So elegant...

Kayn's Pentakill guitar pick. Let me see him play the guitar I beg

The crumpled up receipts. This man goes Shopping (also see: cash, various coins). And he just has a bunch of random shit in his bag because he never bothers cleaning it out.

the open leaking bottle of hair dye. please. do you NEED that

The random jewelry... I love the idea of him either a) taking it off, shoving it in his bag, and forgetting where he put it or b) bringing backup drip with him everywhere in case he needs more

While Sett, Aphelios, and Yone all opted for headphones, Kayn's gone with good old-fashioned corded earbuds. Does he not like headphones? Is it because they mess up his hair?

Big ass box of matches and For Why? Does he smoke? Is he too cool to carry around a lighter? Does he just like setting shit on fire?

Yone keeps a little emergency travel kit. Band mom energy. He's got band-aids and a toothbrush and toothpaste At The Ready.

Bottle of lotion? Yone with a skincare routine? Yone who stays moisturized? Everybody in Heartsteel asking Yone for lotion?

Earplugs (for sleeping on long bus rides, maybe?) I want to see Yone going "I'm sick of this shit" and tuning the fuck out.

Yone is the only one with a real headphone case. Aphelios has his around his neck 24/7, but his wireless earbuds have a case. Sett's just shoving his in there with twenty pounds of dumbbells and hoping for the best.

Yone's got so many little gadgets and I don't even know what they all are. He has his laptop and (probably) his phone, plus a smartwatch, and maybe a portable charger? He's that prepared.

I can't tell what the object beside his smartwatch is (looks wooden?) If anyone knows, let me know? I'm so curious

This man's got even more stuff inside his bag. Yone doesn't leave the house without like fifteen things in case of an emergency.

good news everyone. i'm still losing my mind over them

#heartsteel #heartsteel sett #heartsteel ezreal #heartsteel aphelios #heartsteel k'sante #heartsteel kayn #heartsteel yone

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porcelana-r0ta · 1 year

Text

The Curse of Sight

Summary: When Wes Weston meets Time Drake-Wayne, the dots start connecting. And those dots form a Bat.

Word Count: 2690

Ao3 Link: https://archiveofourown.org/works/44788813

[Part 2]

When Wes Weston's parents divorced, they decided that he should stay with his dad in Amity Park. After all, small town Amity is much safer than big city Gotham, where his mother was moving in order to accept a promotion with Wayne Enterprises. Wes, in order to still see his mom, would visit her in Gotham every summer and every other holiday.

Of course, Amity soon became more dangerous than Gotham could even dream of thanks to the hell portal in the Fenton's basement that killed and bore Phantom, but whatever. No one ever listened to Wes anyway, and he learned to shut his mouth when Sam Manson shoved him against the lockers and asked him what he thought would happen to Danny Fenton if the Ghost Investigation Ward ever believed his “crazy as shit imagination.”

She was still playing the "Wes is crazy" game, even when defending her boyfriend.

Still, she was right. Danny was safer without him trying to convince Amity's negligent populace that Danny was Phantom. (Even if it absolutely drove him mad that no one but him was capable of making the connection between Danny Fenton and Danny Phantom.) So he shut up. He deleted his conspiracy theory blog and even asked Tucker Foley to wipe all remnants of its existence from the internet, a request which his classmate happily obliged. He even said, "I'm glad you're moving on from this whole Fenton-Phantom obsession, Wes."

Professional gaslighters, the lot of them.

So yes, Wes had thoroughly given up on the superhero ID evidence schemes by the time he left to visit his mom after his freshman year of high school. He had made peace with it and settled back into reading mystery novels or movies and solving the case before the protagonists in place of proving Phantom’s ID.

When he came to Gotham, he had to get a new library card so he could keep up with his mystery novel hyperfixation. He happens to take just a little too long in the library, so by the time he has a nice stack of books to check out, it's dark outside.

Great, walking back to my mother's apartment in the dark in Gotham. Seems super safe.

Well, Gotham is no Amity, right?

So he marches on and tries not to be too resigned when he's inevitably yanked into an alleyway even though the apartment is only three blocks from the library.

Classic.

It's just a man with a gun, his face obscured with a hood and a red bandana. He's literally nothing compared to Pariah Dark or Undergrowth or Dr. Spectra or even the fucking Box Ghost.

"Let me guess," he says. "You want any cash I have, right?"

"Kid, shut the hell up and fork over your money," says the man, and Wes sighs. The mugger didn't even wave around his gun or give an impassioned speech about stealing someone's pelt.

"Original," Wes intones. "But I'm fifteen. And everyone knows young people don't carry cash anymore. I guess I could give you my mom's emergency credit card that she gave me, but she did say it was for emergencies only, so."

The man just stares at him. Wes shuffles uncomfortably.

"Oh! And I could just cancel the card before you use it," Wes adds into the silence.

"You don't consider being held at gunpoint an emergency?" the mugger finally asks, looking uncertain.

"Should I?" Wes wonders aloud. Sam had been much scarier when she threatened him.

"You said you're fifteen? And you don't have a Gothamite accent?" the man offers his reasoning, as if it's any kind of logical. He'd fit in well in Amity for that trait alone.

"Gothamites always think they're so superior." He has to roll his eyes. "Guns aren't that scary. You know what is scary? Your whole town being dragged into the dimension of death for three days. This is nothing. This city is nothing." You are nothing. He knows better than to say that last part, though;

"Christ, kid, you're crazy." The man shook his head and pulled the hammer of his gun back. "Just-- give me the watch you're wearing."

Wes sighs again, "Whatever, I'm not fighting for it." It was literally just a cheap Walmart watch. But just as he goes to unlatch the watch from his wrist, a caped vigilante swings down from the rooftops and kicks the mugger straight into the pavement.

The mugger doesn't get back up.

"Thanks, Red Robin," Wes dutifully says, even though he's pretty sure the man was A) not really that much of a threat, and B) going to have serious brain trauma now.

"It's no problem," the vigilante says. "You're a little young to be out this late, though."

Well, that's rude. It's only 7:00 pm. The only reason it's dark at all is thanks to Gotham's pollution problem. (Maybe they should let Poison Ivy just go fucking feral, like Sam suggests.)

Wes doesn't say that. Instead he says: "Didn't you start crime fighting when you were, like, twelve?"

Red Robin sputters, but Wes continues, "And the first Robin couldn't have been more than nine. I have never picked a fight with hardened criminals." Do ghosts count as criminals? Surely not. What right does Wes have to dictate the morals of being from a completely different dimension? "So I think I'm doing better than you in the safety department, no offense."

Well, doing better in Gotham. But the Justice League doesn't need to know about Amity Park, so he'll leave that part out.

"I-- just--" Red Robin struggles for a second, and then clears his throat. "Why don't I escort you home?"

"I'm two blocks away, but thanks. And thanks again for the---" he waves to the unconscious mugger. Definitely brain damaged.

"Yeah, no problem." And then he grapples away.

Phantom's much cooler. Not that he'll ever say that in front of Danny, Sam, or Tucker. Or anyone from Amity.

He makes it safely home, even if he does pretend to not notice the Bat stalking him from above. And of course, once he recounts his tale to his mother, she freaks out that he'd been nearly mugged, and tries to ban him from doing anything in Gotham at all.

"Mom, I can't just stay inside the house all day. I refuse to spend my whole summer on Netflix." He wants to at least go sightseeing.

Her mouth goes into a thin line and her eyes are as fiery as her red hair.

"Fine," she says. "Then you can get a job."

His stomach drops, "What?"

"A job. My floor needs a new intern, and I found just the perfect person."

"No, Mom, you can't," he pleads. "A Wayne Enterprises job? I'll be known as a nepo-baby for life!"

"Well, too bad. You should have thought of that before being mugged."

"Almost mugged, Mom! Almost! Red Robin was there!" When he sees that this point is getting him nowhere, he switches tactics, "Mom, the Waynes are held hostage, like, every other week! Do you really want me in closer proximity to them?"

She lifts her chin and sniffs, "I'll be there to watch out for you. And an intern won't have any reason to be next to a Wayne, anyway."

He groans, "Mom, please. It's my summer vacation!"

"And you're my son. Discussion over. You start in two days."

He groans again, "Do I at least get paid? Or is Brucie Wayne like every other rich white dude out there?"

"Wes, sweetie, you're white--"

"But not rich," he grumbles.

"But yes, you'll be paid. Every position with Wayne Enterprises is paid."

He crosses his arms, "At least there's that, I guess."

His mom walks to him to hug him and kiss his forehead.

"I'll handle the paperwork tomorrow. Don't worry, you'll love it there!"

Well, spoiler alert: he doesn't.

He's basically a go-fer, fetching paper or ink or photos or files and most usually, lunch from across the street or donuts or coffee. Especially coffee. And his mom's coworkers kinda suck because hey, the Wayne's executive PR manager just hired her own kid for a coveted Wayne internship. No one likes the idea of someone being here who doesn't deserve it. So he is really sent on the most stupid, tedious errands possible for an intern.

He called it: he's the resident nepo-baby, beaten only by Brucie Wayne's very own brood of nepo-babies.

Suddenly, just letting that mugger fill him with hot lead doesn't look so bad. Maybe he would have become a ghost! Haunting Danny would have been fun. Or Ember and the others of her nature make it look fun, anyway.

The Fenton thermos part would probably be uncomfortable, though.

"This sucks," Wes mutters to himself, balancing three carrying cartons of Batbucks (Gotham's stupid parody of Starbucks since they have to be special and not like other girls in every aspect possible) coffee with just two arms, staring helplessly at the elevator call button in front of him.

"Need an assist?" calls a familiar voice, though Wes can't place from where.

"Yes, please!" Wes says gratefully, looking up at a face with blue eyes, black hair, and a familiar jawline.

Wait a second.

"Here, I'll get that for you," says the man, who is really more like a teenager, since it's goddamn Timothy Drake-Wayne, co-CEO of Wayne Enterprises at just seventeen years old. "Going up, I assume?" he gives a charming laugh as he presses the up button, the kind one practices to perfection to ace media interviews and entertain the wealthy elite at galas.

"Yes, thank you, sir," Wes says, and takes the time to really study Drake-Wayne's eyes. And sure enough, he can recognize makeup covering up purple eyebags, just like he could on Fenton.

No. Please, Lord, I'll go back to church. Just don't let it be true.

"Yeah, no problem!" Drake-Wayne says, which really just seals the deal. Wes quietly dies inside, and also curses God. "I'm glad to be of service! Interns doing coffee runs really are doing God's work. And there's no need to call me sir. Tim will do just fine."

"Right... Tim," Wes says uncertainly. He kind of wants the elevator doors to open up and reveal a pitch black hole to drop into, but when the bell rings and the doors slide open, it's just the same ol' regular elevator it's always been. Damn.

So. The boss of this whole entire company is Red Robin. Makes sense, seems legit. He figured out that Plasmius was the mayor of Amity, too, didn't he? So why shouldn't all billionaires be playing dress up and fight crime or be the crime? What's stopping them all, really, when wealth is a superpower all on its own?

Wait, fuck. So. If Tim started out as a Robin when he was twelve-ish. And apparently billionaires are playing dress up. Then doesn't that mean...?

Oh, God. Couldn't he go one season without figuring out some superpowered person's secret identity? Is that too much to ask?

And of course, after figuring Tim and goddamn Brucie Wayne out, it's not so hard to see the correlations between the introduction of every other Wayne brat to the debut of each Robin.

He shakily steps into the elevator, "And how do you normally take your coffee?"

"With the maximum amount of espresso the barista can legally give me," is Tim's immediate answer.

Just like Danny.

And even worse, Tim steps into the elevator after him.

"What floor?" he asks, and Wes feels stupid. Obviously he was going to come in: why offer help at all if he wasn't going to push the floor button for Wes?"

"Uh, 73," Wes says.

Tim nods and presses the according number, and then takes one of the cartons from Wes as the doors closed.

Hopefully, any nerves that Wes is showing can be played off as the nerves an intern would get when they somehow get stuck with the Actual Big Boss™ , and then said Boss™ tries to take the shit they're carrying.

"Uh, you don't have to do that," Wes says nervously. "I can carry them all, really!"

"Don't be silly," the literal co-CEO of his workplace says, as if Wes is in some fucked up Wattpad fic. "Again, where would any of us be without the ones who bring us coffee?"

"In bed?" Wes offers nervously. "Sleeping?"

Tim laughs, but his smile looks more like a smirk, "I guess you're right!"

"But seriously, I can carry the coffee. It's my job. And it'll look weird to everyone if they see the CEO helping me do my job."

"It's no trouble!" Tim insists, and then emphasizes his point by stealing the second carton in Wes's hands. "See? And my employees will be glad to see that I value every employee and am always willing to help out!"

Haha yeah, thought Wes. Too bad they'll never know just how much you help out, right?

Finally, the elevator dings, and Wes is released from one prison to another.

Thanks to the normal chaos of working at Wayne Enterprises, no one immediately notices that the co-CEO is carrying the bulk of the load. Instead, they all hone in on the scent of coffee, and they lunge.

"Thanks, Weston!" the few who are clear-minded enough to remember manners manage to say, even as most of them take their orders from a black haired wunderkind instead of a redheaded conspiracy theorist with the curse of Cassandra.

"Of course," Wes says nervously, and then finally some recognition starts sparking in the coffee-hungry eyes of exhausted PR employees who are always trying to handle some wacky Wayne hijinks.

"You're Weston," says his mom's assistant, Jade, pointing at Wes, and then slowly pointing to Tim, "and you're.... Oh, Mr. Drake-Wayne! Here, let me get that for you!" She yanks the empty cartons out of Tim's hands and shoved them into Wes's. Luckily, his carrying carton had been emptied, too, so he doesn’t get coffee spilled all over him and the floor. "Here, Weston, go dispose of these! Why were you making Mr. Drake-Wayne carry them? It's your job to get coffee, not our CEO's! He has better things to do. In fact, he probably needs to speak to Ms. Rolland."

Ms. Rolland as in his mother, who went back to her maiden name after the divorce.

"Now hold on," says Tim, his eyes alight with anger. "I offered to help Weston out, and I have no need to speak with Penny. I was just helping out one of my employees."

"Oh," says Jade, taking a step back. "Of- of course, sir! Weston, here, I'll take these cartons back. And sir, it's very kind of you to help out."

"I try," Tim says dryly. Wes notices he doesn't tell Jade to not call him sir. "You should probably get back to work."

"Of course, sir." And with the cartons in her hands, she scurries off in the direction of his mom's office, where she'll probably complain about how her kid made Jade look like a fool in front of the Actual Big Boss™.

"Uh, thanks," he tells Tim. "But you really didn't have to help me. It is my job, after all." Unwilling or not.

"It's no problem!" Tim repeats, and Wes wants to bang his head into a wall. "And hey, next time you do a coffee run, forget the others and just grab my order." His words are accompanied by a wink, and Wes is pretty sure it's supposed to be weird rich people humor, so he laughs, and pretends his heart isn’t beating into his ears.

"As much espresso as possible," he plays along, and Tim grins, pressing the call button for the elevator. It hasn't been summoned to another floor, so it opens right back up.

"Have a good day, Weston."

"It's just Wes, really," he corrects, and Tim smiles again.

"Wes," he says, and the elevator doors slide shut.

Cool cool cool. So now he just has to survive two months in Gotham while knowing the entire Batclan’s secret identities.

Cool cool cool cool cool cool....

#idk what this is it just spawned out of me #dp x dc #dc x dp crossover #dc x dp fic #danny phantom x dc #danny phantom #dc #batman #red robin dc #tim drake #wes weston #wesley weston #is this wes weston x tim drake?#you decide!#one shot

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shares-a-vest · 1 month

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Prompt: Weed Delivery (Discord Drabble) cw: weed/drugs (obviously)

"Special delivery, my Brochacho!"

Eddie sets down his book and frowns.

"Great!" Steve beams, rubbing his hands together as he hops up from the next lounger over.

Eddie tips up his (Steve's) Wayfarers and finds his kinda-sorta definitely-no-longer-platonic crush-slash-semi-boyfriend greeting Argyle, who appears to be as ready for a pool day as they are.

"What is this?" he demands, incredulous, his eyes growing as wide as saucers when Argyle hands over a comically large bag of weed.

"Hey, man!" Argyle nods, waving – all smiles as if nothing is wrong.

"Eddie!"

He snaps to and is greeted by a classic Steve Frown and Bitchy Pout. Steve props a hand on his hip for added effect and Eddie grumbles.

"I'm your drug dealer, Steve!" he says, clutching a set of invisible pearls.

"No, you are not," Steve positively grimaces before he slips his fingers into his tantalisingly loose, flowing and open shirt pocket and produces some cash.

"But I'm your..." he stops himself, entirely aware that he sounds more than a little pathetic.

Argyle pats Steve on the shoulder, his hand lingering a far too long and Eddie can feel his shoulders tensing.

"Argyle is my weed guy now," Steve grins, flipping the bag in his hand like a goddamn football, "At least until he has to go back to California. Besides, I never bought drugs from you."

"Sure you have," Eddie smiles, defiant.

Argyle side-eyes them and turns away awkwardly to place his towel on the third lounger. He takes off his hat and tosses it too before he begins fashioning his hair up into some sort of updo with a scrunchie Eddie swears is the one Robin keeps here at Steve's house in the case of 'Hair Emergencies'.

"Pretty sure I never did," Steve retorts, tucking the bag under his arm, "I always bought weed from Tommy's cousin. Then when we stopped being friends I had to start buying from Keith's older brother and... Well, now that I think about it, he probably got his shit weed from Reefer Rick too."

"Excuse me!" Eddie shrieks, "I cannot believe what I'm hearing."

"Yeah, sorry, man," Argyle offers, stripping off his shirt now and yep – Steve is looking at the guy's bare chest, "The stuff you got here in Indiana is bad."

Steve nods in agreement, hypnotised by Argyle's soft but strong body.

Eddie flicks his (Steve's) sunglasses back down and settles back against his lounger.

"Cannonball, my dudes!"

#steddie #steve harrington #eddie munson #argyle #argyle stranger things #stargyle ✨#stwgdailyprompt #lilys drabbles #cw weed #cw drug mention

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meetinginsamarra · 15 days

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mayprompts2024 #8, hobby

Read parts 1-5 on AO3 here

Read part six (calm) on tumblr here

++++++

The Perfect Place - Part Seven

Shocked and terrified, John was totally unprepared to answer, so he said reflexively, “It’s both…”

Only to realize with even more horror what he had admitted right now.

But, however, as always, when John was faced by ultimate crushing edge-of-the-seat life-or-death situations (as in the client would leave and he would get fired) the unbelievable happened. With his blood running cold and his beating heart nearly bursting out of his chest, a sudden zen-like state of detachment and serenity overcame John.

Just like when he had fought on the Afghan battlefields, John’s mind cleared and he heroically mastered the situation and saved himself and others from dying.

John slyly added to the previous words, “…ersome to be alone in a shop with a cash register full of money. Dangerous even. A salesman like me needs protection.”

Sherlock seemed astonished. “Is this actually necessary?”

“Well, it’s a dangerous job here. All the cash from selling all these expensive boxspring beds. Bed shops get robbed every day. I need to be able to defend myself and the money.”

“Ah, I’ve already wondered,” rumbled Sherlock and his voice was not bothered at all. It even sounded a little bit disappointed (implying that Sherlock would have liked it if it had been John’s flesh poking into his behind), “why you would need to carry a gun.”

(As already mentioned, Sherlock was an excellent actor because the image of soldier-John with the army gun brought his mind palace dangerously close to catching fire again.)

John relaxed a bit, noticing that Sherlock didn’t mind the gun and the rigid flesh because he kept snuggling backwards against John's body. Since his customer wasn’t appalled, John might still sell the damn bed (and also get some more glorious impressions of Sherlock’s warmth and scent while lying against each other and enjoying the rumbling voice that seemed to go straight into his groin). Sherlock kept being relaxed so he must believe John’s explanation about self-defense in case of a mugging apparantly. Which was good. Or maybe he knew it was a lie and still didn’t mind. Which was even better.

“Isn’t it illegal to own and carry this army-issue weapon?” Sherlock pushed the topic further by asking innocently. Only one milisecond later, he noticed his slip, hoping John would not.

“Well, yes, if it was a real gun,” came John’s quick-witted retort, “but it’s a dummy actually. An excellent mock-up. It has to scare the robbers away, you know?”

“Very wise of you to always be alert and prepared. I appreciate that.” In my hopefully future boyfriend and flatmate and partner in solving crimes thought Sherlock.

Of course, Sherlock knew that there were multiple lies in John’s explanations but that was exactly what he had wanted to prove. If John could keep calm and resourceful in a stressful situation. Sherlock kept snuggling against John who obviously wasn’t willing to change their position either and Sherlock fell even more in love.

John sighed, happily. But then a question emerged. How could he know that this is a British Army weapon? He’s never seen it. Is he accustomed to have guns pressed against this bum so that he can feel the different types?

(And wasn’t that a disturbing and exciting can of worms to be opened? So many options…)

“How did you know that it was this type of gun?” John asked.

Oops, there’s always something, Sherlock chided himself, dammit, sentiment (lust) has fogged the mind palace and I made a beginner’s mistake, revealing a fact I could not have known. Overlooking despite all the deductions I’ve made that John is pretty damn smart, too.

“I’m an excellent observer,” Sherlock hedged, deflecting, “I recognized the shape even under your cardigan.”

Of course, he lied. Sherlock would not tell John about the stalking, obviously. He planned on telling John later, much later when they lived together as boyfriends, there was no need to jeopardize what he had achieved so far. He could scare John away by revealing to be a creepy stalker.

Sherlock needed to explain further, declaring proudly, “I’ve memorized the different shapes, weights, feels, smells and tastes of various hand fire guns. I wrote a treatise about their differences and how to distinguish them from each other.”

“Impressive,” John said, “including even the tastes. But why? Is licking guns your hobby?”

“Of course not!” Sherlock huffed, righteously offended. “It’s for my work.”

(Sherlock considered that he could lick John in his spare time as a hobby, though.)

“You’re licking guns for a living?” John quipped.

“Don’t be daft. I’ll have you know that I’m working as a consulting detective! When the police is out their dephts, which is always, they consult me.”

“Never heard of this profession before.”

“That’s because I’m the only one in the world.” Sherlock finally turned around to face John. He was incredibly close and his eyes were incredibly blue and full of affection and wonder for Sherlock. “I invented the job.”

“Cool,” whispered John and stared right back into Sherlock’s stunning colour-shifting eyes only to find the affection and wonder he felt reflected right back at him.

+++++

tagging some people @calaisreno @totallysilvergirl @lisbeth-kk @peanitbear @raina-at

#mayprompts2024 #calaisreno #my sherlock fanfics #the perfect place #number 8 hobby #no beta we die like (wo)men

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studentofetherium · 3 months

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cash has been all but obsolete my entire adult life, so aside from a cash-only restaurant near my first apartment, I've never really needed to pay for things with cash (anime conventions being the one exception). but i still like to keep some cash on me, just in case of emergency. in most cases, however, the only way i use this money is to give to homeless people, since i like helping people and probably wouldn't be using it for any other purpose

but this has the funny consequence that i now always feel the need to keep cash on hand so i can give it away if need be

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copperbadge · 1 year

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Hey, Sam! Glad you're enjoying your euro trip! I'm traveling internationally for the first time this summer (Canada), and I had a question about currency exchange. At home, I use a credit card for most transactions on a day-to-day basis, but I like to keep some cash on hand just in case. Should I do the same while I'm in Canada? Seems like a good back up in case I lose my card or I want to but something where they only accept cash. Any general tips?

I think it's always a good idea to carry some cash; it certainly helped me out a few times, particularly in Amsterdam where I was shopping at a street market, and Rome when a couple of places didn't want to take card for small purchases. Post-pandemic pretty much everywhere takes contactless cards, I think, but it's not always the best way to go. When I went to Europe, I took 50 pounds sterling for 3 days in London, and 100 euro for seven days across mainland Europe. I changed the remaining 20 pounds for euros in Amsterdam, and spent most of the cash in Rome, once I was sure I wouldn't have any major emergencies; I came home with a 10-euro bill and about another 10 euro in coins.

In general, for travel, I have a pretty specific setup. After a couple of times where I lost a debit or credit card (genuinely lost, they weren't stolen, which just makes it more annoying) and had to change a bunch of website payment info, I started carrying a preloaded debit card for travel, one that doesn't attach to any websites anywhere. I just throw a few hundred dollars on the card and use that, and if it's lost it's way less hassle. It's the only card I have out of the wallet while in transit, although depending on where I'm going once I arrive, I'll add a credit card as a backup.

So I have a wallet in my luggage with my normal debit/credit cards, and then in a holster on the strap of my messenger bag I'll have my debit card and phone (and ID if I'm flying, though I try to move the ID back to luggage as soon as I can) and maybe a backup credit card. When in Europe I had most of my cards in my luggage, a wallet with only cash (usually not all of it) in my bag, and the debit card in the bag strap holster. I could afford to lose the cash I was carrying if I got pickpocketed, but I didn't want them to get my cards, so those stayed in the luggage as much as possible. I doubted that I'd actually get pickpocketed, but being able to write off the cash and not worry about my cards lowered my anxiety about the possibility.

(In case anyone is curious, the debit card is from Betterment; I have a savings account with them and they offered me a checking account attached to it with a debit card. So I have a few grand in savings, and can pull a few hundred at a time from that savings into the checking account, but the debit card can't access the savings side. If I need to "reload" the debit card I can do it instantaneously from the app, unlike a bank transfer that can take a few days. The only downside is if I don't track what I'm spending, the card can run out and give an insufficient funds error, at which point I have to reload it while standing at checkout, which irritates everyone behind me.)

#sam travels #travel

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eightyonekilograms · 1 year

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The parallels between finance and various engineering disciplines are always fascinating to me. It's uncanny the degree to which you can model finance as a complex distributed system like a power grid, including (or even especially) in how it breaks down. The breakdowns in finance are increasingly system accidents: the obvious failure modes are handled by regulations and safety systems, but the remaining ones are caused by emergent behavior in the interconnections between parts that often nobody even knew were connected. And a lot of times the safety systems for the well-understood failure cases make the unknown ones worse!

At dinner last night @keynes-fetlife-mutual's roommate brought up a point about the GFC that I hadn't realized: part of the problem was that various European banking regulations had created a huge demand for AAA-rated assets, via the perfectly understandable public demand that things like pension funds and only make extremely safe bets so retirees don't suddenly lose all their money. But there are only so many AAA assets around! And the vacuum ended up getting filled by sketchy American mortgages that were laundered through securitization and money markets until nobody realized what they were anymore. But to be clear: if American mortgages hadn't filled this demand for AAA assets beyond the realistic supply, something else would have, and would've blown up a different way.

To this I added the point that the in, which is what we saw when Truss became PM: to make a long story short, the chaos occurred in pension funds when the BOE raised rates and looked poised to raise them a lot more, and suddenly these funds were out of cash. Which is really counterintuitive! Pension funds should benefit when rates go up. But these funds had hedged themselves so much against interest rate downside risk that when rates when up, even though their future asset value was excellent in the long run, in the here-and-now they had no money. Again: safety systems causing problems. It's similar to that issue last year when commodities prices went way up, and refiners/miners of some metal, (maybe aluminum, I can't remember or find the link) were screwed because they had again hedged against downside risk and now a bunch of banks were making margin calls on them. This all turned out to be fine, I assume because capital markets gave them bridge funding on the promise that "hey, we benefit from these high prices, we're good for it", but you could imagine a scenario where this price spike occurred during a liquidity crisis where there was no easy capital available, and then these producers would've been strangled to death by their own safety nets.

I don't know much of the details, but there's an emerging discipline of study about the extent to which safety systems against small-scale accidentally inherently make large-scale ones more likely because it increases the risk of cascading failure. This is something that keeps cloud computing operators up at night, since disks and NICs and power supplies die constantly and you have to make that invisible to consumers, but these failover mechanisms are very likely to take down entire datacenters if they just plow ahead with whatever they're doing. It's wild to me that finance faces the exact same dilemma.

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ofmermaidstories · 2 years

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for the love of god do pt2 for the soulmate au DEAR GOD PLEASE IT WAS SO GOOD PLEEEEASE PLEEEEEASE

“The down-payment is ¥500,000,” she says, and your mouth thins before you slide the envelop across to her. Five hundred thousand yen was enough money to pay your rent for a few good solid months or keep you in new books for years. Five hundred thousand yen was emergency money, flee money, start-over-again money—but, you figured, this counted as an emergency, as a way to start over again.

The woman across from you—husky, a round face and her hair piled on top of her head in loose curls—goes to take it, but you keep your hand flat ontop.

“It works, right?” You ask. “I’m not just paying out of my ass for nothing, am I?”

She does you the grace of not laughing, though her lips—full and soft—twitch. “Baby,” she says, and you rankle at the name, “I’m not in the business of ripping people off. My Quirk is the real deal.”

Her eyes are clear gray—like water along stones. Instead of fighting you for the cash she leans back into her chair, taking out a silver cigarette case and tapping it against the table. “Playing around with other peoples’ soul bonds is dangerous,” she tells you, laying the case flat and flicking it open. “Not for me, mind, but for them. People don’t come to me for a joke, Baby. They come to me because they’re bonded to someone abusive, to someone who’s going to hurt them. I don’t do this to accomodate people who change their minds or get bored. I do this because I can; because sometimes it’s a matter of a survival.”

They’re big words; you can feel your frown. “Yeah, you’re big on helping,” you say, churlish. “Is that why it costs so much?”

The woman smiles at you, her eyes crinkling—lighting her cigarette in silence.

You found her on the internet.

You couldn’t be—wouldn’t be—bound to Dynamight of all people. Not when he was already bound to Deku—not when they were both Pro Heroes, and big ones at that, heavy hitters who routinely found themselves fighting for their lives, for each other’s lives, for the country. What would you do with that? What could you do with that? Sit at home and wait for him, knowing that one day he could very well die in his soulmate’s arms? It was alright for someone like Uravity—she might have been Deku’s wife, but she was a Pro Hero in her own right, the chances she’d be there with them were astronomical. You would never be apart of that—you would always have to wait. You, singular.

You had fled from Dynamight as soon as you realised what had planted your feet so solidly there. You hadn’t even looked back—just wretched away from him like he was explosive, and ran. He’d shouted out something—you didn’t care what—and then you had spent that first night in your apartment, pacing, wondering what the hell to do with your elated heart. All the stories people told were right—you had just known. You had seen his stupid face, smooth and unamused and waiting—and you had known. And it was awful. You knew too much about him—you knew too much about his world. There was never any chance.

“I don’t do this with unwilling participants,” the woman across from you says, breaking you out of your thoughts. “Say it aloud: are you sure you want to be unbound?”

You’re in the back of her shop; it’s old, smells of the wooden walls and the dust that’s collected her and the cleaning products sitting in crates nearby. Were you sure you wanted to be unbound? Your best friend from high-school, with his soul-mate-and-rival, complained to you constantly that he hated him, that he’d pay any amount of money to be rid of “the bastard” but even though they both talked like that, neither of them had made a move to do anything about it. They were groomsmen at each other’s weddings, your best friend was the godfather to his soul-mate’s child—they complained about each other, fought against each other constantly on the court, but they loved one another. It didn’t lessen their love for their spouses, or their children, or their friendships. But then—when his soul-mate had gotten into a severe car crash, your best friend hadn’t left his side, waiting. He had stayed until he woke up.

Could you do it, you wondered? You tried to imagine watching Dynamight in the news—watching him go down in flames after Deku, chasing him to the end. Them, together. You, singular.

“Yes,” you say, and your voice shakes. “I’m sure.”

#prompts and drabbles and other things #i was made for lovin’ you — drabble

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docholligay · 9 months

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Doc's Big Labor Day Sale

Hello and welcome worthy friends! Celebrate your own labor by purchasing mine! As many of you know, I recently was given a chance to go on a vacation I can't otherwise afford. Jill's moving off emergency in October, and while we will absolutely be fine, and she very very much needs to, we won't have as much cash rolling in as before, and so if I want to A) buy myself some things for the trip and B) pay for some meals and maybe even a hotel night, so as not to be a complete fucking mooch, I need to raise the cash! (The Patreon will pause in December)

This is where you come in! I have nice things below that you may want to buy, things that come up in limited quantities when available and that I have moved my schedule around to accommodate.

For everything:

First come, first served! First in my inbox, first to claim. If you're second, I will keep you on hold in case person one does not pay. (I'll tell you of course)

I do NOT have to like the item. If we want me to read something and do a positive only review…I mean I guess it’s not OFF the table, but the price would be highly variable and that would be something we’d want to discuss privately before any money changed hands. Not relevant to this moment. Also, this is not a space for Holligay Hates stuff where I'm intentionally being baited, and if I feel I'm being baited I reserve the right to call it off. (Though I am possibly open to that kind of work? We'd have to talk price though it can be emotionally exhausting)

What lovely things can you purchase? And what will I be getting with these fine moneys?

A book review (Delivered in September)SOLD : $85, includes full reading of any book up to 500 pages (longer than that isn’t off limits, just come talk to me) and a 2,000 word at least review of the book. You are absolutely allowed and encouraged to send me questions you’d like me address in the review, or themes you’d like me to touch on. Not a requirement though!

I have the right to veto a book and refund you, but, I’m actually not sure what that would be, in fairness. I just want to put out there I have the right to do it.

Must be available in physical form. (Though ironically I’m doing this to buy a kobo because I think I might like it? Maybe? I don’t know, in any case it would be helpful for travel)

Payment must be made within 2 days of us closing the deal. I'll contact you, I have a couple of ways to pay

What am I getting with this commission? I need a small purse to carry around (Because I'm going to need an umbrella in the UK in winter) Here's what I'm looking at getting!

A weekend of liveblog SOLD (September 23-24): $230, This is exactly what it sounds like, two days in a row of four hours of liveblog! A great idea if you want to do a whole opening episode of an anime or continue something that I've done in the past!

I am open to doing almost anything, but as with everything, I have the right to veto the show you would like to do. If you have something you think might be a little odd, you can always talk to me! I don't get mad about saying no, as long as you're fine with knowing it's a possibility.

What I'm looking to buy with this: I would really like a pair of heeled tie shoes! I have a couple different options but this so far is my top pick, a very nice set of leather shoes that I will be able to wear for years.

Movie Review SOLD: (Delivered in September) $120, a review of any movie up to 2 hours 10 minutes. Longer movies are not off the table but will cost. My process for this is very long; details at the top of this review

But if you want to get my eyes on a movie you would really like to watch me analyze, boy is this the way to do it! I always reserve the right to veto, but there's very little I would veto.

What I will buy with this:

I am very grateful to my mother but also feel like a little bit of a loser, so we're going to go to York and I want to treat her to a true tapas meal, which she's never had before! She'll fucking love it, and this will provide us with a really nice meal and "service charge."

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originemesis · 3 months

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@voxistem from xxx

TV TROPES DOT ORG, GIVE ME THE RUN DOWN. UH OH, LOOKS LIKE A CLASSIC CASE OF IMMORTAL IMMATURITY. but never you mind, dear audience! your host lives with velvette and valentino, he can handle a tantrum or two. this one comes with the added bonus of a holy, angelic soul. well, not so holy anymore but angelic nonetheless. you don't just throw away this kind of opportunity. angel souls are a hefty sum of power, like a briefcase stuffed with wads of cash, requiring transfers in intervals. a little wining and dining, some added expenses — boom, contract signed. and hey, the feathered menace is steadily growing on him. if nothing else, vox has always been fond of rock. ( not necessarily when it's blasting through the tower at three in the morning, but he's adjusting. ) vox makes a show of looking him up and down appreciatively, LED grin flashing across his display as he taps a claw against adam's mask, a static-laced chuckle sounding from his speakers. the fuckboy look suits him. ❝ the prettiest. ❞ the overlord drawls, snaking a clawed grip around the fallen angel's waist, mostly just to hold him in place and steer him down the corridor, in the direction of the elevator, with no more fuss. they have reservations after all. ❝ purple's a good colour on you, birdy. might have to get you more of this. what'dya think, huh? i'm sure vel would love to have you model for her. ❞ out front, there's a limo awaiting them.

Well, it wasn't like he could say this was his preferential placement and all, but it did beat lying in a puddle of blood and used condoms that weren't even his outside of that fucking Lucifer's place...even with cunt^3'd over there vamping on his soul. If it looked like a leech, latched like a leech, and smiled like a leech- it was probably just a TV. In this case, one with legs and enough influence in hell to keep him from getting bulldozed by all the sinners he'd tortured over the years- or worse yet: bored. That was one thing he didn't do very well at all with that attention span of his.

Neck craned down fairly far as if to acknowledge his company, but eyes swiveled elsewhere in a non-committal toss and subsequent roll, he would have his attention brought back to the center of his mask jarringly with the tapping of a claw and the surge of static that came with it and scrambled his face display a brief moment. Oh...? Equalizer bars slanted diagonally shot up and down a quavering moment across the bridge of his visor in the regular golden shade of his features mimicking the stain that was likely dusted across his face underneath at the relenting of a confirmation he didn't expect, but nonetheless packed onto the pile of his steadily stacking Jenga tower of an ego. He'd opened his mouth to pitch whatever saucy thought scuttled out from the knocked over leaf hiding his inner lizard of a mindset, but a side of squawk only emerges once he's yanked over by the hip and ushered towards the doors with a firm, but final say. They were late, and the walking microwave wasn't going to stand for it...or leave him to his Fortnite quests.

"Ehh- mid on most normies. I can elevate it though. Not sure Pinkie-Pie would appreciate the extra work with that hate boner she's got for me." He mused while fussing with a golden stud at the end of his horn, tugging like one might an earring when their hands had little else to do. The 'birdy' doesn't fly under his radar, but he merely huffs a challenge of sorts at the branding.

Challenge accepted.

"Y'know, TV-Din-Dins ~ " The angel mused once he'd been bolstered over to the opening of the ride, talons digging in to the top of the vehicle and scratching his mark in with a firm screech. A sly grin slipped over his shoulder at the one looking to boot him in. "You keep playing the right channel, and I just might let you Netflix and chill a little more soul out of me later." Not that he would. Sometimes it was just cathartic to be simped over for no damned reason other than personal profit. Maybe women did have a cheat code.

#//the tv is good at the love bombing #voxistem #verse ; // dead on arrival #suggestive cw #long post

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lunarsilkscreen · 7 months

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Why Does the Joker know so much?

You can hear it in his words. The Joker knows too much about Gotham. Way too much. He knew the bank he was robbing was mafia owned, he knew all the goons he hired for that job were ready and willing to kill each other for a bigger pot, and willing to keep a secret from each other.

He seemingly has his hands in everything. When the Mob holds an emergency meeting at an undisclosed place? Who is there, waiting?

The Joker.

He was able to setup and execute his "magic trick". Specifically because he knew how each of them would react in that situation. He stole one of the boss's purple suit. "You oughta know, you bought it."

Or maybe, he purchased it with *his* credit card?

"I'm not crazy. No. I'm. Not." In response to one of the mob boss's accusation. He's saying here: "I know your game, you know I know your game, and one way or another, you're going to contact me when I make it out of here alive. Or. Or. Or: we all die together."

That's what he's saying between his last exchange with the bosses and when he shows his hand (of grenades).

At every step of the way, Joker knows what's going to happen and how things will play out. Like somebody playing pool. And unlike somebody playing chess, he's not looking at what moves to make to win in the future. He's looking at how to set-up the table for his opponent's next shot.

He knows about the inner workings of Wayne Enterprises, even gets to some of his employees. Like the one he directs to the bat-tank. He even correctly guessed that Batman would extradite a foreign national. And, how to return the cash the national absconded with back to the mob, securing his "half." Before he burns it.

"gas and gunpowder are cheap" but "money isn't"

He's never guiding anybody's madness. No he has excellent bedside manner. In the case of Harvey Dent, he looks at the scarred half of his face that he's now afraid to show the world, mostly because they purposefully avoid looking at it. Or stare at it too much.

Not the Joker, oh no. He treats both halves of Dent's face as part of the *same* *lovable* Harvey. He looks on both sides of his face with the same Intention, so that Harvey Dent would trust him. Not pity, not fear, not loathing. The same "yea that's a face I'm looking at." Never talking down to him (on either side, unlike what other theorists would have you believe.)

I don't think he even rigged the "person" bomb. I don't think that was Joker's*direct* handy work at all. I think it was his "friend" at Arkham: Dr. Strange. (Not the wizard Dr. Strange. The doctor. The doctor who isn't a Wizard.)

I think he was the boss. Although... "Replacing the voices with pretty lights" *sounds* like something the Joker would say. But not *this* Joker. That's not his style. He always offers a choice, and doesn't take away people's right to choose.

I think Dr. Strange, or some other Boss, promised the Joker an "Escape Plan" and all he had to do was make a phone call. I don't think he actually knew that it was a fellow inmate in that jail.

Otherwise, he'd have given him the option. Now, I know what you're thinking--he already gave him the option. He just delayed it. And again, I'm telling you: This Joker, Heath Leger's Joker, well that's just not his style.

This one is of course the agent of Chaos, not planning. He sets up shots for others to take, and not himself. (It sounds like I'm contradicting myself here. But I'm not.)

At every turn, giving others the option of killing him. Is he showing weakness or his belly like a puppy dog? Or is he *really* asking them to kill him?

The Joker can fight on the same level as Batman. And without the same armor and technical advantage that Batman has, he nearly loses to a Joker with a pipe, and no armor, no plot armor, and no money.

And the only reason he didn't lose, is because Joker wanted to die. Relishing being flipped into the air as the sweet embrace of death is ripped from his grasp by none other than Batman himself.

Who knows full well, that the Joker won't stop. He'll keep setting up the dominos for others to knock down.

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the-everyday-nigeria · 1 year

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Financial Lesson I learnt in 2022

In the year 2022 I've learnt a lot of this some good, some bad and some have absolutely no purpose whatsoever but here are some financial lessons I learnt in 2022 that have made my life all the better.

1. Every penny you save will one day save you: In the middle of the year I got a job that paid about 7x my previous job and hoped my life would automatically become worthwhile and I wouldn't have to the way I did previously and would have more money in my account but to my greatest surprise, this wasn't the case as I seemed to save less money than when I was at my previous job. This became very evident when my younger brother's school called for resumption suddenly, I realized that I had no money to support him and had to resort to borrowing. If I had saved as I was supposed to I wouldn't have had to beg for money to support my brother's education. So it is important that we save a little money for emergencies; no matter the level of income that you are at currently, try to keep at least 1/10 of your monthly income for emergencies because while we do not pray for them eventualities will always arise: you could lose your job, a family member or yourself can get sick, you can make a bad investment, etc and then in your days of trouble, your savings will save you!

2. If it sounds too good to be true, it most usually is: In Nigeria, it is very common to hear: invest 20,000 and get 100,000. Simple mathematics shows that this kind of investment is trying to 500% returns on your investment and there is currently no business on God's green earth that can do this even for stock traders that invest wisely and safely make around 8-12% returns on their investment. Your average business man doesn't make that much profit, neither does your international business man or even your most experienced crypto trader (which by the way I would advise against if you want your money to be safe). So any business that promises you an absurd amount of returns be it online or physical, is usually a Ponzi scheme that will leave a lot of so-called investors in tears!

3. If you can't afford to pay in cash don't buy it: With the advent of things like Easy Buy, buy now and pay later offers; more and more people are tempted to buy things they cannot afford and sometimes things that they do not need. While this is not something I practice, I have a colleague let's call him Bob that bought a phone using one of these services and it would surprise you that the resulting debt accrued by Bob could not be paid in six months for a phone that just cost around 60000! He was knee deep in debt that he had to take loans to pay the phones cost and this spiralled out of control as he was borrowing from one loan app to pay the other and all this started because he bought a phone he could not pay for in cash!

4. Stay Broke: While this might sound like a terrible advice, hear me out. If for example you're like myself that was making a particular amount and you were living comfortably then you 7x your income and immediately raise your standard of living, spending on frivolities, etc; your account balance and assets will most definitely not reflex your new income. Instead of doing what I did, if you instead try to maintain your standard of living or maybe just raise it a bit and avoid non essential things as much as you possibly can: then you have more money to save, more money to invest in things that will serve your future. So while it might sound counter intuitive, staying broke is one of the things I learnt in the year 2022

5. Don't forget to have fun: In my quest to do better with my finances, I found myself at a place where I completely avoided things that I used to do for fun as I said to myself that they were just excuses to spend money that I should be saving; this mentality change when I cracked and went on a spending spree as I had been starving myself of fun things I used to do. If you don't have fun every once in a while, the day you finally break, you would incure the worst expenses ever. So, keep some money aside for fun things, doesn't have to be too much but just enough to keep the "fun monster" satiated!

6. Make efforts to learn about money and how you can make more of it: Growing up in a religious family we rarely talked about money and living in a country where it is very possible to make money from fraudulent and/or mystic way having too much money is usually regarded as a bad thing but one truth I've learnt about money is that money buys you time for example if you had sufficient money you wouldn't have to work extra hours to make more money. Those hours could be spend with friends and family or used to pursue a hobby rather than bursting your butt on a job you don't really like. So while some people might view money in a bad light I've learnt that money obtained legally and genuinely while it might not buy you happiness as we have always been told, will buy you the time you need to find happiness. So learning about your finances and how to make more money is one of the most important things I learnt in 2022.

#finance #money saving #frugality

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