#and of course a lot of russians in the notes of that post whining how they can't donate to gaza because of the sanctions

[wigilda]

"everyone cared about ukraine and no one cares about palestine" a) are you sure everyone cared or cares? b) could we stop comparing ukraine to um. anything?

i am not saying that ukraine didn't get support but it's nowhere as bright as it appears to be and i want palestine to get the same but i don't think that mentioning ukrainians will help anyone

#and of course a lot of russians in the notes of that post whining how they can't donate to gaza because of the sanctions #hypocrisy at its finest #there is a war that you are the fault of maybe focus on it? #god i fucking HATE people today. good morning #dnrb

[granddaughterogg]

Darksiders: The Great House Party - chapter 1

This is more of a polished snippet, guys. But since you don’t seem to like those huge-ass lumps of text I’ve dumped on Tumblr anyway, I’m gonna cut this story into small chapters and publish those as I go. This part is only fluff and totally wholesome. Includes Reader being bratty, Death being a Cultured Badass and Strife making a lame-ass joke. Enjoy!

The sharpshooter appraised you with a half-lidded look. His freckled skin was dark, but not quite brown. You’ve never met a human – or any other being, really - with a hide of such colour. It had deep purplish tones of a ripe eggplant.

Those golden eyes shined like coals in contrast. And now they glided all over you.

It produced a weird sensation in your spine. Not exactly unpleasant, just...alerting. Like that time long ago when you licked a 9V battery and got shocked.

They were no easy answers with Strife. You couldn’t tell what his deal exactly is. You two bickered, you two bonded, you fell out over something trivial, rinse and repeat. Sometimes he made fun of you, sometimes he seemed to really care. Was that buddying camaraderie, or just teeth-clenched teamwork? The most laid-back of the Horsemen kept you on your toes, all the time.

*

The night was damp, sultry, vibrating with lights and music. It came at you as this onslaught of sensation: too many, all at once, like a wave. You could feel your legs giving in. Your better judgement getting off the hinges, bending like a boiled noodle.

You felt hot, bothered and not exactly sober. Although not nearly drunk enough for your poor choices.

So maybe it were those three beers that did the talking. Maybe it was just you.

„I feel like doing something stupid...”, you said in a low voice.

His eyes went huge. In that moment you could see nothing else. Two golden moons, glimmering with drunken lust and feverish hope. His smile was like a shark’s. You should’ve been put off by the grimace – but then again, you did have had those three beers.

„Well then, kid, you’ve come to the right Horseman”.

*Three weeks earlier*

A party!

The idea sprouted in your head during one of those long, awfully hot summer nights. It so happened that none of the Riders had any murderous business to attend. Unless prodded to do something together, they spent their free time much like giant cats. That is: exerting minimal effort.

They lazied around on sofas, which has been moved out to the spacious veranda. It didn’t help much with the heat. But the night wind rustling through greenery surrounding the house was nice.

Now it blew through War’s shiny hair while he dozed off. The moths smashed their little furry bodies against the lamp. Fury chuckled softly, those pearly peepers glued to the monitor of her laptop.

Strife decimated a pile of doughnuts, while Death read War and Peace.

It sure was peaceful. Which means that nothing happened.

You hanged around them with a humongous glass of iced tea, feeling more hot and bored by the minute.

„It will take you forever to finish this”, you chimed in, tracing the Reaper’s pale forearm with your fingers.

„It just so happens that I have forever.” He didn’t even lift eyes from the page.

You felt like an ignored puppy.

„Why would you spend even a minute of it on this musty ol’ doorstop of a book anyway?” You whined, climbing onto the Reaper’s tight abdomen and leaning over the tome in his hand.

Death gave out a sigh.

„I see”, he said with a half-smirk, stroking your chin with his long fingers. „You wish I’d lavish you with attention instead?”

You pouted. „Well, yeah! I’m bored outta my mind.”

„Later”, declared Death and got back to reading.

„Whut?”

„I’ll attend to you later. Very thoroughly, too.”

Damn his narrow ass! The eldest Rider had such a way of announcing those things. Curt, even standoffish, yet subtly playful in his own way. As much as you’d wish to get all in a huff - you felt defeated by the note of dry amusement in his voice.

But you sure as hell weren’t going to show it.

„Death!...”

„Didn’t you hear what I just said? Now get off me, will you? I’m about to get to the good part.”

Strife chortled - and then had the gall to wink when your head sprung back. The bastard.

„There are no good parts in damn War and Peace”, you mumbled, scampering off the Russian literature aficionado. You set your hopes on War instead.

The Big Guy didn’t object to being crawled on, because he was snoring.

So you have lied flat on his broad chest, spread your arms wide and pretended to be this kid from Totoro.

The steady tide of War’s breath was like the sea’s murmur. Soothing.

„So, which part are you at, exactly?...” you muttered, pressing your cheek to the warm vastness that was the sleeping Horseman.

„Natasha and Prince Bolkonsky are having their first waltz”, said Death. „It’s exquisite.”

She’s gonna cheat on him and he will die in the war, you thought to yourself, but of course didn’t say it aloud. You said only:

„Waltz. Dancing...I’d love to dance.”

„Hey pancakes, you could always hit the town with me.” Strife chimed in, his lazy tone implying that he’s is absolutely not invested in the proposition.

„I could?..” You were baffled.

„As if I’d allow that”, said Death calmly and turned a page.

„Oh come on, D!”

„Yeah, D, don’t get your low cut panties in a twist..." Strife dispatched the last doughnut and casually threw the empty tray through the wide-open veranda doors, into the house. It flew with a „swoosh!” and bounced off the kitchen wall before falling precisely into the sink.

The showoff.

„It’s not like I’m gonna take my eyes off her...even for a second.”

The sharpshooter appraised you with a half-lidded look. His freckled skin was dark, but not quite brown. You’ve never met a human – or any other being, really - with a hide of such colour. It had deep purplish tones of a ripe eggplant.

Those golden eyes shined like coals in contrast. And now they glided all over you.

It produced a weird sensation in your spine. Not exactly unpleasant, just...alerting. Like that time long ago when you licked a 9V battery and got shocked.

They were no easy answers with Strife. You couldn’t tell what his deal exactly is. You two bickered, you two bonded, you fell out over something trivial, rinse and repeat. Sometimes he made fun of you, sometimes he seemed to really care. Was that buddying camaraderie, or just teeth-clenched teamwork? The most laid back of the Horsemen kept you on your toes, all the time.

„Those dens that you frequent are not suitable for her kind”, stated your most beloved Nephilim and got back to his read.

„Yeah, cause I’m such a delicate flower, me”, you snorted.

Death ignored you. He would accommodate you in many ways, but he got downward paranoid when it came to your safety.

Those fears of his weren’t all unfounded. Many marauder demons still traipsed the post-Revival Earth; remnants of a once-great army, eager for food or just for something alive to toy with. And during your shared journey through the realms Death witnessed how easy to kill or maim you are.

You couldn’t blame him for being overprotective.

Further bickering seemed pointless. Instead you got an idea. It flashed upon you abruptly like the cartoon lightbulb.

„Let’s throw a party”, you said.

„Huh?...” Strife didn’t seem to follow.

„I said, let’s throw a party. Here. In this house. Let’s get booze and food and stuff. Let’s finally put those bigass speakers you got to play RDR2 to good use. Let’s invite all sorts of folks over and be merry!

„Those are damn good speakers...” remarked Strife slowly.

„Yeah.” You grinned. „That’s what I’m saying. Now imagine Fuel blasting through them.”

„You’ve got me here, pumpkin”, said Strife, throwing his hands in the air. „I’m sold.”

You turned to his twin. „Fury?”

„Oh, I don’t care much about parties”, said the purple-haired one. Her eyes were fixed on funny cats prancing through Youtube. Then she sat up and brushed a tendril behind her shapely ear. „Wait. Did you just say you can make music play really loud tho?”

„As loud as you wish it to be.”

She licked her lips. „Even...Beyoncé?”

You subdued a knowing chuckle. The only thing bigger than the rageful vixen’s newfound affinity for cheesy pop songs...was her need to hide this fondness from her kin. It seemed to have wavered though.

„Especially Beyoncé.” you said, your mouth tilting upwards. „I can’t imagine a better tune to dance the night away.”

„Then I’m on board with this”, said Fury swiftly.

Half of the crew down, another half to go.

„Hey, War!” you jumped up and down, sitting astride the snoring giant. If he were a regular man, he’d probably wake up with a start. War just opened his bright eyes - slowly - and gave you a smile that was not quite there.

„What is it, Little One?...”

„We’re gonna give a party!” You bounced off his firm stomach, excited like a toddler. „Lots of music, lots of booze, lots of people, too! You’re with us?”

„What about food?” That was the Red Rider’s only input. Then he yawned, grunted and stretched to his whole impressive length. The ripple that went through this powerful body almost knocked you over. You laughed breathlessly and clutched onto his shirt.

„Food, sure. We can build a barbecue of epic proportions. Like the one we used to have back when I stayed with the Makers. I’m sure Ulthane will know how to run one.”

„Ulthane! Haven’t seen this old stump for some time now. Also, I’d love some roasted meat.” War’s peepers shone brightly at the idea of a feast; you needn’t coax him further. As Strife’s put it - he was sold.

That left you just with one remaining member of the Nephilim Squad. Unfortunately, he was also the grumpiest one. You first and most beloved. Death.

You looked him in the eyes with pleading.

„D, can we have a house party? Please, please. I’m so bored, I’m gonna climb up walls!”

The Pale Rider bookmarked his page, closed the ancient yellowed tome - and sighed.

„It’s not like I can deny you now, can I?” he said wryly. But the corner of his mouth was twitching, and that flame in his eyes was kind. „Although this is going to put this whole household in a state of disarray.”

„Well, War’s armour pieces already fill the bathtub...and Strife likes to frisbee used dishes into the sink. So you mean, like in more disarray than it already is?” You gave him a shit-eating grin.

Death chuckled. „Good point. Though I have objections. What exactly do you mean by lots of people?”

You calmed down and started to count on your fingers.

„Oh, nothing too excessive. Just a bunch of friends. Like Ulthane and some of his Makers and some angels, I mean, Uriel and Usiel would both be down for it, and maybe Vulgrim…

„Vulgrim steals everything that isn’t riveted to the ground”, said Death dryly.

You giggled.

„Yeah, I reckon. But what exactly can he snatch from our crib that would be worthy enough to fund that soul habit of his? Spoons?”

„Oh, you'd be surprised.”

„Okay, then maybe not him. But Fury, Strife, you both should totally bring your human friends from Haven, too! I’d love to meet them.”

Fury nodded absentmindedly.

„My friends...from Haven?” Repeated the gunslinger in a weird voice.

„Yeah!” You were too preoccupied with your trail of thought to think much about Strife’s suddenly tightened expression.

He went still for a while, then shrugged.

„Your wish is my command.”

„Cool! Oh, this is gonna be fun. I bet Azrael was never to a proper barbecue before...”

„Wait.” Death lifted one hand. „What are you saying? Azrael? The Makers? I have nothing against them, but they would never fit inside this house.”

He was right. You and the Four bought this derelict estate, tore it down and then rebuilt to fit their proportions. Especially to War’s, who never felt at ease in human-sized interiors, what with all his bulk. But the magical Scots people were another case entirely. Same went for Azrael’s nonsensical display of poshness, which was his damn wings.

You grinned and slapped your forehead.

„They won’t...but they'll fit into our yard. Let’s make this a garden party, people! The nights are way too hot to sit inside anyway. War, do you have any additions to the guest list?”

„As long as there’s food, I don’t care”, stated your beloved lug of a man and went back to napping.

„Strife?”

„Lemme see...Make sure to invite Jack Daniels”, quipped Strife and chortled.

You couldn’t help but smile either.

„I am going to regret this”, stated Death stoically. „But so be it.”

#darksiders #darksiders fan fiction #the great house party #darksiders fluff #darksiders death #darksiders war #darksiders strife #darksiders fury #death/reader #strife/reader #keeping up with the nephilim

[hockeyandstuff91]

How did this happen? - Part 6

Word count: 4,974

Players: Tyler Seguin, Alexander Radulov, Jamie Benn

Other people: Katie

Warning: cussing

Authors note: Yay part 6! Sooo I don't know that you can't get Boston cream doughnuts in Texas, however in this case we are going to pretend that you can't lol.

ALSO LMAO I just kept writing and writing and writing so oops.. its a lot longer than I meant for it to be, also why it ends the way it does because I could totally keep going but I decided to make this two parts lol

Translations for this part are going to be: детка = babe in Russian (according to google translate. I apologize if this is not accurate lol)

Hope you enjoy!

Part 1    Part 2    Part 3    Part 4    Part 5   Part 6.5

(Brooke’s POV)

I was dragged out of my sleep by my phone going off. I groaned and opened my right eye, squinting at the clock on my bedside table.

Fucking 8? Really? It's my damn day off and I can't even sleep in.

I sigh and grab my phone off the table and pull the charger out of it. I slide my finger across the bottom and hold it up to my ear, pulling the blanket up over my head.

"Hello?" I mumbled.

"Still asleep?" Tyler was way too awake this early in the morning on a Saturday.

"I was but not anymore," I sighed.

"Wow someone is grumpy this morning," he laughed, I heard his car door open and close in the background and the sound of the engine start. I could tell I had been switched over to the car speakers as he started to back out of his driveway.

"Sorry Ty, I just was hoping that on my day off I would get to sleep in."

"It's okay. You want me to grab you anything?"

"What do you mean?"

"Like breakfast! A coffee or something? I'm gonna get myself something before I head over."

"Over where?" I was still way too tired to keep up right now.

"To your apartment!"

"At 8 in the morning?!"

"Yeah I wanted to stop by before Jamie, Rads, and I go golfing."

"Why?" I asked, a little more irritated than I meant for it to come out.

"Jeez I just wanted to see my best friend but you clearly aren't in the mood. I'll just-"

"No Tyler I'm sorry," I groaned as I pushed the blanket off of me and I sat up. "I'm still half asleep. I'm not exactly following this conversation that well right now," I managed to huff out half of a laugh.

"Alright well I'll be there in like 10 minutes. You want anything?"

"Yeah just get me a doughnut? Do they have Boston cream down here?"

"You like Boston cream doughnuts?!"

I laugh "Yes Tyler I did live only 3 hours from Boston my whole life, all of the dunkin donuts had them."

"I haven't had one in a while. Probably since I was in Boston."

"Well if you find one, that is what I want because neither have I. If not I'll just take a frozen mocha drink of some kind, and a glazed doughnut would be good."

"Alright sounds good. I'll be there soon."

"Okay drive safe," I said and we both hung up. I yawned, stretching and got out of bed. I looked at myself in the mirror and took my hair out of the french braid it was in, throwing it up into a messy bun instead. I didn't feel like getting dressed right now and if Tyler was going to golf with Jamie and Rads I knew he wouldn't be here for long so maybe I would get the chance to go back to sleep after he left. I walked out to the living room of my apartment and sat on the couch, pulling a blanket over my lap since I was only wearing an oversized tshirt. I flipped the TV on and found nothing interesting, of course, so I just turned it to the sports channel for background noise and decided to scroll through Instagram.

About 50 puppy pictures, and random hockey related posts later I heard a knock on my door. I set my phone down on the coffee table and got up, pulling the blanket with me, wrapping it around my shoulders and walking to the door. I looked through the peep hole, seeing Tyler standing there waiting for me.

I opened the door and poked my head out "Yes? Who are you?" I smirked.

"Oh come on!" Tyler laughed and I stepped away from the door, opening it all the way for him.

I turned and made my way back to my nest of pillows on the couch and sat back down. Tyler followed close behind me, setting our drinks and a paper bag of food on the coffee table. He pulled out a separate smaller bag from the bigger bag and tossed it to me.

"Here you go princess," he smirked and sat down on the couch next to me.

I raised an eyebrow at him and opened the bag, gasping. "Where did you find one?"

"I went to a special bakery in town that is owned by a family that was from New England. They have specialty New England items you can't get in Texas anywhere else."

"Aww Ty you didn't have to-"

"Oh if you didn't notice there's two in there, one is for me. I forgot all about those sugar filled devils until you brought it up," He smirked and stuck his hand into the bag and pulled one out for himself.

I just laughed and rubbed my face as I yawned again, still not fully awake.

"Aww is Brookie tired?" He mocked me, wrapping his arm around me as he ate his doughnut.

"Yes," I mumbled and laid my head on his shoulder while I slowly ate my doughnut.

"Well tonight there's a hockey event going on and the players are allowed a plus one. You wanna go with?"

"Me?" I asked, tilting my head to look up at him, seeing him take the last bite of his doughnut.

He laughed and wiped my cheek with his finger, there was chocolate on it, clearly I was making a mess, but at least it was entertaining him. He licked it off his finger and smirked at me, wiggling his eyebrows.

"You're gross," I laughed.

"Why?"

"Because I know what your mind is like, don't even start its too early."

"Fine fine. Anyways do you want to go?"

"I don't have anything to wear for something like that, Ty."

"That's okay we'll get you something," he said and pulled out his phone. "Rads just texted me and said Ashlyn is going, you two can go shopping and find something I'm sure."

"Ty I don't have extra money for all of this right now, I'm barely making my rent as it is," I said looking back up at him.

Tyler looked down at me and smiled "It's okay I'll cover it. I really want you to go Brooke."

"Is that why you came to my house at 8 in the morning?" I asked him as I finished my doughnut.

"Well.." Tyler smiled sheepishly and rubbed the back of his neck. "I thought that if I asked you in person you would be more likely to say yes."

I sighed and nuzzled my face into his shoulder, closing my eyes. I normally would argue with him buying something for me, especially something I knew was going to be expensive. But it was too early and I knew he wouldn't take no for an answer anyways. "What kind of event is this anyways?" I mumbled against his shoulder.

Tyler rested his head against mine and rubbed my arm. "It's a charity event for the children's hospital. We go visit them tomorrow before the game, but tonight we are raising money so we can bring them the check tomorrow."

"Awww!" Anything kid related made my heart melt, especially for ones that were sick. I had been in the hospital for 2 weeks, over Christmas no less, back when I was 9 so I knew how they felt. Having the guys show up to visit them tomorrow was going to really make the kids happy. "Yeah I'll go Ty," I smiled against him.

I had been surprised how cuddly of a person Tyler was, but I for sure enjoyed it. I didn't think he would be open to that especially since we were just friends, but it made sense, there was no pressure there for him to be anything but himself and it just felt natural.

"Yeah? Great! I'm excited. The other guys will be there, some you haven't met. Of course you know Jamie and Rads the most out of them all, Ashlyn and Katie will be there so you girls can hang out when we have to go mingle."

I nodded and pulled the blanket over myself more, some of it covering Tyler as well.

"Ohh no don't get too comfortable. I need to go meet Jam and Rads in like 20 minutes to get in some golfing before we get ready later," he laughed.

I whined and pushed closer to him. I would much rather just spend the day with him but I knew that both of us had our own lives to live away from each other sometimes, even if a lot of the time over the last couple months we had basically been attached at the hip for the most part when he was home.

"I know," he said softly, almost reading my mind. "You get 5 minutes of cuddle time and then I gotta go," he said, pulling me closer and wrapping his other arm around me.

I smiled and rested my head on his chest, feeling his chin rest on top of my head. He rubbed small circles on my back as I just listened to his heart beat. It was soothing and it almost put me back to sleep before Tyler started to pull back.

"Alright I gave you 3 extra minutes, if I'm late I'm blaming you," he laughed and I pulled back so he could get up.

"Jamie and Rad wont care," I said and watched him grab his coffee.

"Rads might not but Jamie.. He takes his golf very seriously," He laughed, smiling down at me.

"What doesn't he take seriously?"

"Good point. Oh! Before I forget here..." Tyler reached into his pocket and grabbed out his wallet and dropped a card onto my coffee table. "Don't spend more than like a grand k?" he laughed again.

"What?! There is no way I would ever spend that much on a dress Tyler, this isn't a wedding, don't worry," I smiled and stood up to give him a hug.

"I know. I just forget sometimes you aren't like other girls from around here," he said wrapping his arms around me again.

"Well that's because I'm not technically from here. But yes you're right, I'm not like most of them," I smile and give him a slight squeeze. "You know me Tyler, I'm not a huge materialistic person."

"I know," he nodded and pulled back from the hug. "Okay so text me pictures or something, I need to know what tie to wear."

"We are gonna match?" I smirked and raised an eyebrow at him, he nodded. "What is this prom?" I laughed.

"Oh shut up, you know Rads and Ashlyn and Jam and Katie are going to match. You don't want to be left out do you?"

I sighed and shook my head "Nooo.. I guess not," I smiled and walked him to the door.

"Have fun dress shopping. And don't spend all of my money!"

"I won't! Have fun golfing," I said and closed the door behind him.

Ashlyn and I had gone to a few dress shops around the city, me being mostly frustrated that none of them fit me well. I wasn't exactly a tiny girl, I had a few more curves to me than most of the other women that were going to be at this event tonight. Of course it didn't help that I also had a large chest (thanks a lot mom and gram) so finding a dress that fit all of my lovely assets wasn't the easiest thing. Thankfully the ladies at the dress shops loved to help and I finally was able to find a dress that I liked, and would wear more than once.

I walked out of the dressing room in the 3rd dress at this store. It felt like I had tried on at least 100 dresses and we had been dress hunting all day, but I knew that was just because I hated trying on clothes. This dress had been on the mannequin in the front of the store and both Ashlyn and I had been eyeing it the whole time, but there was no way I thought it would end up in the dressing room with me. It was a dress I wished I could wear but never felt like I could pull off. It was a tighter dress than I was comfortable with, ruched all the way down the front of the dress, the neckline had a piece added on to add an off the shoulder look, and it was beautiful deep dark purple color, which was one of my favorite colors.

"You look so great!" Ashlyn smiled as she watched me turn from side to side in front of the wall of mirrors.

"You think? It doesn't like.."

"No Brooke its beautiful."

I sigh and nod, turning around and smile at her.

"Do you like it?"

"I do yeah. I do think it is pretty and I think I look good in it-"

"But?"

"I mean you know I have self confidence issues, and normally I wouldn't try to worry too much about it but its a bit different this time."

"Because of Tyler?"

I just nod and turn back to the mirror, looking at myself, I pull at the fabric to try and make it hide the places on my body I don't like as much.

"Brooke stop picking. You seriously do look great"

"You sure its not too tight? I mean I could find something more flowy.."

"If you aren't comfortable in it then don't get it. But I think you are worrying too much. I know you like Tyler and I know you want to make a good impression on him. But he likes you for you. I mean you guys have been attached at the hip when they have been home, there's a reason for that. Don't stress so much," Ashlyn said, getting up and walking over to me, fixing the dress.

I sigh and nod. "I just know the type of girls-"

"Yes I know. We all are aware. But you know what there's a reason they don't stick around long. Why it wont ever last with one of those girls."

"I know I know."

"Then quit, and lets go pay for this and see if we can find you some shoes to go with it," she smiles at me in the mirror.

I walk back into the dressing room and then laugh, realizing there's no way I'm getting this thing off by myself. I poke my head out the dressing room and ask Ashlyn to unzip it for me, going back in and changing into my normal clothes. I walk back out, the dress carefully draped over my arm.

"So how much does that thing cost anyways?" Ashlyn asks as she stands back up off the couch.

"I haven't dared to look yet," I said and laugh.

"Well look!" Ashlyn laughed and walked over to me.

I grabbed the tag and flipped it over. It wasn't as bad as I thought it was going to be, but it was for sure not something that I would ever buy myself.

"Ugh," Ashlyn groaned.

"Yeah I would never buy this for myself. Nope," I shook my head and started walking with her towards the shoe section.

"Well good thing you aren't!" Ashlyn laughed as she started looking at shoes.

"Did you get a new dress too?"

"Yeah, Alex paid for it. It was a little less than that one," she motioned to the dress still in my arms.

I nodded "Well lets just hope that the shoes aren't stupidly expensive too," I smile as we look through the displays.

The dress was going to be $350 which was honestly not surprising, but that still didn't make me feel any less bad. I know Tyler said that it was fine but I wasn't that type of girl. I didn't buy expensive things, I didn't like when other people bought me expensive things either. I just hoped he didn't mind that if I went to more than one event with him I would be wearing this dress to a lot of them.

Thankfully Ashlyn and I had found some cute black heels to go with it that were only $100 and me knowing shoes so well, after working in a shoe store back at home from the ages of 16-21, I knew that was pretty common and not a bad price at all.

We walked over to the counter and set the dress and shoes up there. The lady behind the counter placed the dress into protective bag that allowed it to still hang flat. She grabbed a box for the shoes and told me that my total was going to be about $460. I nodded and handed her Tyler's card and looked over to Ashlyn, shaking my head.

She laughed and nodded, knowing that I hated doing this. "You'll be alright. It wont kill you to treat yourself for once."

"Oooh I know," I said and grabbed the pen from the counter to sign the slip before grabbing his card back and putting it back in my wallet and then into my purse. I grabbed the dress bag and Ashlyn grabbed the shoe box as we headed back out to her car.

"Aw shit I forgot to take a picture of it to send to Tyler."

"It's okay we can take one when we drop it off at my house."

"Drop it off? Why what else are we doing?"

"Katie invited us to go with her to get our nails, hair, and makeup done before tonight. Tyler didn't tell you?"

"No he didn't. But that was very sweet of her to invite us!"

Ashlyn and I had hung out with Katie a few times, at home games, as well as at some cookouts and dinners that Jamie and her had invited all of us to when the boys had a little down time between games. She was very sweet and welcoming to the two of us, which was really nice. I did feel a little out of the loop at first only being the friend but she never made it feel like I didn't belong, which I appreciated a lot.

Ashlyn and I got into her car and made the short drive to her apartment. I hung the dress in the doorway of the hall that lead to her bedroom and unzipped the protective cover.

"Brooke, I was thinking on the way over here you shouldn't send Tyler a picture of the dress," Ashlyn said as she grabbed a water out of the fridge.

"Why not? He asked me to so that he could pick out what tie he was going to wear."

"Well take a picture of just the color then instead of the whole dress. Make it a surprise."

I shrugged "Yeah I guess. I mean I don't think hes going to be stunned or anything when he sees me," I laugh as I pull out my phone and take a picture of just the color of the dress.

"You never know!" Ashlyn said as she walked by you and into her bedroom to grab her dress to bring out and show me.

"Maybe.." I said softly, not loud enough for her to hear me since she was in the other room now.

I opened up the message app on my phone and went to Tyler's name. I sent the picture of the dress and added in

Me: You'll have to wait until later to see the rest, but here is the color 😜

I pocketed my phone and zipped the dress back up and went to grab a water from Ashlyn's fridge for myself. Just as I did Ashlyn came out with her dress, also in a protective bag, and hung it up next to mine in the doorway.

"Ooo yes I'm excited to see yours!"

She unzipped the bag and moved it out of the way so I could see the whole dress.

"Oh that is so beautiful! Does Alex know what it looks like yet?"

Ashlyn shook her head. "No I went yesterday while he was at practice. He said he didn't want to know until tonight when we all showed up for the event. Us girls are going separate from the boys since we are leaving right after our appointment to come back here to get dressed and then head straight to the event."

I just nodded my head. It was a good thing I was a go with the flow kind of person because all of the plans that were going on today I had no knowledge of, but I was having fun so I didn't really care.

"Well I think we are going to look great!" I smiled and walked over to where Ashlyn was standing so that I could look at the dresses better.

After another 20 minutes of talking about our dresses and relaxing on the couch we went to go head to the salon to meet Katie for our appointment. We stopped at a coffee shop to grab a few drinks for the three of us before meeting Katie in the parking lot of the salon.

"Hey girls!" Katie smiled as she came over to greet us, giving each of us a hug.

"Hey Katie how have you been?" Ashlyn asked.

"Great! Are you two ready for tonight?"

Ashlyn smiled and nodded, I just kind of looked at Katie.

"Whats the matter Brooke?" She asked as we headed inside.

I shook my head and shrugged. "Nothing."

Katie and Ashlyn looked at me but didn't say anything since the lady had greeted us when we walked in the door and started getting our information for the appointment. We got brought over to a few chairs to get a pedicure to start with.

I placed my feet in the water, enjoying the massage they were getting by the jets in the water. The ladies who were going to be doing our pedicure had left to go get the lotions and nail polish colors we had picked. I happened to be sitting right in the middle of Katie and Ashlyn which meant as soon as we were left alone the two of them both turned to me.

"What?!" I laughed and looked between them.

"Are you doing okay?" Katie asked me.

"Yeah why?" I asked, taking a sip of my mocha iced coffee drink.

"You just seem.. different than usual," Katie commented.

I looked over to Ashlyn and she gave me a small smile. She understood what was going on in my head but I guess I was going to have to explain it to Katie, which I wasn't really sure how this was going to go because she was one of the skinny and pretty ones that I always compared myself to.

"I know I'm not being my normal talkative self today," I start as I turn to look at Katie. "I'm just not sure what to expect for tonight is all," I smiled at her.

"Oh you'll be fine! We will be there with you. And Tyler and the guys will all be there. There is nothing to worry about," she smiled back. "But I feel like that's not all it is," she said giving me a quizzical look.

I sighed and pursed my lips, thinking how to explain this to her. "I'm not exactly the most self confident person. I got a really great dress but I'm just a little worried about it."

"What? Why you are beautiful!" Katie said.

I smiled "Thanks."

"She's over thinking it because Tyler is going to be there," Ashlyn said, knowing that you didn't really want to say it but it was going to come up at some point anyways.

"Why would that-" Katie started but then nodded "Oh I understand," she said and reached over, grabbing my hand. "You and him are close sweetie. I haven't seen him and another girl attached to each other like the two of you are. I wouldn't worry so much about your physical appearance Hun."

I sighed and nodded "I know. I keep telling myself the same thing. I mean back when he and I first met we both agreed that we felt like we had known each other forever. So there's something clearly there that makes us so close to each other, which is great."

The two other girls nod and Katie sits back in her seat. The nail tech ladies come back in and sit in front of the three of us on their stools and start our pedicures.

After a few moments of silence I speak up again, adding to my previous statement "And I mean honestly as much as I like him, even if we didn't end up together I'm glad that he and I are so close as friends."

"Yeah you guys are great," Katie smiles, looking up from her phone over at me.

"I just have a bad feeling that I will end up pushed out if someone else comes along, that's all."

"I wouldn't worry about that," Katie says shaking her head.

"Why not?"

"Because I don't think that would happen, not with the way he acts with you."

"Yeah but the type of girls he goes for and I usually don't tend to get along with one another."

Katie laughed "Yeah but there's a reason why none of them have lasted."

"I said the same thing!" Ashlyn said.

"See?" Katie said, pointing to Ashlyn "She knows."

"Oh so do I. I just always compare myself to girls like that, and I think that also has to do with the whole issue of tonight. I don't want to stick out among the rest of you. I mean I already do as is just being the friend-"

"No you won't stick out. You will look amazing. Stop. Worrying."

"okay okay!" I laughed and sat back.

The rest of the afternoon we talked about other random things, the topic of the boys not really coming up except for when Jamie called Katie to let us all know that they would be getting to the event a little early and would meet us out front.

"We need to hang out more just us girls, without the boys! This was so much fun," Katie smiled as the three of us walked outside. We had spent 3 hours in there getting our toes and finger nails done, hair styled, and makeup done.

"We really do! Especially when they are gone for away games," Ashlyn suggested.

Katie nodded "I get so bored at home alone when Jam is gone, having the girls over more often would be great. Oh! So I brought my dress with me, you girls don't mind if I follow you back to your apartment and we can all get dressed there so we can cut down on cars we take? I have room for all of us."

"That would be great! Alex asked if I wanted to stay over his house after the event anyways," Ashlyn said. "So if I don't have to drive I'm happy with that," she laughed.

I nodded "I'm sure I can convince Tyler to drive me home after," I laughed.

"Okay, I'll follow you guys," Katie smiled as she got into her car and we got into Ashlyn's.

Once getting to Ashlyn's apartment Katie gushed over our dresses and was excited to see what we looked like in them. Katie got changed first, Ashlyn and I leaning against the counter in her kitchen while we look at Instagram.

Ashlyn's phone rang and I saw Alexander's face pop up on her screen. I smiled and stepped away, walking over to where my dress was hanging up so she could talk to him.

"Hello?" Ashlyn answers her phone.

"Hey детка," Alexander responds.

Ashlyn smiles, loving when he uses Russian words that he had taught her. "How was golf?"

"Good! I missed you. Can't wait to see you soon."

"Me too. We should be headed out in a few minutes. Brooke and I just need to get changed and we are ready to go."

"Okay. We are just parking the car I will see you out front when you get here," Alexander said

"Okay. We are all coming in Katie's car so I will ride back with you tonight if that's okay?"

"Of course детка!"

"Alright," Ashlyn giggled "See you in a bit."

"Bye bye."

"You two are so cute," I smiled over to Ashlyn as she hung up her phone.

"Oh shush," Ashlyn said just as Katie walked out.

"Your next!" Katie said, tapping my shoulder.

I sighed "Alright well I'll need one of you to zip me up when I come out," I said and walked into the bedroom to get changed.

After getting dressed us girls all walked out to Katie's car and made our way to the event. There was a line of cars, a valet attendant taking people's keys to park their cars. Not something that I was used to, but it was fun to get all dressed up and go to something fancy like this.

"Oh there are the boys," Katie said, motioning over towards the front door.

The three of us got out of the car, the boys walking over when they noticed us, Alexander took Ashlyn's arm and escorted her towards the door, I could over hear him complimenting how beautiful she looked.

Jamie smiled and brought Katie over, nudging Tyler who was on his phone, typing something. He finished and put his phone in his pocket before looking up, seeing me for the first time tonight in my dress.

#nhl fanfic #tyler seguin #alexander radulov #dallas stars #how did this happen #how did this happen part 6 #first person

[epoxyconfetti]

Disappointment Redux

Me whining ad nauseum about my life below the cut.

Back when I was a kid, I sang. I sang a lot. Okay... constantly. I still do, to myself in the shower or alone in the car. But until I was in high school I sang in public. I was in choir with a very respected choir director for six years. I sang in musicals, even got the lead in one. I thought I was pretty hot.

There was this voice teacher I’d been hearing about for years. She took only the best students, a few a year. She was very well connected, and found jobs for almost all of her students, or at least great auditions. One girl from my school who studied with her got into Julliard and then the Metropolitan Opera, another sang in New York cabarets while finishing high school. In my senior year, after consulting with our choir teacher, she deigned to audition a few of us to be her students.

I prepared for two weeks, picking the perfect audition piece with my choir teacher. Practice, practice, practice until I had it just right. I did nothing that might damage or strain my voice. I avoided anyone holding a cigarette lest the smoke come near my vocal cords, and drank no milk.

The day of the audition came and we lined up outside the choir room. She would audition six of us, but she only had three openings for students, and she had other schools to go to. We were all nervous as hell, but I was confident. I had this.

I was the third to go in for the audition. The two people ahead of me came out beaming. One girl was so happy she was crying, although the famous voice teacher didn’t announce her results until a few weeks later, whatever she said to this girl absolutely thrilled her.

I walked into the room, and this little sparrow of a woman with a large nose and tiny glasses sat in a chair at the front of the room in front of the chalk board. We’d set up the portable acoustical shell that we normally only used on stage. She was at the focal point of every sound in the room. I put my sheet music on the stand, and she gestured for me to begin. I opened my mouth and sang my best.

Eight bars into my song, she interrupted me. “No, no, no. Stop,” she said in a thick Russian accent. “You will never be a singer. What is Mr. Andersen thinking, sending someone like this to audition with me? Tell the next person to come in.” I stood there dumbfounded. She gestured to the door dismissively, “Off with you. Get out.”

I can’t even begin to tell you how devastated I was. People tried to tell me it was no big deal. They played me “Nothing” from A Chorus Line to tell me I shouldn’t give up. I won’t say I never sang again, but I never enjoyed it as much. I had one marking period of choir left for the year, but I wouldn’t participate. I actually failed the marking period, but my A’s from earlier marking periods gave me a C+ for the year. The girl who came out elated from the audition became her student, and got a voice scholarship to college, full ride, and now she’s a hotshot lawyer in Manhattan.

I never forgot that gut punch.

There’s an editor where I work, and she’s something of a legend in our field. She’s one of the last hold-outs from the days when we actually hired English majors and journalists to write reports. Now we hire experts in other fields, and send them through a two-week class and call them a reporter. When I first got back into reporting, and later made an editor, I hung on her every word. She taught several of the reporting courses, and I waited for the classes where she was the instructor. If she was giving a seminar, I was there. She started a blog last year, and I waited impatiently for each new post to come out.

So this week, I actually got to work with her professionally. A report her office was working on came though our office for final approval. It was a great report. I sent her a note, asking her to make one minor change before I released it for publication. By email, she argued the change I requested. She cited a report she had sent through our office a few days ago, where another of our editors asked for something the way she had written it today. I’m the new guy in this job, so I checked with the other editor, and my supervisors. The first report required it to be done one way, the second another. I said so, very respectfully and citing regulations to back my position.

Her emailed reply was “Fine. Whatever.” She’s one of the most verbose writers I’ve come across at work. Amusing, concise, colorful. Did I mention I love her blog? Five minutes later I released her report into the wild. I was mildly aghast that I might have ticked off my idol. But I went back to work.

I worked late tonight, and I was the last one in my office. Just as I was getting to leave, I noticed that her blog had a new post. Yay! Then... I read it. It was about persistent myths in reporting, and consistency in editing. The entire second half of the blog post was dedicated to criticizing my office, and “certain junior editors” in particular. Perhaps we should be better vetted before we are hired, and certainly better trained before we’re allowed to work on actual reporting.

Same gut punch.

Fuck it. I’m drinking another beer and going to bed. I gotta be in to work early.

[gospacegay]

LRTIHEW: Part Two

The title stands for “Longest Rusame Thing I Have Ever Written”. I have been writing it for a very long time and have no idea what to name it anymore.

Previous Chapter: https://gospacegay.tumblr.com/post/165808913233/lrtihew-part-one

There is swearing, fluff, eventual smut, insanity, and lord knows what else.

Once cleaned up and dressed in fresh clothes, the two gathered in the kitchen. “So... why are you here?” The tanned blonde asked seriously, perched at the edge of his seat with a hot coffee. “You invited me to 'hang out sometime', comrade. I decided the time and location.” Ivan explained casually, eating a piece of Alfred's heaping pancake breakfast. Of course, he didn't feel the need to ask.

“I was going to invite you over, you know.” Alfred complained. Ivan snorted and rolled his eyes. Yeah, right. No one invited him to anything unless he threatened to cave in their skull. “I'm serious dude! I was trying to be nice.” the honey blonde whined, back to his regular childish self. Ivan smirked, lighting a cigarette as he spoke, “What could you possibly gain? Power? Oil?”

“This is what I get for being nice.” Alfred muttered, sipping his black coffee. Satisfied with the dismissive answer, Ivan stopped his own prickly defense. The stubborn American was mostly transparent these days anyway. “What are we doing today, America?” Ivan asked, stealing two more pancakes. “Aquarium, I think. I just need to chill.” the other answered.

Despite understanding the somewhat archaic saying, Ivan could never approve of it. It sounded like Alfred wanted to sleep inside a fridge, or lay in snow. Either activity sounded stupid and unpleasant. Still it has been years since anyone invited him out for fun, decades actually. He could at least pretend to care, he mused internally.

Conversation was very one sided, with Ivan listening. “... and I wanted to sweep it under the rug. Boss man was all 'nope, it's your fault', then the press got a hold of it. I love them sometimes but the reporters were so fucking mean. So now every time I want to visit Mexico I have to jump hoops, or whatever. Sometimes a nation just wants to relax and get piss drunk on tequila in another country, you know?” the younger nation rambled, blue eyes so bright. Ivan briefly considered stealing those glittering jewels for eyes, but dismissed it. He'd never hear the end of it from his leader if Alfred's summer blue gaze was damaged.

“... and we're here!” Alfred announced, pulling into a busy parking lot.” Ivan squinted at the flashy entrance of the place, noting pleasant memories from the past. “This aquarium, it is different yes?” Ivan asked, unable to place why. “What? Oh... that's right! I took you to the national aquarium before the cold war. And maybe one time after. It closed ages ago. It was one of the longest running aquariums in the world. I had good times there...” Alfred recalled, lost to nostalgia. He almost seemed sad to talk about the loss of his ancient monument, not snapping back to his happy self.

“Tell me of this place.” Ivan prompted, tugging his host to the present. To scare, humiliate, or anger Alfred was one thing. To made him sad... Ivan didn't deal with sad people well. He hardly acknowledged the damaging emotion himself. Lit up once again, the American proceeded to drag him to every display in the place. Due to the day of the week, the crowds of noisy children were to a minimum.

The excessive entry cost made Ivan do a double take, but Alfred paid it without complaint. It would have cost nearly a mortgage payment in his own currency for just one ticket. How far Ivan had fallen since his peak of red glory in the 1970's. At least they were still compatible in military strength and global trading power.

Ivan felt himself drawn to the shark pools near the end. It was such a calm blue water. Sharks weren't pretentious, or screeching for attention. They were instinctive and silent, simply keeping to their ancient ways of life. If sharks weren't so stupid, they might even be smug about their existence. Ivan liked to think his much younger self would make an excellent shark.

Alfred was quiet for the first time since arriving, also staring into the shark tank. It was nice to not have continuous noise bleeding from his host's face, but it was also irregular and unnatural. The Russian basked in the relative peace. The silence was broken several minutes later.

“Ivan, you're old right? Have you ever looked around and been... unhappy with everything?” Alfred asked, looking at him earnestly. Ivan thought about what to say, perfectly understanding the question. “Yes, I have.” He eventually replied, not wanting to drag up historical reference. “What did you do to fix it?” The younger nation pressed on.

In this moment, Alfred was not the powerful superpower, but a naive young colony. Back then he had been so curious and open minded. Asking Ivan to teach him skating, going to community dances... the pale northern nation sighed. “I restructured many times. I would be happy for a few years, but the problems always return.” he explained, deciding not to fuck with the honey blonde's head for once. “Oh.” Alfred hummed. Ivan looked at him curiously, wondering. What was he planning now, or had he ever planned anything?

#lrtihew #russia #america #hetalia #aph #rusame #amerus #fluff

[milaw89]

It’s Alright. (2/?)

Team Cap x Reader - Bucky x Reader

Words: 1714

Story Summary: Reader is being chased by someone, not knowing who and why. She’s determined to find that out. A group of superheroes is helping her, but is that really such a great idea? 

Author’s note: I might change the story summary when I post more other parts of this story. Stay Tuned. Reactions or feedback is welcome!

Present day.

Y/N didn’t even put her foot on the first step of the stairwell or the front door of the neighbour living under her opened with a squeak. The old man appeared in the doorway. He whined at least twice a week, about the noise, late at night. The old man is delusional, no noise was coming from your apartment late at night. Sleeping is what you did like any normal human being would.

He followed every step with his eyes, without saying a word, that was a good thing. Causing a scene with the man, was not on her priority list, at least not today.

Y/N growled annoyed. “Yes, I’m home. No, I’m not going to listen to you so get back into your apartment and shut the door.”

The people living in this building give her weird glances when they see her. She didn’t mind, this was the only safehouse that was low-key.

An apartment building located in a neighbourhood that was not so popular to walk around late at night, compared to the other safe houses she had been in.Y/N has to be extra careful now because with only one mistake they could find her.

Who they are and what they want from her? She has no idea but they keep chasing her wherever she goes.

Y/N jogged up the stairs to her front door. Humming a melody that she had in her head all day to keep herself calm. It was classical music, not what you would think of a girl in combat boots and a leather jacket, but if it kept her body in check it was all good. No one could hear the music and she barely had friends that would make fun of her.

Something moving in the corner of her eye caught her attention. She stopped and turned around to the stairs. She could swear that she saw something move, something small. Turning left and right, there was nothing to see. Maybe she was getting delusional like the old man. Shrugging her shoulders, Y/N  put her key in the lock, turned it and opened the door.

A cold wind blew in through the window. She frowned and slowly closed the door behind her. There was no chance that she left the window open this morning. Shivers ran down her spine, her heart beating loudly in her chest when she turned around to the kitchen.

There was a silhouette of someone sitting on the only chair at her small dining table in the shadows. It was facing her that is all she could see, the person was ticking with his finger on the table.

She put the bag down on the armchair next to the front door and switched the lights on. Y/N shifted her eyes behind the man, using her ears if there were other people inside. There was only the sound of him breathing. He was alone. The man pulled up. Y/N took a step back towards the door.

“I wouldn’t do that little girl.” She gulped. His voice sounded Russian. Her mind searched for people she might know or fought off her with that accent but without success 

“Who are you? What do you want from me?” Y/N asked. Surprised that he managed to get into her apartment. The realtor told her that it was hard to break in with the alarm system they installed.

The man chuckled. “I’m the only one asking the questions. Where is your mother Rose?”

Y/N frowned. “My mother…-”

The man stopped Y/N with his left hand raised. “Oh wait.” He dropped his hand.

The man stepped into the light with a smirk. Y/N’s eyes widened when she recognised him.

“I killed her when you were hidden in that closet. Remember me?”

Y/N balled her hands into fists. Of course, she remembered him. She never forgot the face of her mother’s killer. Even if it was nine years ago. He still had the greasy black hair, now with a hint of grey here and there. The green eyes, that haunted her in her nightmares when she was younger. Was he responsible for all those fires? Y/N wondered, she forced her attention back to the man. She had no time to dwell on the past. What did he want from her? Was the only question she wanted answers to. Turning her attention back to the man to ask him that very question.

“What do you want from me?” Y/N hissed, feeling the adrenaline rushing through her body.

“What did I tell you? I’m the one who is asking questions here!” The man hissed.

Y/N huffed stepping forward.

The man looked around the kitchen/living room, nodding his head before he turned to her. “You have something that I need. Your beloved mother left it in one of these safe houses for you to find. Give it to me and I’ll leave you alone. Even though you’re the creation that we want. Naturally born with the serum running through your veins.” The man grimaced, checking Y/N out.  

She knows what he was searching for, but she had no idea what he meant with being born with a serum. If she told him where it was that he was seeking for, he couldn’t get it out anyway.

The man did another step in Y/N’s direction, now only two steps away from her. He cocked his head to the side, grinning menacingly. “Why are you running away from us, little girl? Did your disgusting father tell you to do that?” Y/N frowned, confused about the mention of her father. She had no idea who her father was, nor did her mother tell her anything about him.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about sir. I can’t help you with what you’re looking for. I kindly suggest you leave,” Y/N stated, stepping out of the way.

The man checked her out from top to bottom again, with a disgusting grin on his face. He rubbed his hands together.

“It’s working, isn’t it? I need to see what it does to you.” The man stepped closer, Y/N stretched out her hand. Her mind went into overdrive, shouting that she needed to get away from the door.

Waiting for the right moment, then she jumped on the chair, stepping on the wooden coffee table, making her way to the window. She opened the blinds, hoping to blind the man with the last rays of the sunshine outside.

Out of nowhere, the man lunged at her. Pushing her against the couch, banging her head against the headboard. Black spots danced around her vision, but as she blinked rapidly her eyesight came back to her. She rolled from the couch onto the floor. The man kicked her in her side as she was not fast enough to dodge the kick. Taking a huge heap of air, after it got knocked out.

The man started laughing, a terrifying cackle. Y/N pulled up, quicker than she thought. Her head throbbing but the adrenaline took over, making her stand straighter. Her glare visible throughout her body, ready to fight this man.

He came straight at her again. Y/N stepped in, throwing two punches, one in the stomach, one against his jaw. The man lost his balance. So Y/N kicked him against his knee, Gerard told her to so many times in his lessons. The man stumbled backwards now, but it was not enough to let him fall. He was strong which annoyed Y/N more.

“You’re a strong little girl. I can see what the serum is doing to you. We can use you. Oh, you can become much stronger than this. Tell me where it is, I know you know!” The man wiped the blood off his cheek.

Y/N shook her head. “I will not let you use me. You killed my mother!” She shouted at him in anger. She lunged at him, pushing him into her dining table, it broke at the weight of the man. Hearing several cracks throughout his body, as he hissed in pain.  Y/N stood there watching over the man, spitting out the blood in her mouth on her wooden floor. 

Her body was boiling. That is how it always started but what would come next for her body was always an unpleasant surprise. Not being to control is what caused the most trouble, not only for her opponents but also for her.

Y/N decided to run for it rather than giving him a blackout. She had used a lot of her strength a couple of nights ago in another fight. If she would go and fight the man against her own strength then it won’t end well. Not for her and for him. It was time to find another safe house and lay low this time.

Before Y/N could step away and get the hell out. The man was up and out of nowhere, he grabbed Y/N by her throat. She gasps for air also in shock. Putting her hands on his arm, beating on it with her fists. What she was hitting wasn’t flesh, it was hard, something like metal. Y/N kicked him hard and he growled in anger, his face swollen and bloody. He tightens his grip on Y/N throat, making it harder for her to breathe. With every try to get him to loosen his grip, he gripped tighter.

He skidded through the kitchen towards the hallway. Y/N still being held up in the air, she struggled but the man was too strong.

Y/N saw an image of her mother smiling at her flashing by as she closed her eyes. The man used Y/N’s body as a barricade to knock a door open.

“P..please!” Y/N breathed, but the man didn’t react.  

She knew then it was over.  He had won the fight against her.

A door opened with a squeak and Y/N got pushed into her own closet, banging her head over again.The air came back in as the man let go of his hand.

“Stay there!” Is all Y/N heard before black spots danced around her vision as the black emptiness took over…

Taglist: (If you want to be added, tell me! :) )

@crapythings

#teamcap #bucky x reader #bucky barnes #mystery #avengers #avengersimagine #avengers x reader #avengers fanfiction #bucky barns x reader

[ilgaksu]

So @badacts and I came up with this ridiculous spy au and idk lads here’s a preview of the fic for it I’m working on, hopefully it’ll keep you warm whilst I’m crying over finals (cw: graphic depictions of violence - stay safe kids!) 

*

Agent #10-03-18: Josten, Neil Abram.

Aliases: Nathaniel Abram Wesninski, Michael Hatford, Stefan Bernard, Alex Vidakovic, Chris Rey (see attached notes for further)

Status: ACTIVE DUTY

Security Clearance: Delta

Assignment: Fox Division

Gender: M

D.O.B: 19/03/1991

Citizenship status: American, British

Identifying characteristics: Caucasian, blue eyes, notable facial and bodily scarring (see attached notes for further)

Languages: English (Birth), French (Fluent), Spanish (Fluent), German (Fluent), Russian (Fluent)

Specialisms: Stealth and Infiltration, Mafia (National and Overseas), Interrogation

Service History: #77267, #90568, #22110, #45999 (see attached notes for further)

Deployment Precautions: unstable attachment, previous insubordination, pyrophobia, evidence of further masked neuroatypicality (see attached notes for further)

Family Background:

Birth Father: Nathan Wesninski (deceased)

Birth Mother: Mary Hatford (deceased)

Spouse: Minyard, Andrew Joseph (#03-19-10, Active Duty)

Spouse to be informed fully in the event of MIA/KIA: Yes

Body to be released to spouse in the event of MIA/KIA: Yes

Spouse to be in receipt of full pension benefit: Yes

*

Agent #03-19-10: Minyard, Andrew Joseph.

Aliases: (see attached notes for further)

Status: ACTIVE DUTY (RESTRICTED)

Security Clearance: Delta

Assignment: Fox Division

Gender: M

D.O.B: 04/11/1990

Citizenship status: American

Identifying characteristics: Caucasian, blond, bodily scarring (see attached notes for further)

Languages: English (Birth), German (Fluent), Russian (Fluent)

Specialisms: Extraction, Support

Service History: #77267, #90568, #52019, #41734 (see attached notes for further)

Deployment Precautions: previous repeated insubordination, previous high impact collateral damage (high risk), evidence of profound Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder; diagnosed Bipolar Disorder (Type 2)  (see attached notes for further)

NOT TO BE DEPLOYED OUTSIDE OF EMERGENCY PROTOCOL #4I80

Family Background:

Birth Father: Unknown

Birth Mother: Tilda Minyard (deceased, see attached notes for further)

Other:

Minyard, Aaron Michael (#05-19-03, Active Duty (Medical), Sibling)

Hemmick, Nicholas Esteban (#08-05-03, Active Duty, Cousin)  

Spouse: Josten, Neil Abram (#10-03-18, Active Duty)

Spouse to be informed fully in the event of MIA/KIA: Yes

Body to be released to spouse in the event of MIA/KIA: Yes

Spouse to be in receipt of full pension benefit: Yes

*

“Where’s he from?” Lebedev asks, dealing Andrew in. He doesn’t gesture to Neil, but it’s clear who he’s referring to: everyone’s pretending not to stare. Apparently Markov isn’t the first member of the new generation of the Bratva’s bright young things to bring along a boy, but he’s the first to parade him around the shop floor.

“New York,” Andrew replies. Beside him, Neil stirs a little, acting as though he’s been made sleepy with boredom, scrolling through his phone and slung across Andrew’s lap.

After the averted disaster of last month’s introductions, they figured Neil had made them unforgettable as a pair: might as well make use of it. Nikolai Vidakovic was born in the poorest town in Russia, emigrated to America five years ago, and made a living off working for multiple escort agencies in rotation until he was introduced to Markov a year and a half ago. Within six months, he’d moved into Markov’s apartment. Within nine, he’d had his face slashed open by a rival. The story goes that Markov spent forty thousand dollars a head on bounty money, and then dragged the ones who held the knife behind his car. The story goes they had to replace the gravel on the racetrack, since by the fourth man it had become impossible to clean.

The best liars always tell some kind of truth, Neil had said once. Andrew doesn’t have that kind of money, but he knows if something had taken a wrong turn, with everything that has happened to Neil, he wouldn’t have slept until no one could get the blood back out either. After all, Andrei Markov is an obsessive man.

Under the weight of Lebedev’s eyes, Neil shifts on Andrew’s lap, glancing away from his phone and at the table. He scowls, as though registering the new splay of cards for the first time and taking it as a personal insult.  

“Baby,” Neil whines, as if on cue, “Baby, I’m tired.”

“Then go to bed,” Andrew tells him. “Katya will take you.” At the mention of her current name, Renee - sat a few metres away from Andrew and Neil, ever watchful - rises to her feet.

“You haven’t paid attention to me all night,” Neil continues, voice laced with complaint. He slides his hand between the buttons of Andrew’s shirt, curving his fingertips familiar against Andrew’s ribcage, the splay of his body around Andrew’s petulant. As though tugged by a string, Lebedev drops his eyes back to the cards, his own hand twitching in its hold on his glass.

“There’s a lot of night left,” Andrew replies, with a kind of savage amusement. Neil flops against him again, sulky, and Andrew catches Renee’s eye and shakes his head. She sits back down in her chair, hands folded deceptively still.

Lebedev says, “He’s very American.”   

“He’s from Tolyatti,” Andrew says, brusque with it, Neil’s breath hot against his neck. Neil moves and presses his face against Andrew’s collarbone for a moment before leaning up and pressing a kiss against the bare skin over Andrew’s pulse. Andrew grits his teeth, swallows down on a shiver, and doesn’t look at him. After a few seconds, Neil sighs and pulls his hand back out of Andrew’s shirt, flopping back and returning to his phone. Andrew knows the bones of Neil better than his own; he can imagine how the scar tissue glints, dull and shiny, under the dimmed lights with the way Neil tilts his head; can see it in how people’s eyes catch and then tear away when faced with the weight of Andrei Markov’s notice.

“You like them difficult,” Lebedev says. His smile never gets close to his eyes. “Where I’m from we save that for our wives. Your action.”

“I wouldn’t know,” Andrew says coldly, “I’m not married. I’ll hold.” He holds Lebedev’s gaze, noticing the tension in the way he holds himself in the chair. He is more than aware that Lebedev works for Steiner, and that Steiner himself is stood within earshot, leaning against the bar and gilt-eyed to match.

He nods at Andrew. Andrew nods back. And the thing is, Andrew was transient long before he picked up a collection of new names, long before his own tongue fell out of his head; back when his mouth had been sewn up and he picked out each stitch with his bare fucking hands, fingertips nerveless and bloody with effort. Andrew Minyard has been in the process of becoming Andrew Minyard for over twenty five years now, and a large part of that process has been learning the rarity of a better nature in people. Andrew is commended, time and time over, on his ability to anticipate a perpetrator’s future actions, carving them out in a streamlined, sequential fashion for people who have all the required imagination for it but still lack that basic instinct to know - because nine times of ten, people behave on instinct, people are motivated for reasons old as and older than gold, people can be predicted because they fall victim to their own human condition.

Some people can’t live with believing the worst of people; Andrew’s turned it into a career. The point being, Andrew’s been waiting for Alexei Steiner to pull a stunt like this ever since Neil first fell into Andrei Markov’s lap with the word baby clinging to the breath on his lips. For Steiner, finding a weakness so seemingly by accident, a ready-made pressure point waiting for the cooker, has blinded him from looking for anything else. He’s too busy itching to test the limits; of how precious Andrei Markov’s toy is, of how far Andrei Markov will go to keep Nikolai Vidakovic leashed to him. How easy it would be to unravel Markov if someone cut the leash before he could reel it back in.  

“Of course not,” Lebedev says, “Don’t. The fighting, the guilting, the always fucking with the lights out. It’s a waste.” He shrugs, eyes flitting to Neil, who looks at him with lovely, blank eyes, and then back to his phone. With the sleeves of his silk shirt pushed up and the large patches of skin visible through the rips in acid-wash jeans, Neil doesn’t just look the picture of a boy dragged out from the gutter; it’s noticeable that the scars go all the way down. The sense-memory of them under Andrew’s hands has been making the back of his neck prickle every time he sees a flash of thigh all evening.

“Then again,” Lebedev adds, faintly mocking, “Sometimes it’s better if you can’t see what you’re touching, isn’t it? We are not similar men, of course - but I think on that, perhaps, we can relate.”

And there it is. There’s a brief silence as the others in the room eye Andrew and Lebedev; Steiner’s interest is a particular and separate weight. How far are you willing to go?

Internally, Andrew sighs. He has made a career out of predictability, but sometimes, it would be nice to be proved wrong. Neil, for all his ridiculous mouth and Bambi eyes, isn’t as stupid as Nikolai: he knew this was coming, so he merely blinks boredly at Lebedev until Andrew squeezes the hand on Neil’s hip and says, “Get up, Nikolenka.”

“Are we going now?” Neil asks, brightening immediately.

“Soon,” Andrew promises, and lifts Neil off his lap. Neil sighs but lets himself be manhandled, tucking his feet under himself on the sofa. Everyone is watching, Lebedev including, as Andrew, very carefully, choreographing, reaches into his jacket pocket and pulls out one of the sixteen credit cards listed under Markov’s name. He places it on the table, making pointed eye contact with Steiner, and pushes it towards him slightly. Gestures to where it lies on the table.

“I’m good for your damages,” Andrew says. Steiner’s mouth quirks upwards.

“That’s very considerate. You didn’t have to.”

“Call it a business expense,” Andrew tells him, and then grabs the nearest empty chair and swings it directly into Lebedev’s face. He feels the bones give the first time, but the sound isn’t distinct until after the third swing; he moves so fast that he gets in that third hit before Lebedev falls off his own chair, scrambling backwards, all insect, as Andrew drops the chair and follows him slowly. He looks at everyone else, on their feet, hands to their guns, and smiles.

“Don’t bother getting up,” Andrew says, gesturing back to the discarded splay of his cards. The fact it’s blatantly a winning hand makes the display all the better. “I’ll fold.”

“I didn’t mean -” Lebedev starts, Andrew hauling him upright.

“I don’t care what you meant,” Andrew tells him, “You’re not supposed to be looking at him,” and kicks Lebedev back to the floor.

Somewhere between breaking Lebedev’s leg and the feel of blood on his face, Neil stands in Andrew’s periphery. Andrew, who for all anyone’s watching knows, is consumed with the habit of violence (repetitive, boring, Andrew is capable of more than a reversal of biology) watches Neil slip his phone into his jeans pocket and saunter towards the bar, looking bored out of his mind. As he passes Andrew, he reaches out and drifts fingertips across the bow of shoulders. It is both for show and for grounding.

“You want me to get you anything, baby?” Neil asks. The biggest tell that he’s Nikolai right now is that he lets Andrew ignore him; just sighs, a little resigned, and heads to the bar. Neil Josten would never let Andrew Minyard ignore the question of what Andrew wants. Over Lebedev, Andrew can hear Nikolai ordering another drink - something with amaretto, sickly-sweet and with cyanide, perfect and perfectly in character.

tbc

#aftg #own writing #spy au #badacts

[piiroshkii-blog]

Talk Flower To Me

Warnings: Faint descriptions of injury. Pairing: Otabek and Yuri Words: 2332 Note(s): Otabek is 17 and in band. Yuri is 16 and in choir. High school AU. Also posted on [ Ao3 ]. Reblogs > Likes

"Can I help you?" A voice asked, shocking him back into reality. Yuri gave a small jump at the sudden words, cursing under his breath for being startled. "Otabek Altin?" He asked. The bassoonist gave a nod, but didn't offer anymore words, so he spoke on. "I'm Yuri. You're accompanying me, or whatever." "I know who you are," he spoke, starting to disassemble his instrument. "You're in my math class." Oh. So that's where the name's familiar. The black haired teen looked amused. "You didn't know? You sit right in front of me. Every single day." The Russian only scoffed with a roll of his eyes to try and hide his embarrassment. 

DAFFODIL - Unrequited Love

Yuri groans in annoyance as he remembers the tradition at the school. To make a some what 'truce' between the band and choir classes, over a fight or something that happened a decade or so ago.

The mentioned tradition that has been executed throughout the years happened during every winter concert: the only one that had every musical department performed in on the same night. The tradition was that a band kid had to accompany a choir student, and vise versa, into the concert hall and see each other onto and off of the stage. For most people, it was fine, considering their friends, or crush, tended to be in the other department. For people like Yuri Plisetsky, who had a rather bleak opinion on band students, especially the director, bleh, they hated the tradition and groaned at the thought of personal interaction.

November eleventh was the arrangement day. It was the day that both choir and band kids all skipped third block to gather in the lobby, choosing their partner for the concert. Everyone was notified of the day and was encouraged to show up because no one knew who the directors would pair you up with.

The blond Russian decided to skip that day. Although an entire hour and thirty minutes of waltzing around seemed fun, trying to avoid both band and choir students, as he had quite a literal fan base- there was even an official school club for it- wasn't worth it. So, that day he begged his dads to let him stay home from school, offering to help out at either the restaurant or the ice rink. It took a while, but they decided to oblige since Yuri was late for school anyways and the two definitely wasn't in the mood to deal with the secretary.

GARDENIA - You're Lovely: Secret Love

Otabek Altin was a silent guy. No one knew him except for those who cared enough. Thankfully, Mila was friends with him and was kind enough to give him basic information on the person he was stuck with for the concert.

"Otabek Altin. Average grades; his lowest percentage is actually an 89 so he's actually a smart guy. He plays bassoon in band, but can also play pretty much every other one. He figure skates on weekends and doesn't have any form of social media what so ever. Lame." Yuri took in the information. He had seen him once or twice in the halls and probably somewhere else. The name sounded familiar, but he couldn't place where he had heard it before. Oh well. Otabek was never praised by the teacher, but seemed to always stay at the top of the class, way ahead of everyone else.

"Wait- you're saying he doesn't even have an Instagram? What is he, eighty?" Yuri exclaimed. The red haired girl gave a light laugh and pointed over to a table that was thankfully out of hearing range.

"I don't know. Why don't you ask him?" The blond turned around confused at the suggestion, but then blushed in anger as he made eye contact with the latter. The Russian spent the rest of the lunch stabbing into the recyclable lunch tray with a plastic fork, muttering obscenities under his breath.

HEATHER Lavender - Admiration; Solitude

"Hey, Asshole!"

The Kazakh was standing to the side, away from everyone else, holding a black instrument with many, many holes and triggers. In a black suit with a white dress shirt underneath, the tenor singer could see why he was so popular. Yuri would have been lying if he said that he didn't find the other attractive... At that moment, anyways. As the blond stalked over to the band kid, faint music filled his ears. The bassoon was generally a quiet instrument, but somehow the other could play it even softer. It sounded nice, for a band person. The one yelled at took a second to process that the sort of 'nickname' was directed towards him.

"Can I help you?" A voice asked, shocking him back into reality. Yuri gave a small jump at the sudden words, cursing under his breath for being startled.

"Otabek Altin?" He asked. The bassoonist gave a nod, but didn't offer anymore words, so he spoke on. "I'm Yuri. You're accompanying me, or whatever."

"I know who you are," he spoke, starting to disassemble his instrument. "You're in my math class." Oh. So that's where the name's familiar. The black haired teen looked amused. "You didn't know? You sit right in front of me. Every single day." The Russian only scoffed with a roll of his eyes to try and hide his embarrassment. 

"Whatever. Look, are you going anywhere else? I don't want to lose you and try to find you during the time the concert starts." The band student rose an eyebrow at the blond and secured the case with two solid "click"s.

"Well, the band has some optional lunch, but I'm leaving the school to get my own food. Do you want to come with?"

"You can drive?" Yuri asked.  Otabek nodded. "Can you drive well?" The Russian sixteen year old swore that he saw the side of the latter's lip slightly twitch into a small smile.

"Do you want to find out?”

The object of driving wasn't a car, but a motorcycle. Holy fuck, band kids were crazy.

LILY Calla - Beauty

At the end of the performance, Yuri was basically out of breath. With two solos, one long and one short, he needed a few moments to catch his breath. He walked off stage and met with a waiting Otabek, bouquet of various flowers- some of them were questioning because it wasn't their season to be bloomed yet.

"You did well, Yuri," he complimented as he offered the flowers. "Your voice was really steady throughout the performance." The tenor gave an over confident smirk and shrugged, taking the bouquet.

"Of course I did. Who do you think I am?" he scoffed. Using his peripheral vision to glance around the room. So far, he was the only one to have flowers. Was it not apart of the stupid tradition? Oh well. The flowers were nice, so who was he to complain. As the two walked out, side by side, the blond cleared his throat and averted his eyesight.

"Your, uh, band wasn't half bad either. I could actually hear the bassoons play." A small snort was given, somehow eloquent in its own way, and the bassoonist looked down upon the blond boy.

"What? Are you surprised that it was actually heard, despite my playing earlier?" Otabek teased. "Contrary to popular belief, I can play to be heard whenever I want. I just respected that some people would rather socialize than practice for the concert." Yuri looked around to see if any band people had heard, but it didn't seem like the taller one cared even the slightest. To hide his previous actions, he glared into the bouquet of flowers.

"A band kid? Respectful? No way," the Russian had exclaimed, feigning surprise. The little act was rewarded with a soft laugh that was rough on the edges, as if the noise hadn't been emitted in a long time. A shake of the other's head was given as Yuri's dad, Yuuri, spotted the two and started waving at him as a signal.

"Your dad, I presume?" Otabek asked, voice neutral, but eyes held amusement. The blond fought down a flush of embarrassment and put on a scowl.

"Yeah, something like that."

Without even a goodbye, he stalked to the Asian man, and soon shouts flooded the ears of people around.

ROSE Red - Love, Respect

"Flowers? Who gave you them?"

The blond immediately dismissed the question with an uncaring wave of his hand.

"Some band kid that was paired with me. You know, the guy I was walking with before you showed up?" The raven haired Japanese parent rose an eyebrow, but drove away from the parking lot with no further questions or comments on the flower manner. The ride back was pleasantly silent as the Russian used the time to admire the flowers and how some of them weren't even in season, yet the entire bouquet was as real as his love for dance. Though, he couldn't help but wonder what exactly the bouquet meant.

When he got home, his other parent was less mellow about him holding the bouquet.

"Welcome home, Yuri! I'm sorry I couldn't see-- What are those?" The silver haired man zeroed in on him, staring intently at the flowers.

"They're flowers; what else could they be?" Yuri got a scowl in response of his sass and it took a hand from the raven haired father onto the other parent's shoulder to calm down his parental senses. Yuuri gently pried the bouquet out of his hands and placed them into a vase, after filling it halfway with water.

"I think they look nice," the Japanese parent gave, smiling at the two still at the doorway. "If you're going to continue staring at each other, though, close the door. It's cold and you're letting the warm air out." Viktor gave a huff, but obliged to his husband's wishes, shoving carefully at the blond before shutting the door.

"Do you know what the bouquet means?" The parent decided to ask, breaking the silence. Yuri pulled a confused expression at the inquiry.

"That I did well..?" The fifteen year old guessed. Yuuri gave a soft chuckle alongside Viktor's exasperated sigh, a palm at his forehead.

"Where did we raise our son wrong," he whined, head pointed towards the Japanese man- who was currently making dinner. He turned once again to the youngest in the house and his expression was serious. Well, that was rare.

"A bouquet consisting of daffodils, gardenias, a lavender heather, a calla lily, and a red rose," he listed off, knowing the bouquet at the top of his head, despite only seeing it for two minutes. "This person- they're smart. Not everyone knows or cares about the language of flowers." Again, a single, pale blond eyebrow was raised and the father continued on.

"This bouquet is far too intricate to be a coincidence- and some are even out of season. Impressive." A shake of his head was given to get back on track. The silver haired man listed off the flower and its meaning so effortlessly that Yuri was beginning to think his parents were smarter than they like to initially let on. After the sixteen year old processed the information, he grabbed onto Viktor's wrist and yanked it slightly.

"Take me to the flower shop," he hissed. "We'll get back before Dad finishes dinner, I swear." A faint 'wow' could be heard by the silver haired parent and they hastily made their way out and to the flower shop. Good thing Yuuri's friend, Phichit, owns one and always welcomes them in- even after closing time.

VIOLET White - Let's Take a Chance on Happiness

Otabek Altin would describe himself as plain and boring. He got many confessions given to him, but he knew that they only liked him for his looks- he never even spoken a full conversation with more than half of the people who proclaimed their love for him. It was flattering, sure, but a huge waste of his time and effort to decline every single one of them. 

He didn't know what drew him to buying the blond flowers, though. It was true that the originally Kazakh had noticed the tenor singer way before they were even paired together- it was just a stroke of good luck that he was partnered up with him. 

It wasn't hard obtaining the flowers. He had his own green house with changeable climate so he could grow whatever plant he wanted. The building was hell to create, but the faint pink flush on Yuri's face was more than worth the effort. Besides: Otabek loved flowers. They brought life to his own, filling it with colours and scents all over. The raven haired teen enjoyed when they grew perfectly and took notes when they didn't. He thought that flowers, overall, were wonderful and under appreciated, to then get intrigued by their language. It wasn't hard to figure out each and every meaning, to then memorize it by the "T". 

So, maybe it wasn't that hard to give the latter a few flowers. It was perhaps easier because there was a slim chance that the blond actually knew the flower language. Plus, he had already picked and dressed the bouquet, so there was no going back now. No regrets, Altin.

A white petal from a rose fell onto the ground, copper blobs stained the surface.

ROSE Dark Pink - Thankfulness

When he gave the bouquet to Yuri, he wasn't actually expecting an answer. Of course, when it came to Yuri, though, nothing was ever expected.

Otabek supposed that he shouldn't have been that surprised when he found two flowers stabbed into his locker- a dark pink rose and a white violet. A note was attached to the stem of one them and reading it make him quirk up an eyebrow in amusement.

» Otabek. You're an asshole. Next time, tell me if you like me with words, you romantic. (×××) ××× - ×××× . Yuri

A feeling welled up in his chest. Wow, what were the odds of the latter knowing the meaning of the flowers? The Kazakh opened his locker, after forcing the plants out, and grabbed his books that were needed, placing the two plants in a vase full on water that he always had in his locker.

To: Yuri Plisetsky From:Otabek (me) Message: Let's take it slow before we go into a relationship?

To: Otabek (me) From: Yuri Plisetsky Message: obviously

An involuntary, small smile forced its way onto his feature, to the shock of everyone around him.

Somewhere nearby, another petal fell off of a rose. Even more copper red blobs stained the surface.​​​​​​

#yuri on ice #otayuri #yuri plisetsky #otabek altin #yuri x otabek #otabek x yurio #yurabek #yuri #otabek #fanfiction #high school au #yoi #writing #scritch scratch #shut up kian ヽ(°◇° )ノ #shitty writing is shitty

[cyanoscarlet]

this is how you introduce a new fandom

#yoiweek2017 Day 1 (Le Parfum Des Fleurs) - beginnings and firsts

Or, how Yuuri was convinced to watch an anime based on his life.

(stories on (and off) ice)

.

It was both flattering and mortifying, Yuuri thought, when a story based on your life and love suddenly skyrocketed in popularity like gossip spreading like a forest wildfire.

He sighed as he watched his sniffling husband from the kitchen. Viktor was crying over yet another episode of this "original fantasy action anime about a no-good mage who meets and falls for the number one ice wizard in the continent." It was really good, they said. The animation was beautiful, the story was riveting and the romance was done perfectly right.

Don't get him wrong; he appreciates a good story as much as the next person does. The love and care and attention to detail that went into the creation of this latest sensation was clearly evident in every frame drawn and every line spoken. It was, no doubt, a wonderful work in its own right. It was even considered by many as a revolutionary piece that broke barriers and made history.

What Yuuri did not appreciate -- and certainly did not expect (though he should have, given the circumstances) -- was the hordes of rabid fans and insatiable tabloid writers that practically crash the door and breathe down his neck every single morning since the first episode aired, and seemed to multiply exponentially by the week.

Chalk it up to very observant people to put two and two together, and your high-profile whirlwind love story is revived and retold again on almost every website and social media platform in existence. The side-by-side comparisons went up to eleven when the seventh episode featured the two leads kissing before the cheering stadium - just like how Viktor, his coach at that time, had kissed him at the Cup of China a mere three years earlier.

The fans became a lot more persistent that day, he recalled. Even the casual passers-by recognized them now. "Oh my god, it's so-and-so! From that show!" (Yuuri could not be bothered to recall the names of the characters.) Viktor eagerly responded to this by kissing him soundly on the lips in public - again.

As always, the Russian's attempts at getting him to watch the new episode together failed spectacularly that night.

.

  Yuuri and Viktor were not the only ones whose lives have changed because of the show. Yurio, for one, started receiving hate mail from all sorts of fans - mostly fujoshi, from what he had gathered. Messages ranging from "damn Mudblood" to "inferior Valentin-wannabe", or colorful variations and combinations thereof, began filling the reigning World Champion's inbox at such an alarming rate, he'd actually changed his phone number and locked all his social media accounts by the time the fourth episode had aired.

("I don't even watch that shit," Yurio had lamented in frustration through a private Skype session. "And even I know that Mudblood's from a totally different fandom! What's wrong with these fucking people?!"

That's what you're worried about? Yuuri had been tempted to say out loud, but he'd kept his mouth shut. Maybe it was just the stress of the upcoming Grand Prix Final talking. The men's short program event was the next day, after all. Other than that, he'd completely sympathized with the angry blond.)

Fortunately, the messages stopped when the current episode aired half an hour ago. Yuuri knew at once when his ringtone for Yurio began playing from his pocket and Viktor tearfully joined him in the kitchen at the same time as soon as the livestream finished. "Let's have katsudon pirozhki tomorrow!" he exclaimed, his eyes shining brighter than usual. "To celebrate Julian finally befriending Yoichi!"

"Okay, Viten'ka," Yuuri shrugged, knowing better than to correct his husband on the in-universe pastry the show's tritragonist had just offered the main character. How they even knew about that event between Yurio and himself at Moscow was purely anyone's guess. ("This show is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to real-life persons, places and events is purely coincidental," indeed.)

The phone's vibration gradually increased in intensity as the ringtone segued into the annoying screechy guitar part. (Yuuri never learned how to switch it back after Mila had fiddled with it back when they were in St. Petersburg.) "One moment." He fished out his phone and answered the call, expecting another loud tirade on why the hell he didn't pick up sooner. Instead, he heard heavy breathing over the line, seemingly accentuated by the static.

"... Finally..." Yurio started, his voice unnaturally subdued for someone supposed to be angry. "... They finally stopped..."

Yuuri knew where this was going. "Congratulations for holding out for so long, Yurio," he answered with all compassion. "Are you celebrating tonight?"

"After all that trouble? Of course I am!" The blond loudly harrumphed. "Beka and I are having katsudon pirozhki tonight!"

Viktor immediately snatched the phone from Yuuri's grasp. "Yurio! I didn't know you watched Glassheart, too! Isn't it wonderful?! Who's your favorite character besides Julian? Mine's Yoichi, of course!"

"HELL NO!" Yurio snapped. "Get off my case, old man! Go talk to Chulanont or something!"

Viktor nodded back excitedly, still on an all-time high post-episode rush. "I will! I'm handing you back to Yuuri now." He gave Yuuri the phone back, planting a kiss on his cheek before returning to the couch to call Phichit.

Yuuri put the phone back to his ear. "It's me again... Actually I'm also making katsudon pirozhki for lunch tomorrow. It's been so long; I have to prepare."

"Figured as much."

.

  What Viktor usually meant by "call Phichit" was to open their Skype group for figure skaters who also liked Glassheart. (Yuuri made sure to remember the title now after much persuasion by his husband, lest he gets mobbed by his other friends online, too.) It was a video conference, as always. It didn't take long before the conversation went into full swing, so he played a selection of everyone's skating music from the last few seasons so he would not hear any spoilers.

The beginning lines of "Shall We Skate" was cut off momentarily as a chat bubble appeared on the home screen. It was from Phichit, Yuuri noted, as he pressed a button on his headset to resume the audio playback and lower the volume.

  phichit+chu: hi yuuri! long time no chat!! :))

Me: Hello, Phichit!

Me: It's only been a week, though?

phichit+chu: lol same thing

phichit+chu: so have u watched glassheart already??? :O

phichit+chu: its 3/4 done now, u got some serious catching up to do :)))

(Typing...)

Me: I haven't, sorry.

Me: Viktor's been asking me to watch it with him, too.

Me: I just can't seem to get into it as much as everyone else.

Me: I guess it hits a little too close to home for me.

  Yuuri stopped typing. It was evident Viktor immensely enjoyed the show, even more so because it was obviously based on their own real-life relationship. He'd been a fan since day one, tweeting his thoughts and reactions every week. Now a good nine episodes in, his follower count had shot up to the mid-hundred-thousands and counting. Fans of both the show and figure skating were very much excited to have the Living Legend (and real-life inspiration) on board, and soon he became known as the "Prince of the Fandom" - the King, of course, being the original author.

Many a fan had once asked if Yuuri watched Glassheart, too, seeing as he was the other significant person involved in the story. Viktor handled these questions himself since he knew the Japanese man did not like being associated with the show, albeit not as vehemently vocal about it as Yurio was. (That had almost become a total PR disaster, if not for Yakov's timely intervention with a total media blackout for the young Russian skater.) Yuuri himself chose to stay quiet about it as he went about his daily activities, avoiding requests for interviews and comments pertaining to the show. However, the increasing guilt for putting his husband through this situation in his place, combined with a genuine, slowly-piqued curiosity brought about by many, many messages from various fans, made him reconsider his stance on the matter.

Above all, he missed spending time with Viktor. Sex was one thing, but quality time like this rarely presented itself throughout their respective busy schedules. So maybe...  

  phichit+chu: awww thats a shame :((

(Typing...)

phichit+chu: its actually why i watch the show. it does so many things right. i love how it showcases a mature, healthy romance done right, just like ur love story with victor :')

phichit+chu: at least u would like the action scenes??? they remind u alot of figure skating

phichit+chu: guanghong likes the fighting and magic scenes actually. leo loves the ost

phichit+chu: sara and mila have a crush on the mc yoichi ehehe ;))

phichit+chu: dont tell them i told u tho

Me: Haha, don't worry, I won't. :)

phichit+chu: just give it a chance okay? u might like it :')

Me: I'm still not sure. Maybe if Viktor can effectively convince me. ;)

phichit+chu: listen to ur hubby, man ;)) listen to ur heart :))

  Phichit stopped responding after that. He must be active on the Skype conference now. Yuuri walked out to the living room, and could hear Phichit's boisterous laughter from Viktor's phone as they discussed the ending scene at the kingdom's harbor. Mila was now attempting to pry details out of her former rinkmate about what went down when they reunited after the Rostelecom Cup three years ago.

"No comment," Viktor answered, a secretive smile playing on his lips. "That's between me and Yuuri only."

"No fair, Vitya!" Mila cried foul. "You know he's never gonna spill! How will we make comparison notes now?"

Viktor hummed back amusedly. "Well, I'm not helping. Good luck with that, Mila."

Phichit and Leo also whined at this, while Guanghong tried to placate them. Sara merely laughed in the background.

Yuuri, too, was laughing softly.

.

  It was several hours before the airing of the last episode when Yuuri surprised his husband over dinner. Viktor almost spit out his water when he asked if they could marathon the past eleven episodes while waiting for the finale.

"I guess I'm kind of interested now, with all the hype going on," he confessed, picking at a piece of meat with his chopsticks. "If you're not busy tonight, of course."

Viktor beamed at him, his eyes gleaming ecstatically. He would have hugged the bespectacled man right there and then, if it weren't for the table between them, so he settled for reaching out to clasp Yuuri's free hand, his wedding ring reflecting the white light hanging above them.

"I'll always have time, my Yuuri." Viktor smiled at him tenderly, the silver fringe over his left eye parting ever so slightly as he tilted his head. "I love spending time with you."

Yuuri closed his eyes, feeling somewhat absolved of whatever it was that had been weighing him down. He entwined his fingers between Viktor's, returning the smile with a fond one of his own before letting go. "We should hurry, Viten'ka. I don't want us to be late."

Viktor nodded and resumed eating. The couple finished their meal in silence, the excitement palpable between them, even as they put away the tableware and washed up for the night.

The laptop had already been set up when Yuuri came out to the living room, bringing with him a large blanket and two steaming cups of hot chocolate on a tray. (Not the bedroom, he'd insisted earlier. They might fall asleep.) Viktor clicked on a few icons before invitingly patting on the spot next to him. Yuuri places the tray on the low table next to the laptop, spreading the blanket to wrap around themselves with before joining his husband on the couch.

"I knew you'd come around eventually." Viktor nudged at his shoulder, winking playfully. "I've waited for so long, you know."

"Good things come to those who wait," Yuuri intoned, the old English adage rolling perfectly on his tongue. He leaned in and rested his head on his husband's shoulder. "Shall we?"

"Of course." Viktor tapped on the spacebar, and animated snowflakes began filling the screen.

The opening theme was captivating, the positive lyrics daring the listener to dream big and aim high. The instrumental parts and the repeating refrains were really catchy, and Yuuri caught himself humming along even after it ended. Viktor was humming along, too, albeit at a faster pace. Yuuri smiled; he loved hearing his husband sing.

It wouldn't be an exaggeration if Yuuri said the first episode blew him away. They did not hesitate to set the tone of the series with a healthy mix of fast-paced fight sequences, colorful spells and lightning-speed attacks (which, yes, did resemble figure skating spins and jumps a lot), all tied together by a dramatic narrative that tugged at the heartstrings and pooled tears in the eyes.

Yurio would have enjoyed this show, he thought. It's a shame all that stuff happened to the poor boy before he could even give the show a chance.

They were not kidding when they said Glassheart was totally (albeit loosely) based on his and Viktor's story. Watching the interactions between the leads Yoichi and Valentin, Yuuri could not help but wonder at how well the creators have captured their own dynamics as coach and skater back then, and adapted it perfectly to a medieval fantasy setting. He started daydreaming about icicles forming at his fingertips, easily manipulating their form into whatever he wished. He had been mentally sculpting a still image of Viktor and himself floating in the air when the fourth episode ended.

Viktor was now chuckling as his on-screen wizard incarnation drunkenly hit on the poor bespectacled mage a in the tavern, while said mage's friend gleefully cackled before a floating magic sphere. "And there goes Match Number 55," he explained. "I never really understood how notorious Phichit actually was about these things until this episode aired."

Yuuri responded with a curious hum. He knew better, having been the Thai's friend and rinkmate for longer. On another note, Viktor and the others have apparently been keeping track of the similarities between this show and real-life happenings. Yuuri declined the offer to read through Phichit's detailed masterpost on it later.

His heart soared when Yoichi managed to win his first match at the Wizards' Tournament, even attempting to cast Valentin's signature spell, the Glassheart. It was only for a short moment, a far cry from the powerful attack the legendary ice wizard had unleashed on the dragon in the first episode. Still, Valentin had been so happy and so proud, that he had kissed his protégé before the audience right there and then.

Beside him, Viktor was in tears again. He'd already stopped giving any form of commentary at this point, in favor of "feeling the feels," whatever that meant.

Yuuri sipped his drink slowly. He wished tonight would never end.

.

  The final episode closed with a shot of Yoichi and Valentin standing on the bridge where they had first met, the former now also sporting the uniform of the Royal Wizard Regiment, a silver badge pinned on his breast. Both characters shared a tender kiss, before the screen panned up and faded out to the words, "ab hinc in aeternum" -- from here to eternity.

No sooner had the livestream cut off than Yuuri turned his attention to his husband, who was currently a beautiful, inelegant mess. It reminded him a lot of the time he'd inadvertently shattered his then-coach's heart into pieces by declaring his intentions to retire after the GPF in Barcelona. Though Yuuri's own heart had ached as much, he was glad they'd had that conversation at all. They'd both learned so much from it, and had grown stronger, as a result.

He put an arm around the sniffling Russian, running his hands up and down the latter's shoulder in a slow, reassuring motion. After several quiet minutes, Viktor reached his own right hand up to clasp his, their wedding rings bumping against each ther in their entwined fingers.

"Duo corda," he whispered, referring to the new spell the two leads had created by fusing their Glassheart spells at the last moment in order to defeat the final enemy. It was a beautiful yet destructive spiraling of two columns of living ice, which culminated in a giant arrow that pierced through the monster's impenetrable barrier and stabbed it right through the heart.

More like, "the power of love," actually, if Yuuri dared to have any say in it, but the hot tears brimming on his own eyes said otherwise. He did not expect this anime to make him laugh and cry as much as it had over the past four hours, but it did its job nonetheless and went way beyond that. (Then again, though, the Japanese skating legend was very much known for having a more fragile heart than most other glass-hearted figure skaters everywhere. Or, at least, Viktor had said so.)

So he settled for repeating Viktor's words, reciting from memory the broken Latin phrases that constituted the love song that constantly played during tender moments between the wizards in love. Somewhere along the moment, they had switched from somewhat-butchered Latin to a more-practiced Italian as they softly sang segments of Stammi Vicino in unison.

Yuuri looked up at his husband, poking his head out of the blanket. "Not going to post anything tonight?"

Viktor stopped humming, pursing his lips in mock-deep thought. "I'll do that tomorrow," he finally decided. "I have a lot of feelings to process."

"So you do," Yuuri agreed, observing the already-dried tracks of tears down the other man's cheeks. "What about Phichit and the others?"

"I turned off my phone, actually." Viktor laughed, holding up the dark gadget for his husband to see. "Tonight is Yuuri-time," he added with a flourish, gesturing as flashily as he could from a cramped space, almost dropping the phone in the process. Yuuri caught it just in time, a bubbling feeling of euphoria welling up from deep within his chest.

"If that's the case," he began, "then I have an idea."

Yuuri fumbled for his own phone, opening his barely-used Instagram app. He angled the camera to include an aesthetic shot of the powered-down laptop, the two empty cups of chocolate, and both their legs entangled together. Viktor buried his head into the crook of his neck upon reading the caption, holding the other man to himself tighter than ever.

"You're one sappy romantic, Yuuri Nikiforov," he commented, his shuddering breath as he exhaled tickling Yuuri's neck. "You never cease to surprise me."

Yuuri smiled proudly, bringing his husband closer and kissing him gently. "I learn from the best."

.

     [Image.jpg]

yuuri-katsuki Ab hinc in aeternum. Loving you is an irreplaceable joy like no other.

Liked by v-nikiforov, phichit+chu and 5,277 others

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iheartkatsudon OMG GLASSHEART

lysssssnikiforova welcome to the fandom @yuuri-katsuki !!

phichit+chu about time yuuri!!! :))) @v-nikiforov @m_babicheva @sara-crispino @leo_dli @+guanghongji+

#yuri!!! on ice #victuuri #fanfiction #katsuki yuuri #victor nikiforov #cyanoscript

[newsnigeria]

Check out New Post published on Ọmọ Oòduà

New Post has been published on http://ooduarere.com/news-from-nigeria/world-news/russias-kidnapping-problem/

Russia’s kidnapping problem

[this article was written for the Unz Review]

No, this will not be an article about Russians kidnapped in Chechnia (that was a very long time ago) or somewhere in a combat zone.  I will be talking about the USA and Iran.  First, here are a few links for context:

About the FBI’s illegal detention of parliament member Inga Iumasheva “Imagine FSB interrogating a US senator? FBI agent questions Russian lawmaker, offers ‘informal’ meeting“

About the IRGC’s rather weird arrest of Russian journalist Iulia Iuzik “Iran Arrests Russian Journalist Yulia Yuzik for Espionage“

A recent article by Paul Craig Roberts “Will the Russians Ever Learn?“

My own analysis for the Unz Review “Kidnapping as a Tool of Imperial Statecraft?“

Quick update: the Iranians have declared that the detention of Iuzik was not an espionage case, but a visa violation which will be resolved very soon.

Next, I would like to clarify a few things before discussing what I think is “Russia’s kidnapping problem“.

In the case of Iuzik, I do not think that she was a spy for anybody, including the Israelis.  Why?  For one thing, I read that she entered Iran with a passport stamped with an Israeli visa.  That is not very smart, especially for a putative ‘spy’ and, besides, even the Israelis are not that arrogant (or incompetent).  Furthermore, if the Iranians (who have truly world class security services!) had really suspected Iuzik they had many other options including:

Setting up a sting operation and film her doing something illegal

Feed Iuzik all sorts of bad info to confuse her bosses and smoke out any spies in Iran

Contact the FSB and warn the Russians about her real professional profile

These are just the three most obvious ones.  There are many more.

Finally, spies are not arrested immediately upon arrival, this really makes no sense whatsoever (what would be the point?).

[Sidebar: some have noted that Iuzik is closely linked to all sorts of toxic Russian “informal” or “non-system” opposition groups.  That is absolutely true and I am sure that Iuzik has no more love for Putin than she has for Iran.  And maybe she truly loves Israel.  But that does *not* make her a usable spy while this could have made her a “victim of Putin’s regime and hatred for real journalists“, at least if the Russian Foreign Ministry had not acted immediately and firmly.  The truth is that these Kodorkovskii-type of “journalists” are no threat to Putin or his “regime”.  That is precisely what makes them so angry and why they have to invent “persecutions” ex nihilo]

So what happened here?

My guess is (and I hope and ask my Iranian friends to correct me if I am wrong!) that this is not about Iuzik herself.  I see two possibilities:

The Israeli visa really infuriated somebody at the IRGC and that person acted impulsively

This is the result of internal infighting in Iran

The first one is obvious, so let me explain the second one.

A lot of Iranians harbor plenty of reservations about Russia, some are even outright hostile or suspicious.  They are not alone, there is also plenty of Russians who do not trust the Iranians.  In the first case, the history of wars and Russian interventions (not to mention the Soviet support for Saddam Hussein’s war on Iran!) is the cause.  In the Russian case, the Iranian attitude towards Afghanistan, Chechnia and, especially, Bosnia created a bad image of Iran (and, to a lesser degree, Islam) in some circles in Russia.  There is nothing new here, other countries have had the same problem (France and Germany, Russia and China, etc.).  My guess is that somebody somewhere in the Iranian power structure saw this as a way to create problems between Russia and Iran. The telltale sign for me is that Iuzina was arrested, according to various reports, by a IRGC special forces team (that is what is done with real spies to prevent them from killing themselves or destroying evidence).  Thus a REAL anti-spy method was used on somebody who was self-evidently NOT a spy.  If so, that plan failed, since the Russians immediately summoned the Iranian ambassador who immediately promised to solve this issue.

The case of Iumasheva is much more primitive.  This is simply the latest attempt of the US deep state to try to make the Russians do something in retaliation which could then be used to prove how evil and devious the Russians are.  As for offering her to grab a coffee on the way out, it is simply a lack of education of the FBI agents involved.  Maybe they wanted to hit on her, or brag to their pals about taking her out, or maybe they simply wanted to show some kindness and did not realize how this kind of clumsy “kindness” would be seen in Russia (where women have a very different status than the poor women of the United States).

So these two cases are completely unrelated and do not form a pattern.

Except they do, alas, and this is the real Russian kidnapping problem.

Where whining will get you in Russia

In the public opinion (both in Russia and outside Russia) Russia simply looks weak and easy to bully.  Now, of course, inside Russia these kinds of views are mostly held by pro-US “liberals” who are just waiting to fan any flame against Putin and the Kremlin.  Most people inside Russia do actually understand the reasons why Russia does not retaliate in kind (Maria Zakharova just repeated it all on TV recently, Russian speakers can listen to her here).  She summed it all up by mentioning the Russian proverb “На обиженных воду возят” whose direct translation into English makes no sense whatsoever: water is carried on the backs of offended people.  This proverb comes from the times of Peter I when canalizations were not available everywhere and when some dishonest employees of the state who were supposed to deliver the water by carriage for free began charging money for this.  When Czar Peter heard about that, he punished these crooks by making them pull the horse-carriages themselves.  Nowadays the word “offended” takes a different meaning of “pouting” or “whining”, so I would (very freely) translate it as “whiners get screwed” or something to that effect.  An even freer translation could be “don’t bitch and you won’t be treated like one”.  Simply put, concepts like “oi vey!” or “gwalt” are not Russian ones 🙂

When westerners are outraged, they typically do a lot of talking.  They threaten, they complain, they protest, they denounce, etc.   Russians typically say nothing, take the pain and concentrate.  Furthermore, complaints, threats or protests are seen as signs of weakness in the Russian culture.  For example, the advice given to anybody going to jail in Russia is “не верь, не бойся, не проси” which means “don’t trust, don’t fear and don’t ask/beg”.  If the so-called “Russian studies specialists” and other experts in the West understood this key feature of the Russian mindset they would not misread Russia so often.

So this is what happens: each time somebody in the West kidnaps a Russian citizen (or does not respect their diplomatic status) the Russian officials very boringly and vapidly protest, mostly behind closed doors and publicly repeat the canned sentences about “US obligations under international law”, about how the boorish behavior of the USA will end up boomeranging and even further discredit the country which modestly fancies itself the “city on the hill”, “indispensable nation”, the “land of the free”, “home of the brave”, etc.

This all simply reeks of weakness to non-Russians (just see Paul Craig Robert’s article above!).

And that is a REAL problem for Russia.

In Asia, everybody “gets it”.  The Iranians understand that absolutely perfectly and do not mistake politely smiling diplomats with Russian weakness (Iran’s future is, in so many ways, becoming dependent on Russia and the Iranians know that very well; just as with the Putin-Xi alliance, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and Putin also understand each other perfectly).  Hence their immediate reaction.  As for the Russians, they also understand that this was not a hostile act on the part of Iran as a country but either a bureaucratic screw-up, or a case of Iranian infighting (which happens in Russia too!).

But in the West, Russia’s apparent passivity and even taste for pain only triggers bewilderment and frustration and I believe that Russia needs to address this problem for the following reason:

Thanks to the ceaseless efforts of Obama and Trump, the AngloZionist Empire is tanking much faster than anybody (including myself) would have ever thought.  True, Europe is still a US colony, but the “natives are being restless” and there are all the signs that at least the “Old Europe” (aka “western Europe”) is slowly coming to its senses and realizes that the US not only fails to deliver much, but even cannot really punish very much either.  Not only that, but the “Old Europeans” will vitally need Russia’s help to deal with the “New Europeans” (aka “eastern Europeans), wannabe colonial servants and full-time Empire-brown-nosing regimes when the EU finally tanks (which, at least to me, is not an issue of “whether” but only a question of “when”).

So far, and as long as Russia continues to look like a willing punching ball of the USA, future potential allies will always wonder whether Russia is a paper tiger or, even worse, a “pretend-resister” and a pushover in reality.

Europe and the Americas are no more a Russian foreign policy priority, if only because right now the US is “not agreement capable” while the EU is trying to find some middle-path between the US, Russia and the nutjobs in the East.  True, Russian foreign policy priorities are now in the South, the East and the North.  But let’s not confuse cause and effect here.  A truly sovereign USA or EU would be an superb partner for Russia in so many ways that she cannot but do everything she can to try to change current US and EU perceptions.

So what could Russia do?

I will immediately exclude all actions which would be illegal under international and Russian law.  The fact that a political Neanderthal acts like a thug is no reason for civilized people to emulate him or retaliate in kind.  Each country, each nation, has to decide for itself whether the rule of law (national or international) is something which matters to it or not.

However, I believe that there are legal actions the Russians could take.

For one thing, the Russians could get much, much more assertive at the UN.  I get it, Lavrov had to say that he was sure that Trump and Pompeo had nothing to do with the latest illegal denial of visas of Russian officials to the UN: he was trying to help Trump who probably really had nothing to do with this.  But Pompeo?!  Of course Lavrov and everybody else understand that this could not have happened without Pompeo’s go-ahead.  How much did Lavrov’s diplomatic talk help Trump?  I don’t think that it made any difference.  And it did make Lavrov look plain silly (a very rare case indeed!) in the eyes of the western public.  Was it worth it?  I don’t think so!

Next, so far the Russians have failed to really put pressure on the USA worldwide, but the reality is that she has plenty of options to hurt US security, political and economic interests. For example in Africa where Russia (and China) have gained a lot of traction in recent years or in Latin America where Russia could provide much more political support to opposition groups to local comprador regimes (say in Brazil, Colombia or even Mexico!).  I don’t mean do what the USSR did and waste millions on local Communist parties or by single-handedly supporting the local economies.  But the Russians could begin using political methods (covert and overt) to being showing the US intelligence community (which will immediately detect this) that there is a price to pay.

What would be important in this case would be to start very “low”, with a few actions here and there, just enough to get the US Americans to notice and then to protest in back-channels.  Once this happens, the Russians could simply say “you treat us as hostiles, fine, but there will be a price to pay”.  The first time around Uncle Shmuel is unlikely to notice, but once this become a pattern, especially an increasing one, trust me, he will notice!

And, consider this: the USA is already, and has been since at least 2013, engaged in a full-spectrum aggression on Russia and they have pretty much exhausted all nasty measures which the USA could implement more or less safely.  Escalating further by, say, disconnecting Russia from the SWIFT, or try to impose a no-fly zone over Syria or try to disconnect Russia from the Internet, or blockade Russian ships – these are all measures which are often mentioned, but which would definitely trigger a dangerous Russian retaliation.  The Russians have made several (very uncharacteristic) warnings about that and the US Americans most likely understood that perfectly.  This is also what happened when the Ukronazis were on the verge of an attack on Russia and Putin decided to (again very uncharacteristically) warn Kiev that any such attack would have major “consequences for the Ukrainian statehood“.  All the Ukrainians, most of them being either Russian or understanding the Russian political culture, immediately understood what that meant and the much announced offensive was scrapped.

Conclusion: Russians still often suck at PR

Yes, RT was huge progress, and even Sputnik probably has a function for the western audiences.  And ladies like Zakharova sure are a HUGE progress compared to the stone-faced Soviet spokesmen.  But, simply put, this is not enough.

Furthermore, even inside the Russian society there are real patriots (not just western agents) who are getting mighty fed-up with the Kremlin’s, let’s kindly call it “meek” or “hyper-polite” attitude.  Meekness is a great quality, so are good manners.  But other attitudes and actions are needed when faced with rogue thug-like regimes, especially when those regimes are both self-worshiping and appallingly ignorant.

I have already mentioned in the past that I believed that the “retirement age reform” was a mistake and that it would create a new, patriotic, opposition to the Kremlin’s policies and even, but to a lesser degree, to Putin himself.  This did happen, even if Putin’s last-minute intervention kinda softened the blow and, eventually, this topic was if not forgotten, then at least not the top issue.

Then there has been, for years now, a weird policy of apparent appeasement of the Nazi regime in Kiev.  Since Putin’s very public threat, since he refused to even take phone calls from Poroshenko and since the Russians have FINALLY begun handing out passports to the Ukrainians, things have somewhat improved on that front.  But for YEARS the Russian opposition (patriotic or not at all) was warning about an imminent “sellout” of Novorussia and that hurt the Kremlin (even if that sellout never happened).

I think that it is high time for Putin or Lavrov to start “not taking calls” from Trump or Pompeo, initially figuratively but, if needed, maybe even literally.

As for the patriotic opposition to Putin, there would be a very easy way to deal with it:

start listening to it and show much more firmness

finally give the boot to some of the more toxic 5th columnists in the government

invite that opposition for a real national debate in various public forums (Valdai, TV, radio, etc.)

I think that many of these patriotic opponent of the Kremlin would be glad to fully support Putin if he did that.  If he fails to do so, this opposition will only grow.  Right now the Kremlin is “lucky” that this patriotic opposition has not succeeded (yet?) in presenting a single halfway credible political figure to lead it.  To my great regret, most of the folks involved are angry, bitter and deeply resentful that they have been almost completely ignored by the Kremlin.  But this will inevitably change, especially if the current government continues to look weak, indecisive and not truly patriotic at all.

Thus, I believe that, both for external and internal reasons, the Kremlin needs to develop and implement a much firmer policy towards US-ordered kidnapping of Russian citizens.  I also believe that this will happen once the political costs for the Kremlin of its current “politeness” become even higher.

One more thing – remember the US seizure of Russian diplomatic buildings in the USA?  Putin’s response was very typically Russian: he invited the children of US diplomats to Christmas ceremony in the Kremlin.  For a short while, he did look like the proverbial “better man”.  But what since?  NOTHING!  Another President sits in the White House and the buildings are still under illegal US control.  Did Putin’s “better man” attitude do anybody any good?  Especially in the long term?  I sure don’t think so.  There is a simple truth that every cop knows: narcissistic thugs do not appreciate good manners.  There is a lesson here.

The Saker

PS: I just saw this video of Iumasheva explaining what happened to her:

#Iran #russia #U.S.A

[englishchinesetranslations]

(简体字：为什么中文这么TM难？) 

(繁體字：為什麼中文這麼TM難？)

The first question any thoughtful person might ask when reading the title of this essay is, "Hard for whom?" A reasonable question. After all, Chinese people seem to learn it just fine. When little Chinese kids go through the "terrible twos", it's Chinese they use to drive their parents crazy, and in a few years the same kids are actually using those impossibly complicated Chinese characters to scribble love notes and shopping lists. So what do I mean by "hard"? Since I know at the outset that the whole tone of this document is going to involve a lot of whining and complaining, I may as well come right out and say exactly what I mean. I mean hard for me, a native English speaker trying to learn Chinese as an adult, going through the whole process with the textbooks, the tapes, the conversation partners, etc., the whole torturous rigmarole. I mean hard for me -- and, of course, for the many other Westerners who have spent years of their lives bashing their heads against the Great Wall of Chinese.

From

Schriftfestschrift: Essays on Writing and Language in Honor of John DeFrancis on His Eightieth Birthday

(Sino-Platonic Papers)

No. 27, August 1991), edited by Victor H. Mair

If this were as far as I went, my statement would be a pretty empty one. Of course Chinese is hard for me. After all, any foreign language is hard for a non-native, right? Well, sort of. Not all foreign languages are equally difficult for any learner. It depends on which language you're coming from. A French person can usually learn Italian faster than an American, and an average American could probably master German a lot faster than an average Japanese, and so on. So part of what I'm contending is that Chinese is hard compared to ... well, compared to almost any other language you might care to tackle. What I mean is that Chinese is not only hard for us (English speakers), but it's also hard in absolute terms. Which means that Chinese is also hard forthem, for Chinese people.1

If you don't believe this, just ask a Chinese person. Most Chinese people will cheerfully acknowledge that their language is hard, maybe the hardest on earth. (Many are even proud of this, in the same way some New Yorkers are actually proud of living in the most unlivable city in America.) Maybe all Chinese people deserve a medal just for being born Chinese. At any rate, they generally become aware at some point of the Everest-like status of their native language, as they, from their privileged vantage point on the summit, observe foolhardy foreigners huffing and puffing up the steep slopes.

Everyone's heard the supposed fact that if you take the English idiom "It's Greek to me" and search for equivalent idioms in all the world's languages to arrive at a consensus as to which language is the hardest, the results of such a linguistic survey is that Chinese easily wins as the canonical incomprehensible language. (For example, the French have the expression "C'est du chinois", "It's Chinese", i.e., "It's incomprehensible". Other languages have similar sayings.) So then the question arises: What do the Chinese themselves consider to be an impossibly hard language? You then look for the corresponding phrase in Chinese, and you find Gēn tiānshū yíyàng 跟天书一样 meaning "It's like heavenly script."

There is truth in this linguistic yarn; Chinese does deserve its reputation for heartbreaking difficulty. Those who undertake to study the language for any other reason than the sheer joy of it will always be frustrated by the abysmal ratio of effort to effect. Those who are actually attracted to the language precisely because of its daunting complexity and difficulty will never be disappointed. Whatever the reason they started, every single person who has undertaken to study Chinese sooner or later asks themselves "Why in the world am I doing this?" Those who can still remember their original goals will wisely abandon the attempt then and there, since nothing could be worth all that tedious struggle. Those who merely say "I've come this far -- I can't stop now" will have some chance of succeeding, since they have the kind of mindless doggedness and lack of sensible overall perspective that it takes.

Okay, having explained a bit of what I mean by the word, I return to my original question: Why is Chinese so damn hard?

1. Because the writing system is ridiculous.

Beautiful, complex, mysterious -- but ridiculous. I, like many students of Chinese, was first attracted to Chinese because of the writing system, which is surely one of the most fascinating scripts in the world. The more you learn about Chinese characters the more intriguing and addicting they become. The study of Chinese characters can become a lifelong obsession, and you soon find yourself engaged in the daily task of accumulating them, drop by drop from the vast sea of characters, in a vain attempt to hoard them in the leaky bucket of long-term memory.

The beauty of the characters is indisputable, but as the Chinese people began to realize the importance of universal literacy, it became clear that these ideograms were sort of like bound feet -- some fetishists may have liked the way they looked, but they weren't too practical for daily use.

For one thing, it is simply unreasonably hard to learn enough characters to become functionally literate. Again, someone may ask "Hard in comparison to what?" And the answer is easy: Hard in comparison to Spanish, Greek, Russian, Hindi, or any other sane, "normal" language that requires at most a few dozen symbols to write anything in the language. John DeFrancis, in his book The Chinese Language: Fact and Fantasy, reports that his Chinese colleagues estimate it takes seven to eight years for a Mandarin speaker to learn to read and write three thousand characters, whereas his French and Spanish colleagues estimate that students in their respective countries achieve comparable levels in half that time.2 Naturally, this estimate is rather crude and impressionistic (it's unclear what "comparable levels" means here), but the overall implications are obvious: the Chinese writing system is harder to learn, in absolute terms, than an alphabetic writing system.3 Even Chinese kids, whose minds are at their peak absorptive power, have more trouble with Chinese characters than their little counterparts in other countries have with their respective scripts. Just imagine the difficulties experienced by relatively sluggish post-pubescent foreign learners such as myself.

Everyone has heard that Chinese is hard because of the huge number of characters one has to learn, and this is absolutely true. There are a lot of popular books and articles that downplay this difficulty, saying things like "Despite the fact that Chinese has [10,000, 25,000, 50,000, take your pick] separate characters you really only need 2,000 or so to read a newspaper". Poppycock. I couldn't comfortably read a newspaper when I had 2,000 characters under my belt. I often had to look up several characters per line, and even after that I had trouble pulling the meaning out of the article. (I take it as a given that what is meant by "read" in this context is "read and basically comprehend the text without having to look up dozens of characters"; otherwise the claim is rather empty.)

This fairy tale is promulgated because of the fact that, when you look at the character frequencies, over 95% of the characters in any newspaper are easily among the first 2,000 most common ones.4 But what such accounts don't tell you is that there will still be plenty of unfamiliar words made up of those familiar characters. (To illustrate this problem, note that in English, knowing the words "up" and "tight" doesn't mean you know the word "uptight".) Plus, as anyone who has studied any language knows, you can often be familiar with every single word in a text and still not be able to grasp the meaning. Reading comprehension is not simply a matter of knowing a lot of words; one has to get a feeling for how those words combine with other words in a multitude of different contexts.5 In addition, there is the obvious fact that even though you may know 95% of the characters in a given text, the remaining 5% are often the very characters that are crucial for understanding the main point of the text. A non-native speaker of English reading an article with the headline "JACUZZIS FOUND EFFECTIVE IN TREATING PHLEBITIS" is not going to get very far if they don't know the words "jacuzzi" or "phlebitis".

The problem of reading is often a touchy one for those in the China field. How many of us would dare stand up in front of a group of colleagues and read a randomly-selected passage out loud? Yet inferiority complexes or fear of losing face causes many teachers and students to become unwitting cooperators in a kind of conspiracy of silence wherein everyone pretends that after four years of Chinese the diligent student should be whizzing through anything from Confucius to Lu Xun, pausing only occasionally to look up some pesky low-frequency character (in their Chinese-Chinese dictionary, of course). Others, of course, are more honest about the difficulties. The other day one of my fellow graduate students, someone who has been studying Chinese for ten years or more, said to me "My research is really hampered by the fact that I still just can't read Chinese. It takes me hours to get through two or three pages, and I can't skim to save my life." This would be an astonishing admission for a tenth-year student of, say, French literature, yet it is a comment I hear all the time among my peers (at least in those unguarded moments when one has had a few too many Tsingtao beers and has begun to lament how slowly work on the thesis is coming).

A teacher of mine once told me of a game he and a colleague would sometimes play: The contest involved pulling a book at random from the shelves of the Chinese section of the Asia Library and then seeing who could be the first to figure out what the book was about. Anyone who has spent time working in an East Asia collection can verify that this can indeed be a difficult enough task -- never mind reading the book in question. This state of affairs is very disheartening for the student who is impatient to begin feasting on the vast riches of Chinese literature, but must subsist on a bland diet of canned handouts, textbook examples, and carefully edited appetizers for the first few years.

The comparison with learning the usual western languages is striking. After about a year of studying French, I was able to read a lot. I went through the usual kinds of novels -- La nausée by Sartre, Voltaire'sCandide, L'étranger by Camus -- plus countless newspapers, magazines, comic books, etc. It was a lot of work but fairly painless; all I really needed was a good dictionary and a battered French grammar book I got at a garage sale.

This kind of "sink or swim" approach just doesn't work in Chinese. At the end of three years of learning Chinese, I hadn't yet read a single complete novel. I found it just too hard, impossibly slow, and unrewarding. Newspapers, too, were still too daunting. I couldn't read an article without looking up about every tenth character, and it was not uncommon for me to scan the front page of the People's Daily and not be able to completely decipher a single headline. Someone at that time suggested I read The Dream of the Red Chamber and gave me a nice three-volume edition. I just have to laugh. It still sits on my shelf like a fat, smug Buddha, only the first twenty or so pages filled with scribbled definitions and question marks, the rest crisp and virgin. After six years of studying Chinese, I'm still not at a level where I can actually read it without an English translation to consult. (By "read it", I mean, of course, "read it for pleasure". I suppose if someone put a gun to my head and a dictionary in my hand, I could get through it.) Simply diving into the vast pool of Chinese in the beginning is not only foolhardy, it can even be counterproductive. As George Kennedy writes, "The difficulty of memorizing a Chinese ideograph as compared with the difficulty of learning a new word in a European language, is such that a rigid economy of mental effort is imperative."6 This is, if anything, an understatement. With the risk of drowning so great, the student is better advised to spend more time in the shallow end treading water before heading toward the deep end.

As if all this weren't bad enough, another ridiculous aspect of the Chinese writing system is that there are two (mercifully overlapping) sets of characters: the traditional characters still used in Taiwan and Hong Kong, and the simplified characters adopted by the People's Republic of China in the late 1950's and early 60's. Any foreign student of Chinese is more or less forced to become familiar with both sets, since they are routinely exposed to textbooks and materials from both Chinas. This linguistic camel's-back-breaking straw puts an absurd burden on the already absurdly burdened student of Chinese, who at this point would gladly trade places with Sisyphus. But since Chinese people themselves are never equally proficient in both simplified and complex characters, there is absolutely no shame whatsoever in eventually concentrating on one set to the partial exclusion the other. In fact, there is absolutely no shame in giving up Chinese altogether, when you come right down to it.

2. Because the language doesn't have the common sense to use an alphabet.

To further explain why the Chinese writing system is so hard in this respect, it might be a good idea to spell out (no pun intended) why that of English is so easy. Imagine the kind of task faced by the average Chinese adult who decides to study English. What skills are needed to master the writing system? That's easy: 26 letters. (In upper and lower case, of course, plus script and a few variant forms. And throw in some quote marks, apostrophes, dashes, parentheses, etc. -- all things the Chinese use in their own writing system.) And how are these letters written? From left to right, horizontally, across the page, with spaces to indicate word boundaries. Forgetting for a moment the problem of spelling and actually making words out of these letters, how long does it take this Chinese learner of English to master the various components of the English writing system? Maybe a day or two.

Now consider the American undergraduate who decides to study Chinese. What does it take for this person to master the Chinese writing system? There is nothing that corresponds to an alphabet, though there are recurring components that make up the characters. How many such components are there? Don't ask. As with all such questions about Chinese, the answer is very messy and unsatisfying. It depends on how you define "component" (strokes? radicals?), plus a lot of other tedious details. Suffice it to say, the number is quite large, vastly more than the 26 letters of the Roman alphabet. And how are these components combined to form characters? Well, you name it -- components to the left of other components, to the right of other components, on top of other components, surrounding other components, inside of other components -- almost anything is possible. And in the process of making these spatial accommodations, these components get flattened, stretched, squashed, shortened, and distorted in order to fit in the uniform square space that all characters are supposed to fit into. In other words, the components of Chinese characters are arrayed in two dimensions, rather than in the neat one-dimensional rows of alphabetic writing.

Okay, so ignoring for the moment the question of elegance, how long does it take a Westerner to learn the Chinese writing system so that when confronted with any new character they at least know how to move the pen around in order to produce a reasonable facsimile of that character? Again, hard to say, but I would estimate that it takes the average learner several months of hard work to get the basics down. Maybe a year or more if they're a klutz who was never very good in art class. Meanwhile, their Chinese counterpart learning English has zoomed ahead to learn cursive script, with time left over to read Moby Dick, or at least Strunk & White.

This is not exactly big news, I know; the alphabet really is a breeze to learn. Chinese people I know who have studied English for a few years can usually write with a handwriting style that is almost indistinguishable from that of the average American. Very few Americans, on the other hand, ever learn to produce a natural calligraphic hand in Chinese that resembles anything but that of an awkward Chinese third-grader. If there were nothing else hard about Chinese, the task of learning to write characters alone would put it in the rogues' gallery of hard-to-learn languages.

3. Because the writing system just ain't very phonetic.

So much for the physical process of writing the characters themselves. What about the sheer task of memorizing so many characters? Again, a comparison of English and Chinese is instructive. Suppose a Chinese person has just the previous day learned the English word "president", and now wants to write it from memory. How to start? Anyone with a year or two of English experience is going to have a host of clues and spelling rules-of-thumb, albeit imperfect ones, to help them along. The word really couldn't start with anything but "pr", and after that a little guesswork aided by visual memory ("Could a 'z' be in there? That's an unusual letter, I would have noticed it, I think. Must be an 's'...") should produce something close to the target. Not every foreigner (or native speaker for that matter) has noted or internalized the various flawed spelling heuristics of English, of course, but they are at least there to be utilized.

Now imagine that you, a learner of Chinese, have just the previous day encountered the Chinese word for "president" (总统 zǒngtǒng ) and want to write it. What processes do you go through in retrieving the word? Well, very often you just totally forget, with a forgetting that is both absolute and perfect in a way few things in this life are. You can repeat the word as often as you like; the sound won't give you a clue as to how the character is to be written. After you learn a few more characters and get hip to a few more phonetic components, you can do a bit better. ("Zǒng 总 is a phonetic component in some other character, right?...Song? Zeng? Oh yeah, cong 总 as in cōngmíng 聪明.") Of course, the phonetic aspect of some characters is more obvious than that of others, but many characters, including some of the most high-frequency ones, give no clue at all as to their pronunciation.

All of this is to say that Chinese is just not very phonetic when compared to English. (English, in turn, is less phonetic than a language like German or Spanish, but Chinese isn't even in the same ballpark.) It is not true, as some people outside the field tend to think, that Chinese is not phonetic at all, though a perfectly intelligent beginning student could go several months without noticing this fact. Just how phonetic the language is a very complex issue. Educated opinions range from 25% (Zhao Yuanren)7 to around 66% (DeFrancis),8 though the latter estimate assumes more knowledge of phonetic components than most learners are likely to have. One could say that Chinese is phonetic in the way that sex is aerobic: technically so, but in practical use not the most salient thing about it. Furthermore, this phonetic aspect of the language doesn't really become very useful until you've learned a few hundred characters, and even when you've learned two thousand, the feeble phoneticity of Chinese will never provide you with the constant memory prod that the phonetic quality of English does.

Which means that often you just completely forget how to write a character. Period. If there is no obvious semantic clue in the radical, and no helpful phonetic component somewhere in the character, you're just sunk. And you're sunk whether your native language is Chinese or not; contrary to popular myth, Chinese people are not born with the ability to memorize arbitrary squiggles. In fact, one of the most gratifying experiences a foreign student of Chinese can have is to see a native speaker come up a complete blank when called upon to write the characters for some relatively common word. You feel an enormous sense of vindication and relief to see a native speaker experience the exact same difficulty you experience every day.

This is such a gratifying experience, in fact, that I have actually kept a list of characters that I have observed Chinese people forget how to write. (A sick, obsessive activity, I know.) I have seen highly literate Chinese people forget how to write certain characters in common words like "tin can", "knee", "screwdriver", "snap" (as in "to snap one's fingers"), "elbow", "ginger", "cushion", "firecracker", and so on. And when I say "forget", I mean that they often cannot even put the first stroke down on the paper. Can you imagine a well-educated native English speaker totally forgetting how to write a word like "knee" or "tin can"? Or even a rarely-seen word like "scabbard" or "ragamuffin"? I was once at a luncheon with three Ph.D. students in the Chinese Department at Peking University, all native Chinese (one from Hong Kong). I happened to have a cold that day, and was trying to write a brief note to a friend canceling an appointment that day. I found that I couldn't remember how to write the character 嚔, as in da penti 打喷嚔 "to sneeze". I asked my three friends how to write the character, and to my surprise, all three of them simply shrugged in sheepish embarrassment. Not one of them could correctly produce the character. Now, Peking University is usually considered the "Harvard of China". Can you imagine three Ph.D. students in English at Harvard forgetting how to write the English word "sneeze"?? Yet this state of affairs is by no means uncommon in China. English is simply orders of magnitude easier to write and remember. No matter how low-frequency the word is, or how unorthodox the spelling, the English speaker can always come up with something, simply because there has to be some correspondence between sound and spelling. One might forget whether "abracadabra" is hyphenated or not, or get the last few letters wrong on "rhinoceros", but even the poorest of spellers can make a reasonable stab at almost anything. By contrast, often even the most well-educated Chinese have no recourse but to throw up their hands and ask someone else in the room how to write some particularly elusive character.

As one mundane example of the advantages of a phonetic writing system, here is one kind of linguistic situation I encountered constantly while I was in France. (Again I use French as my canonical example of an "easy" foreign language.) I wake up one morning in Paris and turn on the radio. An ad comes on, and I hear the word "amortisseur" several times. "What's an amortisseur?" I think to myself, but as I am in a hurry to make an appointment, I forget to look the word up in my haste to leave the apartment. A few hours later I'm walking down the street, and I read, on a sign, the word "AMORTISSEUR" -- the word I heard earlier this morning. Beneath the word on the sign is a picture of a shock absorber. Aha! So "amortisseur" means "shock absorber". And voila! I've learned a new word, quickly and painlessly, all because the sound I construct when reading the word is the same as the sound in my head from the radio this morning -- one reinforces the other. Throughout the next week I see the word again several times, and each time I can reconstruct the sound by simply reading the word phonetically -- "a-mor-tis-seur". Before long I can retrieve the word easily, use it in conversation, or write it in a letter to a friend. And the process of learning a foreign language begins to seem less daunting.

When I first went to Taiwan for a few months, the situation was quite different. I was awash in a sea of characters that were all visually interesting but phonetically mute. I carried around a little dictionary to look up unfamiliar characters in, but it's almost impossible to look up a character in a Chinese dictionary while walking along a crowded street (more on dictionary look-up later), and so I didn't get nearly as much phonetic reinforcement as I got in France. In Taiwan I could pass a shop with a sign advertising shock absorbers and never know how to pronounce any of the characters unless I first look them up. And even then, the next time I pass the shop I might have to look the characters up again. And again, and again. The reinforcement does not come naturally and easily.

4. Because you can't cheat by using cognates.

I remember when I had been studying Chinese very hard for about three years, I had an interesting experience. One day I happened to find a Spanish-language newspaper sitting on a seat next to me. I picked it up out of curiosity. "Hmm," I thought to myself. "I've never studied Spanish in my life. I wonder how much of this I can understand." At random I picked a short article about an airplane crash and started to read. I found I could basically glean, with some guesswork, most of the information from the article. The crash took place near Los Angeles. 186 people were killed. There were no survivors. The plane crashed just one minute after take-off. There was nothing on the flight recorder to indicate a critical situation, and the tower was unaware of any emergency. The plane had just been serviced three days before and no mechanical problems had been found. And so on. After finishing the article I had a sudden discouraging realization: Having never studied a day of Spanish, I could read a Spanish newspaper more easily than I could a Chinese newspaper after more than three years of studying Chinese.

What was going on here? Why was this "foreign" language so transparent? The reason was obvious: cognates -- those helpful words that are just English words with a little foreign make-up.9 I could read the article because most of the operative words were basically English: aeropuerto, problema mechanico, un minuto, situacion critica, emergencia, etc. Recognizing these words as just English words in disguise is about as difficult as noticing that Superman is really Clark Kent without his glasses. That these quasi-English words are easier to learn than Chinese characters (which might as well be quasi-Martian) goes without saying.

Imagine you are a diabetic, and you find yourself in Spain about to go into insulin shock. You can rush into a doctor's office, and, with a minimum of Spanish and a couple of pieces of guesswork ("diabetes" is just "diabetes" and "insulin" is "insulina", it turns out), you're saved. In China you'd be a goner for sure, unless you happen to have a dictionary with you, and even then you would probably pass out while frantically looking for the first character in the word for insulin. Which brings me to the next reason why Chinese is so hard.

5. Because even looking up a word in the dictionary is complicated.

One of the most unreasonably difficult things about learning Chinese is that merely learning how to look up a word in the dictionary is about the equivalent of an entire semester of secretarial school. When I was in Taiwan, I heard that they sometimes held dictionary look-up contests in the junior high schools. Imagine a language where simply looking a word up in the dictionary is considered a skill like debate or volleyball! Chinese is not exactly what you would call a user-friendly language, but a Chinese dictionary is positively user-hostile.

Figuring out all the radicals and their variants, plus dealing with the ambiguous characters with no obvious radical at all is a stupid, time-consuming chore that slows the learning process down by a factor of ten as compared to other languages with a sensible alphabet or the equivalent. I'd say it took me a good year before I could reliably find in the dictionary any character I might encounter. And to this day, I will very occasionally stumble onto a character that I simply can't find at all, even after ten minutes of searching. At such times I raise my hands to the sky, Job-like, and consider going into telemarketing.

Chinese must also be one of the most dictionary-intensive languages on earth. I currently have more than twenty Chinese dictionaries of various kinds on my desk, and they all have a specific and distinct use. There are dictionaries with simplified characters used on the mainland, dictionaries with the traditional characters used in Taiwan and Hong Kong, and dictionaries with both. There are dictionaries that use the Wade-Giles romanization, dictionaries that use pinyin, and dictionaries that use other more surrealistic romanization methods. There are dictionaries of classical Chinese particles, dictionaries of Beijing dialect, dictionaries of chéngyǔ (four-character idioms), dictionaries of xiēhòuyǔ(special allegorical two-part sayings), dictionaries of yànyǔ (proverbs), dictionaries of Chinese communist terms, dictionaries of Buddhist terms, reverse dictionaries... on and on. An exhaustive hunt for some elusive or problematic lexical item can leave one's desk "strewn with dictionaries as numerous as dead soldiers on a battlefield."10

For looking up unfamiliar characters there is another method called the four-corner system. This method is very fast -- rumored to be, in principle, about as fast as alphabetic look-up (though I haven't met anyone yet who can hit the winning number each time on the first try). Unfortunately, learning this method takes about as much time and practice as learning the Dewey decimal system. Plus you are then at the mercy of the few dictionaries that are arranged according to the numbering scheme of the four-corner system. Those who have mastered this system usually swear by it. The rest of us just swear.

Another problem with looking up words in the dictionary has to do with the nature of written Chinese. In most languages it's pretty obvious where the word boundaries lie -- there are spaces between the words. If you don't know the word in question, it's usually fairly clear what you should look up. (What actually constitutes a word is a very subtle issue, of course, but for my purposes here, what I'm saying is basically correct.) In Chinese there are spaces between characters, but it takes quite a lot of knowledge of the language and often some genuine sleuth work to tell where word boundaries lie; thus it's often trial and error to look up a word. It would be as if English were written thus:

FEAR LESS LY OUT SPOKE N BUT SOME WHAT HUMOR LESS NEW ENG LAND BORN LEAD ACT OR GEORGE MICHAEL SON EX PRESS ED OUT RAGE TO DAY AT THE STALE MATE BE TWEEN MAN AGE MENT AND THE ACT OR 'S UNION BE CAUSE THE STAND OFF HAD SET BACK THE TIME TABLE FOR PRO DUC TION OF HIS PLAY, A ONE MAN SHOW CASE THAT WAS HIS FIRST RUN A WAY BROAD WAY BOX OFFICE SMASH HIT. "THE FIRST A MEND MENT IS AT IS SUE" HE PRO CLAIM ED. "FOR A CENS OR OR AN EDIT OR TO EDIT OR OTHER WISE BLUE PENCIL QUESTION ABLE DIA LOG JUST TO KOW TOW TO RIGHT WING BORN AGAIN BIBLE THUMP ING FRUIT CAKE S IS A DOWN RIGHT DIS GRACE."

Imagine how this difference would compound the dictionary look-up difficulties of a non-native speaker of English. The passage is pretty trivial for us to understand, but then we already know English. For them it would often be hard to tell where the word boundaries were supposed to be. So it is, too, with someone trying to learn Chinese.

6. Then there's classical Chinese (wenyanwen).

Forget it. Way too difficult. If you think that after three or four years of study you'll be breezing through Confucius and Mencius in the way third-year French students at a comparable level are reading Diderot and Voltaire, you're sadly mistaken. There are some westerners who can comfortably read classical Chinese, but most of them have a lot of gray hair or at least tenure.

Unfortunately, classical Chinese pops up everywhere, especially in Chinese paintings and character scrolls, and most people will assume anyone literate in Chinese can read it. It's truly embarrassing to be out at a Chinese restaurant, and someone asks you to translate some characters on a wall hanging.

"Hey, you speak Chinese. What does this scroll say?" You look up and see that the characters are written in wenyan, and in incomprehensible "grass-style" calligraphy to boot. It might as well be an EKG readout of a dying heart patient.

"Uh, I can make out one or two of the characters, but I couldn't tell you what it says," you stammer. "I think it's about a phoenix or something."

"Oh, I thought you knew Chinese," says your friend, returning to their menu. Never mind that an honest-to-goodness Chinese person would also just scratch their head and shrug; the face that is lost is yours.

Whereas modern Mandarin is merely perversely hard, classical Chinese is deliberately impossible. Here's a secret that sinologists won't tell you: A passage in classical Chinese can be understood only if you already know what the passage says in the first place. This is because classical Chinese really consists of several centuries of esoteric anecdotes and in-jokes written in a kind of terse, miserly code for dissemination among a small, elite group of intellectually-inbred bookworms who already knew the whole literature backwards and forwards, anyway. An uninitiated westerner can no more be expected to understand such writing than Confucius himself, if transported to the present, could understand the entries in the "personal" section of the classified ads that say things like: "Hndsm. SWGM, 24, 160, sks BGM or WGM for gentle S&M, mod. bndg., some lthr., twosm or threesm ok, have own equip., wheels, 988-8752 lv. mssg. on ans. mach., no weirdos please."

In fairness, it should be said that classical Chinese gets easier the more you attempt it. But then so does hitting a hole in one, or swimming the English channel in a straitjacket.

7. Because there are too many romanization methods and they all suck.

Well, perhaps that's too harsh. But it is true that there are too many of them, and most of them were designed either by committee or by linguists, or -- even worse -- by a committee of linguists. It is, of course, a very tricky task to devise a romanization method; some are better than others, but all involve plenty of counterintuitive spellings.11 And if you're serious about a career in Chinese, you'll have to grapple with at least four or five of them, not including the bopomofu phonetic symbols used in Taiwan. There are probably a dozen or more romanization schemes out there somewhere, most of them mercifully obscure and rightfully ignored. There is a standing joke among sinologists that one of the first signs of senility in a China scholar is the compulsion to come up with a new romanization method.

8. Because tonal languages are weird.

Okay, that's very Anglo-centric, I know it. But I have to mention this problem because it's one of the most common complaints about learning Chinese, and it's one of the aspects of the language that westerners are notoriously bad at. Every person who tackles Chinese at first has a little trouble believing this aspect of the language. How is it possible thatshùxué means "mathematics" while shūxuě means "blood transfusion", or that guòjiǎng means "you flatter me" while guǒjiàng means "fruit paste"?

By itself, this property of Chinese would be hard enough; it means that, for us non-native speakers, there is this extra, seemingly irrelevant aspect of the sound of a word that you must memorize along with the vowels and consonants. But where the real difficulty comes in is when you start to really use Chinese to express yourself. You suddenly find yourself straitjacketed -- when you say the sentence with the intonation that feels natural, the tones come out all wrong. For example, if you wish say something like "Hey, that's my water glass you're drinking out of!", and you follow your intonational instincts -- that is, to put a distinct falling tone on the first character of the word for "my" -- you will have said a kind of gibberish that may or may not be understood.

Intonation and stress habits are incredibly ingrained and second-nature. With non-tonal languages you can basically import, mutatis mutandis, your habitual ways of emphasizing, negating, stressing, and questioning. The results may be somewhat non-native but usually understandable. Not so with Chinese, where your intonational contours must always obey the tonal constraints of the specific words you've chosen. Chinese speakers, of course, can express all of the intonational subtleties available in non-tonal languages -- it's just that they do it in a way that is somewhat alien to us speakers of non-tonal languages. When you first begin using your Chinese to talk about subjects that actually matter to you, you find that it feels somewhat like trying to have a passionate argument with your hands tied behind your back -- you are suddenly robbed of some vital expressive tools you hadn't even been aware of having.

9. Because east is east and west is west, and the twain have only recently met.

Language and culture cannot be separated, of course, and one of the main reasons Chinese is so difficult for Americans is that our two cultures have been isolated for so long. The reason reading French sentences like "Le président Bush assure le peuple koweitien que le gouvernement américain va continuer à défendre le Koweit contre la menace irakienne," is about as hard as deciphering pig Latin is not just because of the deep Indo-European family resemblance, but also because the core concepts and cultural assumptions in such utterances stem from the same source. We share the same art history, the same music history, the same history history -- which means that in the head of a French person there is basically the same set of archetypes and the same cultural cast of characters that's in an American's head. We are as familiar with Rimbaud as they are with Rambo. In fact, compared to the difference between China and the U.S., American culture and and French culture seem about as different as Peter Pan and Skippy peanut butter.

Speaking with a Chinese person is usually a different matter. You just can't drop Dickens, Tarzan, Jack the Ripper, Goethe, or the Beatles into a conversation and always expect to be understood. I once had a Chinese friend who had read the first translations of Kafka into Chinese, yet didn't know who Santa Claus was. China has had extensive contact with the West in the last few decades, but there is still a vast sea of knowledge and ideas that is not shared by both cultures.

Similarly, how many Americans other than sinophiles have even a rough idea of the chronology of China's dynasties? Has the average history major here ever heard of Qin Shi Huangdi and his contribution to Chinese culture? How many American music majors have ever heard a note of Peking Opera, or would recognize a pipa if they tripped over one? How many otherwise literate Americans have heard of Lu Xun, Ba Jin, or even Mozi?

What this means is that when Americans and Chinese get together, there is often not just a language barrier, but an immense cultural barrier as well. Of course, this is one of the reasons the study of Chinese is so interesting. It is also one of the reasons it is so damn hard.

Conclusion

I could go on and on, but I figure if the reader has bothered to read this far, I'm preaching to the converted, anyway. Those who have tackled other difficult languages have their own litany of horror stories, I'm sure. But I still feel reasonably confident in asserting that, for an average American, Chinese is significantly harder to learn than any of the other thirty or so major world languages that are usually studied formally at the university level (though Japanese in many ways comes close). Not too interesting for linguists, maybe, but something to consider if you've decided to better yourself by learning a foreign language, and you're thinking "Gee, Chinese looks kinda neat."

It's pretty hard to quantify a process as complex and multi-faceted as language-learning, but one simple metric is to simply estimate the time it takes to master the requisite language-learning skills. When you consider all the above-mentioned things a learner of Chinese has to acquire -- ability to use a dictionary, familiarity with two or three romanization methods, a grasp of principles involved in writing characters (both simplified and traditional) -- it adds up to an awful lot of down time while one is "learning to learn" Chinese.

How much harder is Chinese? Again, I'll use French as my canonical "easy language". This is a very rough and intuitive estimate, but I would say that it takes about three times as long to reach a level of comfortable fluency in speaking, reading, and writing Chinese as it takes to reach a comparable level in French. An average American could probably become reasonably fluent in two Romance languages in the time it would take them to reach the same level in Chinese.

One could perhaps view learning languages as being similar to learning musical instruments. Despite the esoteric glories of the harmonica literature, it's probably safe to say that the piano is a lot harder and more time-consuming to learn. To extend the analogy, there is also the fact that we are all virtuosos on at least one "instrument" (namely, our native language), and learning instruments from the same family is easier than embarking on a completely different instrument. A Spanish person learning Portuguese is comparable to a violinist taking up the viola, whereas an American learning Chinese is more like a rock guitarist trying to learn to play an elaborate 30-stop three-manual pipe organ.

Someone once said that learning Chinese is "a five-year lesson in humility". I used to think this meant that at the end of five years you will have mastered Chinese and learned humility along the way. However, now having studied Chinese for over six years, I have concluded that actually the phrase means that after five years your Chinese will still be abysmal, but at least you will have thoroughly learned humility.

There is still the awe-inspiring fact that Chinese people manage to learn their own language very well. Perhaps they are like the gradeschool kids that Baroque performance groups recruit to sing Bach cantatas. The story goes that someone in the audience, amazed at hearing such youthful cherubs flawlessly singing Bach's uncompromisingly difficult vocal music, asks the choir director, "But how are they able to perform such difficult music?"

"Shh -- not so loud!" says the director, "If you don't tell them it's difficult, they never know."

Bibliography

(A longer version of this paper is available through CRCC, Indiana University, 510 N. Fess, Bloomington, IN, 47408.)

Chen, Heqin, (1928)"Yutiwen yingyong zihui" [Characters used in vernacular literature], Shanghai.

DeFrancis, John (1966) "Why Johnny Can't Read Chinese", Journal of the Chinese Language Teachers Association, Vol. 1, No. 1, Feb. 1966, pp. 1-20.

DeFrancis, John (1984) The Chinese Language: Fact and Fantasy, Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press.

DeFrancis, John (1989) Visible Speech: The Diverse Oneness of Writing Systems, Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press.

Kennedy, George (1964) "A Minimum Vocabulary in Modern Chinese", in Selected Works of George Kennedy, Tien-yi Li (ed.), New Haven: Far Eastern Publications.

Mair, Victor (1986) "The Need for an Alphabetically Arranged General Usage Dictionary of Mandarin Chinese: A Review Article of Some Recent Dictionaries and Current Lexicographical Projects", Sino-Platonic Papers, No. 1, February, 1986 (Dept. of Oriental Studies, University of Pennsylvania).

Zhao, Yuanren, (1972) Aspects of Chinese Sociolinguistics, Anwar S. Dil (ed.), Stanford: Stanford University Press.

Notes

I am speaking of the writing system here, but the difficulty of the writing system has such a pervasive effect on literacy and general language mastery that I think the statement as a whole is still valid. back

John DeFrancis, The Chinese Language: Fact and Fantasy, Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1984, p.153. Most of the issues in this paper are dealt with at length and with great clarity in both this book and in his Visible Speech: The Diverse Oneness of Writing Systems, Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1989. back

Incidentally, I'm aware that much of what I've said above applies to Japanese as well, but it seems clear that the burden placed on a learner of Japanese is much lighter because (a) the number of Chinese characters used in Japanese is "only" about 2,000 -- fewer by a factor of two or three compared to the number needed by the average literate Chinese reader; and (b) the Japanese have phonetic syllabaries (the hiragana and katakana characters), which are nearly 100% phonetically reliable and are in many ways easier to master than chaotic English orthography is. back

See, for ex., Chen Heqin, "Yutiwen yingyong zihui" [Characters used in vernacular literature], Shanghai, 1928. back

John DeFrancis deals with this issue, among other places, in "Why Johnny Can't Read Chinese", Journal of the Chinese Language Teachers Association, Vol. 1, No. 1, Feb. 1966, pp. 1-20. back

George Kennedy, "A Minimum Vocabulary in Modern Chinese", inSelected Works of George Kennedy, Tien-yi Li (ed.), New Haven, 1964, p. 8. back

Zhao Yuanren, Aspects of Chinese Sociolinguistics, Anwar S. Dil (ed.), Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1976, p. 92. back

John DeFrancis, The Chinese Language: Fact and Fantasy, p. 109.back

Charles Hockett reminds me that many of my examples are really instances of loan words, not cognates, but rather than take up space dealing with the issue, I will blur the distinction a bit here. There are phonetic loan words from English into Chinese, of course, but they are scarce curiosities rather than plentiful semantic moorings. back

A phrase taken from an article by Victor Mair with the deceptively boring title " The Need for an Alphabetically Arranged General Usage Dictionary of Mandarin Chinese: A Review Article of Some Recent Dictionaries and Current Lexicographical Projects" (Sino-Platonic Papers, No. 1, February, 1986, Dept. of Oriental Studies, University of Pennsylvania). Mair includes a rather hilarious but realistic account of the tortuous steeplechase of looking up a low-frequency lexical item in his arsenal of Chinese dictionaries. back

I have noticed from time to time that the romanization method first used tends to influence one's accent in Chinese. It seems to me a Chinese person with a very keen ear could distinguish Americans speaking, say, Wade-Giles-accented Chinese from pinyin-accented Chinese. back

[katechattingshit]

Oxymoron - or just a moron.

Hi, my name is Kate and I am useless with keeping up with certain projects because my brain is everywhere and fancy myself Wonder Woman when I am not feeling like the biggest piece of shit in the world. So I take on about 50 projects at once when I’m manic, then when the darkness ensues (as it so often does) the projects stop… Sorry it’s been so long.

*insert here stereotypical group therapy session response “Hi Kate”*

I haven’t written a blog post, or anything for that matter in a while. Why is this? Well, for various reasons I guess, firstly like stated above I am useless. Along with that I have been focusing more on my art than my writing as I have found that more therapeutic recently.

So, let’s get up to speed on the last lot of months - it’s been a doozy kids. Let’s just not beat around the bush, straight up, to the point, cut to the chase - the last 6 months have been fucking shit. There, that’s pretty much the jist of it folks. It’s been a blur of nothing, medications, medical visits, tears, booze, drawing, stitching, loneliness and Netflix.

Jump cut back to October, this was really the climax… actually I don’t want to use that word because I like to associate it with good feelings, lets say it was the pinnacle of my mental breakdown. I wanted it all to go away. I was the most certain of I have ever been that I did not want to continue on this roller coaster journey we call life. I genuinely believed, and still to some extent believe, that Friday 7th October 2016 was my time to go. I should have died. I was calm, peaceful, the most calm and peaceful I have probably ever felt and will probably ever feel. I was done. I was ready. Ready for nothing. Pitch black. The bright light. The pearly white gates and show Thomas my hands - if he asks. The burning flames. God. Satan. Jesus. Morgan Freeman. Whoopi Goldberg. David Bowie. Whatever/whoever was waiting for me. I was ready.

I overdosed on 54 500mg of paracetamol washed down with Jose Cuervo. I wrote a very short note on a pink post-it telling my family not to feel sad, that was going to a better place, that I was finally happy. I went back up to my bedroom, put on my favourite episode of Gilmore Girls and went to sleep.

It has been 4 months since this night and every single day since I have struggled with the fact I did not pass away in my sleep after I peacefully, happily closed my eyes. I struggle with this for a lot reasons, some illogically and I can’t really explain to those of you who have never experienced it themselves (but of course being forever verbal diarrhoea stricken - I’ll try). I guess the more help I get the happier I am that I am still alive. I’m glad that I wasn’t leaving my family and friends with all that pain - awful pain I have known myself after losing someone I once loved to suicide. I’m grateful to some extent that I have the potential/hope to live a happy fulfilled life one day. All these things are great to the average soul, it’s a miracle, a blessing I am still walking on this earth. Yet I still wake up most days, remembering that feeling I had when I took those pills and went to bed. I yearn for that peaceful contentedness. I feel robbed of what I believed was my time. It’s a very conflicting head space to be in, I battle with my own thoughts everyday. I’m glad I am still here, yet I still wish I wasn’t. I am a walking oxymoron - or just a moron.

Since leaving hospital, I have seen what feels like 100s of medical ‘professionals’, had a smorgasbord of medications, been put on waiting lists, and spent many a day and night alone with my dark sad thoughts with no real light at the end of the tunnel or real professional guidance of yet. The NHS is a great service - don’t get me wrong, we as a nation are very lucky to have such a service for free. They’ve be amazing with me with various health issues over the last decade, but the mental health services are underfunded and slow. I am yet to find the right meds - which I guess isn’t the NHS’ fault that’s just because it’s a game of drug Russian roulette, but I am yet to have a proper therapist and course of treatment and could have to wait up to a year to receive these.

This leaves me in a little bit of a tizzy. I am sitting with no real ball rolling to get me to a point where I can again go back to functioning like a ‘normal’ human being (let’s be frank I wasn’t exactly normal before my mental health issues) I NEED HELP. SOME POINT. SOON. PLEASE. I like to trick myself and others into thinking I’m fucking fabulous. Which I can really be, but I need the fudging help to get my life back on course again. However, right now I am sad, tired and exhausted of dead ends and let downs.

So folks, now we/I wait. Or begrudgely my family and I spend a fuck ton of money on going to a private rehab (Pffft, like I’m some coked up celeb and not the loser from Ashford I am in reality, just call me Britney, bitch) but it’s obscene and almost criminal how much they charge, but if it is faster and get’s me better, is it worth the money? At the end of the day it’s just money. What better do I have to spend it on than my own health and sanity?!   (…well pizza, gig tickets, wine, clothes and art supplies- duh.)

No, but seriously though… This makes my head and soul hurt. The world we live in screws with my head. What to do? What to do?! To pay or not to pay?! That is the question. Do I have the time, patience and strength to wait?!

Right now though, I wait. Make pro/con lists. Take the medication I’m currently pumping into my body (at least this one isn’t making me fat like the last). Answer the same questions I have for the last 8 months to the people are paid to listen to me whinge and whine. And avidly avoid the world by watching Gilmore Girls, Buffy The Vampire Slayer, Girls and Sex and the City over and over because they are the only sense of stability I have in my life right now.

Ugh. Let’s hope the rock stops gathering moss soon.