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#and then probably the first lsd trip i need to make sure hes not fucking that up either
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moodboard for the day All These Years: Volume 2: Turn On by Mark Lewisohn is released
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cellarfulofnose · 1 year
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We Were Talking About the Space Between Us
prompt #98. flower power!
(I know I said I'd write a different prompt, but this one was bouncing around my head and I had to get it written out. Hope it tides you over until I get back to requests)
At first, George is angry and hurt that Paul won't trip with them. What's the point, if they're not going to do this together? He knows, now with more lucidity than ever, that a good thing is meant to be shared. If Paul can't see that, he needs only to expand his consciousness, and there's no better way. But he's too obsessed by control--to hear John tell it, anyroad. Can't bear not having his wits about him, giving up control for half a minute and just being.
John, by contrast, is more than happy to explore this wonderful new world with him, all the wicked twists and turns it has to offer. It's so much better with him, too. When they sit together, minds split open, George is sure he's never met someone who can talk about gods and souls and bodies and music the way John can. They connect on levels George wouldn't have thought possible. After a few months, he's not upset with Paul anymore. He feels bad for him for a while, but when all the resentment has faded, he starts to feel a little smug. Paul can't do what they do. He doesn't have what they have, not in his wildest dreams. Soon he stops thinking of Paul altogether when they trip.
Until one day, he does.
He remembers something Ringo said to him, after that party with Mick and Marianne and company. Helping Paul get over an insecurity. He'd scoffed when he heard it, but now his brain is inviting him down paths he hasn't thought to follow. There's something he's been meaning to ask John, in that vein. And with his thoughts coming and going like a river, he doesn't want to forget. Why? becomes Why not? John will probably say no, anyway.
"Yeah, sure," says John, only slightly slowed by the LSD, his smile hazy but full of color.
For some reason, that gets George smiling so wide it hurts his ears, and he almost misses John's instructions. Hold your nose. Hold your breath. Don't even breathe in.
That's it? Piece of piss. He'll have it down pat in no time.
"Ready?"
George nods, though he doesn't know what he's saying yes to, and then John's pulling his head toward his chest, burying his face in his lapels. George's nose sinks into the fluffy, feathery trim of John's outrageous jacket. The feeling is very green, and somewhat sharp, triangular. It tickles. He laughs.
"Breathe," orders John, and gives a huge sniff to demonstrate. George obediently inhales, and right away, the tickle is enough to make him laugh again, so itchy he can almost hear it. It's hard to inhale while giggling, but he manages. He nuzzles against the trim, and everything's green now, vernal green-yellow. John can feel it, too--somehow, he knows this; John can feel everything that's happening to him. The fantastic tickle. The way his breath suddenly leaps in his chest...Oh.
"John." It's thin, frail. He can't quite get enough air. But each time he gasps, it's as if the floor beneath them, the whole room is shifting--gasping. "I think..." he pants, "I'm gonna..."
"Hold it," John sighs, sounding equally out of breath, "hold it."
George doesn't want to move. He keeps rubbing his nose into John's trim--is it fur, or feathers? It makes him feel bigger, fuller, but hot with urgency, like he's barreling toward something huge and shattering.
But he can't, he remembers with crushing clarity. He's got to stop it. He gasps, again and again, the last one pulling him away from John's jacket. The ground is shaking. Just as he's certain the earth is going to explode, he clamps a hand around his nose.
"--'ptsschhhw!"
For a split second, everything goes static-white. Then George is spinning dizzy, like the floor just tipped to the side. God, that was...rapture. He was born again, like a star, in a flash of light. No, wait--fuck, he wasn't supposed to do that. He was supposed to hold it in. But John felt it too, right? Surely he couldn't fault him for that, not for something so pleasurable...
John huffs a sharp breath out through his nose, looking intensely uncomfortable, his face pinched. "Don't--" he begins, but coughs in the middle of it. He swats at the air like he's trying to bat away smoke. "Try not to--do that again. If you can."
He doesn't sound angry at all; in fact, he sounds pleading. Something's wrong. Green fills George's peripheral vision, covering the walls and floor, climbing all over them. "Why, what's--"
"Please, the..." John waves his hand, gesturing between them. "...the flowers," he manages, just above a whisper, and instantly George sees. They're in a garden, lush with rainbows of different buds. Each petal bowl is mostly closed, some loosely enough that he can see a slice of their golden center. They look heavy, almost drooping on their stalks. When he sighs in wonder, a strong wind ripples through the garden, and every flower trembles--just a bit more force, and they'd burst right open. Erupt in petals and pollen.
But that would mean, just now, when he--shit, he'd blown it right at John. That's why John looks so uneasy, he's trying to breathe through a faceful of pollen. "Sorry," George blurts, "I didn't mean to..."
"It's okay, 's just..." John's breath catches and he touches his nose, delicately, like it's something fragile. "You couldn't help it, 's just, I think...I think you better not do it again."
"Yeah," George agrees, and he means it. He won't.
That is, as long as the flowers remain undisturbed. "I think you'd better not, either," George adds, and John nods dejectedly. All right. It won't be easy, but they can do it.
Only...
George feels what John is feeling. Everything that John is feeling. And right now, John (and by extension, George) has a very, very itchy nose. This isn't good. George doesn't like this at all. "Um--" When his voice comes out thicker than he'd hoped, he has to clear his throat. "I sh- I should go."
"What?" John looks horrified. "No, you can't, you can't leave me here..." He grabs both of George's hands, as if to physically stop him. "Not alone with the flowers, George, Christ..."
George's stomach turns with guilt. He knows he can't do it; John wouldn't stand a chance. But just looking at John, just hearing his voice waver, watching his nostrils redden and twitch, all of it's nudging George dangerously close to the edge of another sneeze. "I know, but I...I feel it from you, it's your nose, and I don't think I could hold it back, I feel like I'm...like I'm gonna sn--"
"God, don't say that," John begs. His hand flies up to pinch his nose as his eyes screw shut, turning far enough away from George so that he doesn't have to look at him, but it doesn't do any good. His breath is coming in fluttering gasps that make the flowers sway and dance.
"Please," whispers George.
"I'm...trying--!" John stammers, then convulses forward into his hand. His whole body rocks, but there's no sound--almost none, just a smothered noise in his throat, contained in his head. He takes a shuddering gulp of air and lurches forward again, twice more, squelching two more sneezes into near-silence. The flowers squirm and bulge...and stay closed. Both of them sigh heavily, relief mixed with exhaustion. "Sorry," John snuffles.
George can't answer, isn't even sure his voice would work. It must be the smell of the flowers that's getting to him now, and God, there are so many of them; sharp red ones like tongues of flame, perfect pink tulips, blue bells, fat clusters of lilacs. Pretty ones and ones that don't look quite right, that swim and spiral if you look at them straight on. If they all opened at once...Jesus Christ. John still hasn't recovered, and no wonder. George can feel vividly, electrically, that holding back brought him no relief. Might have worsened things, even, denying himself release like that. Denying them both. George doesn't think he has the strength, if it comes down to him.
"Fucking hell, John." George buries his head in his hands, pawing at his eyes and nose. He's so itchy. He just wants to flush it out.
"I know, all right? It was your..." John sniffles, "brilliant idea..."
George catches a glimpse of the tears welling up in John's eyes and whips around to look the other way, but the damage is done. He feels it already. There's nothing else in his head. The fucking state of them, twitching with little stuttery breaths, eyes and noses weeping. It's all too much. "Just one," he prays.
"No--"
"I can't stand it, John, my nose, I've got to..." George's breath hitches, but not just his. He's part of something so far beyond him, and he can see traces of it now, the deity that breathed life into man's nostrils, gearing up for a sneeze on a cosmic scale. He can't stop it--he doesn't dare.
John cries out in warning and claps both hands over George's nose and mouth just as he sneezes, like a cork forced into the mouth of a bottle. George doesn't know which way is up--he can't breathe, he's going to sneeze again--he buckles forward into John's hands, stifling the explosion.
He did it. Just like John told him to.
John must feel George's smile of triumph, because he breaks out in a grin too. But he must be feeling more than that--they're still linked, after all, and this time, there's nothing stopping John from gasping a sudden, sharp breath and sneezing down at the floor.
"hheH'TChhew!!"
In perfect synchronicity with the deity. And with the room around them, George realizes, as every flower sprays a fairy-dust shower of pollen into the air, gold and glittering. A white rose turns sniffly pink, a few lilies of the valley seem to drip.
"Jesus wept," John sputters, tearing his hands away from George to shield his face with his jacket. George yanks his collar up over his nose and starts to cough. The flowers cough too, and the deity's eyes are fluttering closed again, pinching tightly shut...
In retrospect, George can't say how long it lasted after that. Whether it was hours or just a couple of sneezes back-and-forth between them. But when the garden's just a carpet again, they're exhausted, panting for breath, their noses running all over their clothes.
John clears his throat a couple times. "Could do with another dose."
"Yeah," says George, and they bustle into the kitchen in search of the tea.
John brings it up a few days later ('Anything good?'), and by then George has forgotten the finer details. Something to do with the beauty of nature--and cripes, was it beautiful. That he remembers clearly. Oneness with the divine, how they're all connected, your pain is my pain and that. Discipline over one's body. Paul bristles when they talk about it in front of him, which for some reason John keeps doing. George knows it's petty, but maybe it'll get under his skin and he'll decide to join them next time.
Still, maybe it's for the best that he hasn't decided to yet. George rather doubts he would've survived the garden.
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Anthony’s Stupid Daily Blog (170): Thu 1st Sep 2022
Today was playday with Luna. As soon as she arrived she asked me if we could go to the park so all the plans I had made for today instantly went out the window since she'd already decided the itinerary for the day (But it was probably more beneficial for her to do this because my plans were to get her to draw while I watched TV all day). Luckily it was a nice day so it was the ideal weather for a trip to the park. As soon as she got there she wolfed down a full bag of crisps and drank a full bottle of juice and then insisted on going on the little chair that spins around. I was worried she was going to puke but by the end of it I was the one who needed to sit down as I genuinely felt like I was going to be violently ill. The swings have ben pulled off their chains presumably by little shithead youths who are too old to be in the play-park (or possibly more depressingly, some scorn filled adult who's still bitter about his parents not letting him play on the swings when he was a kid who has damaged these swings out of spite). You know how we have bouncers outside nightclubs checking people's i.d's to make sure they're old enough to get into the clubs. Well why don't we have bouncers outside parks checking to make sure the kids are young enough to play on them. I think that after reaching the age six most kids stop seeing the allure of the play-park as this is when they discover TikTok and knives so there's no reason for anyone over the age of six to be going into one of these parks. Later on in the day I got an idea for my latest comic strip. I find that if I sit down and try to think of an idea for a strip it either doesn't happen or I come up with so many shitty ideas that I go with the first half decent one just to fool myself into thinking I haven't wasted the day. However occasionally an idea for a strip will just form from nowhere in my head as was the case with today's edition:
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Tuned into tonight's Hollyoaks and man there are so many new characters and I have no idea who the fuck they are. Man it's shocking how much a show can change when you stop watching it for...four months. One funny moment came when Maxine was talking to Vicki, Scott's new foster daughter about her boyfriend mistreating her. Vicki said that he's not all bad and that he makes her laugh. Maxine shot back that this was no excuse as her old husband Patrick who abused her was also funny. Umm, no he wasn't he was a psychotic cunt. I asked on Twitter for anyone  who remembered Patrick being in the show to let me hear their top five funniest Patrick moments. One person replied that there was an episode where Patrick accidentally drank a spiked drink and started doing a funny dance. I don't think that you can say that someone's behavior while having an adverse reaction to being poisoned with a psychedelic drug is indicative that they are funny. If this were the case then women who insisted that an ideal partner should have a good sense of humour should just pick any man off the street, secretly give him LSD and wait for the laughs to start. Later on in the episode we got a few scenes with Grace and Cindy who are friends now for some reason that I couldn't be bothered to look up. There was a moment where Grace was telling Cindy that she was thinking of doing a theme night at The Loft.  suggested that the theme should be "2009" since this was the last time anyone gave a shit about The Loft. In the original Tweet I accidentally referred to The Loft as "The Lift". Gave me an idea for a nightclub that is in an actual lift. Every time the lift goes up the DJ plays "Straight Up" by Paula Abdul and when it goes down it plays "Down Down" by Status Quo.
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lanarist · 3 years
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NSFW 18+ Plug! Dabi x Fem! Reader HC
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a/n: first off, minors DNI. Second, this is my first time posting any of my writing on any platform. I have so much shit on Wattpad that just sits in the drafts. I am not confident enough to publish my shit writing. I’m shocked that i am even doing this. But I thought about this while breaking up 🍃🍃 for a blunt. I’ve seen so many hcs/Drabbles of stoner Dabi. ....but what about plug dabi
Also I want to mention that I do not condone drug use unless for medical reasons. it helps me with my extreme anxiety. literally saved me. And I 100% do not condone drug dealing. Just wanna throw that out there before you read.
a/n: this shit is SOOO long I’m sorry. I worked on this for like three days.
Summary: literally brain rot. Dabi being your plug HC.
Warnings: drug use, intercourse, dumbafication, oral (f receiving), sexual themes, mentions of alcohol.
I feel like you would probably meet him at some house party. Full of people drunk and/or high off of drugs that were given at the party, the supplier being Dabi for said drugs.
He immediately noticed you when you joined the circle of people passing blunts around, thinking you definitely did not belong here. You looked so innocent with those unsure doe like eyes when a random guy passes the blunt to you.
Gravely mistaken when he watches you puff that blunt like a champ, not coughing up a lung once and throwing back alcohol like it was water. Good girl on the outside but bad girl on the inside? Holy fuck he thought you were hot. He’s gotta get to know you.
After the smoke sesh, he would pull you aside to introduce himself just to get close to you.
Would definitely give you his number saying, “if you ever need anything, hit me up. I got whatever ya need, doll.”
Anytime you text him needing something, he would get so excited. He would drop whatever he’s doing. It don’t matter if he’s in the middle of a sell, dead asleep, at his part time job extra cash, or early in the morning. He’s gonna give you what you’re asking of him asap.
Definitely giving you discounts even on his best shit. Original price for 10 grams is $100? He’s giving it to you for $50.
Also would throw in extra without your knowledge. One time you noticed he gave you three extra grams and tried to give it back to him. “‘S okay. Just keep it, doll.”
Plug dabi would definitely get jealous if you bought anything from anyone else besides him. He will make sure to give you shit for that.
If he doesn’t have what you need at that moment. Baby, he’s going to make sure he gets it by any means necessary if it means he gets to see you for a few minutes.
Will always bring the drugs to you wherever you’re at. No matter how many times you’ve told him you’ll meet him somewhere or come to his place. He doesn’t wanna inconvenience you.
He would always look for you at parties. Once found, he’s dragging you away from everybody to a vacant room, outside, or to his car. He wants to smoke with you alone.
Loves when the smoke rolls smoothly out of your mouth after you inhale it. Thinks you look god damn sexy with the smoke floating around you and your low red eyes look fucking adorable.
If there’s something new you wanna try lsd or shrooms etc, he’ll offer to be with you and to stay sober incase you have a bad trip.
He knows he’s completely infatuated with you, but will not admit it to his friends. Especially Keigo. “You’re fucking whipped.” “Shut the fuck up, Keigo.”
Absolutely hates it when some random dude hits on you at parties or even stands close to you. He’s pulling you away to smoke.
Finally gets the balls to text you one night to smoke with him. “I got some good shit this time, doll. Wanna smoke it with me?”
When he gets to your house, he’ll already have the blunts rolled, a pipe, or anything you want ready for you.
Will hold the blunt to your lips when it gets too small. gets a boner feeling how soft they feel. He doesn’t want you to burn your pretty fingers.
Loves that you match his energy when it comes to smoking. No one has been able to smoke as much as he does like you do.
When he starts to notice the looks you’re giving him, the way your eyelashes bat at him and the lustful look in your eyes. He decides he can’t hold back anymore.
He’ll grab your chin with his thumb and forefinger to face him, softly blowing smoke onto to your lips as he stares at you. Will roughly pull you in closer to smash his lips against yours after the smoke disappears.
Gently pushes you to lay back on your bed so he can hover over you and rest himself between your legs.
No high from any drug could compare to the soft whimpers and moans leaving your lips when he pushes his hips into yours. It was fucking music to his ears.
Absolutely snaps when you tug on his white hair. He’s tearing yours and his clothes off now.
And don’t you dare try to cover that beautiful body of yours. “Don’t hide from me now, baby.”
He’ll start leaving marks on your neck, then down to your breast, taking extra time sucking, licking, biting, and kissing on them.
When he gets down lower on your body, he’s happy to set that you’re already soaking, showing that you wanted this as much as him. He’ll wrap his arms around your thighs, setting them over his shoulders and will go to fucking work on your pussy.
Swears that he could’ve came on the spot from the moans and whimpers leaving your lips. Especially the moan that you let out when he added two of his fingers into the mix.
Will make it a point to constantly praise you while his tongue makes you feel like you’re higher than cloud 9. “You taste so fucking good.” “God, so fucking beautiful.”
Will stop right before you cum. “Nah, baby. I want you cummin on my cock.”
After he’s got you all ready for him, baby you are in for it. He’s waited so long for this fucking moment. He ain’t holding back. He’ll grab your throat tightly as he seethes himself into you. You both gasp at the feeling of pure ecstasy.
Loves your fucked out face. Tongue lolled out. Tears brimming your eyes. Little bit of drool dripping of the corner of your mouth. Hair a complete fucking mess from the many times he’s pulled on it.
His stroke game? GODLY. He’s thrusting into you like a god damn rabbit but he’s hitting all of the right places and it feels so fucking good.
100% rough but his words are the opposite. “You’re taking my cock so well, doll.” “Look so beautiful while I’m fucking ya dumb.” has a degradation kink but that’s for another time.
Aftercare with Dabi is pure heaven. He’ll hand you his shirt from off of the ground for you to wear. He’ll clean you up, light up a blunt for you two, and cuddle you until you both fall asleep.
Oh and, you definitely getting shit for free for now on.
Tags: @bakugosbratx
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reincarnated70sbaby · 3 years
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maritime madness
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led zeppelin x reader
warnings: swearing, drug use
an: so I was sailing yesterday and I was thinking about this the entire time I might have nearly capsized the boat
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“I can’t believe we’re actually doing this” I spoke, staring out at the large blue yacht that rested on the waters of Normandy. It all started the day before, when we were all throwing around tripped out ideas in our hotel room.
“What are we gonna do tomorrow?” Jimmy asked. I sat by his side, my head resting on his bony shoulder. My dose of LSD had just kicked it, and as it was my first time it probably hit me quicker than the others. I tried to speak, but it felt like every time I moved my mouth, it felt like I would stretch my mouth out of shape, like putty.
“Let’s go explore that cathedral, the big massive one, y’know? The one with the hunchback. Maybe we could bump into him or something”
As soon as the words left Robert’s lips, our entire entourage burst out in giggles. I myself, was having hard time controlling my breathing. I had to rest my head in Jimmy’s lap, Jimmy being doubled down over me clutching his stomach.
“Percy, you dumb fucker, y-you know that’s not a real story” Jonesy informed, all his words all broken up by loud chuckles.
Roberts jaw immediately dropped open in shock, along with his eyes widening and brown trashing in confusion.
“Nah, yeah it was, the uh, the hunchman did the um, bells. Yeah, the bells”
“No he didn’t, because he never existed you nonce. It’s a fairytale from the 19th century” Jimmy piped in, adding his extensive knowledge of mythology and folklore into the conversation.
“But me ma said he existed, you’re gonna say my mum lied to me all those years?”
“Well obviously Perce, it’s just a bedtime story” Jonesy added, still chuckling to himself at Robert’s gullible nature.
“Fine then, someone else give an idea since all of mine always get ridiculed” Robert stated, crossing his arms and craning his head back against the footboard of the bed and staring at the ceiling in a huff.
“How about Père Lachaise?”
“What the actual fuck is pear la chair Pagey?” Bonzo asked, pronouncing the words all wrong in his thick Englishman accent.
“It’s Père Lachaise” Jimmy corrected in a perfect French accent, “and it’s a graveyard in Paris, loads of famous people are buried there - Oscar Wilde, Frederic Chopin, Jim Morrison, Edith Piaf”
“Jimmy you must be as mad as Morrison to think we would waste our day off in a fucking dead person museum. Jesus Christ how did we pick you up” Bonzo sighed, rolling his eyes.
“Okay, what about Mont Saint-Michel? It’s this cool island off of the coast. There’s a bridge but once the tide comes in you can’t get in or out. Wouldn’t that be good craic eh?” Jonesy suggested
“No” Bonzo, Jimmy and Robert all said at the same time.
“Ah! You’ve been outnumbered Mr Jones haha. Maybe you and I could go out another time Jonny boy, we could go exploring and see the spirits trapped on the island” I said with a chuckle, the psychedelic in my system making this whole situation very funny.
“Jesus Christ what the fuck did she even say. That her first time on acid?” Robert asked to Jimmy.
“Must’ve been, it hit her pretty quickly” Jimmy replied, staring into my largely dilated pupils. He swore he could’ve seen something dancing in my pupils, but maybe that was just the drug in him.
We all sat in silence for a couple minutes, all of us enjoying our high.
“Innnnnnnnnnnnnnn fourteen hundred ninety two, Columbus sailed the ocean blueeee” I sang, the lyrics being the only words of a song I could think of to fill the silence. A beat of silence passed and I wondered if everybody suddenly passed out, either into sleep or another dimension.
As I started the next line, everyone else joined in with me. We eventually finished the entire song, even an encore requested by the boys. I sung the encore in a horrendous, deep operatic voice while prancing round the hotel room. A round of applause sounded, and I took my theatrical bows in front of my supportive crowd.
“That’s It! I know what we can do tomorrow. God that is a good idea!” Bonzo declared, jumping up to his feet, not before nearly tumbling backwards.
“Go on then Bonz, don’t leave us guessing mate” Jonesy suggested, breaking the dramatic silence that had ensued.
“Rent a yacht! We can go out early in the morning and stay overnight since our flight back home is in the evening anyway! All we need to do is hire a skipper or something”
We all were stoked at idea of having a private boat to ourselves. Sure, none of the boys were experienced sailors, but that’s what a professional skipper was for, driving rich people around in yachts right?
“Do we really have to do this” I said, making our way through the marina to our yacht.
“The skipper will probably dive off the boat when we get started tonight” Jonesy commented, sharing my lack of enthusiasm for the maritime adventure. “We should have ditched them and gone to Mont Saint-Michel”. I only hummed in response, dragging my overnight suitcase over the gaps in the planks of wood on the dock.
“Um yeah, about that skipper. We couldn’t exactly book one on such short notice” Cole confessed.
“What the actual fuck Cole? Are we just supposed to sail ourselves and drown? I can’t tie a knot to save my bloody life” Robert shrieked. We all stopped in our tracks and turned to the tour manager, glaring at him through our sunglasses.
“Of course not Percy, why would we do that to our cash cows hm? And this is a motorboat, no ropes involved. It’s basically like driving a car. In water. In fact, all you need to drive it is a drivers license, which I’m positive you all have judging by your expansive car choices. Forgot to mention that myself and Peter have opted out” With that note, Cole dropped the yacht keys into Bonzo’s hand and scuttled away.
We all stood there, bags in hand, confusion over our faces as we watched Cole’s figure disappear behind the hundred of other boats.
“Well shit” Jonesy said, the sourness in his voice barely hidden.
“Let’s just go check it out, we don’t even have to leave the marina if we can drive it, we’ll just park out all night” Bonzo affirmed, being unusually optimistic.
We all found the boat and as the boys started embarking aboard, I thought out loud.
“I can’t believe we’re doing this”
“Cmon darling, let’s just see what it’s like. If you hate it we’ll do something else” Jimmy compromised, outstretching his hand to me.
The boat bobbed a bit on the water as I stepped on.
“It’s not hating it I’m worried about, I was practically raised on a boat Jim, I’m just not sure 4 rockstars and a boat is a great combination”
“It’s okay we won’t go too hard, at least one of us won’t, I guess. Anyway, you were raised on a boat? Like a houseboat or something?”
“No, my dad was a skipper. Whenever he was home from trips, he would teach my and my siblings to sail. Y’know the whole nine yards, all the different knots, pulling in the ropes, steering, navigating charts. It’s just been a while since I’ve been on one and I hope I can remember everything”
“Gosh you are fabulous, my dear, I learn something new about you everyday” Jimmy said, pulling me in for a kiss. There was a loud bang of the engine, which we both jumped apart at.
“What the fuck are they at now, Christ” Jimmy sighed.
“Here, go set down our stuff in the biggest room, I’ll go see what they’re messing with”
We both parted, Jimmy heading downstairs, myself climbing onto the helm.
“Oi, Bonz, Percy, step away from the wheel until I get us out of this parking lot” I commanded. Both Robert and Bonzo looked at me funny, before slowly raising their arms and stepping away.
“And you know better?” Bonzo asked, still not sure where my bossiness came from.
“I think I do, unless you have your skipper license on hand?”
“Wait, you have a sailing license?” Robert interjected.
“I actually don’t, but I know everything you need to not drown. My father was a sailor and he taught me how to run a boat. Thank god we have a motorboat, as we might’ve been a little trouble if we have a proper sailing yacht. If we were, it wouldn’t have been as relaxing as simply steering a wheel” I answered, switching the engine on.
We warmed up the engine for a couple minutes, then casted off and finally escaped the madness of the marina. Soon were out on the French coastline. We continued sailing perpendicular to the coast, not wanting to stray too far. All the boys took turns steering, with Jonesy being the best skipper in-training out of all of them. Only once had we had anchored the boat again was the real party going to start.
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if only sailing was this easy in reality 😒
anyway I’m gonna do a spicier part 2 riiight now😎
leave any comments/ideas down below!!!!
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tag list : @rebel-without-a-zeppelin @princesspagey @dreamersdrowse
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wireddless · 3 years
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Codeine Scene (Five H. x Reader) [3]
Codeine Scene Masterlist
Authors Note: First off, I am SO sorry. New Years is always a slow time for me, and I did not mean to take this long to publish. Second of all, this chapter is a transition chapter into a much more fucked up story. I’m warning you now that the rest of this fic will get really really dark. I don’t recommend reading after this chapter if you can’t handle depictions of r*pe, murder, heavy drug use (cocaine, etc,) and other disturbing topics . I’m basing this story off of personal experiences, and in no way do I want someone who isn’t ready to read something like this to read this. This is like the last safe chapter, please do not read after this if you can’t handle the topics mentioned above
Summary: Klaus moves Reader up to Ben’s old room early in the morning. Afterwards, they eat breakfast and decide to trip on acid together. Five learns more about her than he expected to today
Warnings: Drug use (LSD[acid],) mentions of suicide, mentions of sex
Word Count: 3777
Taglist: @alexander-hamilhoe @dumdumsun
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The gentle shaking of (Y/n)’s shoulder pulled her from her sleep. Klaus stood over her, harshly whispering her name. Looking towards his window, she could see the sky was just barely starting to light up, it was still early. 
“Klaus it’s like 7:30!” She quickly grabbed the sheet that was covering her from the waist down and yanked it over her head. A small groan left Klaus’s mouth and he yanked it back off of her. “It’s Sunday!” She tried convincing him to let her sleep in, but it was no use. 
“I talked to Ben and he said you could stay in his room!” Klaus wrestled with (Y/n) over the blanket, knowing she was still tired. Ever the impatient man he was, Klaus spoke again, “We gotta get you settled in right now!” 
“Fine! Fine. I’m up.” (Y/n) sat up and shoved her matted hair out of her face.  “Why right now?” Klaus looked at her like the answer was obvious. It wasn’t, of course. 
“Because trauma can be associated with places! Coming in here right after what happened yesterday could be an issue.” He grabbed a hair brush off of his dresser and pushed her to sit on the bed. Climbing behind her, he started to brush her hair. “Even if you aren’t reminded of it in here, it’s always good to be able to have some privacy.” He made valid points. 
“I guess you're right.” Klaus was extraordinarily gentle with her hair, pulling out all of the mats and even putting in the effort to put it in a low ponytail to keep it out of her face.  “Thank you.” (Y/n) turned and smiled at Klaus, pulling him into a quick, tight, hug. 
Ben's room was up the green stairway, across from Five’s room. (Y/n)’s face scrunched a little when she realized Five would be right across the hallway, but she didn’t complain. Her arms were a little tired from carrying her suitcase and heavier back pack up the stairs so early in the morning, but it would fade rather quickly.
Klaus opened the door and stepped aside, letting (Y/n) rush to the bed with her heavy luggage. “Dad replaced everything in this room a week after Ben died.” Klaus sat on the bed next to her luggage, and she plopped next to him. “He said old reminders would only set us back, so he made this one of many guest rooms.” Klaus peered in the closet, knowing that Ben’s academy uniforms were no longer hanging pristinely on the rack. 
“He didn’t die in here, did he?” (Y/n) turned to look at Klaus, feeling heavy sympathy. 
“Oh no! A mission went wrong, and I suppose we all messed up, but the monster inside his chest started tearing him apart.” Klaus’s usual, very happy energy, was replaced by a solemn, cold one. “He died in the infirmary.” Klaus looked down at the bedsheets. They weren’t the one that Ben had used. “I still talk to him every day, but it still makes me a little sad.” Klaus sniffled and rubbed his eyes. 
(Y/n) pulled Klaus into a bone crushing hug, knowing he needed the comfort. “That’s terrible.” She was a very empathetic person, relying more on feeling than thinking, so she was struggling to hold back her own tears. “Are you sure he’s ok with this?” 
“Yeah! He said something about moving on, and finally attempting to find peace.” Klaus clapped his hands once as he stood. “He’s kind of started meditating too, which is kind of weird, because he’s a ghost and all.” He stood and glanced around the room, getting a good look at it before (Y/n) would make it her own. “Let’s go get some breakfast after we unpack, huh?” 
“That sounds nice.” (Y/n) stood and hugged Klaus again, silently letting him know that she was there for him. 
The walk all the way down to the basement kitchen was unexpectedly exhausting. Six flights of stairs later, two flights between every floor, they were sitting at the table, staring at Five scrape his eggs off the skillet and onto his toast. 
“I’m not making eggs for you two.” His voice was monotone and annoyed. He wasn’t a morning person. “Take some responsibility and make them yourself.” Five grabbed his food and coffee, and looked at both of them before giving his usual tight-lipped smirk and blipping away, presumably to his room. 
Klaus released a few small giggles he was holding in and hopped off the island. “He always seems to add a little spice to life.”
As he was making his way over to the fridge to grab some eggs, (Y/n) asked; “Is he like this every morning?” Not wasting a second after her question, Klaus replied. 
“Yep!” He pulled out four eggs and set them in a clean bowl on the counter. “Without a doubt. It’s worse on weekdays too, because the classes he teaches are all early in the morning. Now do you want scrambled, fried, or boiled?” 
“Scrambled, please.” As Klaus got to work on making breakfast for the two of them, she thought about what Five might teach. “Hey Klaus?” 
“Yeah?” Klaus was stirring the already scrambled eggs in the skillet. 
“What does Five teach? I mean it makes sense that he’s a teacher, but I just can’t think of what he’d be so willing to teach for a living.” Klaus looked back at (Y/n) before down at the eggs again. Her chin was resting in her hands, and she stared over at him, waiting for his answer. 
“I think some sort of ethics class, like there’s different types of ethics, but that’s all I really know. He doesn’t really talk about work, and it’s a bit weird considering he was an assassin.” Klaus split the scrambled eggs in two separate bowls with forks in them and gave one to (Y/n). 
“He killed people?” (Y/n) dug into the eggs, shoving them in her mouth, listening for Klaus. 
“We’ve all dabbled with a little murder before, it’s not really that big of a deal for us, but he swore never to kill for someone else again, I’m pretty sure.” Klaus fillet out a little moan of joy as he started filling his own stomach with the eggs. 
“That must be why he was so unphased about what happened yesterday, that makes me feel a lot better.” She concluded, trying not to remember the way she nearly beat the life out of the man in Five’s car as she shoved more of Klaus’s eggs in her mouth. “These are really good!” 
“Danke!” Klaus thanked her in German, with a mouth full of eggs. He swallowed them and continued speaking. “That actually reminds me- you’ve done acid right?” (Y/n) thought on the question for a moment before answering. 
“No actually, but I did do shrooms a lot with my friends before I dropped out.” Her fork scraped the bowl, trying to get the last of the eggs. 
“Good! You have experience.” Klaus poured the last of his eggs in his mouth, straight from the bowl, before swallowing. “Would you like to do acid with me? You don’t have to, but I feel like this would definitely raise your spirits.” Klaus leaned toward her, waiting for her answer. 
“I’d love to actually.” (Y/n) swallowed the last of her eggs, and stacked her bowl with Klaus’s, before taking them to the sink to wash them. Klaus stood and followed her, digging in the breast pocket of his half-unbuttoned Hawaiian shirt and pulling out a small square of folded tin foil. 
“Great! Now stick your tongue out.” Klaus unfolded the foil and pulled a tiny white square of paper, roughly the size of a phone keyboard key, out from the six-ish others in it. (Y/n) stuck her tongue out as she rinsed the now-clean bowls and Klaus placed the piece of paper on it, before sticking one on his own tongue.
(Y/n) stuck her tongue back in her mouth and sucked a bit on the paper. “So do I swallow it, or…?” The tab didn’t make it any harder to talk, thank god. 
“If you want to, but you absorb it faster when it’s in your mouth.” Klaus picked up the bowls and started drying them. “It’s not bitter at all is it?” Klaus asked, checking to make sure she didn’t take a laced tab.
(Y/n) focused on the tab again, not really noticing any taste. “Not that I can notice.” Klaus smiled as he shut the cabinet where he placed the bowls. 
“That means we’re all good! You can swallow it when the paper feels soggy enough, though, you’ve probably absorbed most of it by now.” Klaus led her back upstairs to his room, practically dragging her by her wrist. “Things are gonna get really funny for a little bit before you actually start tripping.” Klaus shut the door behind them and plopped on his bed. 
“Doesn’t it take like an hour to kick in?” This wasn’t her first rodeo, so she knew her way around at least a bit. 
“Yeah yeah, it’s kinda like shrooms? But the visuals and the trip are just a bit different, you’ll see what I mean.” Klaus grabbed a joint he had rolled earlier and lit up, taking a few puffs before passing it to (Y/n). “Just settle in for like half an hour and then get up to see how you feel.” 
•••
Tripping on LSD was a profound experience. (Y/n) wasn’t able to go outside, as it was raining cold, so she stayed inside, wandering around the house. She and Klaus made some really cool art, and Klaus held it over the vents to dry while she was walking around the house. 
Tripping felt like seeing the universe fully for the first time, and she could somewhat understand Klaus’s view of the world. Many times throughout the last three hours, she thought she saw Five blipping away out of the corner of her eye. She had dismissed it every time, of course.
Now the trip was peaking, and the visuals were insane. The air around (Y/n) felt like breathable, transparent, clay, and it was a little overwhelming with all the visuals, so she opened the door in front of her and quietly sat next to it, letting out a long, happy sigh. Closing her eyes, she paid attention to the gorgeous visuals she could see behind her eyelids. 
(Y/n) didn’t even notice Five sitting on his bed, staring at her from over his book. She was too focused on the movement behind her eyelids, and the euphoric feeling surrounding her, so when Five spoke, she nearly jumped out of her skin.
“I think you have the wrong room.” The sound of Five closing his book reached her ears. 
“Oh my god I’m so sorry, I- I wasn’t paying attention I’ll leave.” (Y/n) stumbled over her words as she tried to stand, clearly embarrassed.
“No, no, it’s fine actually.” Five spoke, rather out of character. “A little company once in a while feels nice, and I see no harm when you’re being quiet.” His face was beyond distorted, but she could still recognize his permanent scowl. 
“Really?” (Y/n) settled back down, more relaxed and at ease. 
“Yeah, I don’t really care.” Five grabbed his book again, opening it back to where he was. “Just don’t be too annoying.”  
“I won’t don’t worry.” Five grunted quietly at her response. A smile painted itself on her face, and she slid all the way down the wall, with her head now on the floor with the rest of her. 
•••
And she was quiet. Five watched for like an hour and a half as her eyes slowly focused on something new in his room every few moments. She was quite taken by the math equations across his wall, and he found it rather cute. He started to find her less annoying, now understanding that she coped the way his brother did. 
He was alone once again in his room now, no longer accompanied by (Y/n). In fact, she was accompanied by one of her “friends.” She barely even knew the guy. 
Five could hear everything. Every moan. Every word spoken with the intent of being quiet, but wasn’t held under the gentle guise of a whisper. It infuriated him. 
Of course, he understood that she didn’t grow up in a particularly healthy home, given that she was in a homeless shelter at almost 18, so she didn’t understand healthy coping habits. It genuinely hurt his heart, if just a little bit, that he could watch another hurt soul walk down the same path as his brother. 
Klaus had gotten help for his addictions, and was off addictive drugs completely, but even Five understood that not everyone will be able to get the help they need. He wouldn’t say he had any feelings for her, but he still felt sympathy. 
Knowing that it was how she coped made hearing all of it a little easier, but he still wasn’t able to handle it after hearing it for fifteen minutes, so he jumped down to the kitchen, brewed himself some herbal tea, added a little vodka, and read his book, criss cross, on the table in the center of the room, attempting to ignore what was happening right across from his room. 
•••
Bailey had just left, and (Y/n) was exhausted. He was kind of an ass, and he treated her like shit in middle school, but he was a horny teen, and it was really easy to just invite him over.
The trip was fading out now. She was no longer peaking, and the visuals were far less intense. (Y/n), after standing at the stairs, staring at them for a couple minutes, deemed it safe to be able to walk down them. She knew it was normally safe to go down the steps while tripping, but something in her head told her to wait, so she did. 
These particular steps were a little steep, as well, so she made her way down slowly, leading herself to the kitchen in the basement. Her bare feet padded quietly on the floor as she walked to the stove, turning the heating element under the tea kettle on. The bags under her eyes felt so beyond heavy, and she knew she’d be sleeping deeply tonight. 
“You done up there?” Five’s voice pulled her out of her thoughts. (Y/n) turned and leaned on the counter to face him. 
“Yeah, yeah, he left like ten minutes ago. I’m just really tired and want some tea to relax I guess.” Her arms were crossed, comfortably holding each other up. 
Five hummed in response. “Well I see we both thought of the same thing.” He lifted his mug of tea, peppermint maybe, and put it to his lips. 
“I thought you only drank coffee.” (Y/n) chuckled a little feeling the heat of the stove begin to reach her back. 
“Well it wouldn’t be very logical to drink caffeine so late in the day, especially when I have to teach an early class tomorrow.” Five flipped the page of his book, continuing to read while talking to her. 
“Makes sense.” Her words were drowned out by the high whistling of the tea kettle, letting her know she could pour it into the cup. Grabbing the tin of loose leaf tea, she hummed as she scooped it into the reusable tea bag that was next to it. 
(Y/n) dropped the tea bag in the cup, following up with the boiling water. She turned, bringing her and her cup to the table, now sitting next to Five. Five was a grumpy, annoying, old, man who has to grow up all over again, but his company was enjoyable, it contrasted hers in such a way that it comforted her. It made her feel like her ADHD was less severe, like her inability to focus was matched by someone who could do nothing but focus. 
Only a day had gone by since they met, and she was already comforted by him. 
Five shut his book and looked over at her. The more he got to know her, the more subtly enjoyable he found her. Her sitting not two feet from him didn’t bother him as much as it usually would. He was kind of ok with that. 
“You drink peppermint?” (Y/n)’s voice was scratchy and hoarse. She really did need the tea. 
“Yeah, it’s the least fruity from what I’ve tried.” He took another sip. “Simple classic.” He set it down and looked over at her, engaging in an unexpected conversation.
“I tend to prefer fruitier teas, I’ve noticed.” She looked down at the cup that she’d been drinking out of for a couple minutes now. “They go down easier and really comfort me. Reminds me of my mom, she only ever made fruity teas.” She took another sip, letting the warmth fill her up. 
“What happened to your mom?” Five looked back down at his drink, then back up at the girl next to him. “I noticed that you didn’t exactly live with her when we picked up your stuff.” 
“Yeah..” (Y/n) hesitated a little. He was awfully blunt. “I was like seven when it happened, but I’m told it was a double suicide, between her and dad.” Her legs were swinging a little nervously. “Mom sent me up to my room one night and told me not to come out until she opened the door, no matter what. The next day a detective came into my room and carried me out screaming. They were both dead on the floor. I lived with my aunt and uncle after that.”
“Oh shit.” Five didn’t expect her answer to be this upsetting. 
“Yeah. My uncle told me it was a double suicide, my aunt said the same thing, she manipulated me and made me think they did it because of me.” (Y/n) sighed into her drink, her distorted reflection staring back at her. “I don’t even remember what the scene looked like, just a lot of blood. I don’t look at anything about it either, don’t really want to relive it.” 
“That’s really tough, wow.” Five chuckled uncomfortably and finished his drink. “I didn’t know my mother, but my mom was a robot. She was pretty much indestructible, but she was fully shut off when our house was being attacked a long time ago.”
“Oh my.” (Y/n)’s voice was soft, hoarse, and tired. Her hand gently moved to rest atop his, not really knowing how else to reassure him, if he even needed it, of course. “I’m sorry about that.” 
Five didn’t even seem to notice his hand being covered. “No it’s fine, I got over it long long ago.” His words were just slightly slurred, and his eyes had reddened slightly.
“Well I’m here if you ever need like, a hug or something.” (Y/n) laughed. “I don’t really know how else to comfort anyone.” 
“It shouldn’t be your job to comfort anyone, that’s not your responsibility.” Five chuckled and smiled slightly. (Y/n) hadn’t expected him to smile, and it wasn’t as weird as she thought it would be.
Before she could even mention it though, Klaus’s happy, booming voice echoed in the kitchen as he practically skipped to the fridge. As she yanked her hand away from Five, she noticed the way he pulled his arm away as well. Maybe he did notice?
Klaus and Five started talking about something as he got off the table and placed his cup in the sink, but she wasn’t paying attention. Before her attention was quickly pulled to the floor, she thought on the way Five had wrenched his arm away. 
As anxiety inducing as it was, the LSD that was still in her system made it easy to quickly move onto the next thought. Before she knew it, a flash of blue wrenched her out of her head and she looked up at Klaus, now alone with her in the kitchen. 
“Hey, sweetie.” Klaus kissed her cheek and led her gently off the table and to the stairs. “Your trip going good?” He popped a black olive in his mouth. 
“Yeah it’s going fine, I really like it. It’s kinda different from shrooms, but not like a bad different.” She was just two steps behind him, trying to keep the same pace as him. 
“That’s great.” Klaus hummed as he popped another olive in his mouth. “These are absolutely amazing. I figured you would like it, it’s really calming and stuff for me. Makes the sad feeling kinda disappear for weeks after.” 
“Oh same, I’ve just felt creative and warm all day.” They stopped in front of Klaus’s room, Klaus still eating his olives. “I’m actually exhausted too, the trip felt really nice.” 
“Well I’m glad I could have helped.” Klaus pulled her into a tight hug, humming loudly. Hugs felt great on psychedelics, she had noticed. 
“You helped so much.” (Y/n)’s voice was slightly muffled by Klaus’s chest. She pulled out of Klaus’s chest, speaking again. “I’m gonna go to bed now, if that’s ok, I’m so so tired.” She laughed a little. 
“That’s fine, I’m gonna crash the moment I hit my bed, so..” Klaus smiled down at her, thankful for this mini-him. 
“Night night, Klaus.” (Y/n) and Klaus both separated to head to their rooms, both about to sleep deeply enough to miss a train going through the house. 
The stairs up to her new room were an almost pastel green color, covered by what looked to be years of grime and nicotine stains. It added character, she thought. The checkerboard floor at the top of the stairs seemed to lead her straight to her new room, which she was really thankful for, she was exhausted. 
Her fingers wrapped around the doorknob, twisting the old carved crystal just enough to open it. She closed it the same way, with just enough effort for it to work, she could have sworn she saw something blue flash near her, but she doubted herself immediately. Once she plopped on the bed, her fingers dragged her phone across the sheets towards her. 
It took (Y/n) two full minutes to open her phone, not remembering her password and then not being able to type the right letters slowed her down significantly. It wouldn’t matter though, because once she turned on some quiet music, she was fast asleep.
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bbbrianjones · 3 years
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Tara Browne
Did anyone ask me to do this? No! Does anyone know who this man is? Probably not! Am I gonna talk about him like he’s the love of my life while linking it to the other love of my life? Abso-fucking-lutely!
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Tara Browne is probably more well known for being the inspiration behind the opening verse of “A Day In The Life” by The Beatles after “he blew his mind out in a car” in 1966 when he ran through a red light and collided into a lorry, dying the following day. He was only twenty-one. He was driving with Suki Potier, who later went on to date Brian after Tara’s death. 
But Tara was also well-known for his friendships in the a circle of musicians, such as Paul McCartney, who Tara first got onto LSD and was responsible for a “rift” between Lennon and McCartney and Brian Jones, who, if you couldn’t tell by my username, is the friendship we will be discussing today! 
All of the information and quotes is from an amazing book about Tara called “I Read the News Today, Oh Boy”. If you can get the chance, I highly recommend reading it as it not only gives a great account of Tara’s life, but also a great description of the sixties in general and what the atmosphere was like. Needless to say, after reading it, I wished to have known Tara and go zooming down London in his Lotus Elan.
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According to the book, Brian and Tara met in September 1964 and hit it off straight away. They both had a mutual curiosity for each other, particular Brian with Tara’s high-end lifestyles as well as having a requited love for rhythm and blues music and fast cars. Tara's wife, Nikki, said they were astrological the same, having birthday's only two or three days apart. To quote her; "They were both Pisces. Free-spirited. Very moral in their ways without ever being sanctimonious. They were like brothers to each other." Tara and Brian also had children when they were both very young, an event people around them couldn’t relate to having.
Due to looking similar to one another, with their pudding bowl haircuts and the same liking to silk shirts and velvet suits, Tara was often mistaken for Brian but he would claim when asked that he was “the chap’s [Brian’s] younger brother”. Jane Ormsby-Gore put it best when saying “they were very alike because they were both small, blond, and pretty,” which I agree to definitely!
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A lot of people have said that Tara was the man Brian wished to be. To quote Jane Ormsby-Gore again, “they were different in that Tara was quite shy. He didn't come into a room and make a big noise. He was a ray of sunlight rather than a blast. Brian was more of a blast. He'd come in and the room would move a bit. Whereas Tara would slip in unnoticed and work his magic in a totally different way." It’s easy to see that Tara was a rather easy-going, “mellow” person however Brian was rather loud, plagued by his paranoia and mental issues. Brian would hang out with Tara a lot because “he would have loved to have had the peace of mind Tara had,” according to Anita Pallenberg, Brian’s girlfriend at the time. “He [Brian] was tortured. Very paranoid. Very sensitive.” Tara was really like a rock that Brian needed when the Rolling Stones were becoming very popular and Brian’s control over the band was given way to Mick and Keith.
According to Anita, Brian “didn't have many friends… And the friends he had, he didn't keep them for very long, because he was too messed up.” I believe Brian’s paranoia got the best of him sometimes and he was fearful of people using him to gain something out of him, such as drugs or girls, but it was different with Tara, as Michael Rainey, a friend of both Tara and Brian, said “Tara wasn't trying to get on any trip. That's why people like Brian [Jones]… weren't frighten of him. He wasn't trying to ride their glory... They saw him as a complete equal.” Brian had a lot of trust in Tara, I think the relationship was a safe haven from all that was going on in the studio and how Brian felt he was being treated. Brian was very sensitive and may have recognised that Tara was sensitive too. As stated by Anita before Brian “didn’t have many friendships,” and “it was unusual that he let someone so close” so, at the time, Brian was lucky enough to have Tara. 
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The picture above was taken for Vogue magazine, and apparently, it was the last truly happy days both couples had together before it all went downhill. Nikki said “we laughed our way through the whole thing”.
People believe that Tara’s death was the end of the free loving and miniskirt Sixties as the later part of the decade paved the way for the summer of love, long hair, drugs, and Altamont. Brian suffered greatly after his death, he had lost a truly great friend in Tara, and it might have been the beginning of the end into Brian’s downward spiral which caused his death due to not having that rock like Tara to support him and, really, make sure he was ok.
I don’t want to end on a sad not so I’d like to finish up with this lovely story that Anita told in the book. “Brian loved model trains when he was a boy. And Tara loved these little racing cars. They played with them all night, all the time laughing, like two little boys.” How sweet can they get!
Thanks for reading, liking and commenting! 
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hyukiee · 3 years
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Chapter 7: Influences
warnings: heavy drug mention, cussing, if your uncomfortable with drug use i would stop reading this story NOW
at this point i’ll post when i post im sorry lol let me know if you want to be tagged though
“So do psychedelics really fry your brain?” Hoseok and Jimin have been bombarding you with question while they took a break from their practice. They really have never been around someone like you before. “Only if you do it a lot, many people do it once and never feel the need to do it again,” you will always have a soft spot for psychedelics. You’ve done them about ten times too many but you are a hippy at heart. “Hobi would actually be the most ideal person to do psychedelics, he’s very happy and open minded. I learned the hard way you really have to be in a good mindset for it.” “Wahh, that’s so cool I bet it’s a cool experience,” Jimin responded. It almost sounded like he wanted to try it, you should probably stop talking… the idea sounds fun though. Tripping with the 7 idiots. You absolutely love tripping with innocent ass people, it’s so much fun to watch but you don’t want to be a bad influence.
Psychedelics aren’t addictive though…
“How are you feeling today?” Taehyung asked hugging you tightly with his sweat covered body. “Mm, a lot better actually.” “That’s good, you look a lot better today as well.” “You really do, I thought you were dead when I saw you sleeping on the couch yesterday,” Jin piped in laughing like a window wiper. Taehyung got more and more comfortable being touchy with you around the members as time went by but it’s saying the least when you say you live with 6 cock blockers. Not even the lust inside you could keep your mind off the awful idea Jimin and Hoseok gave you. The usual you wouldn’t think twice about this but you have to admit you’ve gotten comfortable here. You don’t want to mess things up with the guys, ever. Well, maybe it could be a little secret between the three of you… No.
“So why were you so curious earlier ?” You hopped over to Hoseok’s side as he started walking out of the BigHit building. “Mm, it intrigued me, I think Jimin might actually do it someday.” He laughed shaking his head thinking about him. “Don’t you? One day..?” Hobi stopped in his tracks and looked at you. He looked up at the sky in thought before responding, “Maybe, I mean like you said, most people only ever do it once.” You felt like a terrible person right now. “I would love to do it with you, whenever you would want to… i’d be the best to be with actually.” Hobi laughed as he got into the van with you. “I’ll have to think about it.” “Really!?” Okay, maybe you shouldn’t of sounded that excited but really? “Yeah, I mean.. it’s just a one time thing,” He said giving you a small smile. “Do you think any of the other guys would want to do it?” “Oh yeah, all of them probably with a certain amount of convincing.” “REALLY!?”
Is it fucked up that you know exactly how to get the boys to do drugs with you? Maybe. Will it backlash? Probably. You already got Hoseok, Jimin will be easy, Jungkook will probably easily follow, then Hoseok could convince Namjoon and he can convince Jin and Yoongi. That leaves Taehyung. If you can manage your way into getting Taehyung to do it, your best hope would be getting everyone else on board first. You’re not really doing anything wrong, you want them to experience something awesome that shouldn’t hurt them. “Yah, y/n cut to the chase already,” Jimin teased you. You brought him and Hoseok into a room to start your mission, you were definitely stalling. “I kind of got an idea and thought it would be really cool if we all did LSD together just once,” you spoke quietly paranoid someone would walk by and hear you. “Ahh, I mean… it sounds pretty scary but i’m sure you got us covered … that actually sounds pretty fun,” Jimin basically thought out loud about your idea. Two down, five to go. “How would you get it anyways?” Hokseok asked getting a sudden realization that you are brand new to South Korea, you couldn’t of possibly found any drug dealers that fast. “Oh don’t worry, I can get that shit shipped easy,” Jimin gave you a look, silently wondering how you would know this but come on, it’s you. “By the way, how should I ask Jungkook?”
“Wah, isn’t that stuff dangerous? I mean, I don’t know what the hyung will think about it honestly,” Jungkook rubbed the back of his neck responding to the question fo the week. “Well, Jimin and Hoseok said yes,” “Really?” He responded kind of surprised, you weren’t the only one that didn’t suspect those two to be the ones to say yes. “Aren’t you supposed to be getting sober though?” He asked giving off a little suspicion. “I am, this one time won’t change that at all, don’t worry,” “Good luck convincing Tae that,” Jungkook laughed patting you on the back. You weren’t the only one that knew how impossible it will be to convince Taehyung either apparently.
The boys did you good convincing the others to get on board but now Taehyung is the only one unaware of the sceam that’s going on. If someone slips up before you get to him your screwed. He was out getting food for everyone so you were just impatiently sitting in the living room, pretending to watch TV. You kept looking at the front door before finally, your handsome man walked through the door. Yours. God, don’t fuck this up. “Hey baby, what are you watching?” He asked kissing you on your forehead before going to set the food down. “Ah, I don’t really know to be honest,” you nervously laughed. “Tae, can we talk for a bit?” You started to play with your fingers and shake your leg. “Of course, you have your doctors appointment tomorrow by the way.. for your medication,” You almost completely forgot about that. Which is kind of a good thing, drugs haven’t been the only thing on your mind recently. Maybe you should of fled the country a lot sooner. “So basically i’m scared to ask this but literally all the other guys want to do it and it’s 100% a one time thing we can all take it to our graves-“ “Y/n.. just ask,” Taehyung slightly laughed at your blushing face. “Would you want to do LSD with me and the boys, just once?” You couldn’t read his face. It’s usually really easy to read his face but right now you just can’t. “Even Namjoon hyung agreed?” He looked surprised, but not mad. “Yeah, it’s just once it could be a really awesome and spiritual thing to bring us all closer,” you spoke quietly still on edge about him getting upset with you. “Well i don’t want to be the odd one out… if you manage to get it i’ll do it,” he said patting your thigh with a slight smile. Did you just convince all of Bangtan to do LSD with you? You’ve reached a new fucking level.
“Guess who got her drugs, guess who got her drugssss,” you sang skipping into the dorm grabbing everyone’s attention. “What? The LSD or your prescription?” Jin barely made out with all the laughing. “Both actually smart one,” you smiled flicking Jin’s forhead. Today is Friday so it’d be the best time to trip with everyone. You’ve never prepared so much just to do drugs. You have all the playlists, pillows, and water prepared for today. You couldn’t sleep at all last night, you can’t remember the last time you were this excited to drop acid. “Okay, so everyone leave the living room so I can make the place a vibe because we are tripping tonight!” The smile stuck on your face almost felt like you were already tripping. “Really?” Jungkook jumped up showing his nervousness. “Yes and don’t worry, we’ll all have a talk before it happens. Now get the fuck out… respectfully,” You hopped over to Taehyung and kissed him on his cheek before pushing him away with the other guys.
“Wah, is all this really necessary?” Yoongi spoke looking into the living room. You basically made a big fort with everything they may need or want laid out nicely. The OCD deep inside you kind of kicked in but it looked fucking awesome. The boys came in one behind the other and everyone sat in a circle so you could give the whole run down of what to expect and just simply calm their nerves. You were so nervous your first time but it ended up being one of the most beautiful experiences in your life. You told them the Dos and Don’t dos as you passed out 7 colorful tabs of paper and explained what they’ll feel and for how long. “So we doing this?” you asked looking around at everyone.
“Fuck it,” Taehyung said looking at you winking. Your favorite phrase.
“Fuck ittt,” everyone repeated.
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popculturebuffet · 3 years
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New X-Men Xtrospective Part 3: Imperial (NXM #121-126)
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To me all you happy people! And welcome back to my X-Citing look at Morrison’s Masterwork on Marvel’s Merry Mutants!  Part One is HERE, Part Two is HERE if you feel like it. 
If not... to catch you up on last time....
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All Caught up? Good. Join me under the cut as our heroes head into this old woman’s hedd to see what’s wrong and fight off an alien army while horribly ill. 
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Silent, Psychic Rescue in Process:
So we pick up not long after we left off: Thanks to Beast waking up from his bat induced coma, the X-Men now know Charles is trapped in Cassandra’s body and she pulled a Freaky Friday on him, with marginally less bullets. 
And thus we get this issue. This one was part of Nuff Said, an incredibly clever theme month by Marvel and one I wish they’d try and do again at some point in some form. 
The gimmick was simple but amazing: Every issue would be mostly silent, with at most some dialouge at the start and finish to bookend it. So far i’ve only read two issues of this, this one and the X-Statix one, but it is a genuinely great idea. I do think forcing it on the entire line was a bit much, but as I said I do wish they’d do this again just make it optional: have some books opt in or do some annuals with the theme. It’s just a fun break from the usual and with this issue resulted in one of the best single issues of x-men period. 
Naturally given the name, which is cleverly displayed on a sign the x-men have because of course they do, it’s exaclty that: Emma and Jean after readying themselves (Jean kisses Scott goodbye and Emma downs a bottle of jack because why not do an alchol before doing delecate mental surgery), head in. 
Inside they find horrific old lady head doors, stone ol dlady heads around a tower that shoot lasers, and said doors also bite and puke weird goop because it’s Grant Morrison. This is his chance to just go full balls out weird.. and given last time involved skin flake golemns.. and this isn’t even the weirdest he’s done. As mentioned last time he once had a supervillian run for president using a super LSD Bike that made everyone high. 
And just to prove he can reach that level of weirndess we find charles alone, naked and with an overenlarged brain.. before he transitions Jean to a field of sperm. 
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Yeah... but this DOES have a point.. as it turns out it’s a meaphorical transition into his gestation as a baby.. and how he had a twin. Yeah turns out Cassandra was not lying he did try to kill her.. but as you can probably tell by the fact she’s a genocidal sociopath, she lied by omission to screw with Hank: In the womb she tried strangling Charles to death with his own umbilical cord..only for him to use baby’s first psonic blast to send her reeling and his mom tumbling down the stairs and well.. you can probably guess the rest. Yeah.. Cassandra’s entire origin story is concentrated 
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And I love it. The sheer audacity is nice and everything but what makes it really work for me is the simple concept: An evil version of charles, one almost born at the same time whose every bit as evil as he is good.. granted there’s a TON of Morally Grey in Charles Xavier ESPECIALLY post decimation and even more so now with Krakoa. But he’s sitll at his heart a well meaning person, while Cassandra at her heart is a racist genocidal nightmare. She is pure evil, with enough personality to not make her boring.. and more importanlty all the power charles has but NONE of his restraint. Part of what makes Charles noble is he only uses his powers when necessary. Cassandra.. has no such restraint and will happily mentally snap necks all day. 
So with this our heroine’s leave and we end on the iconic line “Professor Xavier killed his twin sister in the womb. We Really ought to talk. 
This issue is an utter classic. It finally explains Cassandra a bit while still leaving a ton of questions, Frank Quitely is at his best here, and he and morrison are incrediby good at non verbal storyteling. The result is surreal, unsettling and awesome. Check it out. Seriously seek this one out it’s worth the trip. It’s so famous it was homaged with a spirtual sequel in the recent Giant Size X-Men one shots. It’s excellent stuff
Imperial:
So with our first issue we open with things going terrible on that flag ship Cassandra took off on with Lilandra, empress of the Shiar and Xavier’s space wife. She’s revealed herself, is ravaging the ship and mind rapes a the helmsman into crashing it, so with no other options Lilandra sends Smasher, not the one from the avengers run earlier version, to earth to send a warning to the X-Men. 
At the School things are actually going well for a second. In an intresting move the school is changing things up with no officla timetable.. which I think means there’s no rigid class schedule and you can just do them as you please or as necessary for your power. The plan’s the same, they just want to learn from each other in building mutant society and the future. It’s ideas like this that are the bedrock of the current run and were sadly never fully realized here.. but I don’t blame this run for that. Morrison had 2-3 years and it was cut short early, leading to a rather disapointing ending we’ll get to. They never had a chance to really dig in because they were kicked out by morons and then their whole grand design was undone until Hickman un-undid it in 2019. And even then some of this like the idea of mutant culture and what not hasn’t been picked up on yet. I do mean YET, as given the sheer NUMBER of x books touching on all sorts of subjects, it’s only a matter of if not when. 
As for who’s behind this it’s a combination of Jean and Charles: Jean is using charles notes and is going at full tilt. Scott is concerned though.. both about her since she went Phoenix and Logan told him about it and because these plans may alarm the humans. ON the former Jean just brushes him off which is not right.. given what happened with the phoenix force copy of jean, which granted had her personality, memories and powers and Jean later got a set of her memories so it might as well of been and only MAYBE the genocide is something Jean wouldn’t of done under the same circumstances, he’s understandably concerned. He lost her to it last time and it did weird shit to poor Rachel, who hif you don’t know is their daughter from an alternate timeline... because the Summer’s family tree is a WAKING NIGHTMARE. Thankfully I don’t have to untangle it because there’s a handy chart right here to do it for me that was recently released in X-Men Legends, a new series featuring legendary x creators telling stories in the cracks... and given we’re getitng storys by the simosons and peter motherfucking david, yeah good stuff.
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And why yes there are more than one clone in this tree and several alternate timelines. , not to mention several clones and a sexy cat lady, it’s complicated is understnading it and i’m not sure what properly states it honestly. Also if your wondering about Adam there he’s the genetic son of Cyclops mom and the ma Shiar empreror who killed her for not sleeping with him through. Again it’s complicate REALLY feels like understatement. 
Point is he DOES have a right to be worried about the thing that lead to her being cocooned for a while and left their daughter in the future at the time of this... just in case you needed a reminder after that wonderful clusterfuck of a chart up above athe x-men are really fucking weird. 
So Jean brushing that off is not okay. She does however call him out on the second one and rightfully so: This isn’t some dominate the humans manifesto: this is simply changing the course of the future and how they teach their students to create a better one instead of adhering to human norms to try and appease “the republicans’, as jean puts it.. which has only gotten MORE RELEVANT, 20 years on: Attempts to appease the norms of society and things “just because that’s how it’s been” have never been a good thing. It’s why the very writer of this comic took several decades to properly identify themselves as non binary because people were too stuck int heir ways to try and see if there really were just two genders. Fighting against the grain, finding new ways to express things that have always been there... it’s what humanity needs to do and certainly what comes after us would need to do. i’ts how we get better as a race. If something’s not working we change it, quickly or slowly. And given Scott’s huge amount of emotoinal repression lately.. I can see why she’d see the former complaint as just him being a dick as opposed to the genuine concern it is. 
Short Version: Jean Grey is fucking awesome and while he’d be the last to write her for decades, no one did it better than Grant and no one has since.  Hopefully Gerry Duggan can clear that bar. 
After this fight we get a fuller verson of what happened both at the end of issue 120 and in the big reveal last issue: Turns out Hank awoke because Charles piloted his body like a truck and needed it revealed fast. Hank’s regained control of his body and facilities by now, but in a twist of irony he helpfully points out, had Cassandra not gone a needlessly cruel and sociopathic tangent and had Beak beat Beast into a coma, Charles wouldn’t of had a body. 
As for Charles in cass’ body he’s now in a tub of goo created by it. 
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It acts as a shield as well as melding him with Cerebra so he can talk to jean telepathically as his thoughts are very weak.
Thanks to this and her psychic Jaunt, Jean now knows just what the hell cassandra is: She really is Charles twin sister. As for how the hell she surivied outside of the womb and how Charles never knew, she created herself a clone body using his cells and didn’t fully manifest till now. And while she has plenty of intellegence, at an emotional level she’s fully convinced, much like an infant that only she and charles are real and thus destroying him means gaining domance over her world. So in short she’s both utterly insane and now has an interstellar empire at her fingertips. 
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And the news SOMEHOW get sworse: She booby trapped her body and charles only has days before he’s vegatable, having put every psychological disease possible in there, and she’s probably responsible for their colds and the u-men. So in short their pretty scrwed but at the very least Charles plans to try to flip things, use the fact their now public (a clear tactic to weaken them) to share his manefesto, his last will and testiment if you would. 
Scott meanwhile figures since their sick a healer might be a good idea and goes solo to fetch Xorn... who just sorta disappeared after the annual and didn’t return till his arc. 
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We get an utterly touching scene after this: With Logan staying on his hobbit like toes in case of another attack, Jean goes to talk to hank. Hank is still throughly traumatized from the attack, fearing Cassandra is right and he’ll just keep devlovling until he ends up in a metamoprhisis type situation. I mean it’s not ALL bad hank,.. I mean going through that guarantees a musical about you. 
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But Jean reassures him: It’s okay to be afraid of her, they all are.. but as she puts it...
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It’s a really powerful inspiring scene... and really afirms how well Morrison writes Jean from the previous arc onward. She’s confident, powerful.. but also caring and compassionate. Here hank’s at his lowest, disparing that this might get worse.. and she reaffirms that htis evolution is an upgrade.. he may not be the same.. but that’s okay. He’s better. It really speaks to the core message of the X-Men as a whole and why they’ve stuck around all this time: It’s not just okay your diffrent.. it’s WONDERFUL. Your wonderful for being you. Whatever meataphor you read into it, it’s at it’s core a message that no matter who hunts you or trys to shame you for what you are, they are wrong and you are wonderful. And you are not alone... your people are out there.. and they will go through hell to protect you. It’s moments like this that remind me despite the bad parts, the accidnetal transphobic metaphor last time, a subplot with Hank coming up, the affair storyline and Planet X, just.. Planet X.. this run is special to me for a reason. It has heart, character and truly gets how the x-men should work, what makes them great... while making something NEW AND FRESH from it’s bones. Pushing envelopes, chanigng things for good and shaking things the hell up after far too much stagnation. It’s just pure good comicy goodness and i’m proud to finally be talking about it after having always wanted to. 
So as we end the issue Scott grabs Xorn, whose been at a budist temple all this time, and Smasher arrives to warn earth... but his warning missed his intended target. 
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Well at least he got to Hellcow’s coven.. maybe she can call in Man Eating Cow and the Chick Fill A Super Cows.. thought hey might not help. Their parent company IS pretty homophobic.. I doubt their high on mutants either. 
Testament Emma and Jean talk over things how i’ts going etc, with Emma unsuprisingly annoyed with most of the students and Jean optimsitc.
But Emma soon has bigger issues to deal with: TEEN ANGST!
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Yeah 4/5 of the Cuckoos are upset Esme has a boyfriend. Their concerns in part are because without her their apparently powerless.. which given one will die and another will leave and they’ll be left with three is just factually not true, and either Morrison changed his mind later, or more likely their simply exagerating like teens do. Emma points out it’s pointless to fight this...
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So... their in a domestically abusive relationship rife with sexual tension? Are you sure your not htinking of Sam and Diane, Ross and Rachel, Garfiled and Odie perhaps?
Meanwhile Angel’s sulking in a tree talking about how all the kids are stupid and she dosen’t fit in. That sort of thing. Wolverine naturally has a tactful and understandable response to this:
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It’s here Angel goes from understandable, a bit hard edged and obnoxious becuase of a very rough life.. and just becomes annoying.  I do get what Grant was trying to do: he was trying to play with Wolverine’s habit of taking sassy teens under his wing by giving him a more hardscrabble one with a harder life pre-xaviers.. not that Jubilee’s was easy, but I get what he was going for.. he just dosen’t succeed. Instead of a realistic version of a teen sidekick she just comes off as an obnoxious brat whose rude to everyone including her one friend Logan and her later boyfriend.  It dosen’t help that ONCE AGAIN, Morrison flew directly into unfortunate implications without meaning to, by having the only major POC character (Bishop guest stars later and there are two significant characters during the Riot at Xaviers arc but both aren’t relevant before or after), be an abused teen with gross fly based powers and a teen pregnancy subplot. Seriously this isn’t even the LAST time Morrison shoves their foot in their mouth like this in this run. While I do like this run a lot, it’s still 20 years old and it’s still going to have a bunch of bits that have aged like harvarti left on a sidewalk, and handing out unfortnuate implications like their candy is tied for the biggest with their handling of Magneto when he finally shows up in person. It’s THAT bad a take on the character that it’s up there with accidental racisim and transphobia. 
So moving on from.. that we get Jean comforting the professor before meeting the press, giving a throughly lovely speech about how Charles got his powers 30 years ago and despite seeing the worst in humanity, used his telepathy to allow him to see past it and see deep down just how scared and alone we all felt. So she takes them into a psychic conference room and we get a very interesting exchange. 
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It’s an interesting parallel to how real world disinfranchised groups, how it takes time.. but soon being a POC or LBGTQ+ goes from unrightfully perscuted to celebrated. How a group starts with hates whipsers on the fringe of things but grows to be accepted, like it always SHOULD have been. Take representation of Trans people in the media. It started with Trans people being almost entirely punchlines and sources of fucking horendous “DID DEY USED TO BE A MAN.” storylines and hurtful jabs at people who had transitioned, treating them as a sideshow instead of you know as fucking human beings. But now coming out as what you always were ont he inside is celebrated. Sure the right are dicks about it but they always will be: but most media gladly celebrates when someone comes out as trans. Same with being gay, or bi or pan or polamorus or nonbinary.  Hell I admire grant for showing i’ts not even 100% perfect once you are popular: you still have to grapple both with people wanting to copot your culture and those who still don’t understand you trying to speak for you. 
She also gets the standard question calling the X-Men an army, shoots it down with the normal global peacekeeping operation stuff.. then we get this bitch. 
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Who quickly realizes she’s outclassed by Emma Frost, professional that bitch. And while Jean is understandbly going to have to erase that.. I can’t blame her for snapping her.
Just to tear this shit down.: The privacy thing is not something she’s doing. All she’s doing is spcyhic teleconfrencing, you harpy. They fight greek gods and monsters to protect your sorry ass and the last one.. just makes me absolutely livid and feels so much like a real world comment i’m suprised there isn’t a fox news logo next to her bigoted head. 
Trouble follows them everywhere they go.. because their mutants. They can’t help it. A LOT of shit like the demons, aliens, and gods and what not, I do not know if they actually did fight the greek gods but i’m not going to say for sure they did not, the norse gods defintely, not sure on greek. But the point is allt his stuff HAPPENS TO THEM half the time, or is a consequence of trying to PROTECT PEOPLE. I’m so nettled by this because this is how the marvel unvierse acts all the fucking time towards ALL super powered peoples. Mutants esepcailly but they blame the heroes and what not for being chased and harassed by guys in costumes or alien invasions or all the stuff they FIGHT. Sure sometimes they caused it but it’s either because of a monsterous person with a grudge or just because their powerful and some douche took an intrest. I’m just.. so fucking tired of asshole civlians in comics. It’s realisitc I know but it’s just hard to stomach after so many have turned their back on so many for such DUMB reasons. 
Jean recovers well pointing out the genocide and how 16 million people, 16 million possible einsteinss or mozarts are just GONE, and that their trying to focus on the future. She also brings up autistic savants who can talk to atoms and while I don’t like the use of the savant thing, as it brings to mind stuff like rainman I very badly want to see this autistic kid who can talk to atoms as someone on the spectrum myself. Also I just want the crew of HIckma’ns books in general to pour over this because there are a lot of intresting powers and personalities only MENTIONED we never saw proper that could be great characters. Just saying. 
Jean cocludes her speech to the world, including Logan whose wisely getting hammered at anearbye bar.. while Hank finds out what’s going on with their sickness.. nanonscopic sentnels in the blood. 
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But while the press confrence ends well with Jean having won over the press.. things go sideways as not only is it clear Esme’s boyfriend is in fact something sinister.. but Jean falls over due to the nano snetinels, and senses Scott being taken in tibet, taken down by a group of the Shiar’s imperial guard.. picutre the legion of superheroes but blindly loyal to the goverment and far more likely to get killed. And the rest are preparing to attacking including Gladiator who if you don’t know him, has all the powers of superman as long as he retains his confidence. 
And it turns out Esme’s boyfriend is an advanced Scout, the shapeshifting amoeba blob thing Stuff, a new addition by morrison and good on him. And the Imperial Guard are here but with one goal
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 Superdestroyer
On the Ship we find out both wha’ts going on with Scott and Xorn, they’ve been taken and why the shiar are attempting mutant genocide: Cassandra is puppeting ALL of them, has convinced them the mutants are infected and since Lilandra is a puppet, Scott’s words fall on deaf ears. 
Meanwhile Wolverine ambushes one of the squads, kiling one named Dinosaurer via claw to the brain, while Emma has had a dome thing put over her head and isn’t transforming into diamond to counter it because...
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But the Cuckoos fight back, taking out oracle before easily handling stuff since his brain is fairly simple.. and given he’s racist against solid people and unlike the others reveling in the genocide just a tad.. yeah what he deserves. So now with a living weapon the Cuckoos make peace with Angel as they need all the help they can get. 
Jean ushers the press into the panic room, not happy about it but not having anothe roption for their saftey. Hank tells her to self distruct crebra if cassandra get sclose and goes off to join the fight and let off some steam over the situation. Hank easily routes two of them, and one , Manta tries to just fly right ot jtean wince their TK proof. How does that go?
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Jean gets to saftey after that, not that she needs it and hank is quickly taken down by a batch of Superguardians.. only for Wolverine to arrive in the Sknitt of time and chop them up.. oh and as one of the puts it...
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Bad. Ass. I also like the addition of the flight patch, a nod to the Legion, who the Imperial Guard were based on as those kids used flight rings. 
But while Logan and Hank easily tag team these assholes...
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The SHiar call in the big guns.. Gladiator.. and I wasn’t kidding abotu the superman thing. While Logan TRIES to talk him out of it, the murders only confirm Cassandra’s bullshit and Gladiator breaks into the panic room throwing hank and wolverin’e before them having utterly decimated them off panel. I mean Wolvie is a badass.. but even he has limits. I also like recontecullizing the guard as a whole here.. showing just how TERRIFYING they SHOULD be as enimies to the x-men. Yes our heroes did win.. but barely and only till Gladiator showed up. In most cases thier clearly holding back out of affection but here hteir just at errifying unstoppable force, and also apparently used to doing genocides like this. It takes what was a cheesy shout out to David Cockrums other big artistic work, and makes it horrifying and it is AWESOME. I admit to not having liked this arc as much for the longest time but this reread, the sheer teror and hopleessness as an interstellar superman easily cuts through our mighty mutants like tissue... it’s awesome. 
Thankfully one of the Guard found smasher.. and thus the truth comes out so our heroes are given a stay of execution with Gladiator clearly horrified at what he almost did and our heroes now so sick they can barely move and Hank can’t think them out of this. 
Thankfully he dosen’t has to as back in space, Cyclops tires of it and points out something Xorn, not being as experinced nor having delt with the guard ahd thought of: G-Type, the glowly guy about to execute them, is made of solar energy.. and xorn can manipulate that thanks to his star brain. He does, they take out the rest.. and prepare to go save the day.
Losers: PIcking up shortly before where we left off we see Cassandra murder Lilandra’s advisor who figured out what she was just as our heroes escape.. and as Cassandra is having Lilnadra order all of the shiar ships to immolate themselves. 
WIth Lilandra not being any use, Cass tries to psychically force her to commit sucidie but jumping off a space ledge but Xorn saves her. Cass tries another turn at mentally breaking an x-man, pointing out all scott’s recent flaws, his increased repression his faling marriage and while it gets him to stop it dosen’t quite work as well as it did on hank, likely because at his heart Hank is simply a more emotive person. Though his REAL reason for stalling is he can’t kill charles.. which he muses just as the ship blows up real good. 
Meanwhile back at Campus the kids initaiate their plan, having Angel break in and take a dna sample. She also finds beak naked in a tank and decides eh why not and brings him with her. This ends up paying off as Beak suggests the obvious to get emma free.. just force the space guy they have over in the corner to do it. They do and it works
Back in the mansion our heroes prepare for Casssandra... but Jean and Logan object to saving her body, pointing out that getting hank to repair it is exactly what she wants, and that Jean feels she can save charles without uit, with Hank being understandably doubtful given their current condition.. but Jean’s real plan is to put charles in her head and it’s already too far in actoin to stop now: she’s been saving his memories as they flaked off and if she dosen’t do this now there will be no charles left. 
Hank evacuates the civlians to teh danger room, and has an encounter with trish who tries to apologize and get him back.. only for him to rightfully regjecter her..a and then goes a step further by capping it off with:
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Yeah on it’s own it’s not TERRIBLE. Still very dated to claim your gay just to spite someone, but for the time it was acceptable and compared to some of Morrison’s other gaffes in the run it’s minor at best. But it leads into a rather annoying subplot we’ll naturally get to that’s a much bigger issue, so i’ll save talking about it in full for when it comes up again. 
Jean manages to shove Chuck into her head, but is naturally leaking a bit and barely holding it or him together and may of overestimated herself just a tad.. while on the lawn Cassandra easily takes out the guards. That said the scene of Jean taking Chuck into her head is REALLY damn awesome. Jean is the arc MVP by a mile and Hank is pretty dang good competition. 
All Hell: We open the final issue of the arc with Scott and Xorn escaping the spaceship using some teleport tubes taking Arakai and Lilandra with them. 
We open with Cassadra utterly humilating gladiator while the kid team prepares to fight her despite you know, the 8 billion to 1 odds against them. 
Jean, despite hte discknes and trying to keep an old man in her brain marches out , prepared to fight, for the kids sake. For the world’s sake. But Logan’s easily taken out and with Jean barely holding it together.. the kids prepare to fight.. likely being slaughtered even if they mean well.. onlyf or help to finally arrive with Scott and Xorn glowy porting in. We get a really sweet , short moment with scott and jean...
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Scott not knowing the situation tries to have Xorn heal charles first but since Cassandra’s body is dead and unoccupied that’s a no go.. he’s still usefult hough, curing Jean of her nanosentital sickness and moving on to Scott and Hank while there’s still time. 
We find out more about cassandra: She’s a murrmadi, a bodyless parasite.. eseetinally the dark first test a person faces... she just stuck around because she was one for a telepath.. the world’s STRONGEST telepath. But really other than that part the rest just feels like stuff we alreayd heard LAST TIME, mildly repaackaged and seems enitrley like filler to pad the issue out. 
So while Jean takes cerebra, both to keep it away from Cassandra’s plans of mutant genocide and for whatever she has planned, Scott, Hank and Xorn prepare to hold the line.. and as Jean mentions.. emma’s still out in the wild. 
So we get our climactic showdown.. logan, hank and xorn veruss cassandra, with Cassandra trying to do eveyrthing she can, tear them down mentally, throw out the students with our heroes fighting back best they can. It’s good stuff.  
Eventaully Cassandra gets to Jean.. but she’s already inacted her plan, putting a piece of Xavier’s mind in EVERY mutant, and giving Cassandra one ohell ofa reason you suck speech. 
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It’s an incapsulation of what i said earlier and what the runs about: alone we are weak but together.. we just might make it. More on that as we go. But thanks to Cass naturally going fo rcerberba.. she accidently restores charles and is left bodyless.
Emma finishes the fight with her own brilliant gambit, presending cassandra her body.. but it’s actually stuff , reprogrammed into a sentient brain for her to inhabit and leaving her trapped, with Charles hoping t teach the now mentally reset Cassandra.  So Cassandra is beat, the virus is stopped, and our heroes have one.. but naturally for this run.. there’s one last suprise in store. 
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Charles can walk again.. and going forward will be a far more active member of the team. The team is complete, Cassandra is beaten, and the future.. is bright. 
Final Thoughts:
This arc is a mixed bag.. it has really good scenes with the first and last issues being the standouts, with the former being an utter classic with an intresting gimick and the latter being a rousing climax with tons of awesome moments, with some good mometns scattered throughout.
But that’s the arc’s issue.. it has good moments and ideas.. but they don’t quite work togehter. The idea of teh Shiar Imperial Guard nearly doing a genocide is good, but the Shiar are such flat characters.. it’s really hard to care. They just don’t have enough connection to the x-men to really have the betryal sting but aren’t callous enough for genocide protocols to maeks sense. It’s a good idea, I still support it being terrifying.. but not enough is done with it and it feels liek Grant is more concerned with throwing weirdos at the x-men than actually saying something. 
The biggest issue however is the art. While inconsitant art is an issue as they’d rotate artists.. but in previous arcs it was usually pretty evenly split but here it’s sloppy: Quitely does the first issue, van Sciver the second.. and the worst of the three Igor Kordey does most of the art. I gave him the beinfit of the doubt last time.. but this time not so much. His art is muddy and tries to be stylized but comes off confusing,ugly and not great. He’s probably a lovely guy but given he’s up against two legendary artists, his lack of style comapred to both shows badly.  And given the arc is alreayd a bit overly complicated, it makes things WORSE by giving us muddled art in a very complex storyline. The flip flopping art makes a fairly intricate story very hard to follow. It’s easily why this arc didn’t grab me in the past and even seeing some better moments, it’s not the series best. It’s not the worst either, Planet X easily takes that ground despite having far better art. It’s an incredibly muddled incredibly long feeling arc and really needed to be compressed by one or two issues but instead is just hard to get through. It’s owrth it for the rest of the runa nd the good moments within but all in all easily one of the weakest points in the series. 
Next Month on New X-Men:The X-Men soak in the new world order, and we meet fantomex, dust and the last surivivors of genosha. 
Next on this blog:Green Eggs and Ham is back!
If you enjoyed this review PLEASE join my patreon. The end of hte month is coming and I need eveyr cent I can get so join at patreon.com/popculturebuffet and i’ll see you at the next rainbow. 
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miidnightglosss · 3 years
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Boston Tea Party - Part 3 (Matt Connerly: Chapter 1)
Matt Connery - Chapter 1
Matt aggressively threw himself into a chair, scattering multiple bags on M&Ms, nails, and old Pokemon cards. "I'm gonna need chicken blood, salt, five candles, and a bottle of vodka," he said.
Johanna peered over his shoulder, bottles of soda in one hand while she settled her sunglasses on her head with the other. "Vodka? For the ritual?"
Matt sighed dramatically. "No, that's just to make me feel better about ripping a hole in the universe."
"We're just setting up for a party," Sebastian reminded, rolling his eyes. He grabbed the M&Ms from Matt and poured them into a bowl on the nearby snack table.
"Dude, what the fawk," Johanna scoffs with a sort of frat boy-valley accent, lightly punching Sebastian a couple of times in the back.
"We have to get ready, don't we? The party starts at two and it’s already--" Sebastian pulled out his phone and checked the time-- "1:48."
"Shit, he's right. What's all that stuff for anyway?"
"Well," Matt started, "before your boyfriend so RUDELY took my things without ASKING, the M&Ms were for shooting up our noses, the Pokemon cards were for Kiss and Blow, and the nails were just for cinematic effect."
"First of all, I'm pretty sure someone will snort something regardless," Johanna started. "Second of all, those are my Pokemon cards. Gimme back my fucking Flareon. We'll use something else for Kiss and Blow. Third of all, nails are a delicacy that shouldn't be wasted for trivial recreational purposes. Fourth of all, we're not dating."
Yeah, fucking right, Matt thought to himself. It was totally obvious they had a thing for each other. Johanna called it "brotherly love", Matt called it "sexual tension". "Okay, maybe not yet, but eventually."
"Nah, she's engaged to Bartholomew," Sebastian teased. Johanna punched him in the arm, more harshly this time. Laughing obnoxiously, Sebastian ran around the house while Johanna chased him close behind, pillow in hand, smacking him when she was close enough.
Matt rolled his eyes just as Bart, Ciel, and Lizzie walked through the door, all with different snacks in hand. Lizzie's wearing her usual pigtails down, a much more mature look from what everyone is used to.
"Hey, guys," Matt greeted. "We're still setting up snacks and stuff, but feel free to get comfortable."
"Awesome," Bart replied, setting his Mountain Dew: Code Red down on the table. "Where's Johanna?"
Matt shrugged. "I don't know. Currently somewhere with Sebastian and a pillow." Right after that sentence dropped from his mouth, Bart power-walked through the house in search of the girl. "I probably could've worded that better."
"I'm not even going to ask," Ciel sighs.
Elizabeth went up to Matt and enveloped him in a hug. "You look so cute today! Normally dark colors aren't my thing, but they suit you perfectly! Although might I suggest..." The blonde reached into a pocket on her overalls and pulled out a cat ring, placing it in Matt's hand. Matt observed its white body as he pushed it down on his left middle finger, its rainbow eyes reflecting the light.
"I bought one for Johanna, too," Lizzie continued, hardly able to keep her excitement. "I know how you two always go to pride every year together and once I saw how cute it was, I couldn't resist."
"Believe me, she couldn't," Ciel huffed, dropping down on the couch.
Normally, Matt cringes at how enthusiastic and cute Lizzie is all the time. However, this time was an exception. "Thanks, Lizzie." Reluctantly, he returned the hug. It's only a few seconds before Ciel mumbled a "too long" under his breath, the three of them laughing as Grell, William, Ronald, and the others walk in.
Within minutes, everyone had a drink in hand and is settling into the party. Matt felt a tap on his shoulder and turned around to see Sebastian. "Oh, hey, man. What's Joey doing?"
Sebastian rubbed the back of his neck. "She and Bart are arguing over something. Nothing serious, I don't think."
"Oh." That's weird. Those two hardly ever fight, Matt thought.
"Yeah..." Sebastian trailed off. "Anyways, you said your dad was supposed to be performing? That would certainly kick the party off to a good start."
"Oh, shit, yeah, you're right." Matt handed his solo cup of blue Mountain Dew to Sebastian. "Hold this for me."
Hearing Sebastian mutter a "what the fuck", Matt made his way outside to the garage his father had converted into a studio. He named it Santa Monica Discharge, whatever the fuck that means. He still has no idea where the fuck that idea came from but his dad practically took LSD every day of his 20s.
Without knocking, Matt quietly opened the door to the studio to see his father listen intently as another masculine figure, probably a couple of years older than him, played a few notes from an Elvis Presley song on a keyboard.
"Oh, hey, bud," August greeted with a smile as he stood up. The other figure turned around as well, still holding the last note he left on.
So, he's got brown eyes, floofy hair, pretty fucking sick tattoos, he's actually pretty skinny but has buffed out arms, and is an overall bean, Matt thought to himself. It wasn't that bad of a description. The brunet was about as tall as August, his hair falling ever so slightly in front of his warm ivory face. His brown eyes met Matt's gunmetal blue before he had to break from whatever trance this stranger has put on him.
Matt shook his head, returning his attention to August. "We were, uh, getting ready for you to perform, whenever you ready." He nodded towards the other male in the room. "Who's this?"
August patted the stranger's back. "This is Christian. I'm pretty sure he goes to your school."
"I'm a senior," Christian chimed in.
"Yep. He came to me seeking musical guidance so I decided to help him out a bit," August explained. "I didn't mean for it to cut into your party, though. I didn't forget or anything."
"Yeah, I should probably get going," Christian agreed, grabbing his bag resting on the floor. "I've got a little project I'm working on anyways."
"H E Y, why not come veg with us cool kids for a bit," Matt offered shakily, immediately mentally kicking himself for acting so stupid.
"Aren't you guys just a bunch of freshmen?"
Matt felt a pit fall into his stomach. "Well, I mean--"
"Nah, I'm kidding. I'm playing with August today, actually."
"Oh, cool," Matt chuckled to himself. Wait, weren't you just about to leave? That don't make no sense. "See you in a couple of minutes then. With that, he turned and left the studio.
The entire way back to the house (a quick 35-second trip, at most), Matt couldn't help but yell at himself for acting like such an anxiety-ridden freak. A gorgeous man WHO GOES TO YOUR SCHOOL walks into your house and what do you do? You go 'oH, hEy, SoRrY, dO yOu CoMe HeRE oFtEn? Really? CUZ I LIVE HERE AAAARRRRRGGGGHHHHHH--
Bart came storming out of the front door, holding his nose, wincing quietly.
Matt began to ask, "Dude--"
"Don't fucking talk to me," Bart yelled, making his way towards the sidewalk, pulling out his phone a tapping a bit.
Slowly, Matt walked inside, hoping someone would have an explanation for what just happened. Alas, everyone was just as stunned as he was.
Someone get a moving van because these last 5 minutes have been a lot to unpack.
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Mount Everest Ain't Got Shit On Us (Fezco x fem!reader, Part 1.)
Description: You were always told that your life will be as you wish it to be if you'll study enough. That it will pay off if you work hard. And some people were given you like the scary example of what will happen when you don't obey. But sometimes it feels good to disobey.
A/N: Man, Fez is just my main bitch from Euphoria. I just adore him the most. His breakfast is consistent with Respecting Women Juice™️ and Keeping His Shit Together Juice™️. He might not be the brightest man around, but I think he's gentle and caring. Like hell.
A/N: The reader is around 17 to 18 years old, not further explained, attending high school. Rue and the gang are around the same age and since Fezco's age was never actually clarified, let's go with 23.
A/N: This takes place in a universe where Jules was away for a while, but after a few months she came back to Rue.
Warnings: Talking about drugs, drug addiction, smoking, drinking alcohol. You know. Basically the normal lives of today's kids.
Word count: 3 K +/-
Masterlist and declaration: H E R E
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Ever since you were a kid, the adults always told you that you can be whatever you would like to be. When you were five, they lied to you - they told you that you can be a pirate or a princess, or an astronaut or a zoo animal keeper for that matter. 
When you were ten, they usually started to be critical to you just as you started as well. You slowly realized that being a plumber or a social worker is maybe the place you were supposed to be, you started to base your imaginations off the reality. 
When you were fifteen, it all came together - you knew what should you do, what is off your limits and what stays in your boundaries. You could still be something even if you weren't the smartest or the funniest in your class, or the best of bureaucracy. 
And when you go to college you most likely know what you'll do with your life - that you would be a nurse, a teacher, a biologist or you know that you will not go to college at all. Sometimes the young people didn't even continue to college. Sometimes it just doesn't work out. It simply happens.
But they were the other ones - the people who weren't destined to have a normal life. Those who dropped out of high school and just started to live by their own rules and who tried their best to go through life without some bigger problems. 
Your mums usually told you not to be dumb, not to hang out around these people, stay out of their presence and ignoring them as well as you could. But some of them weren't that bad, they weren't the garbage of the society as your mums told you. 
Every one of them had a reason to be as they were - usually it was a reality-based reason, something that made a perfect sense when explained, a serious social issue. You just had to ask them - some of them became gang members to help their family financially, others had committed prostitution, some of them were part of the black market with guns. Most of their fates circled around money. Money, the thing you need to survive in this cruel, cruel world. 
Love meant a lot to those who wanted it. But money mattered way more. You needed money to survive - it was to survive or to be killed. No other options were remaining. 
You lived in a small town since you were born. Everyone knew everything about everyone. It was just as simple as that. It took you by surprise when your parents told you that you'll be moving out of your birth town in the next few weeks to some strange suburb on the other side of America. 
You heard that it actually snows there during winter which was a pleasant change from the hotness of Arizona. Also, it was nearer to the bigger cities of the United States - and you were pumped to visit them with your mum and siblings or cousins. To shop, to see something new, to actually get some experience.
“It isn't that bad. I like this place.” - Your little brother Cal called out as he stepped out of the truck. You carefully took the box out, almost tripped because of you untied old Converse shoes you still wore even after they tore apart near the base. You had an old, rainbow t-shirt on, it basically hung on your body because of how oversized it was, it covered your Adidas shorts completely. 
“New boys. New girls. Fresh start. No history. I love it,” - Francis, your older sister, said out loud. She came out of the closet four years ago and since then, she has dated numerous girls and boys. She was going to attend local college but you were sure that sooner or later, she will introduce you to another love of her life. - “And what about you, my little bean? You feel comfortable out here?” - She hung an arm around your shoulder and you gave her a nod. 
You weren't exactly the happiest about moving out of the town you have known your whole life so well, but both of your siblings were right. The neighborhood seemed to be quiet, safe, clean and nice, just an ideal place to base a family life in. Bikes were thrown around, the kid's screams of amusement could be heard just as the birds sang and the wind around you felt wet and yet warm in a nice way.
“Come on, you golden trio. You are unpacking your things for what seems like a whole eternity! We brought some pizza and Thai if you want some!” - Your mom shouted out of the front door with a huge smile, holding the plastic bag as proof for you. 
“Go.” - Your sis patted your shoulder and got into the truck to shut the back door completely, preventing stealing. You did not wait for her, you looked at your legs, how the fresh green grass breaks under your feet and the soles of your shoes, being careful about not fall down. 
Your mum always told you to tie your shoelaces but you never really listened since you were a small kid. It resulted in a lot of falling down, bruises, abrasion and you crying loud. But you learned how to walk with your shoelaces undone. It was your own choice, after all, you chose not to tie them - and they told you all along that your life depends on what you want and what you don't want. 
Your parent always told you how easy it actually is to live in your generation - that you can use cellphones, that you can use the internet, that they are taking care of everything you could probably need. 
You thought about it a lot - and you came to an opinion. It was not easy at all. To live in your age. It felt more like surviving than living for real. The drugs were easily accessible for the younglings - even your big sis was a serious stoner back in your hometown and you knew that it will not take long her to find the local dealer and become friends with him. The cyberbullying was a serious issue that made a lot of people's life worse, the bullies could easily find your personal information, your old photos, they could make fun or a living nightmare of you and your life. And when your nudes leaked out? Holy shit, you were fucked like hell.
Yeah. You were a high-schooler. But let's face it - almost everyone who tried to make a move with someone or who was in a relationship had sent a nude at some point in their life. It was some kind of a norm for the children your age. 
You were constantly in danger thanks to the great internet and that was a fact. The adults tried to teach you how to behave on the internet... But truly, did any of you actually give a crap? Every one of us took it as bullshit, not taking them too seriously. Who was actually safe around you? Drugs, alcohol, sex, porn, cigarettes, money everywhere around you. 
It was so easy to become corrupted. Just like everyone around you. 
You were not that innocent at all as well - your big sis was really popular back in your hometown - she was truly smart, she was funny, she used drugs and smoked, drank regularly. She was invited basically to every party in the town. Some of them were wild, some of them were pretty muted thanks to weed and ecstasy which was always distributed there. 
You smoked at the parties and did some shots - that wasn't so bad. Kids your age did a way worse thing at those parties. 
Your mum and dad knew that you and your sis attended some parties but they didn't know that there were drugs and alcohol present. You were the Sunday church raised children after all (which didn't mean that your parents discriminated or turn their backs to their oldest child when she said she's into girls a lot), they trusted you.
They often laughed that they have done it too. Sure, you smiled usually, but did you see a girl who is dozed off after Lexauryne, have you felt the actual fear about her life? Have you ever seen what shit Valium or heroin does to someone? Have your friend almost jumped off the roof when they took too much LSD? But you never said anything out loud. 
You have seen things. But everyone did. It wasn't easy to be a teenager in your age. 
Every one of your friends slowly became one of those types your parents always warned you about - at least a part of them was just like the people they talked about to scare you off. Maybe you were one of those people as well. What could you know?
You had your dinner with the typical witty sense of humor of your parents and the usual bickering between you, your little bro and older sis. You felt safe at those moments, away from reality, just chilling with your fam. 
The next morning was your first actual day of school after a weekend of moving in. Your dad went to his new workplace for the first time and your sis and your mum stayed home to continue with unpacking.
"You should get up or you seriously will not go to school on time." - Your mum peeked into your room and you just mumbled something in response when Fran took your bed with her monster attack as you called, tickling you, kissing you into your hair and laughing along with you.
"Get your lazy ass off the bed, ma's right. I'll ride you to school." - She laughed and laid next to you, looking you in the face. You smiled at her, smoothed your hair and yawned. - "Ah shit, you thought about that again, didn't you? You'll be just fine. This is a good neighborhood, ma and pa told us yesterday. Nobody will shove a knife on your neck and threaten you to do drugs or take your money. Nobody will take your pics while you pee. I swear. You'll be alright, baby girl." - She kissed your forehead tenderly.
Fran always said that you worry about too many things. And she often said that you're way more adult than she'll ever be. But she didn't forget to mention that it's harming you a lot in a way.
"So that's how you make girls fall for you. I see it now." - You teased her. She took a pillow and smacked your head with it. But she laughed. Then Fran stood up and stopped at your door to take a last good look at her baby sister. - "Get your lazy ass up and have some good breakfast. We have something about forty-five minutes before you, I and the last shithead would have to go. Go get 'em, tiger!" - She yelled and clapped her hands, letting you alone.
You got the smallest room - Fran demanded the one on the second floor, saying it was for her study purposes. She lied. It was the only room with a balcony and she needed to smoke weed somewhere. Your brother had the second room because he could be a little brat and a pain in the ass sometimes. So you and your parents had the room on the first floor.
But you liked it. It was easier to make it comfortable and you could open a big window to look out on the street. And you had a big bed nonetheless so you were just fine about your new room.
You better did what Fran said - took some of your other shorts from your wardrobe, then you took out your favorite Lion King oversized t-shirt with Rafiki printed on it and you completed with a big ass hoodie which reaches up to the middle of your thighs. You put on some high socks on because you loved the look of them rolled down to your Converse shoes.
You cleaned your face and brushed your teeth and hair, putting it into a bun which was all over the place as always, then you tried to make your face more appealing with some eyeliner and mascara but in your eyes, you looked like a mess. You put your old, torn apart but trustworthy backpack over your shoulder and took off to the kitchen. Everyone was already eating, dad reading the news on his phone as he always used to.
"I don't want bacon!" - Cal yelled almost frantically and that almost freaked the living hell out of you. He loved bacon. What was his deal?
"What is it, young man?" - Mum asked and looked at him. Thanks to Fran's shit-eating grin you knew that she's the one responsible.
“I must declare that I am a proud vegetarian from now on.” - Cal said with a serious face and you just burst out of laughing. Cal was always like that. Smart pants. But he never was socially awkward. He just used some words that were too complicated for a boy his age.
“Oh really?” - You mum asked with a surprised face, watching all of you with her witty jokes prepared face. - “And why is that? Y/N will love to have some more bacon.” - And so it was. Another three slices to your empty, hungry stomach. Maybe Cal's sudden vegetarianism had some plusses to it. 
“Fran told me that it will make me more appealing in front of the girls. And I am a ladies man.” - Cal told with a serious face and that was the moment Fran’s grinning face bursted out of laughter as well. 
“You're also only thirteen years old, pal. No girls until you're at least sixteen. But you do you.” - Your dad said all of a sudden. You loved them so much it sometimes took you by a surprise. 
Then, when the breakfast was over, you went out to your sister’s car. Your dad had one and Fran was given your mum’s car. Your ma said shell take the bus to work so it's ok for Fran to have her own car to do her business with. 
“Okay, shithead one and shithead two. Are you ready for your first venture to the big, scary world?” - Fran joked and waves to ma when you were doing your seatbelt on the co-driver’s side.
“Bring it.” - You said, turning the radio on. It was a station you didn't know, some new hip hop songs. But it was enjoyable, so you just let it play, rolling the window down, leaning your crossed elbows into it. You were aware that your hair will be even messier after that, but you wanted to feel the actual atmosphere and energy of your new hometown.
You felt free from your burdens once again - the hip hop was almost screaming out of your car, the air felt cold between your hair and the sun shined on your skin gently. You were watching the new, strange people who lived there, walking in schools direction, groups of friends, some alone kids, some kids were riding bikes. 
It seemed to be like your old home yet it didn't feel like it. Something was just out of its place and weren’t sure if you can put that thing back. 
The car slowly drove next to some gas station or a small shop, you couldn't tell. But something caught your eye - a boy standing with his back turned to the car, in a long sky blue shirt with some clouds painted on it, jeans and a seriously short hair which color you couldn't figure out. You stuck your head out of the window, inhaling that view until you could. 
Something drawn your eyes in his direction, something told you that you should watch him. He was smoking, that was for sure, and moving his hands, probably talking with someone. 
The boy slowly disappeared because of some other building but you would swear that he turned in your direction as well. The air you were holding in slowly came out of your lungs as you slowly leaned to your seat. Francis was watching you but remained silent, just smoked her cigarette with her right wrist out of her window.
When the car stopped, Cal was almost immediately out of it, saying goodbye to you and Fran, but you remained there, leaning more and more down, trying to be invisible for the others.
“Chop chop, out of the car. You will have a great first day at your new school and you will find some friends.” - Fran told with a smile, smoothing your naked knee with her palm. 
“How can you know?” - Your gaze fell on the big hall leading to the main entrance, to all of those strange people there. That didn't feel right. You were scared for your life - new surroundings, new people, new feelings. How many of them tried some drugs? Will you even find someone to be friends with? The feeling inside you felt like exploding, the unsureness, the unknown, the fear. 
“Because I know your little bratty ass since the fucking day youve been born, dumbass.” - She laughed and undid your seatbelt, opening the door for you. - “Show those bastards who you are and that you are not afraid.” 
And with that, you got up and watched as Fran waved you and took off in her car. And you felt lost.
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pavcrti · 4 years
Text
chicago’s very own pavarti kumari has been spotted on madison avenue driving a rose gold model x , welcome ! your resemblance to mishti rahman is unreal . according to tmz , you just had your twenty fifth  birthday bash .  your chance of surviving new york is uncertain because you’re fiery , but being eloquent might help you . i think being a pieces explains that .  3 things that would paint a better picture of you would be fresh fields of lavender that expand into a cotton candy sky , the reflection of the sun caught in the glimmer of a crystal , rhyming couplets professing deep - seeded emotion . ( i ghost write songs for artists who like to claim they write their own work . ) & ( cis female + she / her  ) +  ( emily , 25 , sher / her , pst )
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holy shit , it’s ya girl . i’m back after needing a bit of a break from being in a group . and bc i honestly adored this place sm and i made so many great friends here i am back . . . 👀 i expect plots with each and every one of u btw so u best deliver . i desperately wanna get this finished before i pass the fuck out . i’ll be joining the server in the morning , but in the meantime if u wanna be my friend  👀 👀 titsiana praises satan#7989
    biography .
name : pavarti kumari 
age : twenty five
gender : cisfemale
zodiac : pieces 
sexuality : bisexual 
profession : singer / songwriter 
hair color : black
eye color : brown
piercings : both lobes , nose 
tattoos : none
voice claim : jhene aiko
released albums : sail out ( ep ) , trip 
miss pavarti was born in bangladesh . her parents are both 100% bangladeshi and immigrated to chicago when pavarti was four years old . she had an older brother who was five years older than her . his name was siva .her family traveled back every summer so she is very immersed in the culture of her homeland and is a very spiritual person as a result . from a young age , pavarti had a fascination with the english language . not only was it so complex , but there was so much that could be done with it as well . she loved poetry and different types of prose . she also developed an absolute adoration for hip hop as a result . she’s been able to work several of her lyrical inspirations in her albums , something she would’ve never anticipated growing up as an immigrant child . when she entered middle school , she joined the school choir as an extra curricular activity which is what inspired her love for music and introduced her to her vocal talents . within time , she began combining her inclination for poetry with her voice . she wrote her first song at thirteen and began to freestyle for her friends . unfortunately , she was never taken too seriously by her peers . she was a female , hardly the usual suspect for the rnb , soul vibe that her voice conveys . before she graduated high school , her brother siva was killed in a car crash . the unexpected death of her best friend and protector sent pavarti into a spiral . this begun her tendency to alter her reality to escape from her pain with the help of drugs . she frequently writes about her brother in her music . when she was eighteen , she was discovered , ironically , by a manager of a local rapper at a poetry slam she was performing at . she impressed him and he introduced her to his client . this is how pavarti entered the hip hop scene , albeit , in secret . in hip hop , it’s very custom for performers to write the tracks that they put out themselves . pavarti learned that she could learn the skills of the trade whilst making her own connections and making pretty good cash , as well . as the years progressed , the notoriety of her clients rose . she’s written bars for multiple big names and by harvesting these friendships , she was able to get signed to a record label and put out her first ep at age twenty one . it was well received by critics and pavarti was thrilled to be taken seriously as an artist doing what she loves . she kept working , kept her nose in her business and released her first full album , trip , just last year . she feels like she is constantly growing artistically and finds herself inspired everywhere she turns . she’s currently working on her second full album and just dropped a new single , p*$$y fairy . other than that , there’s not too much else to note in her history . she did not grow up rich , rather she’s only recently come into wealth . her money is very new and she’s not too skilled at spending it wisely .
    personality . 
okay , so this will probably just be a long winded explanation that no one really asked for / needed but here we go ! first and foremost . . . pavarti is a dreamer in every sense of the word . she’s whimsical , she’s connected to the earth around her . she drifts off into elaborate day dreams and tells herself stories in her head as she falls to sleep . she is very spiritual . she meditates twice a day . her house always smells of incense . she has an affinity for weed and hallucinogenics . she really enjoys writing under the influence . her album trip is literally inspired by several drug experiences she had that had a profound impact in her life . pavarti’s general demeanor is borderline wall - flower . you wouldn’t expect her to be so shy , but she is . she’s the giggly girl who’ll hang back and let someone else come to her first . in the meantime , she’s taking in every single detail . she’s incredibly observant . sometimes she thinks in poetry . she realizes that she isn’t the typical visual for a female hip hop , rnb artist but it’s truly her passion in life and her art flows through her . she says more in her songs than she does to the people she needs to and that can definitely be problematic . with that said , pavarti is very well spoken . girl knows how to sweet talk her way through just about anything . but she also has the temper of a devil . she does not tolerate being fucked around with . she has that attitude about her where she will go and key your car if you hurt her or one of her best friends . people typically wouldn’t expect such an explosion from someone so outwardly sanguine and easy going but she’s the type to scratch someone’s eyes out if she has to . her music is her spouse . this fucks her up relationship wise a lot because she tends to let chances pass her by because she would rather stay undistracted . she has an ego , but not really in the outward way that one would anticipate when ego is involved . she knows she’s talented . she knows she’s attractive . but she also knows that she’s fucking lucky to be where she is and she’s grateful . pavarti is the type who wakes up with a smile because she has another twenty four hours to be alive . she doesn’t take things for granted --- she used to , until she lost her older brother and she realized just how quickly things can change . pavarti is a fiercely loyal individual to her friends . she will stand up for them , no matter what . the thing is , she expects it back . she is very much aware of her self worth and does not react kindly to a one sided vibe . 
    plots . 
ok , ok , ok . . . so how i am going to do this is offer up some songs / song pairings for songs that i believe pavarti has written for specific people with certain plots in mind for at least her side of things . and then i will also list some basic plots that aren’t based on anything in particular , but are still plots that i would like very much to have ! the links go to lyrics ! all plots are gender neutral , so ignore any pronouns that are in the songs .
bed peace / stay ready / while we’re young --- fwbs with feelings : pavarti and your muse have been friends for a while . somewhere along the line things crossed the line and they began hooking up . it’s obvious that they feel something intense for each other but something is always in the way of them being together --- plus , neither are really sure if the friendship could withstand a romantic relationship crashing and burning . so here they are , stuck in this awkward limbo . they hook up , hang out , awkwardly third wheel when the other is dating someone else . it’s an interesting dynamic and pavarti wouldn’t deal with drama with anyone else but your muse . they have a really compelling bond and neither can think of life without the other but things have been like this for a long time and there is only so long a relationship as complicated as this one could actually function .
the worst / comfort inn ending / moments / when we love --- exes that ended badly with lingering feelings : this was . . . just a crazy hot and cold relationship . when it was hot , it was fucking hot . when it was cold ? damn . hell itself could freeze over . they probably have done and said a lot of nasty , nasty shit to each other . at the same time , they could’ve been literally planning their wedding at some point because they both were incredibly serious about each other . in comfort inn ending , pavarti suggests their relationship was a result of her cheating on another boyfriend to be with your muse and your muse ultimately cheated on her as well . we can discuss that but i would high key kill for the extra drama . around the time pavarti was writing her first full album , they had a rekindling that inspired her to write moments and when we love . i don’t envision this relationship having ended in a decent way from there , though . more cheating ? fighting ? they were definitely toxic . she’s definitely planning on dragging their ass some more in her tracks .
lsd / sativa --- platonic soulmates : omg so this plot is . . . so fucking cute . but these two would basically die for each other . there is zero sexual attraction , just genuine , pure love . they do everything together . but what really sealed their bond ? well . . . many different intense acid trips , of course ! they love to get high together and forget about the world . they both feel like they can trust the other because they have been present for so many life - changing moments . they rarely go a day without seeing each other and absolutely never go a day without talking in some capacity . sometimes they fight like siblings . but pavarti would honestly kill for your muse . there is nothing she wouldn’t do for them . 
new balance / newer balance / you are here / clear my mind --- the romantic bad influence : this plot is another messy piece of trash . from the beginning , when they first met , pavarti always thought your muse was too good to be true . they reminded her so much of her brother . she felt this sense of peace with your muse . she fell in love quickly but at the same time , felt like there was something looming over their relationship . like it wasn’t permanent . like it’s all just a dream . the bad influence part isn’t portrayed too much in the lyrics other than stressing pavarti’s fear that your muse isn’t exactly who they say they are and this relationship is doomed to fail somehow . she knows that when this explodes in her face that it’s going to destroy her . i see your muse bringing out edgier sides of pavarti’s personality . they party a lot , they influence pavarti to do crazy things with them and she does and she feels so alive with your muse . that is , until , it all crumbles . the facade is destroyed and whatever it was that your muse wasn’t being upfront about shatters the way she feels for your muse entirely . she feels betrayed . clear my mind is pavarti’s way of trying to hype herself up to be stronger than she really is . 
never call me / --- best friends turned enemies : this is my last long one i promise , wtf , why did i decide to do this . anyways --- this plot is again , a shit ton of angst so enjoy that . your muse and pavarti used to be the best of friends . inseparable . that is until things went south . fast . we can discuss what it was that happened between our muses but it was something huge and preferably something where they both could stubbornly blame each other . pavarti feels slighted because she thinks that your muse should be the one who reaches out and perhaps your muses could be thinking the same about her . 
romantic plots : crushes , unrequited love , hateship , party hookup , friends with benefits , secret fling , summer romance 
platonic plots : give me close friends ! and tons of them please ! thanks . roommates , drug buddies , confidants , unlikely friendship , travel friends , only friends in the dms , enemies turned friend
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sgt-revolver · 4 years
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ULTIMATE Beatlemaniac Tag!
I was tagged by @ourladylennon and @johns-prince to complete this questionnaire. Thanks for the tags, I honestly really enjoyed answering these questions.
How long have you been a fan?: I’ve been a fan for as long as I can remember. I always loved hearing their music on the radio and my music teacher was a fan, so he’d regularly play their music in his lessons and on one occasion I saw like the first 30 minutes of A Hard Day’s Night. I think I only got as far as the scene with John in the bath before he turned it off. But it’s only been during the last 2 and a half years that I’ve listened to them more often, and I’ve finally listened to all the albums all the way through. Now I’m a huge fan and can’t live without their music.
Favorite Beatle: John. It’s always been John for me, even back when I was a kid he was my favourite.
Favorite era for music: I’ll always have a soft spot for their early-mid era music, around 64-66 is my absolute favourite.
Favorite era for lewks: Teddy boy and the whole of 1966 for me. They simply looked so fucking cool around those two eras. The teddy boy era was just hot with all the leather they wore and how they tried to make themselves look ‘tough’, and during 1966 that entire year seemed to be a huge transitional period which mixed with their earlier career and how they looked later on.
Favorite song: This changes, and I do not have only one favourite song. I’ll always love Strawberry Fields Forever, it is always up there as one of my favourites. Same with I am the Walrus. I also love If I Fell, Nowhere Man, In My Life, I’m Only Sleeping and Something. There’s more but this answer will be too long if I keep going.
Favorite album: Revolver, no question. My username is based off it too.
Unpopular/Controversial Beatles opinion: Not necessarily unpopular but I really don’t like Yoko Ono as a person. I wish she didn’t try to make herself part of the band, it’s actually really infuriating. I don’t like to talk about this sort of thing so I’ll leave it at that.
A song everyone loves but you dislike: Ok I don’t necessarily dislike these songs, but I think Hey Jude and Let it Be are overrated.
A song everyone dislikes but you love: Run for your Life, Blue Jay Way and Revolution 9. I’m not really sure why Blue Jay Way isn’t well liked its underrated imo.
Your fantasy involving The Beatles: Seeing them live in concert, before they become big and go to America, preferably in Hamburg or at the Cavern Club. It must have been amazing to be able to be where they started out before Beatlemania, the atmosphere omg yes please. After the show I’d try to do anything I can to meet them, but I suspect I’d end up being so starstruck it would be painfully awkward, but it would be so worth it.
Tell us about the moment you knew you were a fan: There is no one moment I knew I was a fan, but I guess I realised I was a big fan when I listened to their albums all the way through, and I enjoyed them. There’s also the time when I watched the Eight Days a Week documentary and I couldn’t help but love them so much.
Did you ever have a genuine ‘The Beatles suck!’ phase before becoming a fan?: Nearly. This was after I became a fan but a long time ago, I kept hearing constantly how they’re not that good from people I know irl and it almost got ingrained in me for no reason at all. I’m glad I didn’t have that phase, otherwise I would be beating myself up for it now.
Favorite Beatles book: I haven’t read any yet, but I really want to and I’m not sure where to buy any (I’m a bit iffy about buying off Amazon)
Thoughts on the old generation of fans: They can be a bit full of themselves, but I like hearing their stories and their preferences on their favourite albums. Most of the older generation of fans I personally know seem to love John and hate Paul, so I automatically think they’re all the same but I know that’s not true.
If Hollywood were to make a high budget Beatles biopic, what is one thing you desperately hope they include?: I’m personally unsure if I want a Beatles biopic as I know they’ll mess everything up but I want them to include the strong bonds formed with each other and that they never actually hated each other.
Do you read/write fanfic?: I read a lot of fanfic, but I’m not confident with my writing ability so I don’t write anything. Yet.
Are you the only one in your family/friend group to enjoy them?: Both my mum and my dad claim to be fans. My step dad loves them though, yet every time I bring it up with him when he mentions them he ignores me completely, and its painful. My friends either think they’re overrated (they’ve probably only listened to Hey Jude, All you need is love and Yesterday) or they just don’t care/don’t know who they are. And if anyone I know is interested in them, they just mansplain everything to me so I can’t really enjoy listening to them or talking about them with others irl.
Are you a shipper?: Yeah I am.
Favorite movie starring/made by them?: A Hard Day’s Night.
Do you believe in McLennon?: I believe they were soulmates, definitely.
General opinions on McLennon?: They loved each other, there is no doubt about it. The signs are obvious, like the eye fucking, how they were literally inseparable for years and their LSD trip they had together. I do think it was mostly platonic though, and that any romantic attraction was one sided from John. I think Paul was oblivious to some of John’s feelings for him during the 1960s and that upset him.
If you got to change ONE thing about their history, what would it be and why?: The break up, they hurt each other’s feelings so much from all the suing and fighting they were miserable. I would make sure they ended things more amicably and I’d make sure Allen Klein does not get a look in at all during 1969. Seeing Paul get hurt like that is awful.
What song has the best vocals?: This is a real hard one to answer, but I’d say Twist and Shout, Helter Skelter and Norwegian Wood.
What song do you feel had no effort put into it?: Wild Honey Pie.
What is a well talked about moment in Beatles history you genuinely believe to be false?: Yoko wasn’t fully responsible for the break up the Beatles. I believe it was everyone’s fault to some extent, some more so than others. I think John caused the most damage to the band as a result of him putting in nearly no effort and having Yoko on his shoulder every day. Ringo quitting for two weeks is when I believe things were really starting to fall apart, and they never really recovered from that.
What is something you KNOW to be true, but often gets erased in their history?: John was bisexual, he’s pretty much admitted it as well. It gets dismissed constantly though. All of the Beatles were nice, amicable men who had their flaws and did what they can to become better people. None of them were gods, and none of them were inherently terrible people. John and Yoko’s relationship was toxic and incredibly unhealthy. They weren’t as happy together as the books and the Lennon estate make them out to be.
Least favorite look from a Beatle(s): John’s Sgt Pepper moustache. It just didn’t suit him, but then there was his beard from 1969. The beard looked disgusting and way too messy. I don’t think he made any attempt to keep it clean and that he just didn’t give a fuck about it, he just left it there to get worse and worse each passing day.
Favorite look from a Beatle(s): Shea Stadium, on all of them. But when John’s sweaty and his hair is a mess, he just looks fantastic. I also love the suits all four of them wore in Cincinnati in 1966.
I’ll tag @princessleiaqueen @theliverpoolsoldier @underwallsandbridges and @latinxbeatles and anyone else who wants to do it. Don’t feel like you have to do this, but I love reading everyone’s answers :)
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biznichwrites · 5 years
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Hi, how are you? I hope fine! ❤️ I have (a little strange) a request. Can you write a one shot about Giyuu and reader being together, but reader finds out Giyuu is kissing another girl and runs away, with Giyuu following her, but reader ends up being hit by a car and she is in coma but then she wakes up and all happy and fluffy things in the end? Thank you, and sorry for the bother! ❤️
My one shot skills are a little rusty, I haven't written a true fan fic in about… 6 or 7 years LOOOOOL but I'll give it a try! I’m sorry I haven’t written this one for you yet, it left me a bit stumped for some reason. 
I put this under a cut because it came out to be like 5 pages long (WHOOPS I APOLOGIZE FOR NOTHING)
Giyuu wasn’t one to kiss others, typically. He was always loyal, typically. The boyfriend you bragged to others about, typically. But typical wouldn’t over this situation now, would it?
Or at least that’s how you rationalized what you were seeing. You were coming to meet Giyuu for a party after classes and work, but you desperately asked him to come so you couldn’t back out now, even though you really wanted to. Maybe you could make an appearance and dip, you doubt your boyfriend would have an issue with that. As you walked up to the party you tried to call him to receive no answer, not to mention your texts from earlier weren’t answered as well. Well, that was odd, but maybe he took the initiative and went to the party ahead of you! 
Pocketing your phone you walked up to the party and things fell into a hush. Well shit, that’s awkward. Shinobu was the first to snatch you from the crowds of the party and bring you to a quiet hallway.
“What the actual hell is going on?” The cute butterfly clip in her hair betrayed the strain in her voice.
“What are you talking about? I told you I was coming to the party and dragging Giyuu along.”
“Ah, well it seems there’s a miscommunication going around.” With a twist of your face and a confused tilt of your head she continued. “We were told you weren’t coming, but things should be fine.”
“Should be?” The short woman was always a mystery and full of sass, so you didn’t question much. Before you could even get a breath and leave the hall Mitsuri made her way down to you. Was something really that bad?
“I was so worried about you when I heard! I had no idea what was going on.” The pink haired woman had obviously had a couple of drinks and seemed as if she were floating. 
“No one told me what happened and now I’m getting anxious. All day I’ve been at class then work, is anyone going to tell me?”
“Shinobu didn’t say?” A gasp flew from the other woman’s lips. “It was said you an Giyuu broke up!”
“WHAT?”
No. No, no, no. Not an option, you were going to be together forever. 
“Someone was showing messages from you that said you didn’t want to see him again. But now I think about it, there wasn’t really any way to prove who it was…”
You wanted more detailed but you heard Giyuu’s voice though the party goers. So he showed up without you? With a rushed apology to the love guru of the dorms you bolted off to find him. You found him in the kitchen of the frat house, pouring himself two drinks. Two??? He didn’t look especially sad, or happy, or really anything. 
You couldn’t say the same for yourself. There was some rage, to put it lightly. Especially as he turned towards you a girl popped up, pulling his face to hers to grab a few sloppy drunk kisses. 
THAT BITCH. She had always been trying for Giyuu long before the two of you got together. You were so mad that you froze. You could hear two voices from behind you, sounding awfully like the women you spoke to earlier. 
“See, Giyuu, I told you that wasn’t real. No one other than her would-” Whatever snide comment Shinobu was going to make died on her tongue as she came to the scene.  You rage took a deep plunge, spiralling out of control in mere seconds.
So if you broke up with him he had someone to replace you that night? Was that really all you meant to him? And with a girl you never trusted to begin with? Even your friends knew better, but he, of all people, didn’t?
Tears blurred your eyes as his own locked with yours, making time stand still for a moment, and you darted past the crowds. You wanted to go home, you didn’t need to be here. Misturi called for you but it just made you run faster. Not today, you couldn’t deal with this right now. You made your way through the house, ignoring calls of your apparent ex-boyfriend.
You just wanted to make it to your car, at least you could shut everyone out and find some semblance of stability enough to drive home. Right as you hit the street you heard his voice calling clearly, something about wait, and despite your better judgement your head swung around to look at him. Why did he have such a horrified face on?
---------------------------------
You woke up in a weird room. What the fuck is going on? Jesus, everything hurt. Why did your body feel so strange? A choked groan left your lips as your eyes adjusted to the light. This sucked, from what you could tell you were in the hospital. You didn’t even remember much about how you got here. Did you get black out drunk? Someone spike a drink with LSD and you tripped way too hard?
With effort you brought your hands up to itch your eyes. Well it was a shitty enough night, all things considered, you needed to get out of here and go home. When you went to stand up some alarms went off and you couldn’t stop the pounding in your head that followed.
“Damn, just shut up.” Your voice sounded scratchy, like it didn’t belong to you, but that was the least of your problems. With a huff you turn towards the door to get a nurse to turn off the machine, but Giyuu is standing there, looking shocked. Why was he looking at you like that? You’d just seen him a couple of days ago before class. 
You’d never seen him move so fast. Everything in his hands was on the floor and he ran up to you and scooped you up in a hug. What was that noise? Was he crying? You would move your arms to push him back to see if he was okay, but the sheer number of IVs in your arms stopped you. 
“I was so worried you wouldn’t wake up.” His lips brushed your temple and it left you in a state of shock. He was never so affectionate, not in any amount of time you’d been with him. Strange. “Let me get the nurses so they could discharge you.”
--------------------------
If you were to be honest the whole thing was a haze. The next day you were allowed to come home after a few scans. In fact it wasn’t until your discharge paperwork rested on your lap did you even realize it was going on. When the doctors said you had “been out for a while” you had expected a day or two, not 3 fucking months.
On your way out of the hospital you were absolutely losing your shit. Your job, your classes, your bills, THE PLACE YOU LIVE. Oh fuck, your life is over. Giyuu picked you up but you were getting car sick fast, but the glances you saw weren’t going to your place. 
“Giyuu… Uh, where are we going?”
“Home.” So eloquent, a man of few words. “I’ll explain when we get home”
---------------
You sat on his bed, looking at your belongings filling the once empty space of his room. He said he had things figured out, this isn’t what you had expected in the least.
“You might be upset with me.” Maybe, things were just weird as hell now. 
“I talked with your parents to make sure you were taken care of.” Shocking, considering he never really spoke to them, even during visits. 
“So um… Your stuff is here. To make sure your account didn’t overdraw from rent your parents broke the contract.” Probably the only reason your phone was still working. 
“Your classes… I finished them.”
“What?” You could only take so much, like damn.
“Your parents had them transferred to online versions, so I completed them for you. It was too late to withdraw and I know you didn’t want an F on the finals”
You didn’t know how to respond. Of course he said he loved you, but he really meant it. Like REALLY meant it.
“Giyuu-”
“I’m sorry. For everything.”
He didn’t really go past that, but he didn’t seem to want to let you go. 
------------------------------
“I know I shouldn’t have.” Finally he told you what happened. He hid his face behind his hands, but you could still tell his eyes were on the verge of tears. “I was hoping to see you there, I wanted to see you face to face. I shouldn’t have started drinking, I should have thought about you.” 
You hadn’t seen him cry over anything so much, especially for your sake. Even the anniversary of his sister passing didn’t get such a reaction. Slowly you moved closer, as best as you could where you were with recovery. 
“Giyuu, it’s okay.”
“It’s not.” He huffed, but at least he was looking up at you.
“Well, yes and no. It wasn’t an okay experience, but things worked out, right?” Your hand rose to his cheek, cupping it as you brushed away a stray tear.
“Things working out, like I ruined your life?” He looked over, seeing a few faint marks along your body that weren’t there before. “I don’t know how to live with myself for letting this happen to you.”
You shut him up with a soft kiss. He really couldn’t deny you, now especially.
“I love you, Giyuu.”
“I love you, too.” 
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Things Below
Voices. Voices, everywhere. Emily peered out the window from the backseat of the patrol car. Locked in, but free to hear all these confusing voices. She could hear the thoughts of the people the car drove past, picking up fallout from the minds of people on the sidewalk.
“He gave me too much change. Tough shit, sucker. I’m not telling and I’m keeping it. Those stores are insured against this kind of—”
“I’m late, I’m late, I’m late; oh my god, I’m gonna lose my job. What about—”
“I forgot to lock the front door. To hell with whatever he’s saying, I’m sure as hell that I forgot—”
“Stop staring, dumbass. Jeeze, I think I need to jack off in a bathroom stall, otherwise she'll—”
Emily didn’t even care about reading the thoughts themselves. She used to figure people to be thinking drivel like this just by looking at them. No, the reporter wanted to see how well she could focus this ability—how well she could control it. As far as she was concerned, she had developed a superpower. With it, she could change the world.
Only one thing gave her reason for pause; gave her a reason to worry. If she wasn’t dreaming—if this all was real—then it meant the demon she had met at the delicate age of 21 had been real, too.
The edges of her vision turned into streaks, stretching into infinity, blending together in a wild blur of colors and shapes. She only caught glimpse of their faces, all unimportant and forgotten within seconds, but their thoughts reached her mind in fragments, like a rain of glass shards falling into a bottomless pit. Clipped, ripped out of context—like switching rapidly through radio stations and never hearing anything out.
Officer Stanton glanced back at Emily through the rearview mirror. Judging by his furrowed brow, he was concerned about her mental well-being. That was when she realized that her head kept bobbing erratically, moving on a constant swivel. She must have looked like a crazy person to this cop.
“Your nose,” he said after clearing his throat and training his eyes on the road again.
Confounded, Emily dabbed her nose, only to find blood on her fingers.
The splitting headache set in. Or it had been there all along, except that it now cranked the dial to eleven in the very second she stopped tuning in to the thoughts of all the passers-by. She muttered a short curse and a emitted a soft, nervous chuckle.
Looked like the superpower came with a little price tag.
But it had already paid off. Under other circumstances, she would have had to go out on a limb in trusting this “Officer Stanton.” Letting him lock her into the backseat like a common suspect or criminal. But what choice did she have? A bomb turned her apartment block into a blazing inferno, she woke up naked in a dumpster, and she had no phone, no money, and was now wearing the borrowed clothes of her friend Maria—who probably had her pegged as crazy and she should never talk to again.
Scanning Stanton’s thoughts had revealed a certain level of surprising purity. Blue-eyed, this shmuck hadn’t seen anywhere near the amount of horrid things Emily had seen in her time as an investigative reporter, looking into human trafficking and pedophile rings. He was as concerned as she was about Detective Tanner, her single only trustworthy contact in the police—who had gone missing.
Reading Stanton’s mind, Emily knew that this cop had his heart in the right place and was going out on a limb himself. She looked and sounded like a crazy person, had no identification, and lied to him first thing upon their meeting. He had a lot to lose himself.
And she couldn’t tell him everything she had witnessed.
“I was drugged and abducted,” she had admitted to him in that first encounter. Only part of the truth she could speak without sounding like she had lost every last marble.
The other part involved what she could only describe as a trip into hell, where she was hounded by an antagonistic demon she dubbed “Stinky Jim.”
Eight years ago, Emily met Stinky Jim for the first time, though she did not have such a name for the demon yet. Had she known it was real, she would have lost her mind. She would have been the Other Emily, the Lost Emily—the one sitting in a padded cell, rocking back and forth, gibbering, and disconnected from reality.
If her recent awakening—the event since when she could read minds and bend space itself—had taught her anything, then it was that reality itself was a strained, malleable concept.
Even human identity crumbled in the face of enlightened scrutiny.
Back when she was 21, working the sixth McJob in a row before she got smart, got her GED, and got into studying to become a reporter; she still hung out in a basement with the rest of the “gang.”
She remembered that night with stunning clarity. The edges on everything remained sharp. The dive in the basement of the home of Rodney’s parents had burned itself into the pages of her memory.
Her birthday—the night Emily turned 21.
Both on the surface and in all things below, she was a different person. Dyed her hair pink, piercings in her ears and on her brow, royal blue lipstick, torn heavy metal T-shirts. Loved ranting about politics, economy, and social justice; but never lifted a finger to do a damned thing about it.
Just like then. They were sitting in Rodney’s parents’ basement, sprawled out over ratty old couches and chairs with the TV set and old video game consoles, smoking weed, and the four boys listening to one of her many unnumbered tirades on LGBTQ+ rights.
“Shut the fuck up if you ain’t gonna do anything ‘bout it,” Chris told her. “Gay Chris,” as he was nicknamed, which didn’t bother him at all once they grew older—he wore the name like a badge of pride.
His voice cracked as he kept the smoke from the bong in his lungs and passed it on to Carlos, and Chris added, “The fuck do you know about any of that, straightie?”
That stunned Emily. That’s when everything clicked for her. When it all changed. Speechless, she silently agreed with him. Everything she knew about the gay experience was theoretical or secondhand, drawing from Chris’ experiences.
But that’s when she found her true calling.
She wouldn’t “shut the fuck up about it.” She refused to, because it would have been against her nature. She would do the legwork, and tell the world. She would relay the truth, even when it hurt, or when it got her and others into hot water. That would be her strength. Her destiny.
It would take till the end of that week and some feverish reading until she figured out that journalism was the way for her to go, but that was the same night when Emily really took the reins of her life into her own hands, and forged the path she now followed with furious determination.
Carlos chortled, then took a long toke from the bong before passing it on to Rodney. Emily remained silent.
With her most recent rant dead in the water, and the only active water being the one making the bubbling and churning sounds whenever anybody inhaled another hit from the bong, her thoughts drifted. The night of her birthday dragged on like many others in this very place, the matter of her birthday only standing out by the amount of weed they would have burned through by the end of the night.
She loved these boys like her brothers. Loved the countless nights they spent together, shooting the shit about their work, their messes of what could barely be described as love lives, playing video games together on the couch in this same basement and getting into swearing matches more heated than the actual gameplay, going to metal concerts together, or talking about philosophy and spirituality into the ungodliest hours of the morning.
Some time around 2 AM, Carlos had already passed out. He snored in the corner with a pile of empty potato chip bags and plastic bottles piled onto him like a work of art. Chris had gone home to get some sleep because of an early shift the next day. Only Jimmy, Rodney, and Emily remained. Stabbing Westward’s Ungod was playing back from the old iPod in a soft volume.
Rodney climbed back onto the couch and slid onto the cushions between Jimmy and Emily. His eyes were bloodshot from all the beer and weed they had been kicking back and he gave her a stupid grin.
“Got something special for this special occasion,” he said in a conspiratorial tone.
He unfolded his fingers and presented three little things. To Emily, they looked like stamps or pieces of perforated cardboard just resting on his palm, each of them marked with a pastel yellow smiley face.
Before either Emily or Jimmy could ask, Rodney said, “LSD, hoes. Lucy seeing diamonds—in the sky—or something. So, uh, anyway, how about we go on a real trip?”
Jimmy’s brow furrowed and Emily snickered at him. Buff Jimmy over there, the racing car enthusiast who loved tuning cars and speeding in them, accustomed to acting like the biggest badass of their little gang, was now all skeptical and intimidated by this harmless-looking drug resting in Rodney’s hand.
“Fuck it, why not?” Emily asked.
“Nah, I’ll pass,” Jimmy predictably said. “Y'know what, you should too. Also, I should get back home and get some sleep.”
Jimmy scrambled to leave, looking half asleep already, and muttered a goodbye to Carlos who continued to snore away, oblivious to everything going on now.
“Pussy,” Emily called out after Jimmy just before he flipped her off and closed the basement door behind himself.
Rodney and Emily got a good laugh out of Jimmy’s departure. Then Rodney turned his head and waggled his eyebrows at her, holding out the three slips of LSD still.
“I could put one back, or one of us takes two of ‘em,” he said, letting his voice rise sharply towards the end in challenge.
Emily squinted and then snatched two of them out of his palm.
“Happy fuckin’ birthday to me, I guess,” she said, grinning with him in challenge, wondering if he wasn’t going to chicken out himself.
She stuck her tongue out at him like she was about to lick Rodney’s face, then placed the two pieces of LSD on her tongue and retracted it. Swallowed.
“How long?” she asked.
“My dick?”
“Fuck you.”
Rodney cackled and told her it would take two hours. They settled on re-watching Scream—one of Emily’s favorite horror movies. They talked over the flick, as usual. Laughed as Carlos turned over in his sleep at one point, knocking over the pyramid of junk piled onto him without even waking up, and they both wondered loudly if they weren’t going to have a horror trip if they watched a horror movie while tripping on LSD, like the idiots they were.
The movie ended and Emily still couldn’t tell if the drug was having any effect on her system.
“Get me another beer, beer bitch,” she told Rodney, softly kicking him in his thigh while she drooped lazily over the other half of the couch.
He got up and went to the small fridge in the corner of the room. She blinked and wondered why he did that without giving her any lip. Even on her birthday, Rodney wasn’t wont to do what she told him to. Returning to her, he uncapped the bottle of beer and held it out to her.
She took it and looked at him in disbelief. Rodney himself looked befuddled. He blinked and looked around. Was the LSD finally kicking in for him? If so, why was it taking so long for her?
If him tripping balls meant he was a compliant little sheep, she was going to have some fun with this. She pulled out her flip phone and started recording a grainy video on the device.
“Hey, Rodney, why don’t you stand on one foot and spin around in a circle for the audience,” she told him, biting her lip and sensing that he would do exactly as told.
And he did. Almost stumbling over the coffee table and falling onto his ass in the process, he did exactly that. Emily covered her mouth to stifle a giggle. She stared at him through the display of her phone, making sure to capture his dumbfounded facial expressions.
“Rodney, tell the world how much of a little skanky whore you are,” she said, mouth agape with a grin so wide that it almost hurt her cheeks.
“I’m such a little skanky whore that I’d eat Paris Hilton’s ass with whipped cream and a cherry on top,” he said, slurring it out as if his consciousness slipped farther away into a trance or delirium with each additional word.
Emily burst out laughing, “You will never live this one down when the others see the video, dipshit.”
Yet something crept up behind Emily. A dark, foreboding sense of something alien and sinister. It only reached the back of her mind with a delay: she heard Rodney’s thoughts before he did or said anything that she told him to. Or rather, she projected her self into him and he complied, pliable like a piece of wet cardboard.
These thoughts made more sense now, in the present, when she knew she could read minds. But back then, she had chalked it up to the acid trip. The day after, she would go back to her normal life, letting the details fade away into oblivion, dismissing them as nightmarish nonsense.
Except for the knock on the door.
Not the door leading in and out of the basement, but the door to the boiler room. A room where nobody should have been inside.
The hairs on the back of her neck stood up and she stared at it, wide-eyed and terrified. Rodney followed her gaze because she willed him to pay just as much attention to it.
Knock knock. Again.
Or rather: THUMP THUMP. Deep, bass. Menacing.
“Rodney, go check on the clown hiding in there,” Emily told Rodney, not even thinking things through. She couldn’t even chalk it up to the booze and drugs.
All she knew was that she feared whatever awaited behind that door.
Like sleepwalking, Rodney approached the boiler room door. Twisted the knob. Opened it.
A soft red light glowed, engulfing him. A light out of this world. It flickered, danced—like flames. But no heat or fire awaited beyond the door. Only madness.
Emily walked there herself, intrigued by the mysterious light. Her whole body tingled with dread, yet she could not help but approach. She knew deep down, lurking beneath the surface of her thoughts, that something evil awaited there. Something that would drive her insane. She didn’t need to approach, should have turned and fled from Rodney’s basement. But curiosity won out over common sense.
She stood next to him and peered into the place beyond the door.
There was no boiler room there. Instead of the dingy little room with the big cylindrical something, some old plastic crates, and a bunch of pipes and valves—a flight of stairs stretched down, winding around a curve. The fiery red light flickered from the depths, beckoning her.
“Rodney, go lie down and sleep.”
He acknowledged her order, not speaking the affirmation out loud but just thinking it. Emily, however, didn’t even register how the thought had reached her like a spoken word. She could taste his dread riding on the back of those thoughts—salty, smooth, bitter, clamping his throat shut and cutting his breath short.
But her eyes fixated on these stairs. Made of obsidian, covered in strange, indecipherable symbols, bearing names on each step. Names of the lost and the damned. The forgotten and the famous. She could not read them, but she knew the names were important. She would read them again one day, but that was not this day.
Rodney laid down onto the couch and fell asleep within an instant. His thoughts turned into a soup of drugged dreaming and Emily shut them out, probing for any presence at the bottom of those stairs. To see if anything dwelt there, any things below.
“Come on down and find out,” something replied. Not in words, but thoughts. Smoky, crackling like wood in a fireplace, with embers rising into a dark and starry night.
Emily took her first step down those stairs in this other-space. Then another. And another. She tread down this path, and the stairwell narrowed as it twisted and turned on her way downward. She burned with curiosity to find what things lay hidden in the depths.
The door slammed shut behind her and something laughed. Something in a deep, bellowing baritone, like a monster straight out of some horror movie. The laughter died down into a chortle, egging her on to turn around and see for herself.
Fear overtook her and prevented her from turning to behold this demon. This madness. She knew it was there, right behind her. Fetid breath rhythmically struck the exposed skin of the back of her neck. The thing was huge, like a man two heads taller than her.
“If you don’t have the balls to look at me, then you better keep movin’, little girl,” the demon spoke to her, cackling some more. The words carried the air of a threat. “What are you afraid of finding down here, anyway?”
More laughter. Sinister. Knowing. Knowing her deepest, darkest desires, and secrets she would learn in the future
Her heart thumped against her chest, pounding so hard that it threatened to explode out of her rib cage any minute now. And whether she was tripping on the LSD, having an overly vivid nightmare, or this was indeed real, she dreaded turning around and instead continued on her descent.
“Welcome to the maze, Emily,” the thing’s voice crackled. Flames licked from its voice and the biting smells of charcoal smoke and sulfur filled her nostrils, stuck to her tongue. Way too real to be imagined, yet even now, she struggled to explain how this experience or even this memory could be real.
Because right now, she sat on the backseat of Officer Stanton’s car. But the vivid recollection of this memory sliced through time and space, reaching her in the now. The demonic presence still lingered, lurking behind her, occupying the space in her mind.
The unwanted guest renting one of the rooms in the mindscape of Motel Emily. The neon sign of vacancy flickered unsteadily.
Where the stairs wound down further, she reached a door branching out to the side. Or rather, the word “door” didn’t really cut it. It was a stone portal, covered in more symbols or otherworldly runes.
Without thinking, she pushed it open, hoping to find escape from this place, praying to reach Rodney’s basement again, or appear back in Stanton’s patrol car. The past and the present started bleeding together. Had she really experienced all this, back then? Was this the madness, overtaking her mind, surfacing now, tainting the present and overwriting reality?
“This is as real as it gets, bitch,” the demon said, cackling yet more.
The pink-haired Emily celebrating her 21st birthday and tripping on LSD didn’t understand what she saw beyond the portal once she strained herself, putting her legs and back into pushing it open, her nerves fraying with each inch accompanied by the sounds of stone grinding against stone.
Beyond that portal, she saw another Emily, stripped half-naked, handcuffed to a curtain rack, with some man with a painted face sliding a knife into her exposed back. Bodies of the dead and the dying littered the dark and ruined room of some derelict house in that place and Helpless Emily screamed in agony.
Younger Emily gasped and backed away from this scene of carnage and despair, recalling a memory of something yet to come, which Present Emily knew already and remembered as the time the Grinning Man came close to killing her.
The man with the knife, with the face painted to display a horrid grin over a face of cold and sociopathic indifference, turned to look at Younger Emily. She pulled, tugged at the portal with all her might, desperate to close it before something worse happened.
The Grinning Man, that serial killer, turned from Tortured Emily. He tilted his head, staring into the stone portal in disbelief, studying its frame. Before Younger Emily succeeded in fully shutting the portal, he approached with swift steps, ready to pass from one place into another.
But she slammed it shut just in time, just before she could decipher shouts from beyond the portal.
Worse, the demon remained. Right behind her.
She dared not turn around completely to look upon its horrid visage, but glimpsed it from the corner of her eye. Red like a devil, covered in spikes and horns and smiling at her with a maw lined with rows and rows of jagged, shark-like teeth. Blackened, knife-shaped claws opening and closing in anticipation, ready to rip her to shreds if she looked at it for too long.
It cackled again and Emily continued down the stairs.
“That was you,” it said. “That’ll be you, in the future. You fuck-up. Nobody’s proud of you, Emily. Accomplishing nothing of value. Only watching people die in squalor and misery. You are nothing but a worthless witness. A voyeur in a voyeuristic world.”
Hearing the demon speak in such a modern vernacular and imagining to be such a clichéd presence clashed in her mind, and she almost turned to confront the creature. But she read its thoughts and they mirrored her own.
The first time she realized that turning only meant embracing the madness, and ending up in that padded little room, all alone, locked inside her head with drugs—and not the sort that Younger Emily found fun.
Picking up the pace, she continued down the winding, hellish stairs. The walls drew closer together with each step, never moving, but converging in angles that made her descent more claustrophobic with each passing moment.
Present Emily knew she had to break free of this memory, because it was bleeding into reality. The demon was taking hold. She dabbed more blood from her nose and barely perceived the world outside the patrol car, rolling by. This memory was real, made even more real through recent realizations, and recalling it now was rendering it even more visceral than ever before. The knowledge of Present Emily collided with the memories of Younger Emily and they coalesced. They coagulated.
She passed by another stone portal, almost screaming at what she felt from behind it. Younger Emily did not know what awaited there, but Present Emily did not want to see it, and the two of them refused to push it open and look inside.
“Yeah, you keep walkin’, you hypocritical asshole. Eager to discover the truth, but just another chickenshit,” the demon said.
Instead of the inevitable laughter she expected to ensue, the demon growled with anger, reflecting a rage welling in her bowels, only overshadowed by the terror and fear now gripping her heart and driving her down the stairs, faster and faster.
“He’s dead, Emily. Julian’s dead, and it’s all your fault,” the thing snarled.
Its hoofed feet thundered down the steps behind her, keeping pace with ease, the hulking presence chasing her down deeper into this pit of insanity.
“No,” she finally dared to reply, but the demon mimicked her word, mocking her. Then she repeated herself, “No, that’s not my fault. Not like with the others. Not everything is my fault.”
“Maybe not directly, but what if you never entered his life? What if he hadn’t been on that parking lot, that day? He might not have had some crazy stalker cave his skull in with a two-by-four. So maybe it’s still your fault,” the demon growled.
“Shut up,” she said. Then screamed it. “Shut the fuck up!”
“Yeah, shut the fuck up if you’re not going to do anything about it, right, Emily?”
The demon’s voice reached a fever pitch and now chased her. She ran, taking multiple steps down the well in strides, pushing through the narrow pathways, wasting no time to wonder how the demon’s sheer mass could fit through here behind her. The stink of fear erupted from her pores in a sheen of sweat, the heat of this hell engulfing her, and the stench of burning flesh rising from the depths.
The stone walls wriggled. They were not made of obsidian anymore, but worms. Millions and millions of pitch-black worms, things that did not belong in reality but were all too real. Slippery, alive. Writhing, as the mass reached out to her like walls of tiny fingers covered in myriads of chomping little mouths, provoking a shriek of terror to escape Emily’s throat, and the demon to laugh its sadistic laugh at her.
“Run, Emily! Run away, you disgusting fucking coward!” The demon spoke in many voices, those of Chris, her father when he slapped her cheek, the monster on her heels, and even herself. They all blended together. One of many, many in one.
There it was again: rocking back and forth, drool dripping from the corner of her mouth. White, padded walls all around.
Was she truly there? Was this even real? Was her entire life just a lie? Figments of her imagination, trying to make sense where none was to be made?
The stairs split into different pathways and Emily knew what to do. Present Emily wiped more blood from her nose and stared at her bloodied fingers in disbelief. Younger Emily had discovered her destiny, was glimpsing horrors from her future. Of the three possible ways to go, she squeezed into the narrowest one, screaming silently as she felt the wriggling mass of worms engulf her with the heat of a thousand fires, causing her skin to blister and painfully peel back. She clenched her teeth shut and feared the things entering through any orifices but pushed forward.
She had to live. She had to fulfill her destiny. She remembered all the people who died, or rather, those who would die.
She could change the world, but only if she didn’t give in now.
“Shit, I’ll give you a tissue once we reach the precinct,” Stanton said. His offer; his words helped, centering her in the now. The words he spoke bled through into that dark place where Younger Emily found herself, an unknown voice from a stranger from another world, or another time, piercing the veils of different realities, and guiding her through this horrid darkness.
The demon grunted and cackled and choked on the worms entering its maw as it squeezed itself through the narrow, suffocating passageway, following Emily without fail. It clawed its way forth, causing a cacophony of disgusting squelching noises, and sensations that reminded her of bones snapping to the point of sharp edges bursting through skin and protruding from human flesh, and teeth gnashing on exposed innards with blood spurting out, gushing, and the reek of feces in the air.
Her eyes long clamped shut, she dared not breathe but had to, and felt first worms trying to wriggle their way into her mouth. She sputtered and spat them out with an angry scream, controlling the rage that drove her, clawing her own way forth, mimicking the demon’s motions. Or it mimicked hers.
The stairs went upwards and she ascended, pulling her way through the narrowest spot of these walls of worms, fleeing up the stairs. The demon tumbled, but then continued giving chase on all fours, like the beast that it truly was. Like the beast in the back of her head, the madness always just a few steps behind her.
“You can’t get away from me,” Stinky Jim cackled, only to abruptly choke on his words, gagging and coughing up more worms. Through rows of bloodied, gritted teeth, he said, “I am always with you, Emily.”
She tripped, fell, scraped her hands on the jagged edges of the obsidian steps, right in front of one of the names inscribed upon the stairs: Xerxes. Younger Emily blinked, did not quite register what it meant until years later, first dismissing this memory and experience as a bad trip, induced by popping too much acid and being tired out of her mind.
Screams echoed through the infinite, infernal stairwell, bouncing off the walls and curdling her blood until she realized: the screams were her own. The demon’s growling matched them, blended in with them, and she screamed in pain as claws dug into her back, lifting her onto her feet and pushing her up a few steps until she ran on yet farther, stumbling forth and upwards, ever away from the madness that followed her wherever she went, ever away from the things below.
The things below the surface of her mind. The horrid things she pushed deep down to still her mind; the darkness she drowned in whiskey and cigarettes even as she grew older.
This could have been her awakening but she skidded right past it. It wouldn’t be for years until she had her world turned upside down. Never realizing the power she held. The demon followed closely, keeping her blood pumping and the adrenaline flowing like fire in her veins.
She reached a stone portal at the top of the stairs and pushed it open. Instead of meeting resistance and stone grinding upon stone once more, it swung open with ease. She burst right through it and stumbled again.
Catching her breath, wheezing, lungs screaming but only pained sounds emerging from her lips, she looked around. There was no demon behind her. Younger Emily, with her pink hair, and her piercings, and completely stoned, stood in Rodney’s basement. Behind her was only the door to the boiler room.
Rodney slept on the couch, curled up into a fetal position. Carlos slept on the chair, sprawled out, still blanketed by some empty plastic wrappers. Static on the TV screen.
Emily ripped the door to the boiler room open, needing to know if that had been real, but there was no hellish stairwell behind it. Just the regular old boiler room that it should have been, reeking of oil.
The demon’s laughter echoed in her mind. She checked the time, noting how many hours had passed and chalking this whole experience up to a bad acid trip after all. She didn’t go home, afraid to be followed or stalked out there in the dark and cold and wet autumn streets, all alone.
Even though she found blood when she wiped her nose, Younger Emily figured it fit. Demons and hell weren’t real. She didn’t have the power to control minds or enter strange otherworlds.
She curled up on the end of the couch, wrapping herself in a smelly old blanket that Rodney should have washed weeks ago. Although she thought the nightmarish imagery and things she had just witnessed would keep her up until the other two boys woke up, exhaustion dragged her into the realm of sleep within minutes.
Emily sat in the back of Stanton’s car, finally escaping from this memory. She looked out the window, at the people in the streets of New Haven. Instead of reading their minds, scanning their thoughts, and testing the limitations of her newfound powers, she decided against any of that.
“I’m still here,” the demon said—Stinky Jim. He sat right next to her, just out of sight.
The fear welled up again, churning in her guts as if the monster gripped her stomach with a claw and twisted.
“I’ll always be with you, Emily. Just one step behind. You ever want the security of that little padded room—to surrender all responsibility, let the world sort itself out and sink into darkness while you drool in the corner—you just turn back. Let me take the wheel,” Stinky Jim said. He cackled again, showing no hint of mercy.
“Or you keep going deeper down, scratchin’ at those wriggling walls, and dive into those lakes of blood and shit and fire. Find out what’s beneath the surface. Drown in the secrets of those things below, or spit ‘em out and curse the world with your wretched knowledge.”
More cackling.
Emily clamped her eyes shut. She willed Stinky Jim to shut up.
She centered herself. Pushed away every thought. Blocked it all out—she had gained that much control over it now. Focused.
Breathed.
Pushed the demon deep down, where it would lurk. And wait.
With the things below.
—Submitted by Wratts
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tessatechaitea · 4 years
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The Invisibles #1
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If I had to pretend to know anything about art, I'd say this cover represents how pop culture can kill. Or will blow your mind. Or feels dangerous but it's actually pretty safe because the pin is still in the grenade.
What the fuck do I know about art and why the fuck am I assuming this comic book is going to be about art anyway?! Just because Grant Morrison wrote it and I happen to think Grant Morrison has written some pretty smart comic books? Well, I'm pretty sure he's written some huge fucking turds too! It's just that I haven't read any of them that I remember. Apparently I've read a few issues of this but I don't really remember it. I don't like to tell people that I don't remember it when they talk about how great it was because that's admitting that 22 year old me wasn't a discerning critic of his entertainment. At least I also can't remember the truly garbage comic books I was reading in 1994 as well! So it's possible I read this and thought, "I'm so smart because I understand what's happening!" Now I'm terrified to read it because I'm absolutely certain I'll think, "What the hell is going on in this comic book? I'm such a stupid asshole!" Oh boy. This comic book is forty pages long. Get ready for a review that explicates the first fifteen pages thoroughly while also digressing twelve separate times before quickly summarizing the last twenty-five pages so I can go play some Apex.
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I can't say for certain this is a shot at Ann Nocenti but, thankfully, I can say it's definitely not a shot at me!
This guy is Elfayed. He's retrieved a mummified scarab from the desert believing it might be a sign for the mysterious bald man with too many face piercings and the endeavor he's currently on. Which is a mystery because Grant Morrison isn't going to let the reader understand the comic book on the first page! Sheesh! The second page doesn't help explain things but it does place the word "synchronicity" burning in my brain like a buzzing, blinking neon sign.
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Get it? Mummified beetle. Dead Beatles. Boy throwing a Molotov cocktail. Pop culture and violence. I think I intuitively understand this comic book so 70% of the rest of what I say will be dick jokes.
The kid throwing the explosive is one of three members of a gang called the Croxteth Posse. Every youth in Britain joins a gang no matter how stupid and lame they are. It just proves how hard they are even if they never throw one Molotov cocktail or ever even get their genitals touched. The gang members run off into the night, past some "King Mob" graffiti which will be important later, yelling, "We are the boys! We are the boys!" Is that a thing lame youth gangs in London did in the 80s and 90s? Because I remember Lister and his posse saying that shit about being the boys of the Dwarf when they thought they were acting hard on some adventure that probably involved Lister fucking a future version of himself. The Croxteth gang are from Liverpool because Croxteth is a suburb of Liverpool. It shows how imaginative these youths are. I bet there are at least fifty different Croxteth Posses bumbling about at night destroying things. The bald guys name is Gideon (and possibly King Mob. Unless the antagonist is King Mob. I should probably keep reading to find out) and he's both young and old at the same time. He's probably some kind of spirit of the zeitgeist or something, Grant Morrison's Jenny Sparks. He's looking for a new recruit for his own gang since something happened to John-A-Dreams. He might have just died of old age because Gideon's other acquaintance, Edith, is now 95 years old and sulking in her mortality. He wants her to contact somebody named Tom to let him know he thinks he found their new recruit. I think it's probably the anarchist kid because I know how stories work. I'm starting to think maybe The Invisibles are a bit like the Upright Citizens Brigade. Their only enemy is the status quo. Their only friend is chaos. Except there will be less skits with people wearing giant papier-mâché cat heads and more ultra-violence. The arsonist kid's name is McGowan and he's smarter than he acts, according to his teacher who gives him the old "you're not fulfilling your potential and your friends are just dragging you down" speech. But what kind of an anarchist would McGowan be if he gave a shit about what his teacher thinks of him? Oh, that's right! He'd be a good anarchist if he really gave a shit and a bad anarchist if he didn't give a shit but he let the teacher's words affect him anyway. That's how anarchy works, right? The problem with anarchy is that it needs a few rules to make it work well but you can't enforce any rules or else you're not living an anarchic lifestyle. Here's my definition of anarchy from Places & Predators, my roller playing game: a philosophy where anybody can do anything they want without worrying about some stupid guard putting an axe in their head. But they have to worry about everyone else putting an axe in their head all the time because there are no guards. I should probably read The Dispossessed by Ursula K. Le Guin instead of all these stupid Han Solo and Lando Calrissian adventure books.
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Oh, well McGowan's mother withholds love and affection and blames him for all the ills in her life. I suppose I can now forgive him for torching the school library, right?
McGowan heads out to sit in the cold and watch John Lennon have a conversation with Stuart Sutcliffe. They joke about being dead and it's funny because they are dead. Stuart even says he wants to die young which is doubly funny because he does. Ha ha! McGowan doesn't laugh because maybe he doesn't find gallows humor funny. But some weird creature that speaks some German does laugh. He's all, "Ha ha! They're going to die young! Oh ho ho! Such jolly fun! Now join with me, you dumb kid." He also says some German stuff that I can't make sense of because I don't speak German and I don't want to ask the Non-Certified Spouse what it means. I could use Google but I'm being extra lazy right now. McGowan tells the weird German tourist to fuck off because he doesn't care about anything. But you know what kind of people actually care a lot about everything? The kind who need to tell everybody that they don't care about anything. Only people whose feelings are super hurt say stuff like that. And maybe serial killers. Later McGowan decides to prove he doesn't care by suggesting he and his friends blow up the school. Not because he cares how they think they know everything and they want him to be just like them and all adults lack affection and sincerity. No, he just wants to blow it up because he doesn't give a shit about nothing, man. The scene switches to the bald guy who might be King Mob on an LSD trip. It's nothing like taking LSD but I'll pretend it's all metaphor and analogy and spiritual nonsense. In his trip, he sees a gigantic head of John Lennon. Mostly because the whole trip was to summon this head. It's a double page spread of psychedelic images and nonsense mixed with Beatles lyrics and album titles. Strange that Morrison fails to translate an acid trip involving The Beatles when The Beatles themselves have a song that I think most feels like and describes an acid trip. No, it's not "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds"; it's "Strawberry Fields." If I had to state what my favorite Beatles song was right now, I'd say "Strawberry Fields" even though Magical Mystery Tour might be my least favorite (later) album (although now that I type it, I remember it contained "Penny Lane" and "The Fool on the Hill" and "All You Need is Love" and I guess I was wrong about Magical Mystery Tour being my least favorite album). I added the later because their early pop shit doesn't really resonate with me. I don't think I appreciate their music until after they've met Doctor Robert. Just listened to "Strawberry Fields" and now I'm crying. Fucking great song. While trying to burn down the school, McGowan is caught be his teacher. He gives his teacher a brutal beating and then answers a question he refused to answer in class, just to show he's both smart and violent.
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McGowan's arrested and Hugh Laurie sentences him to hard juvenile labor.
I was speaking of acid earlier and I'd like to recommend the documentary on Netflix called Have a Good Trip, especially to people who have never done acid. It's enlightening. You might think that my favorite part was one of the crazier bits about hallucinations or one of the stories about how something odd always happens when on acid (it totally does) but I think my favorite bit is when the musician from Bikini Kill, Kathleen Hanna, tells the story about how acid made her realize that you didn't have to cross the street along the legs of the two triangles comprising the square intersection but can just cross along the hypotenuse. It's not that the idea is mind blowing or even close to an "A-ha!" shower thought; it's just that's the kind of mundane thought that seems like a fucking magic revelation when you're on acid. It's the epitome of the acid experience. LSD makes the mundane profound which is way more exciting than you might think. If you've never done acid, you might have fucked off to the comment section just now to point out that the universe is a wonderful and magical and profound place even without acid. And I fucking agree. But LSD makes everything profound. Every single thing you see or think combines with the fabric of the universe and it all becomes staring at the stars and wondering how it all fucking fits together. But you don't need space or infinity or philosophy; you just need LSD, a stapler, a bottle of water, and a Jack Kirby comic book from the early 70s. Dane McGowan is sentenced to ten weeks in a juvenile facility called Harmony House. It's where violent teenage boys aren't taught to stop being violent; it's where they're taught to use their violence to benefit the government! At least that's my guess. I like to pretend I know what's happening in the comic book as I write the review and then later I delete the wrong assumptions I made and replace them with lies to make me look like a Grandmaster Comic Book Reviewer! Actually, that last sentence was a lie. Normally if I get something wrong, I just write "Oops!" later and then tell readers to forget the terrible mistake I made.
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This is the plot to every young adult dystopian book ever written: "Society says conformity is good. But one young spunky individual with weird hair won't submit and will save the world!"
Sometimes I feel the only people touched by stories about the individual refusing to be a sheep of the status quo are people who tend to be sheep of the status quo. To rely identify with the hero in one of these stories, the reader needs to have though of themselves as part of the status quo and felt the need to participate in some activity that would prove that they weren't. Instead of, you know, just being themselves and never actually giving their place in society a second thought. I find odd people who are inspired by a story that tells the reader to be themselves. How is that inspiring unless you never really knew that was an option? And how could you fucking not know it?! But then again, Heathers is one of my all-time favorite movies and I suppose that's got a similar message about being oneself. But it also has murder and some seriously great lines of dialogue and Christian Slater blowing himself to bits.
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Oh, remember where I mentioned this comic book was basically screaming "synchronicity" at me and that I understood it on an instinctual level after page two? Grandmaster Comic Book Reader!
The leader of The Invisibles (man, I wish the comic book would just tell me that the bald guy with piercings is actually King Mob already) decides to infiltrate Harmony House to make sure their soon-to-be new recruit, McGowan, is doing okay. I'm sure he'll find he's fine because he's not buying into the whole "be a soldier of the status quo" bullshit being fed to the young boys at the institution. It's easy to be against a Headmaster who thinks arguments like "Liberals love freedom but do they want people to be so free that they can steal their VCRs." But will he be able to stand up against the techno-brainwashing and the influence of the mystical creature running things from behind the scenes?! Probably but only with help from the Upright Citizens Brigade. I mean The Invisibles.
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It's surreal that this is the way we thought of controlling the populace in the 90s: turn them into content sheep without any anger or frustration. And yet the exact opposite of that is true: control them by making them angry and frustrated at as many lies and half-truths as you can.
The big twist reveal isn't that the boys' brains are cut up and messed with; it's that the boys genitals are removed as well. Yeesh! Now I'm angry and frustrated! I'm totally against this Harmony House bullshit. Is this actually happening red states?! Horrific! King Mob (yes, they finally reveal that's the bald guy's name) rescues Dane from Harmony House while shooting a bunch of people (including the Headmaster) and blowing the building to bits. It's a good thing we learned the real antagonist was some dick-eating creature called the King of Chains. Dane McGowan isn't ready to join The Invisibles which King Mob was ready for. He had a tarot reading earlier that said the kid was going to have to be put through the wringer first. So he leaves the kid in London and disappears, just so we all know why they're called The Invisibles. I guess Batman is a member? The Invisibles #1 Rating: B+. This issue was forty pages long and it felt like it used every page to move the story along. It's insane that that's one of the greatest compliments I can give a comic book. Way too many writers just fill their scripts with nonsense because they don't have a real plan for their story. I know everybody espouses the idea that a good comic book story should teach the reader something new about the character. But unless learning that Superman can punch something harder than he previously thought he could, or Batman is super resilient and can take a ton of punishment for five issues before rising to the occasion through pure force of will, most comic book writers really don't put a lot of thought into themes. Sure, sure. This sort of feels like the mystic super hero version of Catcher in the Rye which might be why I stopped purchasing it after six issues. Although it's just as likely that I stopped purchasing it at six issues because my infrequent visits to the comic book store made me miss Issue #7 and I just gave up on it. It's not bad and it's put together well and as a young 48 year old who thinks the man can go fuck himself, I'm totally into it's message about being a unique individual! Anarchy rules!
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