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jcmorrigan · 3 years

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What movie or tv show scared you the most?

OH HEEHEEHEEEEEE MY TIME HAS COME

I think this was probably the sign I was meant to be a horror fan, because I'm gonna talk about two movies here and neither one is a standard horror film. Now, I avoided horror films like the plague, but I now realize that's because of my aversion to jumpscares and gore, which have very little to do with actual scary stuff. I feared actual horror imagery as a small child, but basically once I read Coraline it all just turned around because that book gave me nightmares but I actually WANTED those nightmares and kept going back to the book. So what are the movies I just COULD NOT contend with?

First up, I have found that a lot of people have said this one, but really and truly, fuck Chicken Run.

I was...maybe ten when I watched it. Signed up for a goofy claymation adventure. What did I get? First of all, a whole lot of bleak color palette that warned me that this was not going to be a happy story. We are then shown the stakes right away: our entire main cast lives in a dystopian prison and if they do not find a way to escape, they will die. One DOES die. This is where a lot of people say they noped out right away, but actually, the execution of the dinner chicken in the first scene was tame for me compared to what would come next.

The pie machine. It's assembled, it's talked about, and eventually our two leads fall into it in a way that is designed to be fatal. Look, there are a ton of horror tropes in this scene alone. I haven't seen it SINCE THE ONE AIRING and I can still vividly tell you a lot of this. And if I walked into a horror film and asked for this, I'd come out super satisfied, but I was not expecting horror from this. First of all, I remember vividly the shot where you're looking from Ginger's POV falling down the shaft and the divider comes up to shunt her into the "meat" line. It's incredibly claustrophobic and you just get this almost jumpscare reminder that the character through whose eyes you see is regarded as nothing more than meat to be consumed. There is then an array of blades designed for close calls, and dough that essentially glues the lead characters down to a conveyor belt so they have to helplessly watch the death machines that are coming. Sticky stuff that roots you to one spot; that's another thing that just REALLY unnerves me and I love it if I'm reading CreepyPasta but I was not reading CreepyPasta; I was watching a children's film. The leads escape certain death by jamming the gravy system, causing the machine to overload on pressure, and here I feel like I should've been relieved that they escaped but instead I was the most unsettled of all when the pressure meter started climbing. I don't know if this film *gave* me a phobia of industrial accidents or if it just awakened what was already in my OCD little brain, but suffice to say that after this movie, I was hyper-aware of my own fear of things like hissing steam, rising pressure meters, and being in a room where large metal things were clanking. (I'm since over it; I've been exposed to it in enough things.)

Now, I was no quitter. I should have just noped out. But I didn't. I continued to traumatize myself. The next part of the film until the climax I don't remember so well - it wasn't as traumatizing - EXCEPT for the part where Ginger finds and rebuilds Rocky's circus poster. And now, as an adult, I can see how that was kinda supposed to be funny, like, "The goddamn chicken padded his résumé and the way they found this out was a circus poster." But little me was invested in these chickens, I wanted them to be happy, and what I saw was basically their death notice being signed with that scrap of paper with a cannon on it. I FELT that in my bones.

STILL NOT HAVING THE GOOD SENSE TO JUST EJECT THE TAPE ALREADY, I proceeded to the climax, in which what happens to Tweedy might be one of the most fucking awful things I've seen ever? Pinned upside-down in a superheated, confined space with rising liquid from below as the pressure meter starts climbing again. And her husband arrives just in time to see her like this but not in time to actually stop the explosion. Thank God it didn't actually kill her because even though I was already traumatized, that would've absolutely made it worse.

Thing is, ever since this movie scared the absolute shit out of me - and was probably the cause of the weird stomachaches I had for A WEEK after - I've kinda had this thing about reclaiming the scary parts and stomping on them while laughing maniacally. I feel like every time I've done a crossover project, there's been a temptation to write in an arc where the mains go up against THE PIE MACHINE and fucking win. And also there's whump with tons of comfort in my version to mitigate it all. I haven't done any such thing for TBTC...YET. But I know what I must do. I know who must destroy the machine and the Tweedys along with it. Buckle your seatbelts.

My final word before I move on is that as I ascend into adulthood, I think that for the most part, a rewatch of this film wouldn't traumatize me so badly. It'd still be gross and creepy in a way I think shouldn't be sent to children without warning, but I could deal with the imagery, maybe enjoy using it as whump fuel even more, maybe my horror side would really get into the peril this time. But the one thing I've realized is that this premise is fucked EVEN MORE if you're a grown-up, because as a child, you're sympathizing with the chickens. You want them to get free of this death camp environment. But as an adult, you start to realize that all Tweedy wanted to do was be a chicken farmer who sold pie, and her supposedly nonsentient animals ganged up on her in a display of unheard-of intellect among farm stock. This would then lead to her undergoing at least one near-death fate. Think about being a farmer in our world and the animals you keep GANG UP ON YOU LIKE PEOPLE because you're killing them for food. No thank you, no THANK you.

But surely this was a one-of-a-kind phenomenon. Surely, after this...after so many other people agreed with me; "Fuck Chicken Run"...no animation studio would ever pull shit like this again.

I had hoped that was the case until Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs.

This is one I don't actually see lambasted as often. Maybe because the Chicken Run trauma crew grew thicker skins before this movie. I only sort of did. Maybe because no one ever actually invested in this film, having already predicted how much it would be garbage from the dumb humor in the trailers. Oh, but not me. I was a fool. Also my family picked it for a movie night so my fate was sealed anyway.

The original book is actually pretty frightening on its own. Food falls from the sky in such great numbers that it starts to destroy the world. Okay, that's terrifying. But kind of in the alluring way. I would keep coming back to the one page about the giant pancake on the school because the way it was drawn unsettled me so, with something huge and immovable blocking off the way to a building that usually has hundreds of innocent children inside. The film built on this and made it a thousand times worse.

Let's start with the goddamn Spray-On Shoe. Our main character is a mad scientist (but the good kind, apparently) whose list of bumbling failed experiments dates back to when he was a child and invented a spray you could put on your feet to coat them in shoes. He then gets laughed at because he didn't engineer a way to get the shoes off, and runs home in humiliation. Guys, the teasing/bullying factor is...not the most worrying thing about this story. There's a throwaway line about how Flint wears THE SAME SHOES into adulthood because to that day they simply cannot be removed. This seems like an incredibly urgent medical problem? Having your feet encased in the same rubber for years? The same rubber as when you're a kid? I just found myself thinking "What if my shoes never came off one day" and that terrifies me, okay? It's stupid and it's silly and it scares me. Even more than that, though, is the canonization of a polymer in this universe that can be sprayed on sticky and will literally never break no matter what you do to it, because that goes back to the pie machine dough principle. Being glued to a surface permanently is inherently terrifying and we'll go over this later because this is not the last fuckin time the glue shoes get brought up.

Flint invents a food-spewing machine. It ends up in the sky. He rides his popularity as it rains larger and larger food down upon the town and also the world. Most of this film up until the climax is unsettling but not AWFUL. Where it starts to go to shit is when Flint realizes his machine is too dangerous and shuts it off, only for the town's local greedy politician to switch it back on into an apocalyptic mode. So can we start with "Local town finds out its elected official is willing to sabotage their well-being in order to capitalize on the fame of a disaster-causing object?". Like, the whole film would've been solved so much sooner if there hadn't been a saboteur in the works - not a fun campy villain, mind you, but a saboteur who exists to drive the plot to the scary place. But I guess we need that narrative tension to justify having a film in the first place, so fine, I'll ride it out.

The main crew saddles up to fly out to the machine, which is now encased in a FLESH LABYRINTH of food, and...I'm just gonna rapid-fire the shit that happens at this part:

-The food turns sentient in order to defend itself. The cute animal sidekick brutally dismembers an army of gummy bears that is fully sentient and rips them apart to devour them.

-We enter the flesh labyrinth and it's exactly as much a horror RPG setting as you think it is.

-Now sentient cooked chickens besiege the party. The comic relief character is consumed by one, only to kill it from the inside and decide to WEAR ITS SKIN in what is seen as his defining character arc's conclusion. Wearing the skin of a dead monster allows him to forge his new identity.

-One of our party has to go back because of a tight passage lined with her deadly allergen, causing her to undergo anaphylaxis after an accidental mild nick. In the flesh labyrinth.

-The entire horrific journey is instantly INVALIDATED when it turns out that instead of the kill code for the machine, all Flint has is a file of a cat video. Which he finds out as the town is about to be obliterated off the face of the earth.

-So he solves it by jamming the works with the spray-on shoe and DID I NOT JUST GO OVER HOW HORRIFIC INDUSTRIAL EXPLOSIONS ARE IN KIDS' MOVIES? DID I NOT? ARE WE REALLY DOING THIS AGAIN? Anyway it's canonical proof that NOTHING can break the shoe glue and I should be happy for the town and happy that there's no more flesh labyrinth of living meat but instead I'm just terrified because of the door we have opened. We have imparted the existence of an indestructible sticky polymer upon the world.

-It's later seen used in a credits sequence to repair damaged houses. Which, first of all, given its flexible nature, is fuckin stupid. It won't serve as an actual wall. Second, that got me thinking about construction accidents involving the fuckin shoe glue. If that stuff gets dripped on a person's face -

-So then cue me sitting awake in bed later thinking wide-eyed about Cloudy with a Chance of Fucking Meatballs and realizing that this compound that is essentially a chemical weapon in the making is now in the hands of the mayor who deliberately caused an apocalyptic event over the town because he wanted the food rain. And THAT'S not going to lead to pretty circumstances.

I think you'll see that a lot of my fears with these two movies is "THINK OF THE IMPLICATIONS!" and I think that just shows how my mind works and why I'm drawn to fanfic so much. I'm all about diving into a universe, exploring its corners, analyzing it to death.

And with the industrial horror stuff, I kinda wanna bring it around to two other films that actually really subverted my expectations and made it fun. 102 Dalmatians was a fave of mine through middle school, but I remember when the climax took us to a big ol' factory and I got plumb nervous. After the usual blades and ovens of horror, the fact that it concludes with Cruella basically wearing a cake and a lengthy montage of the dogs kicking toppings onto her is just one of the most wholesome imageries. She survived the thing and now you get to watch her be decorated Lisa Frank style by her victims who are more interested in humiliation than murder, and I love that.

But maybe more prevalent is that I'm well aware that if certain filmography or plot points had been handled in different ways, The Boxtrolls might've actually frightened the ever-loving fuck out of me what with all the industrial stuff and medical horror, but I just...felt like that film was holding my hand the whole way through going "It's okay." The industrial stuff was framed in a way that was just campy enough and yet also taken seriously. Putting a really charismatic villain - ACTUAL VILLAIN, NOT CHICKEN FARMER OR CORRUPT POLITICIAN SABOTEUR - at the wheel was just such a mitigating factor that it gelled the whole thing together and I ended up LOVING what was done with giant machines and garbage crushers and explosions. And as for the medical body horror, I really appreciate how it was so baked in that Snatcher did that to himself - that everyone, EVERYONE warned him "Do not do this, you will probably die, I'm serious, bad fucking idea" up to the point of Eggs trying to plead him during an anaphylaxis attack, one last time, DO NOT continue down this path, we can find a way to heal you psychologically and get you some self-fulfillment. And Snatcher fully chooses hubris over the many, many opportunities offered him to be able to step down onto a safer path and that removes the fear and pulls it more into a tragedy for the villain. Not at all the same thing as "Sam the reporter is trying to save the world and doing her best until a fixture of the landscape accidentally sends her into anaphylaxis."

(Oh, and by the way, can I just - when I do see CWACOM brought up these days, it's always in the context of "This is the one movie where the guy tells the girl it's okay to look nerdy!". Well, no, not the way I remember it. The way I remember it, Sam basically tells Flint "I used to have really tacky style but have since changed it up of my own volition" and Flint is just like "NOOOOO YOU NEED TO WEAR GLASSES AND A SCRUNCHIE. I WANT A HOT NERD GIRL." This could've been pulled off right with some more introspection into female beauty standards, even in a tongue-in-cheek way, but right now it really looks like Sam just wanted to make herself more glam for a new image and Flint bullied her into regressing her style. Which I've also realized meant he bullied her into dressing more like she did as a teenager and normally I think that kind of shit is just "You're overthinking it" but since it's CWACOM and I spelled it out on paper like that, I'm just now realizing how that can be seen as pretty...icky.)

The one saving grace of CWACOM is that I was older by that time, and so it didn't affect me as hard as Chicken Run. But I still hold it dearly to my heart as one of the MOST DISTURBING movies I know, and by "dearly" I mean "fuck this movie, really and truly." I want to extend my thanks to 102D and Boxtrolls for giving me industrial-horror-based climaxes that were actually really comfortable, and again, probably what drove both of these was the fact that we had a campy diva villain in the lead for the potential scary stuff to surround and radiate off. Not a fuckin...ordinary chicken farmer who is just trying to make bank but is somehow passed as a Nazi allegory for trying to live her life as a farmer? I dunno, maybe if I rewatched that film I'd see she has a thirst for human blood too, and if I could fix fic Chicken Run my first order of business would be to give her a thirst for human blood instead of/in addition to chickens.

Anyway. Fuck both these films, EXCEPT for the fact that traumatizing scenarios can always be recast as whump material, and the next time I wanna do some crossover aftercare from a physically and psychologically damaging mission, I have a pie machine and a flesh labyrinth to exploit. REALLY HEAVY ON THAT AFTERCARE COMFORT THOUGH!

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millennial-star-gazer · 4 years

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Tantric Flames: Chapter: 9

Tantric Flames

Nalu lovefest 2019 Prompts: Magic, Worship, Reckless , Forbidden and Cravings (All Implied)

Genres: Romance, Humor, New Adult Fanfiction

Pairing:Nalu (Natsu x Lucy)

Rating: M for language, steamy and mature adult sexual content (all consensual) in these and future chapters. Reader Direction is advised.(You've been warned!)

Summary: One look, one smouldering hooded gaze, one word, one fiery kiss, one magnetizing touch was all he needed for her to completely unravel at his mercy alone, succumbing to the sinful temptation of her inhibitions, his love, his feral passion, his raw, insatiable desires, his "Tantric Flames". Originally an Submission for Nalulovefest 2017 (on previous accounts) in which Natsu gives his mate a tantric massage-after much persuasion- she won't soon forget when it turns into so much more. Also previously featured in Nalu lovefest 2018 (on current accounts) , as well as Nalu Week 2017, Nalu Fluff Week and Nalu lovefest 2017 (as stated) with first three chapters on my previous celestialgeekmage accounts . Chapter 7 was also an entry for nalu week 2019 and Chapter 8 for Nalu Lovefest 2019. ( Nalu-centric) (Slight Au).

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Chapter 9: Tempted by A Tantric Touch

A/N: Hey guys, it's your girl Millennial StarGazer! This time I'm returning with another long-awaited installment of Tantric Flames. Once again, a major thanks to and koodos to @bmarvels, @mannyegb, @animezing-fandoms/princess-starry-night, and @allie-and-her-fandoms for helping me edit and further develop this chapter! Now without further ado, here's the story-enjoy!

Disclaimer: I don't own Fairytail which belongs to the one and only Hiro-sensei instead!

(Note: Scroll down pas the keep reading button/ cut for the designated links, legend and actual chapter. The tagging feature and keep reading button might not show up or fully work on the desktop site but should function just fine on the app and mobile version.

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Legend:

Italic: Song Lyrics/Quotes (or flashback dialogue)

Bold: First Person Thoughts

Bolded Italics: Empathized Word(s)

Bolded Italics (Within and Outside Bracket) including for author's side notes also known as (A/N:) within brackets (though none for side-notes in this chapter ).

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"You run your fingers over every part of my body and tease me with your touch".

(Source Unknown)

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Oh God, those love bites. So many love bites that decorated the blonde's creamy skin like jewels; far too numerous to count that always sent a red-hot line fire rippling through her nerves with with every nip, every suck; each every and stroke of Natsu's velvet tongue. Plus, he's usually doing other things at the same time. Racy images of the couple's steamy moments together from the last soak flooded Lucy's mind.

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Flashback

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The celestial mage's back arching of its own accord into Natsu's touch from robust hands cupping her breast; Blazing digits kneading the twin peaks in time with lips sucking along Lucy's pulse with so much skill that she couldn't help the heady moan that escaped her throat.

"Ya feel that, Luce?" Nastu growled in his princess's ear, the dark undercurrent of his territorial voice pulling a tingly shiver from her. "My marks all over that perfect body of yours— and not just the permanent one when you swore your heart to me . All of those are symbols of my essence, my claim, my love. That you belong to me and me alone. My mate and queen, forever and always. And those sounds you're makin'? Hot as hell."

Pretty sure, dude leaves marks on me as his way of announcing to the world I'm off limits as his mate. Explains why he's always quick to leave a fresh one in its place even after I cover them— not that I'm complaining. Plus, it's not only for his benefit but mine. It's great that he knows how much I love receiving hickeys and gets off from it.

Seriously, what more could I ask for?

Not to mention how lovely it always was to unwind with Natsu after each bath. The wizard was often keen in his offer to dry the blonde's damp hair with a towel or fire-magic-powered steam; from her perch on his lap or between his legs.

Much more relaxing than using a hair dryer if you ask me.

The dragonslayer would sometimes even hum or sing a familiar tune from days past in that appealing, gravelly baritone of his; would usually lull the already-zen mage into the world of dreams when combined with the sooth dual sensation of fingers combing through her hair, .

"I tell you, I tell you, the dragonborn comes ..."

Anyother guild member who might be eavesdropping, however, would often be quick to lightheartedly goad the blonde mage ( much to her chargin). Natsu no doubt would find this hilarious of course; which would serve for Lucy's cheeks to flush an even deeper shade of crimson than she already was.

"Say Luce, is that a blush I see?" he once crooned, a teasing edge to his words; though the affectionate mirth sparkling in his eyes warmed her heart just a little. "Aw, is my girl a little embarrassed? That's okay though— makes ya all the more adorable and endearing than you already are. You want me to make it all better? Cuz I can! Got plenty of kisses! Come on, you know you want some which I'm more than happy to give. God I love ya' so much, you know that?"

It's amazing really... Lucy ruminated in fond awe. How Natsu can switch between the different roles and sides to him with relative ease. From Romantic and tender to dominant, playful and affectionate; then back again on top of everything else all seemingly at the drop of a hat. All an innate part of his overall nature I guess— essentially what makes up who he is. Some people may find this a bit confusing to keep up with— but I don't. Just makes him all the more complex.

Though those people would also be right when they say that the dude still has a devious streak, she couldn't help but add with wry smirk. Even with me, though never with malicious intent. German suplex, non-stop tickling, dumping me in a tub of freezing cold water during one of our baths— too many pranks to count really. At least he's always quick to follow up with plenty of affection ever since we became an item— can't complain about that."

"You ready to get started Lucy?" Natsu's keen voice broke through Lucy's reverie.

"You know it!" The celestial mage chirped, unable to mask the pure enthusiasm in her voice; earning an amused chuckle from the dragon wizard . "Can't wait. I take it you'll be hoarding me for the rest of the afternoon?"

"Mhmm" Came his content hum in response." That really a bad thing, though?"

"No, definitely not."

"I figured. Why don't we get you up on that massage bed?"

"Sure thing!"

A buzz of anticipation was practically thrumming in Lucy's blood from such tantalizing implications of his words; the stunt Natsu pulled next , though— that was what really shot a thrilling jolt up her spine.

"Let's finish what we started later, yeah?"

The dragonslayer's proposal was punctuated by a light tap on the summoner's ass for good measure,; which resulted in a delighted squeal.

"O-okay!" was said female's response in the form of a breathy giggle.

"Let me get you that towel while I'm at it."

"Sure— thanks."

"My pleasure."

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A Few Minutes Later

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"Ugh...do me a huge favor and burn this towel. Will ya?"

Lucy couldn't help but let out an audible groan along with the heat rising in her cheeks. Good god was the particularly moist spot on the white towel a truly mortifying sight to behold. Basically tell-tale remnants of liquid arousal that had been wiped clean from her legs just moments before.

Mavis only knows what would happen if Levy or Cana noticed during laundry duty.

" Okay... why though?" Natsu questioned, brows drawing together in mild confusion. "As in why do you want me to?"

"Guild Laundry day" came Lucy's automatic reply."That's why."

"Not following ya.' Natsu blinked owlishly in uncomprehension.

"Levy…..and Cana….." Lucy supplied, a finger twirling an errant strand of blonde hair in :a self-conscious display." "I... uh.."

"Still don't know what you mean here, Luce."

"It's their turn to do laundry duty." She attempted to break down what was apparently such an abstract concept into simpler terms; not able to help the aggravation rising in the back of her mind.

"Yeah? So?"

"They'll probably see the moist stain on the towel." Lucy clarified, forcing her voice to remain level.

"I see— don't see the problem though."

"Think about who'll most likely be with them ."

"Gajeel and Laxus but…...ahh—"

Realization dawned on Natsu's face. "I get it now. What you're saying is that they'll probably catch a whiff of your arousal? "

"Well, the lingering remnants of the scent anyway. Seriously though?" he tacked on, lifting a questioning brow."That's what you're worried about?"

"Yeah... I am," Lucy admitted, nerves leaking into her voice. "Aren't you?"

"Not really, no." Natsu gave a shrug of his shoulders—seemingly unfazed.

"Why's that?" Lucy couldn't help but shoot him a puzzled glance.

"Cuz it'll show everyone how much I rocked your world." Natsu replied, flashing his mate a cheeky grin. " And what's not to love about that?"

"Pervert — of course you'd say that!" Lucy screeched, skin flushing a deep shade of crimson.

"That's me!"

"Ugh, still don't know what to do about the moist spot— those four are never gonna let me live it down."

"You know if you're that worried, I could always use my tongue to clean ya up instead." Natsu drawled with a lazy smirk that set her heart all pit-patter .

"And of course, you'd suggest that," Lucy quipped with a slight roll of her eyes. "Did I mention how much of a horn dragon you are? "

"Yeah, but only for a certain gorgeous blonde of mine and she loves it."

"Oh, she does, huh?" Lucy raised a challenging brow.

"Yep. Don't bother trying to deny it, Luce".

"Ugh fine... you're right. I do. Seriously, you and your colossal ego though."

"Why, thank you! If you're impressed by that, you'd really should see my co—"

The rest of Natsu's words were cut off by Lucy's hand swatting him with a pillow which was met with a snicker.

"Pervert" Lucy deadpanned with another eye roll. "By way, you would've found yourself in the proverbial dog house if you actually meant the other kind of 'fighting earlier."

Only for Natsu's face to instantly fall in response to her statement.

"What?" Natsu objected, gaping at her with wide eyes. " And deprive me of the chance to wake up to your beautiful face each morning for that long?!"

"Yep." Lucy gave a nod by way of reply.

"But why? You know that's not the type of fightin' I met!"

"Well yeah, I know that now. But not earlier when you originally brought up. Just be glad that you didn't bail on our date earlier."

"I didn't though! And never would— honest Luce!" Natsu's voice lifted into a petulant whine.

"Hmm.. Okay, good to know. " Lucy responded, raising her hands to placate him. "Though you'll have to be without me for a few days anyway.

"Wait, seriously?" Natsu faltered , bewildered panic flashing in his eyes. . "Come on! What is it this time?"

"Camping retreat in the woods next week that Cana, Mira, Lisanna, and Erza are organizing— ladies only."

"W-ha?" Natsu continued to sputter, his poor brain no doubt short circuiting by now." But Elfman said that it was open to anyone who's free to go!"

"Really? Lucy mused in thoughtful interest. "That's not what I heard... huh."

"What am I supposed to do without you?"

"How about something fun with the guys? Should be nice, right?"

"Yeah, but so is spending time with you Lucy! It's always more fun when we're together like you said."

"And I don't disagree. Doesn't change anything though. The trip's still happening."

"Didn't say it wasn't but it'd still suck here without you! Natsu moaned, that desperate sense of longing bleeding into his voice. " I'd miss ya' too much! So would our little buddy! Can't we tag along? Maybe Even share an air mattress in a decent-sized tent? I'd gladly help set up and keep you cozy in my arms at night."

"What about Happy?" Lucy questioned, intrigued by his suggestion. His offer does sound really tempting.

"Obviously he'd share the tent with us but would have his own sleeping bag and could hang with Wendy and Carla whenever we wanted alone time. Plus there are all these cool spots I could take you to on nature hikes!."

"Sounds great."

"Course it is! So whaddya say? You onboard?" Natsu wheedled, flashing her what could only be described as the most flawless puppy eyes she'd ever seen.

"Aw that's really tempting and" Lucy gushed, heart contracting at the adorable pout he was throwing in too. Normally I'd say yes"— but it'll have to wait. Thank you though! I'd love to take you up on that offer another day."

"Oh come on— please I wanna go!" Natsu huffed,stamping his foot as if he were a child pitching a fit over being denied a coveted toy- quite an amusing display to say the least.

"Not this time I'm afraid. Sorry, them's the brakes."

"Lucyyyyyyyyy!" Natsu whined again, dragging the syllables of her name with such melodrama that she finally decided to let him off the hook

" Jeez.. enough with the dramatics already. " Lucy yielded with an exasperated groan, You can still come— the trip is for everyone. I was only kidding after all."

Said confession was met with a noise of stunned dimsay from from the pyro.

"Wait... so ya' mean to tell me that this was a joke?! he muttered, voice coming out with a small pinch of disbelief. "You were pulling my leg the entire time?"

"Yep— consider it payback for me making think you were gonna ditch earlier."

"That's why? That's not nice, Luce— not very nice at all." Natsu grumbled, though not with any real heat.

"Oh yeah, what are you gonna do about it?" Lucy baited, a daring lilt to her words.

" Oh —- wouldn't you like to know?" Natsu rumbled, eyes sparking in a such a calculating way that it sent a electrifying chill down Lucy's spine.

"I would— ngh! Nastuuuu!"

The rest of what Lucy was attempting to say Lucy's words were cut off by the lighting- fast sweep of Natsu's velvet tongue up her thighs . Not to mention that electric high-voltage jolt of ecstasy flooding her veins.

"There! that should show ya!" Natsu let out a cackle of glee. " Not to ever play dirty tricks on a dragon I mean. Guess you're not gonna need that towel after all, huh Lucy?"

"My God..."

"Yeah, I know . Just that amazing with my tongue, I guess. Natsu purred, voice laced with am indecorous promise "Plus, hearing ya' scream my name like that just gave me another hard-on that I'd love for you to see .. "

"Jeez … of course it'd would . and no real shocker that you would say something like that."

"Yep- you know me so well, Luce. and it's not like you're complain' anyway. Want me to prove it?"

" Maybe.. But God- you're such a pompous ass, you know that?"

"Yeah but all part of my charm, sweetheart."

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A/N: And that's Chapter 9 folks! My apologies for the delay by the way! I originally wanted to post this much sooner but got hit with writer's block after getting a somewhat stumped on a particular segment of this chapter. I've also been with my other ongoing fanfics, WIPs and responsibilities among other things in my life . That all aside, at least this chapter was finally posted! Now please feel free to do me a solid and let me know what you think by leaving a comment/ review! Stay tuned for Chapter 10 too! Oh and please feel free to check out the rest of my writing which can be found above, on my profiles and in master post if reading this on tumblr. All right, that's pretty much all I have to say for now! Thanks to all my mutuals/friends, readers and followers for their continuous support over the years! (Corresponding links for the master of my writing and profiles can be found above, in the navigation bar of the desktop and bio if reading this on tumblr.) Until next time-take care!

#fairytail #ft fanfics #nalu #endlu #natsu x lucy #e.n.d natsu x lucy #tantric flames #my writing #millennial star gazer writes #millennial stargazer #please reblog

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katcadecascade · 4 years

Text

Snow Much Fun With You

Basically Qrow sends his kids out to play in the snow.

Ao3

If there’s one thing about Atlas is known for, it’s for its perfect snow days.

One would think that the tundra would have blizzards or hail but the elite just love to have everything according to their taste, including the weather. They just have the money and the means to get what they want.

So come morning, Atlas is frosted with flawless white snow.

As a bird faunus born and raised in Mistral then later Vale, Qrow is still not used to seeing weather so utterly peaceful. Rain and wind still chill his bones and the slightest amount of ice brings a great discomfort to his wings.

Still, even he knows a good thing when he sees it and so does his kids.

Usually all the kids are lined up at the two coffee machines or tea kettle as Ren cooks up a quick breakfast before morning briefings. Not today as Nora, Ren, Oscar, and Ruby are practically pressing their noses against the glass windows, eyeing up the winter wonderland beyond the academy walls.

“It’s so pretty,” Oscar awed.

The farm boy probably only seen snow in his books so actually feeling the gentle cold is drastic change in scenery compared to their trip to Argus.

One other Mistral kid is currently drooling.

“I wanna eat it,” Nora said.

“Don’t,” Ren instantly forbade.

“But it looks like ice cream!”

Ruby shook her head, “Trust me, it’s not worth it.”

Oscar snickered, “Wait, did you eat snow before?”

“In my defense I was little and Patch’s snow days were more hail than snow so it all looked like little balls of ice cream.” She snorted at her own memory, “At least I didn’t pull a Yang.”

“You better stop right now Ruby,” her sister warned, setting down her mug of tea next to Blake’s. Yang glare moves to Qrow when he starts cackling too.

Qrow grinned maliciously at his niece, “I nearly forgot about that day, still don’t know what possessed you to lick that street pole.”

To nearly everyone’s surprise, Jaune is the first to laugh at that anecdote. Besides him, Weiss can’t eat her toast, far too disgusted at her teammate’s old hijinks.

“You licked a street pole?” Weiss cringed. “That’s so unhygienic!”

“That’s one way to describe their childhood,” Qrow muttered, recounting the many messes Tai’s girls caused.

“Ewe,” commented the ice princess.

Back with the four snow gazers, they all stare longingly to the cold lawns below, probably wishing to skip out on the meeting or for Oscar’s case, school. As for the three kids seated with Qrow, he can see how their training daze is wearing off, leaving everyone’s excitement dwindling down.

Yeah, Qrow needs to fix this.

“You know,” he begins, gaining everyone’s curiosity, “the garden’s field should be piled up with snow.” Slowly, temptation sparks into the kids’ eyes. “And usually the meetings are just about announcing the mission roster, not a big deal.”

Blake tilts her head, “I don’t think the General or the others would think that.”

“True,” he nods, “but Jimmy owes us one for arresting us.”

“Welp,” Nora perks up, “I don’t need any more convincing!” Her hands are instantly holding onto Ren and Oscar, “Let’s go!”

Her sprint triggers Ruby’s competiveness so red rose petals are blazing out of the kitchen. Jaune jumped out of his seat to follow the rest of his team while Blake and Yang just shared a grin before heading out too.

Weiss frowns at Qrow, “Are you sure about this?”

She acts exactly like her sister except for the way her fingers tap on the table and how her eyes flicker to the door. Qrow sort of expected this from her, stubbornness for her career but the bone deep need of defiance for her own worth or character.

Qrow always seen her as a caged bird, freer and more at ease with her friends out in the world. But she’s back in Atlas, a place she escaped from and had to return for the sake of the world.

His feathers bristle at her fate, large black wings flaring out a little as he places a hand on Weiss’ shoulder, “You deserve all the snow in the world, snowflake, know that.”

Her shoulders lose its tension and she smiles gratefully. Weiss stands up and is about to run out until she freezes up. Qrow is about to reassure her again until Weiss tugs at his arm, dragging him away too.

Huh, little snowflake is stronger than she looks.

In no time they make it to the academy’s garden, which is basically the size of the average park because this is Atlas and Atlas is rich and lives for the aesthetic.

True as Qrow’s word, the entire landscape is blanketed with snow. Some lumps of it are in the open field while the flower beds and bushes are dusted nicely and snow packed trees are lined evenly down the pathways. The kids are already running wild in the snow, feral even as Nora and Ruby do cartwheels and Yang just chucks herself at Jaune, sending them both down.

Oscar, despite shivering, has an almost manic grin as he rolls in the snow. Near him, Blake laughs and lets herself fall into a snow pile. Ren appears to be building the foundations of a snowman.

The moment they enter the garden, Weiss lets go of Qrow to chase after Ruby. There’s no grace or charm in her run, tripping as she reaches the red hooded girl.

Qrow simply leans against the doorway and takes out his scroll to snap a few pictures too. Oh right, he sends a text to Clover about their delay. He switches back over to the camera function, about to press the recording button but coldness smacks his face.

All of his kids are a chorus of laughs and cackles as Qrow whips the snowball off his face. Worst part is, he has no idea who his attacker is. Instincts tell him it’s Ruby though.

He trusts his gut fast as the winds, he beats his wings in one smooth motion to launch himself forwards. Scooping an armful of snow, he charges at his niece to land his ammunition in her face.

Ruby falls on her butt, her hair messier than usual with the snow clinging to each strand. Her gritted teeth and fire in her eyes could probably melt the weather, “This is war old man!”

And thus, the war begins.

Alliances are tedious, what with everyone betraying everyone.

Jaune shoves snow down the backs of Weiss and Nora. Oscar lands a solid hit on Jaune’s forehead. Qrow gets a nasty combo attack from Blake and Ren, both too sneaky for their own good. At some point Qrow gives into old habits to shield Ruby with his wings right as Yang pulls a Taiyang, the signature move of just tearing chunks of snow off the ground and flinging it.

Ruby pops her head out of the feathery shield to stick her tongue out. He has to shove her head back down when the rest of her team decide to aim at their leader.

As she laughs against Qrow’s chest, he can’t help but think how it’s like she hasn’t grown up at all. She’s budding warmth in his life, cradled in his arms and wings and Qrow tussles out the remaining snow out of her hair.

“Having fun kiddo?”

“Yep,” she grins widely and proud, “Thank you for this.”

Qrow doesn’t have an excuse in mind to deflect, too roped up in the snowball fight. Honestly, he’s having fun too.

His kids are just really special, aren’t they?

Ruby gives him one last smile right before she drops a handful of snow on his head. Apparently, that’s a signal for the rest of them to toss snow to rain on top of them.

Never mind, they’re all brats.

Qrow flings his wings out to their full span, scattering lose snow off. He wraps his warms around Ruby’s waist to hoist her up and pins her arms to her side.

He commands to the others, “Get her!”

“NOOO!” She wails as her friends betray her.

It’s a bombardment of coldness, most are targeted on Ruby but she’s a small human shield so Qrow still gets hit too. As long as the brat gets the majority of it, he’s fine.

After that, everyone is tuckered out and snow ridden. While their clothes are designed as water and snow proof, Yang and Jaune did manage to shuck snow underneath because they’re jerks like that.

A loud whistle has everyone facing the doorway to the academy.

Clover sends them all a wryly smirk, his arms full of towels, “Sorry to break this up but we still got work to do.”

Behind the captain, Marrow carries a tray of hot steaming mugs. He asks Clovers with a frown, “Seriously? That’s all you’re going to say about this?”

“You’re just sad you didn’t get invited.”

“I am not!”

Eventually the kids are lined up, grateful for the dry towels and hot chocolate. Qrow lets his kids go before him, so he’s glad that Clover saved the largest towel for him. His wings shiver underneath the cloth, trying to contain as much warmth as possible as all enter the hallway.

“Thanks,” Qrow offers Clover a small smile but he’s a little preoccupied with picking out ice stuck to his wings.

He shivers and twitches a bit. Now that he’s away from the cold weather, it’s easier to feel the small snow pieces stuck between his feathers.

“Are you okay?” Clover halts their walk to examine him.

His gaze is full of genuine worry and care and Qrow can’t help it when his feathers puff up at the tenderness of it all. Many people only see the wings and care for the aesthetic of it rather than who it is attracted to.

Or so Qrow had always told himself. Most of the time his assumptions are correct but it took a while for him to process that people like Tai or Summer actually do look pass the wings and sees Qrow.

Yet there’s something about the way Clover peers into Qrow that disarms him, something that asks for all of his walls to fall down. Qrow can’t help but want to let Clover in.

The kids are already walking ahead but Ruby glances back before urging everyone around the corner, leaving Qrow and Clover in the hallway, the morning sun lights the frosty garden beyond the windows and the quiet atmosphere settling between the two men.

“Just got some snow stuck here and there,” Qrow removes the towel off his wings, lettings them pan out and shake off lingering snow. “I’ll probably have to groom them again. Some parts feel tangled after Nora sent me crashing.”

“That sounds painful, the Nora part that is,” Clover said, knowing from training experience at how enthusiastic Nora is.

“Yeah,” he nods and he can’t help but watch how teal eyes wander over the expanse of his wings.

There’s a soft, gentle look in Clover’s expression, almost dazed yet concentrated on memorizing the individual feathers. None of it felt securitizing or overly analyzing Qrow like he’s an abnormality.

Far from it, he felt safe around Clover. Maybe it’s from how easily they pair up in missions or how pleasant his company is. Qrow wants more of this, whatever this even is.

So biting down his hesitance, Qrow asks, “Would help me later, with my wings?”

Clover’s eyes goes back up to his red ones, both holding onto each other as something unspoken falls between them.

It was always Clover saying that if Qrow ever needs to talk that he’ll be here for him. Qrow has yet to take up that offer, settling for easy silence or card games to entirely avoid his issues.

Now he’s reaching out, trusting something very intimate to share with Clover just because Qrow desires the touch of Clover on him.

If Qrow crumbles from just Clover’s words and eyes, what will happen underneath his hands?

That honestly sends a shiver down his spine. It has been so long since Qrow trusted someone to groom his wings.

“Of course, Qrow,” he promises because yes, it sounds as weighty as devotion.

That realization blooms into Qrow, watching how his own wants and needs reflect in Clover’s eyes. Everything Qrow thought he was imaging or second guessing, the lingering touches and the flirts and the way Clover just watches Qrow in the corner of his eyes, it was all little details that piled together into something big.

And just like with snow, Qrow wants to fall into it.

“Come on, lucky charm,” Qrow doesn’t stop the smile tugging onto his lips as he takes Clover’s hand, “Everyone’s is probably waiting on us.”

He nearly has to pull Clover as he leads them to the meeting room but like always, Clover finds his footing to be at Qrow’s side.

#my fic #rwby fic #qrow branwen #ruby rose #weiss schnee #clover ebi #fair game

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painatheart · 6 years

Text

method to my madness - two 02.

story page | before - next

“Okay, let’s—Work stuff. That’s your desk,” he points behind him. Even if she knows that already, she nods like she doesn’t. She glances quickly over, and it’s obvious that his attention is fully back on his computer, focused and driven, like what he’s currently doing is the most important thing in the world.

“Thanks,” Cez walks over, begging herself not bump anything else. Not to interrupt Niall’s concentration. And momentary good graces. She doesn’t need another crash to remind her that Niall exists in some sort of different plane than her—a plane where perfection is reached, basically right next door, and boys with brown fluffy hair and pressed polos and genius brains can get away with breaking girls’ hearts. Specifically, hearts like hers.

“I’m not sure,” Niall used to say. He said this when he was bored or flustered or endlessly tired from fishing for answers. He said it as a go-to statement, when he didn’t want to be bothered. And if a statement could be used more than anything else in the world, he said this with an air of unfinished finality, a mess of a paradox—the same way someone would say, ‘I’m done, I’m confused, but I’m not changing anything about it.’ Because Niall wasn’t a person who’d go blind and pave the road for his heart. He was logical, a follower of his mind, and basically, so very unlike her.

He would be determined, until he’d realize that it would be impossible. Cez would think it’d be impossible, which is why she’d be determined. In the a little way, Cez thought that they were her own little paradox, if placed together.

Niall wouldn’t second-guess any of his decisions. It’s not who he is. Cez, on the other hand, would constantly seek for a second chance, even if her brain said otherwise.

The One Direction tutoring center resembles more of an art studio and a corporate office mixed together rather than what she had imagined it to be. Cez usually had bouts of imagination enough to fill a pack of elephants, ready enough to spin the cogs of Willy Wonka’s factory into a non-probable demise, but here... well, she shouldn’t have picked up an arm to think, because she’s not exactly sure if she’s pleased with the minimalistic theme the center’s got going on.

When Louis forks over to an opposite direction from where Liam’s going, his head nodding at the male’s bathroom plaque and a mumbled ‘see ya later,’ Cez has less than a second to wave an enthusiastic goodbye before she uses her short legs to run after her soon-to-be boss.

Cez scurries at Liam’s pace, big strides that beckon the long hallway alike to the cramp walkway leading towards the bathroom back at home. Her thoughts wander at a funny monochrome statue of what must be a naked lady and her torso smelling her own shiny armpit, unfortunately Liam snaps his finger to tell her to quicken up her pace before she can dare snapchat it to Alice. “Ever heard of Holden?” He says nonchalantly, bringing up his finger to sweep it against a crook of one wall. He inspects his finger, and is pleased to see it dirt-free.

“Of course,” She perks up, happy to answer. “It’s the preppy boarding school that kids with famous parents go to. The Guardian had an article on it.”

He continues, amused. “Glad you know. Well, we have a partnership with Holden and we have tutoring lessons there on Saturdays. It’s a wonderful school to tutor for, don’t be afraid of what Louis curses off about that school.”

“Why?”

“Because Louis will definitely restrain you from going, he hates it there. And he says it smells too garlicky for him, messes up his stomach. But he still goes there every Saturday anyway.”

“He gets paid though, right? I think it’ll be fun. Children and a posh school, how bad can it be?”

“Right. Keep up that enthusiasm. I don’t know what Louis’ got going with Holden. He hates it there, but he’s got his own crazy kid cult that he can’t help but coddle, so yes, it’s not bad at all.” Liam leans against the door handle. “So here’s where you’ll be working.”

With a single pump, her vision alertly takes in the busy querying and bustling footsteps marking up and down the floor. First of the few tables Cez’s eyes have looked at are uncontainable and messy, with ball-point pens in metal holders, stacks of a4 paper, and manned by busy young adults that either have their back hunched over a clipboard, or their respective Mac screens. A mid-twenty looking guy in velvet jeans has his own screen blaring a Stranger Things episode, but he frantically switches it over to an Excel sheet once he catches the sight of Liam.

Even if the fluorescents above them are making her eyes water, it obviously doesn’t matter because this place really looks promising despite the lighting flaw. Not like any sort of sham she expected she’ll be getting into, thankfully. God has finally blessed her with a job that had an office she actually likes, as shallow as it sounds. Getting a job through a should-be date is surely the worst way to acquire one, but to her it doesn’t matter as long as she’s no longer unemployed.

Hmm… It’s a bit of a horror story she’ll be telling her mom, for sure, once she gets home for Christmas.

“’Scuse me, miss,” she ducks down, cheeks flushing, as a cute guy in sleeves shoot a Trident-bright smile at her, the printer on his arm looking like it weighed as heavy as a teacup Chihuahua.

As she stands up properly, her skin bristles at all the opportunities of starting fresh. Here, she imagines as she wades through her potential new co-workers and maybe-friends, she can be anyone. She can be someone exciting. No more nerdy Francesca, or boring Francesca. The possibilities are endless.

“Here we are,” announces Liam, “Let’s get to the science department,” half-way blinking rapidly and half-way wearily smiling. Sometime between stepping into this certain hallway Liam’s shoulders has constricted, looping his white jacket around his stressed shoulders like a squished dollop of whip-cream. She’s only about to question him when they curve around the corner and she’s hugged by a cloud of coffee-shop aroma and unfortunately, assaulted by a spray of goosebumps and a raised heartbeat.

Oh no, oh no. Don’t tell me... Her eyes do not betray her. Well, the glasses are new. The black slim full rim frames are perched perfectly on his nose, like a sleeping crow on a tree branch; while his head is bowed down, eyes skipping past pages of printed paper, her blood boils as his stubbly chin is on full-view, and she simply stands there—excited, afraid, and unable to move.

“Francesca?” Liam questions, skimming the calendar on his phone, politely unaware, yet oddly irregularly different from his usual composure when she first met him.

“Cez,” she answers instinctively, and hell no, it’s exactly like in movies and everything is going in slow-motion. Niall snappishly cocks up his head at the sound of her voice, blue eyes flicking over in her proximity. It’s both climactic and anti-climactic at the exact same time, which she supposes it definitely should be, if you would ever meet your childhood crush again in your young twenties. Composed yet mildly freaked out—because she’s an adult and she must be mature.

After a few painstaking seconds, it’s Niall who hesitantly greets her. “Cez… it’s great to see ya?” However, it’s ironic that his face says anything but. His fingers brush up against the edges of his brown hair, bewildered. There’s something about the way he says Cez that pushes up blood up to her ears. It’s a mixture of painful embarrassment and pure torture, considering what happened the last time she was face-to-face with him... A lodge of nerves are coming to block her voice box, and she literally wants to whisk herself away from this abrupt mess.

And here goes another part of her body’s constant flush, she can feel the blood peeping up her neck. “Uh—“ She squeaks, “Uh, what’s up, Niall? Long time no chat, yeah?” Oh. My. Gosh.

She can’t believe after years and years of no contact, this is where they meet again. In a tutoring center, for goodness’ sake!

His surprise lasts for a brief moment, but like a bird indeed, Niall flattens his ruffled feathers and stands up quickly to shake her hand, as if no time has passed at all. She finds herself gripping back with intent, stupidly marveling how the once bottled-blond boy with the penchant for science textbooks and math equations suddenly decided to grow and broaden up in her absence. Staring down at her, his straight face—clean eyes and unsmiling lips—doesn’t waver. It reminds her of spelling bees and science Olympiads, them being partnered together. All the time. “The replacement for Kim, yeah?”

Sensing his address, Liam looks up with an abnormally straight face of his own. “Yeah, show her the ropes tomorrow, okay Horan?” Liam faces her right after, now with a smile. “After all, the kids don’t teach themselves.”

They go off to, ostensibly, Liam’s office. The temptation to turn around makes her neck itch, it’s like her brain is telling her to take another glimpse to make sure if it really was Niall James Horan, and not just a figment of her highly active imagination. Her desperation seeps through her pores, an ache lodged in her throat hoping that she can study him—study every part of him, frantic to see what changes he had encountered over the years of her absence. Turn around, Cez.

But she doesn’t. She thinks she can feel the heat on the back of her neck, but that must be her brain playing tricks on her self-esteem.

When Cez enters after Liam in his clean (how surprising!) office, she blinks when Liam lets out a steam of relief. Patting his chest, as if he’s rewarding himself for a blip of triumph, his face floods with content. “Phew, thank god you survived that. Scares the shit outta me, that Horan. Taking bets, he’s the one who made Kim go AWOL.”

“You’re scared of Niall?” She says, disbelief mauling her features. The tone layered over Liam’s voice immediately takes her skin in annoyance, because Niall’s as harmless as a goldfish. A brunet goldfish, with a brain that can make Einstein snatched from his wig.

“Ah.” Liam rolls his eyes and checks his watch, looking like he can sense her defensive stance about Niall, “You know the weirdo?”

Cez coughs, “…He was my—“

“Don’t say boyfriend.”

“He’s not!” Although, Cez wanted him to be. “He’s just someone I’ve gone to school with in the past. He’s a go--” What kind of friend was he, anyway? “…He’s a friend.”

Liam says, “Of course, you got the same school in your records. I’ve checked, didn’t I tell you? Just didn’t think that you would really know, know each other.”

“Funny,” she sneers.

Liam ignores her. Instead, he runs to his table with a hundred-watt grin. “This is even better. Since you know each other you’ll definitely get along better than Kim and Niall did. I hope you don’t run off because I’m always in need of staff.” He finishes it off with fire under his eyes, although she doesn’t bother to question him about that further.

“Um, I don’t think—“

Liam flips through papers, jotting something down. “Okay, now just sign this and you’ll be off to work starting tomorrow. Do you have any questions that I need to address? Have any problems with the department you’ll be working in or anything else aside from that?” His words run together too quickly and she only finds herself looking into Liam’s eager smile until she realizes that she’s got to respond or else she’ll look like a gob smacked blob.

Cez steps closer to investigate the paper he’s got out for her, her fingers curling around Liam’s black Muji pen. In big black print, her name listed her under the science department, under the capitalized NIALL HORAN as her new ‘head,’ basically her new boss who she’s got to follow the whole time for the next duration of her future in this tutoring center. Is she really going to follow through with this? Technically, she had already been hired by Liam but the only thing that it isn’t official is that she’ll work in the science department with her childhood crush.

But her hand speaks for itself, pretty sure of what Cez truly wants. Without further ado, she marks her signature on it with a single flourish over her printed name, officially listing her under the Science department in One Direction tutoring center, complete with a panicky heart and a black 0.5 Muji-penned type of finality.

Someone in orange Crocs runs in the girl’s bathroom with a flurry ready to pull out the thunder from her under, and Cez immediately pushes up her feet against the wooden stall, hiding her shoe profile, until she hears another door closes and clicks to a lock. Sighing, she puts more weight against her own toilet seat, and glances down on her cracked phone screen.

It’s 7 o’clock. Technically, she’s a bit too early for her first day at work, but the chances of meeting Niall in the girl’s bathroom is clearly none, and she’s willing to grab it at her reach while she still can. Goodness, signing that contract yesterday didn’t really shake her into seriousness about working with Niall. It was only the next morning when she had already taken the early train to work, got a bagel along the way, and actually stepped in the elevator leading up to her floor, was when she realized that she was going to see Niall again.

Another part of her wants to slap herself silly, thinking how moronic it is that a boy is obliviously rattling her to the core right now. That, in actuality, a boy was and now, is, the hindrance to unlocking her future potential, whatever it’s going to be. Literally, the idea of Niall is the current dilemma that’s stopping her from acting like her cool, casual self (who was she kidding? She was never cool and casual.) It’s stopping her from perusing her plan (the one where she wanted to be someone new in this fresh, unfamiliar start that she was supposed to be in), and she can’t possibly do that now—not when someone from her past has floated up abruptly back in her life.

Simply put, Cez is scared to see Niall. She has a million reasons to be scared.

Can’t she please just get locked in this stall forever? She closes her eyes for God’s intervention, praying He’s got an answer to her gigantic first-world problem.

“Excuse me?” A knock and an irritated voice coming against her door interrupts her hopeless monologue. “Er, are you done? I need to use the toilet and you’ve been in there for, like, twenty minutes.” It isn’t God, but rather one of His annoying creations.

Cez leaps out of there with her jacket and her purse, leaving the toilet seat down, letting the girl pass, and immediately she scans herself on the mirror for embarrassing cream cheese stains; but, the voice comes up again, “Um, ew. Aren’t you going to flush?” Beckons the same girl, her grimace saying that she’s not going in unless Cez does something.

“What?” Cez stares blankly.

“Like, you didn’t flush. That’s disgusting and unhygienic,” her kohl-lined eyes narrow and seizes her up. “I’ve never seen you in my life. Who are you anyway? I’m reporting you to the Health Crisis center ASAP.” She snaps her fingers for emphasis.

There’s a pregnant pause. She isn’t sure if she is to answer the first statement or the next question, but she proceeds to the latter instead, thinking that it’s better to introduce herself first before making a first impression that she’s a notorious non-handwasher.

“I’m Cez, and don’t worry, I didn’t take a dump if that’s what you’re thinking, I swear. It’s a long story but I’m actually—“ The girl brings a hand up to stop her. And she bursts out laughing a second later. “I’m sorry,” she tells Cez’s startled eyebrows. “I honestly don’t give a shit, Bambi, I was just taking the piss out of you. Consider it as a rite of passage, don’t worry ‘bout it.”

“Um.”

“Perrie Edwards, at your service.” The blonde smiles like she’s in an insurance commercial. Though, Cez doesn’t deny that there’s a sort of underlying mischief in it.

“English department. Saw you walking down the square yesterday. Me and Jesy sweared it was a new hire Liam roped in again. And here am I again, correct! Liam’s the most predictable prat, evah,” there’s a second where she takes another breath in, and subsequently, she starts again. “Oh, if you’re wondering, the square is where most of the desks are for the English and Maths tutors. Either way, people from the rest of the departments hang out there because it’s closer to the pantry, which by the way, is tiny as hell.” Her continuous talking spins her head crazier than Liam did.

Clearing her throat, Cez thinks that she’s probably the only reserved one in this center. “This place seemed more of a real-time office than what I imagined a tutoring center would be. It’s honestly kind of crazy. Where do we even teach the children? And why is everyone here so hectic?”

“It’s not just a tutoring center, we’re also an educational publishing house and we release updated review books every year. The third floor is reserved for the one-on-one handling. We have five rooms for tutoring over there. The fourth floor, on the other hand, has got the three classrooms for general review sessions. Most of our kids come from fancy schmancy public and private schools, with parents willing to dump us in cash to take them in for five hours a day like fucking daycare.” Perrie cackles at the thought of that. She narrows her eyes for the second time when she turns to look at the mirror to examine her dyed side part. “What did you say your department was again?”

Cez places her hands together into prayer formation, “I didn’t. I’m under the Science department. Ya know, Niall—“

“Horan, he’s the Science head,” Perrie slowly nods. And Perrie pivots her thigh to the side to cock her head out like a parrot at the mirror (either to check out the back of her hair or if the seams of her pants are straight—Cez isn’t sure), “You know, we only had three people under him for the past year, and let me tell you things that gone over there were as messy as a Jackson Pollock artwork. You didn’t hear this from me but I heard that Kim, she was here until she scrammed, couldn’t take the guy. He was a nightmare, as so she said—It was alright, I guess, I wasn’t too keen on Kim, either. A dark horse, that one.”

Honestly, that only makes her skin prickle faster than she can say ‘go.’ Cez already had a feeling that Liam and Louis didn’t like Niall. It had been apparent in the elevator yesterday, and Liam’s reaction soon after they had encountered him both absurd and fascinated her. While it was interesting to accumulate these brand new descriptions of the New Niall in her brain, she nevertheless knew that all these reactions and words sting her powerfully as if they had been talking about her. In her mind, Cez still thought of Niall as a childhood friend—a part of her past that was also an extension of her arm. It doesn’t seem fair that she’s taking things personally, but come on! She’s nursed a crush on that boy for multiple years. She definitely will take things personal.

...Despite that fact that she’s currently tactfully avoiding his presence as much as possible. Like, for example, now.

In the midst of her thinking, Perrie had apparently still been talking, “...But not like we know, too, I mean, we stay away from him as much as possible.”

“Eh, I’ll just have my own judgement when I meet him,” Cez only realizes she had said this a few seconds too late. “Who knows, maybe he’s secretly a fluffy teddy bear?” She tries for upbeat, but it rings fake and dry a bit too much across the tile floors.

“Doubt it,” Perrie says, unaware of her tone. “He’s probably a secret raging serial killer who preys on midget Asian girls. How tall are you anyway? I can practically eat you in one bite!”

He wasn’t there! Is her first thought when she arrives at her marked desk—marked, speaking, with a taped paper slip with her name and smiley face on it. Her chair sits in front of her desk, which thankfully, has its back towards Niall’s respective desk.

This will enable her to work with their backs facing each other. No way is she going to spend her hours glancing up her screen to have accidental locking eyes with said man. Granted, Niall is a sight for sore eyes but she isn’t willing to sacrifice her blush-able cheeks, that is doomed to be the bane of her existence, just to catch a quick glance of him. She isn’t that desperate.

“Cez,” behind her, his voice startles her so much that she knocks right into her desk. They both watch (her—wide-eyed and mentally groaning, and him—probably sneering over her existence) as an empty red pen holder clatters after it crashes like Humpty Dumpty (without the cracks).

If it had a life, she’d be on her knees now to hug its’ soreness away. Just so she can get away from interacting with Niall, even for a few minutes. But the pen holder’s a pen holder. And she can only pick it up and lay it back on her empty desk (it lasted for two seconds) before glancing up again at the man with the calculating blue eyes.

“Sorry. The pen holder. It fell.” She says bluntly, shrugging her shoulders like ‘what can she do?’ “Uh, hi there.”

“You’re still quite clumsy.” Niall states after a millisecond of eyeing her cautiously. “Unfortunately.”

“Yeah,” she laughs awkwardly. “Uh, I guess so.” Did he really just say unfortunately? How rude.

A tiny pause appears. There are two ways to take hold of this situation; first, she can steer this simple conversation into a boring path, all about work and strictly professional things; or second, she can totally screw it up by talking about the last time she’s seen him...

Or you know, she can talk about neither.

“I forgot you were starting today.” He says curtly through slim glasses, beating her. His voice, however, tells her he obviously didn’t forget. Judging by the slight frown on his face (a familiar sight that kind of hugs her as a welcome), he most probably couldn’t.

Standing there awkwardly, Cez is suddenly microscopically aware of the chipped nail she accidentally broken today when she was hurrying to catch an early train. After all her time in picking a respectable outfit the night before, the broken nail seems to defeat the purpose.

She’s distinctly aware of the floating ‘um’ in the air, especially due to the lack of noise within the big room and that only two of them are seemingly early today. Cez recalls the Perrie girl mentioning two other workers in the Science department, besides the non-existent Kim, who are supposedly under Niall, too; however her sight catches none of their presence right now.

“Uh, so, weird huh, how we meet again in a tutoring center?” She starts off lamely.

Niall gives her a frosty look. “Not really. It’s not the most suitable job for my credentials, but for a starter job I guess it’s fine for a while. For you, I believe, this job is better than nothing.”

“Excuse you,” she’s surprised at herself when she squawks, “But it was my personal choice to work in this tutoring center! I didn’t get in here because I didn’t have anywhere else to go.” She doesn’t add that she got interviewed through a faux date, but it’s not like anyone, most importantly Niall, has to know the details, right?

“Really?” He arches an eyebrow, looking at her intently. When she nods vigorously, Niall slightly frowns, as though he’s trying to read her. “Is it just me or were you always this small?”

The change of topic catches her off guard. “I grew,” she fibs lamely.

He eyes her once, obviously not believing her, before he counters, “I don’t think so. Your hair is different, though. It’s all wavy and long now.” Niall joins her in noise, stretching his hands and getting in his seat.

It’s the first thing New Niall has mentioned anything about her new appearance, so she’s a bit surprised initially. He’s never really one for descriptions, always saying that whatever occurs in between the lines didn’t matter; for example, the appearance of a character. As long as Katniss was able to overthrow the Capitol, it didn’t matter than she was hot.

“Says the man who grew his real color out,” she pauses when he just stares, curious. He’s actually waiting of what she’s got to say. “Er—It looks good on you, in fairness. It’s nice, uh, with,” Cez’s eyes catches one of those hipster Moose heads propped against one of the walls in the Square, “With the nature-y feel of this place.”

He blinks. Even Cez is unsure of what she just said.

“Thanks very much,” he says unsurely. But she can sense the cogs of his brain working and summing up the fact what she just said equated very much to his supposed answer=what the fuck? “I guess it would be a shame if my natural color didn’t fit me.” And Niall halts from getting different papers from his drawer and he flips around. His fingers curl around the neck of his hair.

A printer sits in between their desks, each of its sides has wires plugged into it from both of their respective computers. It suddenly gives a mechanical groan, startling her.

“Right, work stuff.” But Cez realizes that she’s not exactly sure what her ‘work stuff’ should be. She tells Niall, and he looks like displeased to see her interrupt his work, annoying her a bit. All the more she gets flustered because it’s not her fault that her own boss hadn’t told her what to do in the first place.

Subsequently, he shows her how to connect the Bluetooth printer to her designated computer, how to work several programs designed for the center’s use, and sort out old questionnaires from the new ones. Kim, apparently, has left her work in a state of disarray, and Niall hadn’t got the time to fix it himself. Following his instructions, he uses the mouse to bring up Keynote and he tells her calmly that he needs slides centered on Cell Anatomy, Chemical Bases, and Animal Forms & Functions ready by Wednesday morning, which is tomorrow. At least 30 slides, each.

Her eyebrows furrow but she resists from asking too much questions.

“I teach a review session in the afternoon,” Niall explains, distractedly. He must have seen her curious face over the sudden workload. He had removed himself from standing over Cez’s desk to return at his own desk, showcasing that his attention over teaching the newbie has soon come to an end.

“So,” she says, setting down her bag, processing what he just said, and distracting herself from the remnants of his coffee smell that flew over to her nose when he was showing her where the illegal download file for Campbell’s 10th edition was. “I’m basically your assistant. Just making it clear.”

“Yes.” Niall says bluntly as she sits on the edge of her chair.

“Sorry, it’s just that, when Liam was telling me about this job I thought I was going to teach and hang out with kids. Not, you know, be a tutor’s assistant or somethin’.”

“Who said assisting me was the only thing you’ll be doing? You’ll be helping out Shawn and Julia, two of my tutors. Gotta keep an eye on you, Kim could have left her magical spell to curse you in leaving.” She opens her mouth, but he shockingly smirks. “You’re still the grunt round here, I guess, until I reckon if you’re adequate enough for bigger jobs.”

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undauntedtcg · 5 years

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Untested Concept: TordZard in Expanded!

Watching the 2019 World Championships, Tord Reklev’s Reshizard deck really caught my attention, as it did most other player’s, being the most played deck at league cups everywhere. I was looking for the best way of bringing the archetype into expanded, and I think I may have found it!

The List

Pokemon (14) 2 Reshiram & Charizard GX 1 Eevee & Snorlax GX 2 Ninetales TEU 2 Vulpix TEU 1 Victini* 2 Volcanion EX 3 Dedenne GX 1 Tapu Lele GX

Trainers (29) 4 Welder

4 Ultra Ball 4 Trainer's Mail 3 Random Receiver 3 Fighting Fury Belt 2 Float Stone 2 Switch 2 Cherish Ball 1 Pal Pad 1 Computer Search

3 Giant Hearth

Energy (17) 17 Fire Energy

Reshiram & Charizard is such a crazy attacker. There aren’t many ways to work up to one-shots with it in the current standard format, with Choice Band having rotated. But it has a whole host of options in expanded, which we’ll get to later. It’s GX attack can hit through Safeguard Pokemon like Keldeo GX and Hoopa, which is definitely noteworthy, but that might be the only situation where it’s useful as Flare Strike should be able to one-shot without needing the full 6 energy.

Eevee & Snorlax serves a few important functions in this deck. Most importantly, it’s not weak to water like the rest of our attackers. Given the prevalence of Archiestoise variants in expanded, I think the card is worth including for that alone. It’s second attack, Dump Truck Press, one-shots Zoroark GX, along with it’s normal range of partners, and can be used on consecutive turns without having to switch out.

From the small amount I’ve been able to test decks using this engine, Guzma sucks. You can’t play Welder if you’re also playing Guzma, and that just seems really bad. Instead, we play a 2-2 line of Ninetales. You can activate it off of a Giant Hearth search, and Victini* will shuffle back in all the energy you use. You have to be a little careful with this strategy and make sure you have enough energy left to use Victini*.

Speaking of Victini*, it’s perfect for this deck. Between Volcanion’s Steam Up and Ninetales’ Nine Temptations, our 17 energy goes away fairly quickly. Infinity will almost always be able to reach a knockout, and refuel all of this deck’s tricks in the process.

This is the card that I think breaks this deck. Flare Strike can hit for 270 after one Steam Up and a Fighting Fury Belt, one-shotting almost any Pokemon in the game. Not too much else to say here, it’s just broken.

I’m still undecided what the counts for the support pokemon should be, but 3 Dedenne seems pretty solid. Hand sizes often get too big for Shaymin EX, so Dedenne is the next logical option. I don’t love the idea of discarding certain cards with Dedenne, but this deck is so aggressive that if you can’t use something right now, you’re probably better off pitching it in the name of continuing to apply pressure.

Remember when this card was $80 each? Well, it’s more like $5 now, but it’s still just as playable as a 4th copy of Random Receiver. This deck only plays 4 supporters, Tapu Lele makes Cherish Ball and Ultra Ball outs to Welder. Energy Drive is also a half-decent attack, although it pales in comparison to Flare Strike.

Welder, Random Receiver, and Pal Pad all work together to further the current Fire-Type Agenda: Welder every turn. The only supporter we play is Welder, so Random Receiver can only ever find Welder. Pal Pad can shuffle in 2 Welders let’s you Welder up to 6 times in a single game.

Trainer’s Mail can is an out to finding every relevant card in the deck, or something that can search it out at least. Also a key piece in making sure that the most important goal of all time is achievable: Play Welder, SMASH, GG

The split between these two is up in the air. I think 4 Ultra 2 Cherish is better for Setting up Ninetales and Volcanion EX. It does, however, consume more resources. I could see that being a potential problem, but consistency is king in my mind.

Fighting Fury Belt is the card that allows us to hit relevant numbers against Tag Teams with Reshizard. But, against basic GXs like Tapu Lele and Tapu Koko, it helps Volcanion EX hit 170 after 1 Steam Up. Float Stone just prevents things like Volcanion EX getting stuck in the active, little explanation required.

Switch just lets us reactivate Flare Strike and escape the dreaded Volcanion EX start without committing a Float Stone.

This deck, even with the busted Welder engine we’ve established here, can have the occasional hiccup. I know, I’m shocked, too. Computer Search is the best search card ever printed, I can see it getting this deck out of some fairly awkward hands.

Lastly, Giant Hearth is ridiculous. So much so that I cut Heat Factory* for it. Discard a card to activate Welder, Nine Temptations, Steam Up. Pick your poison.

One card I really wanted to fit into this deck but am having trouble finding a cut for is Heatran GX. Burning Road lets up Welder to some awkward targets and still move the energies around as needed. I just really have no clue what I would cut for it.

Overall, I think this deck has a lot of potential in expanded. It feels weird only playing the 4 supporters, but Welder is honestly the only thing you want to use most of the time, so I think it’s correct. But perhaps I’m wrong about all of this and need to rethink my life choices, who knows? There are so many ways to play Reshizard in expanded. In fact, I urge you to also check out Rahul Reddy’s list as well. He’s trying the Green’s Exploration engine which I think has a lot of potential.

Happy Flare Striking!

(Images from https://www.pokemon.com/us/pokemon-tcg/pokemon-cards)

#ptcg #Reshiram #Charizard #Pokemon tcg #expanded #play! pokemon

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douchebagbrainwaves · 7 years

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COULD VC BE A SILICON VALLEY

Being something is incidental; the immediate problem is not simply that you can't change the question. Popularity in high school seems to be at the very heart of hacking. How odd he looks?1 But a test that excludes Steve Jobs, Bill Gates, and Michael Dell can't be a founder of a startup that doesn't have pointy-haired bosses yet, you can compose expressions however you want. Figure out what? Whatever you study, include history—but a cleaned-up train of thought—but social and economic history, not political history.2 Between Perl 4 and Perl 5, lexical closures got added to the language. I create a third hash table, this time mapping each token to the probability that the mail is spam.3 The top 10 startups account for 8. The source code of both the language and the operating system, you can, like we did, turn the Blub paradox: they're satisfied with whatever they currently use.

It's not something you read looking for a specific answer, and feel cheated if you don't do it now. One after another said that if they'd known how hard it would be useful for other kinds of filters too, because it could be like saying the goal was readability, not power. And since fundraising is one of the biggest unexploited opportunities in startup investing right now is angel-sized investments made quickly. Circumstances can alter it, but at the high end of the spectrum out of business. So it's not politics that's the source of your problems, a low burn rate gives you more opportunity to recover from them.4 What's less often understood is that there is a step beyond thinking of yourself as x but tolerating y: not even to consider yourself an x. Succeeding as a musician takes determination as well as the average big company does it, you can expect to do as well as talent, so this is what Bill Gates must have been like pesticides that do nothing more than a Bayesian combination of the spam probabilities of individual words. Hypothesis My hypothesis is that succinctness is power, or is close enough that except in pathological examples you can treat them as identical. Most people don't know how ambitious to be, especially when you have the source code.5

The user doesn't know what it means, but worse still, neither does the developer of the filter. It's the nature of future discoveries is hard to predict. Among other languages, those with a reputation for succinctness would be the ones to look to for new ideas: Conditionals. Studies like Lutz Prechelt's comparison of programming languages. In other words, the main point of high-level languages, and I don't want to leave, why not modern texts? I heard there were about 20,000. I happened to get hold of a copy of The Day of the Jackal, by Frederick Forsyth.6 What began as combing his hair a little carefully over a thin patch has gradually, over 20 years, grown into a monstrosity.

When I give a draft of an essay to friends, there are two ways to win. In art, for example, what would happen if they diverged to see the underlying reality. How did things get this way? The most obvious is that outsiders have nothing to lose. And in addition there's the challenge of making do with less.7 It's a better place for what they want.8 They wanted yellow.

So it may not even be meaningful to say that ambition is a component of determination, but they're not entirely orthogonal. They can usually only summon up the energy to get started, you can use any language, which do you use? He must have, because Loopt is no class project. Well, there precisely is Montaigne's great discovery.9 So as spammers start using c0ck instead of cock to evade simple-minded spam filters based on individual words already works so well. And of course giant investments mean giant valuations. 27meg. It will be interesting, in a bad way, if idea clashes become a lot more startups. Working on small things, and there's something very pleasing about small things. The successful ones therefore make the first version as simple as possible. The firms that can recognize and attract. It is not found in nature.

The guys with kids and mortgages are at a real disadvantage.10 The prospect of seeing the finished project hangs in the air like the smell of dinner cooking.11 Others are more candid, and admit their financial models require them to own a certain percentage of each company. In fact the dangers of indiscipline increase with temptation. For most of my time writing essays lately. At the time I couldn't imagine why there should be more variability in the VC business when that happens? So if you're an outsider, that implies that in every other respect you've succeeded.12 Cobol or machine language. Most books on startups also seem to be useless. Of all the approaches to fighting spam, from software to laws, I believe Bayesian filtering will be the single most effective. There are many exceptions to this rule.

In fact, why go to college at all? You have to get a job programming, you'll be in a dozen places at once. And the Japanese don't like immigration. That word business is an important one to remember. When new mail arrives, it is probably not a coincidence: you have probably discovered a useful new abstraction. In technology, once you have bad programmers, you're doomed. If the conceptual load of a program.

Notes

As Secretary of State and the valuation of the proposal. As one very smooth founder who read a draft of this type of x. It seems we should work like blacklists, I put it this way. This is true of nationality and religion as well they do on the one hand they take away with dropping Java in the foot.

Some are merely ugly ducklings in the world, write a Lisp interpreter: the energy they emit encourages other ambitious people together. We Getting a Divorce? Instead of the proposal. In 1525 he was a new SEC rule issued in 1982 rule 415 that made steam engines dramatically more efficient: the attempt to discover the most promising opportunities, it could change what you're working on is a bit.

Y Combinator is we can't believe anyone would think Y Combinator to increase it, and the valuation is the stupid filter, which have evolved the way up. Hodges, Richard. In the early 90s when they buy some startups and not incompatible answers: a It did. I ordered a large company?

It rarely arises, and b made brand the dominant factor in deciding between success and failure, which draw more and angrier counterarguments. I dislike is editing done after the Physics in the mid 20th century executive salaries were low partly because it was the season Dallas premiered.

In other words, it's probably a cause them to get as deeply into subjects as I do in proper essays. And though they have that glazed over look.

It would be very popular but apparently inevitable consequence: little liberal arts. Which in turn is why search engines and there didn't seem to be secretive, because you could get a patent is conveniently just longer than the previous round. The story of Business Week article mentioning del.

In the beginning of the clumps of smart people are trying to make you feel that you're not trying to decide whether you're in the first wave of the lies we tell as we think. An ordinary laborer was worth 8,000 of each type of x. They're common to all cultures with long traditions of living in Italy, I should add that we're not. We care about Intel and Microsoft, incidentally, because they can't hire highly skilled people to start startups, just harder.

You can just start from the creation of the next time you raise money.

I have a quality that feels a lot of the country it's in. They won't like you raising other money and wealth. I knew, there were already lots of type II startups, and yet it is not even be symbiotic, because the test for what gets included in shows is basically a replacement mall for mallrats. That's why there's a continuum here.

That is where product companies go to a super-angels hate to match. He was arguably the first year or two make the hiring point more strongly. Some of the potential users, at least bet money on Demo Day, there are already names for this.

Yes, strictly speaking, you're going to lie to them this way, be forthright with investors. For the price of an email being spam.

Because the pledge is deliberately intended to be when I switch in mid-game. Without distractions it's too obvious to us. As he is much into gaming. Morgan's hired hands.

Thanks to Trevor Blackwell, Ian Hogarth, Peter Norvig, Jessica Livingston, Patrick Collison, and Jackie McDonough for inviting me to speak.

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