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changingplumbob · 5 months

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York Household: Chapter 8, Part 6

Time to move in Paris! First up a look at the foster home she's been living in, and it's manager. Then back home Deanna finally finishes the robotics project she's been working on and Paris ages up.

Here we have Ms Gallheizer's Orphanage built by EA ID: Chronicll

Paris: Home sweet hell

Deanna: At least you're finally leaving

Paris: Hopefully everyone will be eating and we can slip in unnoticed

Aaron: We do have to tell the manager you're leaving though, legally speaking

Paris: She'll be thrilled

Deanna: Should we go find her

Paris: We'd better not disturb dinner

Ms G: Where have you been

Paris: I signed out for the afternoon

Ms G: But not the evening. Dinner is at 5:30 sharp and you are late. Again!

Paris: Sorry

Ms G: Don't say sorry, be better girl! You've been here long enough to know

Paris: It won't happen again Ms Gallheizer, because I'm leaving

Ms G: It's not your birthday yet so get upstairs and be glad I kept your dinner portion aside

Paris: I...

Ms G: No smart reply? Of course that would require being smart

Aaron: Perhaps I should introduce myself

Ms G: Why? You a cop?

Ms G: A social worker?

Aaron: Well no-

Ms G: Then you have no authority under my roof

Aaron: I'm a lawyer

Ms G: Sure you are

Aaron: Mr York, prosecutor in Tartosa

Ms G: We're not in Tartosa Mr York

Aaron: Perhaps we should talk in your office, Paris has things to do

Ms G: On that we agree

Deanna: She is exactly like you described, maybe a bit worse

Paris: You think your pa can sort it

Deanna: He can be your legal guardian for a day, no problem, promise

Paris: My room is this way

Deanna: I didn't hear much from the dining room

Paris: No talking allowed at dinner, one of the first rules we learn

Deanna: What a hag

Aaron: Her birthday is only tomorrow, she would have to leave then anyway

Ms G: Be that as it may this is highly irregular. I raise my kids to be independent dependable members of society, not run under their girlfriends skirts

Aaron: You certainly can turn a phrase

Ms G: Paris has no self discipline, give her an inch she will run a mile. How do I know you can provide a suitable environment

Aaron: It's just one day

Calista: Is this the right room

Aaron: This is my wife, Captain York

Ms G: Captain?

Calista: Is there a problem here amore

Aaron: Ms Gallheizer had some doubts about our parental skills

Calista: Did she now

Ms G: Well- Perhaps I jumped the gun

Aaron: So we can take her home

Ms G: Why you would want to is beyond me. But yes, I'll get you the forms

Paris: It's strange, these four walls have been my life for almost a decade

Deanna: No posters

Paris: *shrilly* no damaging the walls

Deanna: *laughs* feel free to coat our walls at home

Paris: Home sounds nice

Deanna: Ready to leave it behind

Paris: Babe, did you notice I already packed

Deanna: *laughs* I did

Kelly: My tooth still isn't out yet

Calista: It'll fall out, don't worry

Kelly: What if I accidentally eat it

Aaron: I did that once, I survived

Calista: Aaron! Chin up caro, you'll be okay

After dinner Kelly mopes to mantis for a while before deciding to just pull it out. Success! Evil laugh!

Paris gets her stuff moved in and Deanna welcomes her with a celebratory pillow fight.

Paris: Your pillows are so poofy

Deanna: All the better to hit you with

Paris: Oh two can play at that game babe

Deanna: I hope you enjoy losing

Paris: In your dreams. En garde!

In the end Paris concedes the fight. She does a quick bit of study for her exams tomorrow then happily climbs in to bed beside her favourite person.

Paris woke up early from a horrible nightmare so decides to polish off her homework until Deanna wakes up.

Deanna: Happy birthday baby

Paris: Thanks. I'm not looking forward to these exams, thank the watcher they're my last

Deanna: You'll be great

Paris: I average a c miss valedictorian but thanks

Deanna: And Joey helped me make you a cake

Paris: I don't suppose I could just age up now

Deanna: No way, you go crush those exams, then come home. We'll celebrate then baby

Paris: Okay, last day of high school, here I go!

Calista had another awful nightmare so works out early to try chase the scare away. She reaches level 10 fitness and discovers she is a perfectionist. I might need to make the skill gain even slower than it already is at this rate! Deanna finally finishes... whatever the heck this thing is.

Pictures of the quadcopter doing quad-copter things

To my complete surprise, but not Deanna's, Paris absolutely aced her final exams! It's finally age up time for her and as she makes a wish Deanna cheers her on. Deanna did a cute little song as well. Paris rolls Creative as her third trait which compliments her cuisine hobby that she rolled earlier.

Deanna: Want to go on a date

Paris: With you? Absolutely babe

Deanna: I'm thinking, beachside

Paris: Sounds perfect

The two head to central Tartosa and take some time to soak in the romantic atmosphere.

Paris: It's so lovely here, and no snow

Deanna: Snow can be good for snuggling

Paris: Maybe so

Paris: But we don't need snow to snuggle

Deanna: I love you baby

Paris: Right back at you babe

They share a kiss and a cuddle

Paris: That sunset is stunning

Deanna: You're stunning

Paris: De, we're in public

Deanna: What do you want to do then

Paris: Play in a g rated way, come on

Deanna: I haven't built a sandcastle in ages

Paris: I won't hold it against you. I've always loved making them. My parents...

Deanna: Did they help

Paris: Yeah, we made them as a family. Once we made one as big as me. I wasn't a tall toddler but still

Deanna: Do you have any photos

Paris: A couple

Paris: Photos of my parents that is, not the sandcastles. They only exist in my memory now

Deanna: I think we did a pretty good job with this one, a castle for my princess

Paris: You're sweet

Deanna: Sometimes

Paris: All times De, I know it

Deanna: And you're happy, with us?

Paris: I am babe

And this chapter wraps up back home with everyone in their right beds. I had to take some shots of the house again as I love property pictures, and sleeping pictures, to bookend my chapters.

Previous Part ... Next Part (New Goth)

#sims 4 #the sims 4 #the sims #Rotation8 #ChangingPlumbobStorytime #YorkHousehold #DeannaYork #ParisPearl #AaronYork #CalistaYork #KellyYork #simblr #R0801

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seeminglyseph · 5 months

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I’m looking at DAO mods and I feel like I kind of like… just wanna paint textures instead of playing the game. Or both. Like. I want to repaint the textures before I play the game. Which is a weird thing to want to do maybe.

Like my secret desire is actually to just rip all my favourite LIs from Dragon age and get their textures and reskin them.

Also give Solas that Sexy skull and braids and locks and concept design look he had because that was always always better than Egg. Idk who vetoed the concept design in exchange for none design all Egg but they were Incorrect. That was a Bad Decision. I get that yes technically he has freckles and a scar and a cleft chin and droopy eyes and details, yes, but. *but*. He could have been better. He could have been hotter. He could have been Great. The Best character des— no I can’t say that when The Iron Bull is in the same game and exists at the same time. That is in fact the sexiest best character design to ever be made. But Solas had to potential to be better in so many ways and ultimately DAI’s designers could not manage designing hair.

They just could not do it. It was too hard. That’s the conclusion I have come to. They also I think struggled badly when it came to skin textures because like look at the options they had in character creation, they strugggglllleeed. They couldn’t make hair and they couldn’t make skin. They suffered in game design and honestly I think probably EA hit them with crunch and low funding and BioWare was like “we were not equipped to jump into this triple A pool this fast this underfunded oh my god what the fuck what the fuck” and we’re seeing that again with DA4 and that’s why all the people EA would have to pay fairly is getting laid off.

BioWare is getting scapegoated by EA and it kinda breaks my heart as an Albertan because we got bought out and now I think our like. One gaming company is getting sold out and gonna go under and get sold so they can move it all somewhere else with fewer human rights protections (no unions or union protections) and people can say “BioWare did this” and it’s maybe a little more “EA did this to BioWare” and a whole lot of Albertans are Shit Outta Luck in the meantime. Because like, what happened in Montreal after Andromeda? Though Montreal as a Major Metropolitan City with a booming economy has more than a few gaming companies, Edmonton isn’t so big a city (still metropolitan but not nearly the scale of Montreal) and has. Uh. A serious need for jobs in the arts and entertainment industries. BioWare being located in Edmonton Alberta is kinda a Big Deal for Alberta. We need that company there for multiple reasons, in part just for the culture. It would be a big deal if it shut down.

Like I guess this is going a little off topic and deranged but like. Alberta needs BioWare. So like. Idk what solution there is in the end, but like… the people getting screwed over are the people here. And we need the company to stay here. And stay open, and start functioning properly. A lot of Californian Tech companies and Tech laws fucked Canada and Canadian workers, and this is kinda an expansion of that, and like. There’s shit a lot of people outside the bubble don’t know about but like.

Alberta needs industry. We can’t have everything shut their doors and move out and then have a bunch of people in wealthy metropolitan areas go “sucks to suck bro have you tried moving?” Like. We still need our companies and infrastructure and industries to. Function. Lotta us can’t afford to leave. We need this stuff to be here. We need BioWare and companies like this.

Despite what you may have heard, people live out here…

#BioWare #weird Canadian rant #this got wildly off topic #sorry idk what came over me #I also just watched part of a documentary on nortel but I got really depressed lmao #American politics heavily influence Canada and I don’t think people notice??!#but also I feel very powerless sometimes #I am very powerless

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bargefreon6 · 2 years

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What Are The 5 Principal Advantages Of Play Game Online

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#live spbo

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dustofbrokenheart · 3 years

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The Lost Boys: Take-Out Intrigue Part 2

Part One | Part Two

Marko x Reader

Word Count: 2,524

Summary: A requested continuation of this idea. Reader runs into Marko a few weeks later and is convinced to go on a late night rendezvous.

There were few moments in life as sweet as when you had just finished a shift.

You got along with your co-workers and the owners were good to you. The job itself wasn’t too bad outside of the occasional snotty customer. But after being on your feet, your body was grateful to go home and just sit.

“Be careful, huh? They still haven’t found that guy,” your boss cautioned as she locked up behind the both of you.

That gave you pause.

Two weeks ago, the cops had come in on official business. Yet another missing person’s case in Santa Carla except this time, the last any one had seen of the victim was outside the restaurant. There were no leads which had the workers spooked, especially since it happened nearby.

Some insisted that he had been in an accident, that he would turn up sooner or later. Others maintained that he must be a criminal himself—why else would’ve he been out so late?

And a third group of co-workers were bold enough to come out and say he was probably long dead, the victim of a killer. You agreed with them.

Whatever the case, everyone was more cautious when leaving after the late shift.

Most of your shifts were still in the day but after seeing that beautiful boy on a random nightshift you’d taken on a whim and started signing up for more in hopes of seeing him again. He hadn’t come back yet.

You reassured her as you zipped up your jacket. “Thank you, auntie. I promise to be careful.”

Passing a critical eye over you, she started chiding you about dressing smarter—what kind of fool wore a nylon jacket in these temperatures. You took it without complaint, knowing the nagging was how she showed that she cared.

Her husband, the other owner, was already waiting in their car and the last thing she told you as she got in was, “There’s eight in that bag. Share with everyone at home.”

You held the bag containing a pile of smooth, fluffy buns reverently against your chest.

It wasn’t often that she brought food from home to give to employees but when she did, it was always delicious. The bao was a big favorite of yours.

“Thank you. I will,” you said with a dip of your head.

They drove off and you head down to your own car. Alone on the sidewalk, you juggled everything in your arms to fish out your keys, taking great care not to squish the bao. It was a particularly quiet that night which put you on guard, your eyes darting around trying to peer into the darkness.

Every shadow was suspicious, the corners of buildings a potential hiding spot for a psycho laying in wait. There was also an alleyway you had to pass by that made you extra wary. You darted past it, careful to keep it in your line of limited vision.

Santa Carla was a shifty town, especially after dark, and you’d rather be paranoid instead of caught off guard.

The jingle of your car keys was almost obvious disrupter in the otherwise silent street as you unlocked the car. Your textbooks were demoted to the floor of the passenger seat, the bag of bao riding shot gun in the actual seat.

For a spilt second, you thought about buckling it in but quickly dismissed it; the seat belt could crush them.

You slammed the door shut when you felt it. A cold shudder on the back of your neck. The kind of anxious realization that you were being watched.

Your head swiveled this way and that, trying to find the source of your unease but the darkness too much of a handicap. It was times like this when you were reminded just how badly lit the street was.

There were no detectible sounds either. You strained to pick up the slightest movement and only heard the rush of adrenaline in your ears.

Desperate to keep your wits about you, you took a deep breath and walked as calmly as you could to the driver’s side. You gripped the car keys tightly, in case you needed to stab someone, ignoring the tremors in your hands. Nothing happened, yet the feeling of being watched remained and you hoped that it’d be okay once you got in the car.

You reached for the handle and thought you were safe when it intensified. There was no warning before a cold hand rested on your hip, the chill cutting through your jacket.

You screamed with everything in you and whirled around, arm poised to gouge out the creep’s eyes.

The other person effortlessly batted your attack away and you recognized belatedly that those distinct curls were familiar. The fight drained out of you with one big gasp of air. “You.”

He smiled excitedly, like he hadn’t just scared the shit out of you. He spun your keys, the key ring looped around his finger. You didn’t remember them leaving your hold.

“Nice jab,” he complimented.

“Yeah,” you stammered, hand over your pounding heart. It was eerie how he snuck up on you like that, even when you were on full guard.

“You didn’t hesitate.” The spinning stopped and he offered you the keys. He leaned in close stopping just shy of invading your personal space. “You have a fighter’s instinct.”

“Only when people sneak up on me.”

He rubbed the back of his head. “Sorry about that.”

His voice was perfectly sincere but your intuition didn’t trust him. It told you that he had liked scaring you.

The customer was just how you remembered him from the one time you took his order. Patched jacket and leather chaps and a cherubic face. The flawless face was a harsh reminder that you hadn’t been able to land a single scratch on him.

“We didn’t introduce ourselves last time,” you frowned. “What’s your name?”

He bit his thumb, the paleness of it standing in stark contrast with the dark leather of his fingerless glove even in the dim light. “Marko.” Hmm. It suited him, you decided. “And you’re Y/N.

You stood up a little straighter, uneasy. You were sure that you hadn’t said your name last time—you never introduced yourself to customers.

Once again, he stole the words out of your mouth. “It was on the name tag.”

Oh. You’d forgotten about the raised rectangular underneath your jacket. The name tag. “Sorry. I’m still a little spooked from what just happened.”

“Never took you for a screamer,” he teased. Heat exploded in your face and the night hid how he focused on the small bird shaped pin on the lapel of your jacket.

He was more mischievous and you wished for the ease of conversation from his other visit. Was this truer to his actual personality? Normally, you’d wouldn’t have minded either way but you couldn’t ignore the weirdness of this encounter.

Your goal was to leave as soon as possible. Either he didn’t pick up on that, or he did and just didn’t care because next thing you knew, he was inviting you to hang out at a park a couple of blocks away. And he didn’t mean tomorrow or next week, he meant right then.

Your resistance was instinctive and the excuse that you needed to go home and get some sleep was both a truth and a lie.

He crowded you against the car, finally crossing into your personal space. You made the mistake of glancing into his eyes and found you couldn’t turn away. The longer you looked, the more you swore that a predatory yellow glowed from his irises.

Human eyes didn’t even come in that color! You were going crazy.

“I think you should come.” His soft tone didn’t match the determined posture. “You’ll have fun.”

You struggled internally but he started to sound reasonable. Forget the fact that this was something you knew better than to do. You really wanted to keep talking with him and an inner voice reminded you that you had been waiting for him to return…This was your chance.

“Okay,” you smiled. The previous reservations evaporated from your mind and all you could think about was the excitement.

The two of you drove to the park, him on his motorcycle and you in your car. All of the benches empty and ready for the taking. There a few by the basketball courts and there were tons of streetlights in that direction so you went there.

Sitting down, you were finally able to see him clearly. The park used white bulbs in their lights which was an upgrade from the orange ones lining the streets.

“Here.” You handed him one of the buns that you brought with from the car. “It’s char siu bao.”

He lit up. “Whoa! I didn’t know you guys sold this. Is it a secret menu item?”

You laughed, spitting out mashed-up bits of food. Still chuckling, you made sure to swallow and then answered. “Nope, there’s not a secret menu. Not one that I know about any way. Sometimes the owners bring in food to share with us and they made bao this time.”

The first bite had him moaning obscenely. The rest of it was scarfed down quickly and he patted his stomach appreciatively, his cut-off tank riding up to expose more of his skin.

“Damn. That was orgasm by BBQ pork bun. Your angel for giving me some.”

For the second time that night, heat spread across your face and you kept your eyes trained away. His boldness was flattering. How could you have been scared of him earlier? It seemed ridiculous right then.

“So,” he continued, “I couldn’t help but notice the eyesore hanging from your rear-view mirror.”

“It’s not an eyesore. It took me a whole week to make that.”

That impressed him. “Really. You make a lot of things yourself?”

It launched a whole conversation about your latest creative projects. What kind of materials you liked to work with, where you got your supplies, and if you would show them to him sometime.

Marko talked about his as well. He mostly dabbled in clothing projects, like his jacket, and painting although he worked with shells and wood a lot, too. If the extraordinary patch work on the jacket was any indicator, he was seriously talented.

Sensing an opportunity, you proposed that you would show him your stuff, only if he showed you his.

“You’ll have to be specific what of mine you want to see,” he said with a wink.

“The projects, Marko. I mean the projects,” you sassed. It was becoming easier to respond to his quips.

He gestured further down where some patches of spray paint were visible on the concrete ground. “I can show you some now, if you want.”

Your brows shot up. He did say he did all kinds of painting, but he spray painted too? Curious, you didn’t wait for him as you went to go take a peek.

People tagged all over Santa Carla these days, normally on buildings or signs. Never had you seen it left up in a public park and on the ground, no less. A lot of residents complained about what they saw as trashy graffiti, but you thought that was a conservative view. Some it was actually quite good, the talent of the artists undeniable.

The five slabs of park sidewalk examples of good pieces. There were styles that differed from bubbly word font to intricate cartoon characters and it was apparent that many people had worked on this.

You examined them critically, trying to find which was Marko’s based on your limited knowledge.

The bubbly font was too soft for him. The animated turtle with a bandana and nun-chucks, certainly a comic book figure, didn’t seem like him either. Then you spotted a stylized skull with a bird placed in each eye socket, an aggressively written ‘anarchy’ running down the side length of it.

The pin was a reminder on your chest and you knew that it was his.

“Aww, how’d you guess?”

“A little birdy told me,” you said, softly touching the image. What really stood out was the high-level shading he incorporated. The cheeks appeared wicked sharp and the eye sockets had realistic depth to them. You couldn’t believe he managed those techniques with simply spray paint.

Marko crouched in front of you, watching you intently. Your scent and admiration irresistible to him.

Neither of you spoke as he leaned ever closer. Unlike earlier, the quiet wasn’t scary and you felt anticipation. Right at the moment he his lips would’ve touched yours, there was a big rustle in the bushes to your left.

Both of you froze. You in alarm and Marko in annoyance.

Next thing you knew, another blonde rolled out from the foliage and bowled Marko over. The curly haired boy was quick to shove the other off of him and you were sure what was happening.

Until the new comer with his fluffed hair patted Marko affectionately on the shoulder, the chain attached to his black coat clinking. That was a familiar touch. “Marko!”

“Get your fat ass off me, Paul” he grumbled.

Paul dusted himself off and peered behind at his butt “I knew these pants looked good on me.”

Marko wasn’t having it. “Yeah, yeah. Why are you here?”

“You abandoned me, bud. I was gunna see if you wanted to feed but looks like you’re already occupied.” He turned his brilliant smile towards you and all you managed was wave awkwardly.

“This is Y/N,” Marko explained. “We were just talking.”

“Sure,” Paul said dragging out the r and flagrantly winking. Yikes, he would’ve gotten a show if he had waited a second more to reveal himself.

“Well now that you barged in, I suppose we should meet back up with the other two.”

Paul nodded and ran off into the darkness without any further explanation.

You stood up as well trying to salvage your dignity. Despite moving in for a kiss minutes ago, Marko didn’t try again. He walked backwards in the same direction Paul had left in, wearing his signature smirk.

“I’ll stop by for take-out soon. Surprise me with something yummy.” With one last cheeky wave, he jogged away.

At the moment he disappeared, it was as if a fog had cleared. All of your alarms came rushing back. You must be crazy for having agreed to come to the park!

Who in their right mind went somewhere with a stranger in the dead of night with a killer on the lose?

Were you that weak for a pretty face that all it took was them asking you nicely? Yes, your time with him hadn’t been horrible, actually, you enjoyed it, but something still wasn’t right.

You trudged to your car, kicking yourself. If he came to the restaurant like he claimed, you’d have to put your foot down more. Stupid decisions got people killed in Santa Carla and you were determined not to be another missing person.

Even for a face like Marko’s.

_______________

Bao is so so good! I can’t tell if I have a good handle on writing Marko yet. Yes, the missing person is the one he offed last time and yes, he did use mind powers on the reader here.

Thanks for reading :)

#the lost boys #the lost boys x reader #the lost boys marko #marko the lost boys #the lost boys imagines

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tomasorban · 3 years

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THE CLONES OF ENKI (excerpt)- By J.R. Jochman from "Forgotten Ages"1979

THE LULU CLONES OF SUMER

Perhaps the most startling revelations of the advanced nature of ancient research into the manipulation of the building blocks of life come to us from Sumerian inscriptions, dated between 4,000 and 5,000 years old. Several legends speak of a time when "god-men" ruled the world of prehistory; and in order to work the mines of the land of Apsu -- identified with southern Africa -- the Sumerian deities decided to create a Lulu, or primitive worker, who would do the actual digging and other hard labor. The god Enki was placed in charge of the task to "bring about the work of great wisdom", and he, with the Mother Goddess, Ninhursag, began to fashion the Lulu. The place where the creation took place was called the Bit Shimti -- the "house where the breath of life is breathed in".

Upon entering the house", Ninhursag first "washed her hands" as any lab worker would, and called to her lab assistants to prepare the first ingredient: "Mix the core of clay, from the depths of the Earth in Apsu -- and shape it into the form of a core; I have knowledgeable young gods, who will bring the clay to the right condition."

The Akkadian term for clay is Tit (molding clay); but in its earliest spelling, ti-it, it also meant "that which has life". In the Hebrew, Tit means "mud", with its synonym "bos" related to "bisa" (marsh) and "besa" (egg). These connotations, clay-marsh-egg, hint at stages of development in the creation of the cell. First, the substance began as a clay. In 1974, Dr. Graham Cairn-Smith of the University of Glasgow's Department of Chemistry, announced a new theory on the origins of life. Dr. Cairn-Smith was not satisfied that the first threads of nucleic organic material floating in the primaeval sea could have come together by chance, but must have needed a structural catalyst within which the threads formed into the first complex DNA patterns. Clay, he believes, was the ideal catalyst.

Clay has a crystalline structure that has the ability to retain and "print" a pattern upon new material. As Dr. Cairn-Smith noted: "Clay consists of stacks thin, interlocking plates containing aluminum and silicon atoms that can be arranged in random patterns. These patterns can undergo changes as new [5]clays 'print' near old layers. This is a system capable of development by natural selection, by trial and error -- the first stages necessary to produce molecules and arrangements of molecules that would eventually form the more complex systems of early life forms."

THE BLUEPRINT OF MAN

More recently, in 1977, Dr. James Lawless of NASA's Ames Research Center, together with Dr. Edward Edelson and Lewis Manning, of the American Chemical Society, succeeded in demonstrating that clay containing nickel will attract amino acids; and the concentrated amino acids will then link up to form chains similar to protein. Dr. Cairn-Smith stated, "In simple terms, clay therefore could have been the basis of life: the Blueprint of Man." (Which reminds us of Elihu to Job, 33:6, "I also am formed out of the clay." RHC)

The next stage of the "clay" development, according to the Hebrew-Akkadian word connotations, was that it became like a "marsh" -- that is, the clay material was mixed with simple organic material, as one find in marshland ooze. In the Sumerian texts, this is seen in the Mother Goddess Ninhursag's command that chemicals called "bitumens of Apsu" be used to "purify" or "impregnate" the clay. Bitumen is a petroleum substance made up of very complex hydrocarbon chains -- the basis of organic chemistry. What is described, in essence, is that organic chains were mixed in the clay, and the clay patterns began to "print" the chains into more complex structures, such as DNA.

That this shaping process was directed can be seen in the "young gods" or lab assistants shaping the clay into a specific mold, bringing it into the "right condition". Enki, the text states, further ordered the assistants to "bind upon the mixture the mold of the gods" -- or, carefully design the organic material into the genetic codes of a human-like creature. The result, in the last stage, was the formation of an egg or cell.

THE BREATH OF LIFE

The next major step, once a cell was produced, was to give the cell an "essence" or code of life. This was done by adding blood. The text reads: "I will prepare a solution. Let one god be bled… his blood. Let Ninhursag mix with the clay-egg."

(One would think, on reading Jochman's article on Sumerian Clones that the secret of making them had been blocked in Cuneiform script for 5,000 years, but Polish Rabbis of the 16th Century were adept at making servant Golem. Read this revealing quote from Gershom Scholem's "On the Kabbalah and Its Symbolism":

"After saying certain prayers and holding certain fast days, they make the figure of a man from clay, and when they have said [6]the Shem Hamephorash over it (that is, breathed the breath of life into it, by ritual chanting) the image comes to life. And although the image itself cannot speak, it understands what is said to it and commanded; among the Polish Jews it does all kinds of housework, but is not allowed to leave the house. On the forehead of the image they write Emeth, that is, truth. But an image of this kind grows each day; though very small at first, it ends by becoming larger than all those in the house. In order to take away his strength, which ultimately becomes a threat to all those in the house, they quickly erase the first letter, Aleph, from the word Emeth on his forehead, so that there remains only the word Meth, that is, dead. When this is done the Golem collapses and dissolves back into the clay or mud that he was . . .They say that a Baal Shem in Poland, by the name of Rabbi Elias, made a golem who became so large that the rabbi could no longer reach his forehead to erase the letter E. He thought up a trick, namely that the Golem, being his servant, should remove his boots, supposing that when the Golem bent over, he would erase the letters. And so it happened, but when the Golem became mud again, his whole weight fell on the rabbi, who was sitting on the bench, and crushed him."

(This delightful tale illustrates the dangers of using creative thought for selfish purposes. It was a warning to Cabalists of that day in Europe. It is a warning of this day to students of mind control and mind dynamics courses; and we use it in our latest talk on Psychic Self-Defense, Part III, "The Dweller on the Threshold", BSRF No. 24-M. Scholem does not include the secret of bringing such a man-made creation to life, charging the clay figure with freshly shed blood or sperm. The technique is described in detail by Franz Bardon in his book, "Initiation Into Hermetics". But Jochman tells us that the Sumerian adepts had their own variation on the technique and carried it several steps further.)

THE ESSENCE OF THE CLONE

The Akkadian texts make it clear that what was being sought in the blood was Napishtu, or an "essence" related to Shi-im-ti, the "breath-wind-life". The key is in the name of the god from whom the blood was finally taken -- Te-e-ma. According to translators W.G. Lambert and A. R. Millard of Oxford University, the name means "personality", with the further connotation "that contained within which binds the memory". This is nothing less than a description of the gene, the element which gives the cell life, and directs the cell to begin the process of reproduction.

The inscriptions tell of the delicate operation by which the god Ea "purified the Napishtu" and offered the solution to Ninhursag, who carefully held the clay-egg-cell. But it was Enki who performed the crucial injection: He blows in" the "breath-wind' into the cell, and gave it life. The injection was successful for the cell began to multiply.

IMPREGNATION OF THE BIRTH-GODDESS

The next and final step involved artificial impregnation. Ninhursag "cut off 14 pieces of the clay-egg-cell" -- she selected 14 cells out of the newly-dividing creation. There then follows a description of the coming of 14 Birth-Goddesses to the operating table: Everything is detailed, from the shaving of the pubic hair, the preparing of the scalpels and surgical instruments, and finally the operations themselves. Within each, one of the 14 selected cells was placed in the womb, and the cells began to grow into living beings.

At the beginning of the tenth month after the first operation, Ninhursag directed surgery to remove the mature creatures. The texts tell what follows: " . . .she opened the womb, Her face brightened with joy. Her face covered with a mask, she removes. That which was in the womb came forth. She cries, I have created! By my hands I have made it!" One cuneiform picture has Ninhursag showing one of the new humanoid babies to the god Ea. On the left side is a minor "god" surrounded by laboratory flasks, bringing a carefully sealed container to a boil on top of a stool-like holder, showing where the child had come from.

Once the experiment proved successful, it appears the process of artificial impregnation was repeated again and again, the cells being used all from the original cell created by Enki, Ninhursag, and Ea. The result would have been the production of a multitude of Clones -- creatures that looked exactly alike. A scene depicted on a rock carving found,in the mountains of Elam near Sumer shows a seated god holding a flask from which liquid is pouring -- a familiar representation of Enki, A goddess is seated next to him -- Ninhursag -- and about the pair are lesser deities, very likely the birth-goddesses who partook in the great experiment of creation. Facing the birth-goddesses, Enki and Ninhursag are row upon row of dwarfish, long-haired man-like creatures who look like a multitude of identical twins -- as if they had been produced from the same mold.

Who were these dwarfish creatures? Perhaps the answer may be found in the reason for the creatures' creation: They were to become "primitive workers" in the mines of Apsu. It is not without significance that this area has turned up some of the oldest prehistoric mines in the world -- as well as forms of ape-men that have become a puzzle to anthropologists: Australopithecus robustus and agile, Zinjanthropus and Homo Habilis. These forms, instead of being so-called "ancestors" of man, are actually the result of genetic creation by unknown experimenters in the past. Perhaps someday we will find the secret when the Bit Shimti is unearthed -- the laboratory-house where enigmatic "gods" manipulated the "breath of life". . .

#ninhursag #history #genetics #mesopotamia #mother goddess #anunnaki #prehistoric #hathor #ninmah #sumer

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misssunflowersandsangria · 4 years

Text

Stars and Sand

Shikamaru stood up, twisting at the waist to stretch. He’d been sitting for far too long pouring over paperwork and translating scrolls. His blonde partner took off her glasses rubbing at her eyes.

“I think we should probably call it a night and pick it up tomorrow.” He recommended and she nodded beginning to gather her things. They’d worked together for a while now but he felt as though he knew very little about her. At first, she was so skittish and seemed scared of him. Thankfully she’d calmed down and they worked well together. She didn’t force him to talk more than necessary, she was smart and a hard worker.

“Wanna get a bite to eat?” He asked trying to remember if he ate lunch or not but remembered that Temari had stormed in with her usual fanfare and handed him his packed lunch that he’d forgotten to grab.

Shiho looked surprised by the invitation her face flushing bright red.

“Temari wouldn’t mind?”

“Why would she mind?”

Shiho still looked unsure but nodded “Uh… yes, I would like that.”

“I’ll see you at the front in 5 minutes.”

“Okay!” She replied excitedly clumsily toppling a tower of books in her excitement.

“I’ll get that tomorrow!”

He just chuckled and shook his head. Women were weird and despite being older he still didn’t quite understand them.

He made his way down the hall hearing the familiar sounds of a storm brewing. He stood in the doorway watching as he liked to call her his “Hericane” berated a Chunin about his lack of motivation, initiative and worried for the future of the Leaf if he was truly the best they had to offer.

“Come on Mari lay off the kid.” She turned those stormy eyes towards him and while still frightening didn’t fill him with the same dread as they once had.

“Lay off?” She asked confused by the statement. Shikamaru couldn’t help but love the cute look of confusion on her face. The Chunin was smart enough to take this opportunity to jump out of harm's way through the window.

He just chuckled at the incredulous look on her face as she mumbled ‘soft’ under her breath.

“Anyways Shiho and I are going to get something to eat. Wanna come?” She stood there in stunned silence and he feared that he had invited the storm into the tiny office.

“You and Shiho are going to go get something to eat tonight?”

“Yes…” He wondered why she was repeating his previous statement.

“She seems like a nice girl. We’ve worked together but I haven’t gotten to know her, I figured that this would be a chance to. You heard my mom the other night, all that nonsense about settling down, hopefully, this will get her off my back if she sees I’m trying to meet people. Besides I’ve told you all about my goals for the future feels like she’d fit into that role nicely.” He explained half-jokingly hoping it would help the confusion.

Temari shut her eyes and shook her head. “I’ll pass. Have a nice dinner.”

With no other explanation, she began to organize and sort her work grabbing her bag to make her exit. He wasn’t quite sure why but there was a weird feeling in the air. He grabbed her arm before she could leave. “I’ll see you at home okay?”

She refused to meet his gaze. “Yea, okay.” He watched her rush down the hall part of him wanting to run after her and ask what was wrong. He knew that she would only berate him for worrying so instead he watched her walk away.

Once some time had passed he made his way towards the entrance to meet Shiho she greeted him with a bright smile and they fell into step with one another.

“Where should we go?”

“I’m okay with anything, you pick.” That was odd. The women in his life, his mom, Ino, Temari, they typically told him where to go and he just fell in line.

“Ramen?” It seemed like a safe enough choice.

“Sure!” They walked to Ichiraku in silence and while he preferred that to idle chit chat it felt awkward and uncomfortable. Temari by this point would have told him all about the level of incompetence and idiots that she had to deal with during the day. He’d tell her that she was too hard on them and she’d call him weak. Then they would trade verbal barbs with one another before falling into a fit of laughter followed by companionable silence. It was routine, familiar and he enjoyed it.

He knew that Shiho was more subdued and quiet by nature but it almost seemed as though she was worried to say anything to avoid making him upset. She opened up a little more at the ramen shop and she told him about her history and experience. She was intelligent and excelled at what she did but she seemed very insecure and unsure about herself. She didn’t flaunt her skills or accolades more than necessary often minimizing what she did. She didn’t make fun of him or criticize anything he told her even if he probably deserved it. She was to the core a very kind, agreeable woman and it left him a little on edge.

Was this what it was like to have a woman in your life who was kind and supportive? Temari, of course, showed that she cared in her own violent/ aggressive way. Shiho though, in what little encounters they had placed him on a pedestal and it seemed in her eyes he could do no wrong. She was overly complimentary over the littlest things. He’d imagined that this was what he wanted for himself versus the constant nagging but this was even more uncomfortable. She would never push him to do more, to strive for greatness. Waving off her compliments was more exhausting than having Temari nag him for being lazy, although she did that far less now.

They were sitting on the roof of the Nara home star gazing.

“You’ve grown up Shika.” He grinned looking towards Temari where she was sitting up looking at the sky.

“You think so?”

“Yes, you’ve become the Shinobi and person that I always knew you could be even while you were crying in that hospital waiting room.”

That compliment coming from her was paramount and filled him with an immense sense of pride.

“Thank you, Mari.” She nodded knowing that they needed very few words between them. She laid down next to him settling against his chest, his arm wrapping around her in familiarity fitting perfectly against him.

“Tell me about the constellations again.” He requested shutting his eyes. She’d told him all about her enjoyment of stargazing back in Suna and he found that he enjoyed it just as much as cloud watching. He smiled to himself, her warm familiar voice telling him stories about the stars.

Temari looked up feeling his breath steady and realizing that he’d fallen asleep. She smiled and kissed his cheek softly loving the look of peace and contentment on his face.

“I love you.” She whispered her confession to the stars.

Shikamaru walked Shiho home staring up at the stars before making his way back towards the Nara compound carrying some take out for Temari. He figured that she probably ate or his mother made her something, still though he figured that she would appreciate the gesture and he kind of missed her. Hopefully, she’d be up for a game of Shogi before bed.

“What the hell did you do?” He was surprised to see Yoshino standing at the doorway fuming.

“What do you mean?”

“Temari left, she packed up her room and left.”

It took him a moment before his voice returned.

“Left?”

“Yes, as in she’s gone.”

“Where did she go?”

She sighed frustrated. “I don’t know, that’s why I am asking you. What did you do?”

“Nothing, I saw her after work, I asked her if she wanted to get something to eat with me and Shiho and she said no. I told her I'd see her here.” He stared at the empty room that was devoid of anything related to the Sand Kunoichi.

Yoshino rubbed her temples fighting the urge to smack the stupid out of her son.

“You asked her if she wanted to get something to eat with you and another girl tonight?”

“Yes.”

Yoshino stared at him with wide eyes. “Are you stupid?”

“What?”

“Oh my goodness. The regaled strategist of the great shinobi war knows nothing about women.” She cried, throwing her hands into the air.

“What are you going on about? You told me to start getting serious about settling down and finding a wife and I told her that. I figured that this is a step in the right direction.”

“I meant that in regards to Temari!”

“Temari?”

“Yes! Are you that dense? I won’t accept this Shiho woman or another woman as the future matriarch of the Nara clan.”

“But you’ll accept Temari?”

“Of course. I thought that this was what you were working towards as well.”

“What do you mean?”

“You spend all your free time together on top of work. She stays here during the weekends, she’s worked with me on top-secret Nara research, she’s met almost 90% of the clan. You gave her access to the clan forest. I mean she wears your old clan shirts to bed. I assumed that you’ve been grooming her to fit into that role.”

“No...no that wasn’t what I was doing ...at least not intentionally.”

“Did you honestly forget that you two had plans tonight? She was so excited about it too.”

“Next Friday night okay? Don’t forget.” Temari reminded him pushing a finger forcefully against his chest.

He just waved off her concerns. “I won’t forget. Besides Fridays are and have been our nights why would I forget all of a sudden?”

She worried her bottom lip unsure but nodded. “Just wanted to make sure. Don’t disappoint me.” She demanded leveling him with a look.

“Troublesome woman. I won’t, come on lay down and relax, will you. I need to sleep.” She sighed but returned to her spot next to him and his arms wrapped comfortably around her. His face resting against the back of her neck inhaling the familiar scent. And he felt himself relax into the bed her presence in his arms grounding him. She had immediately sunk into his touch and settled feeling safe and at peace.

“Good night Mari.”

“Good night Shika."

Shikamaru felt himself pale at the memory. How could he have forgotten?

“You need to figure this out. Do you like this Shiho girl?”

He shrugged trying to process all this information. “I mean...she’s fine. She’s nice, pretty enough I guess. She doesn’t nag me like the two of you do. Life with her would be easy.”

“As opposed to being with Temari?”

“There is no with Temari.”

Yoshino sighed and shook her head. “Then it’s settled.” She turned away from him frustrated and disappointed.

It was one dinner it wasn’t as though he was planning on proposing to Shiho. He knew that she had a crush on him, it was pretty obvious and he hoped that she didn’t think that it was anything more than a friendly dinner. Even more so he hoped that Temari didn’t think that it was any more than a friendly dinner.

He laid down on the bed her sheets still smelling like the wind and the rain remembering how wonderful and familiar it was now to wake up with her next to him. Life with Temari wouldn’t be easy she would nag him, force him to stop sleeping in and work. They would stay up late at night playing shogi because she was stubborn and wouldn’t admit defeat. They would spend afternoons cloud watching and nights stargazing. She would be difficult and demanding and they would probably argue a lot, but even so, he knew that he would be happy with her. She’d push him to be better than he thought he could be. She would help him achieve goals and dreams beyond anything he could have imagined alone. They would laugh and cry together and experience all the joys and tragedies life had to offer. They would be very happy together.

He thought about his life with Shiho, he was sure that they could also have a pretty happy life together as well. She would probably do anything that he asked. She’d never expect more out of him. He wondered whether she’d cloud watch with him. She mentioned that she was allergic to grass so that might not work out. She was kind and smart so Shogi could still be fun with her. Like he’d told his mother, life together would be easy, they’d have two kids, he’d retire once his daughter married and his son became a fine Shinobi and he’d die before her. He could be as simple and as lazy as he wanted to be. Shiho fit into his original plans perfectly and yet it left him feeling sad and unfulfilled. He thought he wanted easy, he thrived in that and yet the idea of hurricanes and winds made him so much happier. So he decided to chase those storms.

Temari wasn’t surprised when he showed up at her place. She was sure that his mother when she found her room abandoned had become upset and demanded he find her. She needed to take her key back.

“Why did you leave?”

She shrugged refusing to look him in the eye. “I didn’t think it was appropriate for me to stay there. Please tell your mom that I appreciate her hospitality. Here are all your clan things. It wouldn’t be right for me to keep any of it.” She handed him a box that had all her Nara clan paraphernalia. Shirts, a stuffed deer, a necklace. They’d even gifted her a fan with the clan symbol emblazoned on it. It hurt packing those things as she not only lost him but an entire family that she had grown to love and care for. She’d selfishly kept a deer looking onesie that an older clan woman had given her as a joke.

Shikamaru rubbed the back of his neck frustrated. “Temari, please, what’s going on.”

“You made your choice Shika and it’s not me.”

“What do you mean?”

“Shiho, she’s what you want isn’t she, she’s the perfect person to fit into the future you imagined as you said. I’m messy, demanding and stubborn. I’ll make life much more difficult for you. All I’ve ever wanted for you was to just be happy. For a while, I thought that I could do that but you don’t want happy, you want easy and that’s not who I am and I’ll never be that person. I was going to tell you tonight to see if maybe we could be something more. Foolish right?“ She very lightly kissed him just wanting to see what it would be like but she felt her heartbreak at the gentle touch. Shikamaru wasn’t hers and he never would be. For as much as she wanted to be his, he’d told her time again his dreams for the future and she didn’t fit into those plans. It was time to accept it.

“I have to thank you though. The last few months with you have been some of the best I've ever had. Being part of the Clan, having Yoshino nag and coddle me like I was her daughter. Having you sitting across the dinner table, then lying together watching the stars. Waking up next to each other. It was almost like I was the person you’d dreamed of and that I fit into the future that you’d imagined. I was just kidding myself and seeing something that wasn’t there. Shika, be happy, live your life to the fullest and live it out as the very person I know that you are.” The tears in her eyes made them glitter and his heart was breaking in his chest. How could he have messed this up so badly? He felt like she was slipping through his fingers like sand.

“You’re right. You’re nothing that I ever wanted for myself. But that was when I was younger and didn’t know what I wanted in life. I wanted simple and easy but now it’s changed. I want you and whatever that means.” He felt desperate, like trying to hold onto the wind in his hands.

She just shook her head stepping away from him refusing to believe that his mind could change so easily. He was a planner and strategist at heart. He didn’t just make decisions following a whim. “You can’t mean that.”

“I do. Mari, you’re right the last few months, well if it's any indication of what our life might be then I want that, it’s been so easy. I want to wake up next to you before the madness of the morning begins and we’re trying to eat breakfast and get our kid dressed so that he can get to school but he’s just like me so he’ll be slow and lazy about it. I want to cloud watch with you then stargaze. I want to argue and fight even if it's just to make up after. I want all this because it’s with you and in the end, you are everything I want. Even when I didn’t realize it, I was trying to make this feel like home. To make it so wonderful and complete that you’d never want to leave.” He used his thumb to brush a stray tear away swearing that she would never cry because of him again.

“I fell in love with this place in the same way I fell in love with you. You became home to me. And this afternoon I felt like I was seeing it all being taken away from me. Shika you have to be sure. Not even just a few hours ago you were out with her to see if you could settle down with her. I won’t be a second choice or have you accept me because that’s what your clan and your mom wants. I chose you a long time ago but I don’t think that you felt that way about me despite all the things we’ve been through and how much closer we’ve become. I’ve just been a troublesome woman in your eyes.” He didn’t like seeing her so insecure and unsure. He knew that he had messed up and how much it affected her was jarring.

He gathered her into his arms clutching her against his chest. Her hands went to latch onto his vest holding onto him tightly, grounding herself, trying to prevent more tears from falling. Maybe if she held onto him tight enough she’d never have to let him go.

“I was looking for the easy way out. I never let myself dream that you could be mine so I pushed away any thoughts and hopes of a future together. Mari, I’m so sorry. Of course, I want and choose you. You’re the only one. My goals and dreams for myself are so small but with you they’re limitless. You make me feel like I can accomplish anything. In the best versions of my future and myself, you are there. The only thing that was troublesome about you was my feelings for you and not being able to do anything about them. I just...I didn’t realize that you felt the same. I figured that one day you’d realize that you were wasting your time with me here and you’d go back to Suna and marry some rich, powerful Lord that was worthy of you. You’re an actual Princess. All I have is my heart, some deer, and a nagging mom, I don’t know if that’s enough for you.”

“It always has been.” She kissed him fiercely, possessively and with all the love she had for him and to her delight he responded just as fiercely. She could feel the weight of his words in his kiss and that he was finally allowing himself to hold onto something that he’d believed for so long was out of his reach.

He kissed her along the shell of her ear sending delightful shivers down her spine. “I love you, Mari, I have for a long time and I’m sorry that I didn’t realize it sooner.”

“Even your feelings are lazy.” She teased him before kissing him once again softly. She knew that this was going to be something that she’d never get tired of doing.

“I love you too Shika.”

“So what did you have planned for us tonight?” He asked after they’d spend a good amount of the night sharing lazy loving kisses.

“It was stupid.”

“Hey, I’m sorry I forgot. Nothing you do is stupid. Please?”

Temari paused and thought to herself before nodding. “Okay, when we get there you can decide what to do. Follow me.” He watched her grab a small bag tucking it into her waist before following her out. They ran to the very edge of the Nara clan forest to the top of the hill where they’d often spend their nights stargazing. They’d long claimed it as their spot.

He watched her carefully as she pulled from the small pouch two vials of sand and a necklace with a large silver ring. She handed him the vial with the Nara clan symbol on it. “It’s something of a tradition in Suna. Almost like a pre-engagement kind of ceremony.” The ring of the necklace opened and she carefully poured sand from her vial that had the symbol of the Kazekage family into it.

“It’s a smaller sand ceremony. I brought sand from Suna and took sand from the Nara clan forest and we are supposed to combine them, symbolizing the bringing together of two lives into one. The two sands combined symbolize everything that we have been or will become in the future.” He nodded in awe of the meaning.

Temari took his hand into hers pausing his movement. “Shika, it’s a real promise and this means a lot to me. Don’t force yourself into it.” He hated that she still seemed unsure about his feelings and hoped that he could prove it to her.

“I already told you tonight I’m committed to you and me and whatever this will become in the future. I’m never letting you go. I love you.” He poured his own sand into the necklace and in doing so, her eyes filled with tears. She then closed it and placed it around his neck.

She held onto the pendant and looked up meeting his soft deer-like eyes that she’d fallen so in love with. She whispered a few words in what he recognized as an old Suna language out loud.

“Just as these grains of sand can never be separated, we pray today that our lives together would be blended like the winds and may our love swirl around each other like the prevailing winds.” She repeated softly so he could understand, his own eyes filling with tears her forehead resting against his.

“You carry the weight of our family and the relationship with you. When we’re married you and me along with representatives from our family will combine sand in a show of unity, some of that sand will be placed in my ring completing the ceremony and cementing our bond.”

He pulled her into a kiss holding her tightly against him the weight of the necklace present against his chest, its meaning heavy on his heart. He couldn’t believe that he almost missed this.

“I love you so much.” He didn’t know if those words could adequately describe how much he truly loved and cared for her.

“I love you too.”

They eventually made their way back to the Nara manor and Yoshino apologized profusely for her son's idiocy. But her happiness at Temari being back home won out.

Shikamaru traced the Nara clan symbol over Temari’s heart as they laid down to sleep. He’d had a shirt made specifically for her a while back and it always filled him with a strong sense of pride to see her outfitted in his clan's clothing. She smiled sweetly at him her hand lacing with his.

“Mari..” He whispered into the dark almost in disbelief that she was there and his. But she had always been there, like a shadow. She kissed him softly and slowly pressing her weight against him as though she knew what he was thinking. Promising that she’d always be there. The sand ceremony was a very old tradition and completing it with someone was a very real and serious commitment. They were promising to build a life and family together. She had decided that night under the stars when she’d confessed to the universe how she felt about him, a life together was all she wanted. She felt that he shared that dream too but like so many other things she’d have to push him along to realizing it.

They cleared the air with Shiho. Temari had no reason to hate the girl and bore no ill will towards her. Shiho explained that she’d seen Shikamaru as a friend for a while and it was obvious to everyone that Temari had his heart. They were actually both thankful to Shiho because she served as a catalyst to reach this point.

Temari lifted Shikamaru’s hand in hers to trace the outlines of the constellations. They seemed so much brighter here in Suna than they were back in Konoha. The vast desert sky laid out before them. After everything that happened, they both wanted some time to themselves and planned a trip out to a hot spring before going to Suna. This was so that he could tell her brothers that he was formally courting their sister. She deemed it unnecessary but appreciated his willingness. When Gaara and Kankuro had seen his necklace though they knew that it was beyond something so simple.

Shikamaru laced her fingers with his to bring her hand down to place a kiss on it. Soon enough he knew she’d be wearing his ring on that hand and it only filled him with a sense of joy, happy that he was finally holding the wind in his hands.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/21373042

#shikamaru x temari #shikatema #fanfic

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magog-on-the-march · 5 years

Link

The idea of exploiting workers in order to tell a story condemning the exploitation of workers is grimly ironic to put it mildly, so when we sit down at E3 to speak with Lanning and Oddworld executive producer Bennie Terry III, we ask what crunch was like for Oddworld on Abe's Oddysee, and if it's improved since.

"No one wants to say, 'This product was done by people who worked 9-to-5, and they all had great healthcare, weekends off, three weeks of vacation, and everyone had that. Here you go.' If it's not great, everyone goes, 'Who cares? Why didn't they lose some fucking sleep to get it done and get it better?'

"The audience is absolutely ruthless, and we should never suspect for a second that they're not. They're absolutely ruthless. They don't care how many people died making the product. [laughing] I mean literally. They don't care. We're ruthless with how we spend our money. We live in a culture that's based on 'Wal Mart's cheaper. Let's go there for our stuff. Amazon Prime delivers without shipping costs. Let's go there.' And that shapes our world. At the end of the day, it's about the quality of what's on screen."

(Full article under the cut for posterity)

The Irony of Oddworld

Lorne Lanning on crunching to make games about the exploitation of workers

Brendan Sinclair | North American Editor | Thursday 25th July 2019

gamesindustry.biz

The 1997 PlayStation-exclusive Oddworld: Abe's Oddysee is very clearly concerned about the exploitation of workers. It centers on the Mudokons, a race that has been enslaved and forced to work in factories by a ruthless company willing to literally putting them through the grinder in an attempt to boost profits.

Clearly, creative director Lorne Lanning has some opinions about capitalism, and he's not exactly shy about it.

But Lanning is also the co-founder of the company behind the game, Oddworld Inhabitants. He was the boss of a company making a video game for profit, in an era where crunch and overwork were pervasive, when the subjects were talked about as virtues in the press on the rare occasions they were mentioned at all.

"It was always terrible," Lanning admits. "And it's still terrible. It's not a burden we try to put on every individual, but for Bennie and I, it's just terrible. And different people at different times rise to the occasion."

He says the idea of a 9-to-5 job in game development is increasingly possible, particularly for "huge companies that have mega-IPs that are doing billions and billions of dollars." Even so, he adds it doesn't seem to be a very common situation for developers.

"I mean, we're past EA Spouse," he says, referring to a 2004 LiveJournal post from the wife of an EA employee detailing numerous issues with the company's treatment of workers. "We're past that, where everyone realized they were basically being exploited for the extreme gain of a select few of the executive class. That's still going on in different places in the world."

Ultimately, Lanning says the problem of crunch in games stems from its nature as an entertainment business.

"I tell this to people we work with all the time, particularly young people," Lanning says. "You have to realize something: we are a luxury class. We're not doing anything important. The important people are picking up your garbage, fixing your medical problems, growing your food, supplying electricity. Those are the important people in civilization; they actually provide a benefit. We're just entertaining people. It's complete luxury; they don't need us."

On top of that, Lanning says entertainment media are in a difficult position because the audience is concerned only with the end product, not the methods of its production.

He likens it to athletes who want to win Olympic gold. They're expected to sacrifice to achieve that goal, from strict diet and exercise regimens to not having a dating life.

"In entertainment, if you want real stability -- and this is where I feel I'm just being honest and not necessarily saying what's politically correct -- if you want to make entertainment that stands out, show me where you can do that where people don't put everything in to get there," Lanning says. "The only ones that are able to do that are the ones who have reached the bar where they now have perfection."

He points to Pixar as an example, saying the animation studio has never had a film that wasn't a hit (although he adds some were bigger than others).

"In the beginning, if you watch [Pixar executive] John Lasseter's videos, he [points to a corner of the room and says], 'And that's my sleeping bag. And that's where I sleep to get these projects done. And if you want to be a great animator, that's what you're going to do too.' That's the legacy of entertainment."

He adds, "I don't believe there's anyone you could talk to who built anything in this business who didn't really persevere night and day to get it done. I've been doing that my entire career. I've had health issues because of it. I wish it weren't that way, but it kind of is."

Lanning asks if we've seen Bohemian Rhapsody. When we say no, he asks if we have a problem with Queen, the band the film was about. We love Queen, we say, but weren't interested in a film that played so fast and loose with the facts.

"Maybe, but see, this is Hollywood," Lanning says. "We're not trying to replicate what was actually true, we're just trying to make something that's inspiring, that you felt was a moving experience."

He then talked about an inspirational scene of the band working through the night to create the song Bohemian Rhapsody.

"Usually with great art, that's what it takes," Lanning says. "I think it was Martha Graham, the founder of modern dance, who said the dilemma of being an artist is living with the dissatisfaction of feeling like nothing is ever complete, done, or as good as it could be. And I think that goes for designers, for directors, for people that are really craftsmen in an artistic sense. The ambitious team is usually going to beat the unambitious team unless you're so fat, like some of the biggest media companies are so fat they can fail and still succeed because they just keep throwing money and bodies at the project."

Given that Abe's Oddysee and the upcoming Oddworld: Soulstorm are about the player character's attempts to organize an exploited labor force to gain power against their oppressors, we finish the interview by asking Lanning about his stance on unions.

"It's kind of like my stance on the death penalty," Lanning says. "Philosophically, I'm fine with the death penalty. I think lots of people deserve not to be here with the rest of us. Practically, I'm concerned about who has that power. If we have such a thing, is it going to be abused and are we just going to shut up political dissidents and stuff like that? Unions are kind of similar.

"My stepfather was a teamster. I saw a lot of things and heard a lot of stories about unions through there. Part of the problems with unions is that they start to encapsulate power and use that in a different way that becomes counterproductive, possibly sometimes, to the industry they're trying to unionize. If we lived in a really healthy, honest world where everyone was fair, we wouldn't need them. But because it's not a fair world, sometimes we do. What would happen to this industry is it would put out most of the small people, but the big ones would survive just fine."

#Oddworld #Lorne Lanning #GamesIndustry #interview

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simnonsense · 5 years

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A Realm of Problems

Okay,

so I and many other downloaded the new “Realm of Magic” Sims 4 expansion pack.

Suffice to say, a lot of us are disappointed and perhaps even confused at the sloppiness to the game creation and the limited content. Some of the houses are not put together very well. Boring. Mismatching color swatches. A whole slew of problems and mistakes that keep cropping up the more you play it.

I just want to say, I need you guys to NOT BLAME THE SIMS 4 STAFF.

Why is that? Well, let me tell you...

Capitalism, Corporate Greed (yeah, I capitalized that), and the CEO’s who own EA itself should be blamed. These money grubbers own a Triple A gaming company, and Sims has been around a long time to create a sort of nostalgia with a lot of us. So, what does that mean? It means that they can force their creators and game designers to churn out product faster, no matter the cost to the game performance or content, because they are certain that people like me will buy it.

Need I remind you, “Island Living” came out June 21st 2019, after “Get Famous” came out in November 2018. That is seven months between those two EPs. “Realm of Magic” came out last week, the month of September, almost less than four months of “Island Living”.

Sure, there were some problems with “Island Living”. Some things that only playing the game would have people noticing and reporting it. Some people claim we should do a beta. Sure, that would be great. Would probably solve some issues. But unfortunately some issues cannot be solved by doing a Beta test alone.

Based on the facts that Triple A gaming companies, like Ea, keep trying to push their content out faster, despite not realizing how it takes time to create a game, even if it is only the Sims, is what I believe is creating all these horrid, sloppy mistakes. When you push out a game and it’s content too fast, without giving time to look it over, check it twice, check it thrice, check it a FOURTH time, you’re going to see those sloppy mistakes like the players are in “Realm of Magic”. You overwork your employees and do not give them the increased pay for overtime. Overworked employees mean that there is DEFINITELY going to be mistakes made. But they have to finish it. There is a deadline the CEO’s have placed, and if you don’t finish it, you’re fired. Triple A Gaming companies have the luxury to fire and hire new employees as they see fit, despite the fact that sometimes they fire the BEST employees, all due to greed.

So yeah, I can see these mistakes in my game, and it makes me sad. But it does NOT make me made at the game designers and creators. I KNOW they are doing their best in a shitty situation. It is the owners of EA themselves that we need to direct our anger at.

They set the prices. They set the deadlines of product release. And they don’t. Care.

Thanks for coming to my (hastily put together, rambling) TED talk.

I hope you take into consideration. Also, here is a video link if you want to learn more about Triple A gaming corporation and their greed.

youtube

He is a little...much. But he speaks the truth about the gaming industry, and it also explains why our EP of the Sims was so...so....shitty.

I guess what I wanted to say out of all this is...don’t blame the workers. Don’t blame the game designers. They are doing their best in a bad situation. They are trying to make a living doing something they love. They are trying to keep their job and finish it to the satisfaction of the corporation who holds their paycheck.

#capitalism #Sims4 #the sims 4 #ts4 #video games #Realm of Magic #the sims #just some rambling #if you disagree #that is fine #just know that i don't give any fucks #i support the workers #down with greedy corporations

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babblingblondegenius · 5 years

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Future Ficlet: All You Need is Love...and Coffee

Wow, tonight’s episode was brutal. Between the painful Olicity separation in present time and the lack of Olicity in the dark future of the flash-forwards, we aren’t seeing any of the happy right now. There seems to be no hope. Our heroes’ sacrifices were all in vain. Basically, everything sucks.

As kismet would have it, a couple of weeks ago, I shared a fun little head canon with @allimariexf and @hope-for-olicity and they both encouraged me to ‘write the thing.’ I’ve had a terrible case of writer’s block for quite some time (meaning I have a gazillion story ideas and a ton of WIPs that are unfinished). I expected this one to end up dormant in my drafts as well. But after tonight’s episode, I felt the need to finish it because we (and Olicity, of course) deserve a little hope and happy. Set two years in the future, the premise of this little fluffy ficlet is that Felicity needs an assistant but she has particular criteria ;)

This should have been the easy part.

After months of enticing investors, obtaining the proper licenses and permits, all the legal mumbo jumbo, and locating the perfect office space, hiring an executive assistant is going to be the breaking point where she finally loses her sanity.

Which completely defeats the purpose of trying to find someone to help her in the first place.

She has been doing fine on her own, thriving actually, since she decided it was time to recommence building a tech company from the ground up, sans Curtis this time. This venture, for better or worse, will be all hers. Her vision. Her name. Her legacy.

Despite her initial apprehension at that thought, she has a clarity and confidence in her mission and goals that has propelled her forward at a pace she couldn’t have imagined. So far, choosing which of her many prototypes she wanted to launch first has been her biggest challenge.

Until now.

She had narrowed down the stack of over 100 applications to the eight most qualified for the position, and began the interview process at 7:00 this morning.

The first one had been punctual, neat, and lacking any sort of personality whatsoever.

The second one arrived twenty minutes late and then interrupted Felicity mid-interview to take a non-emergency personal call on her cell phone.

The third one tapped her super long artificial nails on the edge of Felicity’s desk the entire time and included ‘loud typer’ when asked how her current co-workers would describe her.

The fourth one was a chaotic whirlwind who overshared details of his personal life on every single question.

Maybe he just had too much caffeine in his system. Or maybe she doesn’t have enough.

Coffee. She needs coffee. Her next interviewee isn’t scheduled to come in for another hour, so she takes the reprieve to just lay her head down on her desk for a moment in order to gather up the energy she needs to make the trek down the block for her caffeine fix.

“One vanilla soy latte, extra sugar, extra cinnamon, extra whip cream.”

Oh yes. That’s exactly what she wants. Why she is thinking it in Oliver’s voice, she doesn’t know. Her coffee daydream is so vivid, she can even smell the soothing notes of vanilla with hints of sweet cinnamon spice wafting through the air. Mmmmmmmm.

“Felicity….honey, are you okay?” Oliver’s voice again. She slowly lifts her head and sees her husband standing on the other side of her desk, holding a large cup emblazoned with the logo of her favorite java joint and her name scrawled across it in black marker.

“I am now,” she practically purrs as he hands over her treasured treat. After taking a deep inhale and a long swallow, she blissfully smiles at him. “It’s perfect. You’re perfect.” Suddenly jumping up out of her chair, she shares the revelation brought on by the jolt of caffeine in her system. “Oh! I have a great idea! You should apply to be my EA.”

Oliver chuffs out a laugh. “Because I brought you coffee? Your standards must be pretty low.”

“Worried you couldn’t cut it, Mr. Queen?” she asks, arching an eyebrow in challenge.

“I think my time served as Mayor proves otherwise,” he retorts with an air of gravitas but mimics her gesture, silently letting her know that he enjoys her teasing him and is willing to play along.

She shakes her head. “Nope, not helpful. You couldn’t even get me a break on my taxes when you were the mayor. What are your current qualifications?”

He ponders the inquiry for a moment before responding proudly, “I’m the head chef at Chez Queen.”

She rolls her eyes at Oliver’s corny moniker for their kitchen but gives him an encouraging smile. “Oh yeah, I’ve eaten there a few times. The food is magnificent. But do you have any business experience?”

His expression goes from proud to smug. “As a matter of fact, I do. I was formerly the CEO of Queen Consolidated.”

She takes another swig of coffee and checks an incoming text on her cell phone before reminding him, “I happen to have first-hand knowledge you wouldn’t have made it a week without your super smart and highly efficient EA.”

“That’s true,” he concedes with a grin, “though on the downside, she only brought me coffee one time. One”, he repeats, taking her coffee and phone and setting them off to the side. Placing his palms flat on the edge of her desk, he leans in closer, a visible twinkle in his vivid blue eyes. “I think she actually broke our coffeemaker. Violently,” he teases in a conspiratorial whisper.

Mirroring her husband, she leans in over the desk until their noses are almost touching. “A little violence doesn’t scare you, does it, Mr. Queen?” She allows her gaze to run down the length of his torso, visibly appreciating the definition of his biceps that his jacket cannot conceal. “You look like you could handle yourself just fine.”

“I like to stay in shape.” He feigns modesty but she knows her husband and can recognize that look in his eyes. “Some cardio, free weights, martial arts, salmon ladder…”

“That’s so hot” she blurts out, temporarily slipping out of character as her brain produces an amazing visual of sweaty and shirtless Oliver making his way up the salmon ladder. Will there ever be a day when that doesn’t turn her on? Probably not, and judging from the self-satisfied smirk on his face, he mentioned it on purpose just to get that very reaction out of her. Determined to get back on track, she rephrases, “I mean, that sounds interesting.” She decides a change of topic would be helpful to give her an advantage in their little game. “Computer skills?”

She immediately regrets that question when Oliver gives her a feral smile that makes her weak in the knees. Lowering his voice to the same octave he uses when he is dressed in green leather, he divulges, “I’ve hacked a federal prison network.”

Guh, game over. In all her years with Oliver, that is the sexiest thing he has ever said. She quickly makes her way around the desk and invades his personal space. “Seems like you’re a man of many talents,” she coos appreciatively, latching onto his arm and nuzzling her face into the sleeve of his jacket to breathe in the scent that is uniquely Oliver.

“My wife taught me a thing or two,” he boasts, turning so they are face-to-face and he can wrap his arms around her.

Her hands instinctively move from his arm to his chest, resting over his heart. “She must be an amazing woman.”

Oliver nods in agreement, his nose nuzzling hers. “She is. She’s the best.”

“I know you’re just saying that to get husband points and its working,” she acknowledges affectionately, her hand caressing the stubble on his jaw. He tilts his head into her palm like a contented cat and she takes the opportunity to kiss him like she wanted to since she saw him in front of her desk, whether it was five minutes ago with coffee or nine years ago with a bullet-ridden laptop.

Oliver moans and deepens the kiss, the fervent strokes of his tongue making her long for more. “Okay, you’re hired,” she pants, breaking the kiss when her need for air temporarily overcomes her need for Oliver. “Smoak Tech is a start-up so your health care package consists of me patching you up if you are injured and I’m sure we can work out some type of compensation for your time and skills,” provocatively shifting her body against his and feeling his obvious interest through his jeans and her skirt. Two soft kisses and one firm rotation of his hips later, she is internally debating the sturdiness of her desk and whether they have time for her to show him exactly what she means by ‘compensation’ before her next appointment shows up.

“That’s a very tempting offer, Ms. Smoak” he murmurs into her hair as his hand travels down her back and immediately finds its usual place on the curve of her shapely ass, pulling her impossibly closer, “but I’m afraid my current employer really needs me right now and I just can’t bear to leave her,” his free hand gesturing to the stroller where their daughter slumbers peacefully.

Felicity sighs, pure happiness filling her heart and clearing her mind as she rests her head on her husband’s chest to gaze lovingly at the chubby-cheeked, perfect amalgamation of her and Oliver they brought into the world just four short months ago. “Sounds like she has you wrapped around her little finger.”

Oliver rests his chin on the top of her head and she can hear the love and contentment in his voice when he whispers in her hair, “From the very first moment I met her. She takes after her mother that way.”

A/N: Thank you for reading! I hope this helped to soothe the sting of all the angst. Queen family feels FTW. William was not in this fic because at that time of day, he should be in school and also I didn’t want to traumatize him any further with Olicity’s blatant flirty flirt. The poor kid has seen enough already lol.

Huge thanks and virtual hugs to @allimariexf and @hope-for-olicity for all the fun conversations and being all around wonderful :)

Oliver’s ‘current employer’ ;)

#this was really short #but i finished it #i'll take that as a win #olicity fluff #olicity ficlet #olicity future fic #my fic

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blessuswithblogs · 5 years

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Video Games are a God Damned Mess: Bad Business Practices, Unsustainability, and the Fidelity Plateau

(shoutouts to the anon rando in my inbox for telling me about the read more button you were kind of rude about it but i don’t use this website so i legit didn’t know)

The video game industry has always been a bit wild and wooly compared to its older contemporaries. The emergence of a new medium is always rife with upheaval as paradigms shift and people discover that the old rules don't necessarily apply all of the time. That said, the past three months have been filled with what I can really only describe as catastrophes for many disparate publishers and development studios.

You may recall I talked a bit about this during my game of the year list and Fallout 76 analysis, but to recap: with Telltale shutting its doors and shafting its workers, the writing was on the wall for the same thing to happen again as the intrinsically unsustainable boom and bust cycle began the less glamorous stage. It turns out I was correct in my predictions but congratulating myself for seeing this coming is not unlike congratulating myself for accurately predicting that tomorrow will be Tuesday. Or. Whatever day it will be when I post this. fuck i dated the lp thread ruined LOOK the point is that this was really obviously going to happen and that nobody felt the need to prepare for it or try to stop it before 10% of Activision-Blizzard's workforce got canned is a major failure of the industry at large.

So let's talk a bit about what's happened since then. There's been a lot, so forgive me if I miss your favorite corporate implosion. First, at Blizzcon, Diablo Immortal was revealed to what actually might have been the most actively hostile reception of a game in history. This has less to do with the more financial aspects of the ongoing Videocon Crisis and more just kind of served as an ill omen and an example of Blizzard's worrying descent into... wherever it is they're going. If gross incompetence was a place, they would be descending into it. On paper, a Diablo mobile game is a money-printing proposition. When all is said and done Immortal will still probably make them gobs of cash. In practice, however, they fucked the landing so hard they probably lost potential sales. The kind of folks who go to Blizzcon and get omegahype for a new diablo game are not the kind of folks who play mobile games. Mobile games have a Stigma among the hardcore crowd, and also the Ethical Business Practices in Video Games crowd (which as of this writing appears to be me, Jim Sterling, and the Warframe devteam). For a lot of braindead gamerbros, mobile games are synonymous with things like Candy Crush and Peggle, which are perfectly fine games honestly but they're For Girls or some shit so mobile games are bad and for casuals. More pertinently, mobile games are also a ferocious jungle of microtransactions, pay2win mechanics, and generally shoddy design. Command and Conquer and Dungeon Keeper, beloved franchises that have been ripe for revisiting for years now, both found mobile games and they were both utterly terrible. These games make a great deal of their money by exploiting "whales", or in actual human being language, vulnerable people with disposable income and difficulties with impulse control or addictive personalities. Or kids who know their mom's creditcard number. Kids play video games. Now that we are no longer kids (theoretically, anyway) it can be easy to forget that. I'm not the pearl-clutching type, but I think that stigmatizing a genre of games that proudly touts an exploitative-of-children business model is probably okay.

So there are lots of reasons to be skeptical of Diablo Immortal right out of the gate, and quite frankly whoever thought that just pushing that out there with literally no other Diablo related news items (like any whispers of the long coveted hd remaster of diablo the second) was either transferred in from another company the day before or had some kind of unspeakable grudge against the scheduled presenters, to whom my heart goes out to. There is also some undeniable precedent that Blizzard-Activision will, in all likelihood, monetize the everloving daylights out of it. Both Hearthstone and Overwatch have more or less become nicely polished vehicles with which to deliver lootboxes to players for a nominal fee. If this hadn't been followed by a seemingly unceasing calvacade of disasters, the whole debacle would have been really funny to point and laugh at. It's still pretty funny to point and laugh at, but it also has some less amusing implications. Blizzard in particular has been up to a lot of no good lately. Let's talk a little bit about their recent one-two punch.

First up, we have the complete and sudden abandonment of competitive support for Heroes of the Storm. Heroes of the Storm was essentially Blizzard's seething regret and resentment for letting Valve snatch up the whole Defense of the Ancients thing put into code and unleashed upon an unwitting populace. It had actually been gaining some renewed interest over the past year or so due to the developers putting in some elbow grease and making the game both more accessible and just. More better. HotS has also had a modest but respectable eSports scene since the game's launch, with a variety of professional players, shoutcasters, tournament organizers and emergency bugfixers employed. Many of them were anxious about their jobs for months in advance with no word from the higher ups about who would still be employed by 2019. Sometimes, companies have to make difficult decisions and let people go to keep operating. Even my communist ass reluctantly accepts this as a reality of the system we live in. However, there is a protocol about this kind of thing. Giving notice. Giving, you know, severance pay. Stuff like that. And of course this presupposes that this sort of cut to the workforce is actually necessary in the first place. Given that AB subsequently reported record profits for the year of 2018, I have some doubts. Completely dropping support for a game out of the blue is a scummy thing to do to your playerbase. When it is also directly impacting the livelihood of hundreds of people in your employ, it goes beyond scummy and turns right into Unacceptable.

But "unacceptable" is Bobby Kotick's favorite word in the English language so while shoving hundred dollar bills from his latest corporate bonus up his butt he and his friends in the boardroom decided that the HotS esports people might get lonely, so they had better go and fire another 10% of the workforce too. Just because. Like literally just because. His company is doing fine - better than fine! They are at record levels of better than fine. But the shareholders demand more and more exponential growth, so to cut costs that really didn't need cutting, away goes 10%. Will game quality suffer because of this? Undoubtedly. More work being piled on fewer people who are also living in mortal fear of losing their jobs Just Because is not a recipe for success. People are mad about this, much like people were/are mad about Fallout 76 - players of games, industry wonks, and iconic voice actresses alike are no longer tolerating this kind of thing in Two Thousand and Nineteen, Common Era. Nor should they!

Elsewhere in the Game-o-sphere, similar developments are brewing. ArenaNet, the folks wot do Guildwars, went through another round of mass layoffs. EA's stocks have plummeted and Battlefield V "failed to meet expectations" because it only sold A Ton and not A Fuckin Shit Ton, and Anthem is not really lighting the world on fire. After Mass Effect Andromeda's... curious debut, Bioware has probably been feeling the heat and a lot of people are concerned that it too will suffer the ultimate fate of all studios acquired by Electronic Arts: joining Visceral Games in a broken heap at the bottom of the garbage chute. Bring back Dead Space you motherfuckers. Bethesda continues to, improbably, suffer through PR disaster after PR disaster with Fallout 76, a game that seemingly cannot stop fucking up. Ubisoft has received some positive attention for vowing to NOT lay off hundreds of employees for no discernible reason, which leads me to believe that our standards for praiseworthy behavior have dropped alarmingly low. Even 2K Games in all of its monolithic glory seems to be feeling a bit of a Stock Price Squeeze. Honestly by the time I get this done and posted it's entirely possible that somebody else will fuck something up. I'm still kind of waiting on the fallout from Randy Pitchford's porn thumbdrive, but I'm also a little bit pleased that Actual Money Crimes are getting more traction in the news cycle.

So, returning to the main point: the industry is in a bad situation of its own making. It's a scene that's almost always been defined by trend-chasing. For a while, that meant that we would just have to suffer through an endless glut of EXTREME SPORTS GAMES SPONSORED BY A DUDE or a barrage of samey console shooters desperately trying to be Halo every once in a while. Unfortunately, the trend-chasing now extends not only to the games themselves, but to the methods by which they are monetized. Ever since DLC became a mainstream thing, the brightest minds of the boardrooms have been working tirelessly to deduce which method of fleecing players will scientifically speaking get them the most money. Inevitably, when some enterprising little weasel develops a new and improved monetization scheme, the rest of the little weasels will immediately latch on to that scheme and that's how you end up with Battlefront 2's ridiculous lootbox grind and Shadow of War's ludicrous inclusion of randomized lootboxes in a singleplayer action-adventure game. While I'm certain that the platonic ideal of the lootbox has existed in some form or another for decades now, I think that we can squarely lay the blame for the Great Lootbox Plague of the Twenty-Tens at the feet of Valve.

Valve has been known for questionable business practices for a while now (albeit in a more lowkey way than We Fired 800 People So Bobby Kotick Could Buy a New Yacht), largely getting away with it because Steam has been more or less unchallenged as the premier digital distribution service for video games. This might be changing soon, as Epic Games is going straight for the jugular with a number of aggressive moves with its own fledgling platform, but historically, Valve has faced very few consequences for just kind of being petulantly antagonistic towards its userbase because said userbase is easily mollified by steam sales and Gaben memes. When people think lootboxes in 2019, they probably think of games like Overwatch or Battlefront 2 or basically any contemporary multiplayer game. I certainly do, but a bit of fact finding allowed me to remember that Valve has been doing this shit since Counterstrike and Team Fortress 2, and Dota 2's byzantine cosmetics market can't be overlooked either. All three of these games are or were at one point genre leaders and made Valve so much money they basically decided that they didn't really need to make games anymore. A reasonable conclusion to draw, given the fact all three of these games are inextricably linked to their history as very popular mods. Valve just outsources a great deal of its labor to dedicated, naive fans and gives them a pittance of the huge mounds of dollars they make from their hard work. It's a good racket, but it has set an alarmingly poor example to the rest of the gaming world.

Games as a service, in concept, is fine for games that lend themselves well to the idea. MMOs have been using a variation of the model for decades now and that genre is actually like, Perplexingly Healthy. Free to play games like League of Legends and Warframe have also had success with a service model. The problem comes from the AAA Game industry's pathological insistence on shoving square pegs into things that don't even have holes to begin with. Shadow of War, or Assassin's Creed, or any other major singleplayer offering, has no business whatsoever being a Live Service. They are finite experiences by design and that's completely fucking fine and normal. Appending microtransactions and lootboxes to them is a transparent attempt to just suck up a little bit more money from players in the most unsustainable way possible. Here is a small hint if some WB Games bigwig stumbles upon this: first of all, I'm building a guillotine, so you better watch your ass. Second, how dare you fucking make Shelob a sexy lady. Third, (this is the one that is probably most relevant): People are willing to pay as they go for cosmetics and timesavers for games that they like and want to support. I've dumped a lot of money into League over the years because there was a period of time where I was playing it nonstop and having a wonderful time for quite literally no cost to myself, so I felt like buying the cute Panda Annie Skin was a good compromise. Regrettably I would later learn that there are aspects of Riot Games I'm not super okay with giving money to but at the time they seemed agreeable and my friends who work there gotta get payed somehow. This whole dynamic of wanting to support a video game goes out the damn window when you are already charging a $60 entry fee, plus whatever highway robbery pricing you put on the inevitable DLC. In this case, the onus is squarely upon the publisher to provide an experience and content one would reasonably expect of the pricetag. Putting in microtransactions for cosmetics is galling. Putting in microtransactions for actual game progression, like in Battlefront 2 or Shadow of War, is outright insulting.

Many will leap to the defense of these publishers and developers, saying that these measures are necessary to make these ludicrously expensive and lavish AAA games that all look suspiciously like one another. For the time being, let's accept this as a true statement. If this is, in fact, the state of affairs in the industry, then the industry needs to change to a more sustainable business model. When playing Destiny 2, during a big space cutscene, the cute pilot lady ferrying me to The Large Molerat Man's Murderboat had beautifully rendered skin where you could see the pores and the little wispy cheek hairs that swayed to the momentum of the space plane's movements. It was very nice but then the next year or so I heard nothing but people pointing out "hey this game has no content you dipshits" or "the devteam is actually scamming people with the experience system to wring more playtime out of them". The cheek hairs affair succeeded in making me want the pilot to buy me dinner and regail me with stories of her space adventures as I batted my lashes at her in romantic admiration, but also: stop it. You do not need to do this. This is strictly unnecessary. The graphics arms race of yesteryear is over. Nobody cares anymore. Fidelity is plateauing harder and harder, to the point where games running properly on console without having to settle for 30FPS is becoming very difficult. There is an Earth B somewhere out there where Bloodborne was not a sony exclusive and got a PC release with 60FPS support and loading times for humans and on Earth B I am still playing that game for the forseeable future because it is the best game ever. We are far past the paradigm where we are making Tremendous Graphical Leaps with each successive generation. Right now, as of this writing, games look jawdroppingly good. Just ludicrously pretty and grandiose. Continuing to push the graphical envelope for Every Damn Annual Release is a waste of resources: monetary resources, labor resources, system resources. As of March, 2019, what people really want is stability and functionality. Something that runs nice and smooth at 60FPS and doesn't turn its characters randomly into nightmare inverse-Rayman beasts. I think the huge success of the Nintendo Switch, a console with relatively modest hardware but superb functionality, portability, and a surprisingly full featured library of both massive first party titles, like Breath of the Wild and Mario Odyssey (which honestly look better than a lot of games on more robust hardware because of wonderful art direction) and smaller indie games, is testament to this line of thinking.

Maybe that's too bold of a statement. Maybe there's this huge swath of the gaming public that is just clamoring for more cheek hairs. If there are I think they're fucking out of their minds but who am I to judge. As long as games like that werewolf game The Order exist, where the universal reaction is "this is so pretty!!! ...wait there's nothing in here." I think that there is a serious responsibility to push back against that because evidently it's bankrupting the game industry and forcing them to violate international gambling laws to stay afloat. Except it's fucking not, actually. Many publishers are claiming record profits, upward trends, and are in a spot to have the raw nerve to say "well this game that sold 7 million copies didn't sell 8 million copies so it failed to meet expectations". They are doing ludicrously well for themselves in terms of generating revenue from sales. Where these highly successful corporations are running into problems is satisfying the almighty Shareholders. Shareholders are sort of like. Imagine if you got a job where you had to keep a large committee of actual babies happy, except the babies don't know shit about fuck about anything and demand that you routinely break all reasonable laws of sustainability and keep bringing in exponentially higher profits or they will take their ball and go home. There is still, evidently, money enough to give newly hired executives million dollar signing bonuses, but when it comes to just making a game that doesn't fall back on exploiting people with gambling addictions, we're suddenly dealing with an outfit of noble, longsuffering churchmice just trying to make ends meet. People are rapidly getting fed up with this blatant hypocrisy and dishonesty. Sales from Hearthstone card packs alone could fund a robust HotS esports scene for eternity if properly apportioned. This money is not properly apportioned. It is thrown into a gigantic incinerator so Kotick can get high on the fumes.

You might be wondering what this girls' deal is with Blizzard. Surely there are more egregious offenders? Firstly, Blizzard is very relevant at the moment because they are one of the highest profile publishers to recently Do A Business Oopsie. Secondly, I live in Irvine, California. Blizzard HQ is a ten minute drive from where I live. It's a local company to me, and it's legitimately kind of hard to see it continue to go down this path because I've had friends and neighbors who have worked there and enthusiastically described the experience right up until the very moment they get canned for no reason. My alma mater, UC Irvine, is one of the leading schools in the nation on adopting eSports into their collegiate athlete program. I understand, to a lot of people, Electronic Sports (please support them) are a big joke silly thing, but to me and my family who work in the UC system, they're actually like a huge and pertinent part of professional life. I'm literally being consulted by my mom's co-workers for advice and insight on how to minimize the abusive and toxic behavior that has become synonymous with streaming and professional gaming because campus now has a huge eSports center with rows on rows of gaming computers for students to use. Games Are Big. They are a powerful cultural and economic force in the lives of millions of people and denying that because of "haha nerds" is the same shortsighted, utterly-lacking-in-self-awareness wanking that resulted in the stupendously destructive "its just the internet, it doesnt matter lol" attitude that has caused the world so much grief. That said Bart Simpson becoming an esports legend sponsored by Riot Games is still pretty lame don't @ me.

What it comes down to is this: the games industry has grown into a hugely influential and powerful institution that affects the lives of more and more people every day. However, the appropriate growth in regulation, oversight, and worker protection has not occurred and has honestly shrunk. People love to talk up Satoru Iwata because when the Wii U was floundering he took a massive pay cut and refused to lay off any staff, reasoning that "it will be very difficult for our teams to create software that will impress the world when they are constantly worrying about losing their jobs." It's a little incredible that The Baseline Reasonable Thing To Do has elicited such effusive praise, but that's the world we live in and Iwata-san was pretty alright so I'm okay with it. Both his conduct and reasoning are both solidly above reproach in this case: it is really hard to be creative when the Sword of Damocles is hanging over your head! That’s 500% true! This goes for game developers, community managers, eSports staff, support staff, literally every part of the process that matters, even the totally unrelated clerks and communications people who are still completely necessary for creating games. The only people who don't suffer are the dipshits on top who don't actually contribute to the creation of games in any way. They're still fine. Better than fine, really. That's why people are mad. That's why people SHOULD be mad. Don't stand for this anymore.

#blizzard #activision #eSports #game industry #bethesda #fallout76 #valve #layoffs #destiny #ea

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sunlaozu · 6 years

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KAGEHINA NEIGHBOR AU WHERE THEY COMMUNICATE VIA WIFI NETWORK NAMES AND THE OTHER NEIGHBORS ARE LIKE "DUDES JUST START DATING ALREADY"

Entirely based on this post. This is also a gift of appreciation (and a very truly belated birthday one) for you, Sage!

They were new in town when Shouyou was handed the task to set up the wifi.

The first few days in their new house were spent on cleaning, unpacking and tidying, and this went on for Shouyou until their wireless router had been discovered broken in the midst of unpacking. A new one had to be bought immediately on spot, his father decided, and Shouyou’s opportunity to explore arose when his father appointed him to be in charge.

And without wasting a breath, Shouyou took this as a chance to map through the town he so very wanted to explore.

His legs are pedaling the gears of his bike through the streets with much fervor, and the wind slaps against his skin, through his hair, in his ears, and he’s desperate, eager to unfold all the pieces of the place where it’s already breathing to him a sense of contentment within one take of its air.

The town is small, near the countryside and from what he’s gathered through the car trip on their way to their new neighborhood, it’s bursting with ocean of colors and floral scents which had all been a delightful welcome. There are more cherry trees than he’s ever counted, more spring flowers, and he feels the ache to tread through the tall sunflower fields when he sees them sitting by the bank of warm lakes.

Here, Shouyou could already tell there’s a promise to a fulfilling life for all the things it possess which Tokyo lacks.

Their neighbors are kind. They presented them with a fresh fruit basket as a warm welcome, and they helped Shouyou in his task earlier too when he asked them for directions on shops to purchase wifi accessories from. It’s only after many pauses in his track as he gets lost in discovering wonders of the small town and getting acquainted with the shop workers assisting him, Shouyou does finally manage to buy the much needed router.

But it also takes Shouyou plugging the router into a socket to realize he has no idea what he’s doing.

As it turns out, his small drops of knowledge in setting up the connection hadn’t been enough for him to carry through. Luckily, he has an internet service on his phone and it works well enough for him to do research on establishing the network, but when he feels his brain cells crumpling under the pressure of mind-consuming work later on, he ends up calling for his father who’d give him a guide.

It goes on until the night, until he becomes very sure of his closely approaching death at this point, but eventually, he gets there.

And then, something happens before the wee hours of an evening.

Shouyou’s sacrificed what little sleep he had for this one moment: on the screen, their connection– ‘Little giant’ as he names it– has finally appeared under the list of available networks.

Like a switch, his body instantly slumps against his chair. His triumph have soaked him in waves of relief pleasantly, but the rapture feeling is outweighed by the lack of rest when he feels it immediately chipping away at his consciousness. He decides to call it the night, eyelids growing heavy, and moves his mouse to close the dock on his laptop.

But then he witnesses a sudden change of name as one of the other networks, with some fancy lock beside it, goes from ‘Setter Soul’ to ‘I’m using little giant to torrent volleyball’.

Suddenly, Shouyou doesn't feel as tired. He shoots up from his seat, grows a pair of wide eyes and makes a sound quite close to, if not, an inhuman squawk.

He isn’t sure what to do. He doesn’t know what to do. He’s flushing with shock, anger, but mostly confusion, and so, it’s entirely out of an impulse when he tries to connect to the other network but gets horrified to see a password is required for him to enter.

Oh, yes. He nearly forgets. The fancy lock means that it's a private connection. That jerk.

Then he’s furiously typing the next second, having his own network’s name changed to ‘How did you get that lock?!’ because he can’t think of another way to reach out to this person, so he desperately hopes that they’d see.

And they definitely do see, all right. ‘Find out yourself.’ The response files in with a glare of mockery in its words.

Shouyou grits his teeth, had to fling himself onto his bed for a moment first so he could scream, right into his pillow, without waking up his family.

‘You’re an asshole.’

‘And your taste in music sucks.’

‘Are you snooping around my iTunes?!’

‘D'espairsRay? Their music is giving me despair, all right.’

What comes afterwards had been a furious flurry of banters and threats. Insults thrown back and forth, buttons pushed and pressed repeatedly that it eventually reaches to the point where someone (who surprisingly notices them) has to step in and dismantle the aggressive tension. The ruckus does die down, but only for a while. Unlike Asshole (as Shouyou decides on their name) the newcomer is much more helpful and incredibly kind enough to help him secure his connection.

Shouyou shouts in glee once he manages to achieve the private connection. Even more so, Asshole hasn’t said anything since the newcomer pops in to help but Shouyou feels the need to say something, to poke at him, because with the advent of the lock, the asshole should have been kicked out.

‘Hah, suck on my secured internet!’ He grins smugly, saving the new change for a name.

Asshole replies, ‘Doesn’t change that your music still sucks.’

They fight again.

Even if Shouyou manages to make his family’s network private, that doesn’t necessarily mean it’d signal the end to his interaction with Asshole.

In fact, he only hopes that with his newly acquired skills, his life could be spared for a little longer in the future if he were to set up a router again; Shouyou doesn’t think he’d last if he has to deal with another asshole bursting into his life because his soul is already withering into ashes and that was just one he had to deal with and their constant presence.

But despite all this and the animosity they harbored for each other, they keep talking.

It’s unclear why they’re still talking when all they’ve done is point jabs at each other. Shouyou knows he should probably stop responding to them, but he’s never one to overlook when someone is picking a fight with him, and he's definitely not the kind to back down either, so truthfully, Shouyou does play some part of fault in here.

There’s never a fight when the two are talking, but then their fights soon become more playful, less intense, and before he knows it, it’d lead them to an occasional small, mindless talk, and— and it’s- well, it’s weird. It’s weird enough that they’re communicating through the network names, and it’s even weirder when he considers the possibility of having his family and his neighbors read their drifting, fleeting conversation.

Or… their neighbors? Shouyou finds himself startled at this waking realization. Asshole has to be a neighbor of his after all for their networks to within each other’s range. There’s no way someone isn’t a neighbor if they popped up in their list, it doesn’t make any sense otherwise.

“Great. I’m neighbors with an asshole.” Shouyou says, sulkily, as he stuffs his face into the pillow. Yet, surprisingly, he somehow feels less disappointed with the revelation than he thought he would have.

And so, this peculiarity they share continues and it has gone on for a good month now. Shouyou is currently in his post-graduation, and he still has yet to receive any of the acceptance letters from the universities he’s applied to so, he’s been making use of his free time doing various things, and chatting with Asshole become among these things.

From the looks of it, Asshole seems to be in the same shoe as him, because he’s fast, highly responsive, though there are times it takes a while for them to reply, it makes Shouyou wonder in the briefest moment if they’re around his age and whether they’re a postgraduate like he was too.

One day, he wakes up on a sunny morning nestled into the crook of his pillow, to Asshole’s new network name when he checks his phone.

'Are you awake?' The name reads, and it’s a question, and it’s something odd, so out of blue because they never ask him this, never did check in on him. Until now, that is. He knows that it’s Asshole too because he’s checked the list, their only other neighboring networks (Cat Town, Thunder, Blueville, and the one that’s stepped in to stop them fighting before- Mountain Valley) haven’t changed their names at all since the start of thei strange routine.

Shouyou kicks the bed sheets off of him. He pads towards his laptop to switch it on, and when he hears it whirring to life, he goes on to day with some hot tea from the kitchen, but not before he could type out a new handle for his family’s network to let his presence be known.

‘I am now!’

‘Finally. You slept for way too long.’

‘Aww, were you waiting for me?’

‘I bet you sleep like a log.’

Oh boy, Shouyou rolls his eyes, and sets his cup down onto the desk with a little more force than necessary. Now, just when he thinks how Asshole might be nice to him this time, they don’t and go back to square one, but he sets that aside for now in favor of shooting them back a furious reply.

“Brother!” Natsu announces her presence as she peeks her head into his room. “We’re going to the grocery store, and mom says that she wants you to come too!”

“Mm, okay.” Shouyou drones in reply.

“Now.” Natsu adds, and like that, she’s gone from the doorway.

He sighs, looking at his laptop then onto his unfinished drink. ‘I have to go,’ He types in a rush, putting his laptop to sleep, but he forgets to confirm the change when Natsu calls for him again from downstairs.

It takes a while, because his parents has winded up bringing them on a tour around the town after they finish their groceries.

When they finally return home in early evening, Shouyou feels a little drained, but the tiredness gets replaced by a mild surprise when he comes back to read ‘I’m sorry.’ on the display of his screen. He’s confused, isn’t entirely sure why the other is apologizing, but when he sees his unchanged network name since the morning, everything clicks in place.

He quickly sends an apology for his sudden disappearance, all the while trying to ignore how solemn the ‘I’m sorry’ has sounded in his head and the plummeting feeling in his chest.

Asshole, Shouyou muses, turns out to be not much of an asshole after all.

Well, in a way, they still are one since they haven’t stopped calling him a dumbass. But other than that, the condescending impression Shouyou had of them at first turns out to be a kind of misconception. Asshole speaks in a tone that settles for something less than arrogance, something more than a little straightforward, and to put it simply they’re brutally blunt with their words, even when they don’t know it, and Shouyou isn’t afraid at all to call him out.

Even on the rare occasions when the two are sharing a conversation on a topic pertaining to some depth in their lives, Asshole is being blunt.

Their responses are short too, often- no, usually, and it’s short enough that Shouyou doesn’t need to keep changing his network name to urge Asshole to continue (something that they do for him) after he’s done reading their text. It’s the little things like these that’s altered his view on Asshole because clearly, they didn’t mind how Shouyou is always brimming with a head full of words and even catered to him with a few words like ‘Wow.’ or ‘Cool.’

‘You talk too much.’ The words flash through his laptop screen after Shouyou finishes his storytelling of his ‘the most epic super fun incredible forest adventure’ when he was a kid, but Shouyou knows that there’s no bite to those words; it’s just Asshole punctuating their thoughts in such a way that makes it seem so much like they’re stating a fact.

He’s aware that the man- or woman- or whoever- on the other side won’t see him but that doesn’t stop him from sticking out his tongue at the screen as he retorts. ‘And you talk too little!’

There’s no reply for a little while, but as soon as one comes in, Shouyou knows he’s in for a night of longer banters than the usual.

Their neighboring networks joins in their conversations sometimes, but it happens once in a while.

Mountain Valley is nice as ever, and Thunder gives Shouyou the vibe of a well-respected awesome upperclassman. Blueville, on the other hand, while there’s something about them that doesn’t feel quite right, they could be fun to talk to as well.

At first, it was hard to keep a track on who’s saying which, and there was the one time everything has spiraled down into a big mess of garbage dump because no one knew who was who that they all ended up changing their network names back to what it originally is. Then from that point onward, whenever they have conversation in groups, they have a mutual agreement on leaving the first initial of their network handles at the start of their message.

Shouyou thinks it’s pretty cool, especially how they’re all neighbors, living in the same area, and how they don’t mind this strange thing they’re doing, and he briefly wonders if he gets to meet them all properly in person one day.

But there’s one neighbor who never joins them until the day they seemingly had enough.

This time, it’s only Asshole and Shouyou engaging in a conversation, and they’re talking about their favorite sports which coincidentally is volleyball and they’re quick to passionately talk about it when Cat Town barges in with their newly set name, ‘Oi, communicate like normal people.’

‘Huh?’ Asshole says, and Shouyou copies them.

It takes a while for Cat Town’s name to change again. ’Don’t you guys have social medias?’ and then another, ‘Or phone numbers?’ and Shouyou sits there, feeling an imaginal rock thrown at the side of his head at the existence of given options.

Shouyou embarrassedly types, ‘I… didn’t think of that.’

‘Me neither.’ Asshole types too.

‘Oh my god, you both are idiots.’

Shouyou has to exchange his number with Asshole’s pretty quick afterwards before anyone else gets the chance to see them and jot them down— although Shouyou has a feeling that no one would even be bothered with them at this point. Cat Town’s interruption could stand to be a testament to that. Soon enough, Shouyou’s network name goes back to being Little Giant, and as for Asshole, Setter Soul.

Chatting through phone turns out to be far, far more convenient than using the network name, and Shouyou couldn’t believe that he hadn’t thought of exchanging phone numbers before.

But then… things begin to get even weirder from there.

Asshole turns out to be a man and he turns out to have a name as well after all.

His name is Kageyama Tobio, he is a postgraduate like Shouyou and he’s a bit younger than him. The name is pretty cute, fitting even. There’s a kind of charm to it that resonates well with Kageyama’s character: awkward, somehow dorky, and it’s totally different than the first impression of a douchebag vibe which Kageyama had given him.

Now that they have some privacy to themselves, it’s more bearable as well. There’s more room for them to talk about themselves, they can talk about anything they want, but they’re alone, and the thought of this makes Shouyou's stomach squirm. Their conversations are sheltered now from the outside world; no outsiders to prey on the words they’d send to each other, no Mountain Valley or Cat Town to dance into their conversation freely, and as nice as it is to have their own privacy, Shouyou finds it would still take some time for him to get used to these new changes, and he does get used to it within a week's time.

And one day, Kageyama accidentally sends him something.

Kageyama sends him a picture. Only, it isn’t any picture, it’s the one where Shouyou finally gets to see the face of the man behind the screen who he’s been talking to. Although the possibility it isn’t Kageyama still stands since there isn’t any kind of caption attached to the picture sent, but Shouyou is pretty sure that it’s him.

The man in picture is understandably and impossibly attractive; short black hair with bangs tapered to a v-shape, a nose slotting from a high bridge into a perfect size of a mold, dark eyes and a pair of unfairly tempting lips.

‘Is that you?’ Shouyou asks.

‘Oh. Yes, it’s me.’ Kageyama texts him a bit later and Shouyou’s heart flutters at the confirmation, ‘Sorry. Sent it by accident.’

A beautiful and most gracious accident the world has to offer, Shouyou thinks and nearly smacks himself in the face at the thought.

He spends the next few moments on (definitely not) breathlessly fawning over Kageyama then. He squints at one point later, thinking that he might have seen this face somewhere before… which would make sense, he supposes. Kageyama is his neighbor after all, so he’s bound to have seen him at least once or twice.

Turning onto his back on his bed, Shouyou turns the camera on his phone to his face. He shifts around on his mattress, determined to find the perfect spot and the perfect angle for a selfie, and when he does find it, he snaps a picture of himself with a peace sign thrown up and a big bright smile peering into his phone screen.

Shouyou sends the picture to Kageyama, but only after he’s mustered enough courage.

He receives a text sometime later, and Shouyou’s face has grown thousands of shades darker than the hot red surface of the sun, stars in his chest dancing and bursting with bright lights as he reads the newly received text from Kageyama.

‘Cute.’ Kageyama says.

‘I know! I am!’ Shouyou returns the message with an emoji of a tongue sticking out to the side. It’s then an idea strikes him.

He wonders, what if they were to meet up? Meet properly for their first time, get to know each other more, and it’s not as if they live far, they’re neighbors, so it seems like a good option and a convenience for them to try.

But then Shouyou begins to mull over the details should they decide to meet. On one hand, it’s nice to finally see Kageyama face-to-face, but then he thinks about his attractive face, then some more thousands of other thoughts that could go terribly, horribly wrong.

“What if I make a fool out of myself?” He thinks aloud, shuddering at the worst scenarios playing in his head.

There’s a part of his mind that’s waging war with his doubts, whispering to him the chances of it being one among millions of things that could go great too, that it could be the best opportunity he’d miss out on, and so, he decides to give it a try.

With firecrackers lighting the sparks off his skin, he finally sends Kageyama the question in mind and puts his phone back down on his desk after.

He waits for the reply, but then two minutes passes by, five, fifteen, and by the thirtieth, he begins to panic and thinks he’s said the wrong thing, but he also tries to rationalize himself, that Kageyama is probably busy, and it’s not the first time he doesn’t reply within thirty minutes, so he decides to put his mind on something else. But then his phone sings an alarm, notifying him of an incoming text.

‘Sure. When?’ He reads on the screen.

He stares at the text, dumbfounded. Then, in the next second, he finds himself catching up in his sheer excitement Kageyama’s agreement has brought him that he dives back under his sheets to rejoice.

‘Let's meet up tomorrow!’

‘... Tomorrow?’

‘I mean…’ He pauses on typing, biting his lips to think of a reason. ‘We’re neighbors, aren’t we?’

‘Oh, yeah. Tomorrow then. Where?’

‘Great! Let's meet around three in the afternoon, yeah? We could just… stand outside the house and look for each other?’

‘Sure.’

They’re going to meet each other. Their first meeting. Their very first meeting. After two to three months of talking, they would meet. They’re going to meet up, and then– and then- talk? Shouyou doesn’t know what they will do once they run into each other but he figures a little trip around the town wouldn’t hurt.

He starts rolling around in his bed, grinning so widely through the entire time it starts to hurt his cheeks. It takes him five more minutes to recompose himself, click open his phone and fervently expressing his joy by flooding Kageyama’s inbox with dozens of emojis, finally ending his spree with a good night text.

‘Night. See you tomorrow.’ Kageyama replies, and it’s to this and the low humming pleasant sound within the room Shouyou has fallen asleep to.

Shouyou goes out for his daily run in the early morning. He admits, he is quite eager to meet Kageyama later on, but he’s been feeling nervous too since he wakes up which had been way too early, and it's worse that he doesn’t feel as ready as he did last night for their meeting. So, he figures that he’d run a little more around the neighborhood would do him a good favour.

He starts his routine with a few simple stretches before dashing through the sidewalk with every mighty kick off the ground. He does this, picking up his pace every few meters, until the familiar ache begins to settle in his legs, until his nerves dissipates, replaced by the good burn of jogging. And by the time he feels completely flushed of his nervousness, he decides to put an end to his routine there and jog back— but then, a voice speaks to him out of nowhere, effectively stopping him in his tracks.

“You’re even shorter than I imagined.”

Shouyou squeaks in surprise. He completely stills to a stop, his head turning ever so slowly to the side and sees- then nearly chokes when he’s met by the face he spends staring on his phone for a while the previous night.

Kageyama in person, is much more handsome than the Kageyama in picture. The first thing he notices, are the eyes. In the picture, Kageyama’s eyes had been dark, pitch black, but it might have been the bad lighting because here, under the ray of sun where it’s hitting his eyes, Shouyou could see their colors threaded in all hues of grays and blues.

The second thing he notices is that Kageyama is tall. He stands at least a head taller than him, much to his annoyance, and he’s wearing what looks to be a sportswear.

“You–?” Shouyou gapes, definitely quietly reeling over how he’s meeting Kageyama earlier than their promised time. “Y-you– oh, um, er, you run too?” He dumbly asks.

Kageyama blinks, somehow glaring. “I always run at this time.” He says, muttering, and then, Shouyou gawks, no longer shaken but shocked by the fact how they have never bumped into each other on their run.

“That’s funny, because I always run at this time too!” Shouyou says, and Kageyama looks surprised himself at this too.

“Oh.” He tells, growing quiet, and Shouyou can’t help but be amused at how well Kageyama’s way of texting has reflected him within just a few seconds into their meeting in person.

“So, uh.” Shouyou starts. They’ve already met each other now, and it sounds awkward to have them leave things as they are now only to get back together at later time. Heaving a deep breath, he points a thumb to another direction and gathers up his courage to ask, “Wanna go for a run together?”

But Kageyama doesn’t even wait for him, much less sparing him a glance as he suddenly runs past him with a breeze. “If you can catch up to me, that is, dumbass.”

“Wait… Huh?” Shouyou says dumbly for the second time, the gears in his head still wheeling until it clicks. “What the– hey! That’s totally cheating!” He shouts, and doesn’t think twice to chase after him, his laughter twinkling in the air.

It’s no secret that the two had a whole rocky start at first, but somehow, they still managed to get along. Then somehow, somewhere along the way, they end up developing feelings for each other, and well— here they are.

‘Hey, guys! We're dating now!’ Shouyou changes his network name for the first time in a while, to tell their neighbors slash network name friends of some great news.

‘Finally!’ Mountain Valley says a moment later.

‘Yeah, we knew.’ Thunder follows, although their words ends up feeding both Shouyou and Tobio confusion.

But overall, their neighbors responded to their news with a glee and that's enough to make them happy.

After all, it too was from here where their connection had begin, where the connection had been the weakest but grown to be strong in time. So, it's only fair to let the ones who'd been there at the start to know where they are now, too.

#> answered; asks received!#sagechan #haikyuu #hq #kagehina #kageyama tobio #hinata shouyou #hinata shoyo #kageyama x hinata #kagehina fic #haikyuu fics #aira writes #shouyoto writes

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ellegaardrees57-blog · 5 years

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Wallapop 1.21.4 For Android.

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kaiserdingus · 3 years

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Brutal Legend (2009) PS3/Xbox 360/PC Retrospective

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Have you ever looked at a heavy metal album cover and wished that you could experience that world? Have you ever wished you could listen to it while fighting demons? Tim Schafer heard your wishes and he delivered them, and he threw Jack Black into the mix as well. The result was Brütal Legend, a heavy-metal-inspired action-adventure game with Real-Time-Strategy elements released for PS3 and Xbox 360 in October 2009.

This project couldn’t have come at a more opportune time, as both the film School of Rock and the massively popular Guitar Hero video game franchise helped bring heavy metal into the forefront of public consciousness. For a brief moment in the late 2000s, it was popular to be into bands your dad listened to. Like Guitar Hero, Brütal Legend’s soundtrack featured a varied mix of guitar-centric subgenres. Popular mainstream bands like Black Sabbath, Motley Crue, and Motorhead would be featured alongside more niche bands like Brocas Helm or Cradle of Filth. It would be hard to make a game about heavy metal music without licensing a few songs, but the wizards at Double Fine made sure all their bases were covered when they licensed over one hundred songs.

Eddie Riggs, played by Jack Black, is the world's greatest roadie for the world's worst band. An Incredibly skilled and well-organized manager, Eddie hides in the shadows putting together massive rock shows for screaming crowds. A chance encounter with a legendary fire god sends Eddie traveling to another world, one that resembles all of the best album covers. Hot rods, demons, and giant flying shrimp-leeches populate this rich, atmospheric world.

Discovering that humanity has been enslaved by demons, Eddie helps organize an army to start a revolution. Lars Halford is the leader of the resistance, with his sister Lita and their friend Ophelia as the only other members. With Eddie managing the resistance, they’re able to recruit fighters with different skills and abilities to join their army. Emperor Doviculus, voiced by Tim Curry, rules over the world with a sick, leathery fist, while General Lionwhyte serves under him as manager of the human race.

There’s an interesting story of liberation that’s obvious and subtle at the same time. While the plot isn’t hiding the fact that it’s about an underdog rebellion fighting for freedom against tyrannical oppressors, it's presented in a way that ties it more to real-life struggles for liberation than the usual revolutions in pop culture which are vague about their beliefs. The first group Eddie helps liberate are the Headbangers, meaty-necked boys who bang their heads all day to mine for resources as slaves under General Lionwhyte.

The hierarchy is similar to that of any modern job, with the workers carrying out all of the labor, managers ensuring that the workers do their job or face consequences, and General Lionwhyte as the faceless owner who stands to benefit from the unpaid labor of the Headbangers while contributing nothing himself. Doviculus purposely set up a hierarchical system that would keep the humans bickering among themselves, fighting over the meager scraps they’re allowed, while the demons are safe to rule over them. During the Headbanger revolution, one of the characters mentions the workers forming a union to a Bouncer, who becomes angry at the idea. The game isn’t making any profound political statements, but little touches like this bring the fantasy world closer to our own.

Many of the characters Eddie meets along his journey are based on and voiced by real musicians. The flamboyant General Lionwhyte, a parody of 80’s hair metal bands, is voiced by Rob Halford of Judas Priest. Halford also voices The Baron, an ally who appears later in the game and more closely resembles Halford’s real persona than Lionwhyte. Lemmy Kilmister from Motorhead voices the Kill Master, a motorcycle-riding bass player who’s able to revive fallen allies. Ozzy Osbourne takes on the role of the game’s shopkeeper as the Guardian of Metal. Possibly the most over-the-top character, the Guardian sells Eddie upgrades while making sassy comments and elaborating on the world of Brütal Legend. Other cameos include Richard Horvitz, who starred in Schafer’s previous game Psychonauts, and Kyle Gass, Jack Black’s partner in the band Tenacious D.

During the marketing campaign leading up to Brütal Legend's release, Electronic Arts made a point to downplay the game's Real-Time-Strategy elements. Instead, the game was presented as more of a straightforward hack-and-slash/action-adventure game. While a lot of the game’s campaign features Eddie going on missions and completing objectives, these missions serve to prepare the player for the game’s battle maps. Each mission introduces a new move Eddie can use or a new ally Eddie can team up with. The objective of these missions involves using the newly introduced move or ally to solve a problem and advance the story.

Eddie carries two weapons at all times: his Battle Axe which acts as a melee weapon for close-range attacks and his guitar Clementine which can summon lightning from a distance. Also at Eddie’s disposal is The Deuce, a hot-rod he assembles himself at the beginning of the game that can be upgraded in the Motor Forge. In between story missions, Eddie can explore and help people with their problems while also uncovering secrets of the world, learning how he fits into it, and finding the reason why he was brought there. Various relics offer guitar tabs, which teach Eddie new moves he can use with his guitar. These moves open up a short Guitar Hero-inspired mini-game where the player taps the controller buttons in rhythm to perform a guitar solo.

The battle maps feature two stages, one for each opposing faction, and several resource geysers that can be claimed by either side. These geysers provide resources that help supply your army with the soldiers and weaponry necessary to win, so most battles boil down to claiming as many geysers as you can while sending troops to the enemy stage. Later battles add obstacles that require strategic thinking, or enemies will come from multiple areas, forcing you to divide your troops.

Director Tim Schafer has said that the game was always supposed to be a Real-Time-Strategy game, inspired by the 1990 Sega Genesis game Herzog Zwei. As development proceeded, Schafer found that the action elements were a lot of fun and decided to shift the game’s focus towards that, while still retaining the RTS battles. It’s likely the developers hoped a strong online community would form around the game’s multiplayer mode, which could justify the story mode feeling like an advanced tutorial. Double Fine released two packs of downloadable content which were meant to expand the game’s multiplayer mode with new maps. Had the game been more successful, there might have been more DLC in the works.

It wouldn’t be right to talk about Brütal Legend without mentioning the game’s music. The game features 107 licensed songs from metal bands across the globe, including genres such as black metal, power metal, classic heavy metal, symphonic death metal, hard rock, and industrial. Bands like Black Sabbath, Quiet Riot, Judas Priest, Mastodon, Cradle of Filth, Slayer, and more fill the soundtrack with an authentic sound that would make any metal fan happy. Licensed songs pop in at perfect needle drop moments, such as Brocas Helm’s Cry of the Banshee playing during the boss battle with the Metal Queen.

The game also boasts a robust score composed by Peter McConnell featuring a full orchestra and a heavy metal band to seamlessly blend with the licensed music. McConnell previously collaborated with Tim Schafer on the soundtracks for Grim Fandango and Psychonauts. Judas Priest guitarists Glenn Tipton and K.K. Downing provided the guitar solos played by the characters in the game. To promote the game, a DLC music pack was released for the game Rock Band, which was also published by EA, featuring Motorhead, Tenacious D, and Testament.

Despite a massive marketing campaign involving the game’s star Jack Black centered on a “Rocktober 13th” release date, Brütal Legend was not a massive success for Electronic Arts. The game had only sold a quarter of a million copies across both Xbox 360 and PS3 during its first month of release but was successful with critics and those who played it. Many players were confused and upset by the Real-Time-Strategy elements, more specifically they felt they had been deceived by EA’s marketing. Three weeks before the game’s launch a demo was released that featured the first playable mission. No elements of the strategy side of the game were present, leading players to assume it was a hack-and-slash adventure game.

Since its initial release, the game has gone on to become a cult classic. The sharp wit of the writing mixed with Jack Black’s personality, and the fun gameplay of Double Fine ensured this game would age well. In February 2013, four years after the game’s launch on PS3 and Xbox 360, Brütal Legend would finally come to PC. DoubleFine worked out a deal with EA that saw them receive complete ownership of the game, enabling them to release it on Steam with minor tweaks and bug fixes. The game is also available on Xbox One and Xbox Series X through backward compatibility and is available for free to subscribers of Xbox Game Pass.

Brütal Legend is a fantastic game with a rich, illustrious world to explore that too many people missed out on when it first came out. Some may be turned off by its seemingly overwhelming Real-Time Strategy gameplay, but the game does a good enough job explaining how everything works that even newcomers to the genre should feel comfortable. While a sequel is unlikely, Brütal Legend will stand the test of time as one of the last great games of the 2000’s, and a fitting conclusion to the Guitar Hero/Rock Band craze that was petering out as Brütal Legend was released.

Where to Buy

PS3, Xbox 360, Steam (PC)

The Art of Brutal Legend

Digital Soundtrack

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#Brutal Legend #Double Fine #Tim Schafer #Jack Black #PS3 #Xbox 360 #PC Game #Steam

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bamby0304 · 6 years

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Making Fun a Priority VII

This is my first submission for @flames-bring-a-ton-of-ash ’s ‘Ash’s Birthday Negan Challenge’. I’ve waited to post it today, because it’s my birthday, and the next one will be posted on Ash’s birthday :):)

The prompt I picked for this one is Glitter!!

Masterlist

Summary: After accepting Negan’s proposal, Brandi is now tasked with figuring out how to deal with her new life and all the changes and challenges that will comes with it.

Warnings: Explicit language, smut, and a little bit of angst.

Bamby

After agreeing to marry Negan I was expecting things to change… but I hadn't expected it to be like this.

I was currently standing in the middle of a lounge area, surrounded by nearly a dozen women. All morning I'd been bombarded with information and little tips. Workers and wives were busy dressing, preparing, and filling me with all the knowledge they knew.

Yesterday was when Negan had made the announcement to the whole of the Sanctuary. It was then that he informed everyone that he had a new wife. It was then that he confirmed my new status. It was then that he declared I would no longer be working. It was then that my life changed completely.

As much as I felt for Negan, and understood what being his wife would mean, I had requested not to be present during his speech. Most of the community knew who I was, they knew me as the kind quiet girl who did the laundry. No one ever had a problem with me. But I was sure my new life would change people's view and opinion of me. I didn't want to be there to see the moment people no longer liked me…

Yes. I was having reservations.

No. It had nothing to do with Negan.

He was great. Since agreeing to be with him three days ago, he'd been nothing but supportive, grateful and understanding. Every day and night, he'd been there for me. Walking me to my room after dinner, walking me to work in the morning. He was always making sure I felt comfortable and was sure with my decision.

I was surprised when he suggested we not sleep together until everything was set in place and I was settled in. After the last time we were together I kind of thought things would blow up like crazy after that… but other than a few kisses, things had been pretty innocent.

Another thing that surprised me was how friendly his wives were being. Part of me had been in denial, I thought for sure they'd resent me, but yet here they were, being so helpful. It was as if they were… pleased? Relieved? Grateful?

Despite how nice they were being, the wives were just one of the reasons I was having reservations. Seeing them so glad I was around made me think this thing with Negan, this honeymoon stage, was going to end and leave me as miserable as they were.

Then there was everyone else. Everyone out of my marriage and the surrounding women. The workers and Saviours. My friends and family. My image never really meant much to me until the moment my image was tied to my safety.

What if someone hates my decision so much, and hates Negan even more… what if they try to hurt him by hurting me?

Then there was the pressure of being something I wasn't sure I could be. How long was it going to take before I was no longer interesting to him? How long was it going to take before I tired of sharing him?

Negan assured me I would never be replaced… but I just couldn't believe it.

Right now, I was standing in a room with about twelve other women and six of them were already married to Negan. That meant, at some point, each and every one of them got boring. If I were to go on Negan's history and the facts, my time would eventually come to an end.

"Here, sweetie. Wear this."

A dress was suddenly hanging in my face.

I couldn't remember the name of the woman handing it to me, all I knew was that she regularly tended to the demands and needs of the wives. There was a team of women who cleaned, cooked and cared for them… for us.

Shoving my train of thought over to the side, I took in the dress before me.

Honestly, it was beautiful. Black, all glitter and sparkles, short, caped sleeves, and a cut-out at the back. Modest, sweet, but subtle sexy all at the same time. There was nothing wrong with it… yet there was.

It just wasn't me.

Just as suddenly as the dress appeared it was gone. Then I was grabbed and pulled down to a sit on a chair close by before hands grabbed and worked on everything that was me.

Women were brushing my hair, pulling and teasing it. I had hands at my face, covering me in makeup. Others were close by, going through more clothes, arranging my new wardrobe.

"Now, remember, image is everything," one woman said for the millionth time that day.

"Always smile in Negan's presence."

"Stay out of the workers' area."

"Speak when you're spoken to."

"Don't cheat on Negan."

"Try not to talk to any man, just to be safe."

"Don't be afraid to ask for anything."

"But don't get too greedy."

"There's no need to get jealous if Negan pays the other wives attention."

"He will go back to you eventually."

"Be grateful when he does come to you."

"Definitely don't be greedy in the bedroom."

"Always try to look good for him."

"Don't try. Just do."

"Oh, and no going in Negan's room."

"No going in Negan's room," they all repeated in unison.

I sat there, taking it all in, finding my already confused and dazed mind getting dizzier and dizzier with each passing second. It was all just so much to take in, so much to remember, so much to do.

The longer I was surrounded by these women, the more I doubted my ability to actually go through with it all.

Tonight, was supposed to be the night. Tonight, was supposed to be the first night Negan and I would officially be married. It was supposed to be the first night we would be together since that night I decided to sign the life I knew away…

I stood in my new room, taking it all in as I waited for someone else to fetch me, or for my new husband to come find me.

The room was… nice?

Really, it was. It was lovely, luxurious, fancy, girly, amazing, beautiful. Dim lighting, a large four poster bed, a couch, cream walls, dark floor boards, a fluffy white rug, dozens of cushions, candles, an antique dresser, a matching vanity. Everything was soft and delicate and feminine… and not me.

After spending all day being bombarded with facts, and getting made-over like a doll, I was tired. I was mentally, emotionally and physically drained.

Sure, I looked nice. The dress hugged my curves perfectly. My hair was curled and pulled back out of my face with half a dozen pins. My face was caked with makeup and glitter. Even the black glitter heels I'd been given to wear were amazing.

But it just wasn't me.

The first day being married to Negan and I was already regretting it. I already felt like I was losing myself. If I lost myself, would he even be interested? If I lost myself how much of me would he still like? How much of me would he still want? How much of my would he still be attracted to?

There was so much doubt going on in my mind I was getting dizzier and dizzier. I was feeling sick. I was literally feeling sick.

I hadn't felt this kind of pressure in years. When the world ended everything actually got better for me. I didn't have to deal with anymore of the crap I'd been dealing with my whole life. Now, none of this compared to that crap, but it was still messing with me.

The last thing I wanted was to ruin what I had with Negan, but if things didn't get better, if he didn't help clear the crap out and reassure me that I'd made the right decision, I was sure I wouldn't last longer than a month.

For a few hours, I'd paced and waited in my room. I wallowed, my mind wondering and wandering. But when no one came, when I was left alone for too long, I decided to venture out. I needed a change of scenery. I needed to get out of my room.

I'd been told to wait. I'd been told someone would come by to check on me. I'd been told some food would be delivered to my room. I'd been told to take the time to get settled in. I'd been told Negan would come by when he had the time.

No one ever came, my patience ran out, my mind was going crazy, so I took matters into my own hands.

My intention hadn't been to go to Negan's room. Honestly. All I'd wanted was to take a walk. I just wanted to stretch my legs and lay my eyes on something that wasn't covered in fluff or glitter. Yet, being so distracted as I walked about, I eventually found myself looking up at the door that led to Negan's bedroom.

Many questions ran through my head in the moment I realised where I was. I questioned whether or not I should know. Whether or not I should go in. Whether or not I should just turn around and go back to my room. But as I stood there, thinking it over, measuring the pros and cons, five words kept repeating in my head.

No going in Negan's room.

When I pushed everything aside and focused on that, I was able to make my mind up and build up enough courage to move forward. Why? Because hearing those women say those words with such certainty made me think they'd never stepped foot passed this door. Or, if they had, whatever they experienced in the room was nothing like I had experienced. That there was enough to make me think I really was different to the others.

Taking a deep breath, I lifted my hand and tapped on the wooden door with three hard knocks.

"Come in."

Without allowing myself a moment to chicken out, I did as the voice said, reached for the handle, turned it, opened the door, and stepped inside.

Keeping my back to him, I closed the door behind me, giving us some privacy while also giving myself one more second or so to collect my thoughts and control my emotions, before I turned to face him finally.

He was sitting on the single seater couch he'd been sitting on the other night. In fact, other than the fact it was day time, the picture before me was a lot like the one from the other night. Negan sitting there, nursing a drink while also doing some work.

Seeing him so relaxed, seeing him like this, I liked it. It eased my worried just a bit. It reminded me of a nicer time when things weren't so complicated. It gave me hope that after all this chaos there might be some normalcy…

I didn't speak. I found myself unable to find any words. The courage I'd mustered up on the other side of the door was well and truly gone. The instant I laid eyes on Negan, the worry disappeared. Instead, it was replaced with a new haze… a haze only he brought on… a haze I didn't hate.

Luckily, Negan was never really the silent type. He finished up whatever he was working on before lowering the pages and lifting his eyes.

When his gaze fell on me, he was taken aback. His eyes racked up my form, his lips curving up into a grin, his teeth pulling his bottom lip into their grip. I could practically hear his thoughts. Once his eyes locked onto mine, he uttered one word in a single breath.

"Fuck."

Suddenly, I was nervous. I looked to the ground and fiddled with my fingers as a blush crept onto my cheeks. Still, no words came.

His grin grew. "Speechless, sweetheart?" He leaned forward in his chair, eyes roaming over my body again. "So was I for a second. You look so fucking hot right now. If I'd known this is what'd been waiting for me, I would have left work for later." His tongue ran over his lips, his eyes darkening. "Speaking of your room… what made you leave it? Needed to come see me?"

At first, I thought I should just lie and say yes. Feed his already huge ego. But then I remembered that there really was a reason I left my room, and if I didn't say anything then nothing would get fixed. I came here for a reason, it was time to speak up.

"It's all a little overwhelming, actually." My voice was small, unsure, nervous. I really didn't want to upset him. But I needed to be heard. "Don't get me wrong, I love the room, and the clothes and the hair and the…" I gestured to my face and all the makeup, "but it's a bit much. I'm just not used to it. And… I'm worried."

"Worried?" he repeated, curious and a little concerned.

I quickly nodded, going on. "It's not about you. And it's not about anyone else. At least, not entirely. I mean, it's not their fault. There's nothing you can do, or they can do. It's all about me. And if I wasn't so worried I'd just ignore it and move on, but I don't want it to come between us, and I don't want to ruin anything, and I'm worried if I don't say something you'll realise something is wrong, and the it'll be too late, and I really would have ruined-"

"Brandi," he cut me off, his smile still in place- only now it was smaller and sweeter. "You're rambling."

My head fell once more as a sigh escaped my lips. "Sorry."

Chuckling, he pushed himself up to his feet. "Sweetheart, don't apologise. I think it's cute you're so worried you're getting all tongue tied." He walked towards me. "But I can't help if you don't tell me what's actually wrong."

I waited until he stood in front of me, both of us looking at each other's eyes, that line of respect in place, before I spoke up.

"I don't want to marry you and then become someone else. All these clothes. The makeup. The room. All the information. It's a lot to take in, and it's making me feel like in order for this to work, I have to be someone else. It's making me feel like what we had before was you having a little fun, and now everything had to be managed and controlled like the rest of our lives."

Still smiling, he shook his head at me lightly. "First of all, whatever you've been told by the other women… forget it. They don't know what we've done. You're different. You're the first woman I've brought in here. You're the first woman I've spent the entire night with. You're the first woman I didn't give up on after she said no. So their rules and your rules? Entirely different."

Gotta admit… that made me feel a little better.

"Secondly, if you don't want the dresses, the makeup, or even the room, you don't have to have all that. I want you to be comfortable. But, if I had it my way, you won't be in those clothes or in that room much anyway." His grin turned suggestive once more.

My blush returned as I chuckled a little.

"And lastly, there's nothing you could do that will make me want you less. I know who you are. I chose you because of who you are, not how you look or what you can give me. I like you Brandi. I like this thing between us. Just because you're my wife now, doesn't mean any of that has changed."

"Really?"

"Really." He nodded, his smile slipping ever so slightly. "I thought I'd already made that clear. What do I have to do to prove it to you?"

"I don't know," I admitted. "I just… I need to know this is different. We're different."

Looking down into my eyes, contemplating my words, I could see his mind ticking and thinking. I wasn't entirely sure what was going on up there, but the longer he stayed silent, the more his smile faded and the harder his eyes grew.

"You wanna know this is different?"

I gave a sharp and short nod. "Yes."

Reaching forward, he cupped my face and brought my face to his. Before I could register what was really happening, his lips were pressed against mine in a kiss so deep I felt it settle in my chest. My heart fluttered, my stomach flipped, my head spun and my core began to tingle in anticipation for more of his touch.

Then, he pulled away. One hand continued to cup my face, his thumb stroking my cheek, but the rest of him pulled back.

"Tonight, I'm running you a bath. We're going to have a drink, sit in the tub and talk. Or not, maybe we'll just sit. Whatever you want."

I raised an unsure brow at him. "You, in a bath?"

"Yes." He nodded as if that was obvious. "There's no fucking way I'm leaving you alone to clean all that glitter crap off your face. I'm gonna be there to help you get that shit off. Then, you're gonna get dressed in one of my shirts, I'm gonna get in some pants, and then we're gonna go to bed. No sex. Just sleep."

"Seriously?"

"Seriously."

I was understandably sceptical. I thought for sure he'd try something while we were naked in the bath, or maybe once we were under the covers. But, for the rest of the night, he made no move. Other than a few kisses, a nice foot rub, and some cuddling in bed, nothing happened… and as I fell asleep that night I finally believed this would work.

Bamby

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Robert Crais: Novelsebooks Free Download

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Free download or read online The Monkeys Raincoat pdf (ePUB) book. The first edition of the novel was published in July 1st 1987, and was written by Robert Crais. The book was published in multiple languages including English, consists of 237 pages and is available in Paperback format. The main characters of this mystery, fiction story are Elvis Cole, Joe Pike. The book has been awarded with Macavity Award for Best First Mystery Novel (1988), Anthony Award for Best Paperback Original (1988) and many others.

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The Promise: An Elvis Cole and Joe Pike Novel (An Elvis Cole Novel) – Robert Crais. Elvis Cole and Joe Pike are joined by Suspect heroes LAPD K-9 Officer Scott James and his German shepherd, Maggie, in the new heart-stopping thriller from #1 New York Times-bestselling author Robert Crais. Title: Downloads PDF Stalking the Angel by Robert Crais Police Procedural Books Author: Robert Crais Subject: Downloads PDF Stalking the Angel by Robert Crais Police Procedural Books Meet Elvis Cole, L.A. He quotes Jiminy Cricket and carries a.38. ROBERT CRAIS: THE WATCHMAN: A Joe Pike Novel. The city was hers for a single hour, just the one magic hour, only hers. Larkin Conner Barkley lives like the City of Angels is hers for the taking. Young and staggeringly rich, she speeds through the city during its loneliest hours, blowing through red after red in her Aston Martin as if running. Indigo Slam: An Elvis Cole Novel (Elvis Cole and Joe Pike Book 7) - Kindle edition by Crais, Robert. Download it once and read it on your Kindle device, PC, phones or tablets. Use features like bookmarks, note taking and highlighting while reading Indigo Slam. Crais' books are addicting. He catches your attention from the get go and keeps you hooked to the last word. I always look forward to his next novel. Hard to put down. Kansasgames123 nr2003 designs. Looking frward to another.

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The Monkeys Raincoat PDF Details

Author: Robert CraisOriginal Title: The Monkeys RaincoatBook Format: PaperbackNumber Of Pages: 237 pagesFirst Published in: July 1st 1987Latest Edition: 1999ISBN Number: 9780752816999Series: Elvis Cole #1Language: EnglishAwards: Macavity Award for Best First Mystery Novel (1988), Anthony Award for Best Paperback Original (1988), Shamus Award Nominee for Best Original PI Paperback (1988), Edgar Award Nominee for Best Paperback Original (1988)Main Characters: Elvis Cole, Joe Pike, Ellen Lang, Lou Poitras, Lt. Baishecategory: mystery, fiction, mystery, crime, thriller, thriller, mystery thriller, mystery, detective, seductionFormats: ePUB(Android), audible mp3, audiobook and kindle.

The translated version of this book is available in Spanish, English, Chinese, Russian, Hindi, Bengali, Arabic, Portuguese, Indonesian / Malaysian, French, Japanese, German and many others for free download.

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Some of the techniques listed in The Monkeys Raincoat may require a sound knowledge of Hypnosis, users are advised to either leave those sections or must have a basic understanding of the subject before practicing them.

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On Sale Now! A DANGEROUS MAN Click to order copies. A brilliant new crime novel from the beloved, bestselling, and award-winning master of the genre--and Joe Pike's most perilous case to date. Joe Pike didn't expect to rescue a woman that day. He went to the bank same as anyone goes to the bank, and returned to his Jeep. So when Isabel Roland, the lonely young teller who helped him, steps out of the bank on her way to lunch, Joe is on hand when two men abduct her. Joe chases them down, and the two men are arrested. But instead of putting the drama to bed, the arrests are only the beginning of the trouble for Joe and Izzy.

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“Outstanding. . . Crais begins the story with deceptive simplicity but ratchets up both the tension and the action with surgical precision. The scenes in which Joe saves Isabel from her captors and the final shoot-out among a colorful array of hit men, police, and U.S. Marshals stand as high-water marks among Crais’s illustrious crime oeuvre. . . The particular kind of danger (Joe Pike) carries is just plain off the charts. This one’s sure to hit the bestseller charts.” --Publishers Weekly (starred review)

“Crais is a whip-smart writer. Cole and Pike are carefully drawn, multilayered characters who’ve grown more complex through the years. This is one of the very best entries in a long-running and still first-rate series.” --Booklist (starred review)

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