#i feel like this would be an ideal way to spend corona times | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

roseworth · 3 years

Text

Shadows of the Moon

word count: 4.6k

summary: Prince Eugene of the Dark Kingdom never had anyone there for him growing up. When one of the knights has a child, he takes it upon himself to always be there for him. The two of them grow up like brothers, and they find a connection to a "normal" life through each other.

note: for Eugene Appreciation Week 🥰

AO3

When Prince Eugene first heard that one of the Brotherhood Knights was going to be a father, he was far from excited. Having a baby in the castle didn’t seem ideal to him. All it meant was that there was going to be some snotty little blob crying and making messes all the time.

But when Quirin introduced baby Varian to him, Eugene immediately felt a connection to the child. As crazy as the kingdom was sometimes, he felt calm knowing that there was someone he could connect with. They weren’t technically related, but the Prince immediately saw the child as a little brother, and silently swore he would do everything in his power to make him feel safe.

Of course, there wasn’t much a ten-year-old could do to help an infant. Eugene decided he would leave the protection to Varian’s parents, and he and Varian could just be each other’s connection to normalcy.

When Eugene was bored, he liked to go into Varian’s nursery and read him Flynnigan Rider stories. He was pretty sure the baby didn’t understand a word he was saying, but he still liked the audience. Besides, Varian would babble along when Eugene got to an exciting part of the story, so maybe he was entertained by it.

“The monster tried to sniff out Rider’s scent among the forest, hunting for his next catch. The rogue was unphased, of course, and ducked into a cave to hide from the beast,” Eugene read, adding in dramatic movements as he read. Varian gurgled from his crib, and Eugene smiled.

“That’s not even the best part!” he said. “Once the terrifying monster left, Rider ventured deeper into the cave to find more gold than he had ever seen!”

Varian gasped and flailed his arms. Eugene grinned. He stood up and leaned in closer to the crib. “And of course, there was the time Flynn ran from the ferocious mob! He launched himself up and onto a dragon... . ” He lifted Varian up and onto his shoulders. He made sure to hold the kid tightly so he wouldn’t fall, then ran around the room as he squealed in delight. “And he rode the dragon for miles until he was back home!” Varian babbled and stuck his arms up from his place on Eugene’s shoulders. Eugene spun around, then lifted him off his shoulders and back into the crib. Varian was bouncing excitedly, babbling nonsense with a smile on his face.

Eugene beamed down at him. Even though Varian was only 6 months old, spending time with him was the best part of the day. The kid was a bright light in the middle of the Dark Kingdom.

By the time Varian turned 1, everyone in the castle had all but accepted that he and Eugene had a connection. Eugene had spent years growing up with no other kids in the castle, but now he finally felt like he had a little brother. The two were inseparable, much to the annoyance of some.

“Your Highness,” Hector grumbled. “You can’t continue to do things like this. You’re royalty, you can’t constantly be up to these… things.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” the young prince said. Hector pointed at the child on Eugene’s shoulders, who was tugging on his hair and causing it to skew in every direction. “Oh him? He’s just my new advisor, he has to be with me at all times.”

Hector ran his hand down his face. “He’s a one-year-old, he’s not your advisor.’

“Oh yeah? Let’s see what my advisor has to say about that. Varian?”

Varian yelped and kicked his legs, making noises for a few seconds while Eugene listened intently, nodding along as if he was reciting important proverbs. “Go!” Varian said, reaching his arms forward.

“Well, you heard my advisor,” Eugene shrugged. “Maybe next time, Hector.” He grabbed onto Varian’s legs and dashed down the hallway, leaving Hector to regret his career choice. He heard the knight mutter something under his breath about how he couldn’t wait until the prince grew tired of spending all his time with a child, but Eugene ignored him.

Once Varian learned to walk and talk in full sentences, Eugene thought it was even more fun to spend time with him. He was full of energy, unlike everyone else he had to interact with in the kingdom. Everyone always acted like life was a burden they were forced to bear, but Eugene wanted to stay young and full of life forever.

The only problem was that once Eugene was 14, there were even more expectations put on him as the prince. He was told to conduct himself properly at all times, and he couldn’t get away with the excuse of being a kid anymore. He was called into his father’s office one day and was met with his usual cold gaze.

“The King and Queen of Corona will be visiting today, so I expect you to be on your best behavior,” Edmund said. He was sitting at his desk, his back straightened and his chin held high. Eugene stood on the other side of the desk, feeling uncomfortably still.

Eugene nodded. “Got it.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes.”

“You’re not going to embarrass us in front of our visitors?”

“No.”

Edmund looked his son up and down. “Good. They’ll be here in two hours, make sure you’re ready.”

Eugene nodded again, then turned around and left his father’s office. He sighed quietly after shutting the door, glancing back at the room. Ever since Eugene’s mom died, Edmund was never sure how to talk to his son, and every conversation made that clear. He felt like he had been raised by knights and maids, and every interaction with his father was like a formal business transaction.

He had barely taken 2 steps away from the room before Varian, ever the bundle of energy, ran up to him with a huge grin on his face. “Eugene!” he called out. “Wanna play Flynnigan Rider?”

The prince frowned. “I can’t, we have guests coming in a couple of hours and I just told my father I would be on my best behavior.”

Varian blinked. “Well, the guests aren’t here yet.” Eugene hesitated, and Varian stepped closer and gave his best “kicked puppy” eyes. “ Pleeeeease?”

“Fine,” he said with a grin. “But only for a bit, okay?”

“Okay!” the boy said brightly, then dashed away, gesturing for Eugene to follow him.

They grabbed wooden swords and started reenacting their favorite scenes from the Flynn Rider books. Time started to get away from them; it could have been 10 minutes or 10 hours and they wouldn’t be able to tell the difference.

“I’ve got you surrounded, Rider!” Eugene bellowed, pointing his sword at Varian as they chased each other down the halls of the castle.

“Ah, I see your point ,” Varian said. "But you'll have to try harder than that!" He ducked under the sword and slid under Eugene’s legs, making his escape.

“You’re not getting away that easily!” he yelled. He chased after the kid, and Varian screeched happily as he ran away.

“Get back, foul beast!” he yelled. Eugene grabbed him by the torso and lifted him up as both of them dissolved into giggles.

“I’ve got you now, Flynnigan!” Eugene said.

“That’s what you think!” Varian replied, trying to squirm out of the older boy’s grasp and knocking them both onto the floor. They wrestled on the ground between giggles until Varian managed to slip out and dash away.

Eugene lifted himself to his feet and tried to chase after the boy before almost colliding with someone else. His entire body tensed as he met eyes with the Queen of Corona, who had been there and had seen him playing with a 5-year-old.

“Your Majesty, hi, um, sorry,” he mumbled, dusting himself off. He was pretty sure his father would have a heart attack if he had seen the way Eugene was conducting himself. “Uh, welcome to the kingdom?”

Much to Eugene’s surprise, the Queen just smiled warmly at him. “Your hair got a little messed up,” she said simply, reaching out to fix it.

“Uh…”

“No need to make your father think there’s a problem here, right?” she added with a wink. Eugene chuckled nervously.

If he had learned one thing from his father, it was how to read someone from their eyes. The Queen had an amused look on her face, but her eyes looked sad. “Are you alright?” he asked carefully.

She smiled again and looked down, waving her arms dismissively. “I’m fine, I just… I’ve always wanted a kid. And seeing you two made me think...” she trailed off, then cleared her throat uncomfortably.

His heart sunk. He remembered hearing about what happened to the Princess of Corona years ago. The Queen had lost a daughter, he couldn’t blame her for being sad. “I-I’m sorry,” he said quietly. “I know how you feel, my mom…”

The Queen shook her head and put her hand on his shoulders. “It’s okay, there’s no need for all that.”

He looked up and smiled at her. The sound of quick footsteps broke their moment, and Varian appeared beside them seconds later. “Eugene- oh. Hi,” he said, looking up at the Queen with wide eyes.

“Varian, this is Queen Arianna of Corona,” Eugene said. The Queen waved down at him, and Varian waved back.

“Hi, Varian, you’re Quirin’s son, right?” she said. Eugene was a little surprised that she knew the names of the knights of the Dark Kingdom, but it made sense that she would be kind and attentive enough to know everyone. “I’m about to go see him, would you like to come with me?”

Varian nodded, and the Queen bent down to pick him up. Varian welcomed it, wrapping his arms around her neck as she rested him against her hip. “Bye, Eugene!” Varian waved. Eugene waved back.

The Queen met Eugene’s eye and smiled softly. “I’m supposed to be seeing the royal family of the Dark Kingdom for the first time today in five minutes, I will see you then,” she said with a short nod. Eugene smiled back at her, and she turned to walk away.

Eugene knew that not everyone would be as understanding of his and Varian’s games as Queen Arianna was. Over the next few years, the two of them would make sure to only pull their dumb shenanigans when no one important was around.

Besides, everyone was saying Eugene was too old to be doing that kind of thing. What they didn’t understand was that he was doing his best to give Varian a normal childhood. Neither of them got to experience true “normal,” but the least Eugene could do was make sure the kid was happy despite everything.

As Eugene grew up, he was expected to learn more about the kingdom. By the time he was 18 years old, he had gotten sick of hearing about the history of kingdom tragedies, mostly regarding the Moonstone.

“One of these days, you’re going to be king. You have to be prepared for whatever the Moonstone will do,” Edmund told him. Eugene glanced at the perpetually-closed door of the chamber holding the Moonstone.

“Why don’t we just destroy it?” he asked. His father narrowed his eyes, and he swore he could hear the Moonstone buzzing louder than it was before.

“Generations of your ancestors have tried and failed to destroy it. Now we simply leave it alone and smooth over the disasters as best we can. That’s all we can do, end of discussion.”

Eugene watched Edmund walk away, holding his head high like a king. Once he was out of earshot, he groaned to himself and kicked the door. Stupid Moonstone, causing problems all over the kingdom. And his father wouldn’t even think about finding a solution to the problem. Why did he insist on ignoring it?

“Eugene!” Varian yelled as he scurried toward him, snapping Eugene out of his thoughts. “Check this out!”

The boy had gotten a chemistry kit for his ninth birthday and was spending all his time with it. He had a new fascination with everything about science, and Eugene couldn’t believe he was having trouble keeping up with a nine-year-old.

Varian poured one chemical into another, and it fizzled then turned blue. Eugene watched it carefully, waiting for something to happen, but nothing else came. He looked up at Varian, who had a huge grin on his face and was looking expectantly at Eugene. “Oh, uh, cool! Your experiments are really coming along, Var.”

He beamed, practically bouncing up and down with excitement over his chemicals. “Adding one compound into another completely changes the components of the element! Isn’t that cool?”

“Sure!”

Varian rambled about his chemicals for a bit longer as Eugene tried his best to listen, then the kid suddenly stopped himself. “What’s that buzzing sound?”

“I think it’s the Moonstone,” Eugene shrugged. “It just got louder while I was talking to my dad.”

Varian’s eyes widened excitedly. “Let’s check it out!” He strutted towards the door and put his hand on the handle, almost opening it before Eugene grabbed him by the shoulder and pulled him back.

“Hold it, kiddo. We can’t go in there, it’s dangerous, remember?”

“All the Moonstone ever does is sit there, why is it so dangerous to go in?”

Eugene paused, then shrugged. “It just is, I don’t know. Either way, there’s probably nothing interesting in there.”

Varian scrunched up his face at the door. Eugene could tell he wanted to go in, and honestly, he wanted to too. But he knew that it wasn’t worth the trouble they would get in if they went in. “Hey, how about we check out some more of your chemicals? I’m sure there’s plenty of things you haven’t combined yet, right?” he suggested.

Varian brightened back up and nodded. “Yeah! You’re right, there’s a lot more science to discover!” he said, taking Eugene’s arm and dragging him towards the door, the Moonstone completely forgotten about.

If the Moonstone was as dangerous as his father suggested, there was no way Eugene was letting Varian anywhere near it. It was not worth the risk of him getting hurt. He had sworn to himself years ago that he would protect the kid with everything he had, and no magic rock was going to change that.

Eugene was 24 when the rocks started appearing everywhere. Black rocks had been common his whole life, but it was getting much worse. Homes were being destroyed left and right, and no one could stop them.

He didn’t know if he could sit through another meeting where everyone’s only solution was to relocate civilians. He wanted to scream that these were all temporary solutions, and they needed to find a way to stop the rocks instead of relocating people every other day.

“You’re relocating people again ?” Eugene yelled as he threw open the door of his father’s office.

Edmund’s hardened gaze fell on him. “I know you want to find another way, but I’ve told you there is no other way. These are the kind of decisions you’ll have to make when you’re king,” he said simply.

“But there has to be something else to do! Why aren’t we finding the root of the problem?”

“We already know that the root of the problem is the Moonstone, but there’s just nothing to do about it.”

“‘Nothing to do about it’?” he shouted, slamming his hand on the desk in front of him. “You won’t even try to do anything about it!”

“There’s nothing to be done!” Edmund shouted back, standing up to meet his son’s eye level. “I’ve told you time and time again that the Moonstone cannot be destroyed!”

“How could you possibly know that? You won’t even let me get close to it!”

“Because I won’t lose you the same way I lost your mother!”

Eugene’s mouth immediately snapped shut. He stared into his father’s eyes. He looked… lost. But that didn’t stop Eugene’s heart from racing as thoughts ran back and forth in his head. His face felt numb, and he couldn’t form the words that were on the tip of his tongue. Edmund sighed to break the silence and sat back down. “I just want to protect us, son.”

“What do you mean by that?” he asked quietly when he found his voice. “You said she died of a sickness.”

Edmund shook his head. “She didn’t. She tried to destroy the Moonstone, and… the Moonstone had other ideas.”

“The Moonstone killed her,” Eugene whispered. His hands tightened into fists and his eyes were trained on the floor. His nails were digging into the palm of his hand, but he didn’t even notice.

“Yes,” Edmund said weakly.

“And you never told me? You didn’t think I would want to know how my mother died?” he spat, his voice slowly rising.

“I couldn’t tell you the truth about the Moonstone, I just needed you to know it’s dangerous . ”

“You couldn’t tell me the truth. You let me believe a lie for years because you ‘couldn’t tell me the truth.’”

“Son, I’m not the bad guy in this story, you know that.”

“Don’t call me son,” Eugene said coldly. “What have you ever done to be able to call me your son?”

He didn’t bother letting him answer. He practically ran out of the room and stormed as far away as he could from the king. He didn’t know where his feet were taking him, he just knew he had to get as far from that office as possible.

He slowly came up with an idea as he marched down the hallways of the castle. He threw open the door to the room he had gone to countless times and walked in. Varian jumped as the door to his lab was slammed open. “Hey, Eugene. You look… unhappy.”

“Yeah,” he grumbled. “You want to go see the Moonstone?”

Varian blinked in surprise. “Really? What about your dad?”

“I don’t care what he thinks. Are you in or not?”

Varian bit his lip, waiting for some kind of explanation. Eugene was breathing heavily, and he had anger etched into every corner of his face. Varian wasn’t sure what to do, but he knew from his expression that Eugene was about to do something dumb, and Varian took it upon himself to make sure he didn’t. “Okay, I’m in.”

“Good.” Eugene grabbed the boy’s arm and practically dragged him away from the lab. Varian tripped over his feet to try to keep up with the determined prince, but Eugene paid no attention to him. His only focus was getting to the Moonstone.

“So, uh, why the change of heart?” Varian asked.

“He’s been lying to me about everything. Now I don’t care what he wants for me, I’m seeing this Stone even if it kills me.”

Varian frowned. “...is it going to kill you?”

“Maybe. Probably not, though.”

Varian was about to object when they arrived at the door of the Moonstone Chamber. Eugene looked at the door with a sense of determination he had never felt before. Without another word, he threw open the doors and came face to face with the Moonstone. He stepped in, not checking to see if Varian was still behind him.

He was still behind, of course. He didn’t want Eugene to go in alone. Not to mention, he had wanted to see the Moonstone for years, too. It had always been forbidden for them to go into the Moonstone Chamber alone, so neither of them ever got the chance to get a good look at it. He looked at the rock in question, glowing softly from its black cage.

Now that they were in the Chamber, they had no idea what they were doing anymore. They had heard the horror stories about the Moonstone, but it didn’t look that scary. It was just floating there. Varian had half-expected it to be a giant murder machine, but it was just a tiny gem.

Eugene took a step closer, and the light it was emitting got subtly brighter. He stopped in his tracks, looking at the Stone.

This was the last thing his mom ever saw. He wondered if the Moonstone was glowing as softly and quietly as it was now, or if it was more… dramatic . It just seemed sad now. He stood still for a moment and watched the Moonstone floating alone in the cage.

“Eugene?” Varian said softly. Eugene turned around and looked back at Varian.

“That’s all I needed,” he said, walking back to the door. He pushed it open and walked out of the Moonstone Chamber.

Varian trailed behind him, his eyebrows knit together as he watched the prince. “Are you okay?”

Eugene paused, then nodded. “Yeah. Let’s get back to your lab, you said you’re working on something cool, right? Flynnoleum?”

“Yeah,” Varian said slowly, not wanting to change the subject so quickly. But clearly, his friend didn’t want to talk about this now. “Yeah, if it works right, I can get hot running water to the whole kingdom.”

“Cool,” Eugene responded, his voice barely steady. “Let’s go check it out.”

Ever since that day, everything was the same, but nothing was the same.

They both went back to their lives like usual. Eugene continued to go to meetings to learn about the problems in the kingdom, and Varian continued to work on his experiments. Eugene still spent all his free time in Varian’s lab, watching the kid performing experiments that Eugene didn’t entirely understand. All he did to make himself useful was pass beakers when he was told to. Just like before.

But there was still a weight on both of their shoulders as if something had changed. They learned more about the tragedies of the Moonstone, and they finally understood the burdens their kingdom had borne for centuries. They were each other’s lifeboats in the chaos of what Eugene not-so-lovingly called “The Disaster Kingdom.”

It had been 2 years since they had first visited the Moonstone together, and things had only gotten worse in the kingdom. More rocks were devastating the citizens’ lives every day and no one could stop it. Eugene stopped trying to find solutions, and instead went out and helped as many people as he could in the relocations.

He stayed distant from his father. They talked when they had to, but never more than that. He didn’t mind, though. He had never had a close relationship with Edmund before, at least now they both finally had an excuse.

But one day, everything changed.

Varian knew something was wrong when Eugene didn’t come to visit his lab at the end of the day. He searched through the castle to look for some sign of where the prince went.

His heart dropped when he saw the door of the Moonstone Chamber was standing ajar. He poked his head in to see Eugene standing on the walkway. He was staring at the stone with Adira’s Shadowblade gripped tightly in his right hand.

“Eugene?”

He didn’t turn around to face Varian. He didn’t move at all. “Someone died today.”

“What?”

“Someone died today,” he said again. “A rock shot up into their home and killed her.”

“Oh,” Varian said quietly. “Was it someone you knew?”

“No, but it was someone with a home and a family. And now she’s gone, and her family doesn’t have her anymore. All because of the Moonstone.”

Varian fell silent and looked at the Moonstone. He could have sworn it was glowing brighter than it was last time he saw it.

“I’m going to destroy it.”

Varian’s eyes widened. “You can’t! It’ll kill you!”

Eugene made a noise that sounded like a half-laugh, half-scoff. “It’ll kill me? Just like it’s done to everyone else for the entire history of the kingdom?” he said bitterly. The Moonstone began to hum louder at his words. “It’s already killing people. I’m done just sitting back and hoping it’ll stop.”

“Eugene, there’s got to be a better way to help everyone than walking into death!”

“If you know a better way, I’m all ears! But as far as I can tell, no one can do anything. And apparently, I’m the only one that cares.”

“I care too! I just don’t want to lose you like this.”

Eugene’s shoulders tensed for a moment then fell back down. “That’s not my problem.” He took a step closer to the Moonstone, and it started to shine even brighter.

“Isn’t this the exact same thing that killed your mom?” Varian shouted.

That made him stop. Eugene finally turned around, his eyes narrowed and his hands shaking. He raised the sword at his side and pointed it directly at Varian. “Don’t you dare talk about my mother,” he hissed. Behind him, the Moonstone shot out a burst of light. “You don’t know anything about her.”

“I know enough to know that this could kill you!”

“It doesn’t matter, as long as I can destroy this stupid rock.”

He turned back around and continued his walk towards the Moonstone. It glowed harsher with every step he took, the light almost blinding by the time he was right next to it. Varian’s lip quivered as he watched the closest thing he ever had to a brother drawing his sword and holding it above his head.

“Eugene, wait!” he cried out. Eugene snapped his head to glare at Varian. The kid cleared his throat and took a hesitant step forward. “I… I love you. You’ve always been like family to me, and I- I don’t know what I’d do without you.”

Eugene’s face softened, and so did the light emitting from the Moonstone. He slowly lowered the sword to give his full attention to Varian. “Kid, I’m-”

Before he could finish the thought, the Moonstone shot up from the cage like an arrow and floated in midair for a split second. The next thing he knew, it flew to Eugene’s chest, causing him to gasp and fall backward.

“Eugene!”

“Stay back!”

He clutched his chest and tried to claw it away to no avail. It dug deeper in his chest, and he folded in on himself. He squeezed his eyes shut tightly to distract from the burning the Stone was causing as it embedded itself into his skin. He felt Varian’s hand on his shoulder, but he pushed him away. He held his hand out to force the kid to keep a distance. He had no idea what was about to happen, and he didn’t know what he would do if Varian got hurt.

He felt extremely dizzy and his ears were rushing. His eyes were still shut and he couldn’t hear a thing, all he knew was that the Moonstone was searing his chest. He had no idea what was going on around him or to him. It felt like hours, but it couldn’t have been much longer than a minute.

Is this what his mom felt like right before she died?

A rock shot up right next to him, and he reached out to lean on it, desperately trying to catch his breath. The pain was starting to subside and he opened his eyes slowly. He blinked a few times as Varian came into focus in front of him. The kid’s face looked horror-stricken, but thankfully he seemed unscathed. “Kid?”

“You- your- you look-” Varian stuttered.

Eugene looked down and saw that the clothes he had been wearing had been replaced with pitch-black armor made from the rocks, with spikes protruding from the shoulders. The Moonstone had settled into place on his chest. His hair was pitch black, too, the same color as the black rocks across the kingdom.

“Well, that’s… new.”

#got team awesome on the brain wheeeeeeeeeee #originally this was just going to be the two of them vibing in the dark kingdom #but it kinda grew from there lol #eugene appreciation week #tangled #my writing #fanfic #varian #eugene #tangled the series #eugene fitzherbert #team awesome #dark kingdom au

55 notes · View notes

unpopularly-opinionated · 3 years

Link

I don’t play WoW but I used to play Overwatch and Diablo and this touches on just the general issues that are inside of Activision Blizzard right now regarding the major decline of World of Warcraft and how they’re losing to Final Fantasy XIV, how if the latest WoW expansion or Overwatch 2 flop as they’re projected to do then Blizzard’s most definitely going to pivot almost entirely to mobile games, and how the differences in age demographics are actually dividing the company into multiple camps.

It’s important to note two things: 1) this could be fake but also 2) the link came from Grummz, a former team lead on WoW and producer on Diablo II and Starcraft. It still could be fake despite this, but if he’s sharing it then I feel like there’s at least some measure of truth in this.

Transcription below in case this gets deleted and/or you don’t wanna click the link. Warning, it’s fairly long.

“I’m dropping this here after getting chewed out for three hours over shit the chewee did at work so fuck it. Assume larp and let me vent.”

>Shadowlands is a shitshow. Critical response, Player drop off and just about every engagement metric outside of cash shop have been catastrophic. No higher up expected this because of their “we are too big to fail, if we built it they will come” mentality. They refuse to accept their focus on the world being a begrudged mechanic to funnel players to raiding is not appealing to the player base at large because it appeals to them. They have spent the last 4 months trying to course correct but there is no solid direction and the response to 9.1 has only made things worse.

>Sylvanas is planned to replace the Arbiter despite so many people in the company and god knows how many online saying this would be a total replication of Kerrigans storyline in Starcraft 2 that killed none competitive interest in the brand entirely and you can only go “no, no they WILL like it eventually” for so many real world years before its time to change course. Thus far that has not happened.

>The elephant in the room is FFXIV. To the people in charge they are acting like this came out of nowhere and don’t even seem to understand why its drawing players away in their tens of thousands. We have all tried to highlight things it is doing that are clearly appealing to an mmo audience and not, in my opinion, focussing more on mobile game style retention traps to keep MAU users and habit forming personalities logging in. Its not that they don’t care. They just seem so pig headed and digging their heels in with their fingers in their ears thinking all the problems will go away because WoW is “too big to fail”, there will never be real competition and “they will keep coming back”. But they aren’t coming back anymore. Not in the numbers they used to.

>The people making the spending choices know this. The new model for WoW is market the hell out of a expansion pack for a huge quarter then use 6 month lock ins to pad numbers for the quarters after that. Even if corona had not happened 9.1 still would have been dropping after the initial 6 month subs expired to “keep the chain holding”.

>The mood in the company is tense but also very much “its just a rough transition period”. Activision has been pushing hard for Blizzard to release more regular product and to generate more income per user. As far as i know this is going to be a transition over the next 5 years to a much larger mobile/tablet gaming focus. By all accounts not just WoW but Overwatch was intended to be the moneymaker in the interim but once again someone had the bright idea to kill a game casual players loved on the alter of e-sports hoping for another Brood War. From what i hear the “told you so’s” were loud and a lot of people walked beyond Kaplan.

>The sentiment that was shared quietly in private but being spoken more often is simply that the leadership at Blizzard are not bad people, nor incompetent people but people who had to fill seats left when the old guard jumped ship wether they were suited for it or not. Brack is a genuinely good man out of his depth, Ion is a fantastic raid designer put in charge of designing a virtual world he has no interest or real ideas for and so on. They have been taking form the roles they excel at to be put in positions where they get to do far less of that purely because there is nobody left with the experience to do so and the trickle down is a lack of concrete direction, ambition and focus.

>2021 has seen the playerbase, media and gaming at large “turn” on WoW to a degree i don’t think the leads in their “positivity dojo” bubble considered possible. Its gone from people going “This is how Blizz needs to fix WoW!” to “WoW is no longer salvageable, time for greener pastures” and i think on some level this was never considered as a possibility so there have never been any major plans beyond the usual “try and minimise player drop off by arranging releases around competitors launching updates/products”. The official forums being filled with talk of FFXIV and worse “why do we actually pay a sub?” hasn’t helped.

>There have been some testing the waters lately from certain higher ups if we can remove the line “No King Rules Forever”. Read into that what you will.

>There are still arguments going on about the Kael’thas Voice actor shitshow. I don’t know much about it but i know its heated, wouldn’t be the first time a knee jerk reaction only seemed to generate bad press. We lost a noticeable amount of pvp engagement after the Swifty thing.

>The Preach interview was treated as a disaster and there was talk of more strongly vetting interviewers for “bad actors” and only engaging with a list of questions Blizzard provides. Some pointed out that could just be used to create some form of Fireside Chat akin to the FFXIV “Live letters” but that fell on deaf ears.

>The two sentiments right now among the team are either “we really need a win” or “theres a dedicated cabal of internet trolls out to kill WoW”. Right now we are crunching hard to get 9.2 ready to wrap up the jailors storyline so we can get an expansion out early 2022. If that doesn’t happen there are talks of major shakeups coming down from Activision that have been threatened for a few years now. Its an all hands on deck feeling thats been around to some degree since the “Is this an out of season April Fools Joke” Blizzcon. A make or break deadline is coming closer and things like Diablo 4 were not planned before then. Blizzard needs a significant win not just in initial profit but consumer goodwill. Nobody likes working at what the public now seems to see as “the bad guy” of the mmo industry.

>This has also made new hires decline. Not significantly but the “you WANT Blizzard on your resume” line doesn’t seem to have the appeal it used to. This has lead to more hiring via friend of a friend, to some rumblings about nepotism, and people severely lacking in experience “because they get great twitter optics”.

>On the topic of Twitter we are not being told to “disengage” from it. Multiple employees like Nervig and Holisky publicly attacking paying customers because they got too heated and couldn’t keep quiet is bad press that could have been avoided. A email reminder has gone around more than once lately stating “if you are not customer relations you should not be representing the company to customers, especially if you cannot remain professional”.

>Lastly the biggest elephant in the room is “yo’ boy” Asmongold. The newer hires cannot stand him. They have used terms like “toxic masculinity” and “dogwhistles to dangerous males” while some of the oldest crowd still remaining have called him “based” or “telling it like it is” which has lead to friction to put it mildly. People are told not to talk about him and the recent FFXIV stuff only made it all worse. The idea that an outside element can have such an effect on the product genuinely upsets people. Like Zach is engaging in some malicious act of cyberwarfare. Many of us have point out the now famous quotes by Naoki Yoshida about understanding that players will drift and we need to make something worth coming back to because they want to but some people for lack of a better word see out customers -or “consumers” as they refer to them nowadays- as some kind of antagonistic relationship where the goal is not being an entertainer putting on a show for a crowd but some kind of game hunter trying to trap a large, profitable kill. I wish i could blame Activision but this is a sentiment from more of the younger crowd than the “tech boomers”. Which personal opinion is probably why so many folks like Metzen and Morheim left.

>Before you ask, yes the topic of “wokeness” has shown up in group talks. Its not all some grand sjw conspiracy, people really do want to feel welcome and represented. However the “we need everything veto’ed by people not working on it to see if its inoffensive and bland enough” rubs some of us the wrong way. Like anything in life you can take something too far and lose sight of the core ideals and with everything gone on since Blitzchung it feels like people are forming little factions to pull people in different directions to decide “What Blizzards identity is now” and how to appeal to new players. There has been some drop offs with “go woke go broke” as the only answer in the survey when unsubbing but honestly we are losing subs in unforseen numbers anyway and still making more money than ever through cash shop “heavy users” so it honestly doesn’t make an impact.

>All in all things are rough right now. Blizzard doesn’t have the love of the customers anymore, is no longer treated as an industry giant and while D4,D2R and Immortal aren’t going to kill Diablo even if they fail the sentiment for World of Warcraft and Overwatch 2 are a lot more tense and stressful. The phrase “it might be good to brush up on your mobile development portfolio if we get another underperformer” has been doing the rounds a lot. If Shadowlands continues its stark decline and Overwatch 2 is looking to underperform like its current projections suggest i think the Blizzard of a few years from now will be imitating King a lot more than trying to learn any lessons from Square Enix’s mmo division.

#random #video games #Blizzard #Activision #WoW #World of Warcraft #Diablo #Overwatch #Starcraft #Activision Blizzard

39 notes · View notes

bestworstcase · 3 years

Note

To be honest tts had many characters who had their emotional and mental trauma handled horribly, they deserve better exploration on how they healed and what they went through. Tangled The Movie did a better job of handling these mature themes but why couldn’t tts?

ok so tbh i don’t agree ajklsdlkjf

like! ok to start with. tangled (2010) is kind of interesting to me in this regard because it does such a good job illustrating gothel’s emotional abuse and the harm it does to rapunzel but it - like, at the end of the day It Is A Disney Film. it spends almost all of its running time meticulously building up this very complicated emotional trauma for rapunzel, and then the resolution is like—BOOM!—she has a tearful reunion with her parents and they pull her boyfriend into a group hug, cue ending narration about how they got married and ruled corona and lived happily ever after. to me tangled (2010) feels like it runs off a cliff at the last minute because. lmao.

leaving an abusive parent is the easy part.

which is not to say that it’s easy! but once you hit that emotional point of “i cannot have you in my life anymore” and cut them out... now you have a heap of maladaptive coping mechanisms and psychological scars and inherited behaviors that you have to deal with. you can’t just *flaps hands* cut off your abusive mother and skip off into the sunset with your long lost real family and new boyfriend whom you met three days ago and everything’s gravy. kskjdfjk it doesn’t work like that!

tts on the other hand - absolutely, there were clear limitations on how far they were able to go, and absolutely the plot-driven writing was a less than ideal vehicle for telling a story about recovery-from-trauma. but also like fundamentally tts is a story that is interested in recovery from trauma in a way that i don’t think tangled (2010) was. rapunzel has nightmarish flashbacks to gothel in s1, struggles because of her sheltered upbringing, expresses behaviors that she clearly learned from gothel and internalized as normal, flounders when she is handed responsibility because she is not used to making her own choices, and has complicated, messy feelings about her tower and gothel herself! there is a whole episode dedicated to exploring rapunzel’s ambivalent feelings about her new life in corona through the lens of her suddenly-fraught relationship with pascal. one of the emotional linchpins of the entire show is the moment in RATGT where rapunzel screams “enough, cassandra!” in a direct parallel to the way gothel yelled at her in the film, and while tts ultimately shied away from exploring that on rapunzel’s end, we got multiple episodes following up on how badly this damaged cassandra, eventually culminating in her villain arc in s3.

likewise with cassandra - tts devotes two whole seasons to meticulously building up cassandra’s very complicated trauma, then allows her a whole season in which to have a messy, anguished, enraged breakdown because of it—and then her happy ending is *leaving behind* the toxic situation she was trapped in in corona to venture into the unknown and figure herself out, which is imo a lot more in scale and realistic than rapunzel’s happy ending in tangled (2010).

likewise with varian - in QFaD he is badly traumatized, and the remainder of s1 examines how the failure of his would-be support network to actually support him leads to his continued downward spiral and eventual violent breakdown; when he is punished for this that explicitly makes everything worse both for him and for everyone else, and after his redemption he features as a deuteragonist in what is essentially ptsd flashbacks: the episode. etc.

so my overall impression of the many places where tts *failed* to adequately examine characters’ trauma is very strongly that - they wanted to and they were capable of doing so, but there were disney executives going no, that’s too heavy, that’s too dark, you can’t portray the disney princess with serious deeply-entrenched flaws, you can’t have the disney princess be the one who’s in the wrong in her interpersonal conflicts, blah blah blah. s3 in particular just reeks to me of executive meddling and executive sanitizing of the intended plot. i’m honestly shocked that tts got away with going as far as they did, especially with rapunzel’s and cassandra’s childhood traumas, because frankly it spits in the face of the squeaky clean happily ever after Disney Princess Brand aljsdjfk.

(also as an aside - one’s personal reading of the text is imo a big deciding factor in how unsatisfying the handling of trauma is, bc - i think there is a tendency in some areas of the fandom that are centered around varian and/or eugene for fans to go “they should be more traumatized than they are and it’s bad writing that they’re not broody and angsty about xyz” and like -

the impression i have from being on the sidelines of this discourse is a lot of people have one specific model in their heads of what “trauma” looks like and that model is essentially “miserable and brooding and needing to be comforted” so when we get things like eugene coping with awful shit by cracking jokes about it or not having ptsd flashbacks to gothel stabbing him that gets interpreted as the narrative not taking him seriously as a character, whereas to me it reads as “eugene is a psychologically stable person who has the emotional resilience to cope with horrible events relatively unscathed”—

or this vibe of varian isn’t brooding and angsting all the time so obviously tts is ignoring his trauma, when my reading of him overall is that he’s the kind of person who deals with trauma by throwing himself into work that makes him feel better - like in CR he’s working in the demanitus chamber, surrounded by amber, but he’s doing dumb chemistry experiments he enjoys and over time that’s gotten him to a place where being around the amber is no longer triggering for him, he’s healed enough to have conquered most of that fear.

and obviously all of this is a matter of interpretation and this is not to say that, like, fans who wanted more of a raw exploration of these characters’ fear and sadness and struggle with trauma are wrong or like invalid for wanting that, it’s more - like, i personally choose to take the text more at face value and interpret the behaviors i see on screen as telling me something about how the character responds to trauma instead of as the narrative ignoring that they have trauma altogether. which leads me to “eugene is emotionally resilient and humor is a key feature of his resilience” and “varian copes by working on stuff that is intellectually engaging or just makes him happy in order to tackle his fears head-on” and so forth. and one consequence of that is i don’t really walk away from the text feeling unsatisfied with the way tts handled its character traumas, except insofar as i’m like “wow i wish disney had let them go even farther!”)

#rta #tts #Anonymous

46 notes · View notes

amillionsmiles · 4 years

Text

get myself together, spend you all of my money (Ellie/Aster)

Title: get myself together, spend you all of my money Summary: “You’d think going to college out of town would have knocked us both down a peg, but instead we ended up pretty pretentious.” / or: Ellie, Aster, and an apartment full of things. A/N: written while listening to Mitski’s cover of “Let’s Get Married” on loop.

[Read and review here] or continue under the cut.

Ellie finds Aster Flores again on a Sunday.

So far, the NYC Sublets & Apartments Facebook group has yielded more duds than leads, but she scrolls down and suddenly, there: a corner of Squahamish, waving at her from the screen.

LOOKING FOR: Room to rent, ideally available by August. Recently graduated from art school, so that gives you a sense of my budget, but I’m tidy, respectful, and play well with cats. Any PMs with leads appreciated!

The profile picture isn’t anything new; Ellie’s pretty sure she scrolled past it and liked it a few weeks ago during the influx of everyone’s graduation photo updates. Aster’s looking over her shoulder at the camera, the quiet joke that always seemed to hide in her eyes in high school now more pronounced. It’s a good picture, from a purely aesthetic standpoint, and that’s the only reason her heartrate picks up when she hovers over Aster’s name to click Message.

She takes a swig from her iced cappuccino and starts to type.

Hey! Long time, less conversation. Haven’t been to church in a minute, but I remember there being a Bible verse saying something about “two are better than one,” and I’m pretty sure that also applies to apartment-hunting. If that seems like something you’d be interested in, let me know.

Before she can think twice about it, she hits enter.

They move in together in July, when the summer heat turns the air liquid and the acrid smell of molten trash bags wafts from the street. For a second, Ellie misses the Pacific Northwest: the greenish tint of light filtered through leaves, the way she could disappear to a nearby watering hole for respite. Even the mudding that Trig and his friends did now seems appealing—on the stairwell, she fantasizes about the cool shock of it against her skin.

“Hey, Ellie?”

Ellie turns from where she’s been sitting on the top step to see that Aster’s finally gotten the door open. Rocking to her feet, she pushes the cardboard box across the floor, stepping inside to get a look at where they’ll be living for the next year.

The first room is spacious, combining a kitchen area with what can become a living room, once they buy a couch. Trailing her fingers along the wall, Ellie wanders into the other bedroom, then tests the lights in the bathroom. She comes back to find Aster eyeing the ceiling, a hammer pulled from her belongings.

“What are you doing?”

“Here.” Aster beckons her closer. “I’m thinking that this space is big enough that if we hang a curtain, part of it can be my room.”

“Oh.” Ellie hadn’t put much thought into it when they’d signed the lease, assuming they’d share the back room, like a college one-room double situation. It seems naïve, now; they’re adults, of course Aster would want her own space. “It doesn’t have to be yours, though. I mean—we can flip a coin or something, to make it fairer.”

Aster shrugs. “I don’t mind. Besides, the back room is more muffled—I’m less likely to hear you clacking your typewriter this way.” She smiles, the two of them both glancing to where Ellie’s Smith Corona peeks out from its bubble wrap packaging, the pale blue paint gleaming in the sunlight.

“It was my mom’s,” Ellie explains, her own memory fond against her lips.

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

“I always wanted to hear more about her, after that time at the spring.”

“She was fun.” The words take her back to Ping-Pong, Paul’s paddle thwacking the ball against the wall.

“As fun as you are?”

Ellie raises an eyebrow. “Am I fun?”

Aster pushes a sweaty lock of hair behind her ear. Overhead, the air conditioning hums.

“Guess we have plenty of time to find out, heathen.”

“Saw is not the greatest horror movie of our generation.”

“It is!” protests Aster, sitting next to her on the couch. Waxy cartons from the Georgian restaurant Aster waitresses at litter the table, and Ellie licks her fingers clean of the buttery residue from the kubdari—mm, delicious—as she leans back, waiting for Aster to continue.

“Ignore the sequels. But on its own, it’s this brilliant little clockwork machine of the lengths people will go to when they think they’ve got no time left. And the reveal at the end? I heard you gasp.”

“Okay, I’ll give you that, but a lot of the rest of it feels like torture porn.”

Aster rolls her eyes. “No one watches a horror movie for the butterflies.”

“Except you, apparently,” Ellie points out, because this is a thing they do as roommates, now: watch movies and then discuss them over takeout. So far, they’ve tended toward foreign cinema, art-house, and horror. The last genre is the one Aster engages with most fervently. However, Ellie has started to suspect that Aster can turn nearly anything into a debate, perhaps a side effect of all the time she spent wrestling with God in her head during sermons.

“Whatever. I just don’t think you’re giving it the credit it deserves for how well it feeds on the psyches of all the characters.”

“Cupid and Psyche,” Ellie thinks aloud. “Now there’s a story we could talk about.”

Crinkling her nose, Aster says, “We get it, you read literature.”

“So do you,” says Ellie, nudging her foot. “You’re just as big a nerd as I am.”

At that, Aster laughs, tilting her head back. It makes the column of her throat into the soft marble of a Canova statue.

“You’d think going to college out of town would have knocked us both down a peg, but instead we ended up pretty pretentious.”

Looking around their apartment, Ellie has to agree. There are too many stacks of books lying around, various papers jutting out of them as placeholders so she can flip to the passages she needs when writing essays. Aster keeps bringing back abstract art prints from the showcases she attends. In the corner, there’s a ficus that Ellie took home from work out of guilt (she’d been the only one in the office watering it) which they’ve named Walter Benjamin.

“I kind of like it, though.”

Aster turns to her, cheek pressing against the fabric of the couch. Her gaze is a paperweight: glassy and clear and heavy with something Ellie can’t quite name. “I’m not complaining, either.”

Before college, Ellie had considered herself a morning person, simply because she had no reason to be otherwise. Waking up to signal the trains each morning became part of her biorhythm, as natural and unremarkable as her middle part or her thermal underwear. At Grinnell, though, she’d discovered the guilty joy of sleeping in. The downside has been that her body now relies on coffee to function before 10 AM on the weekends.

“Don’t drink that,” says Aster, whisking the tin away from Ellie’s grasp. “I’ve been using it to wash off my brushes.”

Groggily, Ellie leans against the counter, watching Aster bend over the canvas on the kitchen table. She must have been at it for a while—a good third of it is filled in, streaked with purples and browns. After dabbing at a corner, Aster blows a strand of hair out of her face and straightens, reaching to adjust her messy bun.

Ellie squints. “Have you always had that?”

Pausing, Aster feels along the shaved part of her hair, tracing the chevron indented in it. “The undercut? Yeah. A girlfriend did it for me senior year, before we went our separate ways.”

A spike akin to a dose of caffeine shoots through Ellie. She stands a bit taller. “A girlfriend like a girl…?” she trails off, clearing her throat. “Or. A friend.”

The corner of Aster’s mouth twitches. “The first one.”

“Oh. Um.” Ellie swallows. “That’s nice.”

Aster picks up another paintbrush, twirling it between her fingers before deciding against it and setting it back down. When she meets Ellie’s eyes again, the look behind them is bare, vulnerable.

“I haven’t told my parents, though.”

“Is that why you don’t go back to Squahamish?”

Aster’s lips part slightly. “You noticed?”

“The first summer, yeah,” Ellie admits. “After that, I wasn’t around much either. Internships and stuff, you know.”

“And relationships?”

“Some of those, too.”

“Did you seduce all of them wearing flannel?” Aster asks, nodding to the oversized checkered shirt Ellie favors as pajamas. For a second, Ellie just gapes, taken aback by being so thoroughly called out.

“You’re the one with an undercut. Don’t talk to me about queer signaling.”

Aster laughs. It suddenly becomes very important that Ellie turn around and start the coffee machine, right now.

“I like seeing you with your hair down, though,” comes Aster’s voice, drifting over the sound of water straining into a pot.

“—And then I thought, what if it’s a temperature thing?” finishes Paul, his face ruddy and proud through the screen. Sensing an opening, Ellie stops worrying the inside of her mouth.

“Did you know Aster likes girls? Like, officially?” Almost immediately, she cringes from how juvenile her delivery makes her sound.

Paul doesn’t so much as twitch. “Uh, yeah. It’s come up once or twice.”

“Wait, she’s talked about it with you?” Ellie sits up on her mattress. Since when were Paul and Aster confidantes?

“Yeah. Sorry I didn’t say anything, it’s just I read all this stuff about not outing people before they were ready, and I figured if it was important enough to her she’d let you know eventually. Uh, Ellie, are you okay?”

“Yeah, I’m fine.” Blinking rapidly, Ellie fights the surge of affection threatening to overtake her. Stupid Paul, making her stupidly proud to have him as a best friend.

“Do you—er. Do you think you might like her?”

“Oh, god, no. And I mean it for real this time,” she says, meeting Paul’s skeptical look. Part of it is pride—it seems like character regression, to return to the source of her teenage fantasies when she’s learned so much about herself since then. “It’s just nice to have a friend who gets both parts of it, you know? The being queer and being from Squahamish.”

“Yeah, that makes sense. Hey, do you guys want a batch of these sausages when I finish tinkering with the recipe? It takes two days to ship cross-country, I checked.”

Ellie laughs. “Yeah, Munsky, send them our way.”

Ellie wets the edges of the dough tucked in her palm, working from the outside in as she crimps the dumpling and places it on a plate. Across from her, Aster works with similar dexterity, a pink sliver of tongue poking out the side of her mouth in concentration.

“You’re good at this.”

Aster sets aside another dumpling, using two fingers to scoop a mound of dough from the bowl between them. “Yeah, I helped my mom a lot with her empanadas, growing up.”

“Say you had kids,” Ellie starts. “What’s one thing you’d teach them, before they turned thirteen?”

Aster considers. “Long division. Except I’d have to get someone else to teach them, because I’m terrible at math.”

“Really?”

“Really. Do you ever think about how smart people have been, to invent the concept of infinity and the concept of zero?”

“Mm. And where would you put the idea of God on that scale?”

“Like, a solid fifty,” says Aster, flicking water at her face.

In November, Ellie publishes a short story in the New Yorker, which Aster crows about for a solid week.

“Aster, oh my god, you’re being embarrassing,” she says upon walking into the kitchen and finding her story printed in full, each sheet pinned to the refrigerator door with a bright red magnet.

“You should be proud,” Aster insists.

Paul calls her to discuss it. “Me and your dad read it. I thought it was really good. Are you working on more stuff?”

“Slow your roll, Munsky.” Ellie laughs. “I’m not as prolific as you are, dreaming up new sausage combinations every day.”

Off-camera, the staticky sound of a TV and a faint Ellie? sounds.

“Here, Mr. Chu.” Paul passes the phone to her dad, who is wrapped in his usual robe. The lines by his eyes relax when he sees her face.

“How are you?” she asks in Mandarin. “Are you keeping warm?”

“You should be worried about yourself—it’s colder where you are,” her dad replies. “Paul’s good about keeping me company. He read your piece to me three times. The scene with the swing set, and the little girl…” He switches to English. “Best part. Your mom would be proud.”

“Thanks, Ba,” says Ellie, voice thick. She goes to bed that night and dreams of being sandwiched between her mom and dad, dancing in the living room.

She and Aster host a small get-together in December. They put a Santa hat on Walter Benjamin and get everyone drunk on mulled wine until the party devolves into a caroling session, Aster’s friend James competing with Ellie’s friend Larissa to see who can belt “O Holy Night” louder. Afterwards, she and Aster sprawl on Aster’s mattress, limbs loosened from a successful night. The string lights Aster wound through the curtains as decoration for the party flicker, casting the room a soft gold.

“Would you ever get a tattoo?” Ellie asks. It’s been on her mind ever since she noticed the olive branch inked above Larissa’s collarbone. She’s wary of the pain, though.

Beside her, Aster shifts, arm pressing against hers. “I have one, actually.”

“What, really?”

“Yeah.” She props herself up on an elbow, pulling her shirt up to reveal a cluster of flowers just below her rib.

Tracing the lines with her eyes, Ellie asks, “What kind of flowers are they?”

“Asters.”

“You’re joking.”

Aster looks straight back at her. “I’m 100% serious.”

“Isn’t that a bit too on the nose?” Ellie studies the tattoo again and then snorts, shaking her head. “I can’t believe it.” The wine must still be in her system, because the fuzziness of a laugh flushes through her body.

“What?” Aster seems miffed. “Ellie, what’s so funny?”

“Nothing, I’m just— You were so reserved before, and now you’ve got an undercut and a tattoo and. Do you remember— there was that day when Jenny Newman brought in that pink scarf and you all walked down the hallway like something out of a Clique movie, it was ridiculous. I can’t believe I had a crush on you. Oh my god.”

“Stop.” Aster shoves her shoulder, but she’s laughing, too. “Don’t remind me. God. God! What a terrible color, it didn’t match my outfit at all.”

“But it’s okay, because now you’re Aster Flores, hardcore.”

“Well, what about you, Ellie Chu?”

“What what about me?”

Aster sits up. “You’re walking into a tattoo parlor right now. What do you decide to get, and where?”

“Persimmons,” Ellie says, before even fully conceiving the thought. “On my… right shoulder.”

“All right.” Aster gets up and feels around her desk; the next thing Ellie knows, she’s kneeling before her on the mattress, a fine-tipped pen in hand. “I’ll draw it for you.”

“Okay.” Slowly, Ellie sits up, tugging the collar of her shirt down as far as it’ll go to expose the skin needed for Aster’s canvas. The first touch tickles; she tries to hold herself as still as possible while Aster draws, ink flowing in thin lines. She considers watching the process, but it makes her go cross-eyed and dizzy, so she closes her eyes instead and feels: the smoothness of a persimmon skin, the shine of their texture, the sweet crunch of a fruit just barely ripened.

“Done,” Aster whispers, and Ellie leans closer to catch it. It feels like they’re in a confessional booth. Aster caps the pen and bites her lip, but she doesn’t move away.

“Ellie—” Her breath smells of cinnamon and cloves. Like the sharpest part of the forest, like all things good and lovely and too fragile to want.

“I should go to bed,” Ellie says, and it takes every ounce of strength she has to extract herself, to stumble back to her room and sit against the closed door, shaking.

“Ellie? Ellie, pick up the phone. It’s about your dad. It’s not—super critical, or anything, but I still think—uh. Just… call me back as soon as you can.”

Her carry-on is by the door and she’s set to leave for the airport in an hour. When Aster finds her, she’s cutting and skinning apples in the kitchen—not even to eat, just to have something to do with her hands.

Silently, Aster pulls out some bread, cream cheese, and salmon. When she’s done with the sandwich, she slips it into a plastic bag and holds it out to Ellie.

“For the plane ride.”

“Thanks.” Ellie sets down the knife and goes to put the sandwich away in her backpack. She zips it up.

“Would you come with me, if I asked?”

By the sink, Aster is quiet. Ellie thinks of that awful moment in the ping pong room, when she’d thought Paul had caught on to her.

“You know what, never mind.”

“If I go with you, I’m going to want to be with you.” Aster looks down at her hands as she says it; it’s the first time she’s seemed uncertain in a while. Ellie soaks in the confession, turning it over in her head. It’s brave. It’s honest.

It’s not enough.

“I just.” Aster shrugs, helpless. “I’m not ready for that conversation, yet. With them. For the fallout of what the worst could be.”

Pick me, her heart throbs, selfishly. Pick me pick me pickme. She is a train leaving the station, hoping for someone to catch her. But no time to wait; her dad needs her.

“Take care, Aster,” she says, shrugging her backpack over her shoulder. Aster’s face crumples like snow. Ellie tries not to look back.

The hospital discharges her dad after a week. Ellie stays for another two, making sure his cough is gone and all the mucus has loosened from his chest. When he regains enough energy to start fighting back against her fussing, she recruits Paul to make sure he drinks enough fluids every day.

“Pneumonia,” she scolds at the doorway, shaking her head. “Don’t ever scare me like that again!”

“Ch,” her dad says. “You want to talk about scared? How about that time when you were seven and fell off the monkey bars? Nearly cracked your head open.”

Paul looks between them, bewildered. “Okay, Mr. Chu, I’ve gotta get Ellie to the airport. There’s still ice on the roads so driving will be slower than usual.”

In the car, Ellie holds her hands to the heat, touching the pads of her fingertips to each other.

“Do you like it better out east?”

Ellie tilts her head. “City life is different, that’s for sure. It feels freer and lonelier. Not as many people paying attention to you, so you can be anything you want to be. But also: not as many people paying attention to you.”

“Hm, I get that. Like being at my house versus being at yours.”

“You’re saying that the Munskys are New York City and me and my dad are Squahamish?”

“Never mind. I guess my house has all the people New York has, but they’re all jumping down your throat instead of passing you by.”

Ellie laughs. “You love it, though.”

Across the dash, Paul smiles at her. “Yeah, I do.”

“You wouldn’t consider the Midwest? It’d be a happy medium.”

“I did like Iowa, when I visited you.”

“Chicago, then,” Ellie proposes. “In five years. People there buy lots of hot dogs—it’d be good business.”

“I’ll think about it,” Paul promises, pulling up to the curb. He gets out to help with her suitcase, wrapping her in a warm hug. Ellie buries her nose into the center of his chest and inhales. She wonders if it's possible to absorb his courage through her lungs.

“Paul?” she asks, when he starts to pull away. “Can I ask you something?”

His eyes are bright with concern. “Of course.”

“If you loved someone, and they loved you back in the same way, but they said you couldn’t be together, what would you do?”

“Well, I’d ask myself: when I picture being with that person, what does it really look like? Is it okay if the image doesn’t exactly match up? Because then I’d hold on.”

“Never Let Me Go.”

“What?”

“It’s another Kazuo Ishiguro book,” says Ellie, smiling. “You should read it if you get the time.”

“All right, boss,” says Paul, mock-saluting her. “Now go catch your flight.”

It’s past midnight when she gets back to the apartment, careful not to make too much noise as she slips past Aster’s room and into her bed. Her head is about to hit the pillow when her phone screen lights up, casting her as a glaring shadow against the bedroom wall.

Aster: Hey, heard you come in. Is your dad okay?

Yeah. I sentenced him to house arrest for the month, with Paul as guard dog.

Aster: All right, Foucault. Discipline & Punish. Aster: I’m glad he’s better, though.

Thanks. Did you miss me much?

Aster: Well, I realized that the cookies disappear at a much slower rate when you’re not around. :P

It’s strange to be talking like this when they’re separated by only a hallway, when for the past six months they’ve seen each other face-to-face every day. And yet, in some ways it’s easier: the crackle of electricity, the dots appearing, then fading, then appearing again.

Aster: Can you come into the hall? Aster: There’s something I want to say.

Ellie sits up, swinging her legs over the side of the bed. Gently, she cracks open the door to see Aster leaning against the wall opposite the bathroom. Her hair is tangled. She looks beautiful.

“Hey.”

Sliding down to the floor, Aster gestures to the spot opposite her. “Sit.”

Dutifully, Ellie obeys, bringing her knees to her chest and resting her chin atop them. The hallway is so narrow that her toes end up tucked under Aster’s legs, crisscrossed in front of her.

“I’ve been thinking about what I said to you right before you left,” says Aster. “And I did some more thinking while I was here alone. And the thing is, I don’t want to be all or nothing with you. I want us to be—something. And I’m wondering if you could be okay with that. If we could take it little by little, and just figure it out as it comes. If you’re willing to wait.”

“Yeah.” Ellie swallows. “We can do that.”

“Okay.”

“Okay.” Nodding, Ellie starts to rise, but Aster gets a determined look in her eyes and suddenly she’s swooping forward, the scent of her hair—vanilla and violets—swinging around them, her hand cupping Ellie’s cheek and her mouth a bright star against Ellie’s, striking deep as a hymn into her bones. Ellie counts to five before opening her eyes, and when she speaks, her voice is hoarse.

“I thought you wanted me to wait.”

“Guess I’m bad at following my own rules,” Aster says, and grins.

#the half of it #ellie chu #aster flores #ellie x aster #my writing #fanfiction #ff: the half of it

85 notes · View notes

siritoycollection · 3 years

Text

Why Do You Need to Stop Giving Mobile Phones to Kids?

One of the most common complaints of parents this decade is that their children are “addicted” to screens of laptops, computers, tablets and mobile phones. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic and hybrid and distance learning models, most children are assimilating more screen time into their day. That's why it's more important than ever to minimize the use of electronic devices. In this blog I try to give ways to stop minimizing the addiction to mobile phones and how toys, especially educational toys can be really helpful for kids.

While gadgets are a part of today's culture, they have adverse health effects. This is especially true for children spending substantial time learning on mobiles, laptops and tablets. It's important to utilize break times to get in some much needed physical activities. The parents have a plan to leave away devices somewhere else and engage kids in other productive ways.

According to studies and research by several renowned universities “The average time spent on screens is seven to ten hours a day”

Considering the fact that maximum brain development occurs by age of seven and further building by age 12, what children see, do or hear at this tender age will design their entire future. But in today’s digital world where everything is online or will be online, is it ideal to take kids completely off screens? - This is the counter question many of them ask. Often, due to the limited time, parents give these gadgets like smartphones to engage with their children.

Before we dive further, let’s first understand the big thing — screen time. It has today become a dilemma for parents and guardians because today’s kids are ‘digital babies’. On one side, you can’t take them completely off technology — because it will handicap them in the future. And on the other hand, they shouldn’t use too much of it or rather misuse it! We need to strike a good balance between gadgets and other activities like engaging with board-games.

Screen addiction basically is too much screen usage that makes a child completely lost in it and they end up feeling that screens alone will make them happy and these screens are everything. They reach a point after regular usage of these phones, laptops or tablets where they always want to go back to it every time they are free! Yes, these devices in all ways provide the best of the best i.e visually, auditory, sensorially! With a wealth of apps, games, devices, and content, it's easy for kids to become reliant on these gadgets for entertainment. And nobody, not even their parents/siblings, can compete/replace it. But too much screen time can tremendously impair a child’s development immediately.

[Read about: Challenges faced by parents during Corona Pandemic]

And that’s not all, too much regular usage of mobiles especially can trigger the reward mechanism in the brain of kids – which makes the child more and more addicted. The reason this occurs is that screens in whichever form factor – tabs, smartphones, TV, video games, etc. are extremely stimulating.

Here are some impacts both immediate and long term of too much screen time on a child’s physiology:

1) Causes headaches

2) Leads to poor vision

3) Decline in physical activity

4) Affects posture

5) Causes obesity

So now let’s understand how can you as a parent nullify the impact that screen time has on children? How can you prevent your child from falling prey to this?

Foremost thing is that instead of relying completely on these screens to keep children engaged, parents have to focus on ways to improve their communication with the child. “Parents need to gradually draw them out of their comfort zone by talking to them to make them feel secure and confident. The key thing to understand is that children want to engage, and when there is no person around to do it, they begin to rely on devices and to stop these kids should have a wide variety of fun and educational toys in their shelves”

That said, you cannot expect kids, who spend hours on devices, to suddenly give it all up and chat with you. Don’t force them; just be around and they will gradually start getting comfortable talking and sharing things with you.

“Physical toys such as this from our collection Chota bheem & Friends and books support warm, verbally rich interactions and quality time for the parent and the child,” Ideally, parents should choose toys that are not over stimulating and encourage children to use their imaginations. When children solve real-world problems through casual games, social, emotional and behavioral skills will be developed and improved.

Encouraging your child to seek out and get involved in activities that don't need a screen like enjoying nature, playing soccer outside, or reading together a story-book, or even learning a new board game like chess are just a few ideas to name . It also helps to establish (and enforce) a daily schedule that everyone follows. Making it clear to your kids when they are allowed devices and when they are not, will help set right.

Keeping in mind the child’s interests and capabilities, start looking for alternatives, such those as mentioned below

a) Encourage hobbies – Hobbies help a lot in taking the child off screen. Pick up activities which are of interest to the children like dancing, singing, origami or painting.

b) Spending time for casual games – Toys play an important role in the learning process and overall-development of children. Sports and physical games always excite them. Casual Games and toys are the easiest ways to take the child off these gadgets. One such is our newest product Tangram Travel Game Magnetic Puzzle Book Game.

Get your children toys that are challenging, engaging and make them “learn through playing”. And it is through play that a child first learns to make decisions and solve problems. Some toys that would engage are:

A Mini Royal Enfield Bullet Motorbike model – This miniature toy is a wonderful way for children to experiment and learn about dynamics. Children can independently play the way they like it, in different directions, and adjust the speed to form interesting combinations. It improves the visual-tracking skills via the movement of wheels.

Thomas Train Track Set – Children love trains and traveling to reach the desired point. Each point on the number line depicts numbers and helps them understand that moving forward is addition. This toy not only keeps the children off screen but also is a great aid in development.

Parents are likely the only people in the world who are truly interested in what the child has to say and what the child feels. Engaging with them in fun-games and activities that are stimulating is a must to aid their development.

So parents, be smart and avoid devices that are likely to hamper your child’s development. I Hope that this blog helps you a lot in your parenting.

Check the Below Videos:

youtube

#Toys for Kids #Diecast Cars #Miniature Cars #Diecast Model Bikes #Miniature Bike Toys #Educational Toys #India Map Wooden Puzzle #Magnetic Rings Fidget Toy #Wooden Educational Toys

1 note · View note

rocksandrobots · 4 years

Text

Of Rocks and Robots Ch. 28 - The Club

Once again just a friendly warning that this episode features and discusses teenage drinking

Varian stumbled out of bed and yawned. He looked at the clock and noticed the time. 6:30. Shoot! He was suppose to be up before six!

He threw on some clothes and rushed down stairs to the cafe.

Hiro and Aunt Cass were already down there setting up for the day.

"Sorry.. I slept in." He apologized. "Why didn't anybody wake me?"

"Oh well, I figured you could use the sleep. Besides it's only thirty after. Sit down and have some breakfast." Aunt Cass placed a couple of egg sandwiches on the table along with a cup of coffee and a cup of orange juice and encouraged the two boys to have a seat. While they both ate, Aunt Cass blithely carried on the conversation.

"So how did last night go?"

Varian eyed Hiro who glared at him over his sandwich but didn't say anything. "It went great actually. I even met someone while there."

"Oooh, that's wonderful sweetie. I'm so happy that you're making friends."

"Her name's Carol and she's a freshmen at the Art Institute. She just moved here from Mississippi, so she's new in town like I am."

"Oh, so she's what, 17... 18?"

"I..I honestly don't know. I didn't think to ask. But she invited me to another party tonight. If it's okay, I thought I might go. I could find out then."

"Another party?" Aunt Cass raised an eyebrow. It was a holiday weekend sure, but it was unusual to get invited to two parties in two days.

"Yeah, it's Jessica's birthday. She's Carol's friend and another person I met at the art school. They're all going to some restaurant to go dancing at. I forgot the name of the place, but Carol was going to text me directions if I could make it."

Aunt Cass thought a moment about it and then nodded along. "Well okay, just let me know where and text me when you get there. Also, once again, try not to stay out too late."

"Wait." Hiro interjected. He couldn't believe the ease with which Varian lied, nor could he believe that the other teen had just tricked Aunt Cass into letting him go out again to another wild party. He considered telling the truth right then and there, but the angry glare from Varian reminded Hiro of their argument last night and how Varian held dirt over himself as well. So he came up with an excuse instead. "I...I thought you wanted us all to spend more time together this weekend?"

"Well there's still Sunday tomorrow." Aunt Cass answered. "Why don't we have family movie night again? What do ya say? We could go out to the theater and catch a new release. I think their playing some sort of superhero movie this week."

The boys exchanged awkward glances but in the end agreed. Neither were ready to include Aunt Cass into their current feud. Besides she looked so happy at the thought of them all going out and spending time together as a family, that they just didn't have the heart to disappoint her.

They finished breakfast and Hiro left to meet with the rest of the gang. Varian however stayed to help with the cafe as promised.

"You know," Aunt Cass said while they washed up the morning dishes together. "I know it's only been a month, but I want you to know that we're all so glad to have you here. It hasn't been the easiest thing in the world readjusting, I know, but things are really working out; you're making friends, you and Hiro are really coming together here lately, and most of all you make our family just a little bit bigger and a whole lot happier just by being here."

She placed a loving hand on his shoulder, and Varian felt his heart drop at those worlds. He still didn't feel like he fit in here with the Hamadas and his relationship with Hiro had only degraded over this past week, which was already rocky enough to begin with. But Aunt Cass was so loving and hopeful that Varian only felt guilty for not measuring up to her ideals.

He gave her a small smile but deep down he couldn't wait to get out of here and back to another party. One where no one really knew who he was nor cared. Where he could drown out his intrusive thoughts and self doubt with a stiff drink.

"He went to the frat party?" Honey Lemon asked in worry.

--------------------------

Hiro was with the rest their friends at Joe's Dinner, recounting his argument with Varian last night.

"And you're sure he'd been drinking?" Gogo also asked with a frown.

"He said so himself and he smelt like beer when he came in." Hiro confirmed.

Gogo's eyes narrowed but she didn't say anything further.

"So what did you do?" Wasabi asked.

"Nothing. I..I wasn't sure how to tell Aunt Cass." Hiro looked around at his group of friends who were all giving him judgemental stares. "Look, I was still in my armor, alright. It was past midnight, and Varian had a point when he said that he covered for us all the time."

"You mean he covered for you ." Fred pointed out. "You're the one hiding your superheroing from Aunt Cass."

Hiro heaved a sigh, but Wasabi added his own opinion before he could offer up a defense. "You should have told her. Both about the drinking and about you being in big hero six. She's going to find out someday anyways and the longer you put it off the worst it's going to be."

Hiro cast his eyes downward unable to come up with a retort to that.

"Where's Varian now?" Gogo asked.

"Working at the Lucky Cat and after that he's going to another party."

"Another one?" Honey Lemon interjected.

"Someone he met at the other party invited him to go dancing tonight. He convinced Aunt Cass that it was just innocent birthday party." Hiro explained.

Everyone exchanged worried looks.

"You need to tell Aunt Cass." Gogo insisted.

"No, wait." Hiro pleaded. "Look, maybe we can handle this ourselves. Varian won't listen to me, but he might listen to all of you. Then there'd be no reason to involve Aunt Cass in any of this."

"And if he doesn't listen?" Fred asked.

"Hiro, why are you so against just letting an adult handle this?" Wasabi added.

"Look, Tadashi would go after him. He'd be there to help and try to reason with him, not be a snitch."

Hiro's explanation only elected more worried glances.

"And did it ever occur to you that Tadashi wasn't always in the right?" Gogo asked.

"What do you mean?" Hiro asked with trepidation.

Gogo sighed, "Look, we all miss Tadashi. He was a wonderful person… but that doesn't mean didn't make mistakes. Just because he kept trying to bail you out of those bot fights himself doesn't mean he should have."

Hiro had no words for that. Never in a million years would he have questioned Tadashi's methods. If it wasn't for his brother he would still have been bot fighting, and would have either been hurt or in juvie right now if not for trying to reach out to him.

He searched Gogo's eyes questioningly before she heaved a sigh in frustration and relented. "Fine. Where is this party?"

"I don't know. We'll probably have to just follow him; catch him before he gets there."

"Then I propose we suit up." Fred said. "To the headquarters!"

--------------------------

Varian stood in line to get into Monroe's with Carol and the rest of her friends. He'd had rushed to find Jessica a birthday card and a small gift and met them all at the restaurant right around nine. Only the restaurant, wasn't a restaurant, it was called a 'club' instead. There was still food and drink to be had, but the real reason folks came here was to dance, and Varian could hear the loud thumping music even from where he stood outside.

"Must be a really popular place." He shouted to Carol over the music and other party goers. "I don't see how we'll be able to dance with such a crowd."

Carol laughed "Yeah, Monroe's like the hottest spot in town. But there'll be room, the line just makes it look more crowded than it is."

Varian looked up ahead and spotted a large man at the front of the line. People were handing him cards or flashing their wallets towards him. Upon inspecting the cards he would then let them in through the door.

"What's he doing?" Varian asked.

Carol looked at him in surprise. "Checking I.D. They don't let you into the club unless you can prove your 21. That way they don't have to check everybody who wants to buy a drink inside."

Varian's heart stopped. No one here knew his actual age he realized. At the last party it didn't seem to matter so he hadn't brought it up, but here he'd be found out and no doubt made to look the fool all because he didn't meet some abritay requirement.

"I...I don't think they'll let me in then." Varian admitted to the girl.

"Why not?"

"Well, I haven't a license yet, and.." Varian was going to admit the truth but Carol interrupted.

"Oh, cause you just moved here." She nodded her head as if she had just figured out his problem. "Well you have some other sort of ID don't you? A passport or a visa?"

"Yeah I have both those things, but you don't understand.."

Carol placed a hand on his chest to stop him. "Don't worry boo. We got you. We'll make sure you get in." She gave him a smile and a wink.

"Wouldn't be first time we snuck someone in." Jake put in.

"It wouldn't?"

Jessica laughed. "You think we're all 21 one? I mean I am, it's my birthday, but I wasn't always. Besides it's a dumb law anyways."

"If you're old enough to vote and join the army, you should be old enough to drink." Another one of Carol's friends, Daryl, interceded.

Everyone in the group seemed to be in agreement with this sentiment and Varian relaxed just a little bit. Though only a little. He wasn't necessarily voting age either.

"There's no age laws in Corona. Everybody drinks." Varian added.

"That's right, Europe doesn't have the same laws as we do." Carol said as if only just now considering the difference.

"I went to Germany once." Mary said; she was Daryl's girlfriend. "I was in high school and was able to get into a bar no problem. They just don't care over there."

"I'd love to visit Europe someday." Carol said, changing the subject. "I think Ireland would be a cool place to visit."

"I'd like to see Spain." Jessica threw her opinion in. "Would you take me see Spain baby?" She asked of Jake teasingly.

"Sure, if you got a couple of thousands of dollars lying around." Jake joked.

This elected more laughter from the small group of poor college students, and Varian's worry began to wane. Only to kick back up once they reached the front of the line. Panicked he dug into his pocket and pulled out the fake passport that Professor Granville had given him.

"What's this?" The bouncer at the door said incredulously.

"It's a passport." Carol said forcefully before Varian could answer. "Ain't you ever seen a passport before?"

"It's not even in English." The guard threw back annoyed and he flipped the booklet around to show off the I.D.

"Well of course not." Carol rolled her eyes. "It's in Russian. He's from Russia."

"Ok, prove it. Say hello in Russian." The bouncer clearly didn't believe them.

"Um.. privyet?" Varian answered hesitantly. It was a bit of a loaded question as there was more than one way to say hello in Russian, but Varian defaulted to the more informal greeting as it's what he and his dad would use most often.

The guard raised an eyebrow still not convinced.

"I also have my visa and college I.D. if you want that instead." Varian offered helpfully as he pulled out his wallet. He didn't think it'd be enough to let him in but better to be cooperative then to start a fight.

Just then Daryl from behind them yelled, "Hey, what's the hold up!?"

The bouncer took a look at the long line spiraling behind them and rolled his eyes while heaving a frustrated sigh. He didn't have time for this. "Fine." He said as he handed back the passport. "Go on in."

"Thanks." Varian mumbled as he took the I.D. back. He couldn't believe that had just worked.

"Yeah!" Carol added and then stopped to ask Varian in a whisper. "Uh, how do you say thanks in Russian?"

"Spasibo." Varian replied.

"Yeah, Spasibo!" Carol called back to the security guard in very bad mispounation of the word before they headed into the club.

--------------------------

"He's already left. We just missed him." Hiro said as he hung up the phone.

The gang huddled upon a rooftop across the street from the Lucky Cat. They had wanted to catch Varian while he was leaving, but it seemed like they were too late.

"Did your aunt say where he went?" Gogo asked.

"No, and I couldn't figure out a way to ask her without raising suspicion."

"Why not just call him instead?" Honey Lemon suggest. "Ask him himself where he's at and tell him we want to meet up."

"I doubt he'd want to talk to me" Hiro sighed.

"I'm on it." Wasabi said, but after several rings the call went to voicemail.

"Now what?" Fred asked.

"Looks like we'll just have to track him down the old fashioned way." Hiro said as he walked over to Baymax and mounted the robot. "Let's go."

Everyone dispersed to look for the wayward teen.

--------------------------

"Chug! Chug! Chug! Chug!" The merry group chanted as Varian and Jessica competed to see who could finish a whole pint of beer first. The others having given up the challenge before hand. They were neck and neck but the birthday girl sputtered with laughter at the last minute and Varian scored the win. He slammed the empty mug on the the table with a wide grin as the rest of the gang applauded.

"Ok, you win," Jessica conceded. "But beer is easy. I'd like to see you try that with some hard stuff, like whiskey or tequila."

"I don't know what tequila is, but your on!" Varian shouted over the den of noise.

The club was dark and smoky, with the only light coming from the flashing strobe globe twirling above the dance floor. Music blared a thumping beat that resonated in your chest and patrons crowded around to dance, drink, and make out. The little group had taken up a small round table off in the corner so as the better hear each other talk, but even then one had to half yell to be heard.

"Hey, can we get some shots over here?" Jake called to a waitress, then he turned to Varian and said, "Okay, you wanna play? We'll do a round of shots. Most down the hatch wins. Loser pays for the drinks."

"Deal" Varian agreed.

The waitress brought a tray of shots and Varian eyed the small glasses smugly. You could down one in a single gulp. This would be easy he thought. Only to nearly lose with the first sip alone. Whatever this tequila was, it was stronger than either ale or wine and burned the back of his throat as it went down. He finished the drink and tried to suppress a cough.

"Not as easy as you thought it was, hun?" Jake smiled as he picked up his second glass.

Varian however was not one to give up easily, and besides he really didn't want to blow through all of his hard earned money in one night. So he steeled himself and grabbed another shot, and then a another, and another.

On the fourth shot Varian saw Jake starting to slow, his face becoming red from alcohol. Varian too was becoming lightheaded but he pressed on and nabbed his fifth drink. He didn't notice if Jake had drunk his fifth yet or not, he was too focused on winning, but as he reached for the sixth he heard the other guy call out defeat.

"Okay, okay! You win!"

Varian flashed a grin and drunk the sixth anyway in celebration; just to rub it into other college kid's face. This last glass he also slammed hard upon the table in victory as the tiny crowd around him cheered.

Jake pulled out his wallet to pay the tab, both annoyed and begrudgingly impressed that he had lost.

"You're like the scrawniest guy alive; where do you put it all?" Daryl asked incredulously.

Varian shrugged his shoulders as he had no real answer to give.

"Well let's take a break from the booze for a while." Carol interceeded. "I mean we came here to dance after all. That is if you boys can still stand after all that."

She tugged on Varian's sleeve and pulled him to the dance floor and the rest of group followed after them.

Varian stood in the middle of the floor at a lost of what to do. He wasn't a bad dancer persay, but he didn't know any American steps and he doubted any of the more traditional folk dances that he knew would fit with this type of music.

"So..how does this dance go?" He shouted Carol above the music.

She laughed, "Anyway you want it to. Just feel the music." She swayed her hips in time to the beat to give him an idea.

Varian figured he would look silly doing that, it was clearly more of a move for women, but he did see most of the men jumping up and down and so he tried this in time with the music.

"Yeah, that's right! You got it!" Carol encouraged as she slid closer to him.

"Any luck?" Gogo asked Hiro as the gang gathered on top of a building in the middle of downtown.

Embolden, he grabbed her hand and gave her a twirl. This enlightened more laughter and they both broke down into giggles before carrying on with their dance.

--------------------------

"Baymax found an energy reading similar to Varian's close by, but it's fuzzy. He's probably in one of the buildings around here, but there's like eight or more clubs just on this street." Hiro explained.

"Well we can probably go in and check while you can stay out here and keep an eye on things." Honey Lemon suggested.

"Yeah, but there's no guarantee they'd let any of us in either." Fred pointed out."None of us are over 21."

"Look maybe we're over reacting here?" Wasabi offered optimistically. "What makes you think Varian could of snuck into any of these places? The kid still looks like he's twelve and he doesn't even have a driver license. Or it could even be that he was telling the truth about it being an innocent birthday par...."

He paused mid-thought as they heard a familiar laugh coming from the street below.

"I have found Varian." Baymax said, stating the obvious as they all peered over the roof to see their friend drunkenly walk out of one of the clubs across the street. He was with a short girl with a dark curly afro and they were giggling over something as they made their way towards the bus stop nearby.

"Or he could be stumbling out of a bar with a drunk girl hanging on his arm." Wasabi corrected himself, clearly disappointed.

Honey Lemon frowned. "I know her...she's in the sorority at SFAI."

"Carol." Gogo confirmed. She had been dragged to the occasional makeup party there, by Honey Lemon herself no less. "But she's a freshman. No way she's old enough to be drinking either."

"Peer pressure can often persuade people into partaking in unsafe activities." Baymax stated as he launched into his health education protocols. "If someone is pressuring you into doing something that you don't feel is safe; say no and walk away..."

"Uh, yes, Baymax. We know." Hiro informed the robot.

"So do we go down there now to talk to him, ooorrrr..." Fred asked, but the arrival of the bus answered for him. Varian and the girl boarded the public transport before anyone could to do anything.

They all exchanged worried and exasperated looks with each other before taking off to follow the tram.

Varian stood in the middle of the bus holding on to one of the center poles. He and Carol were the only two occupants aboard besides the driver, and he could have sat down anywhere, but he was beginning to feel woozy from all the alcohol and standing upright helped to keep him balanced.

--------------------------

Carol however decided to sit down. She sat across from him with her face in the palm of her hand and her eyes sleepily staring out at nothing in particular.

"Do you have to work tomorrow too?" She asked suddenly, breaking the quiet.

"Uh..not sure. Probably. I usually work weekends. Either way though, I know my aunt has been talking about us all spending some 'quality family time' together all weekend long."

Carol smiled. "Responsible, family man, a great dancer, it's a wonder you're still single."

Varian blushed but laughed off her comment. "Responsible? Me? Yeah, no…..but family does mean a lot to me and I did promise Aunt Cass, soooo, sorry I had to bail out early again. But you know, you could have stayed at the party without me."

Carol shrugged. "Eh, I was about done anyways. The guys are fun to hang out with and all, but after awhile you start to feel like a fifth wheel, ya know?"

"Yeah, I know how that feels like." Varian agreed dryly.

"But you do know you didn't have to escort me home right?" Carol added with a laugh.

"I know, I just, I wanted to make sure you got home safe."

"Ever the true gentlemen, hun?"

Her smile grew wider and Varian couldn't tell if she was teasing or flirting. He rubbed the back of his head self-consciously. He was beginning to like this new girl, but he wasn't always the best at picking up social cues and he didn't want to ruin anything by being presumptuous.

"Well, I don't know about that, but looking out for one another is just what friends do, right?"

Carol looked surprised by that comment. "I..I guess…I have a hard time picturing Jake or Daryl doing anything so chivalrous through."

She snickered at that, but Varian tilted his head in confusion.

"But I thought you guys were friends?"

"Oh don't get me wrong, they're good people and all, it's just all we do is hang out at parties sometimes. I don't expect them to like loan me money or come and bail me out of the slammer or anything. We ain't that close."

She sounded nonchalant but Varian nevertheless grew concerned.

"Then who is?" He asked.

Carol was caught off guard by that question.

"Who do you call when you need help?" He clarified.

She opened her mouth to answer, but no sound came out and she just as quickly closed it again. They awkwardly stared at each other for a few moments before the bus came to a stop in front of the SFAI campus. Carol quickly got up and hurried off the tram. Varian rushed after her.

"I'm sorry! Did I say something wrong?"

She didn't answer him but instead started to storm up the front porch steps in front of the sorority house.

"Look, I didn't mean to offend you." He called after. "I..I just…"

He trailed off and she paused on the stair. She didn't turn to face him, but the very fact that she was no longer running away encouraged him to try again.

"Look, I just, I know what it's like to be on your own, and I know how hard it is to move someplace where you don't really know anybody and nothings familiar and you don't feel like you always fit in. I.. I just meant that if you ever needed someone, for anything, you could call me...you know, if..if you wanted to.. that is."

She finally turned to look at him with that admission. There was a pout on her face and tears threatened to spill from her eyes, but she tried to make a joke instead to distract from this.

"You know most folks don't talk like you do." She half heartedly laughed. "You sound like a character out of a cheap rom-com."

He offered her a small smile. "Eh, well, what can I say? I am Russian remember."

They broke down into soft giggles at that.

"You wanna come inside and grab a coffee?" She asked after there laughter had subsided.

"Oh, I'd love to, buuuut it's after one. I should probably get going soon." He declined.

"Well alright, but you have my number, so don't be a stranger." She said before giving him a wink and another of her charming smiles.

She waved him goodbye before heading inside. Varian waved back and then turned to leave, only to be confronted by the rest of his friends waiting for him at the bus stop.

They were dressed in their armor and stood there glaring at him sternly.

"Hey...guys.." Varian slowly said, confused as to why they were here."What's going on?"

"We could ask you the same thing." Gogo replied.

"Uh...well, I'm heading home from a party, soooo..." He made to leave, fully ready to just walk to the next stop instead of hanging around for yet another argument, but Wasabi placed a hand on his shoulder to stop him.

"Do have any idea what an incredibly stupid thing you just did today?" His friend asked.

Varian cast him an angry pout and back-peddled away defensively. He stumbled a little, still feeling tipsy from the tequila, but righted himself before falling.

"You can barely even stand up." Wasabi admonish, further driving home his point.

Varian huffed in frustration and threw an accusing glare at Hiro. He was getting really tired of everyone judging him and he rightly guessed that the other boy had dragged their other friends into this. However before he could respond, Gogo laid into him instead.

"You broke your promise."

Varian's stomach dropped as he realized that, yes, he had indeed went back on his word about not trying to purchase alcohol. Yet, he still wasn't ready to admit fault. Who were they to act so high and mighty? It was just a few drinks? It wasn't like he had hurt anybody.

"So what's it to you?" He threw back."It's not like what I do affects any of you. Me going to a party now and then doesn't harm anyone."

"B..but you could get hurt." Honey Lemon timidly said.

Varian looked at her confused. What did she mean hurt? It was just a party.

"You snuck into a club at sixteen with bunch of strangers." Fred explained. "Like that's just ain't safe, man."

"Fred's right," Wasabi added, "anything could have happened to you in there and we wouldn't have known."

And for the first time, Varian started to actually feel guilty as he realized just how worried his friends were for him. However his defensiveness kicked back up when Hiro added his two cents.

"You need to stop and think about what you're doing first. You can't just keep jumping into situations without…"

" Oh knock it off!" Varian interrupted. "I am sick and and tired of everyone telling me what I can and can't do! I've been on my own since I was fourteen! I know how to take care of myself, alright!"

"No you don't." Gogo pushed back. "You know how to survive, and I hate that you had to, but that's not the same thing as actually being mature. Now just stop and come with us; we're taking you home."

She reached out to grab hold of Varian's sleeve and to pull him along, but Varian wouldn't comply. He wasn't entirely sure what happened next, in his addled state, but she pulled in one direction and he tugged his arm away in another. Either her blades rolled out from under her or he didn't realize his own strength, but either way Gogo wound up lying flat on the ground after their struggle.

Everyone froze in shock and Varian felt his heart race as his anger turned into alarm and shame.

"Gogo!" Honey Lemon rushed to her friend's side to help her up. "Are you alright?"

Gogo refused the help however. Instead she gave Varian a hurtful and angry glare as she picked herself off the ground. His breath shallowed as he waited for her to go off again, but all she did was shake her head at him, turned around, and then skated away.

That was somehow even worse than a lecture.

Honey Lemon followed after her.

"Dude, what is wrong with you!?" Hiro reprimanded and all Varian could do was look at him with wide eyes. What was wrong with him?

"I...I...I don't know!" He choked." I just...I just wanted to forget… just for a little awhile. Forget that I'm...I'm.. b-broken."

"And how does this help?" Wasabi asked, and Varian had no answer.

"Look, I know you've been through some really messed up stuff." Wasabi continued. "More than most people ever will, and I'm sorry you had to go through that, but you can't keep on like this." He sighed in defeat. "Come and gets us when your ready to actually deal with things." And then he too turned and started to walk off.

Fred cast worried glances between Varian and the direction of where their friends were leaving, unsure of what to do. Ultimately, he too turned away and reluctantly made after the rest of the group.

Varian could hardly see through the tears now. They were leaving him. Everyone was leaving him. They always did at some point, and here he had dared to hope things might just be different in this new world. Yet, he had no one to blame but himself.

That's when he noticed Hiro and Baymax still standing there, watching him disquitedly.

"Well, aren't you going to leave too?" He asked accusingly.

Hiro took a moment to find the answer, but when he did he said, "Why should I? We're going to the same place, remember." He held out a hand to Varian. "Come on, Aunt Cass is waiting."

Varian blinked through his tears to see Hiro standing before him with his arm outstretched and a look of concern on his face. Varian's breath quickened and his vision swam. He had felt lightheaded all night and now the added stress of the recent fight only seemed to highlight just how drunk he really was. He was so sure he had been careful, that he hadn't really had that much, but that didn't stop the ground from rushing up to meet him as he fell, nor the darkness enclosing around him as he fainted dead away.

#varian #Hiro Hamada #GoGo #big hero six #bh6 #tangled #tangled the series #rapunzel's tangled adventure #BH6 the series #honey lemon #cass hamada #Fred Frederickson IV #wasabi #of rocks and robots

24 notes · View notes

bopinion · 3 years

Text

2021 / 13

Aperçu of the Week:

He who trusts others too little has fear in all corners.

He who relies too much on others wakes up in terror.

Wer andern gar zu wenig traut, hat Angst an allen Ecken.

Wer gar zu viel auf andre baut, erwacht mit Schrecken.

(Wilhelm Busch)

Bad News of the Week:

I am a firm believer in equal treatment and fair play. Even if that can sometimes lead to losing to a bully. And of course, such a mindset is put to the test, especially in times of crisis. And we are having a time of crisis right now. In the face of Corona, we see - once again - a significant way in which individual states and societies are dealing with it. Let's take the USA and Germany for example. Surprise!

The two countries have made by far the largest investments in vaccine development: of a total of $5.9 billion (according to a study by the Center for Global Health at the Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies in Geneva), 2.2 came from the U.S. and 1.5 from Germany, which thus clearly leads in relation to its population. But who is now benefiting how much from its investments? Surprise!

Last week, U.S. President Joe Biden announced that in his first 100 days in office, 200 million doses of vaccine will find their way into the arms of his citizens. And it is to be counted on the fact that to the Independence Day on 04 July the entire population is protected. Germany, on the other hand, does not dare to make any prognosis, but only has the courage to hold out the prospect that at the end of the summer - and we are talking about September 21 - every adult who is willing to be vaccinated can be offered a vaccination. In plain language: then I will also get a vaccination appointment, and than can be three months later. Merry Christmas. Why is that? Surprise!

The seemingly great success in the U.S. is primarily due to two factors: First, an export ban on vaccines was imposed - which also trumps contractual delivery obligations of private-sector companies. Second, an emergency law decreed that pharmaceutical company A must or, depending on one's point of view, may produce the vaccine of pharmaceutical company B - although this law was explicitly created for wartime. And therefore its legitimacy may be doubted. But the USA has always been quite generous with the term war, not only since Ronald Reagan's "war on drugs" or "war on crime". So a declaration of war is obviously only a political tool, if it helps. Surprise!

Germany, on the other hand, sits in its European boat full of lofty principles and wonders. How can it be that there is too little vaccine, although it is needed? Why do supplies to third countries such as Australia leave the continent when we don't have enough vaccine ourselves? Why does the UK get batches from Belgian and Italian manufacturing plants, but Europe gets none from the island? Why does not a single pharmaceutical company keep its delivery promises to Brussels, but to Jerusalem, New Delhi and Ottawa? After all, we ordered and paid and dutifully kept to the terms and conditions. Well, the transition from idealism to naivety is fluid. At least we are the moral victor. But, as we all know, you can't buy anything with that. Unfortunately, none of this comes as a surprise...

Good News of the Week:

Last week, the UN again hosted a donor conference for Syria. The war-torn country in the Middle East, whose population has no chance of survival, let alone a future, without international aid. And there is no end in sight to the suffering. The U.S. doesn't give a damn about the legacies of its own decades-long misguided Middle East policy. And the other major players, Russia, Iran and Turkey, are merely pursuing their own geostrategic goals and are therefore coming to terms with despot Bashar Al-Assad at the expense of the civilian population.

6.4 billion US dollars came together at the conference. Of that, 596 million from the United States. And 2.05 billion from Germany, not counting the indirect support through our share of the EU budget. Who notices the difference with vaccine spending (see Bad News of the Week above)? The explanation is obvious: the USA, glorious inventors of hedge funds and turbo-capitalism, do not give away money, they invest it. And this primarily with the goal of maximizing profits. And Germany often acts selflessly. Again, we are the moral victor. This time, however, we are not paying for our own disadvantage, but simply for a good cause. And therefore don't feel like fools.

Personal happy Moment of the Week:

Ever since I grew too fast at 12, 13 years old, I've had problems with my back. Fatal for someone who works at a desk. Especially because humans are not exactly designed for sitting. Therefore, I recently bought a so-called standing/sitting table for the home office. In other words, a table that you can move up and down electrically so that you can change positions frequently during the course of a working day. After two weeks, I can draw an extremely positive conclusion. Because I stood all days. And completely. In other words, without sitting at all. And not with more back pain, but with integrated back training. And I have to smile about the fact that a standing desk would have done just as well.

As I write this...

...I listen to a cacophony my wife is creating with the vacuum cleaner and an 80s playlist from the HomePods. But since this saves me from doing housework, I can't complain... ;-)

2 notes · View notes

tenseifucker · 4 years

Text

Yan!Izuku x Idol!Reader pt 4

Oops lol

So honestly I see most of Deku's school life being p normal

As normal a school life a shounen protag can have I mean

But!!!

By his 2nd or 3rd year, his efforts will have paid off

He, as well as a few his classmates, get an offer to appear on a variety show

Ya know to get their names out there or some shit

Anyway he's pumped bc he knows you're a regular on it

He's totally planning out every possible conversation y'all could have

Maybe even planning out ways to... touch you!!!

Just the thought of it makes him sweat lmao

So when it comes time to show up for filming, you bet he's hella nervous

He and the others make their rounds to the dressing rooms just to be polite and introduce themselves he notices that you and your group share a room

Expected, but not ideal

But thankfully

By some holy act of god

As he passes by, on his way to the restroom, he notices the door is cracked open

For a room that's supposed to be full of girls it's awfully quiet...

He decides to knock, just to make sure everything is okay

But it's empty

Just like the hallway

Bitch it takes him a whole millisecond for his ass to jump in there and take a closer look

Ngl he's a little shocked by how messy it is

There's probably makeup and accessories all over the place

There are a few water bottles scattered around the room too, all of them with a different person's name written on them

He finds yours in sitting with a couple others on the coffee table, still half full

He just sits there in awe for a moment, before sitting in what he assumed was your seat

Indirectly!!!! Touching!!!!!! Something other than your hands!!!!!!!!

Internally, he's losing it lmao

While he's sitting there, staring at your water bottle, a thought comes to him and before he can register what he's doing, he already has it in his hand

Well, he's come this far!

He unscrews the cap and just takes a second to admire the bottle's mouth

The mouth that has touched your mouth

Slowly, he licks along the threads, making sure he gets in to every crevice so he can try to taste you

After he gets his gross little high off of that an even better idea comes to mind

He takes a sip and even though it's just ordinary water, it tastes like the sweetest thing in the world to him

And y'all I'm so sorry

But he goes to take another, slightly larger sip, only this time he backwashes.

Like, it's one thing for him to indirectly kiss you, but it's a whole nother fucking GALAXY for you to indirectly kiss him

Even if you don't know it

And like this little asshole

He just screws the lid back on and quietly leaves before anyone can come back

And he just spends the rest of his time waiting in total bliss

Until filming starts lmao

That's when it comes out that you and Denki share a braincell and holy shit the pure chaos that comes from making you two work together is comedy gold

Like the host could ask you guys to name 5 US states and y'all will be bouncing shit back and forth before confidently answering and getting almost all of them wrong

Like y'all got New York yeah but there was still a question mark behind it so don't feel too proud lmao

The look of shock on your faces when the hosts tell you that Australia is actually an entirely different country/continent would be sad if it wasn't so funny

"Wait, then was the right answer Austria?" "Yeah, that one sounds right"

Y'all are both getting smacked for that one

Deku is low-key pissed

He also develops a minor grudge against Kaminari but that's neither here nor there lol

But dw it just drives him to work harder on standing out so he can still be invited back and get more chances to work with you

Thankfully some of the other games/topics let him show off a bit

Plus he manages to get some good reactions out of you!!

After filming is done, you go up to each of his classmates individually and tell them what a great job they did

When you finally come up to Izuku, the excitement in your eyes in unmistakable

You congratulate him on getting this far and tell him how excited you were to see that you finally got to work together

The poor boy is just kinda sits there like an idiot lmao

You'd think he'd be used to this by now but oh well

Also, before everyone gets ready to leave, you pull him and his classmates aside, and ask for a group shot to post on your blog to promote the episode

Of course everyone agrees

And I s2fg that is gonna be his new lock screen

Just cropped so it's only you two in the pic lmao

This has been sitting in my drafts for ages lmao Working on my midlife crisis + corona recovery + mental health + restructuring at work but it's cool I just wish I was dead✨

#mha #bnha #izuku x reader #yandere #izuku midoriya

11 notes · View notes

astroismypassion · 4 years

Note

howdy, saw u we're having tech difficulties sorry abt that! i got you a coffee the other day my name is carson, 22 October, 2003 in Winchester, VA, USA @ 2:43 PM !

Hi!

Thank you for buying me this delicious hot beverage. I drank black coffee with rice milk while writing your interpretation. I hope you will enjoy reading it as much as I did writing! I listened to Leonard Cohen while writing your interpretation. ;)

Your dominant planets are: 1. Uranus, 2. Mars and 3. Pluto. Your dominant signs are: 1. Aquarius, 2. Scorpio and 3. Aries. Your main mode is Fixed. You are Air dominant.

FAMILY, SIBLINGS, EARLY LIFE

You have Taurus IC. You are a private person and you might not post much on social media or that often. Only your family and really close friends know what you value, what you like and desire. You have most of your 4th house is Gemini. Your parents emphasized communication and conversation in your early life. Maybe you learnt how to be polite, well mannered early on. You probably liked to read a lot of books or your parents often read to you. There might have been gossiping in your family or around your family. You talked a lot. You might have learnt how to read and speak early on. If you have any siblings, they are Aries or Taurus. Those can be your cousins, close friends from elementary and high school or other family relatives. Even some of your neighbours can be those signs. In your elementary and high school years you were steady fast. You liked learning and doing homework, studying at your own pace and step by step. You didn’t like big chunks of information at once since it overwhelmed you. You have Virgo Moon in the 8th house. You might have a very deep, complex and intense bond with your mother. She can be over loving, overbearing at times (almost to the point of suffocating you), but she really loves you. She is a perfectionist and can be over critical over you at times too. She is an organised lady, who likes cleanliness. You have Libra Sun in the 9th house. Your father influenced you in a way to go after your wants and desires in life and really push you to establish yourself. He probably knows people from all walks of life and with different backgrounds due to Sun trine Uranus. He is freedom loving, adventurous and polite. He is quite diplomatic. He might have worked abroad, with foreigners or foreign people at a certain point in life. Or he works in the educational field. He might even be a preacher! Or he works in a field where there is some sort of art involved, building or designing. Or even law!

PARTNERSHIPS AND FRIENDSHIPS

Your friends are Gemini, Cancer, Sagittarius, Scorpio and Capricorn. In your romantic relationships you attract Cancer, Gemini, Leo, Virgo, Sagittarius and Libra. You have Scorpio Venus in the 9th house. You attract a lot of people who are intense, deep thinkers, mysterious and secretive, yet they like their own personal space, freedom and can be flighty. They are loyal and passionate. They like exchanging ideas, opinions, views on life with you. You have Pisces Mars in the 1st house. This is how you approach your crush, how you take action and sometimes how you act in love. You are passive, you prefer someone else approaching you. Though, you are not scared of asserting yourself. You might be torn between you taking the first step or let someone else do it. People would sometimes be scared of your intensity if you approach them first. It’s like you’re brave, determined and know exactly what you like. You like artistic people, who also have a knack for business and are still kind, compassionate and loving. You have Leo Descendant. You might project a proud image onto others. Or others can see you like that sometimes. In love you could attract egotistical, proud, generous, childlike people, who have good humour. You have Venus sextile Jupiter. When you’re in love, you might overlove and be very generous with your time, affection, money and attention. Venus trine Saturn. You like to provide for others, but you want the same in return. You like to be babied from time to time too. You like reliable, responsible, loyal people. You might date someone who is older or younger than your own age. And you have Venus square Neptune. You might attract people who need “healing” or can have even certain emotional or mental difficulties or some repressed feelings. You can idealize them or think that your love might somehow “heal” them. You love people unconditionally and have a lot of universal love for others.

CAREER, PROFESSIONAL LIFE, PUBLIC IMAGE

You have Sun conjunct Mercury. This is a writer’s placement! You could do well in publishing, marketing and any communication field, even journalism. You are very proud of your mind and intelligence, so your mind and ego is directly tied. You like others praising you for your way of thinking and how your “mind” works. In fact you might have broken off a relationship, because you didn’t like “how their mind works” or what their thinking process is. You also know how to compliment people and know just the right words to appeal to them! You have Saturn in the 6th house. You might have certain difficulties with your coworker in your day to day life. Even some difficulties with other authority figures, such as parents, teachers, professors. This takes a great tool on your physical and mental health. You might have a set routine or you don’t like changing it often. You don’t like any disruption or changes in your day-to-day life. Your 6th house is in Cancer and Leo. Even though you have Pisces on the first, you have a bit of Leo in the 6th house. This indicates that you are a proud coworker. You might even talk in a condescending voice sometimes or boss other people around. You like to be the one in charge. But you still do it in a diplomatic way due to so much Libra energy. With Cancer here, you need a lot of emotional connection to your work. Your day job needs to be emotionally fulfilling for you. You have Taurus North Node in the 3rd house. This indicates your life purpose and what you are here to learn in this lifetime. You need to learn how to stabilize and ground yourself. How to set your own value system. With 3rd house you might end up being a writer or a speaker or somehow work with communication and even foreign languages. With Aries in the 2nd and Capricorn Chiron you might not like the 9 to 5 job and would benefit from being your own boss and be self employed at certain points in your life. You also need to learn a steady, step by step approach to dealings with 3rd house, such as your relationship with your siblings, family relatives, neighbours, close friends, communication, talking, writing and speaking. You have Scorpio MC. Like I mentioned previously, you are a private person, general public, people on social media, your boss, teacher, mentors don’t know much about your personal life. You view this aspect as very private and intimate, so you don’t discuss it much. But most of your 10th house is already in Sagittarius. You might be seen as bluntly honest sometimes or like a bit of a preacher. You like to fight for truth and freedom. You might post or talk about religious, culture, current affairs or travelling on social media or when you’re in public settings. You have Sagittarius Pluto in the 11th house. You have intense hopes, wishes and desires for the future. To the point sometimes even scares you a bit. You might dream of “freedom” in whichever form this comes for you, either financial freedom, travelling or expanding your mind and horizon. You might even like the idea of a bit more unconventional, spiritual, “boho” lifestyle.

ADDITIONAL OBSERVATIONS You have Chiron in Capricorn in the 12th house. There is a wound when it comes to your career. And it is connected with your Saturn in the 6th house. You might not like working for others or in a team. You might dislike the dread of a daily grind. You might even suffer health issues because of your job and dislike of the working environment! You have Saturn, Pluto and Jupiter currently transiting your 12th house. This means you might have had trouble sleeping or you reconsidered and evaluated endings, got some closure with certain topics, someone might have even died in your circle of acquaintances. You might find yourself thinking more about spirituality, endings, closures, suffering, sadness, grieff. You might isolate more at this time (not just due to corona, since the transit is around 1 and a half to two years long). You might like to spend more time on your solitary hobbies or work alone. You could also be dealing with forgiveness a lot at this time. You might find it harder to take action and be assertive. It’s like you’re more passive. You have Sagittarius Part of Fortune in the 11th house. Your friends, friend circle can benefit you too! You might learn through them a lot or expand your understanding and knowledge. You might like to travel with your friends often! You have Taurus Lilith in the 4th house. Here is where your “bad” side shows. You might be overindulging, a bit lazy and idle at home. You might be also more stubborn, highly opinionated at home or with your family members. You have Scorpio Juno in the 10th house. This indicates your ideal soulmate or ideal partner, be it platonic or romantic. They need to be intense, mysterious, hard to figure out, reliable, loyal, hard workers, responsible. They need to have deep desires and aspirations and goals. They need to be ambitious. You have Cancer Ceres in the 6th house. This represents how you wish to be nurtured and how you nurture others. You like to feed others or share food with them and really listen to them. You might like small acts of kindness and do little errands for them. You like to be appreciated and respected. You might like to form family-like bonds with others.

CHART RULER

Your chart ruler is Uranus. The chart ruler of the 1st house is in the 1st house. This means you are your own creator of your destiny. Your personality, ego might develop through your own life experiences and characters traits. Only you can give the life you want to yourself. Here is more on this topic of life purpose by an excellent fellow astrologer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1HnMdFJeXR0

HOUSE RULERS

The ruler of the 1st house is in the 1st house. You express yourself through the way you look. You express yourself through clothing and makeup. The image you project affects your ability to navigate through life. The ruler of the 2nd house is in the 1st house. You spend money on haircuts, manicures, facials and clothes. You earn money with your appearance. Self-esteem has an effect on your behavior and mannerisms. Your appearance makes you look wealthy. The ruler of the 3rd house is in the 1st house. Early education experiences shape the way that you present yourself. You like to talk about yourself. Talking, writing, singing, gossiping and diary writing are part of your personality. An interest in these activities is one of the first things people notice about you. The ruler of the 4th house is in the 9th house. You live far away from your family. You feel rooted when you gain knowledge. Home life affects your ability to travel and have foreign experiences. The ruler of the 5th house is in the 8th house. Creative talents and gifts are hidden. Hobbies revolve around the taboo or occult. The ruler of the 6th house is in the 8th house. The daily work environment must serve your need to form deep relationships. You use your knowledge of diet, nutrition and exercise to help other people transform. You want an intense work environment. The ruler of the 7th house is in the 9th house. Partners help you expand your horizons. Your partner needs to be broad-minded. You want to be with someone who likes to discuss philosophical topics. Your open enemies are people from other cultural or religious backgrounds. The ruler of the 8th house is in the 8th house. You enter sexual relationships for sex. You get emotionally entangled with other people to form deep connections. Your attitude to life and death affects your ability to deeply connect with other people. The ruler of the 9th house is in the 9th house. You find meaning by devising your own personal belief system. You travel to expand your horizons. You gain wisdom by learning about religion. You find meaning in higher education. The ruler of the 10th house is in the 11th house. You expect your friends to be ambitious. You choose friends who have won awards and made achievements. Your true vocation involves the structure of organizations and groups. You have a professional approach to the groups you get involved with. You want to be in a profession that has an audience. The ruler of the 11th house is in the 7th house. You want your partner to have the same long term hopes and dreams. You want to reform attitudes to marriage. You want your partner to approve of your friends. People you meet over the internet have the potential to become significant partners. You bring your friends into your significant relationships. You commit to clubs and groups. The ruler of the 12th house is in the 6th house. You experience sorrow and loss through health issues. Being alone too much causes health issues. You have an imaginative approach to diet and health. You desire to escape from daily life. You want to merge with your work.

#astrology #natal chart #chart reading #astroismypassion #chart interpretation #birth chart

16 notes · View notes

blackcoffeeandblankpagess · 4 years

Text

An accumulation of thoughts ft. today’s turkey content

This afternoon we went around our neighborhood (largely to try to find some cats to say hi to (don’t worry we are not tryna pet any rn)) and we found my beloved turkeys and this cat! was so! freaking adorable! we watched him/her for like 15 minutes sneaking around the turkeys, he kept crouching like he was gonna pounce but then would just step back. The woman living in the house whose lawn this was all happening on came out at one point and we were like uh hi sry we just like watching the turkeys and she was like you’re good (lol)

Honestly seeing how much the neighborhood cats brighten my mood when I take a walk has me thinking about adopting a cat... I was looking into fostering requirements the other day out of curiosity. Not in the cards rn with our current housing/moving soon but maybe in a little bit...

in other news-

I did a lot of reaching out to people this week (and recently) and it feels good!

A few weeks ago before all hell broke loose I facetimed my highschool bff for awhile and caught up on like....5 years of life basically, last weekend I facetimed one of my best friends/the closest person I have to a sister from home, this week I talked with @runninglaur (hi ily) and tomorrow I’m talking to my college bff who I honestly have barely spoken with since graduation because life was hectic and I think we both just needed a lil space

also! a friend of mine set out to hike the AT like 2 weeks ago and it became pretty clear last week that it wasn’t looking very doable given everything happening re: corona virus. I talked with her on the phone for a long time last weekend about her decision to get off the trail after having this plan for the longest time and not knowing when she would get another chance, it honestly meant SO much to me that she wanted to talk to ME about such a huge thing in her life, and she specifically said she thought I would understand more than anyone because I’m the only person she knows who she could see actually doing it (for background, I have thought a little about the idea of hiking the AT over the years and have read a shit ton of books about it which I have since shared with her), ANYWAY, I think she might train for a half to channel that physical energy into another new challenge, she’s also going to school in oregon and I am thinking of a fall marathon (but literally whO KNOWS anymore) and I sent her the info for the half that goes with it so! exciting!

We are outta here may 1st and it feels really weird that our last month here is going to be so anti-climactic in terms of doing CA things, we had a lot scheduled which is now irrelevant so that’s kinda sad. My mom was supposed to be here this weekend which is clearly not happening :// Also we were originally planning on taking a long fun roadtrip back to the east coast and hanging in NJ with my fam but uh NJ is noooot doing so hot so it’s looking more like a sprint to NC

But I love jared’s family so not complaining

I finished reading where the crawdads sing and LOVED it!!! As I was told by everyone, it is a slow start but once I committed to it I breezed through like 300 pages this week after barely reading anything for months

Also want to read more, as I have said (doesn’t everyone say that?), and am trying to use this at home time as a reason to read the books I have here

knee is feeling okay! upped the leg pt the past two days and will probably continue to emphasize it in the coming days. going to take it for a spin tomorrow on a run and go from there. honestly feeling really lit up by the idea of training hard for a fall marathon. when I crossed the finish line in february with a 20 min PR I felt so so so excited to see what I could do if I reaaaaally put my all into it since my training this winter was less than ideal in 30000 ways. I am someone who thrives on routine so, think this will be good for me (ironically I had finally nailed down a plan for myself last weekend after weeks of not knowing and then BAM, hurt myself)

on friday nights I usually spend some time to myself decompressing and watching the week’s grey’s anatomy episode and can I just say I love that show? I know it’s been on since like....the dawn of time but I cry every. single. epsiode. and it is good!

tomorrow we are making waffles and it is supposed to rain and I am excited

#personalposts #berk

22 notes · View notes

summerinawinterdaylove-blog · 5 years

Text

After Dark

Hi! This is my first fanfiction posting and I’m really really excited about it. If you read, please be sure to share what you think! I have no followers yet so, hopefully, this doesn’t flop 😂😅🤞

A quick 2.8k fic about secretly being friends with benefits with Shawn... and nothing more. Right?

Warnings: Smut, alcohol and drug use, vulgar language, non-vegan food.

The smell of the tender meat doused in red wine and garlic wafted throughout Shawn’s kitchen, a random playlist echoing through his Bluetooth speakers. He’d just gotten in from tour the morning before, taking a day to spend with his family… and now he was intent on seeing you. As soon as he had the chance he was texting you, asking you to come over for a late dinner and a movie, just to hang out.

You’d been friends for years, very close friends at that… who occasionally fucked. Maybe more than occasionally, but… technicalities, right?

He settled on making rib-eyes with the red wine sauce you really loved and a blueberry spinach salad with goat cheese medallions that he’d tried while on tour. As soon as he tasted it, he thought of you and how he had to make it for you. He always pretended that he hated cooking but he found every excuse he could to make a meal for the two of you.

The song turned to Pusher Love Girl by Justin Timberlake causing a smile to form on his face. He picked up his half-full bottle of Corona, taking a quick swig and then singing into it like it was his microphone and he was onstage. He danced around his kitchen, totally unaware of the fact that you’d helped yourself inside.

There you stood, leaned against the doorway, your arms crossed and an amused grin on your face, enjoying your concert for one. It was good to see him, you’d been to a couple of shows when he was nearby but that had been a couple of months ago and you’d never gone quite so long without seeing each other. Seeing him onstage was an experience all on its own but it was nothing compared to being alone with him.

He felt your eyes scanning over his body, admiring how he wore only a grey pair of sweats. His arms looked even more defined than usual and his ass just the slightest bit perkier. He’d definitely been working out. He grinned, checking you out just as openly.

“You look good, Mendes.”

He smiled, “You look pretty great yourself, honey. Now you just gonna stand there or are you gonna come give me a hug?”

Your stomach did somersaults at the mere thought of being close to him again. You missed how his skin felt against yours, his breath hot against your neck, him. Of course, you gave him what he wanted, walking over to where he was and wrapping your arms around his neck. He quickly placed his beer on the counter, wrapping his arms back around you, his hands resting at the spot just above your ass.

His eyes trailed down to your lips, covered in your favorite red lipstick, the perfect contrast to the comfortable clothes you were wearing. You opted for a simple pair of black leggings and one of his pink merch hoodies, nothing too extravagant, but you figured you wouldn’t be clothed for too long anyway. You left your vans at the door, your feet covered only in a silly pair of socks with his face all over them that he’d gifted to you before tour began.

“I really missed you,” his voice sounded raspy and soft as he spoke lowly as though there were other people in his condo that he didn’t want to hear him.

You ran your tongue over your bottom lip, biting it between your teeth, your eyes trailing down to his lips this time, “I missed you too, Shawn.”

He slid his hands down just enough to rest on the swell of your ass, pulling you closer against him, “Well we’re together now…”

You swallowed the lump in your throat down, nodding at him in response and then hearing the sizzle of the pan that brought you back to reality. You wanted him to take you right then and there but he’d worked hard on dinner for you and you didn’t want his efforts to go to waste.

“We’ll take advantage of that… as soon as we’re done with dinner, okay? Smells really good.”

He smiled softly, both of you a bit clearly disappointed but you had the rest of the night to love on each other, “Thank you, hun, hopefully it tastes just as good.”

He kissed the top of your head and reluctantly pulled away from your grasp, reaching into his cupboard for two plates, “What do you want to drink?”

“Corona’s fine,” you grinned, walking over to his refrigerator and helping yourself.

As you sat together to eat dinner you enjoyed some good laughs, hearing all about his best tour experiences… and the not so good ones.

“I really wish you could’ve been there to experience it too, you have to promise you’ll come to more shows next time,” he told you, taking the last bite of his steak, his lips wrapping around the fork as he did. “I don’t like going that long without seeing you.”

You chuckled, “Alright, fine, but you’re gonna have to talk some of our other friends into it too. It would look weird if I just showed up to a bunch of shows and we disappeared together randomly, everyone would start to catch on.”

“Well, yeah,” he started, gulping down the last of his Corona before standing to his feet and starting to clean his mess, “but fuck them.”

You laughed, sure that he was joking with you, “Fuck them?”

“Yeah,” he shrugged, “they might speculate but it’s not really their business if we’re fucking each other or not, is it?”

“Well, no, but-“

“So fuck them,” he grinned at you. “Tell me, Y/N, how did it feel for you? Going without me for three months?”

“Shawn,” you chuckled, “what the fuck are you getting at? Don’t beat around the bush with me.”

“I’m not getting at anything, I’m simply saying I didn’t like going that long so if they’re gonna speculate… I don’t really care.”

“Alright… you’re telling me you didn’t sleep with anyone else for those three months?” You finished your meal, getting up and cleaning your own mess, an eyebrow raised as you glanced at him.

“That’s exactly what I’m telling you,” he finished washing the dishes and uncovered a dish of brownies, slicing into them with a nearby knife. “I got by merely with my hand and the thought of you.”

You weren’t expecting that.

“Oh…” You responded, finishing loading the dishwasher. “I didn’t know we were, like… exclusive.”

Shawn didn’t turn to face you, only continuing to slice into the brownies, but his movements did stall for a moment, “I mean, we don’t have to be… I just thought… it’s okay if you’re sleeping with other people…”

“No, no…” You leaned against the countertop, watching the movement of his hand, not comfortable enough to look in his eyes. “I’m not, I haven’t…”

“Oh,” he sighed involuntarily, “cool, okay.”

He carefully got himself a piece of brownie and extended one to you, “They’re the special brownies so one is more than enough, alright? Please don’t get seconds, I don’t think you’ll be able to move if you do.”

You snorted, taking the brownie and immediately biting into it. This was your typical night together: food, having a drink, getting high, maybe throwing a film on, fucking a time or three and then sleeping. He was never fond of the idea of you driving in a state like that or taking a random uber in the middle of the night and you only ever did this stuff after dark.

You finished your brownies, sharing a glass of strawberry mint infused water and then walking into his bedroom. He started fussing with the tv, putting his Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets dvd into the blu-ray player. You got yourself cozy on his bed, yawning quietly and stretching your tired legs out over his mattress.

“Fuck, I’ve missed this bed,” you poured. “I think I was having withdrawals.”

“You could’ve slept in it while I was gone but you refused to take the key,” he chuckled, finally getting the movie started and getting comfortable on the bed next to you.

You glanced over at him, the dim lighting of the bedroom wasn’t ideal to get in the mood but the mixture of missing him, the high and how good he looked you were already there. Your eyes slowly made their way over the broad expanse of his shoulders, the way his chest looked more defined than it had last time you’d seen him, his stomach tighter too. His hands were folded over his lap and although he wasn’t hard, the grey sweatpants left little to your imagination (even though you’d obviously seen his cock before.) One of his legs were stretched straight out, the other bent, his foot tucked under his knee. He looked at peace.

When your eyes worked their way back up to his face you realized that he’d been watching you just as closely, his lips parted just a hint, his eyes completely focused on yours.

“You’re too far away,” he commented.

“Then come closer.”

He needed no more persuasion, swiftly closing the gap between you. He gently placed his right hand on your jaw, his thumb lightly caressing your cheek as he slotted his lips over yours. The kiss was just what you needed, traces of hunger and need making themselves apparent without a single word necessary.

He delicately ran his tongue over your bottom lip and you immediately granted him the access he was longing for, opening your mouth enough to allow his tongue to fall into delicious rhythm with yours.

You smiled against his lips, the entire situation making you overwhelmingly happy. You’d spent so long missing him and wishing he was home, wanting to have a night in with him and spend ages making out with him… and now here you were, his lips against yours and no plans outside of each other for the next 24 hours.

He slid his left hand under your hip, gently guiding you to move onto his lap. You did so, never breaking the kiss, a knee on either side of his body. You could feel his hardening cock resting along the inside of your thigh and it only caused the ache in between your legs to increase.

You needed him so bad.

“Baby,” you moaned into the kiss, shifting just enough to rest your clothed heat on top of his length, rocking your hips desperately over him, needing the pressure. “I know we usually take our time but I just… can’t. Not tonight. It’s been too long.”

“Jesus,” he breathed, knowing you meant it whenever you let baby slip from between your lips, “Okay, no wasting time tonight.”

You sat up enough to pull the hoodie off of your body and reach around to unclasp your bra, tossing them both onto the floor, not even a little worried about where they might land. You leaned back down, your lips pressing against his once more as you started grinding back on forth on his cock again, your patience wearing very thin.

You needed to cum like you needed to breathe.

“Y/N,” Shawn begged, “You’ve gotta… you’ve gotta fucking stop or I’m gonna cum.”

Sighing, you started to tug his sweatpants and boxer briefs down in one go, your mouth going dry at the sight of his cock leaking precum, his tip the most beautiful shade of raspberry you��d ever seen. If the circumstances were any different you would most likely be putting him in your mouth instead.

You carefully moved off him, plopping onto the bed on your back. Raising your hips, you began to pull your leggings and panties down your own body as he finished removing his. He glanced over just in time to see the crotch of your panties utterly soaked and he groaned, his cock twitching at the sight.

“Fuck me,” his voice was barely above a whisper.

He propped himself up with his left arm, positioning himself between your legs and sliding his right hand under your thigh, lifting your leg and showing you how he wanted you to wrap it around his waist.

You were breathing heavily at this point, the anticipation was almost too much to bear. You reached into his bedside drawer, grabbing one of the easily accessible condoms and hastily ripping the packaging open. You slid your right hand over his cock, giving him a light squeeze and eliciting the prettiest moan from his mouth in turn, and then rolling the condom over his length.

“Please,” you asked him, lining his tip up with your folds.

You were so wet at this point that even just sliding him through your slit made a noise. He knew he was fucked.

He leaned his face down, smashing his lips against yours as he positioned his own cock against your entrance, slowly beginning to push in. He knew if he went too quickly you’d be uncomfortable… and he’d cum straight-away.

Taking his right hand out from under your thigh, knowing that at this point you’d understand to keep it there, and reached his hand up to your right breast to lightly twist your nipples. You opened your mouth in a small gasp and he didn’t hesitate to take the opportunity to deepen the kiss.

His rhythm was flawless - slow and deep, hitting all of the places that you’d been craving him for three months. Your back arched every time that his tip slammed against your sweet spot, an almost whimper escaping from your own mouth into his in time with his thrusts.

He broke the kiss, touching his forehead against yours, his hot breath fanning over your face. His eyes were looking deeply into your own as your cunt throbbed around him, convincing him that you were teetering over the edge.

“I want you, fuck, I want you to cum for me,” he whispered, eyes not leaving yours, rhythm speeding up just a bit. “Can you do that for me?”

Your brows softly furrowed, your lips falling open as your legs started to shake. The pleasure was so intoxicating that you swore you could see stars and your eyes filled with tears. You nodded in response, holding true to your word instantly thereafter. He tucked his face into the crook of your neck as he worked to chase his own orgasm, desperately wanting to get there so he could hold you and talk some more.

You placed your hands on his face, gently guiding him back to your lips. You kissed him hard, expertly working your tongue against his, trying to make his orgasm one of the most powerful, wanting it to be worth the long wait. It was a messy kiss, your teeth colliding every once in a while as he began to thrust more vigorously inside of you.

You broke the kiss, stretching your neck enough to press your lips against the spot of his jaw directly under his ear. You knew it was a sensitive spot for him so you flattened your tongue against the area before gently sucking onto it, not letting up until you were sure it would purple.

His thrusts fell sloppier as he spurted stream after stream of his release into the condom, his body nearly collapsing on top of yours. There was a thin layer of sweat between the two of you, your skin hot and bodies exhausted.

“Missed that so much,” you quietly stated, not able to put the effort forth to speak at a normal decibel.

“Not as much as I did, I bet,” he chuckled weakly, forcing himself up to discard of the condom and clean you both up. “You should go pee, hun, then we can cuddle and finish the last half hour of this movie before bed.”

You nodded, getting up from the bed, a bit wobbly in the best way. You walked into the en-suite, taking a look in the mirror and grinning, taking a moment to breathe everything in. He was finally back.

Once you were done, you walked back into the bedroom and slid into one of his plain white t-shirts. Shawn was already back in bed in a pair of Calvin's, everything cleaned up and the blanket pulled back for you.

You crawled into the bed next to him, melting into his side and letting out a contented sigh. He wrapped his arm around you out of habit, leaning his head onto yours, his bright eyes glued on the last bit of Harry Potter. You, on the other hand, were absolutely exhausted and you doubted that you’d make it through the entire film.

“Goodnight Shawn,” you told him softly.

He smiled down at you, getting you both a little cozier so you could sleep more easily, “Goodnight honey, I’m really happy you’re here.”

It wasn’t long before you were asleep, your body not fighting rest in the slightest. He heard you softly hum and he looked down at you one more time, a wide smile stretched out over his face. He gently kissed your head and whispered, “I love you so much.”

If only he had the courage to tell you when you were awake.

#shawn mendes #shawn mendes fanfiction #shawn mendes imagine #shawn mendes blurb #shawn mendes smut #shawn mendes fluff #after dark #my first writing #mine

389 notes · View notes

hazuki-sama · 4 years

Text

Music Natalie “HYDE LIVE 2019 ANTI FINAL” interview

HYDE's new live Blu-ray / DVD 'HYDE LIVE 2019 ANTI FINAL' was released on July 29; his first video work since 'HYDE ACOUSTIC CONCERT 2019 黑ミサ BIRTHDAY -WAKAYAMA-' announced in January, performed last December. This is a recording of "HYDE LIVE 2019 ANTI FINAL" held at Makuhari Messe International Exhibition Hall in Chiba, Japan on April 4, 2019. If 'Kuro Misa' is "stillness" that had been solemn from the beginning to the end, "ANTI FINAL" is the "movement" of HYDE with the aggressiveness on display.

What is HYDE feeling and thinking in the influence of the new coronavirus that has forced him to suspend his live activities? We asked him how he felt and what he thought about the ever-changing situation of the world.

Text by Akiko Nakano @ Music Natalie, translated by hazuki-sama

During this period of restraint, You wrote a column for Music Natalie called "What are you guys doing at home?” Thank you for letting us know what you're up to. It was surprising to our readers that you have been reading "Hiroshi Channel" and there was a great response.

HYDE: Really? I watch all of "Hiroshi Channel". It gets my camper's blood pumping (laughs).

What kind of days did you spend during the period of your self-restraint?

H: I hardly go out of the house. When I do go out, it's just to do the bare minimum of shopping. Once I went back to L.A. for music related activities, but I came back to Japan in April because the effects of the corona in the U.S. got worse while I was there, and I've been in Japan ever…… since.

How did you feel about the situation when the world was in turmoil and many things stopped?

There was a lot of disappointment, and a lot of plans I had been thinking about to surprise the fan with had cancelled, but I knew it would have to happen. Fortunately, I had a lot of work to do, so I decided to do what I had accumulated. I wanted to make sure I was in a position to get the best possible start when I was ready to move.

In the music scene, there are a lot of restrictions, but there are also a lot of artists who use Instagram and YouTube to distribute their work and express themselves in new ways.

H: That's true. There are some artists who are trying their best to stream live, but what I really want to do is to have an audience at their shows, and the idea of no audience doesn't really appeal to me (*taken at the end of June).

I'm sure there are a lot of fans who are looking for that.

H: Of course there are some things you can learn by doing, but if I can't do live shows yet I want to use that period of time for production. I'd like to use the time to work on things like improving the quality of the songs.

What new challenges have you faced in your personal life during this period?

H: Mow the grass! I enjoyed my daily life, mowing the weeds in the yard and other activities.

HYDE cut the grass……?

H: Yes. I've been able to plant lights in the yard so that I can light them up. I also got up every morning and cleaned right away, and I've never done that before. Now that I have the time, I've started doing things around the house. Those days aren't bad, but it's a bit like living on a retreat (laughs).

For the past 10 years, you must have spent almost half of the year performing live, but did you ever feel a sense of loss at the end of the year?

H: I feel a sense of loss. But in this situation, we have no choice but to switch it up. The entertainment industry has been suffering due to the self-restraint request and we've lost our big tour and we've lost most of our income for this year. There are a lot of people banging on about policies during this period, but Japan is a democracy, and isn't it true that the government should have a proper election by the people? When I saw the voter turnout and didn't vote, hysterically frying the government when they didn't vote, or envying other countries when they didn't take my number card, it felt like they were angry at themselves for putting their responsibilities on the shelf, and that made me cringe.

But when I see the low electoral rate, I get the impression that many people have abandoned their right to vote. However, in the face of the current situation, I feel that it is an opportunity to rethink politics and our way of life.

H: Yup. It's true that there is a lot to think about through disasters.

Do you feel that the world has influenced your work?

H: I have. I'm much calmer than I've been able to write songs. There was a time when I used to write and release songs with more energy, but now I take my time with them and listen to them a few days later. I'm being particular about things I didn't care about before, so I feel like I'm able to make good work. I think that artists, not just me, will be able to make good work once the corona crisis is over. Of course, more time isn't always better than more time, but for me, it's about taking it easy and listening with fresh ears and saying, "What do you think of this song? And I ask the staff and band members about it. I used to make my own decisions and give myself the OK, so that's changed. I do my own production, but by listening to other people's opinions, I've noticed things I didn't realize.

What did you discover in the course of your work?

H: I like arranging and producing songs rather than writing them from scratch. I spend more time arranging the songs than writing them. For example, if I were a film director, when I set out to make a film, I don't think I'd be able to do it alone. I believe that you need all kinds of skills and people to make your ideas come true, and doing everything by yourself is not the ideal.

You've said that before. When you're writing a song, you can collaborate with someone else, or you can let them write the lyrics and the music, and that's how you get closer to your ideal.

H: Yes. We are in a situation where we have the time to pursue that more. It's a blessing in disguise.

What type of sound are you working on now?

It might be harder and more metal-like than ever before. I think it's heavier than "ANTI.

What about the lyrics - "ANTI" was also pretty intense and heavy, but I didn't realize it was more than that. What about the lyrics?

H: I haven't written the lyrics to most of the songs yet. But I want to push it further than ever before, as well as composing and arranging. I think there are things I can say because…… I'm in a position to say them, such as about Corona, the way we think about government and politics in this country, and our relationship with other countries. Like the issue of discrimination, which is becoming a problem all over the world right now. Corona gave me the opportunity to realize that there are many things that I should write about and sing about.

Speaking of discrimination, HYDE, like many musicians, responded on Instagram to the "Black Out Tuesday" strike that spread through the music industry on June 2nd. You haven't been outspoken about social issues on social networking sites until now, have you?

H: I was wondering if I should express that one. But is it okay to pass this off? I thought about it. I haven't responded to social movements and movements on social media in the past because I've never been good at the right-wing situation where everyone else is doing it and I'm doing it too. But it's not a bad thing to participate in Black Out Tuesday, because it's not a bad thing to participate in Black Out Tuesday, and there's no better way to get racism out of this world. I thought it was a bad idea to be one-sided there, so I thought I'd post my stance on the subject.

What did you feel when you participated in Black Out Tuesday?

H: Black Lives Matter, which is the basis of Black Out Tuesday, is against discrimination against black people, so it's another thing, but I'm me and I think there is a lot of discrimination against yellow people in the American film and music scene, so I wanted to express my opposition to racism, based on my own experience. When I saw the spread of Black Lives Matter, I wanted to express my opposition to racism, based on my own experience.

I don't know. But considering the current situation in the world, it will take time to create a society without discrimination.

H: I agree. But I think "Black Out Tuesday" was one historical catalyst. I don't know what to do about it either, but I think at the root of it is an education issue. We aren't born with a preference for skin color. You are educated by your parents and the world to dislike the color of your skin. The color of our skin doesn't change how good or bad a person is or how valuable they are, and we have to acknowledge the good things about each of them.

Now, the video of "HYDE LIVE 2019 ANTI FINAL" is being released amidst the growing thirst for live performances, was there anything that you felt while watching the video again?

H: The band members and the audience created quite a bit of chaos. I think I played a good show as well. I wanted this album to be the culmination of my return to solo work. The album "ANTI" that I released last year was just an invitation to a live performance, and I thought it would be the first time the work would be completed live. We went through HYDE LIVE 2019 ANTI FINAL and decided that once this live show was over, we'd turn our attention to the next one.

I could feel the tremendous enthusiasm of the live performance on that day through the video, and it was overwhelming.

H: I'm glad. I get excited when I watch videos of "Neon Genesis Evangelion". I think this "HYDE LIVE 2019 ANTI FINAL" is just as exciting to watch as that, and I think it's a video that draws you in.

What scene in Evangelion excites you, HYDE-san?

H: It's still a fight scene. It's like the children on Eva are being cornered, or they're trying to beat the apostles…… somehow. I don't know if there's a point like that in my live performances, though (laughs).

Fans are excited by the sight of you fighting on stage and they are also excited by the sight of you. Also, if your video "Kuroi Misa" released in January this year was the static part of HYDE, I felt that "ANTI FINAL" is the work that expresses the dynamic part of you.

H: Well, I can't let my relatives watch this one (laughs). I can make them watch "The Black Mass", but they say not to watch this one, because it's not me. That's not me.

What do you mean it wasn't me?

H: It's like a weasel, and it's like the devil is taking over (laughs). (laughs) It's like anarchy.

It's not just the performance, but also the art set - there are destroyed police cars and broken buildings, and the whole atmosphere is decadent and aggressive.

H: Yeah.

I'm sure each song is a highlight, but what is the most memorable song for you?

H: I think "Mad Qualia" in the middle of the song was a good catalyst and a good start to the second half of the show. Because it triggered the climax of the show. The audience's sing-along was great, and I think this song tugged at the heartstrings the most among the fans. Then there was the last song "ORDINARY WORLD". I don't think this song will ever end on such a quiet note again, though.

The audience turned on their phone lights in unison and there was a spectacular view of the venue. I thought it was a very nice way to end the show, including the aftermath.

H: Hmmm, the form of the show I want to do now is not that beautiful ending. I really wanted to end the show crazier. But this time, I thought it was okay.

Why did you decide to put ORDINARY WORLD last, against your will?

H: I had to sing it at the end of the tour a lot. We decided that we should probably end with this song on the final. But before I sang, I saw the audience turning on the light on their phones and I realized that this wasn't just a light. It's a meaningful light.

So, at the end of the MC, he said, "It's all meaningful light. This light is the light of my important people. This light is the light of my important people.”

H: When I was touring in the U.S., I was very happy to see people who weren't fans of mine lighting up their phones for "ORDINARY WORLD". When I was able to see that scene in Japan, I thought it was a light that showed respect for me, and I felt the tour was tightened up by this scenery. Japan has been through a lot of disasters, so the title of the song "Ordinary World" comes together with the title of the tour "Ordinary World" and I was praying and singing during the tour, but now when I see the video, it's very emotional for me.

You said in the past that you were going to try out the American music scene for a couple of years and if your dream didn't come true, you would stop expanding overseas.

H: When I said that, YOSHIKI said, "Let's keep doing it" (laughs). I feel like I should do as much as I can under the current circumstances. Of course, if the situation changes, we'll continue to do it, but it's hard to keep prioritizing our schedule forever. I won't be able to go to a festival this year, but my dream of driving the crowds wild at a festival overseas won't change. It would be great if we can make it all up to next year, but if we can't, I'll probably extend it by an extra year. There have been periods of time in the past when we haven't played a show, but the cancellations have never gone this far. It's never happened to a live music club that went out of business. I know there are bands that have made it their goal to perform at these venues, and I'm sure…… they'll be quite sad.

But there are a lot of measures in place to support live music venues, so I would like to support them personally. How do you think the music scene will change in the future, HYDE-san?

H: I'm sure it will evolve as more and more live broadcasts are available. Artists and audiences will be connected virtually. Just like the popularity of the Zoom party. If it wasn't for Corona, I don't think the Zoom party would have been as popular as it was.

Did you have a Zoom party, HYDE-san?

H: I didn't do it (laughs).

But I'm guessing that you've been invited to join us.

H: No! I don't even know how to do it (laughs). I think online communication is going to evolve. I'm not interested in it right now, but if it gets more interesting, I might do it too.

In HYDE's case, it looks like you might be doing this in a few years time (laughs). (laughs) You used to not post much about yourself on SNS, but now you are actively using it.

H: Haha (laughs). Some people say it's cool to not blink, but I'm like, "What's cool about that? I think it's a good idea. I think it's cool if you're a very forward-thinking person and you have an attitude and stance of "this won't change in 100 years". But the world is changing and knowledge is increasing. Even though times change, you can still think that sticking to your own ideas is a bit of a smart move. I'm more likely to be flexible and admit, "I was wrong," and say, "This is what's happening now, so we should change our plans. So maybe what I'm saying will change in the next year? But just because what I'm saying has changed doesn't mean that what I've said in the past is a lie. Because the moment I'm saying that, it's true for me.

When I asked you to define a good live show back in the days of VAMPS, you replied that it was "a show that is slow and steady and you can feel the fans' excitement.

H: No, it's about creating even more chaos on the live stage now. It's important to see how much chaos we can create live.

And what do you mean by chaos, exactly?

H: Each of us should be reckless and free to enjoy ourselves without getting hurt. A circle mosh or dive is fine as long as it's born as a result of the customer having fun. That's not the goal. I don't like the right kind of movement, and that's why I don't like performing in the hall. In a hall, everyone tends to move in the same way, so it looks like a religious meeting. Well, I think live music is like a religion in some ways (laughs). But I don't think the scenery is cool. If someone is headbanging, everyone is headbanging, and…… it's weird not to. But when I went to see the GazettE live, the moment the audience started headbanging, the wind blew in, and it was an amazing sight. I thought that was a chaotic space (laughs). I thought, "You can do that in the hall if you wanted to.”

The headbanging of the audience at the GazettE concert is certainly spectacular.

H: Yeah. I want to see chaos at my shows now. I also want to show the audience how excited I am about it. Japanese people aren't very good at expressing themselves, are they? It's our job to see how much we can break that shame, though. Because if each of us let ourselves go, even if it's just a little bit, the people around us will be influenced by it. If we can create a chaotic space, I think live shows will become more interesting. We can't do live shows right now, but I think the quality of the work we create will improve because of that, and the momentum we have when we start moving should be amazing. That's why I want my fans to save up their money and energy. Once we start moving, we'll make them spend a lot of money! (laughs) So now I hope you'll watch HYDE LIVE 2019 ANTI FINAL and wait for me to prep for it.

By the way, when we interviewed you in February, you said that you were planning to release an album by the end of this year.

H: Hmmm, I don't think I'll be able to release it within the year (laughs). But we're working on a lot of new songs, so please look forward to it.

#hyde #Hideto takarai #translation

3 notes · View notes

mrtroy · 4 years

Text

America Needs Both

I've been reading a lot of opinions of my friends, pundits and others over the last few weeks. Corona virus. Racial injustice. Police brutality. The coming presidential election.

I feel like with each passing issue, the divide gets deeper. The differing sides seemingly getting further apart. Some of these opinions I agree with. Some I don't. But the more I think about it, the more I realize as a nation, we need both sides of most of our issues. No, we don't need racism. We don't need looting. Or police brutality. But we do need the ability for people with different opinions and viewpoints to be able to have those viewpoints without vilifying them. We need a nation where we understand that black lives matter. But we also need a nation where our public servants (police, teachers, government officials) matter too. You may be angered by one side of that paradigm right now, but in order for our nation to truly live up to its ideal, we need both. We need a nation where people in cities feel represented. And we also need to provide opportunities to those who live in rural America. We need corporations. And small businesses. We need non-profits. And agencies that watch out for at risk portions of the community. Right now, there's a good chance that the idea of voting for the candidate opposite your preferred political party seems like an outrageous thought, but lest not forget that whoever our next president is will again be governing our entire nation. Forget who wins, how beneficial will it be to our nation to have roughly half of our citizens enraged? Say what you want about Donald Trump, but he realized in 2016 that a large subsection of our population felt like the policies that Barack Obama's administration had enacted didn't appeal to them. Pause. Whatever you think about that statement above, it is true. Now, fast forward to 2020, whoever wins this election will signal to our nation that we either want to go the same direction, or back the other way. Joe Biden is currently running campaign messaging that is asking potential voters to condemn the acts of Donald Trump and pledge their allegiance to Biden's campaign. Let's just say this works. I have no idea who will win this election, but just for the sake of this piece, let's say it's Biden. Come January of 2021, we'll have the opposite half of our nation that can't wait to vote a president out of office. Not only that, but if Biden were to follow suit with Obama and Trump, and if balances of power stay split in the House and Senate, we're going to spend the next four years seeing different pieces of legislation that previous administrations enacted be reversed. Or, we'll see the opposing party block things in the Senate to the point where very little will change in Washington. At this point as you read, you might be thinking, okay, you're a moderate, or, you're arguing for party reform, or maybe the abolition of the electoral college. And while some of those things may be the answer (I'm not educated enough on those topics to know for sure) what I'm actually arguing for is something that isn't political at all. It comes back to the examples I gave at the beginning of this piece. America needs both of its major points of view. As people, are we better off accepting our neighbor with a different point of view, or turning them into a sworn enemy until they see things exactly how we do? Before you fire off a retort to a school of thought where you just can't possibly accept Point X of someone's viewpoint, realize that person may be reading this same piece and thinking the same thing about not accepting your point of view. If we continue in these cycles of behavior, where do we end up? Do we just keep browbeating each other until one school of thought dies out? Or, do we end up having the public conversations where we say one thing to avoid drawing a reaction, but actually believe something else in private? To be clear, I don't know how to fix every issue. I don't know how to find a common middle ground for some of society's most inflammatory issues. But what I do think would be a good start would be to stop trying to make every issue one-sided. 'If you don't believe this, you must be a raving lunatic.' Or, 'If you believe this, you can't possibly call yourself a good person.' And yes, I have been guilty of reacting in the above manners in discussions I've had. But, bringing these kinds of attitudes to any conversation / debate / issue rarely leads to change and it rarely helps anything. So, rather than jumping all over your neighbor - or silently writing them off in your brain - the next time you disagree with them, I think we all need to do a better job finding a middle ground. And again, this isn't to say that we should tolerate terrible things in our country because we're doing the neighborly thing and accepting people's vile viewpoints. But it is to say that we should be able to find a way to find a middle ground on things that are worth finding a middle ground on. Because I think many of us can agree that the status quo we've got going on isn't working. For the rest of this year, we can find some solace in saying, 'Vote in November.' But come December, all of us have to live with the officials we elect - and it doesn't do us much good if roughly half of the population is ready to lose their mind if their candidate happens to be the one who loses. -- I have always thought American ingenuity was our greatest virtue as a country. Throughout our history, we've had groundbreaking inventors and innovators that have figured out new and better ways to do things in more effective ways. We need to muster up some more ingenuity as a nation. To modify how we think and how we react to opposing thought. We have to empower the things that make us different to also make us great. We cannot simply agree to disagree. Or, stop trying to address topics in our world because the opposing sides on certain issues are simply too far apart. We also cannot simply take politics, or matters of social / racial justice off the table when things get too touchy to deal with. We must not run to the safety of only those who think like we do and attempt to isolate ourselves from anyone who thinks differently. We must ask ourselves, in 2020, do we want to attempt to solve the issues plaguing our nation, or do we want to continue to point out how stupid, or wrong, or morally bankrupt our neighbors are? Let's say you were brought into a situation as a third-party mediator in a fight between two neighbors in the town next to yours. Let's say you agreed with one of the neighbors, but after talking to the second neighbor, you could see that he or she was 100% convicted on where they stood - and weren't trying to be a jerk about anything in any apparent way... If it was your goal to help these neighbors, would you start your engagement with a ruthless insult of the second neighbor? Would you tell your neighbor that if he didn't come around to seeing things the way the first neighbor did, he may as well be an idiot? Would you tell your neighbor that his family - and anyone that thinks like him - is a worthless pile of garbage for thinking the way he does? Unfortunately, it seems as though these kinds of tactics are often resorted to in response to things happening that we don't agree with. What about trying to find solutions? What about trying to listen? What about trying to work towards mutually beneficial outcomes? These are the things we need to be doing. Not arguing. -- In closing, as discussions, debates and conversations happen over these next few months, try to be empathetic to your fellow humans. Yes, there are some terrible people in the world who have thoughts that are not worth considering a second side of. However, there are also millions of our neighbors that think differently than we do that are fantastic human beings who deserve to be heard and respected.

America is better when the right and left find common ground. America is better when opposing viewpoints are met with intrigue not detest. America is better when we try to find solutions, rather than simply attacking our neighbors. In a fantasy world, it might be nice to envision a way where one opinion or one side of an issue worked for everyone, but because that’s never been true at any point in history, America needs to embrace the fact that there are two sides to every issue, and we’re better off if we can consider both.

1 note · View note